Accident in the Early Morning

It started like the last few Wednesdays. Jenny and I left really early so I could drop her off for class at Great Lakes Christian College. As I headed back to the freeway, I had to drive three-quarters of the way around the round-about at Willow and Canal. Just as I passed the halfway point, the car coming from the opposite direction failed to stop in time, and hit my car. I managed to control my car and get out of the round-about. So did the other driver. However, she did not stop on the other side of the intersection. She hit me and kept driving. The elderly couple that were driving behind her at the time said they couldn't get her license plate number when stopped to check on me. I didn't see any damage right away, so I decided to drive on. The rear of my car was throwing violently as I drove, so I stopped at Horrocks to call the police and report the accident. The police officer came, wrote up the incident, and went on his way. Jenny managed to borrow a friend's car and met me at the store. We made the calls to Shroyer's for a tow, State Farm for the insurance claim, and Shaheen Body Shop for the repair. And as quickly as she came, Jenny returned to class. I waited about an hour for the tow truck to pick me and the car up. By the time we got to the body shop, I had missed the opportunity to catch a ride to work with my dad. The estimator at the body shop told me they would probably need three day to repair the damages. So Enterprise picked me up. The only vehicle they had available to rent at the time was a full size service van. I got on the freeway as soon as I could and got safely to my cubicle quite late. My coworker Peter took the follow photos during lunch.

New Year's Resolution

Among the other resolutions I've made again and again, such as losing weight or exercising more, I added a new one this year:

By the end of the year, I would like to create a piece of software outside of TrainMaster.

This resolution is not for profit. I'm not looking to turn a buck on the side. My goal is not to pad my resume, although creating something on the side won't hurt the resume either. The one thing I'm after is stretching myself, putting myself to a challenge I hadn't encountered before.

When I started fostering this idea last year, I looked at a couple of different technologies. Microsoft has recently released XNA, it's development platform for the Xbox360. The technology looks sound. Many homebrew developers are already publishing on the platform and making notable amounts of money. While the publishing mechanism seems straight forward, I lack a few key elements in the development process. Namely, an HDTV and an Xbox360. Maybe next year.

Another technology I looked at was the Facebook platform. I like the social interaction that Facebook brings to the Internet. This option was more appealing because it offered more new languages to develop in and new challenges in deployment. Items I still need to publishing on this platform includes setting up a directory for web serving and perhaps an extra charge for a stable IP address and a domain name.

Of course my dream platform is the impressive WiiWare. I've always loved Nintendo products and attempted to get a development kit from them for my high school programming independent study. I was shot down then and told that development kits only go out to recognized developers. While the concept of WiiWare would seem to denote a shift to the small guy like 2D Boy and Semnat Studios, one must still go through Nintendo to get the development kit. Looks like I'll have to put this one on the future list.

While console development stays a dream and goal of mine, I think I will spend this year focused on the Facebook platform. So I will end this post with some questions for the Facebook users out there to answer.

1. What do you like most in an application?
2. What are some things you don't like about some applications you've tried?
3. When you play a game on Facebook, how long do you perfer each session to last: several clicks, several minutes, or more?
4. Do you prefer direct or delayed interaction?
5. Should your interaction be limited by your friend list, or do you like to interact with new people?

I thank you for your input, your opinion is valuable to me.

Where did December go?

It is hard to believe we are already a third of the way through January. I had been planning to post about an overly busy weekend at the beginning of December. I also planned to post about the busy end of year deliverables that piled up. Then again I hoped to post about all the different Christmas parties I went to. When I finally got time to breath, I found my time filled with a return to the free MMORPG that I'd been playing with some of my friends. By then, New Year's Day had come and gone, and I was back at work setting an aggressive bug fighting schedule. And here we are on January 10th and I'm blogging for the first time in a month, so let's make it a good one.

The first weekend of December had Jenny and I driving all over the Greater Lansing Area for an assortment of dinner parties. Saturday night was spent in Grand Ledge, and my first visit to the home of my pastor, Frank Weller. He had invited us and a number of other couples to a dinner party and informational meeting for a program called Joshua's Men. This program is a year long leadership training course. I look forward to participating in Joshua's Men in 2009, and I'll have more to say about it once it kicks off. Sunday night was spent in Williamston, for the annual P.I. Engineering Christmas Dinner. This year, the party was held at our new warehouse space, which is currently being rented by a textbook binder. It was a delicious dinner and and a fun evening touring our newest facility. Monday night was spent in Lansing, at Jenny's work party. The Elmwood Nazarene Child Care party was a potluck dinner, and was fairly awkward for me. I only knew one other couple at this party, and I was feeling ill that evening. Lucky for me, Jenny knew in advance, and didn't parade me around in front of all her coworkers. Three completely different dinner parties, one busy weekend.

Early December was spent delivering our first Mainline Simulator. The project director was on site with the customer, installing the hardware. I was in the office in Willamston, sending through software and content updates from myself and the other members of our team. Overall, it was a successful install, but there is more to be deliver on the software and content side in 2009. The rest of December was spent fixing bugs for our first Train Yard Simulator customer, and then cloning that code for the training facility they resold our project to. I also had to set up a generic Yard Simulation for a brand new customer looking to spend some of their 2008 budget. Finally, just before the office holiday break, I had to make a copy of the source code for our Escrow Lawyer. Five big deliverables, one busy work month.

