A Year in Iowa

The year's over...

2009-01-01T20:11:00.000-08:00

... but the postings aren't, not quite yet. December was very busy, with lots of family and travel. So I'm behind -- almost exactly a month behind -- on my reporting. I'll keep the blog alive for a few more days until I can get caught up for everyone on December.

In the meantime, wishing everyone a great new year ...

Rob left today

2008-12-02T15:20:00.000-08:00

Rob has been here for a week and we've really enjoyed his being around. It's been a quiet visit, as Rob arrived with a cold and needed some recuperation time (but he's a really nice guy and didn't leave it with us). We've been out to choose our Christmas tree, we've played board games, and we had a lovely time as Deanne joined us for a few days. He left this afternoon (the really unfair photo at the right shows him at the checkin kiosk in Cedar Rapids) and we hope he's having a good flight home as I write. His freelancing seems to be going well and he's valued by the group he works with. He is taking home some homemade butter cookies from a family recipe and with instructions to share them with Trista when he gets home. He leaves a few traces like this toothpase tube that shows he inherited some of his father's cheapness!

First snow of the season

2008-11-30T05:25:00.000-08:00

Last night Judy got an extra birthday gift -- the first snow of the season. It's not a really heavy snow, but it came down slowly without a lot of wind so it sits lightly on every branch in the woods. It's also a nice gift for our son Rob, who has always visited early in the year when we had lots of snow and he was able to go sledding. Maybe we'll get in a run or two before he goes home!While the westher is beautiful, and while we really enjoyed seeing our daughter Deanne over the holiday weekend, we're glad she went home early yesterday and we're looking forward to seeing her again soon for Christmas.

Black Friday

2008-11-28T05:38:00.001-08:00

Shopping -- is there a more dreaded word in the English language? Especially -- ESPECIALLY -- as in "Holiday Shopping"? But sometimes one must bite the bullet and take one for the economy, so we went out shopping at 5:15 this morning to get something that had a limited number of items at the store. Even at a technology store the line was long, but we did manage to get what we were looking for.

But sometimes when you go to the store you see something that catches you by surprise. In a store that passes for a "department store" these days, I saw a display of something whose function is not entirely clear. The wag in me would call these "Christmas bedpans" -- after all, what else do they look like? -- but somehow it doesn't feel like that's their intended function. Who knows?

Family Thanksgiving

2008-11-28T05:15:00.000-08:00

We have so many things to be thankful for that one day just isn't enough time; every day Judy and I tell each other how fortunate we are. But for Thanksgiving day, we had even more reasons to be thankful. Deanne was with us from Chicago, Rob was with us from Sacramento, and Rick was with us ... from across town. We weren't sure just how many people we'd have for dinner, though, so we had a 22 pound turkey for five people. But it was a lovely day, from seeing an eagle flying over the house to cooking (Judy), carving (Steve), eating (the Young People), to pie and a movie. We hope your day was wonderful too.

Changing of the guard

2008-11-26T13:01:00.000-08:00

A few weeks ago I wrote about the robins in our trees, but we've had a changing of the guard here. Yesterday I noticed that I hadn't seen a single robin for a week or so, and today I saw a bald eagle in a tree by the Iowa River where they congregate in the winter. In fact, we've seen eagles around for a couple of weeks, but they're getting more and more common as they come in for the winter. Such wonderful birds...

The 2012 elections

2008-11-25T07:59:00.000-08:00

I just saw this remarkably jarring image in a post that talked about the "Election Horror Picture Show" -- so (of course) I had to share it with the three of you who read my blog. Doin' the time warp again...

Writing in Iowa City

2008-11-21T16:05:00.000-08:00

We found out today that Iowa City has been named by UNESCO as a "City of Literature," joining Edinburgh and Melbourne as the only cities with this designation. This is a significant distinction and goes along with Rick's decision to move here to be in a writing-rich environment. With this designation, Iowa City joins the Creative Cities Network, a group of cities with rich creative environments. We're delighted with this designation, and we're glad to be able to participate in our own small way. (My co-author and I recently completed the review of the copyedits for our forthcoming Shaders book, and today I saw the book listed in the AK Peters online catalog. Not exactly literature, but I claim that it's still creative!)

Sadie Hawkins Day

2008-11-13T14:39:00.001-08:00

Today, friends, is Sadie Hawkins Day. The actual date is taken from the first day when the notion occurred in the Li'l Abner comic strip, though some celebrate a date a few days later. I expect that most of you are too young to know about this venerated tradition of the hills, but I come from the Ozarks where single young men stay indoors on that day. So if you're single, this is a good day to watch your back...

Final results are in

2008-11-13T12:44:00.000-08:00

WARNING -- election geek stuff ahead!

We've just heard the final results for the Presidential vote in Johnson County, Iowa, where both Iowa City and Coralville are. Before the election we heard that our precinct, Coralville 6 (CV06) had never gone Democratic, and the first returns showed that the precinct had gone Republican again this year. But for the first time, absentee and early ballots were counted in their precinct this year instead of simply being counted generally, and it made a difference -- CV06 went Democratic. It probably had done so before, but we did have the lowest precinct percentage for Obama in either Iowa City or Coralville, with only 60% for Obama. (A few rural or small-town precincts were lower, and two, with a total of 809 votes, actually went for McCain.) So I'm feeling better about where we live now...

Birds & berries

2008-11-09T21:53:00.000-08:00

There is a tree in our front yard that turns dark red and produces berries each fall. I don't know what kind it is, but there are a few others in the neighborhood; it seems to be a popular sort. When the berries get "just right" the trees are swarmed by robins and cedar waxwings (see the photo at right); it would be easy to conjecture that the berries have fermented and the trees have become a local bar. But the birds don't seem to fly drunkenly (I've seen that and it's a strange sight indeed!) so probably they're just feeding and getting ready to fly south. The robins should have gone already, because we've had snow flurries and it's gotten well below freezing. But winter is close and we'll lose them all too soon now.

Pride

2008-11-04T21:24:00.000-08:00

When I hear someone say "I'm proud to be an American" I cringe inside. I can be proud of something I've done, and I can be proud of something someone I love has done. Pride is a satisfaction by which one measures one's stature or self-worth. But I cannot see a reason to be proud of something I had no control over. So I can be, and am, proud of my/our kids for their accomplishments. My father could be proud to be an American -- he made the choice to immigrate to the US. But I cannot be similarly proud because I made no such choice. What I can be, and what I genuinely am, is grateful and happy to be an American. Most of the time.

But I am proud, button-popping proud, of America this evening. To elect someone who promises a new way to think of America, to reject the politics of fear and division, to make a choice to turn the country towards a more positive relation with the rest of the world, is more welcome than I can say.

And I apologize to all my friends from the Americas who will rightly cringe when I mis-use "America" and "American" as I have done. Please recognize that at this emotional moment I can't really think of a better way to express myself without this clumsy shorthand!

Final early voting statistics in our precinct

2008-11-03T22:35:00.000-08:00

Since we're poll watching on election day, I've been watching the early voting statistics in our precinct (Coralville precinct 6, or CV6). Iowa's had a lot of emphasis on early voting, and it shows -- in our precinct, 57.8% of registered voters have already voted, almost 70% of Democrats, over 50% of Republicans, and almost 50% of independents. We're guessing that we'll have a pretty easy time as poll watchers tomorrow; we hope so!

Fall chores

2008-11-03T21:30:00.000-08:00

I got a lot done of fall chores done over the last few days. Rick and I took out a couple of large limbs from our big backyard tree to create a bit better balance and open up the ground to more sunlight, and we put up the deer fence around the junipers by the driveway. I did most of the work (and none of the creative culinary work) for a big batch of butternut squash soup (with 12 pounds of squash). Yum! I've put up the winter bird feeder and added a second hanger so I can get both sunflower and thistle seed on the same pipe. The birds also say Yum! I've also cleaned gutters, done a little weeding, and grilled what's probably the last set of burgers outdoors this season. Yum again! So let it snow, let it snow, let it snow (it's forecast for later this week...)

Books we made

2008-10-31T09:44:00.000-07:00

This fall we're in a bookbinding class, part of the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute at UI. Technically it's called "Adventures in Book Conservation" but "adventure" may not be quite accurate ;^} . The class instructors are from the Iowa Book Works, and the lead instructor is a conservator with the University library.Last night our class made books, using an ancient Ethiopian sewn-book technique. It was quite interesting and not too difficult, but the class members who knit, crochet, or sew seemed to find it easier than the others. The photo shows the books we made -- Judy's is upright and mine is reclining. If you can download and zoom into the photo you may see the pattern of the lock stitches on the spine; they can be quite nice.

Drive and drop

2008-10-30T11:07:00.001-07:00

Today we went out on a "Drive and Drop" for the Obama/Biden campaign. I mentioned this in a post yesterday, but let me explain what that is.

