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The adventures of 2022

Tuesday, Jan 24th, 2023 by pleia2 | 0 Comments

2022 was a mixed bag. On the one hand, our three year old started preschool and ended up bringing every sickness he came across home, and we were essentially sick for half the year. We also finally succumbed to COVID-19 in July.

On the flip side, the boys finally got vaccinated! And we finally got to go back to Philadelphia, twice! I went to my first in-person conference since March of 2020, and generally things began opening up again. We’re still not back to where we were before the pandemic, but I’m not sure we’ll ever be, or if that’s a desirable state. Folks in the United States have really played fast and loose with illness for decades, and now the thought of going out without a mask when I have a cold just feels rude.

I’ve also had a bit of a reckoning with myself that’s still in progress. I’m a mother now, and in charge of a single family home. As a result, these two things consume almost all of my free time, most of the rest of which goes to attempting to get enough sleep. I keep setting milestones after which I think I’ll feel better (conclusion of breastfeeding, my youngest sleeping through the night, not being sick) but I keep being disappointed. So in 2022 I worked with my doctor to start a low dose of antidepressants, and started talking to a therapist. I also spent a day away on my own at a local resort, which was a brief respite but one that I really needed. Most days I can tell that the medication and small changes here and there are helping, but I definitely have work to do and am in need of more support.

MJ and I got to connect a bit more in 2022. It’s so difficult finding time to spend together with a baby at home, so as the boys slowly eased out of baby-hood this year, we were able to go out on a couple big date evenings (anniversary and my birthday) and have started leaving the house on weekdays as we can to do lunch together. In October we even got to go out for a quickly little day trip to a BART maintenance facility, which may not be the most romantic thing, but it was nice to get out together and enjoy something together that we totally would have done before we had kids.

I love a lot about being a parent though. I have always been happy about the fact that I never grew up too much and still know how to play and be silly, but it’s really kicked up a notch when you have kids around. Being thoughtful and creative with them comes so naturally not because I have experience with kids (I don’t), but because we share so many of the same interests and the so many of the same things bring us joy. As my boys continue to get bigger, I’m enjoying sharing my interests with them, from riding a train to looking at the stars and identifying planets (we’re big fans of Jupiter over here).

Work was quite fulfilling in 2022. We had some major product launches that I worked hard on supporting, several major events, and I was thrilled that the work I put in to preparing my promotion resulted in said promotion. I’ve become more focused with what learning I want to do each quarter, which has had the unintended consequence of strengthening my bonds with the mainframe community as I find I’m able to connect even more. In all, I’m still loving my job, and everything I’m continuing to learn.

The only trips we took in 2022 were two to Philadelphia, the first in September and the second in December, but I did still give some talks! Mostly virtual, but I did give a couple in-person at the Open Mainframe Summit while I was in Philadelphia in September. The following is my talk rundown.

As we ease into 2023, I’m hopeful that this year will bring some of the changes to my life that I need to take. I’m aiming for some more milestones at work, and I’m going to continue pursue taking better care of my self, both with regard to my physical and my mental health.

Filed under: EOY

Adam is 4!

Tuesday, Jan 17th, 2023 by pleia2 | 0 Comments

Adam turned four in early January. It’s a little hard to believe that four years ago I had my first newborn at home!

His birthday landed on a Friday and unfortunately he wasn’t feeling very well that evening. Instead of going out to dinner as planned, we spent the evening playing Lights Out! in his bedroom, where I put some LED candles around his room and we all played with glow sticks and flashlights. Given his love for the dark (and my own!) it made for a perfect, low-key evening.

And Saturday we had his party!

At his request, we had a Pixar Cars themed little party with a small group of local friends. He’d been talking about the cake for about a month, periodically reminding me that he wanted the same one his brother got last year, complete with the same car toys on top. Thankfully our friend (and former au pair) was kind enough to go to the store and order the cake while we were out of town so it would be ready for the party on Saturday.


It was nice to have people over, for the first time in ages the play room had four kids running around having fun together. Adam received a few gifts and Aaron enjoyed helping him open them. We ordered a couple pizzas and everyone seemed to have a nice time.

