shikora.org

So, a recap of today’s events seems to be in order.

The day started with a call around 9:30 from a person I was looking to buy an old Nordic Track machine from. I broke mine recently and wanted another one. We agreed for him to stop by later in the day for me to take a look at it. About a minute later, my phone rings again. I was thinking it was the guy with the Nordic Track again so I wasn’t expecting Brooke when I answered the phone. She tells me that Shayna’s hit her head on a table at daycare and will need stitches. I jump into some more presentable clothes and get in the car and run over to her daycare. When I get there Brooke is coming out with a very dazed and puffy looking Shayna. They had bandaged her up really well, but I could tell that it was a big cut just by how much gauze they had used.

I follow Brooke to the hospital where we look for a parking spot somewhere near the emergency room and can’t find anything. We finally found some spots in the parking garage that’s at the other end of the hospital. We walk to the emergency room and are told to fill out a form and take a pager to let us know when they need us at the desk. About a half hour later the pager goes off and we are called into a room off to the side of the waiting area. There someone asks us a couple more questions, takes Shayna’s temperature, and tells us that she has no idea when we will be able to be seen as more rooms won’t be open till 11am.We both look at our watches thinking that she can’t mean what we think she means since it’s only 10:15 at the time.

About 15 minutes later the call us up to the desk and have us fill out more paper work, I guess to actually admit us to the hospital. Two cups of tea, a muffin, and a bagel later it’s 12:30. At this point Shayna has ripped off her bandage and I finally get a look at this gaping hole in her forehead which is about an inch long and is now bleeding again. I try to get the bandage back on with Shayna yelling and screaming the whole time. That doesn’t work so Brooke has a great idea and goes up to the desk to ask for more bandages and gauze. They go in the back and get her an oversize band aid. We put that on Shayna cause it’s better than nothing and we watch it fill up with blood. At this point I wonder aloud weather our primary care might have an opening. I was half kidding but Brooke thinks it a good idea to ask so I call up the office and tell them what happened. They say no problem, come in and they’ll take care of it. We go up to tell them we’re leaving and find out we’re next, though evidently we’ve been next for awhile. We both figure it’ll probably be another hour before they get to us anyway so we take off and go to our primary care office, though not before they “require” us to fill out *another* form saying we are declining assistance. We left the emergency room 2 and a half hours after arriving having never seen a health care professional.

I read recently that Oregon ranks among the bottom of all states for emergency care. Shocking.

On the way over to the primary care office, I get a call from the guy who I was buying the Nordic Track from. I had called him back earler and told him the situation that I was in. He was really understanding and told me he would just drop off the machine and if I liked it to send him a check. I was amazed and heartened by how considerate he was and how much faith he had in me as a person. Craigslist is not normally known for such people.

Once we were at the office, we were seen right away and given the best care. She gave Shayna some local anesthetic and then did a great job of stitching up Shayna as Brooke and I helped hold her still. They put in 5 stitches, but 2 can come out in a week so she has less scaring. They said that it was a clean break in the skin and came together well, so it shouldn’t scar very much.

When I got back to the house at about 2pm after getting some lunch for us, I found the Nordic Track waiting as promised. I’ll send him the check tomorrow.

Update– 1/20

Shayna is doing great.

The hospital sent Brooke a letter a couple of days ago asking for money. They said we didn’t pay the copay before we left. Nothing like adding insult to injury.

@Donpdonp put some pictures up of Hawthorn Blvd in Portland during the recent snowpocalypse. here’s a link to his flickr stream.

So OpenID is now working on Shikora.org. What is OpenID? You can read about it on Wikipedia. Basically it means you can login to leave a comment without creating a new user name and password, only your OpenID, which you can use at other places around the internet.  Thanks a lot @donpdonp for walking me through this and @factoryjoe for creating the OpenID WordPress plugin.

