don't wait

Something Divine?

2011-07-23T15:33:00.000-07:00

I sometimes wonder how God can unconditionally love every human on the planet. So often I am exposed to the unloveliness of humanity. We are rude, short, selfish, outspoken, vain, childish... complete the list with your own personal pet peeves. It's easy to see the worst in others, their shortcomings, their insecurities... it's also easy to see those things in myself. I suppose I can just as easily (if not moreso!) wonder how a righteous God could harbor feelings of infinite love for me.

Yet... there are moments, and I never know exactly when they are coming, when I feel like I share a piece of this same unconditional love for all of humanity. Perhaps I am in an airport, and I see someone sleeping slumped-over, mouth agape, and I have this rush of affection for this stranger. Maybe a cab driver smiles at me. An employee is stocking milk in the dairy section of the supermarket and I get a taste of our Father's furious love for his child.

I love these moments. I wish I could live there all the time.

Deep Thoughts While Chilling in My Hotel Room

2011-05-23T08:10:00.000-07:00

When you are young and growing up, a very common question is, Who do you want to be when you grow up? A fireman? A lawyer? A doctor? An athlete? And then you get secondary school, high school, and the question becomes more pertinent. Which college should you go to? Which major should you declare? It's always with a forward look, thinking, planning, studying, working hard... to become this person that you have imagined and planned yourself to be.

Lately I've been having the realization: I am that person. Perhaps that's a tardy revelation at 34 years of age, but I guess you can't really time these things. This is who I am. And that's not to say that I don't have the ability or desire to continue to grow and change and develop and mature... but in some many ways, who I will become is all right here in who I am right now. It's a startling realization.

Now the next question is, am I happy with that person?

That, my friend, is a much tougher question.

MousePhone! Get yours today!

2011-05-09T12:24:00.001-07:00

"Can I hold him?"

2011-05-03T12:42:00.001-07:00

Hi Internet!

2011-04-15T15:47:00.000-07:00

Well it's been about two years now, so I thought I would create a new post for my blog. Actually, it's more of a test to see if this will still show up in people's RSS feed. Why write if no one reads it?

Let's take a vote, shall I fire this blog back up again??

Heroic Images or NASA Fraud?

2009-07-25T20:55:00.001-07:00

Awesomeness

2009-07-17T07:26:00.000-07:00

True Plight (or Flight?)

2009-07-12T14:07:00.000-07:00

Star Dust

2009-05-19T14:09:00.000-07:00

Time lapse video of the night sky as it passes over the 2009 Texas Star Party.

Galactic Center of Milky Way Rises over Texas Star Party from William Castleman on Vimeo.

BBC on Craig Mundie

2009-05-13T14:21:00.000-07:00

BBC did a piece on the Microsoft Home, which my team is responsible for, and also a short interview with Craig, our boss.

Fire Alarm Jam Session

2009-05-13T11:00:00.000-07:00

Maybe next time Microsoft has a fire alarm test, instead of exiting the building we will try this instead:

Must See Movie!

2009-05-13T10:55:00.001-07:00

So I went out and watched Star Trek last night with some friends. Excellent! Very much enjoyed it.

However, I think this upcoming movie is going to blow away even the cinematic thrill-level I experienced yesterday at Star Trek:

1,301 Fluorescent Lights

2009-05-05T16:50:00.000-07:00

Richard Box set up 1,301 fluorescent tubes powered only by the electric fields generated by overhead powerlines.

Cooking With Dog

2009-04-13T16:18:00.000-07:00

What's could possibly be funner than cooking a nice, tasty Japanese meal? Cooking it with a talking dog!

Rescuing Worms

2009-04-03T11:46:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, as I walked out of the loading dock area of one of our buildings here on Microsoft campus, I saw a worm stretching himself out full, heading straight into concrete loading area. I knew why he was doing it--rain was falling in sheets outside, and the soil had become over-saturated with water. Worms actually do respirate, but through their skin, and so he was basically suffocating and heading for dry ground. I also knew that he was going to wind up as a dried-out worm carcass, stuck to the bottom of some driver's shoe in a day's time at that rate. I had all of these thoughts as I walked past the worm out into the rain to my car.

And I had to turn back.

A small, insignificant saving of a single worm. What's the use? I can't think of any reason for it. But I went back and picked up my little moist, wiggling friend and chucked him out into a patch of soil and plants. And I felt better about it. I did.

The Sartorialist

2009-03-18T15:23:00.000-07:00

So, thanks to my good friend Esther Maria Swaty, I have become a fan of a website called The Sartorialist. It's a fella who wanders around the street and finds very fashion-forward folks to snap impromptu shots of. The world of fashion is a very strange animal. Sometimes you think, Oh yeah, that's sweet! Like that look. And other times it's more like ??? How on earth is that stylish?

A couple from today that made me raise my left eyebrow:

runorgt

2009-03-02T18:04:00.000-08:00

What is your name if you take your fingers from their asdf jkl; home position and shift them one character to the left on your keyboard?

Mine is: Runorgt.

Pretty awesome.

Argh! Why am I at work and not here right now??!

2009-02-25T15:03:00.000-08:00

menome

2009-02-20T21:07:00.001-08:00

tehn with two fifty six from tehn on Vimeo.