The Democratic party has developed a list of everyone in Iowa who is a registered Democrat or has registered his or her intention to vote for the Obama/Biden ticket. Each day the county auditor in each county makes available the names of all the registered voters whose votes have been received (by mail ballot or at an early voting place). These names are marked off the master list, and the next morning the precinct captain will get a list of those voters in our precinct with an Obama/Biden interest who have not yet voted. We will take some of these names and will drive around a neighborhood, putting out door hangers reminding them to vote. Simple. Our job will be simplified considerably by the fact that well over 50% of the registered Democrats in our precinct have already voted.

On election day we will be poll watchers, another get-out-the-vote volunteer job. We will note and report those people on the list who have voted (not HOW they have voted, of couse; we won't know that) so that as the day goes along, the precinct captain will know who has not yet voted so they can be contacted with more reminders. Some of these contacts will be by phone and some by door knockers.

World Series 08

2008-10-30T11:00:00.000-07:00

It's a little hard for a Cardinals fan to root for the Phillies in the World Series. I grew up in the 1950s when the Cards and Phillies always seemed to be racing for fourth place in the National League (there were only eight teams in each league then), so the Phillies were hardly the Good Guys, but at least they're National League instead of the Designated Hitter League. The Phillies seemed to win in spite of themselves; it was terribly frustrating seeing all the runners stranded in scoring position, game after game. But it's over and we have to settle for sports with time limits for a few months until baseball comes around again...

Interesting few days ahead

2008-10-29T06:48:00.000-07:00

We've been looking for ways to be involved in the elections this year, but some of the traditional election volunteer activities, such as door-to-door canvassing or phone bank staffing, just don't fit our personalities. We've found two that do work, though. We'll be putting out door hangers in our precinct for registered Democrats who have not yet voted, and we'll be working as poll watchers on election day. Each of these is a two-hour commitment and there is training for poll watching, so we'll be a bit busier than usual through Tuesday, but it feels good to be doing more for the election than just voting.

First hard freeze

2008-10-28T16:19:00.000-07:00

We had our first hard freeze last night -- not just a frost, but a real freeze. Not a big deal here, but I can just hear some California teeth knocking at the thought! It's supposed to be pretty nice by Hallowe'en, and I imagine that I'll have the usual bunch of terrible visitors. Lots of kids in the neighborhood, which is a lot of fun.

Gas mileage

2008-10-26T12:14:00.001-07:00

We've all (well, those of us who watch TV) seen lots and lots of ads about how fuel-efficient the new cars are. I'm not particularly impressed -- I have a 14-year-old Nissan Maxima that was the top of the line in its day: six cylinder, good power, lots of accessories (for its time). And when I filled up yesterday, I had gotten 21 mpg in town (that's actual, not estimated) and often get 30 mpg on the road, and that's with E10 ethanol content that should actually reduce mileage a bit. That's comparable with many new compact cars and better than any of the new six-cylinder midsize cars.

I sometimes rent cars and like to get the smallest car I can, and some of these just-like-a-car-but-smaller vehicles are OK, but I'm not sure I'd like them every day. The only car I've driven that impressed me more with its economy and driveability was a Volkswagen turbodiesel we drove in Scotland in 2006. I didn't figure the fuel "mileage" but even with the very high European fuel costs, the per-mile fuel cost was just about the same as our cost here. In the US, the Jetta and Jetta Sportwagen diesel (30/41 manual, 29/40 auto) are impressive, but I think the European version gets even better mileage.

Last Saturday farmers' market for the season

2008-10-25T06:02:00.000-07:00

Fall is lovely in Iowa, with oaks turning rust-colored, maples bursting into flames, and sumacs becoming scarlet ranks along the roads. The weather breaks and long-sleeved shirts come up from the basement closet, but it's not yet cold enough to deal with icy roads. It's time for the year to come to closure, but the closure is tinged with sadness because it's the end of the farmers' markets. The stuff for sale is different now, with hard winter squash and late fruit predominating, but there are still fresh tomatos and even a few raspberries. We'll miss all the fresh food but it will be back in six months -- Iowa's own version of Orpheus and Euridice.

Oregon beach

2008-10-23T13:30:00.001-07:00

As part of our Oregon trip, we spent a couple of days in Gold Beach -- an interesting little town that was starting to shut down after the tourist season when we were there. Several restaurants were closed (including, alas, the little Paul Bunyan Burger shack) but there was a really nice little cafe down at the harbor. Our place was beachfront, though it was maybe 40 meters from the actual beach. The weather was cool, but nice enough to sit out on the deck and read (when suitably bundled up, of course!)Of course, we also drove along the southern Oregon coast, a lovely part of the country; that's Arch Rock above, only one of many great views.

Adventure boot camp?

2008-10-20T08:19:00.000-07:00

We stopped at several viewpoints as we were driving around Crater Lake last week. At one of them we found this vehicle from an "Adventure Boot Camp for Women." I'm sure the participants were out hiking around the rim, but apparently they left the driver behind to take care of the van...

Visiting Crater Lake

2008-10-20T08:09:00.000-07:00

We were in Oregon for a week earlier this month because some friends from the Northwest were giving some computer graphics content at the CCSC-NW conference in Ashland. As long as we were there, we visited Crater Lake and the coast for a couple of days each.
We were at Crater Lake Lodge just a couple of days before it closed for the winter. It was pretty nippy, as you can tell from this picture of Judy taken as we walked over to the Rim Village store to see if any Christmas stocking stuffers jumped out at us. (Did they? We'll never tell!)
Our first day there was beautiful and sunny, as you can see by this photo from the window of our lodge room. We drove around the crater rim and enjoyed the day quite a bit. We also enjoyed a really good dinner at the lodge; National Park lodges seem to have really good menus--probably to give guests the energy to get out and enjoy the parks.
The next day started out pretty, but by the middle of the day it was spitting snow and by the end of the day it was snowing pretty solidly. We went out for a walk in the morning and found these frost flowers "growing" by the side of the road, but later on the lounge chairs outside the dining room were less inviting. By the next morning it was largely clear and the lake was beautiful with snow on the island and caldera walls.

From John McCain's campaign...

2008-10-17T07:46:00.000-07:00

A member of John McCain's campaign staff has been quoted as saying "John McCain needs foreign-policy advisers like Tiger Woods needs a golf coach." (New Yorker, October 13, 2008, p. 116) Interesting concept, since Woods HAS a golf coach (see TheAge.com or USA Today, among others). On the other hand, Obama has an extensive and very experienced foreign-policy team. So which is best -- "experience" that needs no assistance, or "experience" that knows enough to know that policy needs to be developed with careful thought and input? I seem to remember a President who insisted that he didn't need any help; wasn't his middle initial 'W' or something? Saints deliver us from another President who is his own vision of perfection...

Sign seen recently

2008-10-17T00:08:00.000-07:00

We're just back from a week in Oregon, including the CCSC-NW conference at Southern Oregon University in Ashland. I'll write more about that later, but a quick note here to share a sign just outside an elevator door at the SOU library. I hope people don't take it too literally...

Just turned off the "debate"

2008-10-15T18:36:00.000-07:00

I tried to watch the debate tonight, but watching McCain try to get the last word in on every point and watching him spread the same distortions that his negative attack ads have been putting out, I simply got too nauseated to continue. Good bye, John. Good bye, Sarah. "Mothra" is on another channel, and I intend to raise the level of my television viewing.

Alaska postcard

2008-10-15T17:14:00.000-07:00

Got this postcard in the mail today. Interesting, and it means something. Not negative, not smearing anyone's character directly or by implication, simply saying what the sender believes. And I agree with him. Hope you do too!

Cartoons this morning

2008-10-06T07:45:00.000-07:00

This non sequitur cartoon was in this morning's paper, and I found it funny and very, very germane. Enjoy!

And in the next New Yorker there will be the following cartoon that's perhaps a bit more subtle.

The Seacrest barn

2008-10-05T17:14:00.000-07:00

Today was a celebration of the Seacrest barn's 125th year. This is an octagonal barn about 15 miles east of Iowa City. We have enjoyed visiting old barns, and this celebration also included a demonstration of Belgian work horses loading hay in the barn. So we went out and enjoyed the afternoon quite a bit.

The barn is quite complex, with a lower level having stables and milking stations, a "main floor" (where the ramp shown in the first picture leads) with workshops and various equipment, and an upper level that would have stored hay for the winter. The upper level was gorgeous, with an amazing domed ceiling that almost looked church-like.

The Belgian horses are beautiful, massive animals that are clearly capable of an amazing amount of work, but they are also very well mannered and take directions readily from their owner. It was beautiful to see how they worked, and it was amazing to see just how difficult it was to move hay from the main floor of the barn to the upper level. It seemed to take at least two different pulls on different ropes to get the hay lifted up and then moved over to the right storage area.

