allaboutduncan

Monster Names

// July 9th, 2009 // No Comments » // Web

This is pretty funny stuff:

Get Your Monster Name

Granny

// April 21st, 2009 // No Comments » // Uncategorized

Granny, my Mom’s mother, passed away yesterday. She was 94.

She was the grandparent I was closest too. For almost 5 years, I ate lunch with her 4-5 times a week. Almost every day I showed up, she would have a little project for me to do. Whether it was change a light bulb (her bathroom lights would go out 2, 3, 4 at a time) or take out her garbage, I was her lunch time handyman.

Our lunch time is something that I will always cherish. It gave me a chance to really get to know my grandmother. We would spend lunch talking about anything that popped into her head.

I loved the stories of her childhood and youth. She told me how her and my grandfather met. She told me of their early years in Murfreesboro (where we live now). She told me about the time my oldest Uncle found my grandfather’s pistol, when he was only a toddler.

I remember staying summer’s with her and my grandfather.

She would make the largest pancakes and waffles for breakfast. They would cover the entire plate. I remember falling asleep to her scratching my back. I remember her smacking my bare legs with the fly-swatter if we misbehaved.

I remember Christmas at her house. The children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren always got together once a year over there. The larger our families grew, the more insane each holiday would become. The last Christmas we were all together, there were eight great-grandchildren—all under the age of seven.

As of yet, I’m not overly sad. I will miss her—as much as I missed her when I changed jobs almost 3 years ago and I was no longer able to eat lunch with her.

At least I have the memories, the photos (see above) and the rest of my family.

Like Father – Like Son

// April 13th, 2009 // No Comments » // Uncategorized

I’ve long embraced being a geek. It’s something I enjoy. Part of the reason I embrace it is because I know it does not define everything about me. I’ve picked up tons of things from my Dad. Every time he visits, he usually teaches me something else. He’s an uber-handyman, Mr. Fixit and amazing engineer. I can call him on the phone, describe a noise the car is making and he can point me in the right direction.

Although my Dad did read Uncanny X-Men and G.I. Joe with me for a few years when I was a kid, I would never have called him a geek. I do remember piles upon piles of old Sci-Fi journals, books and magazines when I was a kid, but again, I never would have called him geek.

However, that has changed. He recently sent me the photo on the left and it made me realize, he is a geek. He just geeks out about different things than I do.

This is a board for a game Carter and I invented one rainy day. Carter wanted to play baseball, but the rain kept us from going out.

We grabbed a dry erase board, some markers, a four-sided die, a six-sided die, and within an hour we had a fun and quick game.

The six-sided die determines if you get a hit or not. Numbers 1,2 = a hit, 3, 4, 5 = strike and 6 = pop-fly/out.

The four-sided die determines the number of bases your get if you roll a 1 or 2.

It’s all pretty simple, but fun and entertaining.

On our recent trip to Texas, I casually mention to my Dad—the night before we leave, no less—about this game Carter and I created and how he should make us a board to play it on. I quickly sketched it out.

Less than a week later he sent me an in-progress photo and this past weekend I get the completed image above.

Yep, he’s a geek. Give him a good idea and he makes it work. Somehow, if the internet were around 30-years ago, I can imagine him creating a site like Instructables.

It’s funny how much you pick up from your parents. As a kid, you think that you’ll never be like your parents. Later, you discover that you’re more like them than you’d like to admit. The final stage is realizing how proud you knowing they’ve taught you well.

I hope that my sons will look back on me (and Jill) someday with the same feeling.

Halfway to 70

// February 24th, 2009 // No Comments » // DVD Menus

Yep, today is my birthday and unlike many other “monumental” birthdays (16, 21, 30), this one seemed to bother me as I kept creeping ever closer to it. Now that 35 (halfway to 70 – as I’ve been telling Jill) is upon me, it’s not as bad as I thought it would be.

It’s actually caused me to reflect a little on things. I consider myself lucky for the life I have. I have a great wife, two great sons and a great family (and extended family). I have a great job and I enjoy going to work everyday.

Thanks to Carter (and soon Riley), I get to play baseball, Ben 10, superheroes, board games and watch cartoons whenever time permits. Unfortunately, with 2 kids and everything else that life entails, that’s not as often as I want, but I enjoy and cherish those moments. I try not to let the opportunity pass when it presents itself.

