Quadragesima IV (no, it's not a surround-sound format)

Quadragesima is the Latin term for Lent, meaning "forty days". The Lentan period starts today on Ash Wednesday, it is marked in many places by Mardi Gras celebrations on the previous day. For early Christians the rules of fasting during Lent were strict: just one meal a day, in the evening, and no meat, fish, eggs, or butter is permitted. Most religions have relaxed these rules, for example, since 1966 Roman Catholics only require strict fasting on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday.

I posted about Quadragesima in 2007 and in 2008. Traditionally Lutherans aren't required to fast or sacrifice something for Lent as some other denominations require (see here for a brief theological discussion), but I will be doing it again this year. Last year I didn't make a Lentan sacrifice, but in previous years I have given up desserts and sweets, alcohol, sodas, and other dietary things.

This year I chose to give up television. I quit watching television completely for a week in college, during my senior finals, but it was still very difficult to do. Lent is actually 46 days (the Sundays in the Lentan period don't count towards the 40 days), and it has been difficult to maintain my will power for this long a period, so I decided not to leave it to chance. I had been considering television but I actually decided to do it when I heard a commercial from DirecTV about temporarily suspending service for free. I called them to set it up, suspending service from today until Saturday April 3rd. The good: they set up the suspension at no cost, automatically. The indifferent: any time remaining to fulfill a contract doesn't count during the time of suspension (that makes sense, since I'm not paying during that time, and my account has to be fully paid up before they will schedule the suspension (since the biggest leverage they have to make me pay their bill is to threaten to cut off service). The bad: the suspension time will count towards any promotions I have, like free HBO for six months. That doesn't really seem fair, it just seems spiteful.

My rules:

• No television at home, including no DVDs, DVR, VCR, etc.


• No television on Sundays or on Solemnities


• No Hulu to watch television shows on my computer


• Youtube is okay, within reason


• If I'm at someone else's house or at a restaurant I won't leave or ask them to turn off the television, after all, this is my sacrifice, not theirs


• Movies at a movie theater are okay

I will be disappointed to miss some of the series that I am following, but in order to make it a true sacrifice, as a way of remembering and personalizing the great sacrifices made for me, it has to be something that's significant.

My 2008 in Cities

Criteria: one or more nights spent in each place. Cities marked with an * were visited more than once. Numbers represent the number of nights I spent in each city. I traveled more this year than usual, mainly because of the job change, getting started back at El Paso. Cities are in the order that I remembered them. Here are my lists from 2005, 2006, and 2007. I also put 2007 in a Google map. See the 2008 Google map:


View Larger Map

Bellaire (the rest)
Atlanta (6)
Birmingham (16)
Corpus Christi (12)
Park City (5)
Salt Lake City (9)
Columbus, GA
New Orleans (12)
Houston (3)
Natchitoches, LA
Indianapolis (6)
Houma (9)
Chicago (4)
Dallas (7)
San Francisco (6)
Jackson, MS (2)
Laurel, MS
Conroe
Washington, D.C. (4)
San Diego (4)
Shreveport, LA
Monroe, LA

Labor Day 2008

Because it’s Labor Day, I’ve been thinking about all of the jobs I’ve had in my life. I don't remember what I wanted to be when I grew up, my earliest memory of a career path is when I was in high school. I wanted to learn about computers (they were pretty new back then, I was one year removed from punch cards on a mainframe at UT) but my dad talked me into majoring in engineering, he said that I could always work with computers with an engineering degree, but if I majored in Computer Science and discovered that I didn't like computers, I was stuck. Even though I really didn't understand what an engineer did, I agreed, and in my first semester I realized that engineering was my calling. There was a big construction wall around the new Mechanical Engineering building, and someone had spray painted "Engineering isn't everything, it's the only thing" on it. Other graffiti was removed, but they left that. It was inspiring, and at the time, I agreed. One professor said (tongue-in-cheek) "I consider anyone not working in the engineering field to be a leach on society." I regret now that my college career was so focused on engineering and left-brain activities. I've come to value my creative side, with reading, writing, and other "liberal art" outlets. If I won the lottery I would go back to university for sure.

