Massive update of updateyness

Soo I have been kinda slacking off on putting stuff in this thing lately..
A couple weeks ago as part of a work thing I had the opportunity to participate in the regional FIRST robotics competition. I was a volunteer in their "machine shop" area tending to the needs of the ~61 participating highschool robotics teams. It was pretty straight forward.

Something broken: fix it.
Something that doesn't work right: figure it out.

For the most part it was pretty fast paced. Every kind of job from cutting off pieces of wood, plastic, aluminum to figuring out how to make shaft A fit into bearing B with very limited equipment. Fab work, machining, and a very small amount of welding. Our "shop" was basically a few tables with some fab equipment and a motorcycle trailer with a Grizzly mill/drill and a lathe along with a MIG/TIG welder.


It was pretty cool seeing all this happen. People running around everywhere, lots of enthusiasm for the science and technology end of things and just an all around fun (and tiring) time. Wish they had this program when I was in school.

I am working on a video of my footage from this event. I *plan* to get it done soon. But we'll see.


This last weekend was a ton of fun. I visited my friend Randi up in Seattle. During our travels we ended up at the Experience Music Project / Sci-Fi museum. Two things for me to nerd out about. Music and Star Trek.. The sci-fi end of it was pretty cool but I ended up doing most of my nerding at the EMP end of things. Upstairs they had soundproof studios where you could play instruments for 10 minutes at a time (as to not hold up lines forever) and I tried my hand at some real drums. I love my electronic drums to pieces but there is something just downright cool about a real acoustic kit. My friend Randi (who I did my best not to blow her eardrums out with the drum noise) has the nifty talent of being able to play just about any musical instrument she picks up and we spent 10 minutes goofing around. She flip flopped between guitar and bass and I did my best not to mess her up too bad and played the drums. It was pretty awesome. She worked around my in-experience and for a short period of time we sounded not half bad. I wish I had been able to record our goofing around.

If you have never been the the EMP I *highly* recommend it. It is a blast no matter how much (or little) musical ability you have. I have more to post but that's it for now!