Raible Designs

Moving

Today is move-in day to our remodeled house. The final trim installation and a the last few doors should be done sometime this afternoon. It's hard to believe it's almost done. It's been a long journey since construction started in March. There were a few interesting times along the way, like the garage demolition and basement wall falling off. It's tough to mention it, but it wouldn't be right to talk about this finished house without taking a moment to remember Bob the Builder. He would be smiling from ear to ear if he was here today.

It's been 7 months since we moved into our current house. After living in sub-1000 sq. ft. houses for the last 15 months, it'll be nice to get some space again. Total square footage on new house? Somewhere around 2500 square feet! Here's a comparison between old and new (click to zoom in):

Old House

New House

Automating the new house

Automating your project might be cool, but what about your home? In a recent Macworld issue, there's an article titled Automate Your Home. After reading it, I became inspired to do some automation in the new house. Since we're scheduled to move in this weekend, I'm getting close to buying the software and hardware necessary to do this. The top software packages seem to be Indigo (for OS X) and Active Home (for Windows).

I'm leaning towards the Windows version since my Windows box is always on and there's likely more information/experience working with that version. My PowerBook gets turned off frequently, so that's not a good idea. I could buy a new G5, but $4000 for home automation is a bit spendy. In reality, I'd like to find a easy-to-use (and install!) version for Linux since my Linux box is always on. Any tips?

I'd love to hear any experiences folks may have with automating their homes. Initially, I plan on automating light activation when you walk in the room. Any other cool ideas?

What's up with GMail?

I'm sure a lot of other GMail users have seen this. For the last couple of days, whenever I get an e-mail from someone with @gmail.com in their e-mail address, GMail displays the following warning:

Warning:  This message may not be from whom it claims to be. Beware of following any links in it or of providing the sender with any personal information. Learn more

My guess is they've had some sort of security breech or someone's been spoofing gmail addresses. Any ideas?

Indian Summer

After finishing Spring Live (at least the hard part) on Friday, this weekend was a nice relaxing one where I actually got to sleep a little. Abbie and I even got out and did some fun stuff. On Saturday, we drove up to the hills and road the Georgetown Loop Railroad. We went with some friends, Tonya and Suzie, and had a great time. Unfortunately, this might've been one of the last times the train runs. According to their website, it looks like they're finished - but according to the conductor it sounded like the Colorado Historical Society is going to demolish everything and rebuild a fancy-dancy (and expensive) new train park. More info at savethetrain.org. The temperature was awesome - mid 60s all the way up in Georgetown.

Today, Abbie woke me up early and after noticing it was a beautiful day - we headed up to Red Rocks for a hike. Abbie is becoming quite the hiker these days. She only asked "Daaeee - uupppp" once and after I bent down and picked up a rock for her - she never mentioned it again. Good times - we saw deer, bikers, birds and even a little snake in the trail. Once again, I rewarded her with marshmallows at the top and she was one happy camper.

Last, but not least, I snapped this pick of Jack giving me some gansta signs. What a cool kid.

Damn

It's 8:20 a.m. and I still haven't gone to bed yet. The good news is I got a lot done on Spring Live and AppFuse in the last 10 hours. I guess I just lost track of time...

Sick

Julie and I had an agreement worked out. I was going to work this week on Spring Live and hopefully finish off the last chapter for 1.0. My plan was to wake up at 6:00 a.m. every morning and work until 2 p.m.

Then I caught Abbie's cold (or maybe I got it from Dion via e-mail). That was Saturday. Jack caught it on Sunday. Julie doesn't have it yet, but the rest of us are sick and I've lost all motivation to work on anything. Sleep is my new best friend.

Damn, I was almost done with the WebWork version of AppFuse too. Tomorrow I have an interview, so I'll probably rally and take a bunch of DayQuil or something. Hopefully that'll inspire me to get back in the groove and get some work done.

The Job Hunt

Now seems like the time to be unemployed. Everyone is doing it. I myself have been unemployed since the Julie went into labor on August 27th. Those were the terms of my last contract - when the baby is born I'm done. Once again, I'm glad I'm a contractor b/c this unemployed thing is a just a phase I go through a few times a year.

So far, the hunt for the next gig is going pretty well. I have a couple of leads. I've done the whole interview thing and now I'm just waiting to hear back about budgets and such. So nothing is confirmed and all opportunities could fall through. Since I'd like to start working again one week from Monday (September 27th), it's time to put my nose to the grindstone and see if I can find something soon. My usual process for this is to respond to job postings on the DJUG Jobs and RMIUG Jobs mailing lists. If that doesn't work, I'll start searching on Dice and Monster next week. I've actually gotten a few jobs off the mailing lists and one off Monster - so I know most of these avenues work. I've always found looking for and accepting a new gig quite fun. If I can finish Spring Live, AppFuse 1.6 and find a new gig all in the next 2 weeks - I'll be a very happy man. Actually, I'll be happy if I can just land a new gig.

Raising two kids

As you can probably tell from my lack of posting here - I'm having a good time being Abbie's buddy these days. I've also learned a couple of things. First of all, raising two kids is easy. You just have to give up any notion of wanting to do anything for yourself. Secondly, we had a "turn off the TV week" here and Abbie didn't even notice. She's usually a huge Elmo fan - so I was a little worried. However, she only asks for Elmo when the TV is on. Kids are actually a fair bit easier to manage when there is no TV. This goes back to point #1. If you concentrate on the kids and not on yourself, it's pretty easy work. Exhausting, but easy. Chances are you won't ever regret it. That's it - we're off to Gymboree and then to the airport to pick up "Mimi" and "Baba" (my parents).

I've created a monster

This past week has been a lot of fun. In order to survive our new life with two kids, we've split up the responsibilities. Abbie is now my kid and Jack is Julie's. This means that I'm in charge of Abbie 24 hours a day, and Julie takes care of Jack. Julie's definitely got the easier deal as Jack sleeps most of the time. Abbie and I are having a blast though. We've been out and about every day - whether it's at the park, riding bikes or in the mountains hiking. Now when she wakes up she yells "Daddy" instead of "Mommy".

I think I've created a monster though. Today I went the local Starbucks during her nap in order to try and get a little Spring Live writing done. Julie called me when she woke up from her nap to tell me that I had to come home right away b/c Abbie wouldn't come out of her room. She was screaming for Daddy and wanted nothing to do with Mommy. Uh oh, this little girl is going to be awfully upset when Daddy goes back to work at the end of the month. Since I don't have a new gig yet, maybe I won't be going back to work so soon.

This week I realized why I like being a consultant so much. I've taken 9 weeks off so far this year - and after this month, it'll be 13! When I told my Dad this he made a good point, "then why haven't I seen you more?" Unfortunately, out of the 9 weeks I took off earlier this year, I went to conferences for 4 of them, and worked on Spring Live for 4 of them. The other week I was sick. Ugh, I've got to start taking more vacations like this one - they're awesome.

Frances

Julie's Mom lives in West Palm Beach, which is directly in the path of Frances. She's decided to weather it out in Miami. I don't know if Miami is in the path of the hurricane or not, but I'd love to find some blogs from that area. Blogs seem to provide much timelier news than traditional media - and they're usually more pleasant to read.

Michael Levin (of Gainesville I believe) points to buzzmodo, who seems to live in Central Florida and gives a chilling perspective of what's going on there right now.

The streets are empty, stores are boarded up, many gas stations are without gas, having sold out yesterday. Most business are closed including all of the banks.
...
I heard friends today sharing tips about where to get battery powered radios, then where to get batteries, and where to get water.

It's almost as if people are preparing for the end times.