Two-Fer

Yep, down in the South, we do talk funny, but then y'all sound funny to me. Lordy, I've been flying outta Nashville too much.

Life IS about laughing.

I just got to meet my newest grandson and watch my daughter get her PhD: Grand and grad in one day. Cool, ain't it?

Grand is cute. Not just because he's mine but also because he has a Mohawk... a big clump of hair smack in the middle of his pun'kin head. Daughter is doing a great job with him, even though he wears her out. At three weeks old, he's an eating machine and mom's the eats.

Grad did very well. Getting her PhD is a big deal. It was five years of hard work, and the last 9 months of which she was pregnant! I am very proud of her for this accomplishment. And to top it off, she's starting a career job soon! I wish I could look at her face as she reads her first pay stub deductions and wonders who's swiping her money.

- © 2012 by Willy

Mamas, Let Your Babies Grow Up To Be Coders

Life is not fair. Not for geniuses and not for the rest of us. The trick is to keep at it... whatever "it" is... ignoring the jeers and hearing the cheers.

Some of us have our own language, whether it's music, math or space. To a very bright 8-year-old, questions abound: Where does dirt come from? How do we balance on two little feet when we're much, much taller than these feet? How much does a bicycle tire act like a top? Why does water accept that extra oxygen atom to become hydrogen peroxide? Why does rocket fuel burn instead of explode? And how do we start that burn? How does an orbiting satellite resist the subzero cold of space on one side and the relentless sun on the other? How much does the earth rotation centripetal acceleration counter gravity effects? The wonder and questions are endless, at any age.

Every good engineer I know has some degree of Asperger's autism, obsessive-compulsion and attention-deficit hyperactivity... myself included. It's a recipe... it's what we're made of... and we're different.

As kids, we are easy targets for bullies to intimidate because we don't understand the social graces. What we do understand is that we can always be better at what we are. We stand alone. We thirst for knowledge. We must focus. Thus, with smug detachment, we continuously and repeatedly learn and apply what we know to obtain experience. With knowledge and experience comes not only the many significant contributions to space and science, but also success over bullies.

When mature, engineers contribute. I've contributed to produce many a machine. I've been published in over 140 technical reports, conference and journal papers, newspaper and magazine articles... even a poem about a machine. And I am now mentoring many young engineers on how to quench their own thirst.

The true engineer flowers late. We surpass and outlast the smug bullies and suave louses. I've had the satisfaction of ordering a burger from one of my school bullies... no fries with that... who had trouble giving me back change for a hundred dollar bill, at which I smiled. At one of the reunions, the bald fat captain of my High School football team tried to sell me insurance, as the fat former head cheerleader flirted, at which I had to laugh.

It's possible we might even outlive them.


- © 2012 by Willy

To Some Degree

People are not good or bad, not black or white, but shades of grey and hues of colors. We are all different, and we don't all think alike, but there's more to it than that. It seems to me that we all may have some amount of mental illness, i.e., we're all a little crazy. Specifically, it seems to me that the recipee for a good engineer scientist is equal parts smarts, anti-social, Asperger's, OCD and ADD/hyperactivity... or otherwise they wouldn't be good engineers.

Every good male engineer or scientist I've known had some degree of emotional issue and came unequipped to cope. The nerdy, geeky engineer's only saving grace was that he made a good living. Unfortunately, that drew the wrong girls. The engineer then got distracted by relationship and subsequent marriage and lost his edge, therefore losing his career, his marriage, his assets and his mind. The girl that understood did quite well, considering marriage a profitable business arrangement with a long time-constant. The engineer was not interested and didn't understand the expectation, time sequence nor duration and repeated the process a few times in his lifetime, bumping into love, when he should have instead understood what he is... good technically but incapable of social interaction nor romantic love. Read Einstein's life (or the many others). And, yes, me too.

The young engineer that understands early on, and does not succumb, has an tremendous, fulfilling career of significant contribution and great mental health. The engineer that understands in mid-life does contribute, to some limited extent, and finds calmness in life with the help and brotherly love of friends. The ones that never get it just waste their lives.

It would be like a tall thin kid trying to wrestle, or a powerlifter trying track. It just don't work. Gotta use your given talents.

- © 2010 by Willy

Accept

I've long known that people aren't machines, and that relationships aren't equations.


That thought comes up often. Whenever I meet a difficult person (I dealt with two of them at a wedding yesterday), my thoughts automatically go to the fact that I'm glad I live alone with my machines. I tolerate rude people for a short time but am glad that I don't have to deal long-term with them... I go home and they go to their unfortunate spouses.

Relationships only work if you can stand the pain, and I won't. I detach. My life is full, exciting, tiring and surprising, but there is no longer room for the excitement of adversity. I'm truly thankful that I am where I am. It has been an active choice. Relaxing solo is my great joy, and adventure is my excitement.


- © 2010 by Willy

Yes, Another Wedding and Reunion

Seems that the family only gets together for weddings and funerals. Flew in late Friday, returned Sunday. Another quickie. My fortysomething second cousin Juan married Nancy this weekend. He was laughing and she was crying, and I hope this isn't ever turned around on him like it did me. The priest was eloquent and the food was great. Nobody wrote "Help Me" on the soles of his shoes. It was nice to see the family, specially those that I hadn't seen in decades. Motel great, with free gym across the street. My flight uneventful. The rental car people ripped me off, but that's what I get for using the biggest.

It was the family that made it a pretty darned good weekend overall.

The Happiness Epidemic

Happiness can be caught like the flu. Yesss!

We are social animals. We share the flu, and we share our behavior too. Just like being fit is "in" and smoking is "out," other social behavior, like happiness, can catch on. We can catch a case of Happy. Or, conversely, happiness propagates... like kindness.

Time magazine reported in a terrific article last Christmas that Harvard social scientist Dr. Nicholas Christakis and UC San Diego's James Fowler announced last year the results of a 20-year study of 5,000 people showing that emotions can pass among a network of people. Your happiness may be determined by your friends' friends. Or your happiness can infect your friends and, in turn, their friends. What a nice flu to catch!

This might explain why we like happy people and like to hang around them. Birds of a feather flock together.

How the hub (me!) becomes happy to begin with is based upon a positive attitude... and a decision. But the point is that it goes both ways... I can draw happiness as well as generate it.

Everything matters... everything you do and say has positive (or negative) repercussions. Want to make your world better? Be happy, be kind, and be a good example.


- © 2009 by Willy

Again to Social Bike Riding

I'm not used to bicycle riding with others, but did go a couple of hours today to accompany my friend Dave and some of his pack. This was Dave's first ride since he collided with a truck during a descent about a month ago. He had said he needed a wheel but it was me who was sucking wheel. Groups have a way of getting you motivated. Conversely, riding solo means that you can slow down to any speed, sightsee and lollygag... and lose fitness.

Now, I do like to sightsee and lollygag. It's a quiet time to observe nature, think and pray... but I do recognize that I need my fitness too to keep the pounds off and the juices flowing. A good friend of mine my age went into the hospital this weekend... yes, Thanksgiving... with congenital heart failure.

Our ride today was between one rainstorm and another. Early today it was raining buckets, then it was sunny briefly while we rode, and I got back home at about the time the sky opened up again. Our timing was good and with temps in the 40's, it was a nice ride.

And, no, I decided not to go up into the Smokeys to do some cold weather backpacking because of the precip added to the temps meant road closures like last weekend's. Instead, I hiked locally, hit the gym and biked today. I'll try again over the Christmas weekend.

- © 2008 by Willy
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