Santa Matt's ramblings

 Today I'm going to do something here in my blog I've never done before. I'm going to rant! First some background. I spent the last thirty years of my career writing software. The first 10 of those years I still worked for Midnight Burglar Alarm. When the upper management found out I could write software the stopped using their expensive consultant and I took over hardware maintenance and software development. We had 3 mini mainframe computers based on the Data General Nova series. No graphics just accessed via ASCII dumb terminals. I wrote accounting AR and AP systems, Inventory and CSM systems. Eventually we transitions to a PC network (which I engineered) and purchased software from a development company. In my personal life I worked with Timex Sinclairs, Atari personal computers and eventually PC's, Building, modifying and programing them. When ADT bought Midnight Burglar Alarm I was let go. I immediately got a job with the development company that had provided MBA...

Due to changes in my Christmas schedule I was finally available to appear as Santa at the "YMCA Santa Run". So on the appointed day and time I found myself with Mrs. Claus posing for pictures and talking with the runners as I moved to the area the Y had setup for me. Families would come and get pictures with Santa and Mrs. Claus. One of the people that came for pictures was a grandma and three grand children, a brother and sister around 5 years old and their cousin a girls about 7 or 8. It was immediately apparent that the brother and sister were her favorites. She seemed to only want pictures of them with Santa. At one point when the older child tried to be in a picture grandma told her "Get out of the picture. You're ruining the picture." After several minutes of this the little girl was in the corner crying and I was seething but I held my temper in check. When grandma finished getting her pictures she took the two younger children aside to look at the pictur...

 Recently I have had many requests for a how to document to make Pixel Goggles. A couple of years back I made three videos for Factory 2 and they are posted on YouTube. Here is a list of what's available and a link to the videos. Pixel Goggles 1 : The original Pixel Goggles based on welding goggles. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pl1PMHbrlPg&t=52s Pixel Goggles 2 : A physically smaller set of Pixel Goggles based on sun glasaases or eye glasses, also called Pixel Glasses. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eHIWygxoNXM&t=6s Soldering 101 : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5bc7v1sXJXE&t=10s I hope these links help you in your own DIY adventures.

Recently I went through some serious medical issues. While I was teaching at a software conference in San Francisco, I became very sick. For over 15 years I have had a problem with fluid build up in my legs. While I was at the conference my left leg became infected. I had a fever of 103 and bouts of hallucinations. I was so sick that I didn't even know I was seriously sick. My wife nursed me and kept me going. My company said I should go home. But between my not realizing how sick I was and my "Get it done" philosophy, I taught all of my classes. My company did rent one of those powered scooter chairs. When we left San Francisco to come back to Michigan, the airline went above and beyond to help me get home. But I was so tired when we got home, I told my wife I needed a couple of hours of sleep before we went to the emergency room. Being of advancing years I went to the hospital that is supposed to be the local specialists in seniors. They immediately started me on an ant...

Simple Pixel Watch (Update to version 6) This is a simple watch using two pixel rings, a Flora and a real time clock (RTC). I wanted a less expensive and lower power consumption alternative to the NeoGeo watch. So I dropped the GPS and positioning boards in favor of a RTC. Construction is easy and fairly quick. You should have some soldering and leather working skills but this is definitely a beginner's level project. Parts List Flora (Adafruit PRODUCT ID: 659) NeoPixel Ring - 12 x 5050 RGBW LEDs (Adafruit any variant) NeoPixel Jewel - 7 x 5050 RGB LED (Adafruit any variant but it is best to match the pixel ring. IE. they should both be cool white or both be natural white.) Real time clock (Adafruit PCF8523 Real Time Clock Assembled Breakout Board) Battery and charger (Adafruit Micro Lipo w/MicroUSB Jack - USB LiIon/LiPoly charger - v1) Assorted leather strips 2 ¼  to 2 ½ inches wide. (One will need to be long enough to go around your wrist and overlap 2-3 ...

So the whole family gets together for a late breakfast or brunch. All of my kids and grand kids were there and Pam's fiancee' Zack and Monica's brother and his two kids. Quite a few of us and a small table for the grand kids and their chaperon which doesn't show in the pictures.  Here we have Ralph and Angela, Monica's Brother Steve and James Here we have James again and his wife Adrienne, Pam and Zack. In the background you can see Jonathon, Steve's son and the chaperon for the grandkids table around the corner.  I peeled a blue colored egg and it must have had a small hole in the shell. Look at the interesting pattern it left.  Jonathon took turns giving his second cousins piggyback and horsey rides. Here is Sera's turn as soon as she puts down here Easter loot.  Here is Angela and Monica sitting and chilling, talking to James in the picture below. In the background you can see Jonathon giving AJ a ride. I think AJ enjoyed it more t...

Easter is the holiest day of the year for Catholics. We believe that what took place on that first Easter two millenniums ago changed all of creation for all of time. So we try and make it special. Catholics also mark days like our Jewish brethren as sundown to sundown, not midnight to midnight. So starting a bit before sundown on Holy Saturday, we start the vigil for the celebration of Easter. We start outside of our darkened church. There we light a fire against the darkness. From that fire we light the new Easter candle that we will use for the next year. From the Easter candle we light our individual candles and enter the church following the Easter candle and the priest. In this picture are some of the altar servers waiting to start the procession.  Okay, one little flash picture just so you can see the Easter candle being carried by the deacon and father in the background in white and gold vestments. The church is lit only by the candles as...