Fixing Electrical Problems & Feeling Like A Man

For some mysterious reason the light in our backroom when out a little while ago... and so did a single wall outlet... and changing the light bulb didn't help.

Welcome to summer project #1: Fixing the back room's electrical

Now, I have been very blessed to not have to deal with many electrical problems. And when I did, I was at home and let my dad handle the situation. Ah... growing up... I may not have been at home, but that didn't stop me from having multiple video conferences with my dad, including one where I literally propped up my phone so he could watch me test fixtures.

The light fixture. There are 3 sets of wires running into it.

Since I'm an electrical newbie, I couldn't figure it out and ending up calling an electrician for help. I learned from him that the trick is to figure out the logic of the wiring. Once you know the logic, you often find where the problem occurred. He also looks for clues: First, the age of the house will suggest wiring conventions of the time. Also, he looks for signs of repairs or "non-original" items. Apparently repair work is often done by a general contractor, who isn't an expert in electrical wiring, which is genuinely confusing, and therefore mistakes are often made.

It took him 45 minutes figure out what was going on. Which I felt good about how long it took since I gave him a head start by undoing everything and pointing out what worked and what didn't head of time. He assured me that it wasn't easy to figure out. He then spent 15 more minutes explaining to me how to fix the issue and providing me the necessary materials (wiring, boxes, nuts, etc) to complete the project.

I had 4 reasons for wanting to do it myself.

• He charges $78 per hour. He estimated it would take him an hour to do it. Do you know how much Yogurt Extreme I can get for $78? Going out for "something sweet" is how Jessi & I reward ourselves for accomplishments.
• Also, he also wanted to add another hole to my wall so he could do it easier. No thanks!
• Furthermore, he wasn't 100% that's where the issues was. What if it was different once he started? Another hour or two?
• Finally, this was something I wanted to learn how to do so I didn't need to call for help in the future.

So, off I went to fix the electrical.

The problem

Our back room is wired like a daisy chain. So one wall socket leads to the light fixture, which leads to another wall socket. The point of failure was where the wall socket went up the wall to the attic and over to the light fixture. The wire looked fine in the attic, which means it failed in the wall... right next to where a door had been added... A "non-original" item.

My guess is the cause of the mysterious failure is our treadmill. It's in this room, and when we run it tends to shake that part of the building. Being that it failed shortly after we started running on it for our half-marathon training, my guess is that we jiggled apart an already lose connection in the wall. 

The solution

Since the existing wiring is stapled in along the entire length it's impossible to pull it out. So the next best thing is to abandon it buy cutting off the two ends and installing a new wire parallel to it.

So, I headed up to the attic and drilled a new hole down to the wall. Then I used a new toy: a steel fish tape. I pushed that down the hole. Then I went back into the room and grabbed the tape out of the hole. I hooked the wire to the tape, went back into the attic and pulled the tape back up (along with the wire).

Cost at Home Depot: $10. Value to me: $100

The wire I used was strong enough to hold itself

Let's pause a talk about the attic for a little bit.

First, I put on a long-sleeve sweatshirt, safety glasses, and a mask.

Then I head up into a hole just barely big enough for me.

Then I enter into a HOT, dark, fluffy, short space.

I first had to find the fixtures, which was buried under all that fluff, which is insulation blown in. Oh yeah, and I did that while balancing on the beams so I didn't go through the drywall (aka. the ceiling).

This is the top of the light fixture. That white cord is the new wire.

It's hard to tell in this next picture, but roof is slanted, and the fixtures are near the end. Which means the spot where I actually pulled the tape through and re-strung the wire was not very tall. I literally only had enough room to crawl around on my belly. Swimming around in insulation, all covered up, got very, very hot.

So that's the attic. Now back to our story.

Once the wire was pulled through, I striped the plastic and hooked everything back up. With batted breath I turned the power back on and hoped for the best. Indeed, the light worked! I was 95% sure it would since I tested it earlier by temporarily connecting the wires in the room (thanks to Jessi's suggestion), but there's still that moment of doubt. :)

Here's a picture of the light fixture working, and a lamp plugged into the wall socket. A little clean-up, and the room was back to normal.

