Happy Century, Grandma!

Today is my maternal grandmother's 100th birthday! That's right, my Grandma, whom I thought last year was not much longer for this world, has made it to 100 years.

The world was a very different place 100 years ago. I'm sure that she never expected many of the developments that have occurred over the past 100 years. If she were aware of what was going on today, I'm sure she'd be thrilled to learn that we'd elected our first African-American president. It was from her that I got much of my sense of justice.

We'll probably go see her tomorrow, and give her a picture that Vinny drew in her honor.

Anyhow, just a shout-out to my grandma, and congratulations for making it 100 years!

Countdown to Conference

On Thursday, we'll be taking off for Kentucky, and Jeff and I will be leaving Vinny behind with my dad and bonus mom while we're at the conference.

I am extremely grateful that my dad is willing to look after Vinny for us. I know he feels a special bond with his grandson, because he was there in the room when Vinny was born. Also, since we live so close by, he's gotten to see Vinny at least once every two months, so he's gotten the opportunity to watch him grow up. And getting to take care of him over the course of a week like this also adds to the experience.

Vinny loves his Grandma and Grandpa, and often requests to go to their house. We've been telling him for a while now that he'll get to go there soon, but I don't think he really has a concept of time.

Anyhow, I think Vinny will have as much fun as we will. Plans include taking him to see my dad's mother in Indiana for a few days. I don't know what else they plan to do, but anything with Grandpa is bound to be fun!

More Vinglish

Continuing the documentation of his ever-expanding vocabulary:

• Buhsh teeth: brush teeth
• Choca milk: chocolate milk (actually, ovaltine)
• Cwanbewy: cranberry sauce (yes, he is my son!)
• Noonels: noodles
• Banganga: banana (he's been saying all three syllables, in his idiosyncratic way, for several months now)
• Ike sweam: ice cream
  
• Wauger: water (it's pronounced just like water, except with a "g" rather than a "t." And, we think it's so cute that now we've started calling it wauger too!)
• Slowflake: snowflake
• O by doodness: oh my goodness!
  
• Look-a aww de lights: Look at all the lights!
• I dwaw papew: I want to draw on paper
• Coink: coin
• Money: any slip of paper -- a dollar bill, a receipt, a coupon...
  
• Lightning bulp: light bulb

Also, he's been singing the alphabet song for quite a while, and has almost all the letters included in his song. These days, it goes something like, "A, B, C, Deee, F, G/ H, I, Jaaay, L, M en P/ Q-wah S, T-uh V, duba-aw X and Z."

And Now, Some Levity

My son has the most interesting sense of humor. One of his favorite things to do is to propose something ridiculous, and then say "NOOOOO!" afterwards.

Some of my favorite recent examples:

• Eat moon? NOOOOO!
• Eat vacuum cleaner? NOOOOO!
• Touch star? NOOOOO!
• Get inside washing machine? NOOOOO!
  

Also, whenever I emphatically tell him not to do something, I say "No, sir!" The other night, he was kicking me during a diaper change, all the while saying, "No sir! No sir!"

In Which I Feel that I'm Vicariously Living through Junior High Yet Again

I was filled with such hope this past Tuesday evening, when Barack Obama was elected President of the United States. I kissed the wiggling boy in my arms as I felt a lump forming in my throat. My precious son will think nothing of electing a president of any race or ethnicity. Tonight, we have made this world a better place for him to inherit.

But by morning, my hope turned to despair. The same state that delivered the presidency to a man who would have been forced to take the back seat of a bus forty years ago had told its gay and lesbian citizens that their temporary welcome at the front of the equality bus was overstayed, and it was back to second-class status for them.

I wept when I saw confirmation of my worst fears: California's Proposition 8 passed. I spent my prescheduled counseling session crying and discussing the damage California's voters had done to my psyche, rather than talking about the personal issues I had hoped to work through. The sadness and depression has been lingering over my head all week long.

I have never given money to any political cause, but I gave money to the "No on 8" campaign. As my longtime readers know, two members of my first family are gay, so while this was a personal fight to me, it seemed to mean a lot more to me than that, for some reason. My goodness, I am more upset than the person nearest and dearest to me who is impacted the most by this defeat! She was taking it in stride, while I am still a mess.

After some Friday night introspection, I was able to figure out why this defeat upset me so: It's like living through Junior High School all over again! Hear me out.

Proposition 8 was a measure to decide what kind of rights a minority group of people should be allowed to have. Are their actions sufficiently acceptable to the general public? Basically, it boiled down to a popularity contest -- were gays and lesbians popular enough to be allowed to remain on equal footing with their heterosexual counterparts?