Their birthdays are a mere five weeks apart, with Hanukkah (usually) in the middle, and that’s been a challenge. But I think celebrating Aaron’s before we leave for Philadelphia for the holidays and Adam’s afterwards is working out well. It’s causing clear delineation between their parties which allows us to focus on each of them fully. I think we all are a little partied out by the time mid January rolls around though.

Filed under: family, food, kids, life

Winter Holidays in Philadelphia

Monday, Jan 16th, 2023 by pleia2 | 0 Comments

On December 14th we flew to Philadelphia to spend three weeks with family and friends over the winter holidays. Things didn’t exactly go as planned.

As soon as we got into town it was clear that the kids had caught some kind of cold. A few days later MJ ended up on antibiotics, and the kids had full blown colds. Somehow, I managed to get out unscathed, but that meant I was taking care of everyone and doing sleeping shifts on the couch so I could more easily run downstairs to care for Aaron, or upstairs to check on Adam, all while letting MJ get rest so he could recover. I was also working to get my end of year tasks done at work and generally getting things squared off so I could depart for the rest of the year with as much done as possible. It was exhausting, and I kept having to pause and remind myself how lucky I was that I wasn’t sick too.

The first Saturday we were in town I also went to a Celebration of Life for CJ Fearnley, whose sudden passing I already wrote about. I wasn’t sick, but I was sure to mask up the whole time in case I was contagious. The grief I was feeling over that weighed heavy on me, and I was grateful that MJ was still feeling well enough at that point to watch the boys for the afternoon so I could go to the service. I said a few words, connected with some folks who I hadn’t seen in years, and in one case someone I knew through my work at CJ’s company years ago but never got around to meeting in person. Seeing how he touched so many lives and was soothing, and attending was a good step in my path to heal from this loss. In the time since his passing, I find myself constantly reminded at how many small ways he touched my life, he really was a wonderful person and mentor.

In more uplifting news, it snowed! Neither of the boys had experienced snow in person since we’ve been hunkered down in snow-free coastal California for the past three winters. The snow was brief, and the rest of the trip ended up being warmer and rainy, but it was enough for us to get outside for a few minutes to run around and take some pictures.

Everyone was on the mend by the time my little sister Annette and my nephew Xavier came into town to visit on December 24th. The last time we saw them was the summer of 2019 when they came out to California to meet baby Adam and spend a week with us. The pandemic sure threw a wrench in our ability to connect, and I’m really happy that the trio of cousins got to meet and spend time together, it ended up being the highlight of our trip for me. The cousins enjoyed a bunch of outings together, and some staying home playing video games (Adam played Mario Kart for the first time!) and doing things like decorating gingerbread men. It was also really nice to catch up with my sister.


With Hanukkah landing late in the year and at the same time as Christmas, we also had the treat of spending all of Hanukkah in Philadelphia. My sister and nephew got to experience the final two nights of it with us too.

The boys and I set up the model train I always bring out for the season, and I piled presents on the table. I enjoyed the train long before I had kids, but it’s nice to get to share that joy with kids who are happy to just spend a half hour watching the train go in circles as they move models around and see how much they can speed it up without a derailment.

We also met up with some folks from the Philadelphia Linux Users Group who I hadn’t seen since before the pandemic and we did a little outing to the Mercer Museum in Doylestown. Adam thoroughly enjoyed exploring the labyrinthine museum and all the curious items to look at, while Aaron seemed content to spend most of the time in the children’s room, which is a new addition since I was last there over a decade ago, and one of the only rooms with heating. Afterwards we all ended up at a Hibachi place for lunch, which was also a whole new experience for the boys.

Speaking of new experiences, we quickly discovered that the change of scenery of the townhouse caused Adam to explore his surroundings a bit more, which included hopping out of his crib and running around the house in the morning. Since this isn’t really safe for him, we started evaluating our options. We hadn’t moved to a toddler bed in California yet, but it swiftly became clear that we’d have to do something. Unfortunately the way the room and door are set up, there isn’t actually a place to put a bed against a wall that doesn’t collide with a window, closet, or door. Infuriatingly, the spot where his crib lived was about 2 inches too small to put a twin bed in the same position, so some creativity was required. We ended up going to Ikea and getting a MINNEN extendable bed frame and associated spring mattress which takes twin sheets and in the medium state fits perfectly in his room. The boys enjoyed helping us assemble it, and as a bonus, I was able to move the crib down to Aaron’s little room so he could take that instead of the Pack N Play with mattress that he had been using, and rapidly outgrowing. The first few nights were a little rough, but I think they were both much happier with the final result.