There's something very tricky about electricity. It reminds of my finance class in school. On the surface it seems pretty straightforward. Connect two wires and power flows. However, given how flexible electricity is, there are many creative ways to wire something up. There are also many safety precautions and principles you need to remember since electricity can be very dangerous. Combine these, and something that seems simple suddenly becomes very, very complicated.

So, being able to figure it out, along with working in the attic feels very manly. I'm also living off the high of completing my first summer project - which feels great!

Why Is My Dog Frisky?

I'm attempting to get some work done this morning, but my cute dog, Vinnie, has other plans. He's pulling at my shorts, my shirt, and on occasion attempting to hump my leg.

Thanks dude. You can stop now.

I wouldn't mind too much, but I really do have work to do and my legs are getting all scratched up. Maybe if I have a quick Zen-like moment and write about it I'll feel better. Maybe...

I just don't get it. I know that on occasion it means the dog is trying to dominate you. Other times he's genuinely frisky. I'm honestly not sure which one this is, but it's time to stop.

By the way, I did get him to sit long enough for me to take this picture, and then he jumped on me again. What a dog!

Apple's WWDC 2012 Keynote Too Hot Too Handle

On Monday morning Apple will be giving their 2012 WWDC Keynote to an audience packed with developers from the East Coast. Like all Apple events, there's only one thing guaranteed to come out of Monday: disappoint. You see, expectations are at an all time high for Apple this time round. If I didn't know any better, I'd think it is some massive conspiracy to set everyone's expectations way too high, only to be manically disappointed, so next year nobody will want to go.

Seriously, the list includes everything. It's a whole new Apple... as if they need to fix something... Here's what I remember just off the top of my head

• MacBooks
• A new Macbook Pro Redesign
• A revival of the MacBook brand
• New Intel Chips
• USB 3.0 on the MacBook Pro
• A Retina display MacBook
• An entirely new MacBook! (this could be filed under the "MacBook revival")
• A new Mac Pro design!
• Software
• iOS 6
• A new Maps App, with turn-by-turn navigation
• Facebook Integration
• Siri API, plus for iPad
• Another re-vamp of the Notification Center
• New skins to choose from (like for the Settings App)
• iCloud API
• OSX Mountain Lion released
• An Apple TV SDK, maybe even hardware!

Why is it that tech reporters feel the need to support every single rumor they hear? Sure, Apple probably is working on all of these, but they like to dole out information slowly. That way customers can absorb the changes a little bit at time. Plus, they're only human, it genuinely takes a while to create new products.

But that's not fun! I get that. It is more fun to dream of all the possibilities Apple has in store for us. Plus, no body remembers if you get it wrong, so there's no harm in guessing... err... predicting. As for me, as a current owner of an iMac and iPhone, I would love to only hear about updates to iOS and OSX (with free updates, please).

So, prepare to be utterly disappointed on Monday. Everything Apple comes out will either already be known, or a copy of something someone else already did. We'll all still buy it, and love it, but it'll be disappointing.

One More Thing!

Here are my predictions of what you won't see on Monday:

• Control your iPad using Apple TV's remote
• iWork coming to the upcoming Windows 8 tablet
• Deep LinkedIn integration with iOS
• Oprah Moment: all attendees get stock options ahead of Apple's dividend
• iOS gets a file system similar to OSX
• iAds rolling out to OSX apps & HTML5 websites
• A tribute video to Steve Jobs where everyone wears his outfit and says "Insanely Great!"

image: gamenguide.com

Thoughts On Building A Podcast

Back in December I shared that my brother and I started a tech podcast called Furlo Bros. We get together once a week, on Sunday at 8pm, to discuss the tech news. I have the business angle, and has the engineer angle, and we share the brotherly love. We just finished recording our 38th show (36 weekly, 2 specials), and I've learned a couple things about building a podcast.