Do you see how flawed that method of decision-making is? It's reminiscent of Junior High School, in which your fate is determined by consensus of the most popular students -- they decide who gets tripped on the way to the cafeteria or who gets their face plunged into the toilet bowl; whose life is hell on earth and who can just live their lives in peace. It's juvenile and it's not in the spirit of the entitlement of all people to the rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

I'm sorry, but nobody's rights are up for debate. Even the most vile and bigoted people are deserving of equal protection under the law. That's the whole point of having a Bill of Rights, and of having separation of church and state -- to allow people to follow their own path even when their views or private behaviors are incredibly unpopular.

For example, I think (as do most people who would read this blog on a regular basis) that white supremacists are some of the most vile and bigoted people in the world. Should we vote on their right to vote, marry, or live their private lives in peace? Absolutely not! Their popularity (or lack thereof) should not be a consideration when it comes to how they are treated under the law.

I see that some gay rights groups have filed lawsuits against Proposition 8, arguing that by allowing Proposition 8 to stand, "you are effectively rendering equal protection a nullity if a simple majority can so easily carve an exception into it. Equal protection is supposed to prevent the targeting and subjugation of a minority group by a simple majority vote." By contributing to their legal fund, I hope to find some cathartic release, almost as if I were helping my fellow nerds fight back against the assholes who dunked their proverbial heads in the toilet. A win for equality will go a long way towards healing many emotional wounds, including those I sustained at school some two decades ago.

Keeping to Your Principles in a World that Disagrees with You

Fearless commenter Pete takes exception to my comments in the previous post that nurses or doctors should do the job they're paid to do. Quoth Pete:

If something is wrong you shouldn't do it. Being `hired' implies you agreed to perform abortion services, you are trivializing this issue....

I completely agree, Pete, that if you believe something is wrong you shouldn’t do it. However, my point is that you should know what is required of a job and either perform the job you were hired to do, or quit. A job at an abortion clinic necessarily requires participating in the abortion procedure, and if you’re opposed to the procedure, you should not get a job there in the first place. Likewise if you don’t feel able to weigh the physical and mental health of a rape victim versus the potential life that could (against her desires) form inside her, or to make snap judgments about the life of a fetus versus the life of its mother, then it sounds to me like emergency room medicine may not be for you.

Similarly, a job as a pharmacist necessarily requires dispensing medications by prescription. If you are opposed to birth control medication, the morning-after pill, or even prescription vitamins, well, that is too bad for you. You do not get to make the decisions about what medications another autonomous human being takes. Those decisions are made by that person with the help of his or her doctor, not by you.

I have no sympathy for people who do not do the job they are paid to do. Why is that? Because I, too, have faced moral dilemmas in my line of work, and have resolved them simply by not accepting any job that involves morally questionable work.

The biggest employer of computational scientists in this country is the United States Government and its contractors. Most of us perform work for the Department of Energy or Department of Defense.

I am morally opposed to war and nuclear weaponry. Remaining consistent with my morals significantly limits my career opportunities. I had the opportunity to work at an NNSA (National Nuclear Security Administration) lab. I turned it down for a lower-paying job at an Office of Science lab. I'm happy with my decision; the 50% larger paycheck I was offered could not pay for the moral contortions or soul-selling I would have had to do.

Likewise, many of my colleagues at my Office of Science lab do contract work for the Department of Defense. They are flush with funding, while my funding situation is a little more unstable. But I would not trade my moral consistency for their monetary stability. I've never been asked to work on their projects, but if I were, the answer would be an unequivocal no, even if it put me out of work. Life is too short to sell myself out like that!

I understand, however, that others have different morals than I do. I can see why people might feel that keeping an active nuclear arsenal is an effective deterrent to nuclear war, but I happen to disagree. If I felt even more strongly about it, I might find a line of work that helped to reduce the necessity for nuclear and conventional weapons (for example, something that works to solve the problems of poverty and iniquity in the world).

I spend my days making a difference by enabling scientists to perform basic science and energy research using supercomputers, and I couldn't be happier. Had I tried to fit myself into the NNSA/DoD mold, I would be a lot richer monetarily, but much poorer inside my soul. I would encourage morally conflicted medical professionals to find a different path where their morals can't be compromised.

Sounds Like a Plan

Predictions* from Focus on the Family for an Obama administration (my editorializing in color):