Perhaps the most surprising event of this aftenoon was seeing a graduate school friend at the barn. Kent Fuller worked for the same advisor I did, Frank Anderson, and I knew that he was in the Iowa City area, but we hadn't looked him up after I moved here. He and Gretchen were at the barn, though, and it was nice to say hello. I'm sure we'll get in touch with them when we can have time to catch up. A very nice treat for the day!

Washington and Facebook

2008-10-04T22:45:00.000-07:00

I'm just back from some NSF panels in Washington. They were read-on-site panels, so we had to read, write reviews, meet our panels, and do panel summaries in just over two days. Hard work, but I always enjoy meeting other panelists and learning about what's happening around the country. And sometimes I even get some time on my own -- I was able to get to DCA pretty early so I could go to the Smithsonian American Art Museum to catch a marvelous joint exhibition of Georgia O'Keefe and Ansel Adams. The exhibition was built around the concept that they had natural affinities, and I think it made the case pretty well. And, of course, their works are incredibly gorgeous.

While I was there I got an email from Rob inviting me to join Facebook and be his friend. I'm too old for that, I thought, but what the heck -- it's Rob, so how bad could it be? And it's not bad at all, though I think I'll stick with my blog and not be QUITE so cool as he is. But it is a chance to be a little closer to him and Trista, and that's great.

The Oxford Project

2008-09-28T19:40:00.000-07:00

This evening Judy, Rick, and I went to the Englert Theater in downtown Iowa City for a reading from The Oxford Project, a new book from Peter Feldstein and Stephen Bloom. Peter is a friend of ours, and has been a friend of Judy's for years. The book gives an intimate and honest portrait of the small town of Oxford, Iowa, through photographs of people taken 21 years apart and through candid interviews with them. The reading tonight was in a theatrical style, with individuals reading the things that townspeople have said. Very effective, quite touching, and a wonderful look at small-town America. As Bloom said this evening, when you want to understand the real history of America, you won't get it from Sarah Palin or Barack Obama -- you'll get it from understanding the lives of people like these. A remarkable project about a very real town and the very real people in it.

My spam filter must work

2008-09-26T18:26:00.000-07:00

I keep reading about email "whispering" campaigns that spread rumors about the Presidential (and Vice-Presidential) candidates by anonymous or pseudonymous email. Either the spam filters on my Mac or the filters that Stanislaus uses must be doing a good job, because I'm just not seeing them. In any case, I would never believe anything that did not come with full and verifiable citations, because I have never taken anyone else's word for anything like that. Perhaps this is part of my training as a mathematician; perhaps it is a trust in my own ability to discern; perhaps it is too much early exposure to preachers who told me that I must believe only what they told me.

It really doesn't matter anyway, because I got my mail-in ballot in the mail today. There are some local candidates I need to look at, but I expect to return the ballot by Monday. November 4 comes in September this year -- which would probably be a better title for this entry anyway!

Nobody asked me, but...

2008-09-25T15:45:00.001-07:00

Interesting watching and listening to the political developments in the last few days. I had a strange thought about the Republican VP situation today. I suggest:

* Johh McCain knows that Palin is not really capabile of being a worthwhile Veep. He'd have to be as dumb as W to believe that, and he isn't.

* When JM is dealing with a real issue, Pailin isn't with JM -- Lieberman is.

So I'll put up the following two-part conjecture:

* Palin was chosen as eye candy and as a frisky distraction, and if JM is elected she'll carry out the public duties of the Veep. But the real contributions that a Veep would make won't come from Palin -- they'll come from Lieberman.

* if JM should become seriously ill, Palin will resign JM will name Lieberman as VP so he can take over.

As I said, nobody asked me, but this just might be plausible. YMMV...

First touches of fall

2008-09-24T09:45:00.000-07:00

Fall is here -- it sneaked in while I was being vetted for the jury on Monday -- but it really doesn't feel like it yet. The temperatures are still in the upper 70s and lower 80s, with lows only in the 60s. Not at all fall temperatures in the upper Midwest. But this is good, because corn and soybeans are delayed from the late spring and floods, and this will let farmers get in those crops.

There are ways we can tell that fall is getting here, though. Our bush that turns bright scarlet is starting to get some red highlights, and the first newspaper story about a vehicle hitting a deer appeared the day before yesterday. Time to start slowing down on the roads in our neighborhood that go through the woods; I don't want a repeat of my deer collision a couple of years ago!

Jury duty

2008-09-23T15:39:00.000-07:00

I've had jury duty the last couple of days. I was selected yesterday for a criminal jury, and today we heard the prosecution testimony before a recess; after the recess we heard that the defendent had reached a plea agreement and we were released. The details aren't important, but I am comfortable that justice was done for both society and the defendent.

Johnson County has an interesting jury system. The shorthand name is "one day or one trial" -- you come in on Monday and are either selected for a jury that day or released. In either case, this is your jury exposure for four years (or longer). Because of the modest requirements, there are very few exclusions; everyone serves. This is a better system than the one-week exposure in Stanislaus County, California, but even that was better than many other counties. So I'm pleased to have been able to serve, and pleased at the treatment that jurors and potential jurors received. And it doesn't hurt that the jury payment was actually reasonable, given the amount of time I had to give -- much better than the minimal wage.

Our snake

2008-09-22T05:13:00.000-07:00

Yesterday Rick and I saw a snake by the retaining wall in front of our house. It was a very small snake, probably just hatched this year, but I didn't recognize it (not that I have such a broad herpetological experience or anything). I took a photo (below) and looked it up online, and it seems to be a brown snake; Rick verified it with a better online reference. As we were looking at it, it crawled into the wall in a very small space between blocks. So now I guess we have a Resident Snake to help protect us from small insects.

Amana artisans studio tour today

2008-09-21T18:19:00.000-07:00

There was a tour of artisans' studios in the Amana Colonies this weekend, and Rick went with us today to look around. It was a lovely warm not-quite-fall day, and a great excuse to be out. There were a number of places on the tour, but -- this being the Amanas -- some of them weren't open on Sundays. We ended up visiting a glass studio (mostly layered glass), a tinsmith who was both making new objects and re-creating antique pieces, a broom and basket shop that had some wonderful art baskets, and a coppersmith who mostly made oversized insects and frogs-with-martini-glasses. I really didn't get it on that last one...

At the broom and basket shop we found this hard-working fellow connected to a windmill that kept him going. There was a large woodpile out behind the basket show, so he must have put in a very productive summer. Wind power for the worker, firewood for winter -- sounds like a localized solution to energy problems to me!

Travel and the economy

2008-09-19T20:11:00.001-07:00

Over the last couple of weeks I've been exchanging emails with Guido Rößling, my co-chair for a program at a computer science education conference to be held in Paris next summer. Of course, this means that I'm committed to a trip to Paris in early July, and perhaps one in March as well to organize our program. (For any of my non-US friends who cannot read this, that translates to "organise our programme" in the Queen's English.) So we're committed to some travel and to the costs that will go with it. Of course, this week's economic debacle will probably make the USD even more worthless than it already is, so the cartoon below seems appropriate.But it is Paris, after all, and perhaps we'll stay at our tiny hotel just around the corner from the Café Flore and down the street from St. Germain de Prés. Life could be worse, and we'll see a number of good friends at the conference (which is really why we do these things!)

Monarch butterflies

2008-09-19T14:45:00.000-07:00

Iowa is on the fall migration route of the Monarch butterfly. There have been butterfly-tagging events here, and we routinely see them flying around. It's a lovely treat.This photo, from Drake University (wish I'd taken it myself!) shows a Monarch on some local wildflowers.

Jet trails

2008-09-18T22:32:00.000-07:00

Today was mostly clear with a few clouds, but there must have been some unstable air at flight altitudes because the sky was filled with jet contrails, probably from flights from Chicago to the west coast. The effect was very interesting and I thought I'd share it with you all, though this composite of two photos is pretty crude. Enjoy!

Class reunion

2008-09-18T17:15:00.000-07:00

Last weekend we went down to Ft. Madison, Iowa, for Judy's high school reunion. I won't say how many, but if you look closely at the second photo you can figure it out...Ft. Madison is a very nice small river town on the Mississippi, almost on the Missouri border. It has had a consistent set of employers, and the town is in very good shape. The old part of town is particularly nice, with many lovely old homes. One of them has been converted into a B&B, the Victorian Bed and Breakfast, and its photo is above. We had a suite, not just a room, and the biggest and best breakfasts we've ever had at a B&B, and that's going some!Of course, the real function of a class reunion is to catch up with your high-school friends, and Judy saw many friends she hadn't seen in many years. Some of them had gotten old, but some (including us, of course!) hadn't. She had a great time and I was very glad to meet people who had been important to her growing up. (That's Judy in the front row, just about in the center of the photo.)