Classic!

2009-02-20T00:55:00.000-08:00

This is a telephonic exchange between a hotel guest and
roomservice at a hotel in Asia. It was recorded and
published in the Far East Economic Review:

Room Service: "Morny. Ruin sorbees."
Guest : "Sorry, I thought I dialed room-service."
RS : "Rye. Ruin sorbees..morny! Djewish to odor sunteen??"
Guest: "Uh..yes..I'd like some bacon and eggs."
RS: "Ow July den?"
G: "What??"
RS: "Ow July den - fry, boy, pooch?"
G: "Oh, the eggs! How do I like them? Sorry, scrambled, please."
RS: "Ow July dee bayhcem - crease?"
G: "Crisp will be fine"
RS: "Hokay. An San tos?"
G: "What?"
RS: "San tos. July San tos?"
G: "I don't think so"
RS: "No? Judo one toes??"
G: "I feel really bad about this, but I don't know what
'judo one toes' means."
RS: "Toes! toes!..Why djew Don Juan toes? Ow bow singlish
mopping we bother?"
G: "English muffin!! I've got it! You were saying 'Toast.'
Fine. Yes, an English muffin will be fine."
RS: "We bother?"
G: "No..just put the bother on the side."
RS: "Wad?"
G: "I mean butter - just put it on the side."
RS: "Copy?"
G: "Sorry?"
RS: "Copy...tea...mill?"
G: "Yes. Coffee please, and that's all."
RS: "One Minnie. Ass ruin torino fee, strangle ache,
crease baychem, tossy singlish mopping we bother honey
sigh, and copy....rye??"
G: "Whatever you say."
RS: "Tendjewberrymud"
G : "You're welcome"

Mr. Joaquin Phoenix Seems to Have Lost His Ever-Loving Mind

2009-02-18T16:53:00.001-08:00

We're All Gonna Die

2009-02-16T11:48:00.000-08:00

100 meters of existence.

Do You Still Visit?

2009-02-08T14:19:00.000-08:00

Please comment. Love to know if folks still visit. If not, this blog may die, and that would be sad.

I'm Going Boarding All Day Friday!

2009-01-27T13:21:00.000-08:00

Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow...

Reasons to Like Windows 7

2009-01-26T10:19:00.001-08:00

So, maybe I drank the koolaid, but let me tell you: Windows 7 is gonna rock. I've been using the beta and they've made a ton of improvements. Don't believe me? Maybe you'll appreciate the opinion of the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times or cnet reviews.

Come on baby, we're back in the saddle! Though 5,000 people short...

Best Photo Ever

2009-01-16T15:55:00.000-08:00

Click on the photo for a larger version. The longer you study the photo, the better it gets.

Kickin' It in Vegas

2009-01-15T13:58:00.000-08:00

From left to right: Janet Galore, Me, Jonathan Cluts and Flora Goldthwaite. Janet and Flora are Program Managers on the team, Jonathan is the Director, and I'm the guy who makes stuff happen. Best folks EVER to work with.

Skill

2009-01-13T14:29:00.000-08:00

A lot of people at Microsoft are very smart, especially the people that I'm surround by daily working around strategy and research folks (which makes me wonder how I got the job). At a recent team meeting we had a guy come and talk to us about immersive computing (computing in the future will move away from monitors and small squares of computing space and will become more immersive = imagine your wall being a huge monitor).

But something he talked about was very interesting and paradigm-shifting. He asked the question, "What is skill?" How do you define skill? When you say that someone is skilled at something, what exactly does that mean? The opposite of skill is not unskilled. The opposite of skill is attention to each detail. To move from having to pay attention to every detail to "skill" is a process called aggregation. In this process, all of the detailed steps aggregate into a subroutine, which has minimal "load" on our attention.

Imagine driving a car. You are a skilled driver when you can perform all of the necessary individual steps without having to pay attention to them. When you are unskilled, you have to think about every action. Imagine a rock guitarist, who can play amazing riffs while discussing what he's going to do later that day with his friends. Skill = subroutines.

This is What I Do

2009-01-11T18:43:00.000-08:00

A demo around education that our team created, which was used at the Steve Ballmer keynote address at CES 2009.

Concentric Circles

2009-01-06T16:49:00.001-08:00

Breaking News: Series Of Concentric Circles Emanating From Glowing Red Dot

Facebook Kills Blogs

2008-12-16T16:40:00.001-08:00

Bloggers of the world should unite and fight against the powers of these new-fangled social networking services such as Facebook and MySpace. The energy that I would normally use to create a new blog post is now poured into keeping up to date on all the new status updates, posts, photos, and crazy Facebook apps that are out there. There's only a certain amount of free minutes in a day, and when Facebook is all finished, and a few twitters, with a smattering of random news feeds thrown in (maybe an RSS for SteepandCheap), what time do I have to create elaborate and interesting blog posts? And it's so much more work!

Is it really worth keeping up on blogging?

New Laptop!

2008-12-16T16:34:00.000-08:00

I have a new Lenovo X301 on the way... maybe not the prettiest laptop ever, but super light, super thin, super sturdy, a 128GB SSD and should do the trick.

Stumpy the Four-Legged Duck

2008-11-06T13:24:00.000-08:00

stumpy_version1 from ze frank on Vimeo.