If You Build It, They Will Come

In some sense, this is true. It's one of the magical things about the Internet: if you create something valuable, people find it and share it with others. That's how Google grew, how Facebook spread, and why Instagram got bought for $1 Billion. None of them spent money on "traditional" advertising (OK. OK. Google eventually did, but only after it was huge).

The only "advertising" I've done is post each shows on popular social sites: Facebook, Twitter, Digg, Pinterest, StumbleUpon, Delicious, and Google+. We've seen consistent growth each week. We're not "huge" yet, but we'll get there. I realize I could do more in these spaces, but I honestly don't have the time. I would love to interact with people more and post stories more regularly with commentary. Time seems to be my limiting factor.

If You Build It, Build It Well

Having said that, building something valuable is NOT easy. Even in the age of Wordpress where anyone can start a blog, it requires a lot of work. We have 15 plug-ins working to create a seemingly simple website. Most are designed to speed up the site, which is still too slow for my tastes, but we'll get there.

We also played around with a bunch of recording options before landing on our current favorite. We're now to a point where we can record everything in real time (No more hour-long sessions to mash it all together. Yeah!). In order to accomplish that, I spent an entire weekend (no joke - like 15 hours) playing with different software to make it work. Our current solution requires 5 different programs. I'm not sure what we'll do when I travel.

If You Build It, Build It To Last

Much like cell phones, we all get distracted by the up front costs required to get set up, and then only realize later that it's the monthly recurring costs that require the most from us. The same is true of podcasting. To fill up a 2 hour show I come up with about half the content. To do that, I skim 1,000 - 2,000 articles each week. I actually read 30-50 articles. I bookmark 10, and dive deep into a couple, only mentioning the others. It's a lot of work distilling down to the what I think is the top 1% of tech news that week!

Before starting the podcast, I used to skim about 1,000 articles each week because I enjoyed it, but there were some weeks that I could "take off" because I was busy. That really isn't an option any more. I've learned how to cheat on those weeks by finding a couple sources that cover the top news of the week, but even then it's still work.

If You Build It, Prepare To Be Delighted
We started this podcast because we enjoy talking about tech together. We also believed we had insights that others would appreciate. At the very least, we wanted to have it on record when we said something before anyone else. We're only 38 shows in , and I'm already addicted to it for one really big reason:

It's an awesome feeling to gain a new super-fan. Being a marketer I constantly ask if we're doing something unique and valuable. We do have the hope of someday making money, and that can only be accomplished by creating something uniquely valuable. I love hearing from real people that, yes, we are doing something entertaining, something valuable. Being that these are fellow tech enthusiasts, it's super fun when I suddenly get followed by the same person on 10 different services. It's moments like these that make all the work worth it. OK. Getting to talk to my brother each week for a couple hours is pretty fun too. :)

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So those are my thoughts on building a podcast so far. We're just getting started, and I'm really enjoying the process. I'm sure I'll have more thoughts in the future, but that's enough for now.

PS. I still think our logo is beyond awesome.

Garden Fence

Jessi & I sure had a productive holiday! Our final project was to create a fence around our garden. After long conversations about the best way to do it, we finally settled on this solution. It's a light PVC fence made of two parts. Those pieces then pivot vertically on the short ends of the garden. This way we can mow the lawn around the garden easily, and still get to all parts of the garden easily. Plus, when you watch the video, you'll see it has a semi-geek feel to it when it's opened. Always a bonus.

Who Kept The Dog Out?!

We didn't stop with just installing a new radio in our Jeep. The next day we cut out a piece of wood to go behind the back seat. You see, we discovered the hard way that Vinnie could get back there when he ate my turkey avocado bacon burger. That happened back in February, and it took until this weekend for us to make something to stop him.

The solution was pretty easy: We cut out a board to go just over the top of the back area. It balances itself on the two sidewalls. We used some left-over wood to make it. First we created a template using cardboard, then cut out the wood, and sanded it. It's not the prettiest thing ever, but that's OK. If it does work particularly well, we might upgrade to a nicer piece of wood.