• From the end of 2009, Justices Roberts, Thomas, and Alito have been constantly outvoted 6-3 and they are essentially powerless. (Awesome!)
• The most far-reaching transformation of American society came from the Supreme Court’s stunning affirmation, in early 2010, that homosexual marriage was a “constitutional” right that had to be respected by all 50 states because laws barring same-sex marriage violated the equal protection clause of the U.S. Constitution. (Yes, I think that is where the interpretation is going. Oh, and get over your bad selves and stop using scare quotes already!)
• Boy Scouts: “The land of the free”? The Boy Scouts no longer exist as an organization. They chose to disband rather than be forced to obey the Supreme Court decision that they would have to hire homosexual scoutmasters and allow them to sleep in tents with young boys. (Remember, homosexual == pedophile. Oh wait, no it doesn't! Sounds fair enough to me. And they can't discriminate against atheists anymore if they're shut down.)
• Adoption agencies: “The land of the free”? There are no more Roman Catholic or
  evangelical Protestant adoption agencies in the United States. Following earlier rulings in New York and Massachusetts, the U.S. Supreme Court in 2011 ruled that these agencies had to agree to place children with homosexual couples or lose their licenses. (Providers of public adoption services are no longer allowed to discriminate against people? Awesome!)
• Doctors and lawyers: “The land of the free”? Physicians who refuse to provide artificial insemination for lesbian couples now face significant fines or loss of their license to
  practice medicine... (Doctors have to do the jobs they're hired to do? Outrageous!)
• Homosexuals in the military: One change regarding the status of homosexuals did
  not wait for any Supreme Court decision. In the first week after his inauguration President Obama invited gay rights leaders from around the United States to join him at the White House as he signed an executive order directing all branches of the military to abandon their “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy... (Well, I think this is where public sentiment is going anyhow. Sounds great to me!)
• The U. S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit heard a new challenge to the phrase “under God” in the pledge, and, as it had in 2002 in Newdow v. United States Congress, Elk Grove Unified School District, et al., it held the wording to be unconstitutional. Now the Supreme Court has upheld this decision. (Sounds awesome. There's no need for those words in the pledge, which was originally written without it.)
• Congress lost no time in solidifying abortion rights under President Obama. In fact, Obama had promised, “The first thing I’ll do as President is sign the Freedom of Choice Act” ... (Awesome! Finally, a president who thinks that I know better than anyone else does when it comes to the contents of my uterus!)
  
• Nurses and abortions: “The land of the free”? Nurses are no longer free to refuse to
  participate in abortions for reasons of conscience. (Forcing nurses to do the job they're hired to do? Awesome!)
• Terrorist attacks: “The home of the brave”? President Obama directed U.S. intelligence services to cease all wiretapping of alleged terrorist phone calls unless they first obtained a specific court warrant for each case. Terrorists captured overseas, instead of being tried in military tribunals, are now given full trials in the U.S. court system... (Oh no! Treating terrorists like they're actual human beings? Godless forbid!)
• The new Congress under President Obama passed a nationalized “single provider” health care system, in which the U.S. government is now the provider of all health care in the United States, following the pattern of nationalized medicine the United Kingdom and Canada. The great benefit is that medical care is now free for everyone -- if you can get it. [Some blathering about ridiculously long waiting lists...] (Sounds about like things are now, except that instead of waiting lists, we have price lists. Instead of out-of-control wait times, we have out-of-control prices that are unaffordable for most people with serious diseases. Either way, people who need medical help can't get it. But I doubt that this would happen should we have national medical care; it doesn't work that way in Canada despite what these people would have you believe.)

I expect President Obama to get right on it. Sounds like a plan to me!

* Except that they're not actually predictions, because, like, predicting stuff is witchcraft and shit. Except, yeah, they are, by any normal definition of prediction, predictions.

Coming Attractions

This is the month of the big conference for which a colleague and I are in charge of placing thousands of signs. I have traveled four times this year to the conference planning meetings, and gotten well acquainted with the Austin (Texas) Convention Center. It's a big place, so we're going to be doing a lot of walking in order to place all these signs.

This conference is the biggest conference in the high-performance computing field, with nearly 10,000 attendees. I think we have almost everything done. There are just a few signs we have to finish up. We've also ordered twenty blank signs, for things we might have missed.

I've managed to convince my better half to come along too, and help us place the signs. He (foolishly?) agreed to help. We're leaving Vinny with my dad again, this time for ten days. The conference is the week before the week of (American) Thanksgiving. We're leaving for Austin on the Friday before the conference, and coming back the Saturday after it's over. Luckily, we're flying in and out of Lexington, so that will make things easier for my dad in terms of dropping us off and picking us up. Unluckily, I had to make Jeff's flight arrangements separately from my own (which were made by my workplace), and by the time I went to do his, my return flight was sold out, so he's taking a different flight back to Lexington than I am. The good news for him is that he leaves an hour later than I do and gets in an hour earlier. The bad news is that we're not together.

In preparation for the walking we're going to do at the conference, Jeff and I purchased some (expensive) walking shoes this past weekend. We went to the New Balance store and were fitted for some shoes. Jeff declared that his shoes were heavenly, like walking on air. Mine are comfortable, but not quite that nice.

I think we should have a lot of fun. I may get the opportunity to meet up with a fellow blogger, and if I do and assuming it's okay with this person, I'll let you know all about it. But even if I don't get to do the meet-up, there are so many things to do and people to see that I know we won't be bored!

