Posts Tagged ‘personal update’

Can you reinvent yourself? For Love?

Saturday, October 24th, 2009

This is a bit of an unrealistic question. We are who we are because of the past that has shaped us. What if we opt to forge ahead with a new direction? Is that part of the growth our past delivers? Here’s a more interesting question: How much do we change for our spouse? I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately. Prior to my previous relationship I had acted based mostly on instinct when it came to dating. My instincts were, I have to say, very good. I dated some wonderful women who were wonderful. Now days, I find myself most NOT dating, and analyzing why a particular girl wouldn’t be right for me. W.T.Heck. I seem to be convinced I need to find someone that ‘fits’ me.

To that, I call BS. I want someone who pushes me a bit, someone who puts me on edge: someone who I find exciting sometimes. I enjoy the safe relationship, but if there’s never any edge to it, it becomes more work than enjoyment. Like my once gushing project says: I want to find someone who enjoys putting up with me. I want to enjoy putting up with her. I don’t need every day to be filled with edgy excitement, just once in a while is good.

I’ve always suggested it’s important to find someone you want to grow together with. I won’t be the same person in 10 years, I’m not even close to the same person I was 5 years ago, even. (Wow, not even close!) So, I hope that someday I find someone who understands that: knows I’ll change, knows they’ll change- is okay with that. The important part is that that other person pushes me to grow, to change, try new things, grow together and I desire to do the same in return. Eyes on the prize folks: happiness, sometimes that requires you to step outside your normal comfort zone.

All Purpose Catch Up Post

Monday, March 23rd, 2009

3-23-09 Post Storm Low Light HDR Composite.

I whipped up an HDR image of my sister’s street after the storm tonight, click it for a BIG version (be warned, 24 inch screens suggested ;) ). The storm was glorious and I sat in Brocco with my two sisters and a friend of Ashley’s and watched it rain.  It rained, hard, and fast. It was quite excellent and I soaked it all up and then took a bunch of photos. Really, none of them turned out worth shit except this HDR collage of their street after the rain at sunset. Still shooting with my S5-Is in RAW with CHDK firmware. I’ll keep on shooting and see what comes out next, I want to do some streetlight shots, possibly a 15+ shot HDR collage.

In non-photo news I’ve got just 6 work days until I celebrate a full year on with Jenzabar Inc. This is my longest (ha) full time employment besides for myself. The folks at Jbar make it fun and easy to enjoy my job and help make a great product better. Long live JICS.

I’m also going on my 2nd month of using the Grid, from Media Temple. So far, so decent. There have been some odd slowdowns/catches and glitches, but over all plenty of disk storage, bandwidth and CPU usage for my sites. I’m getting much better at optomizing my sites for the unique SQL challenges posed by being on the grid. For instance, you might notice my gallery is finally nearly up to speed again, and it’s taken me a while to get it all tweaked out that way.  I have been frustrated trying to get my gallery url re-writes in my gallery plugin for WP and still cache wordpress. It keeps kicking each other around, so for now wordpress = not cached. Might have to just break down and get an SQL Container.

No change on the car status, still waiting to get headers on, but now it’s clean and uber-shiney in the garage waiting some more buffing and waxing. It will emerge a shiney mofo, ready to catch the eye of every mustang driver on the planet (ha, sorry Justin!) along with the ear of every cop. I did manage to get pulled over a couple times for noise violations, need to learn to keep my foot out of it! Otherwise, same old same old, hung a hammock in the garage for those lazy afternoons detailing or working, or a bit of both.

Haven’t made it to the lake yet, but keep meaning to do so. I’m sure it’s fine, but now I’m getting anxious! Can someone tell the weather we need a few more days of 60+ degree days so I can get up there and start enjoying?! I think we’re all excited about getting it opened up and we’ve got a pretty decent sized list of stuff to do this year including fixing the deck, and painting some bedrooms/living room/ kitchen and making  a bar in the dinning room/living room area. Outside we’ll get rid of the nasty shed blocking out beach from our new neighbor Dave’s place and really just try to enjoy the place as much as we possibly can.  That will include many a party, and several guests, so get ready to party!