We'll see, but it should keep Vinnie from getting down there. Now we can put items, like food, down there and it'll be safe.

Installing A New Radio

The Radio in our Jeep didn't work and we decided Memorial Weekend was the time to replace it. There are plenty of video tutorials on youtube that explain how to switch out a radio, so instead... here's what we did... in pictures!

Here's the stock radio. It doesn't work. :)

First we took all the shroud off. It was surprising simple. Jeeps are awesome like that.

The antenna plug

A bunch of speaker wires. Too bad colors are not standard. But there's the Internet to help!

The new radio used a new connector. Lots of crimping and double checking wires.

Oh yeah! Got them all, and they all work!

What the new radio looks like. That shroud piece is universal, you just cut off the tabs you don't need.

All done! The new radio works great. We took a ride to get ice cream to "test it".

Portland Timbers Army

I had the pleasure of joining the Portland Timbers Army last night as the Timbers took on Valencia, a spanish team, in an friendly international match. The Timbers ended up losing 1-0, but the match was still good. As Steven Smith, a Timbers player, tweeted:

#RCTID ->RT @Steven26Smith: I'd say we held our own.Now time to get ready for the big game on Saturday. Night all #tired
— Portland Timbers (@TimbersFC) May 24, 2012

Totally agree. You guys played great. Here are the highlights of the game:





Lots of close opportunities.

The field during warm-ups. It's a nice stadium.

This was my first Timbers match experience, and I must say that being in general admission with the Timbers Army looks way more fun than seats on the sidelines. We get to stand the whole time, and yell fun chants without people looking at us weird. Here's a small snippet of what cheering was like:






It was a blast and I'd like to go again. Thanks David for inviting me.

Here I am, enjoying myself. :)

Meat Retreat Twenty12

For the second time, I got to participate in my church's Meat Retreat for the High School Boys Youth Group. What is the Meat Retreat? Well... It's a retreat devoted to one primary activity: eating meat, plus some other things. Here are the highlights of this weekend. Thanks to Keith and Steve for letting me steal your photos.

We hold the retreat in Bend, Oregon. So we piled all the boys (19 of them) into the church's yellow bus and headed over.

But first we stop at A&W in Sweet Home and consume some meat... and lots of Root Beer.

We stay at Tumalo State Park in one of the group campsites. It's a semi-sucluded place where boys can be boys. By the time we get there, set up, and go shopping for meat, it's time for bed.

The next day we wake up and eat meat. Then we split into two groups. One goes mountain bike riding. The other goes Frisbee Golfing. Then we all come back, and eat more meat for lunch.

The afternoon is spent playing kickball / softball. It's a pretty fun time.

Here's a good picture of the group of boys:

And here's another picture of some guys... Boys will be boys.

We also played Buck Buck. According to Wikipedia, Buck Buck was started in Europe in the 1600s with one group of players jumping on the backs of another group of players with the goal of toppling the whole group. Yep. Bill Cosby even joked about it in his 1967 album Revenge where he introduced Fat Albert as "the baddest Buck Buck breaker in the world". Here's a visual of how it's played:

Group one locks waists to form a strong foundation.

Then players from the other team jump on top.

Eventually more players start to stack on top.

Finally, the supporting group tumbles under the weight. Hilarious.

OK. Back to what we did. That night, we headed over to Safeway to consume ice cream. America's Got Talent played on a near-by TV, which captured most of our attention. That guy with the earth harp? Amazing!

Then we headed back to the campground, started a fire, and chatted for a bit.

 The next morning we woke up and ate... more meat!

 We then headed over to Smith Rock and hiked to the top.

It's an amazing view.

 So there you go. That's the Meat Retreat. Lots of meat, lots of fun.

Garden Time!

It's one of my favorite times of the year...when the sun begins to shine and the grass gets cut and when the garden gets cleaned out and replanted!