There are a lot of birthdays in our family in December, so while my family was in town we invited MJ’s extended family over for a big five-person birthday party. We also got to spend time with MJ’s family on New Years Eve in a little house party that had kids everywhere! It’s so funny reflecting on how our extended family was child-free until Adam came along, and now it’s all so lively and chaotic at family gatherings, quite the change.

At the end of our trip the weather warmed and dried up quite a bit, allowing us to go to a local park with MJ’s step-sister and her son. It was nice to get a little more time in with them and somewhat make up for the first ten days of our trip when we were all sick.

The flight home was uneventful, though we did have concerns about storms hitting the bay area upon our return. Thankfully there were no delays, and while it’s still challenging, we are getting better at traveling with two young kids. A big backpack full of snacks and activities, plus their own headphones and phones loaded with downloaded content were all lifesavers.

If I’m honest, the trip had bright spots but it wasn’t the reset I was hoping for. I came home feeling more exhausted and worn out than before, and I was already quite tired coming off of Thanksgiving. But it was pretty much on track for 2022, with our oldest starting preschool it felt like we were sick with something or other all year. Plus, with the addition of a “bed project” it meant that are already disrupted plans for house projects while we were in town were further shifted, which was also disappointing.

Here’s to 2023 being healthier, or our least our immune systems being better a fighting off whatever comes along!

Filed under: family, kids, life, philadelphia

Remembering CJ Fearnley

Friday, Dec 16th, 2022 by pleia2 | 0 Comments

On December 8, 2022, CJ Fearnley passed away after a short, serious illness. I’m heartbroken.

When I moved to Philadelphia in 2001, one of the first communities I got involved with was the Philadelphia area Linux Users Group (PLUG). I had just started dabbling in Linux with the help of my boyfriend at the time, and with the first meeting I ever attended being about Beowulf Linux clustering, I was quite out of my depth. Still, I stuck with it and slowly got familiar with the community, and the leader of the group, CJ Fearnley.


CJ Fearnley leading a PLUG meeting in 2015

CJ gave me my big break. During the dot com boom I dabbled in web development, but that quickly fizzled out along with everything else, and I ended up getting a job doing accounts payable work for a large corporation. It’s not the kind of job that one has a passion for, but it paid the bills, and I was able to keep an eye out for any contract tech work. That’s what caused me to be available when CJ was looking for junior folks to help with installing servers for his clients. I jumped at the opportunity and here and there I’d make myself available to pick up a server, drive it to the install location, haul it into the data center, or whatever closet it was living in. From there, I had my trusty Debian installation CD and would do the install and load up the default packages it needed. After a few months and an in-person which culminated in seeing Richard Stallman speak in Philadelphia, CJ offered me a full time job with his company, LinuxForce.

The first thing you need to know about working for CJ is that he’s very principled. His passion was for open source software and among his goals for running LinuxForce were spreading open source and Debian. He believed in the technology and he believed in the philosophy, and we was often uncompromising when it came to both, which is refreshing to see from someone running a company. And that company would never make him rich, but it did provide a living for himself and a small handful of employees like myself. He also believed in giving people a chance, particularly minorities in tech. He would always have me keep an eye out for smart folks with non-traditional backgrounds who might like a position where we could mentor them into success. His track record was great, several of the people he had on his payroll over the years have gone on to have remarkable careers in systems administration, and him giving them a start was key to that for all of us.

I spent six years at LinuxForce. Each day we’d spend 30-60 minutes syncing up with the latest client needs and plans for the day. This included division of labor, and frequently the opportunity for me to work on something new or otherwise sparked my interest.

