Chazd's (Charles Dowdell's) News Burps

It appears I am getting a new ISP, new satellite internet connection and a new email address. I have finally had it with Earthlink and their Satellite connection. I am getting some new service Oct 17th. It will be a welcome relief with the problems and poor customer service over these years. It reminds me of my old hosting company. The problems just grate on you and grate on you. It is quite a relief after you invest the time to get a new supplier. It was quite iritaing when my earthlink email stopped working when I was in Antarctica last year. The current problems are mess between slow connections limited Internet access. The video didn't seem to work on the previous post. It is a new system. They will get it going at some point. My Departmnet won the Center for information Developmnet Managemnet (CIDM) Rare Bird award this Year! Thta is a big deal. We are dwarfed by the compition and the other submmisions came from Microsoft, Cadance, Mentor Graphics and others. It feels gr

I am back from Atlanta. We won the annual CIDM Rare Bird award in regards to our XML process development! The award is great, but feeling that you deserve it is the greatest part. I am in the hospital waiting room in Binghamton. Bonnie is under general anesthisia for the sound wave lipotripsy to breakup the remaining large kidney stone. Hopefully it works. I am not sure how long it is going to take. I haven't had a flying lesson this week. I will be going up this coming week. I have been studying the sectional charts looking for interesting cross-country trips. The plan is the same as it has been, to accomplish a first-solo this year. After that I haven't made any commitments, but the natural thing to do is the required cross-country solos, written exam, build hours, take a oral exam and check flight. It takes a minimum of 40 hours for the private pilot license. I will have many more than that most likely. Getting comfortable in the air is not as easy as it is for some folks,

Bonnie is doing better. They got one of the stones out. A future lipotripsy will get the other big one. She was doing well enough that we decided to have me to continue to Atlanta, where I am now at the CIDM Best Practices Conference. My presentation went well. I have another couple days of meetings. It feels good to be ahead in our processes compared to other folks. The Future is even better. I have alot of work to get ready for winter still. I am looking forward to finishing projects I started earlier this year. After working outside last winter in Antarctica, I plan on working outside more this winter in tame-ol upstate ny. You must dress and regulate. What I mean by regulate is you have to manage your clothing. If you get hot, remove; if you get cold add. Humans can't regulate their heat that well. It requires a manual process. Knowing that makes a big difference.

Well, they managed to ply loose one of Bonnie's stones. The other big one (6.8 mm)is bypassed with a stint and it awaits lipotripsy. It appears I can take her home tonight.

My satellite internet is still barely working at home. It will not let me see many sites including Blogger.com. I am blogging from the Wilson Hospital (Binghamton N.Y.) surgical waiting room. Bonnie and I have pretty much been here (and another hospital) since 4 am. It turns out she has some nasty big kidney stones. They are doing an assortment of procedures and contingency procedures. Let's hope for the best.

We have three cats now. Two gray ones and a yellow one. It was a weird trip arriving at the point of having three cats. I gathered firewood and mess of other stuff. It was really relaxing. Here is an interesting article about how farming is losing its position of dominance (no kidding). http://petersmagnusson.com/2007/09/04/for-the-first-time-in-10000-years-farming-is-not-the-dominating-industry/