All tilled and ready to plant!

We decided to try a couple of new things this year and stick with a few tried and true favorites. Here's what we've got growing this year...


Yearlong Strawberries: These are actually the same plants as last year. Vinnie got to all of the berries last year before they even ripened but this year there are tons of new buds! More on the Vinnie problem later.

Zebra stripped Zucchini: I was attracted to these literally because they were stripped! We'll see how they turn out.

Red Potatoes and Yams: I had some beautiful yam vines last year but I started them way too late and the vines froze before producing anything.

Carrots: Last year I started my carrots from seed, this year I went with seedlings since my carrots never got thicker than a pencil. I tried a new variety of organic baby carrots.

Spinach: For whatever reason greens grow extremely well in our garden, the spinach last year, however, totally got burned...We are going to attempt to cover the garden this year. Hopefully that will help.

Swiss Chard: This is the same crop from last summer...it bolted in the last few weeks and is now turning to seed. It is still super tasty and I just read how to harvest the seed and re-sow them. I have been the most happy with this plant out of all of them. There is nothing I (or Vinnie) can do to kill it!

Snap Peas: My snap peas also got burned last year so hopefully covering them will do the trick this year. We did get a few peas before they croaked. The plants I got this year seem to be a little stronger than last years.

Herbs: My parsley, thyme and oregano all wintered very well! I am keeping them and might add a few other herbs along the way.

Onions: I had a few bulbs from last hear that suddenly took off this spring. We have enjoyed chives throughout the summer but I am hoping that the bulbs actually fill in this year.

Tomatoes and Peppers: Lincoln Elementary, where I work, is selling plants from the school garden this year so I am going to try out some of the tomatoes and peppers. I might also get some basil, cilantro and tomatillos...but we will see if I have enough space!

Admiring his work

So, the big goals this year are to create some shade during the full sunny afternoons and also to keep Vinnie, the hole digger-plant destroyer, out of the garden. We haven't come up with any good solutions yet. If you have any ideas send them our way!

Vinnie the garden eater

Thanks for reading!

Jessi

Why I Quit Netflix

It was time.

It all started when Netflix decided to split up its DVD and streaming business. Remember that? I don't think there was a worse way to handle that debacle. Still, the one thing that stuck was a "massive" 40% price increase: from $10 to $14.

Netflix made it clear at the time that streaming was the wave of the future. You know, the "disc is dead" and all that. Many people decided right away to quit Netflix. I decided to side with Netflix's vision and chose streaming only. Saving a couple dollars each month was phycologically nice too (since I never actually noticed it in my monthly budget).

At the time the streaming library wasn't as big as the DVD section, but Netflix said it was the future. So surely the movie choices would grow over time, right?

Right?!

Then in September Netflix failed to reach an agreement with Starz for their streaming content. Care to guess what the majority of the movies I watched were?

To consul myself, I found myself bingeing on television series. But here's the rub: watching a movie takes at most 2 hours of my life. Watching a television series takes a LOT more time. So I would start watching a TV show because I couldn't find any movies that interested me, then get hooked on a show I only kind of cared about.

Hours.

Gone.

Meanwhile, I had a notes app I used to list movies I wanted to see, but weren't available on Netflix streaming. These were movies I actually wanted to see, not just to kill time.

The final nail was when Netflix announced that it would be pursuing an "original content" strategy for streaming. In other words, that future flood of streaming movies is never coming. My movie wish list would never be added to the Netflix queue.

That's when I decided to was time to quit Netflix. It still took a while to pull the trigger because I still had a few TV series I wanted to finish (addictions can be bad...), but eventually I finished them, made sure Jessi watched everything she wanted, and quit.

What's Next?

A bunch of things.

First, we're keeping our entertainment budget the same since iTunes has EVERY SINGLE MOVIE on my wish list to rent for $3. I figure 1 to 3 movies a month should be plenty.

Especially since we'll keep using Hulu for TV shows.