When I began, I wasn’t sure what I wanted from my career, just that I had grown quite fond of Linux and open source in general, and wanted that to be a big part of my career. Early on, he asked me, “do you want to be a systems administrator or programmer?” and with the limited experience I had, I didn’t know how to answer, so his answer was to throw everything in my direction and see what stuck. I started out with Debian packaging, did a lot of programming in Perl, and then developed a fondness for systems administration. I found with systems administration I could have my hands in various technologies and still build things I was proud of, so that’s ultimately the direction I took under his mentorship.

CJ kept me on when I moved to San Francisco, and I worked a couple more years for him before I felt I had outgrown my role there and wanted to move on to something different and more challenging. What was his response when I mentioned I wanted to look for something new? Complete support, which I’m sure comes as no surprise to anyone who knew him.

We kept in touch throughout my successive moves. When I visited Philly I’d often stop by a PLUG meeting, sometimes to even give a presentation on the latest thing I was working on, and we’d catch up after the meeting over pizza. The pandemic did a number on my personal relationships, and so has being a new parent, so the last time I saw CJ was in the summer of 2019 when I came by the PLUG meeting to give a presentation about Linux and open source on mainframes. We caught up as always, and I figured I’d catch up with him when I was in town again. That dragged on a bit with the pandemic, and before I knew it, I had a shocking email in my inbox explaining that he was suddenly quite ill and didn’t have long to live. I was able to get a quick message off to him expressing my care and thanks, and within a couple days he was gone. He was only 55.

Because of CJ’s influence, I was the first to jump at the opportunity to see a Buckminster Fuller exhibit that came to the SF MOMA. I went to more than a few events put on by the Long Now Foundation. In 2013, he came to my wedding with his partner Jeannie.


CJ and his partner Jeannie at our wedding in 2013

There are a lot of reasons this loss has hit me particularly hard, especially since it was so sudden, but I think the core of my despair comes from the fact that his mentorship was pivotal to me at a critical time. I learned a deep level of Linux systems administration that I think would have been difficult to gain elsewhere, especially as a woman in the field at the time. He was patient and thoughtful even when I struggled with things, and while no boss wants their employees to make mistakes, he fully adhered to failure being a part of learning, and stood by that when mistakes did occur. Tech stuff aside, he also taught me to be uncompromising and genuine, both of which have served me extremely well in my career. Losing a mentor and friend like CJ is devastating.

But he lived a full life following his passions and had the love and respect of participants from every community he was involved with. There are so many people who got their start in the Philadelphia Linux community who continue to thrive in the industry, and those I’ve spoken to since his passing have all credited him with helping them get their start. Whether it was attending PLUG meetings in high school or getting them set up with their first shell accounts, CJ was there to run meetings and help lead the way. And as one friend pointed out to me today, he “led from the trenches” which is a style of leadership I’ve come to embrace.


Audience at a PLUG meeting in 2013, including CJ in the foreground

In the small pond of the earliest Linux adopters, CJ was one of the kindest people I knew. His willingness to share his passions was the bedrock of the Linux community in Philadelphia. It’s going to be hard to move forward without him.

Thank you for everything, CJ.

Filed under: reflection

Aaron is 2!

Thursday, Dec 15th, 2022 by pleia2 | 0 Comments

Just after the pandemic began in 2020, we learned I was pregnant. It culminated in having beautiful little Aaron in December. Which means, he just turned two years old!

Aaron has been really into buses lately, so theme-wise it was nice to do one around buses for him. Unfortunately the buses that all the party goodies focus on are school buses, and while those are fine buses, they aren’t exactly what he shouts about when a public bus drives by. So I went a bit DIY with it, and printed off some drawn buses from AC Transit (Alameda County, CA), MUNI (San Francisco), and SEPTA (Philadelphia). Add in a Happy Birthday banner, some balloons, and a dozen little cutouts of an AC Transit bus that said “Aaron Shuttle” and we were all set!

Oh, and a cake! Just like other decorations, the only cake was school bus themed, so we just went with AC Transit colors and a little Aaron Shuttle decoration.


We still aren’t doing big social things, so it was a low-key little party with some close family friends who have cared for the boys in the past. He got a few little presents and was mostly just excited to see everyone and eat cake. Adam was a fan of the cake, too.

It was also a delight the following Monday when the person who does social media for AC Transit saw the cake I shared and wished him a Happy Birthday from the official AC Transit Twitter account.

