360Flex in Indianapolis

This year I was able to participate in the 360Flex conference held in Indianapolis. For the uninitiated, Flex is a programming language developed by Adobe to make fancy internet applications. The conference was held at the Crowne Plaza Hotel in the heart of the city. The hotel is also a working train station, and has 13 Pullman cars that have been restored and refurbished and are used as rooms and suites. I was in the Jean Harlowe room, in car 26. There are fiberglass ghost people around the hotel picturing people who would have been in the train station at the turn of the century.

The main sessions of the meetings were held in the Grand Hall of the Union Station. It is an awesome space, with stained glass windows at each end and intricately detailed walls.

Because it is a working train station, there were times in the evenings and mornings when my room would start to vibrate as a train arrived or left. It was a bit disconcerting at first, but added to the ambiance.

I'll post some of the technical Flex stuff at my other blog, AllThingsRIA.blogspot.com Oh, and I actually won a prize - I got an advance copy of the new Flex 3 Professional - only the 2nd time in my life for winning a door prize!

Spring in Billerica

Spring took a long time getting here this year, but once it finally came the flowers and trees started to bloom. I've never seen lilacs like we had this year, and the flowering trees and bushes were spectacular. My daffodils and tulips are in their 4th year, and have spread and multiplied - I'll probably have to separate them in the next year or so.

Our house faces to the south-east, so we get lots of warm sunshine and reflection off the siding, which means that the iris plants at the front of the house are first to bloom. The ones along the fence should bloom within the next week or so.

My Thesis is Finished!

I received final approval on my thesis and got it published and submitted, so now all that's left is graduation on June 4. Here's a shot of the Harvard Red binding. Anyone who wants to read it - just let me know!

The Rains in North Carolina

We flew to Charlotte, NC, to spend the weekend with Chris and Holly and family. Emma's baptism was the main reason for going, but we got to take walks, play at the park and see soccer games too. The azaleas were at their peak and really beautiful this year. It was nice to leave cold New England and travel to a warmer place for a bit and lots of fun to see kids playing soccer and to get to know Eliza and Thomas.

Captain Carrot the Canary

We picked up our canary over the weekend. He's a "red factor" canary, which means that he's more orange than yellow and that we have to feed him red and orange foods to keep his color up. He started singing Sunday, and he sings longer and more interesting tunes as the days go on. He's a bit camera shy, and stops singing when I get too close with the camera, so this video is from across the room. It's not much to look at, but he was warbling some pretty tunes on it.

April Update

Happy Easter, everyone. Lisa came to visit, so we worked on a puzzle. It has to be the hardest puzzle we've ever done.


Robert and I got to bird-sit some friends' cockatiel this past week. Her name is Holly, and she was a fun addition to our household. Here is one video where she was quietly looking around in her cage. Seems like whenever I got the camera out she became really quiet.

March

This March has been a typical "in like a lion, out like a lamb" here in New England. We had another big storm on March 2nd: here are some pictures.







The snow took forever to melt, mainly because of temperatures in the teens and twenties for a couple of weeks, but we have finally started to warm up a bit. The crocuses that I planted to naturalize the back yard have finally poked their little heads out of the ground.





When I was little my Dad used to take pictures of flowers that we saw when we were on vacation. I never used to understand that, but I do now. It's so rewarding to see the flowers that you have planted and tended bloom. They look really cheerful in the sunshine.

Now that the weather has warmed up I've been able to hit the roads cycling. Doing Spinervals all winter has really paid off;I feel like I'm stronger and faster than even at the end of the season last year. It's still pretty chilly and I've been wearing tights, several layers, a woolly under-the-helmet hat and lobster-claw gloves, but it's so great to be out in the sunshine.

I have also spent March polishing my thesis document, getting it ready for submission. I finished the final edits and turned it in today. The next step is for the research director to review it and provide me with another list of edits. Hopefully after that it will be off to the printer and I'll be done. I also got my papers to order my graduation "regalia" - I plan to walk on June 4th and everyone is invited!