Have You Voted Yet?

Hello, my dearest American friends. If you have not yet voted today, please do. Yes, even if your vote and mine would cancel each other out. Especially if you want to cancel my vote out, because by the time this posts I will have already voted, so there!

Seriously, it's an extremely historic occasion, and I am proud to say that I voted on the day that we will probably elect the first non-white president in the history of the United States, even though I live in a state that is going to go the other way, no doubt about it.

Anyhow, go out and vote. Exercise your rights. And make sure to double- and triple-check your vote before you turn it in.

Six Pseudorandom Facts about Me

I was tagged by Acmegirl to do this meme, so here goes. I hate tagging other people, though, so if you want to be tagged, consider yourself tagged; otherwise, don't worry about it.

The rules:

1. Link to the person who tagged you.


2. Post the rules on your blog.


3. Write six random things about yourself.


4. Tag six people at the end of your post and link to them.


5. Let each person know they’ve been tagged and leave a comment on their blog.


6. Let the tagger know when your entry is up.

Okay so here goes.

1. I am very allergic to (dog and cat) fleas. This is an important reason why we have no pets. The misery I experience when a flea bites me is really too much to bear. I first discovered my flea allergy when I was home the summer after my first year of college. I developed all these bright red welts with watery heads on them that itched beyond belief. My mom took me to the doctor, who immediately ruled out flea bites, since we had no pets. He then thought I must have some sort of micro parasite, and the only way to kill it was to cover my entire body (skin, scalp, soles of my feet, you name it!) with some kind of really stinky cream, and leave it on overnight. I did that, the itchy welts didn't go away -- in fact, I kept getting more and more! -- and boy was I annoyed. Then, a cousin who grew up on a farm with pets came for a visit, and she immediately found and captured a flea. My mom took it to the extension entomologist, who identified it as a dog-and-cat flea. We had the house flea-bombed while we were gone, and the problem was solved. To this day, my bout with the fleas adds an extra layer of discomfort to my interactions with other people's pets. The last thing I need in life is another round of flea bites.
2. Every weekday morning, I eat yogurt with cereal on it and drink a tall glass of water. I liked the Dannon Lite-n-Fit kind, until they recently changed the recipe and I don't like their "improvements." Luckily my local grocery chain has a good store-brand-equivalent, and I eat that. I used to have a sprinkling of Rice Krispies (or their store-brand-equivalent) on my yogurt, but lately I have been enjoying Uncle Sam cereal on my yogurt. Uncle Sam is pretty vile stuff if you just eat it plain, but the sweetness of the yogurt counteracts its natural flavor. And Uncle Sam stays very crunchy through the course of breakfast, something that was an issue with Rice Krispies.
3. When I was a kid and we would travel, we would eat fruit-flavored yogurt with sweet cereal (such as Alpha Bits) for breakfast just about every time we spent the night in a hotel. There weren't so many hotels that offered you a "complimentary" breakfast like there are nowadays. So we would have these yogurt cups and a box of cereal handy. My weekday breakfast is much lower in calories than those breakfasts of my childhood, but it does still evoke those memories.
4. On those trips when I was a kid, I visited all the states in the continental United States, and a few Canadian provinces. Our summer vacations (not the whole time we were out of school; I mean the time we traveled in the summer) usually involved traveling to wherever my dad had a conference, and back. We had a big tan van and my parents drove that thing across the country I don't know how many times. Some of my favorite places we went were the Canadian Maritime provinces (okay, that may have actually been the Summer of the Fleas -- not exactly when I was a kid), the Southwestern U.S., and the Pacific Northwest.
   
5. I do not have a diamond engagement ring. My engagement ring is a gold band that's a replica of a medieval French ring. On it, it says "Vous et nul autre" (You and none other). Then, I have a similarly wide gold wedding band, that is beveled but otherwise plain. The wedding bands were $60-70 each at Service Merchandise, a store that no longer exists, but was known at the time for its low jewelry prices. The lack-of-diamond was at my request, because first, I like the flat profile of my rings, making it much harder for me to snag my clothes, panty hose, or whatever; second, diamonds are overrated; and most importantly, with all the cruelty associated with the diamond industry, I could not with good conscience indulge in one.
6. I am an avid proponent of the hyphen in writing. Not just because I have a hyphenated name -- it's because the hyphen is a very useful tool for communication. It can help clarify what word is modifying what. Take, for example, Bach's work "The Well-Tempered Clavier." The hyphen tells you that "well" modifies "tempered," not "clavier." When you say it, your vocal inflection and your pauses between the words is what gives you this clue, but in the written word, we rely instead upon the hyphen. So, if you were saying one of the terms I run into all the time, "high-performance computing," you would say "high performance (brief pause) computing." My colleagues joke with me that thanks to my dogmatism, their hyphen usage has increased by 2000%.