Bonus: BART did too! And if there’s anything Aaron loves more than buses, it’s trains, particularly BART.

We’re in Philadelphia now for the holidays and are going to do a joint birthday party for both the boys (Adam was born at the beginning of January) while we’re in town visiting family and friends there. So we’ll have more cake soon!

Filed under: family, food, kids, life

Thanksgiving weekend adventures and more IBM s390x trinkets

Friday, Dec 9th, 2022 by pleia2 | 0 Comments

Thanksgiving weekend was a bit of a whirlwind. We had four days with no work and the boys at home, so my mission was to keep us all entertained during that whole time, including Thanksgiving when not much is open!

We ended up taking BART to San Francisco to go to a park. Aaron is really into buses right now, so the park I selected was the transbay terminal. At the bottom, lots of buses! But there’s also a magnificent park on the top floor that has lots of beautiful greenery to enjoy, and tables and chairs to enjoy a meal. We packed a picnic lunch of some of our favorite snack foods and while it wasn’t exactly a peaceful picnic with two little kids, it was effective and fun. While we were there we also took the little gondola ride from the street level up to the park. It strikes me as a bit of a silly thing thing, but we enjoyed it and the operator was really friendly and shared facts about the park.

Thanksgiving dinner itself was what has become our usual here in California, we picked up food to be heated up from a local diner about 90 minutes before dinner. It’s a pretty basic Thanksgiving dinner, but it’s easy and we all seem to enjoy it. This year our au pair joined us for dinner, along with one of her friends who didn’t have other plans for the day. It was a really nice evening.

Friday we went to the local Japanese Gardens before heading out to eat at our favorite local restaurant, and then made “rainbow challah” with some food coloring. After enjoying rainbow challah french toast, Saturday we kind of got back into our usual routine of outings and meals.

Sunday we made a gingerbread house! Which Aaron chomped on during construction, which I tried to stop him from at first, but then I just found it to be funny and appropriate, so the patching we had to do to compensate for the holes became part of the fun. That evening we also put up some blue and white lights for the holidays.

In other fun kiddo things, Aaron broke my glasses, and so I needed new glasses. I went a little throwback with these ones to get some sturdy solid-rim ones like I used to wear. They’re not exciting, but I’m hoping they hold up to a little abuse from the boys. I’ll also try to be a bit more careful.

In fun project-y things, I mentioned my SPARC project in a previous post, I haven’t made progress on that but I did find a lot of SLT/MST circuit boards on eBay and since I really like them for jewelry and they’re getting harder to find, I snatched them up.

Given my love for 3d-printed mainframe models, I also picked up an IBM postcard featuring a miniature IBM s/360 display that was built around the launch that makes my little models look even more like toys!

I am still struggling to find a balance between work, family, rest, and hobbies. I feel a bit sad when I’m not making things, but I also have discovered how tremendously important sleep is to being a fully present parent for our boys. I doubt there is a balance, but I do want to get to a place where I’m more satisfied with the decisions I’m making about my time.

Filed under: family, food, kids, life, mainframes

Holiday cards 2022!

Wednesday, Dec 7th, 2022 by pleia2 | 0 Comments

Every year I send out a big batch of winter-themed holiday cards to friends, acquaintances, and anyone who made there way to this blog post somehow.

Reading this? That means you!

Even if you’re outside the United States!

Even if we’ve never met!

Send me an email at lyz@princessleia.com with your postal mailing address and put “Holiday Card” in the subject so I can filter it appropriately. Please do this even if I’ve sent you a card in the past, I won’t be reusing lists from previous years. I’m also starting late this year (oops!) so the window for sending cards will be brief, so please get me your postal address by December 10th.

Disclaimer: My family is Jewish and we celebrate Hanukkah, but the cards are non-religious, with some variation of “Happy Holidays” or “Season’s Greetings” on them.

Filed under: holiday cards

Date at the BART HMC, local fall festivities, and my SPARC

Monday, Nov 28th, 2022 by pleia2 | 0 Comments

Several weeks ago a Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) board meeting was held at the BART Hayward Maintenance Complex. I’d never been to a BART board meeting before, but the chance to visit the maintenance complex was too good to pass up, and I RSVPed for MJ and myself as soon as I saw it.

