WiR: Jan 27, 2009 - I'm late!

Check me out. I'm using acronyms (WiR = Week in Review). Using acronyms in your blog is a good sign that you're on your way to internet stardom. Who would've guess that a cheesy sounding show called "This Week in Tech" could turn into a popular, full-time internet media network called twit.tv. It's all in the acronym...yep. OK, moving on:

FYI: For anyone who may have noticed that I changed how my blog pages look, what do you think?


Things I Think I Liked

• Systm is quite possibly my favorite video podcast. They show you how to do some of the coolest geek-stuff.
• For the first time in 3 years I overpaid my taxes last year. I get a refund! Wahoo!
• Macy's Customer Service at Park Meadows Mall - Started our wedding registry there and their employees were very helpful.
• Took a tour of Ashlynn's school. She was stoked that there was a library. That's just awesome!

Things I Think I Didn't Like

• JCPenney in Southwest Plaza - Went to register there for our wedding and it was kinda sad. There wasn't much to pick from. Also, their customer service was lacking.
• When my officers are rattled by a call.

Things I Think I Think

• "You must be the change you want to see in the world." is probably one of the wisest things I've ever heard.
• We should go to Hudson Gardens during the spring to check out flower ideas for the house.

This Week Made Me Wonder...

• Between the televised oath that President Obama took and the corrected oath he took later, who was technically president? I guess it would've been Biden, right?
  
• How can we keep Ashlynn's excitement over libraries going?

Things to look forward to

• The month of June - The wedding will be over and we'll be comfortably moved in to the new house.
• Saturday's head shaving party for Tayler!
  

Shave a dispatcher! Save a girl!

For those of you who don't know me, I'm a dispatcher for the Englewood Police Department in Colorado. In December, one of my officers found out that his beautiful 4 year old daughter, Tayler, had a malignant cancer. This really hit home for me because I have my own beautiful 5 year old daughter. I don't even want to try to imagine what it would be like to receive that kind of news. I get a little choked up just thinking about Tayler.

We're getting together Saturday for a fundraiser/show of support for Tayler. Officers and dispatchers are going to Tayler's house to shave their heads and raise money for the Ellisons' expenses. Now you may be thinking, "Police officers with shaved heads? Aren't half of them already shaved or balding anyways?". Here's the catch though: One of our dispatchers has offered to shave HER head if we can get $2000 of donations by Saturday. So far we have raised $850.

How can I get a dispatcher to lose her hair? Mumble incoherently on the radio. Har har. How can you get this particular dispatcher to lose her hair? If you're in Colorado, you can drop off a check made out to Tayler Ellison at any First Bank branch. Let me know how much you're pledging so we can put that towards the pledge. If you our out of state then you can send a check to:

Shane Ellison
Englewood Police Department
3615 S. Elati St.
Englewood, CO 80110

Here is Tayler's story from the caringbridge.org site that was set up for her. If you want access to her site, let me know and I'll get you that info:

One night in November Tayler started having sudden seizures. She was rushed to the emergency room where they weren’t sure what was going on. As they tried to control the seizures they decided she needed to be taken to Children’s Hospital. They did some tests and found that she had a small lesion, the size of her own pinkie nail, on her right temporal lobe. She was hopitalized for one week, and then released. She was given some anti seizure medications and told that she needed to follow up in six weeks for another MRI.

The six week MRI showed that the lesion had grown to 3 and a half times the size of the original lesion. Tayler was immediately admitted back to the hospital (Children's)and emergency surgery was scheduled to remove the lesion that was now the size of a golf ball. The surgery went as well as planned and the Ellison’s were informed that Tayler had a highly aggressive infection. They went for about 24 hours thinking this until they were finally told they were informed incorrectly and Tayler in fact has cancer.

Tayler had to have a second surgery to remove the rest of the tumor. The surgery was a success, the entire tumor was removed. The Ellison’s have been traveling a long hard road. They have found out that their beautiful little girl has cancer and have been waiting for a week to get a full diagnosis.

Today (12-30-08) the Ellison’s were given a 100% diagnosis for their daughter.

Tayler has a grade 4 Astrocytoma which is named a Glioblastoma. There are 4 grades of Astrocytoma, grades 1 and 2 are benign, grades 3 and 4 are malignant. The Ellison’s knew a few days ago that Tayler had a malignant tumor so they weren’t surprised to know it was high grade Asctrocytoma.

With this they have also found some of Tayler’s treatment plan. She will begin radiation and chemotherapy on January 13th. The first day they will be administering both chemotherapy and radiation at the hospital. They will be doing this to see what kind of reaction she may have to the chemo. After the first day, Shane and Alena will be giving the chemo to Tayler at home through her PICC line that is currently in her arm.