Mexico City

2008-11-06T12:55:00.000-08:00

Remember my blog about Mexico City?

WHAT?

You don't remember it? Sheesh, and I thought you were a loyal reader. It was such a deeply profound and inspiring post, too. Ok, here it is.

Anyway, I get to go there this month (Nov. 21-26)! I'm taking an extra couple of days to explore the city. Apparently Mexico City is a lively, exciting, and dangerous place. Stories like this one from last week make me a bit nervous, but since I'm not the heir of some multi-million dollar family, and I don't dress like a lawyer or banker, I'll be ok.

Muppet's Animal Caught Speeding!

2008-11-04T11:14:00.000-08:00

Some explanation: German traffic camera systems are designed for cars with the driver on the left and the car is a British Audi with the driver on the right. The German camera system automatically scrambles the image of the passenger in the right seat order to protect their privacy when it detects a “driver” (Animal) in the left seat of the vehicle. Although the German police have the license number, make, and model of the car, the camera system keeps scrambling the driver’s face, preventing them from fining the driver since German law requires the driver to be clearly identifiable in the image.

(from Gizmodo)

They're Going to Build This in Dubai

2008-10-29T16:22:00.002-07:00

From cnet:

"Undulation turns to fragmentation. "If you think they are five buildings, you are completely wrong. They are the same building, just changing every moment," Fisher said. The appearance at any given time--the variation at right looks uncannily like the advanced stages of a Jenga game--will depend on a number of factors, including the speed of individual floors, their acceleration, the direction each is facing, and the timing of a given floor to its neighbors. The floors of the tower are intended to move independently, and also slowly enough to keep residents from getting motion sickness.

In addition, the dynamic towers are supposed to be self-powered. That is, large wind turbines are to be mounted horizontally between floors, turning with enough frequency not only to generate electricity for the building itself, but also to create a surplus that could provide energy for neighboring structures. Solar energy could also be a component of the system, according to Fisher."

I love spicy beef Pho!

2008-10-21T11:48:00.000-07:00

I just like to eat it. I like to walk down to the cafeteria and order it from the older Vietnamese couple there. I like to put two spoons of plum sauce in it, along with a squeezed wedge of lime and several thin slices of fresh jalepeno pepper. I like to eat it with chopsticks. I like that I have to grab double napkins because of the sweat that breaks out on my brow as I eat it, and the snot that starts running. I like the feeling of being full of Pho, which isn't heavy and debilitating like a burger, or steak, or pasta.

If Pho were a woman, I would be courting.

If it were a car, I would only put premium unleaded in it. If it were a season, it would be a beautiful summer evening with a light breeze. If it were a boss, I would get a fat raise. If it were...

Well, you get the idea.

Livin' the Dream

2008-10-08T08:04:00.000-07:00

Boston

2008-09-26T10:27:00.000-07:00

So the last few days I've been in Boston, preparing for and supporting a presentation by Craig Mundie at the Emerging Technology Conference at MIT. Boston is a beautiful place, I wish I could have stayed a couple of days longer to check out the city.

Everything felt a bit last-minute with the demos... As it's not a MS event, I don't have all of the normal support guys that I'm used to seeing taking care of our demos. Somehow, everything came together at the last minute yesterday morning (got to the venue at 6:30 am to finish set up) and the presentation went very well. Then we hauled everything off-stage in 15 minutes, freighted it downstairs in the elevator, broke down all the properties, packed all hardware and shipping out at 2 pm, then flew out at 6 pm back home. Long, long day.

Here's an article about the presentation. It's fun to see something that you set up and ran on YouTube and CNet the very same day!

Grand Central Station

2008-09-14T16:36:00.000-07:00

While traveling the subway in NY last Friday I came into Grand Central Station and saw a clump of people gathered around... a voice was coming over some speakers... a familiar voice... who is that?

Frustration

2008-09-07T13:01:00.000-07:00

The below photo makes me angry in ways that I can not easily communicate:

Why, you ask, does this photo cause such strong emotions in your good friend, Tim Davis? I'm glad you asked. I would love to tell you about:

THE MOST AMAZING PHOTO THAT I HAVE EVER TAKEN WITH A CELL PHONE CAMERA IN MY LIFE!!!

It's not the above photo. Oh no. But let me start at the beginning.

I'm driving to work one innocuous Tuesday morning, when lo! I spy to my left a golden retriever sticking his whole upper body out of the back seat of a moving car, face to the wind, hair streaking back, paws clamped down to the outside of the car, and a pair of old-school aviator goggles on his noggin! Coolest thing ever, and I absolutely HAVE to capture the moment. The above photo was my first attempt, from two lanes over. I recognize even on my small phone screen that the shot was inadequate, so I race around the car in the lane to my left, cut them off, get right next to this car with dog, and *snap*... THE MOST AMAZING PHOTO I HAVE EVER TAKEN WITH A CELL PHONE CAMERA IN MY LIFE! It was perfect. It was something I could submit on some cute-pet-photo website and win money. It was like the dog knew I was taking the shot and posed just perfectly. I held my camera up and just admired the shot for some time. And then...

And then.

