Grandpa worked the presses

My grandfather worked for the newspaper in Valparaiso, where I grew up. I think he actually worked the presses at one point, but was doing editing and layout when I was old enough to go to his work. Riding home tonight, I happened to pass the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette building when it was dark outside (thanks, daylight savings) and the press room lights were on. I never knew they actually printed the papers there. I figured it was just offices and administrative stuff. Now, I have a new destination to swing by on my way home from work to gawk and the fun, beautiful machinery.

Misty fall morning riding

It's been a nice week for riding in the mornings, somewhat chilly at full speed, but worthwhile.

Unearthed

We went to Unearthed, a fundraiser for the Friends of the Pittsburgh Urban Forest last night. A handful of artists created work from dead and fallen wood from Allegheny Cemetery. Some of the pieces were great. Some seemed like the artist either couldn't find inspiration in the piece they received or by the deadline. It was a fun night. Maya was circulating sort of on the clock for her job at the Lawrenceville Corporation. Tim's band, the Metropolitans played a set during the show. Silas just hung out in the carrier the whole time. He slept for the first hour or so and woke up and looked around for latter half. We didn't end up with any decent pictures of him. Alas.

Thursday at work

Oh yeah, cold mornings now - I love it! Or at least so far. A little bit of snow and some wind made for a fun ride in. It was sunny and really pretty today, despite the temperature.

Bethany and Silas came to work for a short visit as well. Silas slept for most of it in his double thumbs-up pose.

Gravity of Light

Upon Courtney's suggestion, she, Dave, and I went to the Gravity of Light visual art presentation this week during lunch. It was set up in an old warehouse that Dave and I both bike past every day on our way to work. The artists, from Brooklyn, set up several large scale pieces along the walls of the Pipe Building and illuminated the room with the blindingly stark light of a 50,000 W carbon arc lamp.

The carbon arc lamp itself was fascinating. Basically, the mechanism brings two charged carbon elements together and pulls them apart, creating an arc in the space in between. The process burns off some of the material, so the mechanism slowly brings the rods closer and closer to keep the arc distance approximately the same over time. The light it cast was brilliantly white and caused amazingly sharp-edged shadows throughout the warehouse. It was a good experience.

Less than a penny

Yes, more of my pedantic behaviors. I don't remember when I took this, but it's from Stan's Market in the Strip District. With these cheap prices, who wouldn't shop down here? And why would you buy regular potatoes when you can get yams and red potatoes for 1/100th of the price?

Not quite a snowy commute

I have no picture, but wanted to document that today was my first ride in to work with snow. Of course, it was a grand total of maybe 10 flakes, but snow nonetheless. I need to get wider tires with tread for the bike. The narrow road slicks on there are going to serve me poorly when it gets wetter and/or icy.

With the beard, I can still ride to work without the face mask to stay warm. I might try out some goggles, as my eyes water the whole way. I remember the tears freezing on my cheeks and beard in previous winters.

Presentation is over

The presentation went well. I'm glad it's over. I have to admit, despite the stress of putting together an hour and a half of material, it was kind of fun. The presentation part went fine. I didn't have a mic, so some people in the full room had trouble hearing me in the back. Overall, we got positive feedback. For the kid that about wet his pants in nervousness in high school speech class, it's kind of funny to be pretty comfortable talking to 50-100 people once or twice a year... This is my second presentation at the EEBA conferences. I've presented papers at two others.

EEBA is the Energy and Environmental Building Association. There is one more day left in the conference, so I'll get to do the rest without the cloud of the never-finished presentation hanging over me.

Nightime break for dinner

Just posting a few nighttime pictures around the resort from my walk out for dinner. I didn't do much besides work on the presentation all day. I did get a nice 3 1/2 mile run in the evening before it got dark. Even though it wasn't all that hot, the air is so dry.

Water heater or sci-fi bomb

Well, it's not nearly as cool as the Maker Faire in Austin this week, but this electric water heater was sure a looker. That turbine-looking device is the flow sensor. It provides the computer some idea of the flow rate of the water so it knows how hard to pulse the heating elements hidden in those sexy stainless steel tubes. Of course, the timer is there so you know how long you have to get off the ship before the core goes critical and you need to be at least two parsecs from the resultant thermonuclear explosion.