In order for Tayler to receive the radiation she will have to be sedated. The first round of treatment will be 30 sessions or about 6 1/2 calendar weeks with chemo and radiation being given each weekday, with just a couple of exceptions.

After the first round, Tayler will have a three week break then start a new round of chemo without radiation. The second round will alternate between two different chemo meds. The first medicaiton will be given for two weeks followed by a second medication for one week. This three week pattern continues for a total of 12-16 weeks with no breaks.

Tayler will then get another short break (about a week) before beginning the third phase in her treatment which is a one week on, one week off, chemo cycle to continue until about the end of the year.

We will be doing MRIs about every three months during treatment to look for any signs of the tumor returning. We will be looking for completely clean MRIs as the surgery took out the tumor mass that could be detected and we are fighting this on a cellular level now.

The treatment is very aggressive because the type of tumor is so aggressive. Tayler will be hit hard by all of the medication and radiation, but this is what will give her the best shot at a cure.
The prognosis for a Glioblastoma tumor are not pleasant. With a positive note from the doctor that a complete removal of the tumor probably doubled her chances, she is still looking at a 20% survival rate. The doctor advsied that the rate for adult's with the same tumor is less than 2%.

Week in Review for Jan 20, 2009

Ever have one of those weeks when you're never sure what day it is? That's been this week for me. It happens pretty often since I work my graveyard shift, but it still sucks. It's probably even worse for that reason. I changed the format of my blog. Let me know what you think please!

Things I Think I Liked

• I'm pretty sure all the video podcasts I subscribe to are done with their CES coverage. Cool stuff, but I'm over it now.
• I'm officially on my way to owning my first home! Wahoo!
• Some government agencies are using Twitter to keep their citizens updated. There's using your noggin!
• Got invitations ordered for the wedding. Our Matron of Honor rocks!

Things I Think I Didn't Like

• There is such a thing as a professional Halo player. Seriously?!
• Kinda lost touch with Vera. We were/are going to study for a Network+ certification, but that has kinda fallen apart lately. She also has my library book that's overdue.
• Stupid people on the right trying to blame Obama administration for things that have gone wrong. There isn't even a Obama administration yet!
• Stupid people on the left can't get over their Bush/Cheney hate. Have some respect!
• The job market still sucks.

Things I Think I Think

• Web 2.0 and social media could be the start of revolution!
• Wireless access to the internet is making it increasingly hard for entities to control information. This is a good thing... mostly.
• There are some things that happen during your life when you want to be around people you know. Today is one of those days.

This Week Made Me Wonder...

• Is there a good Colorado Tech News resource? I can't find any. Is there a market for it?
• Can I use Android on a tablet pc/touchpad/pictureframe/charging pad to create a home-use computer device? You could listen to music on your computer and look up recipes online with ease. This is a big idea.

Things to look forward to

• House inspection on the new house. Hopefully it doesn't take long.
• The inauguration.

Counter offer accepted!

We found out around 6:30 last night that the seller made a counter offer. The conditions stayed the same, but she basically split the difference between what the house was listed at and what we offered. I was completely unsurprised!

Amy emailed me the counter offer and Corrine and I discussed it, stressed about it, contemplated it, stressed about it some more, argued about it, gave up on it, contemplated it, celebrated it, worried about it, then after 1 1/2 to 2 hours, we accepted it. We thought about countering, but due to the amount of people that seemed to be out looking at houses, we didn't want to chance the seller getting a better offer.

This morning I made it official by turning in the signed paperwork to Amy's office. We're under contract now. Barring any unforeseen catastrophes, we should have a house before the end of February. Not a townhouse, but a house-house! Woohoo!

We made an offer on a house!

On Wednesday we looked at more homes to buy. Amy, our realtor, had shown us a listing for a house that just came back on the market. We were skeptical because most houses in our price range in the area we're looking aren't that well kept. It's a 4 bedroom, 2 bathroom bi-level house with a 1 car garage in a good neighborhood. It's walking distance from the elementary school. We liked it when we first walked through, but we weren't too sure about it because the bedrooms seemed kinda small.

Giving it some thought, we measured Corrine's bedroom furniture and went back today. We found out that we still like the house and as an extra bonus, we could fit in the master bedroom! So since the house is within our price range and we like it, we made an offer on it tonight. We should hear back by tomorrow night if it's accepted or not.