Then I pressed the Home button on my smartphone. This takes me back to the home screen. In a startling flash of realization, I knew that I did not press the "Save" button, which would take the captured shot and save it to my phone. No, I didn't press that button.

I had pressed a different button.

I trumpeted into my car in a high-pitched squeal "NO!" but it was too late. It was gone. And when I went to look at the photo that I was able to salvage, the dog is purposefully turning away from my phone, like he knew the whole time all that would transpire, he knew what would happen, how the cell phone camera gods were set to spite me on that most unfavorable morning on my commute to Microsoft.

PS. Click on the photo to see the larger image and the full spitefulness.

Life's Small Pleasures

2008-08-29T11:40:00.000-07:00

I've got them, and I know you do too.

The sound of a fresh can of tennis balls being opened.
Spicy beef Pho.
Brand-new socks.
The smell of a hot, summer day.

What are some of yours?

Optical Illusion

2008-08-28T17:14:00.000-07:00

So I know this will be hard for you to believe, but the two squares marked "A" and "B" below are exactly the same shade of gray.

This illusion occurs because our brain does not directly perceive the true colors and brightness of objects in the world, but instead compares the color and brightness of a given item with others in its vicinity.

Here's some more.

Famous

2008-08-28T16:54:00.000-07:00

Wow. I just found out that I'll be flying with Craig on his private jet for his upcoming College Tour in October. So I suppose this experience will, in part, make up for the fact that I'll be traveling and working on my birthday, October 8th. We'll be hitting 5 universities in 5 days: Princeton, NYU, U of Mich., UC Berkeley, UC San Diego.

Good times! I love my job.

This is the one.

2008-08-09T16:59:00.000-07:00

Door Ding

2008-08-06T15:00:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I did a terrible thing. I felt really bad afterwards, and had to pray and ask God to forgive me.

You think I'm joking, but I'm not, and I would like to confess my sin to you.

I had a site visit at the University of California San Diego yesterday. The PR person and I stopped by a Jamba Juice after the meeting at the University was finished up. When I went to get back into the towncar that was driving us around, I swung the door open and it popped open much easier than I expected and bumped into the rear door of the car next to me. "Oops," I muttered, and got into the towncar. As I looked at where the door where it had hit, there was a definite ding mark. I thought, I should leave a note or something, but this PR person was in the car, and the driver was already talking and ready to pull away. Then I noticed that there was a guy sitting in the driver's seat on the phone! He was looking back at me through the tinted window and gesticulating, talking on the phone, probably saying something like, "Dude, this guy just smacked my car with his door and now he's taking off!" I felt mortified, and as we backed out, the guy was getting out of his car to check out the damage. Then I could see that it was actually a pretty good little dent, and a skosh of paint had chipped off. It was a Volkswagon in decent shape. But I still didn't say anything, and we slowly drove out of the parking lot.

And I had that sick feeling in my stomach.

Why didn't I get out and give him a business card, offer to pay for the repair? Why did I just remain silent?

So there it is, and I had to work through the bad emotions and guilt and ask God to forgive me, because I have absolutely no way of getting a hold of that guy now.

Claytronics

2008-07-31T16:06:00.000-07:00

Some of your are wondering, "Gosh, Tim, you have this job that is supposedly on the cutting edge of technology. What kinds of stuff are you guys working on?"

This is an example of the future of technology: Physical Dynamic Rendering with millions of tiny, microscopic robots. Could you imagine all of the potential applications?

Japanese Style "Popping"

2008-07-27T20:40:00.001-07:00

Long Awkward Pose

2008-07-23T18:45:00.000-07:00

This is a great website. The idea is simple: People look foolish when posing for a picture. So tell your loved ones you would like to take their photo... then secretly videotape them the whole time.

Here's some results.

Mugshot

2008-07-10T12:52:00.001-07:00

At first I was amazed to see a mugshot of Bill Gates... but then I was suddenly swept up in his shirt/sweater combination. Wow. He seriously took geek to a whole new level. Props, Bill!

Rocco!

2008-07-06T21:42:00.001-07:00

So I am once again Uncle Tim. I love it! I'll be that crazy uncle that shows up and teaches the wee boy about the crazier side of life... hunting for frogs, how to make sushi bombs, proving that you can turn your poop green by eating too many Otter Pops.

A gorgeous little Rocco:

Giant Traffic Cones

2008-06-24T15:05:00.000-07:00

Need I say more?

I snapped these with my phone.

I Do, Robot

2008-06-23T18:20:00.001-07:00

An exerpt from this article about the future of robotics, and the way humans relate to them:

"An artificial intelligence researcher predicts that robotics will make such dramatic advances in the coming years that humans will be marrying robots by the year 2050.

"Robots will become so human-like -- having intelligent conversations, displaying emotions and responding to human emotions -- that they'll be very much like a new race of people, said David Levy, a British artificial intelligence researcher whose book, "Love and Sex with Robots," will be released on Nov. 6."

Lord Jesus, let it never be.

My Office

2008-06-23T18:14:00.001-07:00

Because I know you've been curious to know what my workspace looks like:

I think it's pretty amazing that I get paid to play with robots. His name is iRobi Q.

My cool no-chance-in-hell-I'm-ever-gonna-turn-on-my-ceiling-flourescents lamps.

