Author Archives: BoB

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Amazon hurts consumerism in Western New York

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I just recently completed my move from Chicago to Brockport, NY.  Happily, all of our belongings survived the move more-or-less undamaged, and we are close to having everything unpacked and in its new location.  One problem we had during the unpacking was the box spring for our bed; there was no way that a queen-size box spring was going to make it through the small space occupied by our stairway.  The box spring is ancient and we had intended to leave it in Chicago, so purchasing a new one was in the plans.  I didn’t realize what a pain it would be.

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4th of July in Brockport

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We have been busy with our move to Brockport, NY.  More importantly, we have just finished getting internet installed so the website can be updated!  Trying to conduct a cross-country move over a national holiday has its challenges, but one advantage is that it feels like your new home town is throwing a welcome party!

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Sankyu very much

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This past weekend, I successfully tested for my brown belt (Sankyu) in Judo.  I had started Judo in college (last century) and for over 15 years couldn’t find the willpower to get back in to the sport.  Then Kayla Harrison won gold in the 2012 Olympics.  Something about an American finally winning Judo gold gave me the motivation I needed to find Sensai Barnett at the Jiu Jitsu Institute in downtown Chicago. Searching the internet for judo clubs in Chicago, you’ll find the current web page is optimized for the Mosaic browser — (note: a new website is in the works) — but perhaps the club’s web presence is an allegory for the style of training one will receive: traditional.

Roneye (left), James (Right) and me (the only guy who broke a sweat).

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Mandy: The periodic table (teaser)

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About six months ago, I started working on a project I like to call my piece de resistance. It combines a number of maker skills that I’ve learned over the past few years.  I call her Mandy, and she’s a laser-cut periodic table that has a bunch of three-color LEDS, an Arduino that controls the individually addressable LEDs, and a Raspberry Pi that stores information about the elements.  To make it stand out from being “just another bright periodic table”, I added a voice activation component, so Mandy is able to display different periodic trends at your verbal command!

I’m getting ready to move to a different part of the country, so I do not have time to provide more information about Mandy.  In the meanwhile, I created a teaser-trailer for your (OK, my) personal enjoyment.

 

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New adventures

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It was a busy week for me, starting off with a birthday celebration, culminating with Star Wars Day, and it happened to be my last week of teaching at Chicago State.

I have a fake facebook account floating around on the interweb. My original intention was to use it to snoop into other people’s lives and maybe take advantage of a special offer or two. Since the birthday I entered on that account is false, the few real friends of mine who found the account typically wish me a happy birthday some time in the fall. Fortunately, my wife doesn’t do facebook either, so she isn’t fooled by the alternative facts found on-line and knows when to really celebrate my birthday, and she did so this year with a pyramid of lava cakes.

Full disclosure, this picture does not have enough calories in it, so coffee ice cream and freshly made maple-syrup flavored whipped cream were added post production.

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