As I look back on the past 35 years, I see a lot of successes and a lot of mistakes as well. However, my favorite thing to do is to look at where I am now. I look at the wall of photos, cards, coloring books pages, and toys on my desk in front of my and it brings a smile to face. What makes that smile even bigger is thinking what my desk, those photos and this wall will look like in a another 5, 10, and 15 years.

If there is one piece of advice I can give, it is this: embrace change. As you get older, your life will definitely change and so will everything around you. Don’t waste time trying to do the same old thing everyday. Look at what’s happening around you and participate. Jump in. Be an active part of that family that you share your life with.

Paw Paw’s Army Photo

// December 19th, 2008 // No Comments » // Web

A few years ago, I gave my Mom a great present that cost practically nothing.

I used to work close to my grandmother’s (Granny) house and I would eat lunch with her several times a week. She would often have little chores for me to do when I arrived—change a light bulb, get something off a shelf or out of a closet.

One closet retrieval trip I found a huge box of old photos. Some of them were over 50-years old and others I remember from my childhood. We don’t have many photos from when I was young. My Mom’s housed burned and our photos were lost. That was about 15-years ago.

So, I asked her if I could borrow this box and scan a bunch of them in. Granny told me to just take them, she didn’t want them anymore. Reluctantly I took them, knowing they would be safe with me.

It was probably a year later, just in passing, my Mom mentioned how she missed having the photo of her Dad (we called him Paw Paw) in his Army uniform. It, like all the other photos, was lost in the fire.

I remembered seeing that photo in the box Granny gave me. So, I did a little digging and found it. It was a little beat up. So after a quick scan and a trip through Photoshop, I had a great looking photo to print and give to her.

It was the simplest gift, but meant so much to her. Those are the gifts I life to give.

Star Wars – New and Old

// June 10th, 2008 // No Comments » // Movies

In a few years, I will make it to Disney World in Florida for the Star Wars weekend. I can’t wait to take “the boys” (Carter and Riley) when Riley is old enough.

When we visited Disney/MGM last year, Carter wasn’t quite tall enough to ride the Star Wars ride, so we had to make do with the large AT-AT and Speeder Bike on display. We did manage to catch the parade at MGM (which I highly recommend) and the appearance of Darth Vader, R2, and C3-PO were his highlights for the day. A full Star Wars takeover of Disney would be a blast.

View more photos from the Star Wars Disney weekend on Flickr.

While in a Star Wars mood, check out the photos on the Growing Up Star Wars Flickr Photo Pool. Featuring all vintage photos of Star Wars memorabilia, there are lots of photos like the one above. Somewhere in the Duncan archives, there’s a photo me wearing that Yoda costume.

Flickr Video – Is It a Good Thing

// April 9th, 2008 // No Comments » // Web

Flickr has finally added the long rumored Video feature and I’ll admit, I’m quite happy about it. Although, I seem to be in the minority.

Judging by the comments on the Flickr Blog Post announcing Video, most Pro members (video upload is available only to Pro members) are not pleased with the feature.

Many complaints center on YouTube being available for video and they don’t want Flickr to fill up with crap like YouTube. To play devil’s advocate, I’d say Flickr thought of that.

• Video upload is available to Pro members only. How many kids/teens will pay $25 for a feature that’s free on YouTube?
• Videos are limited to 90 seconds. Again, longer videos are free on YouTube and 90 seconds limits what you can do.
• Video is homemade content only. No video clips.
• Video is safe or moderate content only. Nothing to offend anyone.

I think Flick user The_Searcher said it best in his forum post:

I would see this as one of those “hobbies” that kick in here, less a complete takeover. Like HDR groups, TiltShift groups, FishEye Lens groups, etc. People will take those kinds of shots, but unlikely that’s all they’ll do.

You may find an initial spike, as everyone jumps at the chance to make a video. Then once the novelty wears off, and people realize they still have to be creative to make something good, it’ll settle into a niche. maybe.

I know I plan to use it over YouTube for my personal / home videos. I think that will complement my main use of Flickr as a storage/viewing for personal photos. This will let me keep my YouTube for things like DVD Menus and other non-personal uses.

Some of the complaints are valid. There are other photo features that Flickr could add. RSS feeds are needed for Video, Photo, and Both. This feature also breaks some existing Flickr integration. It works fine with my Recent Photos widget/RSS, but the import photos doesn’t display video. Time to get rid of that section anyway (or just direct it all to Flickr).