The Junior Park Ranger

During our trip to the Grand Canyon last month, we were missing our favorite little boy a lot. So when Jeff saw a cute little park ranger costume at the shop in Grand Canyon Village, well... he bought it for Vinny.

Luckily, Vinny's really too young to understand what's going on, so we could get away with picking his costume for him (this is probably the last year for that). So Daddy dressed him up as the cutest little park ranger out there, and took this outstanding picture of our junior park ranger examining his sunglasses:

(Shouldn't that just win the cutest costume for two and under award?)

I think he's just as cute as his first and second Halloweens, but maybe I'm just biased. But no picture is as outstanding as this one of our cute little devil from last year:

(Clearly, this is a contestant for best picture ever.)

Before we took him trick-or-treating, I explained the rules. "We ring the doorbell, say 'trick or treat,' and then we get a piece of candy and put it in the bag." He really didn't understand what I was talking about, and at the first house, refused a piece of candy but wanted to go inside the house. Eventually he started to understand not only that people were offering him something, but that that something was CANDY, and then had I left him to his own devices, he would have taken everything from the bowl. He still didn't catch on that we were supposed to just stand at the door and not go in, though. He managed to give me the slip and go into several houses before I realized what was going on. A lot of people thought he was dressed as an explorer and just commented that he was acting in character.

Anyhow, it was the most engaged that he's ever been with Halloween. The first year, he mostly slept through the trick-or-treating. The second year, he wasn't walking yet so it was kind of a hassle to get him in and out of his wagon and carry him to people's doors. This year he's walking on his own and he really enjoyed seeing the people and walking into their houses (much to my embarrassment).

This post encouraged to be posted in a timely manner by the Parentbloggers Halloween costume contest, in which you can win a gift certificate for blurb -- where you can create a coffee table book custom-designed by you!

Caught in a Loop

Here's a clear explanation of the ridiculous loop that people with chronic illnesses can get caught in under our current healthcare situation.

Basically, if you're so ill that you can't make enough money to support yourself, then you become eligible for disability payments from Social Security, and Medicare (eventually) and finally get the care you need. Then, you get well enough (thanks to the expensive care and medication paid for by Medicare) to support yourself, at which time you become ineligible for Medicare. But your job doesn't provide health insurance benefits that will give you the care you need, and you can't afford to pay out-of-pocket, so you get ill again, go on social security and Medicare, and then once again become eligible to receive the treatments you need...

Anyone who wants to reduce the number of people on Social Security disability would do well to support a single-payer health care system. In that way, people would get the treatments they needed from the beginning, and those whose chronic conditions are treatable would never need to rely on disability payments.

Dear Voters of California

Today is Write to Marry Day, in which bloggers write about their opposition to Proposition 8, the proposed amendment to the California constitution that would take away the rights of same-sex couples to marry.  This is a post I've been working on for a long time in my head, and thanks to the impetus of the day, is finally coming out on the page!

Dear Voters of California,

This coming Tuesday, you will be voting on an issue that is near and dear to my heart.  I really wish that I could be one of you so that I could vote against Proposition 8.

Why?  Because if there's one thing in this world that's important to me, it's my family.  I love my husband, I love my son, and my sisters and my parents too.  I love my in-laws, my bonus family members, and my outlaws too.

Outlaws?  Yes, I have outlaws.  They're people who, in my mind, are in-laws, except for the whole lack of legality business.  You see, half my first family is gay.  This means that the loving, loyal, supportive lifetime partners of my family members are considered complete strangers to my family members under the law, because between the two partners there is not exactly one Y chromosome.

But in California, my same-sex-coupled family member/outlaw pair could be considered as legitimate as my husband and I, and share the same sorts of rights and responsibilities that he and I do.  They could be considered first-class citizens with the same rights toward each other that any single-Y-chromosome pair of adults who love each other can have by paying a modest fee to the County Clerk's office.

That is, provided that you vote down Proposition 8.

Proposition 8 is designed to take away rights -- rights that anyone should have -- to marry, regardless of the content of their chromosomes.  And that, Californians, is just plain wrong.

The opponents of marriage equality, knowing that there is no legitimate legal argument for their opposition, have resorted to lying -- saying that legalizing same-sex marriage would force churches to marry same-sex couples or lose their tax exempt status.  That is untrue.  Churches could choose to not marry same-sex couples, just like they can choose not to marry couples who don't follow any of their other religious tenets.  If a church doesn't have to sanctify the marriage of an atheist, they won't have to sanctify the marriage of a same-sex couple, either.

No, this is not about upending other people's religions.  This is about respecting the civil rights of people who are different from you.  This is about leading the way in tolerance, love, and justice.