Teacher's Day

2008-09-18T04:36:00.000-07:00

China has an annual Teacher's Day, when people celebrate the teachers who are or were important in their education. It's a wonderful idea, and says a lot about how China has gotten where they are in the world. This year it was September 10, and a friend of ours, Yang Ke, sent us a photo of his teacher, Shi Jiaoying, with himself and some of Prof. Shi's other students. This is doubly wonderful because Jiaoying is one of our best friends and was part of my birthday celebrations this summer. Here's the photo, taken on the new campus of Zhejiang University; it's clear who is being celebrated, and Ke is the young man on the right, who has just finished his PhD and is about to start working with Microsoft Research Shanghai.

I was wrong...

2008-09-17T17:12:00.001-07:00

I couple of weeks ago I thought I could distance myself from politics, and I said so in this space. I was wrong. There's no way I can ignore the lies and misrepresentations that are flying around so freely. So, figuring that Seattle is the gateway to Alaska and so a Seattle paper would have some idea of what is really going on in Alaska, I want to share a few cartoons from Horsey, the editorial cartoonist on the Seattle Post-Intelligencer. Enjoy!

Green jobs

2008-09-17T11:34:00.000-07:00

Interesting piece in today's Cedar Rapids Gazette. A new company in Newton has opened a wind turbine blade factory that will employ 500 people. This is the fifth wind energy company in Iowa (two in Newton, one in Cedar Rapids, one in West Branch, and one in Ft. Madison) and is an indication that once we can wean ourselves off oil and the resource-extraction "Drill, baby, drill" mentality, there is an enormous economic potential in new energy sources and other green jobs. If we look at the models of the computing and communications industries, once this starts it's going to grow really quickly, so if I were looking to invest in the future, I'd look at things like algae-based fuels and flexible thin-film solar panels.

The joys of home ownership

2008-09-10T20:18:00.000-07:00

As Rick was visiting us last March in preparation to move to Iowa City, we had heavy rains and a heavy melting snowpack -- and we had so much water around that we had water leaking in one corner of the guest bedroom. Pooh. So we had the fill and landscape wall under the back porch reworked, and at the end of the job we had our contractor look at the corner where the leak had happened. It turned out that the leak was anything but new, and there was significant water damage in the corner and under the edges of the window.
The picture shows the damage from the inside; you can see daylight at the corner of the window where the sheathing had rotted from poor window installation, and you might be able to see the damage in the lower left corner. The view from the outside shows the repair of the lower part of the wall, but further damage was found below the upper window and we had to replace sheathing below that window and around the dryer vent. Quite a job, but it feels good to do it right. Next year -- we're going to look at the other windows in the back, because some of them probably have the same problem. Oh, the joys of home ownership...

Anniversary

2008-09-10T05:11:00.000-07:00

Today is our third anniversary -- and the first one that we've celebrated at home. Eurographics used to give us a reason to be in Europe, and our first two anniversaries were in Budapest and Prague. But home is good, very good.
The picture, taken this morning, is a very special anniversary plant that blooms each year around our anniversary time. Our friends Sousan Karimi and Mahesh Dodani sent us this lovely orchid as a wedding present. We keep it in the kitchen window, and each fall it sends out several flower stalks.

Fall flowers

2008-09-08T19:32:00.000-07:00

We've started to get just a little bit of nip in the air here in Iowa, and some leaves are starting to act as though they really don't see much use in hanging around any longer. I guess fall is in the air. It's time for fall flowers. At the Farmers' Market last Saturday there were some wonderful pots of chrysanthemums for sale, and anyone with allergies will know about goldenrod.

There are also a number of very pretty fall-blooming wildflowers. Here are two photos of flowers out along the path behind the house. I don't know their names -- we have never been properly introduced -- but I enjoy greeting them as I walk by and enjoy their beauty.

Gustav missed us -- almost

2008-09-05T05:04:00.000-07:00

Hurricanes do most of their damage on the coast before they go over land and start to weaken. But they linger on for several days as strong storms, and they can be nasty, even several hundred miles from the coast. Yesterday we were in just the edge of the remains of Gustav; just south and east of us they got several inches of rain, and we had a blustery day but we got less than an inch. Today is dawning mostly clear and we're looking forward to a nice day -- there are signs that fall is near, but we're in no hurry...

Training the remote

2008-09-04T05:01:00.000-07:00

Over the last eight years we have very carefully trained our TV remote to change channels -- or turn off the TV -- when certain faces appeared on the screen. After last night's round of character assassination at the RNC, we're instituting another round of training so that any Republican face or commercial triggers the same response. It's not that hard -- it's all the same stuff anyway.

Sheesh. Classical politics -- if you don't have anything to say, say something nasty about your opponent. If you don't have anything positive to offer, wrap yourself in the flag. If you don't have any policies to benefit citizens, say that you're for the nation (I suppose that most voters have never read about Mussolini's fascist state and its policies.)

Enough, already. To mis-quote Flower the Skunk in Bambi, "if you can't say anything nice, I'm not going to listen to you at all." And I suppose that means that this blog will become a politics-free zone.

Obama, Biden, and a Rove-free country.

Years of experience?

2008-09-02T17:14:00.000-07:00

As we hear politicians talking about years of experience, let's think about the Geiko gecko. You ask whether a humble (or not...) lizard can have years of experience? It's known that the gecko has a long and ancient lineage, but scientists from Oregon State University and the Natural History Museum of London have just found a 100-million-year old gecko, almost doubling the known history of the species. But nobody knows if a gecko were ever the mayor of a small town...

Say what?

2008-09-01T07:03:00.000-07:00

Does it strike anyone else as odd that the Republican National Convention starts on Labor Day this year? The irony is so deep...

Interestinger and interestinger

2008-08-30T07:46:00.000-07:00

Well, John McCain pulled a surprise in selecting Sarah Palin as his vice presidential candidate. She's pretty, she's red-headed, and she's feisty, but what else is she? Her choice blows out the Republican claim that Obama's not sufficiently experienced -- she was the mayor of a town of about 6500 and was governor for two years, and has never faced any real national issues. Of course, she was really nominated in an attempt to get the nobody-but-Hillary voters, and that may succeed, but I'll be very interested in what Hillary has to say about her. It would have been very interesting to know how many others were contacted about the position and declined because they didn't want to be tainted by being the VP candidate on a losing ticket...

Oh, wait! I forgot another key advantage that Palin has -- she does not seem to have ever been photographed with George Bush.

Being studied

2008-08-29T18:08:00.000-07:00

In the EdBiz (as Tom Lehrer once put it) we get used to studies as something we do or something we assign others to do. But now that we're retired persons in a city with a major university and medical school, we find that there are opportunities to be the object of study. Sounds grim, I guess, but not really.

Judy and I are now in a study of ageing and memory that looks at memory processes and, at the same time, will give us a longitudinal look at our own memories. We certainly experience enough "what IS that word?" moments to make us wonder sometimes, and this is a simple study that just requires us to take a few memory tests.

I'm also in a study of vascular function and cognition, looking at relations between how the functioning of our vascular system and our cognitive systems are related. This is a more complex study and will involve some blood and MRI studies as well as cognitive testing.

There are three reasons we like to do this sort of thing. One is that we believe it contributes to knowledge and science. A second is that we always learn something from them. And a third is that there is generally a modest stipend for contributing (though not always; a study I did a year ago paid almost exactly enough for parking and gasoline).

And, of course, it gives me something to write about in the blog when the days are slow...

Al Gore and the internet

2008-08-28T10:39:00.001-07:00

A recent conversation in which somebody said "Yeah, and Al Gore invented the internet" in a depricating manner -- to which I had no real answer -- left me wondering just what was said. So I looked for sources, and found that he really said, in part,

"During my service in the United States Congress, I took the initiative in creating the Internet. I took the initiative in moving forward a whole range of initiatives that have proven to be important to our country's economic growth and environmental protection, improvements in our educational system."

Judy managed the University of Iowa's networking system in the late 1980s and she says that indeed, Gore's initiatives were critical in moving from the older networking environments to the real internet, and that it wouldn't have happened without him. This is confirmed by Vin Cerf and Bob Kahn. How did the distortion leak out? Through the efforts of that real Friend O' Truth, George W. Bush and his trusty sidekick Karl Rove, whose efforts continue as consultant to the John McCain candidacy.

Who's your buddy?

2008-08-24T09:26:00.000-07:00

There was an interesting photo in the most recent Smithsonian, and I realized that it reminded me a great deal of another photo I saw a few months ago. In both cases, a politician was being associated with another politician who is widely accepted as having done great damage to others. One of them is embarassingly like a child with his father. Some even believe (and I agree) that the other politician is fundamentally evil. The analogy is far from exact and I'll admit it can be picked apart, but the resonance is certainly there. Judge for yourself.

Catching up

2008-08-24T09:09:00.000-07:00

Once again, I've let the blog slip. Perhaps that's telling me something, but I'll choose to believe that I'll still be able to keep it up.

