Friday
We meet a lot of characters while working at Fair Foods. Today, at our first site, one of the garbage men jumped off the truck, and whipped out some kind of ID. He shouted that he was from Code Enforcement, and that he needed to see our papers, and that we needed to shut down and leave. If we didn't show him our permit then he said he would have us each arrested and fined $1000 dollars for selling food out of 'that hot van'. When Jason asked him who he was representing, and whether he would allow us to speak with his supervisor, he simply continued shouting that this was about Code Enforcement. Our friend Tom who was at the site with us went to the other garbage man and asked him what was going on. The second garbage man simply said that his partner was crazy. They left, and continued down the street, giving us no more trouble.
Whatever.
Friday, July 2, 2010
Tuesday, June 29, 2010
"Almost Anything"
Thursday
Today I went with Mary over to her friend Sparky's place for game night. We played a game that involved, ... wait for it ... counting beans! It's called Bohnanza (the name is German) apparently a play on the german words for 'bean' and 'bonanza'. It was a close match, with a final score of 21 to 22 to 23 to 24. I placed third, Sparky was second, and Mary was the night's big winner. It seems fitting that she should win though, seeing as she won't get too many chances to win game night for the next five weeks. She is headed out to Washington to take a class and visit with family.
Sparky really seemed like an interesting character. After a computer science undergrad at Carnegie Mellon and graduate work at MIT, he is now employed in a small freelance company by night, and by Harmonics (the makers of the wildly popular Rock Band series) by day. He showed me some photos and videos from one of his projects, which was to design the intermission antics for a huge fountain display at a brand new mall. Every hour the fountain puts on a ten minute show. The show pulls out all the stops, using an 8x8 grid of 20 foot jets that can be lit with any color, several 50 foot jets, a few arching fountains, a rain curtain, fog machines, colored spotlights, and background music. His company's job was to design the fountain's behavior between shows. They decided to make it interactive. They installed motion sensing hardware, and at certain times, the fountain will play different interactive games with the audience. If only a few people are around, the jets nearest you might shoot up as you walk around. If a few more people are around, the colored spotlights may turn on, and the fountain will make multi-colored displays corresponding in hue and size with the crowds. If many people are around, the outer rim will light up like a roulette wheel, and after settling on someone, the fountain will give a reward, the elaborateness of which depends on the vigor of the dancing. It really seemed like a fun project to be involved in. While at MIT, he took a class called 'How To Make (Almost) Anything', which included machining, circuitry design and construction, microprocessor programming, and use of a 3-D printer. He had a beautiful rainbow cube made up of 4x4x4 smaller cubes that were attached together by rods. It seems that MIT's definition of '(almost) anything' must have a clause about computers. Not too surprising for MIT.
The Fountain:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zPsZ1bFRwMM
Today I went with Mary over to her friend Sparky's place for game night. We played a game that involved, ... wait for it ... counting beans! It's called Bohnanza (the name is German) apparently a play on the german words for 'bean' and 'bonanza'. It was a close match, with a final score of 21 to 22 to 23 to 24. I placed third, Sparky was second, and Mary was the night's big winner. It seems fitting that she should win though, seeing as she won't get too many chances to win game night for the next five weeks. She is headed out to Washington to take a class and visit with family.
Sparky really seemed like an interesting character. After a computer science undergrad at Carnegie Mellon and graduate work at MIT, he is now employed in a small freelance company by night, and by Harmonics (the makers of the wildly popular Rock Band series) by day. He showed me some photos and videos from one of his projects, which was to design the intermission antics for a huge fountain display at a brand new mall. Every hour the fountain puts on a ten minute show. The show pulls out all the stops, using an 8x8 grid of 20 foot jets that can be lit with any color, several 50 foot jets, a few arching fountains, a rain curtain, fog machines, colored spotlights, and background music. His company's job was to design the fountain's behavior between shows. They decided to make it interactive. They installed motion sensing hardware, and at certain times, the fountain will play different interactive games with the audience. If only a few people are around, the jets nearest you might shoot up as you walk around. If a few more people are around, the colored spotlights may turn on, and the fountain will make multi-colored displays corresponding in hue and size with the crowds. If many people are around, the outer rim will light up like a roulette wheel, and after settling on someone, the fountain will give a reward, the elaborateness of which depends on the vigor of the dancing. It really seemed like a fun project to be involved in. While at MIT, he took a class called 'How To Make (Almost) Anything', which included machining, circuitry design and construction, microprocessor programming, and use of a 3-D printer. He had a beautiful rainbow cube made up of 4x4x4 smaller cubes that were attached together by rods. It seems that MIT's definition of '(almost) anything' must have a clause about computers. Not too surprising for MIT.
The Fountain:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zPsZ1bFRwMM
Monday, June 28, 2010
"Let's Do That Again!"