I hope that you in California vote down Proposition 8, and that it energizes the country so that sometime soon, I will be able to weep with joy as I watch my family members and their same-sex partners united in matrimony, not only spiritually but legally.

Sincerely,

Rebecca, loyal sister, daughter, and friend to LGBT people

Sleep Slippage

Dearest Internets, I am at my wits' end! I appeal to your wisdom. Seriously, any advice is welcome.

We are having trouble with getting Vinny to go to bed. Here's the situation:

He sleeps (or, I should say, ideally he would sleep) in a toddler bed that is simply his crib with one side off. We removed the side about six months ago, because we thought it would help in the mornings when he woke up and was bored. That way he could just slip out of bed and play.

Well, he figured out a couple of months ago that if he wasn't really tired, he could just open the door of his room and leave. So we installed a child-proof doorknob cover on the inside of his door. But this just made him angry, and if we put him to bed, he would run over to the door and kick it and hit it, while screaming and crying. Eventually he would get tired and fall asleep right in front of the door. If you opened the door a few hours later, you would hit him with the door. I did manage to squeeze through and put him in his bed but it was hard to do so without waking him up.

Then we decided to install a gate in his doorway, because we thought he might be afraid of the dark and need some light from the hallway. But that actually made things worse, because he can hear what's going on around the house a lot better, plus he can see you leave.

Here's what I've tried.

• I can go through the nighttime ritual and then put him to bed awake, which results in him screaming and crying and doing what I have described above.
  
• After the nighttime ritual, I can continue to hold him and rock him to sleep in his rocking chair, and then set him down in his bed. He will sleep for a few hours until he wakes up in the night and realizes that I'm not there, and then begin screaming and crying and rush over to the door. The crying is genuine, or at least, he does produce tears.
• I got him a nightlight, thinking that it could be fear of the dark that's bothering him. But unfortunately, he tends to pull the night light out of the outlet, which scares me that sometime he'll end up shocking himself.
  
• I can take him to bed with me, and (usually) he falls asleep and sleeps through the night. Sometimes, such as this past Friday night, he does not want to fall asleep and then we don't get to bed until obscenely late (2 am, in this case).
  
• If we move him to his room when he's fast asleep, he will wake up in a few hours and cry and rush to the door. If he does fall asleep with us, sometimes he lies completely still and sleeps peacefully; other times he kicks us in the head all night. Usually he is very mobile when he is close to waking up.

So we do have a solution that usually works: letting him sleep with us. But it is not the most convenient for us, and I would like for him to sleep in his own bed. Any suggestions?

Weekend Adventures with Grandparents

In honor of our beloved son's second birthday, Jeff and I decided to rent a cabin at Big Ridge State Park and invite his four grandparents to join us. Jeff's parents and my dad and bonus mom came down on Friday.

On Friday afternoon, they went on a tour of my lab, including a tour of the area I work in. Then we headed for the cabin. We got there after closing time, and didn't know how to get the key to our cabin. Luckily, there was a ranger from a different park coming out of the restroom at the time, and she was able to find out with a phone call that our key could be found in the mailbox.

After unpacking our bags and putting our food in the fridge in the cabin, we headed out to a nearby town for pizza (Vinny's favorite food). We found a local pizza place and shared two pizzas before returning to the cabin for the night.

In the morning, I had planned to make some pancakes for us all to enjoy. I'd mixed all the dry ingredients at home, and would mix in the wet ingredients at the cabin. But I realized that I had forgotten my two-burner griddle, and sent Jeff back to our house for it and a few other things (such as allergy medication). Then, after he got back, I realized we had forgotten the eggs, so Dad and Marvis went out to get some eggs. Finally, we had all the ingredients for our breakfast, which we enjoyed at about noon.

In the afternoon, we took Vinny down to the playground at the park. He really enjoyed slides for the first time. He figured out how to slide down a slide by himself, which is a pretty big development. In fact, there was a corkscrew slide that he was somewhat intimidated by, so I offered to help him go down it, but before I could get seated, he'd accidentally fallen down it. I was worried that it would freak him out but it seemed to have the opposite effect. He couldn't get enough of that slide, and he must have gone down it a dozen times or more.

That evening, we cooked hamburgers and brats on the charcoal grill for Vinny's birthday dinner. We enjoyed the hamburgers and brats along with some red potatoes with rosemary, potato chips, and fruit salad. After dinner, we opened Vinny's presents to give us some time to make room for cake and ice cream.

I had made Vinny a cocoa devil's food cake (my standard chocolate cake) with raspberry filling between the layers and white frosting on the outside. As it turns out, my son is more of an ice cream eater than a cake eater. He ate all his ice cream and some of mine, but ate only a few bites of the cake.

Having so much sugar so late made it a little difficult to put Vinny to bed, but eventually he did fall asleep. In the morning, Jeff and his parents went to Quaker Meeting, while the rest of us cleaned up the cabin before taking Vinny back to the playground one more time. Then, we drove back home, where Dad and Marvis assembled Vinny's new Vinny-sized table for him.