Spring: it can’t come soon enough!

Thursday, March 19th, 2009

I’m really REALLY ready for spring now. I’ve got so much to do, and yet while the weather is like this, I just can’t help but not care! I’ve got bills to pay, taxes to do and work to get done, and yet I really just want to open the windows, and go for a walk, or a ride, or *gasp* go to the lake! I am getting stuff done otherwise, cleaning up messes doing work etc, but really I long to be outdoors. I need a hammock, here at home, and fence, and no neighbors.. ha.

Music update: I’ve put my library on random for what must me the first time in 2-3 years. I’m enjoying tidbits and realizing that more and more I’ve grown out of hardcore. I can appreciate most of the musical bits, but the screaming really has lost it’s luster for me. Right now: Atomic Dog by George Clinton, which is putting me in a funky-awesome mood. New additions to the library: Owl City, Metro Station, and 3OH!3.

My New Year Wishes

Saturday, January 3rd, 2009

Friends, Family and Loved Ones-

Father time has been a wile fellow over the past year! Just as I was beginning my final semester of school and sixth month of being a Systems Analyst at the University of Sioux Falls things started moving much faster around here.

Spring came quickly with a job move to Jenzabar Inc., an educational ERP software vendor out of Boston in April. My new job lets me work from home and affords me great opportunities to travel. Included in the travel this year has been Cincinnati for two weeks, Nashville for a week and Tampa Florida for a week. It’s also given me great connections to schools all over the country and the opportunity to teach several courses in programming.

Outside of work the spring brought a few unforeseen snow storms (and snow days!) and an exciting new area of my life: the lake. Grandpa and Grandma Weins gave their cabin at Lake Brandt to Jennifer, Ashley and myself. Being as my childhood is filled with memories of sunny afternoons at the lake and stormy weekends with the family there, it was an exciting event! We spent the first part of spring cleaning and freshening the place up, and the rest of the summer enjoying it! Our hard work culminated in a fourth of July bash which included the removal of a very large tree, skiing/tubing/wakeboarding and a fireworks display that is going to be hard to top in 2009!

While the lake was a continued source of enjoyment all summer I also got an opportunity to spend some time with gear head friends in the Corvette. Various auto-cross events with the local NASA league and a night at the drag strip fixed my need for speed. One of the bright spots was the entire family (two Corvettes and a Mustang) making appearances at several local car shows (Madison, Canton, Automania in SF) and even a few awards being had for our hard work detailing them.

The fall came with sad feelings as the lake got closed up and the car went into the garage, but with high hopes of the summer to come. The snow brought more time to focus on SiC Media, the web company I’ve owned for the last 3 years, and other projects around the house. To fill the lake void I had a wonderful addition to my life: Luci arrived from the SF Humane society and has been keeping me on my toes ever since. The Corvette is getting a cam swap over the winter, and much planning is being done for the lake and of course much celebrating during holidays.

With Christmas approaching quickly I send my wishes for a healthy, happy and blessed 2009 for all of my friends, family and loved ones. I look forward to another great year enjoying it with all of you!

The Dawning of a new Blog

Saturday, January 3rd, 2009

Welcome to the new ChrisUthe.com. In the past this page has been primarily used to house my Resume, which can still be found here. Due to the frustration of running multiple sites for multiple purposes (loudmouthme.com && ourthinktank.org both blogs, gallery installs etc) I’ve decided to focus it all down to one site, this one. LoudmouthMe.com and Ourthinktank.org will both land you here. For now none of the content will come over, but that might happen later. For those that visit here, new content! Photos, lots of them- and personal updates! Thrown in posts about PHP C# and other geeky things. It’s a mish-mash of all the things that happen in my life, a true blog about what I do and who I am. Welcome!