So -- what's happened over the last couple of weeks? We were in LA for a week at the annual SIGGRAPH conference, where we enjoyed the awards dinner where our very good friend Stephen Spencer received the 2008 Outstanding Service Award -- very much deserved. We also enjoyed seeing a number of friends. I also organizes a BOF (Birds of a Feather) session on teaching computer graphics in context in computer science that generated a very active and productive discussion, and was part of a short course on proposal writing. And after the conference we had a wonderful visit with Randy (our son on Judy's side) and Cynthia that included an informal organ concert at the home of Randy's boss. Some of the music was familiar and lovely, and some (by Olivier Messaien) was pretty challenging, though interesting.

Since coming home, I've been focused on working on the Computer Graphics Shaders textbook and on a paper that was accepted for SIGGRAPH Asia in Singapore in December. I guess that focus is my excuse for not doing a blog sooner. But with the political conventions coming up, it should be a lot easier to find things to write about!

Please close the windows

2008-08-09T07:06:00.000-07:00

We're deep into August, but the request "Please close the windows" doesn't mean what it usually does at this time of year. We've been having really nice weather with the low temperatures down in the lower 60s or even mid-50s, and Judy's been asking me to close the windows because it's uncomfortably cool for her. The long stretch of wet weather is also continuing, and I've not yet had to water any of our plants. (This has actually been going on over a year; I didn't need to water last summer either.) An unusual, but not unpleasant, stretch of weather -- though there are probably many places in the world where the weather is as bad as ours is good. Global warming brings all kinds of climate change.

Iowa wildlife

2008-08-09T07:05:00.000-07:00

In yesterday's Cedar Rapids Gazette there was a small news report about an unusual traffic accident on I-380. While a semi carrying bananas was passing a car, the truck hit a buffalo while the car sideswiped a second one on the shoulder of the road. Not the usual kind of wildlife we would find in our back yard!

How time flies...

2008-08-02T09:00:00.000-07:00

It's been almost a month since my last posting -- a very busy month, but that's probably not a good excuse. In that month we've come home from China and gotten back on North American time, been to some NSF panels in Washington, Steve's been to an advisory board meeting in Edmonton, and we've been out to visit family in Sacramento. This is the first weekend we've been home in about six weeks. It's about time!

A few things to share from the month, though. First, you may have an image of a suburban home in China, but unless you've visited there you probably don't think of this:These are very interesting homes with plenty of room, but they don't look much like a North American or European home.

Second, we've talked about our extended Chinese "family" of friends who Judy knew through her lab at Iowa. While we were at the NSF panels we went to visit our friends Jie and Yu and their brand-new baby Alex. Such wonderful people!

Edmonton was a very quick trip with no sightseeing time, but I did take one photo to share. Remember that I'm a mathematician at heart, so I was glad to see an example of a hypoteneuse (with a nod to Tim for the bad pun):

This morning was one of those rare August mornings when the temperature and humidity both fell, and after we went out to the Saturday farmer's market (see the earlier posting on that) I went for a long walk. The woods undergrowth is high and had some interesting flowering plants, and there were some butterflies out along with lots of birds and a few baby rabbits. A really nice day. I hope your day was lovely too!

Goodbye to Hangzhou

2008-07-05T16:08:00.000-07:00

This morning we went out about 5:45 for a walk to say goodbye to the West Lake and Hangzhou for this trip. It was warm, but we were anything but alone -- many people come out early to walk and enjoy the day. This photo along the causeway shows something of the number of people out walking.It seems to be common for people to be out early, exercising or just enjoying the day, and it's nice to be in their company. It really doesn't feel "foreign" somehow being here, and we look forward to our next trip back to China.

Another birthday dinner

2008-07-05T16:00:00.000-07:00

Birthdays, like other good things, are just too good to only have once. We had wanted to take Prof. Jiaoying Shi to dinner when we got to Hangzhou, but it ended up as a family dinner with our very good friends.From left to right: Prof. and Mrs. Shi, Ke Yang, Judy and me, and Mingmin Zhang and her daughter.

We went to the Kuiyuan Restaurant, a restaurant with a long history in Hangzhou, and had their specialty shrimp and fried eel noodles -- along with lotus-leaf chicken, a specially-prepared fish that we really like, and several other things. Noodles are, of course, a birthday specialty meaning long life.

Morning walk up Beishan Hill

2008-07-05T00:10:00.000-07:00

Just north of West Lake is a hill that I believe is called Beishan Hill -- bei=north, shan=hill or mountain. It's not a very high hill, only some 200' from the lake, but it's quite picturesque and we've never walked up it on any of our other trips to Hangzhou. We did walk up this morning before the day got warm, and below are a few photos of the hillside, a temple near the top, and a view of West Lake from the hillside.We really enjoyed the walk and are sure that the exercise was good for our old knees. Tomorrow will be our last day in Hangzhou (and in China) and we hope to have one more good walk by the lake before we leave.

Hangzhou markets

2008-07-04T23:15:00.000-07:00

When we are at home, Judy is Not A Shopper. The caps are intentional. She simply dislikes shopping and everything associated with it (except for the farmers markets, as I talked about earlier). But when we travel, things are exactly reversed -- she loves to shop, though she shops for friends and for gifts more often than for herself or for me. Me -- I like to putter around some markets, but not all.

Anyway, while here in Hangzhou we've shopped in three markets. The first was the Hefang Street market (called "History Street" on our map), where there are traditional shops and fixed kiosks, the wares are traditional and varied, and the prices usually non-negotiable (at least to westerners). The second was the Jiankang Road silk market, a long, long street of silk shops with clothes and scarves, and where the prices were negotiable but not too much, because the quality was generally very good. Our friend Yang Ke was with us and helped us greatly with questions of prices and quality -- he gave up time working on his dissertation to be with us, and we appreciate it very much The third market was the Wushan Road Night Market, a very, very crowded set of temporary tables with widely varying quality and very negotiable (read: VERY negotiable) prices and a crush of people walking up and down the street. We come to the Night Market every time we're in Hangzhou and, while its wares have changed and the growing prosperity of China means that the omigosh-it-can't be-that-inexpensive-can-it prices have changed, it remains a real treat. We bought something at each, and enjoyed each of them in its own way.

West Lake in Hangzhou

2008-07-03T19:48:00.000-07:00

This morning we went out walking early along Hangzhou's West Lake, one of China's most famed beauty spots. This is one of the places on earth I've found where my blood pressure drops and I feel really happy and contented. It might help that I've never been here without Judy, even before we were a couple -- but I digress.

Today is sunny and hot, hot as it gets in the US midwest or south, sticky and hazy hot. So we went out early, around 6am, with the sun low and the shadows long. Almost immediately across the street from the hotel is a large patch of lotus plants that are in full bloom. The flowers are amazingly lovely, shaded from white to a dark pink, as you can see in the photo; the background is Xiling bridge to an island, linked to the city by the bridge and a long causeway.From out on the island, the view across the lake includes some islands and a pagoda on the far shore through the morning haze (though if you look a bit farther to the left, you can see the modern city).

Our hotel in Hangzhou

2008-07-03T19:36:00.000-07:00

OK, so why on earth are we talking about something as prosaic as our hotel? Because we've stayed here several times and it's in such a lovely setting -- right across the street from the West Lake and an easy walk from many neat places. We know it as the Xinxin Hotel, but they seem to want to call themselves "Hangzhou The New Hotel." When we were here before, it always seemed to be just a little old-fashioned, just a bit like China might have been like a generation ago. We were surprised to find that it has had some remodeling done and is now very much like a standard Chinese business hotel (which is NOT the same as an American business hotel; you can find some of those in China, but why would you want to?) Some of the changes are nice -- the front desk is more efficient and the breakfast room is now in the former dining room with a wonderful lake view. Some of the changes are ... well, quirky. We have a full-sized window from the bedroom with a view of ... the inside of the shower. I've not seen anything like that since a room I once had in Las Vegas. Oh, well...

Public transportation in China

2008-07-02T17:12:00.000-07:00

Since we've been in China we've taken many taxis and a high-speed train from Nanjing to Suzhou, and today we take a bus from Suzhou to Hangzhou. We'll also take a bus from Hangzhou to the Shanghai airport when we leave China. About the only thing we've not used is local buses; taxis are easier for us. Some things stand out about this transportation:

1. it's inexpensive. The high-speed train (up to 206 kph) cost $10 per ticket, the bus to Hangzhou costs about 50 cents more, and we've never spent more than $6 on a taxi (and all our taxi trips in Suzhou have been less than $2).

2. it's efficient. Things run on time and move pretty well. You don't always want to watch the taxi driver in traffic -- but (s)he knows how to get around in traffic. The train was one of the smoothest we have ever taken, and that includes many of the European trains including the TGV.

It doubtless helps that Judy speaks some Chinese, but between hotels and friends we have not had any problems in arranging transportation. I think the US could learn some things!