It’s pretty rare to have tours of this facility, and I don’t think they’d ever done a fully public event, so this was a really special opportunity. Several hundred people showed up, and we were whisked off from a public BART station over to the facility via a series of shuttle buses. I get the impression that they were surprised and impressed by the turnout, but they were able to easily absorb the crowd. The board meeting was kept short, and then the facility tour began! We walked down the long corridors of the facility seeing stations for repairing all kinds of things for the trains. Every so often we’d pause to hear from one of the folks who worked there, either giving some details about the work, or sharing the history that led to some of the work that’s happening now. It was fun and fascinating to get such a behind-the-scenes look at everything.


And I’m glad it was fun. It occurred to us halfway through this tour that we hadn’t really gone out to do something other than meals together, alone, in quite some time. Date morning at the BART HMC? Hah!

In November I also got sick again. It happened a few days after I finally got the bivalent COVID booster, and along with a cough that needed an inhaler, I also had an incredibly stubborn sinus headache. Pile on some recent struggles with depression that caused me to contact my doctor and up my dosage of antidepressants, it was a tough few weeks as I struggled through not feeling well and a couple weeks of drowsiness caused by the medication change.

Still, I have two little ones and they love to go out! We met up with some other families one gloomy weekend recently to check out a fancy new playground in a nearby town, complete with a few rides, including a small train that went around the park and a carousel. I’ve succeeded in bestowing my love of trains upon my boys, so it was a really enjoyable time for everyone.


Our town also had the Castro Valley Light Parade recently. Like so many things, it went on a two year hiatus during the pandemic. MJ and Adam went to it in 2019 while I was out at a hackathon for work, but it was my first time experiencing it. We decided to go after the boys had dinner, which seems to have been a bit of a mistake since the parade really does conclude after an hour or so and then it’s just the festival, which was less interesting to the boys. Still, at this age it was actually a fine amount of time to be out, especially since they got to eat some cupcakes and get light-up bracelets while we were there.

Finally, MJ had a friend of his in town recently who came with us to the light parade. She traditionally has visited a couple times a year, but both the pandemic and having kids have changed it somewhat. Thankfully, she is interested in getting to know the kids more, so it gave me the opportunity to send them off with her and MJ one Sunday morning while I got some peaceful alone time. I took the opportunity to dig into my Sun SPARC Ultra10 project again. I ordered a hard drive that should work and got it all set up, but I was disappointed to discover that a lot of tools had changed since the last time I set up a PXE boot server, and I found myself reading more documentation than expected once I sat down and got started. As a result, I couldn’t get much done and was left feeling a little disappointed. Since then, I’ve been able to dig a bit deeper into the options out there for DHCP and TFTP, and will probably end up with a solution that uses dnsmasq exclusively for the whole setup, and be much simpler than ones I’ve used in the past. Bonus, if this works out I can document and re-purpose it for use at Partimus, and that cheered me up a bit and made the process of learning a new generation of tools more compelling.

Which brings me back to my mood. Now that I have mostly gotten past the drowsiness and the worst of this depressive episode, I’m going to try pushing myself again to get back on track with hobbies, house projects, and some of the things I enjoy but haven’t had the energy to do. I don’t have very much time to myself these days, but I certainly could use the time I have more effectively, which in turn should bring me out of this slump. I hope.

Filed under: castro valley, events, family, kids, life, rails

Our doorbell

Wednesday, Nov 16th, 2022 by pleia2 | 0 Comments

It’s hard to believe we moved into this house nearly five years ago. In some ways, it feels like we’re still settling in, but I’m sure part of that has to do with how much our lives have changed since moving here and having kids. Plus, we’re still discovering new things about the house, like our doorbell.

The doorbell worked intermittently when we moved in, and as the months progressed it stopped working entirely. Given our workload and focus on new family, it ended up near the bottom of our list of priorities, and with babies in the house, the lack of a doorbell was actually a feature most of the time. Still, it was a little annoying when people would stop by, since the front door is far from where we spend most of our time so knocking is rarely effective. Halloween this year changed my priorities. These past two years were pandemic Halloweens where we just put candies out front on a decorated table, but this year we were back to answering our door. A working doorbell would be incredibly useful, so I grabbed MJ and we set about debugging it a few weeks ago.