Friday, December 19th was a terribly snowy day. So snowy, in fact, that every district in Ingham county was closed. Snowy enough to change the plans Jenny and I had to change our plans for celebrating our 4th Anniversary. We also had to reschedule the Getchel family Christmas feast from Saturday the 20th to January the 3rd. Christmas Eve brought a half day of work, the Jardine family gift exchange, and Christmas Eve Candlelight Service at SLCC. On Christmas day, I spent time with a sick Jenny at home, my parent's house and her parent's house. She found the most comfortable place to nap at each place. So many Christmases, so many fun times.

I spent three whole days in my pajamas, on my sofa and playing ShadowBane. ShadowBane is a free to play Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game. Some close friends introduced me this fun game. It has an open world to play in, an aggressive Player vs Player format, and highly customizable character classes. I had neglected playing with my friends for a few weeks and logged back on to find our guild had captured our own city. I spent those few day catching up and enjoying myself. If you feel so inclined, you can download the free software, send me a message and I'll help you get started in the game and induct you as a member of the Keepers of Dawn.

Jenny and I spent our New Year's Eve celebrating with our small group. The Cohoons, the Batdorffs, the Simmons, and all their kids stayed up until midnight to witness the turning of the calendar and the dropping of the ball. We filled the lead up to midnight with Wii gaming, Apples to Apples, Darts and deep fried anything. It was a great evening that spilled over into the next day with Bowl games and Board games. Great times with close friends.

Friday, Janurary 2nd was a bit of a write off. I had to return to work, but had very little to do. Most people spent the day cleaning up their work stations and work spaces. I took the opportunity to defragment my hard drives. The following Monday, I met with the project manager and discussed all that needed to be done for our Mainline customer. He suggested i set the schedule for the tasks ahead. I set an aggressive one that forced me to make the changes and improvements to our software that had been stewing around in my brain for a while. I spent most of the week on track, but encountered some un expected hold up late in the week. Next week should witness me getting back on track and completed on schedule.

All told, I ended 2008 pretty busy, but I wouldn't have it any other way. Life has been good for Jenny and I. 2009 looks to be just as busy and better than ever. I have new opportunities to learn and grow. I look forward to grabbing on to each of those opportunities and becoming a better programmer, a better husband, a better leader, and a better man. And maybe, just maybe, I'll blog more often.

Trilogy Weekend

I like movies. A lot.

Jenny went out for a little bit of Black Friday shopping early on Friday morning. She returned home shortly after I decided to roll my lazy (read long weekend) self out of bed. She told me right away about buying Pirates of the Caribbean: At Worlds End for a meager 6 dollars. I quickly asked if we had to wait for Christmas to watch it. She said we didn't have to wait to which I quickly responded we couldn't watch the third movie without watching the first two. So we did. When the three films had finished, I jokingly asked which trilogy we would watch on Saturday. When she suggested Back to the Future, I was sold on the idea of finishing my lazy weekend watching that on Saturday and the Austin Powers trilogy on Sunday. It was almost like our own private film festival. Nine films in 3 days is so much fun for me.

As a side note, Back to the Future: Part III features steam locomotives in its old west setting and I actively noticed certain things about the movement and control of trains that I have learned at work. Wheels slipping when the train leaves the station, pulling the pin to uncouple the passenger cars, and other train subtleties stood out to me as being accurately portrayed. I might be coming down with a case of Trainitis.

For more information on each film, check out The Internet Movie Database by clicking below

Friday:
Saturday:
Sunday:

Wii Thanksgiving

Yesterday was Thanksgiving. Jenny and I hosted my family at our house. It was a good time seeing all my cousins again. We had a great meal, watched the Lions lose, and then we turned on the video games. First was a Soul Calibur II round robin, with my tournament winning cousin kicking butt and taking names. Then we switched to Super Smash Bros Brawl, which a different cousin excelled at with Ike. After that, the cousins started parting ways, and Wii Sports got put in the system. If only I had taken a photo of my Grandma and Grandpa playing Wii Bowling. They are fairly techno-savvy, but I had never imagined they would pick up a Wii Remote. But they did, and had a grand old time playing. What a great Thanksgiving it was.

About my title...

I guess it is time to explain the title of my blog. When I was in elementary school, some of the hottest toys (at least in my mind) were Tyco's SpyTech line.


These toys, along with the monthly new code in Boys' Life magazine, awoke the inner secret agent in me. I wanted to be a spy when I grew up, and practice make perfect. So I would sneak up and down the halls of where ever I was, especially around the Church building when the grownups were having meetings. At this age, my mother still bought all my clothes, and would make very convincing suggestions about what I should where to Church. One piece of clothing I particularly loathed was a pair of dirt brown corduroy pants. The reason I hated these pants so much was the fact that they made a sound while I walked. Every step brought a little friction noise that I was certain gave me away while I was sneaking around in dark hallways. This lead to one of my first statements of independence, when I declared to my mother, "I don't want to wear these pants anymore, because spies don't wear corduroy!"

Halloween Goodies

I love Halloween. It is one of my favorite holidays. Every year, I try to out do my costume from the previous year. This year, I dressed as Professor Farnsworth of Futurama fame. I don't feel I pulled the costume off as well as I have past costumes, but I was working with limited options. With a heavy load on at work, and most of my stuff still in boxes, I did the best I could.

I also held an open house style party last night. It was our first real chance to show off the house. We had quite a few people come through and visit, so I would mark it in the successful party column.

Overall, I had a great Halloween, and I look forward to next year.