I recorded and edited a bunch of Personal Telco videos awhile back. It was fun being a videographer. The video files used to be posted somewhere, but I can’t find them any more. March 2007 pt.2 is where Caleb and Russell talk about their findings on their metrofi analysis. Now that metrofi is gone and buried, it’s probably only interesting as an academic paper, but still, here they are.

March 2007 Monthly Pt1

March 20o7 Monthly Pt2

April 2007 Monthly

May 2007 Monthly

June 2007 Monthly Pt 1

June 2007 Monthly Pt 2

September 2007 Monthly

Hey I made it on  StrangeLove Live! wOOt! Ok, it’s just a cameo appearance and I’m just acting goofy, but still I think it’s funny. Check it out.

http://strangelovelive.blip.tv/#1640897

I took a bunch of photos in font of my house so I could try and stitch together some panoramic snowpacalypse shots. Here’s the first result. Some things I’ve learned in the process, iPhoto doesn’t do image stitching and photoshop does a resonable job but gets confused if you don’t do it right. In case you want to do something similar, here are the instructions I found helpful.

Last year I went to the Aquarium of the Pacific. I took a some video of the place and the “behind the scenes” tour. Here’s a link to the video. It’s a 1.5 gig file, so watch out for that. I haven’t figured out a way to embed video directly in the post yet. Once I do I’ll update the post.

I love aquariums and have been to a number around the country. This one in particular has some truly amazing displays, especially their tropical reef displays. I had been to this aquarium when it first opened a decade ago. I was there for a Python Conference and missed the last day and part of one evening to hang out there. Recently I worked for a company that sent me to L.A. a couple of times and couldn’t resist going again. Each time I go I am stunned in awe of the beauty.

Oh wow is it ever snowing. I can’t remember the last time we’ve had this much snow for this long. I’ve spent all day watching the fall snow and the wind pick up what was already on the ground and blow that around too. The first year my family and I moved to Oregon it was like this, all winterwonderlandish. I remember riding my dirt bike up and down the streets in my t-shirt while -10 degrees with windchill was nipping at my nose. In 2006 we had an ice storm for a few days that made me ride the bus to work. It was cold, but there just wasn’t that much snow. There were some other ice storms I’ve lived through while living in Oregon. Two of them I remember distinctly as I was trapped and couldn’t travel far for all the ice. This is different. Lots and lots and lots of snow (by Portland standards). It almost reminds me of growing up on the east coast, almost. I remember watching my parents dig out the car from the piles of snow.

I baked cookies today. I made chocolate chip cookies from the recipe on the bag, only I used splenda instead of sugar. They are still way yummy. The only issue is if you use splenda, you have to make the cookies flat to begin with, cause they won’t fall on their own in the oven. I found that out the hard way.

@jaacob showed me a book reader for my iphone the other day that rocks. Its called Stanza. My iPhone is now the dream machine I’ve always known it could be. I’ve read 2 books since putting it on. One was A Christmas Carol which I could download for free in the app. It was really interesting to read all the descriptions of food and parlor games people played back in the day (19th century style). For some reason I don’t read books unless I can carry them around in a portable device. I guess it’s just way more convenient.

There was question posted on craigslist recently that coincided with some discussions I’ve had with people recently. I figured I’d try and answer it here.

The question is: “The rapid increase in computing technology has greatly benefited mankind in many obvious ways. However, over-reliance on programs and formulas has also allowed for disastrous financial strategies such as credit default swaps. How do you strike a balance between the benefits and risks of computing technology’s growing role in our daily lives?”

My answer isn’t really cut and dry, but more the start of a conversation. Computer technology is just a tool, another tool in a long list of disruptive tools created and used throughout human history. It is how we use the tools that determines our quality of life, both as individuals and as a society. Tools do not change the essential nature of being, that is created by our actions to ourselves and others. As an example, it wasn’t financial instruments that caused the mortgage crises, it was people using them in unethical and illegal ways. The real question isn’t how we strike a balance with technology, any more then we need to strike a balance with hammers and can openers. The balance we have to find is within ourselves. That balance will be reflected in how we use the tools around us and what we accomplish with them.