Boss (looking out window): Did you see my new car?
mike d: which one is it?
Boss: The one in the far corner.
mike d: whoa, did you get a good deal?
Boss: yeah, the guy tried to screw me at first. . . but then I pulled out my programmable calculator.

We have a Ping Pong table here at work. But we don’t just stroll upstairs and Ping the Pong. no no. It’s a slaughterhouse up there. There are two giant holes in the wall from when Bill slammed into the wall when going for a shot. There are broken paddles. There are smashed balls. It’s a war zone.

Victor has purchased two personal paddles, each for over 100 dollars. And V is able to put so much spin on the ball that space time begins to tear.

While everyone else is skipping the ball into the corners, I’m lobbing them high and mighty. yes, I think it’s fair to say that my abilities are a bit less toned than anyone elses. I’m not upset by this. Because of my weakness I’m usually paired with kingpin V. And we do alright.

Do you want to know the REAL definition of extreme?

Check this out.

UPDATE:

even better.

Incredibly intelligent.

Super Mario!

Worthy of the internet crown: Super Mario Flash!
click on the picture on the left to play the video. And be sure to watch the sequels.

A NEW DEFY SHAUN McQUAID HAS BEEN PUBLISHED!

I was driving to work this morning and I saw a guy with the decepticons logo on the front of his car.

This leads me to one of two conclusions

A. he is just a cool guy who knows how awesome the transformers are
B. his Chevy wagon can transform into a huge fighting machine

I’m currently working on some very interesting work. My goal is to try and manipulate variables within the solid modeling program that we use so that it will do my work for me. Sounds geeky? perhaps. But it also holds some huge potential for cutting down the required amount of engineering work for your standard job here at TTool. I hope to be done in a month.

In other news, we went rock climbing last night and I tried a 5.12. I failed miserably. In fact, I could barely do the first move. What amazed me most is that the move required an extremely unusual muscle in my side. After I tried twice I had to stop, simply because this one odd muscle in my side was a bonfire of pain. How unusual.

If you’d like to come rock climbing, send me an e-mail. i’m trying to get as many new people as possible before May 15th so that I can win a free rope.

The Question

February 9th, 2005 at 4:13 pm
Shaun,

I have a print of a photograph by Robert Doisneau hanging in the stairwell of my apartment. The piece is called Le Bouquet de Jonquilles (or Bouquet of Daffodils) and can be seen here:

http://www.art.com/asp/sp-asp/_/PD–10063945/sOrig–CRT/sOrigId–787/The_Bouquet_of_Daffodils__Paris_1950.htm?ui=C958674B218E4097AB1BCDC5840C8484

Every time I pass by I admire the shoes on the women in the photo. Shaun, where can I find such shoes as these? Who made them? Why are they so fabulous? Could they be even MORE amazing in color?

Jealous,
Jill

(more…)

there’s a new banner up on WPTopsite.

Jefte: No hard feelings, I’m just working the humor angle.

This weekend the House of Rock truly rocked. We had a bunch of visitors including Jesse’s bass-tastic cousin Tyler, his girlfriend Karen, Kurt and Shauna, and both H.C. Alicia and my sister Alicia. We went climbing on Friday and Saturday and my sister did quite well. Her confidence was impressive and she has some funky flute playing muscles in her hands that I’m sure helped her hold on to the walls.

As one would expect, we made an extra large pot of beans for the guests.

Karen had to skip out on the beans because she was a vegetarian, and our beans contained bacon, ground beef, and pork fat. her loss.

Technological advances like these will help prevent the existence of irritated people of the future.

JonAbad has helped me fix the comment problem.

It is repaired. Feel free to enjoy the newness by commenting on this post with accolades for Jon Abad.

All accolades must be in the form:
Jon Abad is the ________ in the _________ of my life.

.

P.S. New banner on WPTopsite

mike d: Wow, it’s a beautiful day.
Galecki: yeah, I’d rather be doing something else today
mike d: Anything else.
Galecki: pretty much. Except maybe walking on broken glass shards.

mike d’s complaining:
My right buttocks and right calf hurt.
My left hamstring and quad hurt.

But I still plan on going rock climbing tonight.

HoR news:
This weekend is a HUGE weekend at the House of Rock. We’re going to be doing some heavy housework. So if you have no plans and you’d like to experience true labor, please stop by.

Sitting down for the first time after the marathon. Tired, but happy.

Theresa and I finished the Marathon! It was extremely exciting. It took us just over 5 hrs. And we felt great.

The amount of energy was ridiculous. We were wearing bright yellow shirts that had our names blazoned across the front. Under Theresa’s name it said “run-zilla” under my name it said “run-asaurus”. The back of Theresa’s shirt said “Sister. Mom’s favorite” And mine said “Brother. Mom loves me more” The entire way people were screaming our names and applauding us. People for as far as the eye could see. There were well over 21,000 runners and at least that many fans. It took us a full 30 minutes before we even crossed the starting line.

It was hot. 70 degrees is hot for running. But people had hoses and were giving out oranges and plenty of water. Some little kids had their arms stretched out for high fives. As Theresa and I slapped his hand he muttered “848, 849,”

Wellesley was exciting. Theresa and I had a big “We ‘heart’ Wellesley” sign. And as we ran by, holding the sign above our heads, the students Exploded in cheers! Just a huge wall of sound! I was shouting and cheering back at them but I could barely hear my own voice. 1/2 mile of pure adrenalin.