Strategic Prototyping

2008-06-19T12:41:00.000-07:00

We are famous! This is Jonathan Cluts, director of our team at Microsoft. Here's the full article in the Seattle PI.

Jakarta Pics

2008-06-14T14:49:00.000-07:00

Doubtless if you tried clicking the link on the previous post regarding these photos, you weren't able to view them.

I've posted them to my Flickr photostream for you. I think this is the correct URL to use, so if you can't get there, let me know!

Sickness = Anger

2008-06-14T13:40:00.000-07:00

Perhaps you're the same as me in this regard, but when I start to feel those initial signs of getting sick (sore throat, maybe a touch of dizziness, fatigue), I usually get pretty angry. I HATE getting sick SO MUCH. I work hard not to get sick--eat pretty health, exercise often, take multivitamins, wash my hands often, don't hang out with sick folks. Doesn't seem right. And do you ever feel like a sickness magnet? I hate to hear of something "going around." It means I'll likely have a go at it.

Rrrrrrrgh!

Some People Have Too Much Money...

2008-05-30T11:30:00.000-07:00

This beauty was parked outside of Gold's Gym Redmond yesterday as I left the gym:

Daniel did a little research and we determined that this is indeed a Lamborghini Murcielago Roadster. Yeah. They only make 200 a year. It hits 110 MPH in second gear. It is, in a word, disgusting.

Fitness!

2008-05-29T15:29:00.000-07:00

Yip! It's good to get fit!

So I've had this unspoken, and now spoken, goal for quite awhile, but I'm just now coming to realize it: getting fit. No, I don't want to be cut, or chiseled, or ripped, or anything like that. Imagine every picture of a bodybuilder that you've ever seen, and now cut-n-paste my head onto that image. Scary. But I would like to get fit, like... develop an athletic build... so I could wear a fitted tee without a bit of a stomach-bulge pushing through the shirt, you know what I mean? And that simple, little, innocuous goal is actually a real challenge.

My biggest challenge isn't getting to the gym. Lately, I've been going 3-4 days of the week, sometimes 5 days, and just LOVING it. No, the big challenge is DIET. I just like to eat food. And I like to eat the food that I like to eat, not the food that I don't like to eat. Some foods that I like to eat that are probably getting me in trouble: beer (yes, it qualifies as a food-item in my world), cheese, burgers, cheeseburgers, fries, bread-items, and beer. Food that I will grow to enjoy much more as I force myself to eat it: salads, seafood, protein beverages, fruits, and steaks. Lots and lots of steaks.

The result? Looking like I don't "work out in a gym." Just looking....

Fit.

Car Wreck in the Parking Lot

2008-05-14T01:07:00.000-07:00

So today I had to run to a different MS building on campus, but I couldn't pull out because a security truck was parked right behind my car in the parking lot. I saw the security guard on his cell phone, pacing around... then I saw an Asian lady on her cell phone, and another guy on his cellphone. Then I saw the lady's car... smashed into the back of the fella's car. She had a shiny silver Audi, and she had run into a parked BMW M3, shiny black. Her front end and his back end were pretty mushed together. Then I heard the security guy saying, "You should get the owner of this car on the phone as he probably doesn't know his moonroof is pretty much gone." I noticed that the car NEXT to the BMW that was hit had the moonroof smashed out completely. When the security guy got off the phone, I asked how that moonroof had gotten smashed since there was no other damage to the car. He said, "You didn't see the light pole? Look!" and lo, the lady had FIRST completely taken out a light pole (which fell onto the car and smashed out the moonroof) and then smashed into the back of the BMW.

As he walked over to move his truck for me, I asked the security guard how she had managed to take down a light pole and smash into a parked car in a parking lot... "We haven't gotten that far yet."

Pics of Jakarta!

2008-05-14T01:05:00.001-07:00

Yes! I have them!

But I just uploaded them to Facebook and I don't want to do it all over again. You can check them out here.

New Job

2008-04-11T09:47:00.000-07:00

The long awaited post! I'm now a FTE employee of Microsoft! Yip!

I am working as a Operations Program Manager for the Strategic Prototyping team under Craig Mundie. Ok, what does that mean? Basically, Craig is the chief visionary of Microsoft, shouldering a lot of weight as Bill Gates steps down from day-to-day involvement in the company to devote himself full-time to his philanthropic pursuits. Our team exists to create compelling demos for Craig to demonstrate during his different presentations around the world. My role within that team is to provide end-to-end logistical and technical support for the demos as they travel. (ie - I may be heading to Jakarta, Indonesia in the beginning of May for a presentation on the future of health care) Craig is looking 5-10 years out at where technology will be taking us.

Obviously, this is a really, really, really cool job and I'm going to be greatly challenged in this new role. I plan to keep this blog updated with the latest and greatest cool techie stuff as I hear about it (as much as I'm allowed to!).

Another Excellent App

2008-03-17T14:33:00.001-07:00

I know, I know... what you REALLY want when you surf to my blog is some interesting, revealing, thought-provoking posts about life, love, and the pursuit of happiness. Instead, you get posts about neat apps you can download.

Well, here's another one.

It's called PicLens and I really don't even want to try and explain it. Just let me say that if you EVER find yourself browsing through photos on Google Images, Flickr, or other photo-sharing websites, this app is for you. It's really quite beautiful. Enjoy.