However, I think Flickr did a great job integrating the video into their existing system without making it obtrusive or hard to manage. I’ll be using it, now to see what others do.

The one feature I want is to post video by email. I can do this on YouTube and it’s perfect for video from my cell phone. Once Flickr adds that (which I’m sure they will), it will be perfect.

Papa and the boys

// March 21st, 2008 // No Comments » // Carter

Went to pick Carter up and he and his cousin were sitting outside with Jill's Dad (Papa).

Murfreesboro Symphony – Carter’s First Concert

// March 11th, 2008 // No Comments » // Carter

Last night I had the great pleasure of taking Carter to his first concert. The Murfreesboro Symphony performed a selection of music from popular movies during “A Night with Oscar.”

He did amazingly well considering the show started at 7:30 and lasted for almost 2-hours. Not once did he complain or ask to leave. Quite the contrary, for most of the songs he tapped his toes, pretended to play drums or simply sat and watched intensely.

As we took our seats near the front of the hall, I noticed nervous looks from the older couple seated next to us, no doubt thinking “great, our peaceful night out is ruined, thanks to this kid.” However, at the intermission, the gentleman asked how old Carter was. He commented on how well behaved he was and that he’d never dream of bringing his grand-kids of similar age.

Yes, I’m bragging and it’s because I’m proud. I’m thankful that I have a son that is willing to do things like this with me. I’m thankful he’s well behaved enough to go to something like this and even appreciate something like this at 4 years old. I’m thankful I have a son that can say in the middle of the show “Dad, I think this was a great idea.”

The program couldn’t have been planned any better. There were enough pieces he was familiar with to keep his attention and with Star Wars being the final piece, we counted down the songs until it was time for his favorite.

• Raiders of the Lost Ark
• The Cowboys
• The Pink Panther
• Jurassic Park
• Bridge Over the River Kwai
• Somewhere in Time
• Sound of Music
• Intermission
• Gone with the Wind
• On Golden Pond
• Jaws
• Star Wars – Leia’s Theme
• Star Wars – Main Theme
• Star Wars – Imperial March (Darth Vader’s Theme)

The program only listed Star Wars as the final selection, so there were a few puzzled looks when the orchestra started when they began playing Leia’s theme. There was a small break between Leia’s theme and the Star Wars Main Title. For a moment, I was afraid they weren’t going to play it.

The Main Title theme got the biggest response from the mostly over 40 crowd, but I was the least impressed by this piece live. Not the orchestra’s fault, they were flawless. It just seemed like a constant march or pounding. Not enough subtlety or pauses to appreciate what was happening.

When the Main Title theme was done, Carter was ready to go and had started walking to the end of the row after the applause died down. He stopped dead in his tracks and began grinning from ear-to-ear when he heard the first few bars from the Imperial March (Darth Vader’s theme).

Overall, it was an excellent show. It was the first time I had heard many of those songs in a live setting. Jaws was probably the biggest surprise. I love the movie (and the music), but the impact that piece of music has in a live setting is amazing. Every orchestra member seems to be playing something different. Notes are out of harmony. The increase in in tempo. It all builds an amazing amount of tension.

There was one bad thing about the evening, the audience. It was a sizeable crowd, but there should have been many more people there. If I had to guess, the majority of the audience was over 40-50 years old, with only a few children (less than 10) in attendance. That’s just sad. Something like this was perfect for families wanting to introduce their kids to something other than typical music on the radio.

Thankfully, the new season for the Murfreesboro Symphony is about to begin and they’ve got a similar performance planned showcasing music inspired by literature. If you’re in the Middle Tennessee area, it’s a great, inexpensive night out. Keep checking the Murfreesboro Symphony web site for the updated 2008-2009 schedule.

Carter Says

// January 30th, 2008 // No Comments » // Carter

Carter is one of the most well-spoken 4-year olds I’ve encountered. That’s likely in part due to the fact he gets a lot of practice talking. He can fill 30-minutes of driving with questions, comments and answers. The sad reality is that it causes you to tune out at times and there’s not telling what you’re missing.

I’ll be posting from time to time, fun things he says or does as a way to remember them and to share them.

Lately, he’s been enjoying Fruit Cocktail which he calls…

Fruit Cottontail

Some things you just don’t want to correct him on.