Plus, I've been thinking about getting back into reading actual paper books (well... eBooks first, paper if I have to). There are a few technical ones I want to read that really don't translate well in spoken form.

There are also a ton of summer projects I want to complete, and summer is upon us.

I'm actually pretty bummed that Netflix and I grew apart. I really like their business model and I think they've done a lot to disrupt the movie rental industry and the cable TV industry. I'll still be cheering for Netflix, but it won't be as a customer.

A Little DIY Greek Yogurt

I came across a cool little how-to called How to Strain Your Own Greek-Style Yogurt via Lifehacker. I shared it with Jessi and we decided to try it. It's super easy.

First, buy some plain yogurt & some coffee filters if you don't have any around. We have the single cup style coffee filter system.

Second, double up the coffee filter and put in a colander. We used the one made for our coffee filter. Also, put some sort of liquid-catching device for the watery whey to drip into. A bowl, or cup will work just fine.

Third, fill the filters up with yogurt. It'll look like this:

Fourth, cover with a towel and put in the fridge over night.

Fifth, take it out the next morning (or about 8 hours later), and scoop it into another container with a lid. Toss the liquid whey.

Sixth, enjoy your thicker yogurt without the watery whey. Side note: don't drink the whey... It tastes horrible...

Not surprising, you'll lose a lot of volume in the process, but that also means you don't need to eat as much since it's much thicker. Here's a before and after comparison:

Try it out. Add some berries, granola and/or honey for a real treat.

What Time Is It? Time To Get A New Watch

I have always been a watch person.

In middle school, high school and college I owned G-shock watches. Those things are amazing! I had one that could tell you the altitude which we used while back-packing. They also had at least 5 alarms and a myriad of other cool features - like water proof up to 200m. Never mind my ears hurt after 10 feet - I could go 200m!

And yes, I was that kid in class who had it beep at the top of every hour. In retrospect, I bet my teachers hated that. :)

Being indestructible was my favorite feature. I could wear it while working and not have to worry hurting it. That's a major bonus when doing construction work in Mexico and everyone wants to know if it's lunchtime yet. My last G-shock made it through junior year of high school, college and a couple years beyond.

That G-shock finally met an untimely doom during a construction project on our duplex. I accidentally slammed my wrist up against a wall and it literally shattered the outside casing into 3 pieces. So much for that highly valued 200m water proof feature. I milked it for a few months beyond, but once the battery died I knew it was time to move on.

For my next watch I ventured into new territory. I wanted something I could wear for more occasions: mainly dressed up or casual. My G-shock didn't work well with long sleeve shirts because of it's bulk. Since I mostly play sports for exercise, I didn't need a sports watch. I found an analog Timex that met my need.

I've already gone through one battery and it's been a trooper. The only time I don't like wearing it is when I do serious typing (like right now) because it rubs my wrist weird.

I don't want to dismiss this watch - it's good. But today I once again ventured into new territory.

Kickstarter is a website that helps people raise money for creative projects by allowing other individuals (the crowd) to collectively fund them. This is known as crowd-funding. It's a pretty amazing platform with many interesting projects.

One project is called Pebble. It's an e-paper watch that connects, via blue-tooth, to your smart phone. It can display the time, incoming caller ID, text messages (on Android), control music, monitor your running pace, and many more cool functions to come. Here's a video of the watch:




Pretty cool, right? On Kickstarter, people can pledge to give money to the project with various rewards for contributing. For example, for $115 you can get a black watch when it comes out.

I was hesitant at first to fund the project because the blue-tooth technology they were using was an older one. That meant greater batter drain and less possible features. Then today they announced they would upgrade to the latest version of blue-tooth given all the popular demand for it.

Boom.

I signed up and will be getting mine in September.

So I enter a new phase of watch awesome-ness. It's a 2012 high tech version of the G-Shock watch, but with the sleek look of my current Timex watch. Now the big question is what color I should get. I like the white since it'll match my iPhone, but then I might come off as a bit of a hipster. I'm not sure how I feel about that... :)