Thursday, March 19, 2009

St. Patrick's Day Parade - South Boston 3/15


Last Sunday I trooped the St. Pat's parade in South Boston with the rest of the New England Garrison of the 501st Legion. I was dressed as a Tusken Raider (the tan guy down in front), which is an easier costume to wear when walking farther than 50 feet - though visibility is an issue! We were joined by members of our Rebel sister group, Alderaan Base, and Legion members from Canada, New York, and Pennsylvania. We had over 50 marchers and the parade was watched by an estimated 600,000 people! Here are a few photos from the event, and you can see more here, and a short YouTube video of us here. I came away from the parade with one blister, sore legs, and some great memories!

Captain Rex taking a break from working the crowd.
Boba Fett and Vader. The guy doing Vader that day is 6'11 - he's huge!
Chip just had a baby, so that's him holding his new apprentice, I mean, his 3 mo. old.
We even had R2 and C-3PO!





Sunday, March 15, 2009

Photos from Adrian

Here's some photos we got from Adrian on his mission - spiced up by me with a couple quotes from the movie Nacho Libre...





1) Adrian going into the Missionary Training Center in Provo on February 4th.

From Nacho Libre... "The brothers don't think I know a butt-load of crap about the gospel.... but I doooooo".


2) We don't know what Adrian's doing here. Having fun I suppose.

From Nacho Libre... "If I win at the battle jam tonight maybe that means God wants me to be his warrior missionary".





3) Adrian with his new buddies.

From Nacho Libre... "Steven, why have you never been baptized?"

"I never got around to it, ok?"

4) Adrian's currently in Umatilla, Oregon near the Columbia River.

Ok, I've run out of quotes...




5) Adrian gets a sweet new bike.

Tuesday, February 10, 2009

T2 wins in the Andes


A short note on the race Bill and I ran this past weekend as the T2 Team: The Columbia Andes Crossing Race (www.columbiacruce.com). The race was run by over 500 teams of 2 people and was on trails for a total of 100 km starting from San Martin de los Andes in Argentina and finished over the border in Chile after going part way up the Lanin Volcano that you can see in the picture below.


The race was 38 km on day 1, 26 km on day 2, and 36 km on day 3 - camping at night on different lakes.


Running up and down some pretty big elevation changes and crossing different streams and narrows.



We wanted to be in the top of the over 80 year old category (sum of both runners) and the grueling training we did over the last couple of months paid off!... we had a 14 minute lead after day 1 and managed to win our category by 27 minutes by the end of the three days. We finished in 11th place overall - not bad for a bunch of veterans.
Hopefully I will be able to walk again soon! The memories will last a lifetime! Thanks to all for their support and encouragment. Here we are at the awards ceremony in San Martin with our trophies and prize gear from Columbia.

Tuesday, February 3, 2009


Outliers, by Malcolm Gladwell

reviewed by Jim Tidd

Outliers are extraordinarily successful people. How did they do it? How much of it was talent? How much of it was intelligence? What about hard work? Gladwell has some interesting answers to these questions.

Consider the top Canadian hockey players. Most of them were born in January, February, or March. Why? Because the cutoff date for selection into the next higher level team is January 1st. A kid born on January 2 is almost a year older than a kid born Dec. 31, so he is going to play better hockey. He may not have more native talent, but he gets promoted, plays with better players, gets better coaching, and more ice time. This selection occurs every year starting at age six, and he has that same advantage every year. By the time he's a young adult, he's a better player than his younger counterpart, permanently.

To catch the PC wave, you needed to be born about 1955. Like Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, or Scott McNealy. The key PC event was the announcement of Altair computer kit. You needed to be old enough to know what to do with it, to be able to afford it, but not already graduated from college and absorbed into the IBM workforce and family life.

10,000 hours is a magic number. By the time their opportunities came along, people like Gates and the Beatles already had their 10000 hours into what they were doing.

There is a concept called "smart enough". To work in theoretical physics, you need an I.Q. of at least 120, but beyond that it doesn't matter much. Einstein was 150. Many unknown scientists have I.Q.s well over that. So the "gifted" programs in schools are bogus because they focus on I.Q.

It's an interesting book.

Friday, January 23, 2009

Grampa and Grammie Family Photo

Check out this great family photo!
Correct me if I'm wrong...

Back: Nilson, Miles, Roger with Jessica, Geanna, Grampa, Dad with Jeff.

Front: Shirley, Joanne, Grammie, Mom with John (left) and Bill (right)

Phoenix and Tucson



Above: Geanna, Grampa, Libby, Me




Above: Jessica (Chris's daughter), Chris, Geanna

I had a recent business trip to Phoenix, which included a weekend stay with an action-packed Saturday with Aunt Geanna. She picked me up at 9AM, we went across town to Chris's house where I met his family, then to Geanna's place, then to Tucson (2 hour drive) to see Grampa and Libby and Gail, Ed, and Merrilee, then back to Phoenix to see Danny and his family in the evening. Geanna drove the whole way and dropped me off at 11pm! It was fabulous to see and connect with great family. Unfortunately I didn't get a photo of Libby's kids when we were at Grampa and Libby's, and I didn't get a photo at Danny's, but if Geanna got one and sends it to me, I'll post it. Did you know that Libby took a welding class, I think when she was in Prescott? And Dad was a member of a "gang" that had regular meetings and the members wore eagles on the backs of their jackets (according to Grampa)? And that Dad built a boat when he was a kid at Grampa's studio office?

Sunday, January 4, 2009