June Junk

July 4, 2015 10:13 pm

Okay, not junk. Not at all. But alliteration, you guys! And I get sick of titling these posts “miscellany” or “camera dump.” But anyway, here are all the fun pictures from June that didn’t already get their own blog post. Enjoy!

Heather with some art. She loves to art.1-IMG_20150602_164523as

If you’re going to be realistic about feeding your doll, you need the Boppy. Obviously.2-IMG_20150603_105238as

On any given day, looking into the family room, you may see something like this: 3-IMG_20150604_133348asTotally normal, right? Isn’t this how everybody uses their tablet?

Sometimes feeding the baby gets boring. That’s when you move to the family room and watch TV.4-IMG_20150605_092807as

Kyle turned 30 this year! Wahoo! The girls helped him open his presents.5-P1010506as 6-P1010508as 7-P1010510as 8-P1010519as

And blow out the candles.9-P1010527as 10-P1010530as 11-P1010532asSo we decided to experiment with the cake this year, and it came out YUMMY! I just used the recipe for chocolate cake and frosting off the back of the Hershey cocoa tin (also found here), but the secret was the filling. Kyle has invented this mousse stuff (it’s essentially instant pudding made with whipping cream instead of milk) that is divine, and that’s what I used (vanilla flavored). Kyle needs to blog the recipe, and when he does, I’ll link it (Edit: Link!). He also declared it’s even better the next day. It did not last long.12-P1010533as

Heather really likes to snuggle up in blankets. Even when it’s 100F outside. She’s also started piling up the cushions and pillows and making all sorts of comfy arrangements.13-P1010536as

I’m the Primary secretary in our ward, and our chorister asked me to help out a few weeks ago. To help the kids review the song for Father’s Day, they got to put something in my hair for each line they remembered. Everybody had a lot of fun with it!14-singing time

One afternoon, Heather came up to Kyle and said she wanted to marry him. (When I asked her what that meant, she said they dance!) So she put on her flower tiara thing and they danced. When I showed her this picture and asked her what it was, she said, “Me and daddy…being married…” in a sweet, sing-song voice, and she twirled away. She obviously has fond memories of this event.15-H and K marrying

 

Kyle walked by Heather’s doorway one morning to discover her in bed with what she declared to be her “perfect family.” I don’t think that requires any further explanation.17-perfect family

This is Heather’s dance class at their in-studio dress rehearsal. Too cute.18-dress rehearsal

And this was a Mommy fail. I packed the sunscreen! I just forgot to put it on her. Poor thing. Ibuprofen and aloe vera helped, but she was pretty uncomfortable for a couple of days.19-sunburn

On Father’s Day, Heather helped me make some peanut butter brownies for Kyle.20-Fathers Day brownies

In Primary, the kids got cards with Pop Rocks candy to give their dads, and Heather thought the candy was amazing. She liked watching it pop in Kyle’s mouth:21-Fathers Day pop rocks

And lastly, Heather had swim class the last two weeks in June. It was her first time not being in a parent/child class, and she loved it! They were in a 2-foot pool and the class was very small, so she had a lot of one-on-one time with the teacher. I love watching her learn new things!IMGP3277as IMGP3279as IMGP3281as

May Miscellany

July 3, 2015 11:06 pm

Kyle and his girls:12-IMG_20150501_185406as 13-IMG_20150501_185827as

Heather was so tired she laid down on the couch and fell asleep in the middle of the afternoon. This has never happened before or since. In fact, later that day, she didn’t believe it had happened until Kyle showed her photographic proof. (For the life of me, though, I can’t remember WHY she was so tired! Some adventure with Daddy, I believe.)14-IMGP2990as

Heather spent an afternoon with our friends the Badgers. She got her nails painted for the first time!15-IMGP2994as

All dressed up in her recital costume for picture day:17-IMGP3025as 18-IMGP3029as

Awww, sisters!19-IMG_20150519_161631as

Heather and I got to do some sidewalk chalking one afternoon, and it was super fun. I drew a face, and she proceeded to add the digestive system (‘cuz she’s awesome like that). This is the only art I got a picture of, though:20-IMG_20150520_162048as

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The girls and I went for a walk downtown, and Heather somehow ended up in the fountain. She thoroughly enjoyed herself, though, and has fond memories of our adventure on “the First Street.”IMG_20150526_153737as IMG_20150526_153742as

April Stuff (a.k.a. Johnsons in Livermore)

9:42 pm

Waaaaaay back in April, some of my family came out for Corinne’s blessing. My parents came for a week, and my brother Christopher and his son Miles were here for that weekend. I came across some nice pictures, so here they are!

Heather and Miles, up at the Redwood Valley Railway:1-IMG_20150418_180400as

We had a picnic dinner at a local park one evening. As I recall, it was windy and chilly, but the kids had a blast on the playground.2-IMGP2836aas 3-IMGP2852aas 4-IMGP2860aas 5-IMGP2864aas 6-IMGP2866aas 7-IMGP2873aas

After Christopher and Miles left, but while my parents were still in town, we went to Muir Woods. It was pretty fantastic. Unfortunately, none of the pictures with my parents came out very well, but they were there!8-IMGP2908as 09-IMGP2911as 10-IMGP2969as

And to round out our coverage of April, Kyle and Heather made this:11-IMG_20150424_180717as(I think Kyle did most of the work, but it’s pretty clear who his muse was.)