Another Weekly Team Meeting

2008-03-10T10:32:00.000-07:00

I'm enjoying the bets these guys are making...

Today's Team Meeting

2008-03-03T13:06:00.000-08:00

I walked into my team's weekly meeting a couple of minutes late and behold! Our chief technologist on the team was thus bedecked (without any explanation given):

Even as I snapped these photos with my phone, no explanation was given to me until the meeting adjourned, and Tom threw the hat on the table with relief. Apparently he lost a bet, and part of the deal was that he couldn't explain why he was wearing a witch's hat in our team meeting.

It's these kinds of things that bless me in a deep way.

Chris and Veronica!

2008-02-27T10:31:00.000-08:00

Just Now

2008-02-13T13:03:00.000-08:00

Walking from the cafeteria back to my building I passed a row of birch trees, shedding their skins like so many ancient treasure maps. The sun was picking and choosing pieces of the lawn, rhodedendrons, parking lot, buildings... I whistled loudly and for a moment I thought I heard reverb, as if the sound of my whistling were bouncing off the undersides of the dark storm clouds being pushed along by the chilly February wind. I whistled again and stopped, waiting to hear it, but there was no echo. I smiled for no good reason.

Nice moment.

Perfect Little App

2008-01-29T17:26:00.000-08:00

Do you ever wish that there was a nice little functional app that just did that one little thing that you need it to do? For free? And I don't mean a "free download", which we know just means that you can get the trial version for free which will do 90% of what you need it to do and then require you to register the product for a one-time fee of $14.99. Or maybe it will do 100% of what you want it to do but leave a big, fat watermark in the middle of the finished product, which won't go away until you buy the stupid software.

This evening I realized that something has been bothering me for some time now. Whenever I walk away from my workstation for any time at all, I lock my workstation (WindowsKey + L). And this always brings up a standard, ugly Vista whooshing-lines background which I just don't like. Why doesn't it post my desktop background up there? Wouldn't that be nice?

Well, let me show you the hotness that is now my logon screen background:

I can now lock my workstation with great joy. And here is the streamlined, free, wonderful little application which can change your logon screen graphic (and this is ALL it does).

Wooden Bike

2008-01-25T12:46:00.001-08:00

Yes, I know--for you hardcore bloggers out there, all of my constant linking to other interesting webpages is a kind of cop-out. Well, here's another pretty cool cop-out:

This kid created an entire bicycle made only out of wood and glue--including wheels, spokes, chain and gears. And it actually works. Pretty amazing.

Winter Wonderland

2008-01-15T09:07:00.000-08:00

How did you do in yesterday's snow?

I was trying to drive home in the worst of it down 148th and got stuck at an intersection when I had to stop and lose my momentum. Esther Maria had mentioned to me that the Mazda3 doesn't handle well in the snow... and I've discovered that she's absolutely correct. Plus my tires are at the end of their life with little tread and that doesn't help. So I was stranded at a Shell station, not wanting to risk the drive home, wondering how I would make it the rest of the way home. All I had was a T-shirt and fleece, no jacket, so I bought a pack of trash bags and put one on like a jacket and stood outside at a bus-stop, hoping to hitch a ride on a Metro bus. I had a nice chat with Cesar who was also waiting for the bus and spoke absolutely zero English. Cesar is from Guatemala, so I blew the dust off my Spanish speaking abilities and discovered that he works at McDonalds down the street and is going to school to learn English.

Ultimately it quit snowing and the roads looked a smidge better so I wish Cesar well and was able to drive home without further incident.

Now I'm at work and this is the view in front of me out the window:

2008

2008-01-14T10:32:00.001-08:00

It's a new year! And a new season! And I'm turning over a new leaf! And under this particular leaf, Tim Davis once again blogs regularly!

Check back often!

This is exciting!

!!!!

Memory Lane

2008-01-10T13:31:00.001-08:00

Sometimes I randomly click on archived months from years past. Here's a particularly interesting post about having my wisdom teeth removed from January two years ago. Fun times!

http://timothydavis.blogspot.com/2006_01_01_archive.html

This Guy Had Too Much Time on His Hands over Christmas Break

2008-01-10T13:21:00.000-08:00

A re-creation of the battle of Minas Tirith from Lord of the Rings... in candy.

You are my true friend if...

2007-11-24T14:23:00.000-08:00

... you still check this blog regularly!

I am guilty of subjecting my blog to severe neglect once again. Here's an odd blogging paradox: The busier you get, the more things you have to blog about, and the less time you actually want to take to blog. That pretty much tells the story.

In short, had a lovely Thanksgiving at my condo with family (sister Niki, her boyfriend, my niece Amethyst and nephew Aaron, and my brother Stephen) eating lots of turkey and whatnot. Working feverishly on getting everything finished for the Christmas play at church (You're invited! For more info, click here). Thinking and praying about my next step of employment (contract at Microsoft ends in May). Bought airline tickets to Phoenix for Christmas (ever seen a cactus decked out in Christmas lights?) along with Stephen, to spend with Mom and Grandma.

There you have it. Hope you're digesting all of your leftovers well!

Wines and drugs are total destruction weapons.