Suzhou gardens

2008-07-01T23:36:00.000-07:00

The part of China that includes Suzhou and Hangzhou, sometimes referred to simply as Su-Hang, is famous in China for its beauty. Suzhou is sometimes called "The Venice of China" because of its many canals and lakes, and it is also known for its beautiful gardens, many of which are world heritage sites. Here is a photo of a canal we crossed on the way to one of the gardens.
The Humble Administrator's Garden is known as the most beautiful garden in south China. It includes several lakes and canals, as well as several buildings. In the early summer season, there are many lotus plants in the lakes and in large ceramic pots on the grounds. The photo shows a typical view in the garden.
Nearby is the Lion Grove Garden, a smaller garden that has smaller vistas and more buildings but is still quite lovely. This garden looks like it was part of the living areas of a home, and some of the buildings are set up for things like receiving guests. There is one lake in the garden, and the photo shows that and the fanciful stone structures that are found in all the gardens.
A third garden we visited was smaller and was near the east city moat (yes, moat -- a river flows around all four sides of the old city of Suzhou.) The Garden of a Couple is even more of a garden with a residence, and it had even more of the feel of a home. The photo is of one of the garden's main features -- an artificial "mountain" in one of the courtyards. Overall the garden is said to have the feel of the mountains.

Suzhou pingtan

2008-07-01T17:50:00.000-07:00

When we were in Suzhou two years ago, we came across Pingtan, a lovely art form in which two singers, usually a man playing a three-stringed instrument with a small sound box and a woman playing a pipa, sing ancient songs in an antique Suzhou dialect. We found a small studio just a few doors from our hotel where pingtan was performed, and enjoyed it so much that we went back there last night. We didn't take any photos -- it has always felt rude to ask to take them -- but there are some wonderful photos on the linked page.

We had an interesting language experience at the studio. The manager brought us two books and a couple of sheets of paper, and tried to explain to us what was expected of us -- but she did this by writing things over and over (in Chinese, of course) and saying things more slowly and loudly, just the things that we've seen Americans do in English while trying to communicate in Europe. We finally figured it out -- one book let us order drinks (we ended up with green tea, mostly by default) and the other book let us order songs, at a cost of 20 to 50 yuan each. There were a few others at the performance, also ordering songs, so we had a nice evening.

Becoming an object

2008-07-01T07:49:00.000-07:00

Today we visited two of the beautiful gardens of Suzhou, the Humble Administrator's Garden and the Lion Grove Garden. They merit a posting of their own, and they'll get one. But tonight's story is about what happened there.

Have you ever wondered what it would be like to be a clown or a statue and have people stand by you and have their picture taken? That happened to us several times today. We are apparently different enough -- older, larger, whatever -- so that people want to have their picture taken standing with us, even with their arms around us. It's an interesting feeling and certainly is not offensive, but it leaves you feeling a little strange and wondering what they must see that makes them want the photo.

So your homework for tonight is to think about this: what might make a stranger want to have his/her/their photo taken with you? Please send your answer in a SASE and we'll award an appropriate prize to the winner. Neatness counts... ;^}

For shame!

2008-07-01T07:39:00.000-07:00

Sometimes it's difficult to live up to one's principles. Forces seemingly outside one's control take over, and one does things that one really doesn't want to do. This is the story of one such situation.

We're in Suzhou, and we're out of instant coffee that we can brew in the room to start the day. Our hotel room does not include breakfast, and the daily price for breakfast is more than we want to pay. What to do, what to do?

One word: Starbucks.

We knew there was a Starbucks in Suzhou (we saw it when we visited two years ago), and we knew it was within walking distance (1/3 mile) from the hotel. And we knew that we really wanted some good coffee.

So we strayed from our principles and went to an American chain while we were out of the country. We walked right by the KFC, we turned up our nose at Pizza Hut, we didn't even give McDonald's an instant's thought. But we were led astray by Starbucks.

Be kind when you think of us, be generous, be forgiving. But damn, the coffee and scone were good this morning...

Touring in Nanjing

2008-06-29T17:13:00.000-07:00

While we were in Nanjing we did a little touring. To the north of the city is the Zhong Shan, or central mountain, with several interesting areas. We visited the tomb of Dr. Sun Yat-Sen, one of the fathers of modern China and one of the leaders of the first republic, who died in 1924. His tomb is very much in the Imperial tradition, with a long walkway up to the actual tomb. The walkway had a lot of steps, especially for old knees:This is the view down the steps, with some of the people in our group: Prof. Jiaoying Shi in the yellow shirt near the center, and Prof. Jim Shen in black to his right (our left). At different points along the path there were buildings and sculptures off to the side, and this one shows Judy standing next to a turtle that originally held a large tablet on its back.If you look closely at the turtle's head you will see what looks like racing stripes; this was probably a very fast turtle!

Nanjing has been the capitol of China in various ways over the centuries, and among those it was one of the early capitols of the Ming emperors. There is an area of Ming tombs on the same mountain, and we visited there the next day. One of the features of these tombs, both in Nanjing and in Beijing, is an avenue with many animals that show the emperor's power. In Beijing they have been replaced by concrete replicas, but in Nanjing they seem to still be the stone originals. Here is Judy saying hello to a camel, and in the distance you can see other animals down the avenue.The overall area of the Ming tombs is very broad and there are many wonderful buildings and walkways; it's not within the scope of a blog to include many more. Just one -- a wonderful small tile shrine in which you would burn papers on which you had written prayers or requests.From Nanjing we went on to Suzhou, and I'll write more on that soon.

66

2008-06-28T14:47:00.000-07:00

Today (it's still June 28 at home, even though it's the 29th here in China) is my 66th birthday. I think this must be a good date for a birthday; my 60th birthday was in Botswana and my 65th was in Scotland, both with good friends. This year I celebrated it in China.

The 66th is a very good birthday; the number six is liu(4), which sounds like the word for "luck", so 66 is liu liu or "luck luck." One's daughter or daughter-in-law is supposed to cut up 66 pieces of meat and cook them with noodles, and offer this to the king of the underworld so he'll forget to come for you. But instead we had this wonderful birthday cake!Our dinner was held in the area around the Confucius Temple, a very big tourist area along a river. Beside the river was a wonderful dragon, seen here by day and then by night.The dinner was 22 courses, although "course" really means a very small dish of the food, and the dishes were quite varied and interesting. And no birthday dinner is complete without entertainment, including this lovely pipa player.And no birthday is complete without a toast, so here's a photo of several students and my colleagues Jim Chen and Ruwei Yun sharing a toast with me. Ganbei!

Greetings from Nanjing, China

2008-06-27T18:21:00.000-07:00

We have been attending a conference on education and entertainment, hosted at Nanjing Normal University. We had a good trip, flying north from Chigago near the North Pole (sorry for the poor quality of my cell phone photo of the in-flight map) to Beijing and then on to Nanjing.During the conference there was a book signing for the translation of my beginning graphics textbook into Chinese, and the photo shows Prof. Jiaoying Shi (right), me (middle), and Prof. Zhigeng Pan (right); Prof. Shi led the translation team and Prof. Pan worked with him. A number of others contributed to the translation and I appreciate all their work.We expect to have other things to share from Nanjing soon.

It's been too long...

2008-06-25T02:15:00.000-07:00

I've not posted to this blog for over two weeks now, and (if anyone is reading and cares ;^} ) I apologize for that. In terms of the photos on the last entry, the place I was standing when I took the photo of Dubuque Street and the river was under a foot of water shortly after I took the photo, and the bridge I was standing on when I took the photo of the riverbank overflow was cut off on both ends as well. I just didn't have the heart to keep writing about the problems everyone was having. All the gory details can be found in the pages of the Iowa City Press Citizen or the Cedar Rapids Gazette online. The water is going down, and in some places has gone down quite a bit, but that just exposes the amount of damage in homes and businesses -- it will be a long time for people to get back, and some will (for good reason) just give up and move on. The lucky few had flood insurance, but the key word seems to be "few."

The good news is that Rick should be back at work, even though the hotel isn't yet open -- at the last I heard, he was supposed to help provide security for the hotel once it was accessible but not yet open. The management like him and want to keep him working for them, and that's nice to hear (though it doesn't surprise me; he's a good worker).

Anyway, I'll have more to say soon, but for now, thanks for your patience.

The Iowa City flood of 08, part 1

2008-06-11T11:37:00.000-07:00

Over the last few days we've had a continually growing flood problem in Iowa (and much of the Midwest) and it's getting very, very serious. We're particularly affected by the Iowa River, whose watershed runs WNW from Coralville out into central Iowa. This is my first note on the flood, but I'm sure it won't be my last, as you'll see. We are very fortunate, though -- we're high above our own little creek, and that creek has only a very small watershed so it doesn't even flood up to the path at the bottom of the yard.