Here's a link to some pictures I took Wednesday and today from my phone. I just realized we don't have any pictures of the bedrooms. Oops.

http://photos.scottpantall.com/GalleryThumbnails.aspx?gallery=159567

Week in Review for Jan 13, 2009

I'm really trying to make sure I keep up with my blogging and also make sure I post interesting stuff. Can I keep up with a weekly post? I guess there's no way to know unless I just dive in so here is the good, the bad, and the thoughts for my week ending today.

Note: Most of my internet world was flooded with information from the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) this week, so I got to find out about a LOT of cool gadgets. Please excuse the extra amount of geek-drool all over this post.

Things I Think I Liked

• Got the big ball rolling in the home search.
• Best CES coverage goes to Tekzilla. Sure it turned into a-whole-lotta-gadgets shows, but isn't that really what CES about is anyways?
• A WordPress tutorial that walks you through it barney-style. Thanks Anthony!
  
• IO Gear wireless video (As it turns out, IO Gear's site wasn't working when I posted this, but it's really cool. I've always wanted to be able to wirelessly hook my 'puter to my TV)
  
• Brother badass sewing machine. The Quattro™ 6000D. Did he just say "badass sewing machine"? Yes I did.
  
• The watch phone! It exists! With a touch screen and bluetooth connection. Dick Tracy never had it this good.
  
• The Powermat wireless charging station.
  
• Made reservation for honeymoon at A Mountain Valley Bed and Breakfast in Estes Park.
  
• Ashlynn is a big fan of Sorry and Mario Kart. See her driving skills here!

Things I Think I Didn't Like

• Got a new workstation in the communications center at work. It's so locked down,we can't even access Notepad. WTF?
  
• Negativity begets negativity. My co-workers need an attitude adjustment. Not really in a bad way. It just needs to happen.
  
• Some group of dumbasses are suing to attempt to block any mention of God during the inaugural ceremonies. Usually I'm on the side of those who want to limit the reach of organized religion, but this is ridiculous!
• Colorado Labor Department Puts Dent In Unemployment Numbers: by hiring more call center employees to deal with the high number of unemployed residents.
• I had to make an appointment and pay $25 for a doctor to tell me I can take 4 Motrin instead of 2 for my painful rib.

Things I Think I Think

• I think Obama should keep his BlackBerry. Hell, I think he should be issued a government BlackBerry. This guy agrees and he's a internet tech-journalist. That makes him smart, so I've heard.
• I think less drastic ups and downs in the stock market are a sign of the bottom.

This Week Made Me Wonder...

• Is January "Convention Month"? I spent all week hearing about CES and MacWorld online. Then I hear ads for the National Western Stock Show and Sportsmans Expo in Denver this month. The Detroit Auto Show is also this month.
• Could you turn a USB drive into a key? Has it already been done? Probably.
• If you could text 911, how would it work?
• Would an intranet blog at work help my boss keep us in the loop?

Things To Look Forward To

• Presidential Inauguration 1.20.09
• More home searching
• Getting invitations for the wedding ordered (I wonder how many we're gonna order?)
• Being done with this post. This took way longer than I thought. So much cool geeky stuff to share and I didn't even put it all in here!
  

Overwhelmed by Possibilities - An Ongoing Problem

Once again, I have completely overwhelmed myself. This month, I jumped into the deep end of the social internet by keeping up with Twitter, Facebook, MySpace and by staying committed to my blog. There is one big problem with my blog though: It has way too many possibilities! There are so many things I want to say in my blog, but what direction do I go with it?

I don't feel comfortable blogging about everything I'm interested in because most of my interests have fairly targeted audiences. My interests include: technology, public safety/dispatching, personal adventures, wedding planning, hockey, football, etc. Do I create a blog for each topic? That sounds a bit extreme, but then again if you're reading my blog because you dig my point of view on Ubuntu and social media then you probably don't care about my thoughts on dispatching or how my wedding plans are shaping up (Plans are going pretty good, thanks).

This always seems to happen with me when I adopt something new. I dive in headfirst, I think of all the possibilities of my current project, then I get overwhelmed at all the possibilities and can't decide which way to go with it. I end up stopping whatever it is I'm doing because I don't know what I want to do the most. This post is my attempt at avoiding that.

Any advise will be taken as sage words from a wise soul.

"Chase after truth like hell and you'll free yourself, even though you never touch its coat-tails." - Clarence Darrow

Hunting for houses: Part 1

Today Corrine, Ashlynn and I went out house hunting for the first time. We met our realtor, Amy Terry at Tommy's Subs. There was 2 reasons for meeting at Tommy's: 1. It's freakin' Tommy's! 2. It's close to the neighborhoods we were looking in.

