RSS

Author Archives: admin

Long time coming

Long time coming.

It has been a long long time since I have posted and here is a long awaited update.

In August of 2023, my wife of 22 years was diagnosed with stage 2b breast cancer. Just had a clear mammogram in May of 2023, but felt pain where it shouldn’t be and had it checked out. The initial ultrasound begat a whole slew of tests. The mass looked like cauliflower, so that usually only means one thing, cancer.

After being diagnosed, I googled what was the best cancer hospital and oncologists in Illinois, turns out it the University of Chicago, which also happens to have a cancer center in our neighboring town of New Lenox. The treatment was aggressive, but, spoilers, there is currently no evidence of disease. The treatments were:

Implantation of a port that leads directly to her heart.

Many infusions for chemotherapy, including 4 AC aka the Red Devil, that is so caustic, it can only be infused using a central line and the nurses wear disposable gowns. There were at least 8 infusions of a different chemo. This was all to reduce the size of the cancer, which it did, from about the size of a golf ball to the size of a pea.

Following the chemo, a little rest, then a double mastectomy with goldilocks reconstruction (5 ½ hours).

Some more rest, followed by what seems like endless radiation…daily…5 days a week, I think for 3 weeks. It may be longer, I will have to ask.

Some more rest and a final surgery, a oophorectomy, removal of her remaining ovary. She only had one left, the surgeon thinks it may have been lost with the c-section she had with our son. She had a partial hysterectomy a few years ago, so this just finished the job. She now gets to enjoy menopause at the ripe old age of 41, but this was done because the cancer was estrogen and progesterone positive. Don’t give it hormones to promote growth and it will help prevent it coming back.

Long story short, there is no evidence of disease 🙂

She has a break from treatments until some time next year, hopefully just a routine flush of her port and blood work will be the majority of it, knock on wood.

In other news, out son graduated with honors from high school, and is in community college and just loves it. He was very worried about how it would be, but it is such a change from high school, in a good way.

My retro controller business really took off this year with the introduction of the true analog Atari 5200 controller, so much so, that Cyberphreak Enterprises LLC is a real thing.

I’ll try not to ignore this main site as much in the upcoming year. Hopefully no more major health scares in the near future.

 

Posted by on September 28, 2024 in Family

Leave a comment

Street Photos

I have taken photos for years, but have not done much street photography. So, this week I am stepping out of my comfort zone of landscapes and nature and got out in the street. These photos were taken in Hinsdale, Illinois in the harsh noon sun. All photos were taken with Canon 5D Mark II, Minolta Rokkor 50mm F1.4. Very interesting looking for light and patterns in our everyday world of suburban America.

 

Posted by on June 7, 2023 in Old Glass, Photos

2 Comments

Photos for 3/30/2023

Fractal Bird, Canon 5D, Helios 58mm,F2
Terracotta Circles, Canon 5D, Helios 58mm,F2
Moss Bokeh, Canon 5D, Helios 58mm,F2
 

Posted by on March 30, 2023 in Uncategorized

Leave a comment

New Camera, Old Glass

A couple weeks ago I purchased a new to me Canon 5D, Mark II, 21 megapixel, full frame, DSLR. It was a top of the line Canon 14 years ago and takes some of the most amazing photos I have taken in my life. It is my first full frame camera. For those not familiar, this means the sensor is larger than the size of 35mm piece of film: a whopping 24x36mm, over 43mm across. Over 20x larger than any cell phone camera. That being said, some cell phones take some amazing photos, but they really rely on digital manipulation to stitch together several images from up to 4 different cameras together. DSLR and Mirrorless cameras use the old fashioned way, huge sensors and huge glass to capture images. I am going to do my best to take a photo a day, or more.

Window, Canon 5D, Mark II, Manual Soviet Lens, 50mm F3.5.
Window, Canon 5D, Mark II, Helios 58mm, F2 lens
Bark, Canon 5D, Mark II, Helios 58mm, F2 lens
Bokeh test, Canon 5D, Mark II, Helios 58mm, F2 lens
 

Posted by on March 29, 2023 in Old Glass, Photos

Leave a comment

An Open Letter to Elon Musk

An open letter to Elon Musk re: Twitter

A month or so ago you completed your acquisition of Twitter, a social media platform. Not a software company, not an engineering company, a SOCIAL MEDIA platform. You have laid off over half your staff and with your ill worded ultimatum, the remaining half of your staff left as well.

In the meantime you have been holding ‘code reviews’ which are pointless in terms of fixing what is wrong with twitter. You then add a cherry to the top of the crap cake and allow a known traitor, Trump, back on your platform. I have been an engineer, a real, degree engineer, for 24 years and I can tell you are not facing a technological issue, you are facing a psychological issue.

I am part of your target audience, a late 40’s, white male, and I abandoned the platform even before you announced your acquisition earlier this year. Why did I leave? It was boring and there are better alternatives out there. Too right wing, too full of stupid, and just too boring to top it all off. The major technological gripe was how difficult it was to engage with others. In fact, this loops back to the social, psychological issue with Twitter. It is not compelling. The content is not unique, the whole microblogging idea has been done to death and no amount of software engineering will fix that.

I honestly don’t know how you can fix Twitter. It may just be an idea that has played out, like America Online, Myspace, Geocities and Angellfire. Websites and social media come and gone and it may be time for Twitter to go. When a traditional message board like Reddit or social media like Facebook exist, what’s the point of Twitter? With ad free alternatives like Mastodon, what compels me to use Twitter? All of these points are psychological, not technical. Forget code reviews and hire a team of psychologists, anthropologists, and sociologists.

I would wish you luck, but to be honest, I, like millions of people will not miss Twitter one bit.

 

Posted by on November 21, 2022 in Uncategorized

Leave a comment