My first real job (other than paper routes and mowing lawns) was at the Oakwood Glen swimming pool. A couple of my friends got summer jobs there as lifeguards, and they hired me to come in the morning and clean the pool. It was about 30 minutes of work, six days a week, and I got paid $20/week, which paid for a tank of (leaded) gas!

When I went to school I didn't work my freshman year during the school year, but my sophomore year I had to get a job. I went down to the local Wendy's and applied, and was hired on the spot. That was a tough job at first, mostly mopping, wiping, cleaning grease, on your feet all day long, and then I worked my way up to the salad bar. I occasionally did fries and made burgers, one day I even got to work the grill, but that was a skill position, you had to anticipate how many burgers to have going at the same time. Too few, and everyone has to wait. Too many, and there's a lot of waste. I think I lasted one semester there, I eventually gave my notice when the semester was up. The next semester I was a pizza maker, a much nicer job. No grease, and we ate and drank for free on the job.

In the summers, I became a lifeguard and a swim team coach and swimming instructor at Willow Forest. I made enough money in the summer to last me most of the school year, living large until around April and scrimping by until the summer. Eventually, the pool company I worked for got out of the business of managing lifeguards, and I stayed on as a chlorine delivery truck driver (the world's best!) and commercial pool repair. That was a tough job, I worked 100+ hours a week most weeks in the summertime. The boss worked just as hard as we did, and I really learned a lot about the rewards of hard work and a job well done, and also I learned what I didn't want to do for a living for the rest of my life.

In a break from school I worked as an engineering intern for 3D/International, designing HVAC (heating, ventilation, and air conditioning) systems for office buildings. I also worked on the construction of the George R. Brown Houston Convention Center, although I was disappointed when I saw the architectural styling. After returning to Hancock Pool Services for another year, I started working at FERA Corporation as a CAD (computer-aided drafting) technician while I finished up my degree. When I graduated, they hired me as a corrosion engineer. Four years later I went to work at El Paso, and with a brief interlude at Enbridge, I'm back where I was.

Phelps Miracle Finish

Sports Illustrated has a series of underwater photos here showing how Michael Phelps beats Milorad Cavic in the 100 Butterfly for the closest of his now presumptive eight gold medals.

I was a swim team coach for summer league age-groupers (ages 4 to 18) during the 1984 Olympics in Los Angeles and we watched some of the swimming events as a team. I saw how important the finish is in winning races, and I showed the team some of the techniques the Olympians used. One of the girls, a 14-year old (her last name was Thomas, I think, her mom was the organizer of the swim team at Willow Forest) came to the pool every day that week and practiced that finish. At the meet on Saturday, she was about a half-length behind this big brute of a girl coming in to the finish of the 13-14 girls 100 IM, and she beat her out at the finish by using the touch she had practiced. It was one of the most rewarding moments I've ever had. Then the other girl's dad came over and asked me to step outside.

This is a picture of me in 1981, playing bass at a Klein outdoor party. I was seventeen, and a freshman at UT Austin. This is the first bass I ever owned, an Ibanez Roadster, and I bought it just a couple of months before this gig. I traded it in for one of the Fender Precision basses that I still own.

Mike Ruocco submitted this picture to Are You Hot or Not, and I got an 8/10 (not too bad, I thought).

I’ve got two Fender Precisions, both 1970’s models, one fretless. I’ve also got a Yamaha BB1200, and I just had a custom G&L L-2500 5-string bass made, in Belair Green. I play through a Gallion-Kruger head and a 4x10 Hartke cabinet.

Recruiting Corrosion Engineers

Our job market is as hot as it has ever been, I regularly get several calls a week from recruiters looking for corrosion engineers. Our company is taking an active hand in recruiting prospective corrosion personnel from colleges and universities, and they asked me to help them come up with a description of what a corrosion engineer does.

Corrosion Control - we keep exciting things from happening

Corrosion Control - real-life application of the Nine Tenets of Constancy

Corrosion Control - crushing the laws of Thermodynamics, see them driven before you, and to hear the lamentation of their women.

Sounds pretty exciting, doesn't it? When someone asks me what I do, I usually tell them it's a combination of MacGyver and that guy Q from the James Bond movies.

Drew Bobblehead

Yeah, I probably watch The Office a little too much.