The flooding comes from getting a lot of rain on top of soil that is still saturated from the long, snowy winter and from earlier rain. The rain has come from some pretty intense storms; you can see some storm clouds (from our front porch) at the leading edge of a storm late last week.Floodwaters have been rising slowly, giving people time to move out of their homes, but the waters have been rising relentlessly. This is a composite photo so you may need to click on it to get a good view of the flooding. It is taken along Dubuque street, one of three main routes into Iowa City from the north.
In Coralville, upstream of Iowa City and downstream of Coralville Reservoir, the river is out of its banks, and you can see how the river comes over its bank and down through a wooded area. When these pictures were taken, the river was still under control at the Coralville Lake dam, though the outflows from the reservoir were about three times normal. But the lake was still rising, and last night the river came over the spillway. At this point the river is forecast to rise about five feet more in Iowa City, so you can imagine what it might look like at the peak in a few days. I'll try to document this more when we get there.

Traditional values?

2008-06-09T18:46:00.000-07:00

The 2008 Presidential campaign has an interesting twist. The Republicans, the party of traditional values, also has a tradition of campaigning against the Democratic candidate's wife on the grounds that she didn't represent these values. But Senator McCain's wife is anything but traditional. Her Wikipedia entry shows her to have done some admirable things, but she hardly fits into the Mamie Eisenhower - Pat Nixon - Laura Bush middle-America model.On the other hand, Michelle Obama is much more middle-America. She grew up in a working-class family and has small children. She is also very accomplished, as again shown by her Wikipedia entry. Personally, I would much rather sit next to her than Mrs. McCain at a dinner party, because I believe that Mrs. Obama and I would have much more to talk about.

Summertime, and the livin' is sweaty...

2008-06-06T13:52:00.000-07:00

It's been a cold, wet spring -- and we may have more to say on that later, since there are real flooding problems around the midwest this year -- but we always knew that the cool weather couldn't last. And it hasn't. Today it is so sticky, a bit warm but very, very humid, and we've put on the air conditioning for the first time. It's always good when we can hold off the A/C until June, and a week into the month is even better. But it's time for summer, and we'll hole up in the heat of the day now until September, when we can once again enjoy a time without A/C and without heat.

Die Dreigroschenoper

2008-06-05T20:04:00.000-07:00

For years I've been a fan of Die Dreigroschenoper (The Threepenny Opera) by Bertold Brecht and Kurt Weill. I have a CD of an original production with Lotte Lenya (Weill's wife, for those of you who only know her in "From Russia with Love"), and I've learned just about all the German in the original 1931 script.Recently I found the movie in the Coralville Library and had great hopes for it. It was directed by the great G. W. Pabst and Lenya was Jenny, as in the original production, but it wasn't the same -- the production just didn't have the kick of the original, and some of the best songs were left out. But as a piece of history it was interesting; German movies of the early 1930s have a flavor that American and other European films of the time don't.

First firefly

2008-06-04T23:19:00.001-07:00

Big night tonight -- I saw the first fireflies of the season. Fireflies, or lightning bugs as we called them when I was a kid, were one of the great treats of summer. I can't say I treated them well, but they were just plain magical. Now they're a large part of the summer experience, and it's good to see them again.

Birthday (1)

2008-06-03T05:53:00.000-07:00

This month is my 66th birthday, and our good friends Qi Hua and Jun Ni invited us over for dinner a couple of days ago. I'm really sorry that I didn't take a photo of the whole table, because they and Jun's parents really gave us a wonderful dinner. We just don't go out for Chinese food in the US any more (unless we have Chinese friends with us who know how to order off the menu) because we're so spoiled by real Chinese food.The sixty-sixth birthday is a very special one in China, because six is liu(4), and liu also means "luck". So sixty-six is liu liu, or "luck luck" -- a very good birthday. Our friends made a very special dessert for us, "eight-treasure rice". The eight treasures are dried fruit and nuts in the sticky rice, with sweet red bean sauce as well. Yum! The photo is a dish of eight-treasure rice that they sent home with us and that we shared with Rick for dinner last night. What a treat to have such good friends who spoil us so!

It's hard to lose weight in Iowa

2008-05-30T20:36:00.000-07:00

I've had a hard time staying on the weight wagon for the last year or so. The worst culprit is probably travel, especially when the travel involves breakfast in the meeting room. Oy! But Iowa has lots of temptations on its own:Today was the annual Mennonite relief sale at the local fairgrounds, and the photo is part of the long table of pies for sale. And I'm supposed to be able to walk by and not sample one? In fact I did get by the table -- but not the homemade doughnuts or the ribeye steak sandwich or the homemade ice cream with hot fudge sauce. Of course, it was all for a good cause. But you know, perhaps the weight problem isn't Iowa's fault; perhaps it's mine...

Iowa City Farmers' Market

2008-05-18T16:30:00.000-07:00

Farmers' markets are among the treasures of life. I've enjoyed them several places, even in downtown Arlington, VA, but the farmers' markets in Iowa City and Coralville are among the best. Everything is guaranteed local, because people are only allowed to sell things they made or grew themselves, and everything is laid out beautifully because people are drawn to wonderful displays. There are five of these markets each week, but the largest is the Saturday morning market in Iowa cith, shown here.This market opens at 7:30 am, and Judy's always there by 7:15 so she can walk around and find the "specials" -- the stalls that have only one or two packages of berries, or the best tomatos, or whatever else is particularly good that week. She can then stand in line at the booths she chooses and wait for the whistle that lets vendors start selling. And my job is to stand in the second-best line and to carry whatever we buy. That keeps us in fresh vegetables (and other things -- this week, morel mushrooms) for the week to come. It's a great way to start the week!

Coconut cream pie

2008-05-18T16:13:00.000-07:00

This one's for Deanne, who loves coconut cream pie...

While we were in the Ozarks, we went into Branson one day and found a tea room that advertised "Coconut Gream Pie". We went in and saw that the coconut cream pie looked really good, so when we ordered we asked them to hold five pieces for us. The picture shows the table with the pieces of pie, and they were even better than they looked. Yummy! Deanne, we wish you'd been with us...As for my brothers going into a tea room, those are stories that stay within the family ;^}

Family weekend in the Ozarks

2008-05-17T18:42:00.000-07:00

Last weekend we drove down to Table Rock Lake to have a visit with my siblings and their spouses. Driving down was interesting and we had to backtrack a couple of times to find the right roads. We loved the cultural ambience of the Ozarks, and one of our backtracks came when we missed a turn while admiring the local architecture.We very much enjoyed seeing everyone and catching up, and everyone was very glad to meet Judy. Here's the gang:Left to right: me, Phil and Marlene, Judy, Beth and Bob, and Andy. Phil, Andy, and Beth are my siblings, in decreasing age order. While there, we had to go to Silver Dollar City because it was one of our father's favorite places. They were having a bluegrass festival so we saw this Cajun group perform (bluegrass? Cajun? you figure it out...)Another day we rented a boat and went out for an afternoon on Table Rock Lake. We found some familiar waterbirds, like Ducks, out for a swim. We had seen a similar species in Washington DC, but their coloration was a little different.And here's a shot of the four siblings plus Judy out on the lake.

The flowers that bloom in the spring, tra-la!

2008-05-16T08:33:00.000-07:00

With springtime we have had the usual (and wonderful) tulips and daffodils, and we're getting the small woodland flowers we love at the edge of our little woods. But a couple of things are very special to us.The picture shows our lilacs (left) and redbud (right). The lilacs are special to Judy because they remind her of the lilacs her kids gave her for Mother's Day years ago but were left with her former house, and the redbud--small as it is--is special to me because Judy gave that to me for my birthday a year ago. We hope you have some special springtime flowers too!

Where do you get your news?

2008-05-06T17:59:00.000-07:00

News is all around us, with local and national newspapers (I loved getting the Washington Post every day when I was with NSF), weekly and monthly magazines, and local, national, and international news broadcasts. But what we get in the US is immensely sanitized and US-centered.

So - where do you get your news? Let me suggest that at least once you go to someplace you had never thought of: the official Kazakh news service. It's probably less different than you might think, but at least it's not US-centric and maybe it's even got something interesting that you'd never find on CNN or in the Post. Have fun!

Open house!

2008-05-05T13:35:00.000-07:00

No, it doesn't mean what you think it means -- it's not an invitation, it'a a command. It means that after a very long winter with a LOT of snow and rain, we can finally open up the house and let in fresh air. And along with the fresh air we get bird songs (robins, cardinals, blackbirds, wrens, ...) and the smells of the flowering trees outside. Tonight we may even have dinner in our enclosed porch. Ah, springtime...

Getting a haircut

2008-05-02T18:25:00.001-07:00

Getting a haircut is simple, right? You just go to the barber shop, tell the barber what you want (unless you have a regular barber who knows what you want), and wait until it's done. Unless your favorite barber is 900 miles from home...As it turns out, my favorite barbershop is in Arlington, Virginia near where I lived while I was with NSF. I get decent haircuts at the same price as in Iowa, and they give really nice hot towel and neck massage service as well. I'm writing this from Arlington after some NSF panels and here's the barber shop. After all, sharing funny details of your life is what personal blogs are all about, neh?