2007-11-15T10:45:00.000-08:00

Gotta love foreign signs translated into English (click on the picture to read it more clearly).

Electrifying

2007-09-27T13:06:00.001-07:00

Looking for a new line of work? Maybe this gives you some ideas...

BELIEVE

2007-09-25T10:46:00.001-07:00

Halo-caust

2007-09-22T12:15:00.001-07:00

A very witty video satire on the huge Halo 3 hype.

Saltwater Fuel

2007-09-14T08:24:00.001-07:00

This is Where I Work

2007-09-05T11:00:00.000-07:00

So blogs are supposed to be places where you share things about yourself with other people. I figured today I would give you a little tour of Building 35, where I work at Microsoft.

This is my little happy office space. I recently had to change offices twice in the space of two weeks. Yes, the view is nice, but I share what used to be a single executive's office with four other people. Here they are, hard at work!

As a lab engineer, a lot of my work is done in our server labs. They don't let just anybody into these inner sanctums of technological wonder: here I'm scanning by badge to get into the lab.

And this is what is looks like inside.

Lots and lots of servers. Below is a job that I did a couple of months ago... I installed 40 servers in these racks and cabled them. It may look like a jumbled mess to you, but I assure you it all makes sense.

Today I'm working on storage arrays for these Dell 2950s.

The thing with the blue light is the storage array. It's basically just an enclosure with a whole bunch of hard drives for storage. In this single array there are fifteen 300 GB hard drives.

If you do the math, that's 4 1/2 TB (terabytes) of storage. (Yeah, that's quite a lot.)

Out in the front lobby we also have another very, very important item that I also spend a lot of time working on:

And you'll never go thirsty when you're on MS campus with all of the free beverages:

Yep, a pretty great place to work!

All Natural, Baby!

2007-09-05T10:59:00.001-07:00

Life

2007-08-29T21:47:00.000-07:00

So sometimes I get this overwhelming feeling of being alive. I can't quite explain it. I may be driving in my car, windows down, sun shining, or perhaps I'm walking down a hallway on Microsoft campus. Maybe I just grabbed a Vitamin Water from the fridge. Yet in a moment I feel exceptionally vital, alive, breathing, here. I really enjoy the feeling, and it usually doesn't last for long. Not sure what it's all about.

Mountain Men

2007-08-06T15:47:00.000-07:00

Last Saturday Tom and I found our way up the 3-mile trek to Mason Lake in the Cascades. A very nice hike, in spite of the cloud that got stuck on the mountaintop, and of course the company was stellar. At the lake we jumped in and swam out to the middle, opening our eyes under water and staring down into the crystalline melon-green depths.

Early Morning

2007-08-01T10:16:00.001-07:00

Me and a few fellas (Daniel, James, and Dusty) got together this morning to help Mark Harmsworth's campaign by doing a lit drop through some apartment complexes. Because of the nature of apartments (managers prowling around, waiting to waylay anyone passing out literature) we had to do it early in the morning... 6 AM early. Good times.

Then I decided since I was in Mill Creek to stop by Tom Hallstrom's house to grab my sunglasses which I had left over there on Sunday. Now, I just so happen to know that Tom is working 4PM-12AM shifts this week, so 8 AM was most likely still sleepy time for Tom. But did that stop me from driving there and knocking chirpy beats on his door while ringing his doorbell until he came and answered, bleary-eyed and none-too-happy with Tim? No. No it didn't stop me.

With friends like me, who needs enemies? But hey, with glasses this cool on a sunny day like today, can I really be blamed? (Don't answer that, Tom)

2007-07-26T11:54:00.001-07:00

Terrible! Just terrible! I have been the perpetrator of severe blog-neglect. I apologize to all of my regular visitors (and random ones too). New and interesting post coming shortly....

Short Funny Clip

2007-06-25T09:33:00.001-07:00

What's the hardest part about being you?

Moustache

2007-06-19T12:58:00.000-07:00

The rumors are true. And here's a video for proof.

Eggs

2007-06-16T17:03:00.000-07:00

So my flatmate, Daniel, has taken to boiling entire dozens of eggs at a time to pack with him for various meals and snacks. I recently munched down a couple of these bad boys only to be reminded how tasty and healthy a good hard-boiled egg is, especially with a touch of salt sprinkled on. Great in protein also!

I'm cooking some on the stove right now.

When was the last time you enjoyed the goodness of a hard-boiled egg?

New Car

2007-06-11T13:09:00.000-07:00

So I bought one! A Mazda 3 s, a sporty little zoom-zoom hatchback. It is much fun to drive.

Unfortunately, using words like "sporty" and "zoom" in relation to a car trigger the ultra-sensitive receivers of all car insurance agencies out there. They can smell the higher payments, the more "comprehensive" coverage required by loan companies, the collision insurance. I had a conversation this morning with my insurance agent and this is about how it went, tweaked a bit to adjust for how I actually HEARD it...

"John S Hunter agency, John Junior speaking."

"Hey John, this is Tim Davis."

"Oh hi Tim."

"Hey. I just bought a new car and I need to look at switching my insurance over to cover this car, as well as adding comprehensive and collision to the policy."

