Merry Christmas! (video)

In the spirit of Christmas and having fun, here is a short video of the ImprovEverywhere group providing some assistance to one of the Salvation Army bell ringers.

Enjoy!



Read more about this group and how they prepared this event here

Note: email subscribers will need to click through to Steve's 2 Cents to view this video.

Last minute prep

Some food shopping and last minute gift shopping all in preparation for the big day tomorrow.

We'll buy some fresh bread dough for our roll-ups which is a Christmas Eve dinner tradition. The roll-ups are like a calzone. The bread dough rolled up around (1) ham and cheddar cheese, (2) some Italian sausage and mozzarella cheese, and (3) some pepperoni and mozzarella cheese.

My father will join Dolores, Carolyn and I for dinner. Allison is with Brad in New Hampshire.

Time to go for a walk to start the day.

Enjoy the family time this holiday season!

Bubble sort

End of this work week, end of this month, end of this year (almost) - lots of 'ends' coming together at this time.
Hence, time for bubble sorting. Looking back over each period, bubbling up the key points, consolidating/condensing the multivariant points to a theme or collection of themes, if possible.

Start with a long list.
Which of these is most like the other?
Put them into like categories.
Then take another pass through the shortened list.

Looking for the single instances to pair them up, looking for the doubles to make them triples, etc.

Soap bubbles, originally uploaded by Ernst Vikne.

As an example, some project data I am working on concerns business service category. Due to the open formating allowance, there are over 400 entries. Many of these actually are similar to one another. The first pass at combining them shorted the listing of over 400 to about 160. Further consolidation and combination has reduced the listing to approx. 60 categories. I'll socialize this listing with some co-workers for validation that it makes sense to them.

For my own period review, the socialization will come here. From the consolidation effort, a story will emerge. You can provide feedback on the story via comments or reading activity. 

What are you doing to wrap up the year?

July 27, 2048

2048? Will we be around then?

What will the world be like then?

Hans Rosling predicts that this is the date at which the Asian market economies will over take the US and UK as dominant. View this recent TED Talk to see his presentation and understand some of the risks to the projection.




Now, what are you going to do to prepare for this day?

What she'll miss

Carolyn is coming home for Christmas and writing up the things she'll miss that she found while she was in Greece:

During my last walk around the city I was thinking about how many things here I am going to miss, and its a pretty long list. I'm going to miss the weather for one (its about 40 degrees warmer than Boston right now). But I am very much looking forward to snow and a white Christmas. I'm also going to miss the food, the feta, the chocolate, and the tavernas. The Greek lifestyle includes sitting at restaurants or cafes for hours at a time with the staff in no rush for you to leave. In fact, they encourage you to stay with live music, and rounds of wine and dessert on the house. I'm going to miss walking down the street and seeing a group of old men sitting outside relaxing and playing backgammon.

Read her full posting here

Short day, busy week

It is the shortest day of the year today. Still means you can accomplish something worthwhile today!

For me, it is the start of a short work week and busy family time. My brother and family arrived successfully yesterday. They'll spend time with Dad and my sisters in RI today before heading north to ME on Tuesday.

Carolyn comes back from Greece on Tuesday. The weather is looking good for her connections at this point.

The MBTA did a good job clearing the stairs to prepare for the commuters today. The Franklin budget doesn't cover overtime so the schools will be opening two hours late today to enable the personnel to clear the parking lots and sidewalks for the students and facility.

Accomplish something good today!

Someone with stilts walked on my deck

Someone with stilts walked on my deck, originally uploaded by shersteve.

The snow is coming. Time to shovel.

I'll be back later with more pictures and shovel stories.

Yes, it is cold here in Franklin

We have had some good old fashioned New England cold weather the past couple of days.

The leaf was stationary for this photo but didn't stay in place long as the wind whipped it up and away. It could have beat the train to Boston yesterday!

With some precipitation coming up from the South later today, we are sure to get some snow. The real question will be what track the storm will take and how much snow will get. Hard to predict due to the fickleness of nature.

My brother and his family are scheduled to fly into Logan on Sunday so I hope the storm starts early and leaves early to allow them to have a good flight.

Stay warm today where ever you are!