Crete

2008-04-29T06:41:00.001-07:00

No, I haven't let the blog go idle. For much of the last two weeks we were on Crete the annual European computer graphics conference (http://www.ics.forth.gr/eg2008/home.php). As always, we loved seeing friends (I started to say "old friends" but most of them are younger than we) and we enjoyed seeing a new part of the world. The photo shows a small dinner group at the harbor at Hersonissos, where the conference was held.
We had been to Chania, on the western end of the island, before, but this time we saw the middle and eastern parts. There are many interesting things on Crete from different eras in the island's history. Perhaps the best known is the Minoan palace at Knossos, just south of Heraklion, partially (and controversially) rebuilt by Sir Arthur Evans. Here is a photo from that palace showing some of the reconstruction.
Another wonderful Minoan site is at Malia, about 30 km east of Heraklion. There is much less reconstruction here, but the palace was smaller than Knossos and the layout is clearer.
Besides the Minoan sites, there are many things left from the Ottoman and Venetian eras. The fortresses at the harbors in Chania, Rethymno, Heraklion, and Ierapetra are examples of these, and the photo is from Heraklion.
We had a great time and look forward to the next chance to travel to an interesting place and see good friends. Keep watching this space...

Barberries

2008-04-09T21:13:00.000-07:00

When Judy and I decided where to live in Iowa City, she was more interested in a condo where all the outside work would be contracted with the association. I wanted a house because I wanted a yard. We decided on a house, but she insisted that she would not have to do any of the outside work. I can live with that, and we do get help for some outside things (especially things like getting the driveway plowed out in the winter and getting the yard mowed in the winter). But sometimes I feel like I should do something myself. And sometimes that something is bigger than I thought.

So a few days ago the day was nice and I was feeling energetic, so I decided to prune the barberry bushes in front of the house. I knew when I started that barberry is a VERY thorny bush, so I wore gloves and thought I was being careful. But it had been a couple of years since they were last pruned, so there was a lot to be cut (see photo). I knew I got a few thorns, but I managed to get a lot of little pieces in my hands that I've been picking out. ouch! Maybe next time I'll pick an easier job when I feel energetic. Maybe I'll just stop feeling energetic. Or maybe I'll see if I can get Rick to do some of these things now that he's in town...

Springtime?

2008-04-09T08:10:00.000-07:00

Springtime proceeds by fits and starts in the upper Midwest. Last weekend there were frogs calling all day (and night) long in the little stream behind the house, and yesterday we had a brief but active snowfall.I know it will be spring soon because the daffodils and tulips are putting up little green shoots, and three months from now we'll be begging for just a taste of the cold weather we had yesterday. But right now I wonder...

Iowa swamps

2008-04-05T22:04:00.000-07:00

It's still early spring here in Iowa. After the very heavy snowfalls and a rainy day, we have a lot of water in the woods just below our yard. You can tell how early the spring is -- the trees haven't wakened yet and the grasses are only a little green.

Even though this is only an urban swamp with a paved walk right next to it, it does have its own charms; the other evening we were walking along here and nine deer walked across the trail and up into the woods. Nice.

Happy April!

2008-04-01T07:20:00.000-07:00

It's April, and even here that means springtime is about on us. Yesterday morning I saw just a bit of snow left in a heavily-shaded spot, but it was so warm yesterday that I believe it's gone today. So today's note was going to be "The snow's finally gone!" -- we've had snow on the ground since the beginning of December, and five month is an awfully long time.

But.

But this morning we were getting the day going, having our first cuppa and watching the Today show, and we looked out the window and saw snow falling. Not a lot, and not for long, but enough to be reminded that winter holds on a long time in the upper midwest and only lets go grudgingly.

Still, there are traces of green in the gardens and planters around town, and some buds are swelling on the redbud tree we planted in the edge of our woods last summer, so spring is coming. spring is coming. spring is coming. There, I said it three times fast, so it must be true...

Computer changes

2008-03-29T12:45:00.000-07:00

Lots of chanages going on in our computers here. I've bought a new MacBook Pro so I could work with the full set of computer graphics shaders for my textbook project, and I've instilled Windows Vista on it as well using Boot Camp. It seems to work pretty well, and I can use Mike Bailey's glman application on the Windows side and access geometry shaders. Of course, the machine has some new bells and whistles, including an onboard camera, so in the true "new toy" sense that had every new Macintosh user in 1984 using the San Francisco font, below is a photo of myself with one of the built-in Photo Booth special effects. Yes, Virginia, it is more than a toy, but old boys can still enjoy the toys...
Most of the changes involve repairs, though. Judy's PC has been in the shop for a successful disk transplant and memory upgrade (boy, what I'd pay to get one of those upgrades for myself!) and my older Mac is in the shop for a fix on the display. And Rick's machine is down, but he was able to get most of his files off it and now we're trying to figure out if the disk is fatally broken. But that's life with machines, I guess. And a big tip o' the hat to Julie Gorman, the Stanislaus computer science sysadmin, who's been a great help in consulting with us on Rick's system and has continued helping me in many ways after I retired.

Shampoo bottle instructions

2008-03-26T18:59:00.000-07:00

Anybody in computer science is familiar with the shampoo bottle instruction

Lather - Rinse - Repeat

that many of us use as an example of an infinite loop. On a hotel shampoo bottle recently I came across an example of another interesting instruction:

If seal is broken do not use

Of course, if the seal is not broken you cannot use the shampoo, so I guess this is an example of an always-negative logic statement...

Seen on a fortune cookie...

2008-03-25T19:29:00.000-07:00

Plan to be spontaneous tomorrow

Robins!

2008-03-24T11:15:00.000-07:00

There's been one big change in Iowa since I left a couple of weeks ago -- the robins are back, in flocks of a dozen or more, picking through the remains of winter woods and yards as they get ready to start nesting. It's good to see them. Spring comes late in Iowa, but the robins are a sure sign that it will come!

There and back again

2008-03-24T11:07:00.000-07:00

It's been a while since my last posting, but as the sign on the door says, I've been out. My adventures over the last two weeks were nothing like Frodo's, but they were enough for me. I've been to the west coast twice and the east coast in between, but I'm now home (*sigh of relief*)

The first leg of the trip was to Portland, where I attended the SIGCSE Symposium on Computer Science Education. The highlights were seeing many friends, having a good conversation with my Prentice-Hall editor, and getting a couple of good ideas for future projects. Judy came out for a couple of days and we enjoyed good food, Powell's Books, and some nice walks along the Willamette River.

I next went to Arlington VA for some NSF work. This is always enjoyable and I always learn a lot from talking with old and new friends.

Finally I went to California to help Rick, our son on Steve's side, move to Iowa. The photo above shows us by the rental truck and his car that we were towing. It was a typical move, with hard work loading, lots and lots of driving, and more hard work unloading. There were a few highlights of the drive, however ...
* a nice visit with our son Rob on Steve's side in Sacramento, where the photo was taken,
* heavy snow on the Sierra Nevada summit that Rick drove at night,
* dust devils in the Nevada desert,
* more snow showers in southern Wyoming, and
* thousands of sandhill cranes flying and in the fields along the Platte river in Nebraska.
And, of course, it snowed here on the afternoon we were unloading the truck. Not a lot, but enough to tell Rick that winter's still hanging on in Iowa, even if all the almond trees in California have already finished blossoming.

Rick's now moved in and is doing a job interview today. It's good to have him near us and we're looking forward to his getting settled and getting into the rhythm of his new life in Iowa.

I'm getting tired of politics

2008-03-11T13:42:00.000-07:00

I'm getting tired of politics. In this election we have a Republican candidate for President who is basically a really decent guy with some ideas that don't come from NeoconsRUs, but he's turned the steering wheel hard right in order to appeal to the Bob Jones University wing of his party. If he had had the guts to avoid accepting the endorsement of the Current Occupant ... but he didn't.

And also in this election we have two Democratic candidates. One of them is fresh and brings a new balance to the Tennessee feudin' match we call the American political system; the other is being supported in the primaries by the Texas Republicans because if she runs, all the BJU wing will run out to vote against her, and a lot of moderates and independents will likely stay away. See the LA Times online poll results in the figure that show Clinton barely ahead of McCain but Obama hugely ahead. After her "3am phone call" ad, I might leave the top of the ballot blank too, because I cannot abide the running-on-fear campaign that Cheney-Rove-Bush used, McCain is adopting, and Clinton stooped to. What hypocrites -- to run on public safety and to oppose reasonable gun control, when uncontrolled guns kill thousands of people every year.

Yes, I'm pulling for Obama, and keeping my fingers crossed that voters will get tired of fearmongering and choose someone who can look at rebuilding the reputation of the country without trying to do that at the point of a gun/tank/aircraft carrier/nuke.