Decisions are made by those who show up

June 16, 2015 10:30 am

The article “Inside Obama’s Stealth Startup” was published yesterday over at fastcompany.com.  It discusses the U.S. Digital Service as well as 18F and the effort to bring government tech into the 21st century.  When these stories post I oftentimes take a look at the comment threads on common tech watering holes like Slashdot and HackerNews.  Generally speaking, Slashdot comment threads are rather cynical while HackerNews tends to be more optimistic, but overall it provides some kind of view into how the greater tech world is responding.  So I was surprised at the amount of cynicism expressed in the comments on HackerNews on this article.

Now, I tend to be fairly cynical, the only negative remark on my annual performance appraisals has always been that I should try to be less cynical.  (Personally, I think my cynicism has helped make our team successful, but I digress…) While I may be somewhat cynical, I’m also on the inside of government work.  I know my team members and their skills.  I know the mission space my software is used in.  And I know my background and motivations.

I understand feeling that nothing in government could really be improved so this whole thing must be nothing more than a PR campaign.  It’s not.  This is possibly the first genuine attempt at meaningfully improving government tech services ever.  And there are more people pushing for it than just those in the U.S.D.S. or 18F.

I’m reminded of a quote from The West Wing: “Decisions are made by those who show up.”

The government isn’t just another corporation out to make a profit.  It is the thing which makes our country more than some lines on a map.  If it’s not working the way you want it to then you have two choices: whine and complain on the Internet about how broken it is or show up and do something about it.

torbakhopper via Flickr - Creative Commons Licensed
torbakhopper via Flickr – Creative Commons Licensed

The government is likely to continue to exist for some time to come*.  If we’re not trying to make it better then it’s not going to get better.  If you know me well you know I am not Mr. Patriotic, and in fact I find patriotism dangerous as it is often used to stifle dissent.  This isn’t about being patriotic or that somehow the U.S. is better than other countries.  This is about the U.S. government being our government.  And it was created upon the idea that the citizens should have some say in how their government operates.

For years technology in government has fallen behind due to thousands of qualified techies deciding they would rather chase piles of money by selling ads and shiny, metal gadgets than trying to make the government better.  And I get that it’s not just about the money. Fighting bureaucracy is hard and exhausting.

But if we don’t fight it then it’s only going to get worse.  And we can change it.  I have changed my small corner of it.

When I started in my job 6 years ago the source code for this group was stored in an ancient deployment of SVN, the applications were built on homegrown J2EE frameworks with no documentation, missing source code, years behind industry best practices, and with release cycles measured in months.  The code was like spaghetti, it barely functioned, and the intended users hated it.  They disliked it so much that they continued throwing their data into Excel to avoid using the custom software which was supposed to be more useful than Excel.  There was no reason for it but culture and lack of energy to fight for change.

When I joined, the existing software group had disbanded.  I still haven’t gotten a full story about what happened, but on my first day on the job the “team” consisted of myself, a database administrator, and a team manager.  Seeing the catastrophe of code that was in front of me I pushed on the manager to let me build a prototype using a modern framework (what did we have to lose, after all?).  It was a smash success and that prototype grew to become one of our core applications.

Now, with the help of willing managers and with our tiny team of software developers (just me, then 2, then 4, now ~7) we’ve made massive changes.  We use Git for our version control, we build our applications on popular open-source frameworks and libraries, we follow industry best practices as much as possible, our release cycles are measured in weeks and sometimes days.  Our users love the software and constantly ask for more advanced tools.  Our management estimates our technology environment to be at least a year ahead of any other organization in our mission space, we have saved the government millions of dollars, and we have saved lives.

Fighting the bureaucracy is hard.  Some days you think it would just be easier to give in.  It would be easier to give in.  But then nothing gets better.

We have enough work to keep a team twice our size busy but we can’t find qualified people to fill the positions.  If the qualified people choose money over service then government technology will continue to suffer.

Our government is what we make of it and the decisions are made by those who show up.

So show up.

Achievement Unlocked

June 10, 2015 4:56 pm

We had our little graduation ceremony today for the National Security Leadership Program that I’ve been participating in over the last year.  The result is being awarded a Certificate in National Security Affairs.

IMG_20150610_162951sWe got to meet with the Lab’s Deputy Director for Science and Technology, Patricia Falcone, who handed out the certificates.  She came to the Lab just a few months ago from the Office of Science and Technology Policy at the White House.  She knows Mike!

The certificate program consists of four graduate courses: Deterrence and Coercion (focusing on nuclear weapons), The Role of Intelligence in Security Affairs (focusing on intelligence agencies and operations), Terrorism in Today’s World, and National Security Policy (history, structure, application of U.S. national security organizations).

It was definitely a different way of looking at the world and a very different way of writing papers.  A lot of time the papers I wrote I felt ended up being a bit hand-wavy, but then I’m used to writing papers where you have hard data with which to argue your point.

I have no idea what will come of my having participated in this program, but it was a good experience.  I enjoyed being back in a class room setting to really focus on interesting topics and at the same time I’m really glad I’m not a full-time student anymore.  It was really nice to be able to intelligently and maturely discuss controversial topics of national policy in a setting that doesn’t devolve into name calling or logically defunct arguments.

Having been through it, I kind of wish passing these courses was a minimum requirement for any politician elected to a national office.