Eventually Jeff and his parents arrived home again, but we discovered that Jeff's dad had left his camera at the cabin, so Jeff and his dad drove back there to retrieve it.

Over all, it was a really fun weekend together. We all had so much fun getting together and appreciating Vinny. We may all differ when it comes to politics, religion, or other matters of opinion, but one thing we all agree upon is that Vinny is a fantastic little boy.

Richer Than God!

Confused about the credit crisis? Need an explanation that even Barbie and Ken can understand? You are in luck, my friend!

My sister Rachel and her friends teamed up to provide a video explanation of what happened and why we're now in this financial pickle. It will help you to understand what we're all being asked to pay twelve figure bailout payments for. Click and learn!

Adventures in Interval Arithmetic

I realize that some people read this blog just for the math. Those people have been mighty bored for the past several months as I've prattled on about Vinny, the fact that I am really busy, my vacation, etc. I need to remedy this problem and get talking more about math, as this blog's title implies it is about. So, math fans, this post is for you!

When you take a measurement of something (such as the temperature of your sick child, the height of your house's ceiling, or the RPM level of your car's engine), this measurement is not exact. For example, the thermometer we use to measure Vinny's temperature is digital, and displays the following: xyz.t (where x, y, z, and t represent any of the digits 0-9). Assuming that its method of measuring temperature is completely accurate, there is still error inherent in reading this measurement, because the precision of the readout is limited to increments of one-tenth of a degree Fahrenheit.

For example, if Vinny's actual temperature were 101.138˚F, we would see only 101.1 on the readout, because the temperature would be rounded to the nearest tenth of a degree. Therefore we would be unable to distinguish the temperatures from 101.05 to 101.149999.... They would all show up as 101.1. If we say that a is the actual temperature and â is the measured temperature, then for a in the interval [101.05, 101.15), â = 101.1.

Rebecca, you might say. Your parentheses don't match. You are correct! I did that on purpose. In mathematics we use [ or ] to mean "closed interval" and ( or ) to mean "open interval." Any number between 101.05 and 101.15 is within the interval. The only questions are about the numbers at the end of the interval. If a = 101.05 exactly, then it falls within the interval. But if a = 101.15, then it does not fall within the interval. A number infinitesimally smaller than 101.15 falls within the interval, but 101.15 itself does not. This is because a temperature of 101.15 would be rounded up to 101.2.

This is what we have to work with in interval arithmetic: these ranges. So, for example, if we want to figure out what Vinny's temperature range is in Celsius when the thermometer reads 101.1˚F, then we can convert the interval to Celsius.

Recall that C = 5/9 (F-32), where C = the temperature in Celsius, and F = the temperature in Fahrenheit.

So, we could take the minimum part of the interval and convert it, and then convert the maximum too, to create the Celsius interval. This works because [a, b] + x = [a+x, b+x], and µ [a, b] = [µa, µb] for non-negative µ. Thinking about it in geometric terms, picture the number line, and place a and b arbitrarily along the line such that b is greater than a. If you add the same number to both a and b, all you're doing is translating the interval to a different place along the line, but not changing the ordering of a and b. If you multiply by a non-negative number, you're just stretching the interval to be µ times its original width (or shrinking it, in the case of a µ less than one). Multiplying by a negative factor simply reverses the ordering of the interval, i.e., -µ [a, b] = [-µb, -µa].

So, if we do the interval conversion we obtain [101.05, 101.15)˚F = 5/9 {[101.05, 101.15) -32}˚C = 5/9 [69.05, 69.15)˚C = [38.36111…, 38.41666…)˚C.

Multiplication of intervals creates an interesting situation. Suppose you've measured the height of your ceiling and the length of a wall and you want to calculate the area of the wall. If the wall is 2.50 meters tall and 4.63 meters wide, and your measurements are accurate to the nearest centimeter, then the intervals are [2.495, 2.505) and [4.625, 4.635), respectively.

So how would you figure out the range of the area of the wall? When multiplying two intervals [a, b] and [x, y], there are four possible numbers to consider as the maximum or minimum of the interval: ax, bx, ay, and by. In general, we can't just take [ax, by] as the interval; for example the range for [-3, 1] [-1, 2] is [-6, 3], not [3, 2] -- which doesn't even make sense as an interval. In the case of the wall, though, there are no negative numbers to worry about, so the wall area is anywhere from [11.539375, 11.610375) m².

The examples I have given here may seem silly or unimportant, but there are actually some very important applications of interval arithmetic. A big one is computer arithmetic.