"Sure, no problem, let me boot up the computer here. Slow computer day. Mondays and Fridays are slow computer days. Ah, here we go. A 2004 you said? Four-door hatchback? Comprehensive and collision... with a $500 deductible? Ok.... one moment. Looks like your insurance policy is going to be $1 hundred bazillion more dollars for a six-month policy."

"$1 hundred bazillion? Seriously? That sounds like a lot... how much is that a month?"

"An arm, a leg, and the life of your firstborn child."

"Wow... I knew it was going to be a bit more expensive, but not THAT expensive. Is that a good rate? I mean, is that a competetive rate for this insurance policy?"

"It actually is. I'll switch you over today, and the change will be reflected on your next month's bill... pro-rated at $1,258,221.83."

"Wow. I really wasn't budgeting that into my car payments. That's really a lot."

"Thanks for your business! Let me know if I can help you with anything else."

So I did a bit of searching around on my own and found a policy through Geico (no, they're not paying me to say this) for only $20 more a month than my current policy on my old beater Ford Escort, and that is adding comprehensive and collision.

I let John know that I wouldn't be needing his services anymore.

Global Photo

2007-06-07T16:56:00.000-07:00

Oh wow, this demo is just amazing. And if you're interested in demoing Photosynth yourself, you can get it from Microsoft Live Labs.

The Future is Now

2007-06-01T17:11:00.000-07:00

Ever heard of surface computing? Remember the movie Minority Report? Well the future is now...

One Click

2007-05-28T11:05:00.000-07:00

Pretty creative. I like it when they're all just standing looking up at you, waiting for your next move.

Crazy Car

2007-05-22T12:09:00.000-07:00

So I walked out of Gold's Gym the other day and behold! I saw a pretty amazing car. (I only had my phone, so the photos aren't the highest quality.)

A Project by Yann Arthus-Bertrand

2007-05-19T21:04:00.000-07:00

Six billion Others.

Brain Camera

2007-05-18T12:24:00.000-07:00

So I was walking along outside today on my way to lunch and I was thinking about yesterday when I was walking back from the cafeteria, how I saw a small brown bunny chasing a crow in the grass, and how I wished that I would have had my camera at that moment to capture the little escapade, but carrying my camera around with me all the time would be a bother, even though it is pretty small and sleek and stylish... and I thought how nice it would be to have a very small but high-quality camera that I could have hanging from my keychain to capture such moments, and how technology will bring us to that place, surely... but then I took it a step further and thought about one day having a device that could capture exactly what my eyes are capturing, like tapping into my optic nerves and recording everything I'm visually seeing realtime, but I surmised that we're probably a long way out from that right now, since if we even play around with an optic nerve at all, it dies.

And THAT, my friends, was my thought... and also all one sentence. :)

All In a Day's Work

2007-05-17T11:01:00.000-07:00

So I have a new job at Microsoft! Well, I technically work for Siemens and am a contractor for Microsoft. I work with the SQL Labs group in building 35, the team that supports all of the different labs used by the folks who create and test Microsoft SQL Server. It's a great job and pays well, but it's definitely a bottom-rung job, a foot in the door which will hopefully open up to bigger and better things.

Part of my job is yanking old hardware out of the labs and helping to install new hardware. The below photo shows some (not all!) of the gear that another contractor Mark and I pulled out of the labs yesterday to simply throw away. Mark said that if I could see an open field where they put everything that was thrown away from the Microsoft campus in one day, I would be shocked.

(Those servers aren't small, by the way.)

Bloomsday Run

2007-05-07T16:59:00.000-07:00

Well I'm not actually as sore today as I thought I would be! Armando, his wife Lisa and friend Katie and myself ran the Bloomsday Run yesterday. For me it was my first time... and it was a blast! It's a big deal over there in Spokane... all of the news channels are covering it live, thousands of people show up to support the runners and over 40,000 people ran (I think).

Here are my stats. (And no, I didn't walk Doomsday Hill!)

Sufjan Stevens

2007-05-02T22:27:00.000-07:00

The other night when I was at Tyler and Bianca's house doing the latest video bulletin shoot, Tyler had some fantastic, whimsical music playing on his stereo. "Who is this?" "Sufjan" "Oh, this is Sufjan!" Then I remembered that Gus had told me about Sufjan Stevens and played some of his music for me while I was in Spokane last time visiting... then Tom Hallstrom reminded me that he had played Sufjan for me at my condo once while visiting. Yet it was this final exposure to him that convinced me to purchase his latest album "Come On, Feel the Illinoise!" Amazing. Go ahead and think of any box, any size and shape and color and genre and title, and you cannot place this album into that box.

Do You See What I See?

2007-04-25T15:21:00.000-07:00

Mount Si

2007-04-24T10:57:00.000-07:00

What better way to spend a day of unemployment than hiking to the top of Mt. Si, scrambling up the haystack and praying to God? I had this idea last week. The cool thing is that on Sunday Graham was praying for me after the service and he said that he heard the words, "No service" while praying. He asked God what that meant and saw a cell phone with no bars of service, and that sometime to get service you have to hold the phone up high or get it up to a place where there's reception. Confirmation. I didn't receive any specific words from God to write down, probably because I didn't ask Him any specific questions, yet I definitely felt His presence up there and got connected up.

The hike also kicked my butt.