The first 18-20 miles were fun, I felt powerful and comfortable without any real pain. I was just running off of all the energy and emotion. Theresa got a stomach cramp from 10-12 so that slowed us a hair, but it was good to take a few extra walking breaks. We hit heartbreak hill, and really? After training in Hilly Meriden and even hillier Kentucky, it didn’t seem all that bad. It was just a long slow grade hill. Heartbreak? Bah.

Once we passed Boston College, around mile 22, the mile markers seemed to get further and further apart. Theresa and I crossed the finish line together. I am extremely proud. And, I’m very happy to report that my knees were solid for the full 26.2 miles. I even took off my knee brace for the last 4 miles.

I will have to do this again next year.

completely unrelated…. check out this. Count the number of men. Wait for the animation to change…. and count the men again. Ta da! magic.

Meowtorpedo. a lot of Meowtorpedo.

The Marathon starts at noon, though my sister and I probably won’t cross the starting line until 12:20 or 12:30. We start in Hopkinton. Once it’s through, we’ll go through about 7 towns. Here’s the breakdown.

The first 8 miles or so are all downhill with a key stop at TJ’s food&spirits at mile 2 and a few lakes. Theresa and I are pretending that the first hour is just a warm up. We’ll “start” racing at mile 6.

At mile 9 we should be running by the Cochituate state park. If we’re keeping up to pace that should be around 2pm.

At 13.1 miles we cross Wellesley, which should be huge. Runners world describes it like this:

Because of the way the course bends, the celebrated shrieks of the school’s 2,400 students will reach your ears well before you pass by them. If you don’t get chils once you hit this gauntlet of sound, say even the most hard-boiled Boston vets, you must not have a pulse.

And with Theresa being a wellesley grad, I’m sure it’ll be even more exciting.

The next 6 miles or so, up to 17.5 are much more up and down. A few long upward grades. We’ll pass by the Newton Fire Station on Commonwealth Ave around 3:10pm. So if you happen to be in the area…

Heartbreak hill is at mile 20.5. Theresa, who has done this twice before, informs me that it’s a depressing hill because you turn a corner and it keeps going up.

After heartbreak is BC, which should be a party, and then we reach cemetery mile. It’s described like this in Runners World:

“I call it the Cemetery of Lost Hope,” Squires says. Treseler adds, “It’s really a no-man’s-land. All of a sudden, everything goes quiet. It’s very easy to become distracted or deflated.”

we should be running shortly after Hour 4.

Then we reach beacon Street. and it’s a straight downhill 5 miles to the finish line.

Theresa and I will be wearing bright yellow shirts. Mine will say “Run-asaurus” Theresa’s will say “Run-Zilla”

My taxes are done! Praise the Lord! And, I’m happy to say, I will be on the receiving end of a plump refund check. Presuming that I did everything correctly.

All else is average. I’m working hard to complete a couple projects at work and I’m planning on running the Boston Marathon on Monday.

and I had a really crazy dream last night that involved helicopters pulling a HUGE american flag out of a pond… but I don’t remember anything else.

Jill sent me this, it’s humor in its finest form. Though the multiple camera angles makes me a little hesitant to believe that it wasn’t staged.

In the last entry’s comment section, kurt asked “what are you doing right now? I’m bored.”

well, I just got back from a fire extinguisher safety class, and now I’m getting back into my design of leads for a welder. Specifically, I’m designing the layout of the cooling tubes and a few covers and supports.

pretty exciting huh?

“I think there might be some beef in my hair.”

Big page changes my friends!

I’ve finally updated to the latest version of wordpress with the help of the all powerful Jon Abad. Say goodbye to Comment errors! As a celebration of this fact, I’ve made a new MSPaint banner for the WPTopsites website.

Please read Tim Baird’s comment to the post “Children Attack” to get the background needed to best understand this entry.

Disclaimer: The following experiment took 18 minutes of company time. As a result, I will work an additional 18 minutes this evening to make up for the time spent doing these tests.

I ended up modeling a quick person, and then I submit that person to a 9000 N force to the face. I took the material of the person as a stiff homogeneous material (nylon), in real life the results would likely be considerably different because a persons body is much more bendy and isn’t made of Nylon. But this will give us a decent feel for what sort of static strain will result from such a blow. My test kid is about 5 feet tall.

Step 1

Step 1 required me to place the model into the FEA program and create a mesh. I used a very coarse mesh because I didn’t want the analysis to take too long.

Step 2

In step 2, I assigned the material Nylon to the body, and then made the feet ‘fixed’ and defined my force to be right in the target’s face. Here I make the assumption that I would be accurate in my assault.

Step 3

Step 3 is simply a screen shot of the running test window.

Step 4

Step 4 shows a graphical representation of the deformation of our test subject. Notice the significant bend resulting from the impact.

Step 5

Finally, step 5 shows the Static strain. Notice the concentrated force in the subject’s neck and left foot (weird…). It is likely that the neck and feet (if they were truly fixed) would be those body parts most damaged by a Roundhouse Kick planted on the target’s face.

15 or so high school students infested visited my work place today. I got to show them the wonders of Finite Element Analysis. As I’m sure you can imagine, they were busting at the seams with excitement.

That’s right kids! Check out that displacement! 7.847 x 10^-5 m!

I’m going to have to get some cooler stuff for my office so that next time children invade I won’t be remembered as: “that younger guy who showed us a graphical representation of stress and strain on a support beam” and will instead be remembered as: “that younger guy who uses a DDR dance pad to navigate Microsoft Outlook.”