January flew by. We’ve had a lot of wedding stuff to do, the bulk of which recently was finalizing invitations, from ordering to making sure we had all addresses to finding a calligrapher and, this week finally getting them all stuffed and sent out. This past weekend we also started to finally populate the gift registry. The Intro to Judaism class I’m taking in preparation also just started this past weekend (we started one in the fall, but it had been cancelled due to low attendance). To top it off, things with my new job are really great, but it’s a lot of work to get up to speed with everything and it’s leaving me quite exhausted in the evenings.
A few weeks ago my friend Cheri asked if I’d be interested in a small online group she was putting together to learn some of the basics of electronics via Sparkle Labs’ Discover Electronics Kit. I ordered mine before leaving for Philadelphia and it was there to greet me upon my return. We started our weekly meetings a couple weeks ago and it’s been a fun experience so far, we’re meeting weekly over Google Hangouts to share our discoveries and progress. Plus, having a group to work with is actually motivating me to complete the homework assignments we’re assigning each other, the same of which I wish could be said for some of the Coursera courses I signed up for (oops). It’s also cool to have my very own bread board, I made a light happen! :)
In other fun stuff news, I met up with my friend Mark last week to attend Rifftrax Presents Night of the Shorts IV: Riffizens on Patrol at The Castro Theater. In spite of my long history of MST3K fandom, I’d never actually seen Mike, Crow and Tom Servo live in their human forms before. It was a really great show, and finally going to a show has inspired me to find something interesting for MJ and I to go to in the near future.
I’m happy to report that Partimus is chugging along. The Ubuntu earrings and necklaces fundraiser did exceptionally well over the holidays, fellow board member Grant Bowman has been putting a considerable amount of effort into learning how to make us a more professional organization and James Howard has spearheaded work in Oakland with labs at the Prescott and ASCEND schools (some details here). We also had a board meeting a couple weeks ago where we were able to have some great discussion and vote to bring on Bethany Doolin on to our Board of Directors.
One of the things I need to do for Partimus is update my bio, which I’ve been putting off until I could get professional headshots done. I finally got around to last weekend! A few weeks back we contacted Melissa Morelli, the woman who did our engagement photos to see if she’d be interested in flying to Philadelphia to do our wedding photos too (she’s a known variable, quite welcome in the midst of all these wedding choices!). She happily agreed, which inspired me to also ask if she does professional head shots, which she does! After some discussion of exactly what we wanted, we decided to meet at Cavallo Point, just across the Golden Gate Bridge which had some great places for generic head shots, but also some opportunities for some very San Francisco shots with the bridge and city in the backround. The winning photos from the shoot should be available next week and I will get to profile updating.
February is going to be a crazy month, and in preparation my body has decided that this relatively free weekend will be the one where I’ll be sick. I came down with a cold and fever on Thursday and so yesterday and today I’ve pretty much only been working and sleeping. The fever’s gone down so I’m hoping just to be able to recover this weekend and be in better shape next week as I prepare for some upcoming travel and events.