We honestly thought it would be a very involved project. It was not. I even questioned the value of writing this post at all for fear of getting hopes up about this being a deeply technical, fascinating story. It’s not. But it was still pretty fun to dig into, especially since I knew nothing about how doorbells actually worked.

The actual chimes live above the stairs, which is tricky to get to, so we decided to start at the button. Plus, figuring out if there was power even going to the button seemed like a valuable use of our time. Good news: power was good!

So up to the chimes we went. Taking off the cover led us to discover a much more interesting device than we expected. Manufactured in 1994, it appears to be a an Emerson Rittenhouse Model C8846R 8-Note Electronic Door Chime. It’s fully electronic, and lo! There’s a battery in there! Maybe that’s all it will take to “fix” it? I swapped out the battery and… it kind of worked. Huh.

That’s when I dropped the model number into Google and discovered this glorious YouTube video: Servicing an Emerson Rittenhouse Model C8846R 8-Note Electronic Door Chime Base. As the video shares, there are no service manuals, wiring diagrams, or any technical information that can be found online about this, so the video was all I had! Thankfully, the solution was hilariously simple. About halfway through the video he does a close-up of the board and it clearly says, “Use with two 9 volt batteries”. Two! There are TWO batteries inside this thing!

So I climbed back up to the chimes and dug around behind them until I fished out the other battery so I could replace it. That was the solution all along!

Our 28-year old doorbell lives once again, just in time for Halloween. In the couple of days it took for us to ferret out the issue, MJ did a bit of research into what we’ll eventually replace it with that can be tied into our overall home automation strategy. But I can wait, this old doorbell and I are pals now.

Filed under: castro valley

Halloween 2022

Sunday, Nov 13th, 2022 by pleia2 | 0 Comments

These past two years have been unusual for a lot of reasons, but Halloween was notable because it’s a holiday that is incredibly memorable and social for kids. The pandemic meant very muted celebrations, and either none, or limited, trick-or-treating. As things ease up this year and kids become fully vaccinated, we finally got a glimpse of what a normal Halloween could be for our boys, and we had a lot of fun.

First, I discovered hooks along the front of our house last year, presumably used for Christmas lights in the past, and so I took the opportunity this year to buy Halloween lights! Adam “helped” me install them and I also put some pumpkins and a little wreath by our front door.

We did some Halloween art!

We took an afternoon to go to a local pumpkin patch and mini-carnival with rides for the kiddos!

And the weekend that led up to Halloween itself, we did a bunch of little activities in our costumes. This year Aaron and I dressed up as Stitch and Lilo, while MJ and Adam dressed up as the Man with the Yellow Hat and Curious George. Our first outing was to a trunk-or-treat that is held at a park within walking distance of our house. That afternoon, we walked down to our local comic book store for a festival they were having.

Sunday we attended a pumpkin decorating and playground event with other local families.

And that afternoon we went home and did our own pumpkin carving!

We have Gromit, Shaun, and Timmy lawn ornaments that a few of the kids in the neighborhood enjoy visiting, so I thought it would be fun to do Shaun and Gromit on the pumpkins this year.

The stencils I used were made available in a couple promotions Aardman did, and are still available online:

On Halloween itself we spent a little time at the village for a big Halloween event, but it was unexpectedly (for us!) crowded, and a bit much even at this phase. Besides, the boys didn’t actually need much candy and it was nice enough to get a little taste of the event and walk back home. That evening we went trick-or-treating!

Once we wrapped up trick-or-treating, we all hung out downstairs to answer the door to give out more candy. The boys probably enjoyed that just as much as getting candy themselves, as the novelty of people coming to our house is still fresh. It was also fun for them to see lots of kids and costumes, and generally to be up “late” doing an activity that was outside the norm.

Looking forward to lots more “normal” Halloweens with the boys in our future. It’s always been my favorite holiday, but celebrating with kids is a whole different experience.

Filed under: castro valley, events, family, kids, life
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