Houses are mostly out of our price range, but we thought we'd give it a shot. The first house we looked at was ok. It's a bi-level house with a 2 car garage. It could work. The things we didn't like about it were the hedge and the cramped bedrooms. The somewhat worn and broken wooden fence in the back might've been a problem except the neighbor's dogs were nice. We liked the kitchen, the deck, the 2 levels and the big freakin' garage.

Everything went down hill after that house. The next house we looked at had a really nice backyard, a huge master bedroom with a huge closet and a jacuzzi tub in the master bathroom. The downside: It had no kitchen. Well, half the kitchen was there, but the apparent flood it had caused them to take out all the flooring, half the cupboards and even the kitchen sink!

The houses after that were all in various states of ugly. One house was on a block where I expected the police to be staking out and the house itsself had foundation problems. The kitchen floor was so warped, walking on it made me feel like I was drunk. Another house had super pink shag carpet and no appliances.

We looked at a couple newer cookie-cutter houses. I liked one of them, but Corrine doesn't like them because they're, well, cookie-cutter houses. They all look the same and they're really close to each other. The one I liked had a backyard that had about the same square footage as most people's living rooms.

Next week we're probably going to look more at condos or townhomes. It seems like the houses in the areas we like are just out of our price range. The ones we could afford seem to need too much work. This has definitely dampered Corrine's hopes, because she was really looking forward to having a house. As much as I'd like one, we really can't afford one yet. Hopefully next week offers more hope.

Making my blog feel more like home

It's time to make my blog feel more like me. I'm never comfortable looking and acting exactly like anyone else and having a blog with a pre-made theme, no matter how obscure it might be, feels like I'm wearing someone else's clothes.

Here's my simple plan to make my blog my own:

Step 1: Put my big ol' name on it -
"But it has your name on it already." You're tempted to say. But what's cooler: scottweblog.blogspot.com or www.scottpantall.com? You know which is cooler. I don't have to tell you. I wonder if the day will come when everyone has their own website. Should I register www.ashlynnpantall.com now?

There is one potentially big obstacle in my way though. My current webhosting account was started with my wedding website, so if I want to add scottpantall.com to that account I'll have to keep my wedding domain name, konoldpantallwedding.com, active as long as I want to keep my scottpantall.com domain active. Are you still following?

While this may not seem like a big deal, I don't want to deal with konoldpantallwedding.com indefinitely so I'll have to find a way around this.

Step 2: Giving my blog it's own clothes -
The internet, and techonology itsself is all about using other peoples' things, but to seperate myself from the rest of the herd, I gotta do my own thing. I'll spend the next couple of weeks tinkering with my blog. I'll change colors and backgrounds, resize sections, add content and widgets, etc.

I'll be soliciting help from 2 of my good friends, Anthony Wyatt and Candice Guilbeault. Both of whom already have their own websites in their names.

There is a good chance I will make more than few errors, which will make my site look like complete crap for a short amount of time. Please let me know if you see one so I can fix it.

"Part of understanding the creative urge is understanding that it's primal. Wanting to change the world is not a noble calling, it's a primal calling." - Hugh MacLeod

Facts, Opinions and Goals for 2009

Here is my obligatory New Year's post: My summary of expectations of this ninth year of the 21st century. 2008 was a much better year than 2007 and I expect 2009 to continue that trend.

I would tell you what my new year's resolutions are, but I don't do those. Something about the phrase "new year's resolution" says "quit by mid February" to me.

So without further ado... well maybe a little ado... what is "ado" anyways?... here are my facts, opinions and goals for 2009:

Facts

• I will buy a place to live.


• I will get married.


• Ashlynn will start kindergarten this fall.


• I will have a Network+ certification.


• I will have my own website.


• I will have much less credit card debt than I have now.

Opinions

• By this date next year, I will be attemting to mooch off the success of at least one of my currently unemployed friends.


• By the end of the year, the major TV networks will have successful web-only shows.

Goals
My overall goal for 2009 is to do less dreaming and more doing. I'm going to change my Wouldn't-it-be-cool-ifs and Someday-we-shoulds into I'm-going-to's.

• Keep in touch with friends and family better - I say this every year. Maybe I've been thinking of it as a resolution. If I keep saying it, maybe it'll stick. This shouldn't be too hard since buying a home and getting married are big deals that you usually tell your friends and family about.


• Contribute more to the internets - 2008 was the year I learned how to use RSS feeds, find blogs and get info from MySpace, Facebook and Twitter. Now it's time for me to give some back.


• Depending on the state of the economy and housing market, start my business.

Now that I've laid them out, this seems like a pretty straightforward year. Let's hope it stays that way! And just in case you were as curious as I was (I'm sure you weren't!): Ado - noun - busy activity; bustle; fuss.

--May you get all your wishes but one,so that you will always have something to strive for!--