Computers have a limited capacity to express numbers. A number such as 1/3 cannot be expressed as a fraction on a computer; instead it is expressed in a form similar to a truncated decimal representation (i.e., like 0.3333). It's not actually a decimal representation because computers represent numbers in base two, but the concept is the same.

As a result of this, if you subtract two numbers that are pretty close to one another, you may end up with a grossly inaccurate result. This phenomenon is known as catastrophic cancellation. For example, if we had a computer that had four digits of accuracy, and we used it to take the difference of 13/12 and 14/13, we would get 1.083 - 1.077 = 0.006. The real answer, 1/156, is approximately 0.006410, so we are not far off. But if our computer had only three digits, we would have 1.08 - 1.08 = 0.00 as the answer!

We can use interval arithmetic to see that while our answer is far from accurate, the interval of uncertainty contains the correct answer. So, in the case of the three-digit accurate computer, we would have [1.075, 1.085) - [1.075, 1.085) = [1.075, 1.085) + (-1.085, -1.075] = (-0.01, 0.01). (Subtracting is like adding the negative of the interval. And when we have the sum of an open and closed bound, the result is open, because (a + almost b) = almost (a+b).) As you can see, the interval of uncertainty contains the true answer, so using interval analysis we can find an upper bound on the margin of error for our calculation.

There are other cases in which an analysis using interval arithmetic is also useful, and I hope to write another application up soon. In the meantime, I hope you have enjoyed learning about interval arithmetic and if you have any questions feel free to ask!

Two Years of Vinny

At this moment two years ago today, I was in all kinds of pain because I hadn't yet given in to common sense and requested an epidural.

Today, as I scrubbed the kitchen floor, I thought about how different from that day two years ago is today. I'd much rather scrub the kitchen floor than give birth, I mused.

Yet, that labor was very much worth all the pain. From it came someone who has changed my life for the better: a little person from whom I have learned so much.

I had forgotten that everything is wondrous. I did not remember how satisfying a drink of milk could be, or how fascinating a button is, or how beautiful music sounds. I never knew it was possible to be so happy upon seeing someone you love after a day of separation. I didn't realize that I was worth loving so much, so purely, and so unconditionally.

I am truly fortunate to have this little boy in my life. All the pain and sleep deprivation -- it was worth it. Happy Birthday, sweet boy.

Mariachi Night

Today was a big day: it was performance night for our Mariachi band. It went really well!

We had a rehearsal in the afternoon in the auditorium. It is in the local high school, but it is no ordinary high school auditorium. The auditorium, along with the rest of the high school, has been recently renovated -- the ribbon cutting ceremony was just last month. The auditorium is bigger than some University venues I have played in, and the acoustics are wonderful.

Then we attended a pre-performance reception sponsored by my employer's international friendship club. I had to leave early because I was asked to speak at the pre-concert discussion of the music. I explained how our group was formed and a little bit about the music to an audience of interested music lovers.

Then, it was time for the orchestra concert. We Scientificos Locos (mad scientists) sat in the audience during the first part of the concert. During intermission we got our instruments and waited back stage while the orchestra played a short piece. Then, we were on stage.

I suffered no stage fright (after all the recitals I've done, this performance was nothing). My fellow Scientificos Locos did not freak out either. We went out there and just had a lot of fun, and thanks to that, we did great. Oh sure, there were a few mistakes, but nothing major. Our enthusiasm more than made up for it. We got a lot of applause when our three pieces were over.

After another piece by the orchestra, the concert was over. As the audience enjoyed some Mexican desserts at the after-concert reception, we got lots of compliments and gratitude for performing.

I had a really good time performing. The only thing I wished was that Jeff and Vinny could have been there. I had some complementary tickets reserved for them, but unfortunately Vinny was too tired and cranky to make it through the concert. Jeff wisely took him home after the pre-concert reception.

Checking In

I really am still alive, just very busy with crazy things like WORK!  I have an interesting post planned on a movie that Jeff and I recently saw, but it takes time to work these things into final blogging form.

So instead, I'll leave you with an anecdote.  The other day, I was talking to a man who made an inappropriate joke (i.e., racist, sexist -- it doesn't matter what exactly).  I had once read, maybe at Thus Spake Zuska or somewhere else, that when you encounter an inappropriate joke, a good tactic is to feign ignorance and ask the person to explain the joke.  I thought this was a perfect opportunity to try out this tactic.

So I put a puzzled expression upon my face, and said, "Was that a joke?  I see you're laughing, but I don't get it."  

"You've got to be kidding me," he said.

"Oh no, I really don't understand what's funny.  Perhaps you could explain it to me."

He grew uncomfortable and embarrassed.  "It was an inappropriate joke that I shouldn't have made.  Never mind."

In this way, I was able to make him realize that what he said was inappropriate, without lecturing him (which would probably make him unreceptive to the message) or coming off as self-righteous.  So thank you, whoever had this idea!  It worked well in this case.