Tuesday
I'm clearly not around children enough. I'm the youngest child in my family. I never worked the nursery at church. I didn't really do any babysitting. My youngest cousin already towers over her sisters. Today I went back over to Keith and Sarah's for the second time. Nancy wanted me to take them some food, and deliver some onions, plantains, tomatoes, potatoes, veggie burgers, for the Boston Project. I had the pleasure of enjoying a wonderful meal of burgers and veggies off the grill, along with pork and beans, and sweet potato pie for dessert. After dinner, I got to play with the kids, and I must say, their MarbleWorks tracks made me a little nostalgic (MarbleWorks is set of tubes and ramps that slide together and form long routes for marbles to roll down; we had the exact same set as a kid). I was sitting on the couch, and Joseph (5) brought me over a small plastic airplane and a single rubber band. He wanted me to hold the rubber band taut, then he would use it to launch the airplane. He did this a couple times, and then Timmy (3) wanted a turn. Timmy would launch the airplane across the room, looking to see where it went. After running to get it, he would say in the sweetest, most excited voice, "Let's do that again!" It seemed like it would never get old. The mystery and magic of the rubber band kept Timmy coming back, over and over, never tiring of saying, "Let's do that again!" God calls us to come to him like little children. Sometimes I think we get bored or tired of God, but he is so amazing and wonderful! May we never tire of putting our trust in God, letting him launch us out in faith, seeing where he takes us, run after his will, and all the while turning to him to say, "Let's do that again!"
I'm clearly not around children enough. I'm the youngest child in my family. I never worked the nursery at church. I didn't really do any babysitting. My youngest cousin already towers over her sisters. Today I went back over to Keith and Sarah's for the second time. Nancy wanted me to take them some food, and deliver some onions, plantains, tomatoes, potatoes, veggie burgers, for the Boston Project. I had the pleasure of enjoying a wonderful meal of burgers and veggies off the grill, along with pork and beans, and sweet potato pie for dessert. After dinner, I got to play with the kids, and I must say, their MarbleWorks tracks made me a little nostalgic (MarbleWorks is set of tubes and ramps that slide together and form long routes for marbles to roll down; we had the exact same set as a kid). I was sitting on the couch, and Joseph (5) brought me over a small plastic airplane and a single rubber band. He wanted me to hold the rubber band taut, then he would use it to launch the airplane. He did this a couple times, and then Timmy (3) wanted a turn. Timmy would launch the airplane across the room, looking to see where it went. After running to get it, he would say in the sweetest, most excited voice, "Let's do that again!" It seemed like it would never get old. The mystery and magic of the rubber band kept Timmy coming back, over and over, never tiring of saying, "Let's do that again!" God calls us to come to him like little children. Sometimes I think we get bored or tired of God, but he is so amazing and wonderful! May we never tire of putting our trust in God, letting him launch us out in faith, seeing where he takes us, run after his will, and all the while turning to him to say, "Let's do that again!"
Sunday, June 27, 2010
"That's Weird"
Monday
We certainly have an interesting fleet. It really seems like the vans rotate between being in and out of commission. The big van's brakes were making a clicking sound this morning, so we had our mechanic friend come over to look at it, and he and Nancy fixed it up. This is the van with no visibility out the rear view mirror (since there is insulation covering most of the inside, including the back windows), and only a quarter of the original visibility out of the driver side mirror, since one 3x3 inch patch is all that shows through the duct tape that holds the mirror together after some long-ago accident. The back doors are a bit odd as I have described before, and the molded plastic piece that belongs between the front seats (it has the ashtray, cigarette lighter, and cupholders) currently inhabits a spot in the front yard right between two computer monitors. The left turn signal runs on manual operation.
So today we were restricted to the smaller van, the caravan. This vehicle has a large curved gash in the windshield, an arc scratched out by the metal arm of an old windshield wiper that no longer had a blade. The back door doesn't open, the gas tank can only be filled three quarters of the way, as a leak will waste any additional gas you might add. While station surfing this morning, Jason explained to me that the radio only receives certain stations, and *Hot 97 Boston* is not among them. Immediately after he had explained this, we caught just two words from the next station: "That's weird."
Eh. Not a bad vehicle for $200 bucks though. And the big van was only $1400.
We certainly have an interesting fleet. It really seems like the vans rotate between being in and out of commission. The big van's brakes were making a clicking sound this morning, so we had our mechanic friend come over to look at it, and he and Nancy fixed it up. This is the van with no visibility out the rear view mirror (since there is insulation covering most of the inside, including the back windows), and only a quarter of the original visibility out of the driver side mirror, since one 3x3 inch patch is all that shows through the duct tape that holds the mirror together after some long-ago accident. The back doors are a bit odd as I have described before, and the molded plastic piece that belongs between the front seats (it has the ashtray, cigarette lighter, and cupholders) currently inhabits a spot in the front yard right between two computer monitors. The left turn signal runs on manual operation.
So today we were restricted to the smaller van, the caravan. This vehicle has a large curved gash in the windshield, an arc scratched out by the metal arm of an old windshield wiper that no longer had a blade. The back door doesn't open, the gas tank can only be filled three quarters of the way, as a leak will waste any additional gas you might add. While station surfing this morning, Jason explained to me that the radio only receives certain stations, and *Hot 97 Boston* is not among them. Immediately after he had explained this, we caught just two words from the next station: "That's weird."
Eh. Not a bad vehicle for $200 bucks though. And the big van was only $1400.
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