The Column
Motto: Is the “Of Pisa” really necessary?
Stuff’s happening. I’m very likely buying a house. Melissa and I will quickly become homeowners. LIVING THE AMERICAN DREAM. I’m going to celebrate by hanging an American flag outside the place. Also, the Captain America shield in the garage. Anyway, I’ve been thinking about it basically nonstop. We’ll know for sure if we own the house if/when all the stuff between now and closing happens successfully. We’re optimistic.
In other news - for obvious reasons I’ve been thinking about “settling in for the long-haul”. I’d like to make sure that I (continue to) do things right with this. To that end, I am going to start a “lunch” project, where I consider the cost, time, and nutritional return for my lunches Monday through Friday. You can go out for lunch, get lunch from the cafeteria, or bring it in. You can go out to place A or place B. Bring in food 1 or food 2. What are these combinations doing for my health (both physically and fiscally)? Which lunch options should I avoid? Which should I have more often?
I’d say you should look for more on that at some point in the future.
Today I had an idea - I want to replicate the Weasley clock from the Harry Potter books. For those not familiar, the Weasley family has a clock whose hands don’t tell the time, but instead point to the location of each member of the family. I want to use a microcontroller & rotary actuator to create a clock whose hands tell whether or not Melissa and I are “in” or “out”, based off wifi connectivity/bluetooth proximity/some sort of IFTTT integration online. It’s technically possible, but would be very challenging. I will add it to a list of several “I wish I had time to do this sort of thing” projects I’ve got.
That “I wish I had time” excuse is crap, by the way. I’m sitting on the couch right now writing this. I could easily be working towards any of the goals on that list… but I’m not.
Anyway, this is a best-effort to-scale representation of the place we are looking to buy. Don’t read too much into the names of the rooms. They are named after what the look like right now.
Top 5: “If I had the time for it” projects
5. “Color blind” video, where objects of a certain color are just completely invisible to the colorblind person.
4. Any number of other small projects (like those lunch thing)
3. “The first ever photo bomb” video, where someone photobombs somebody else getting one of those pictures taken that you have to sit still for a minute for.
2. Learn music.
1. Write a “Life Tracker” on Android.
Quote:
“Applying for a mortgage! As if I’m a real grown-up.”
- XKCD #1674 -