2015 Wrap Up

Inspired by Cate Huston and @femengineer - instead of focusing on what I didn't finish in 2015 that I had wanted to, I'm going to do a wrap up of what I did accomplish. This is by no means complete, but this is a great time of year for introspection.

For work:

• Increased my team's size and the scope of the work we're doing, though the work still seems to add up faster than I can grow the team.
• People on my team have taken over leading areas, so I can do other things. This is good - they are smarter than I am, and they will make sure the right thing happens at the right time.
• Dusted off my C coding skills and learned the new processes for: using virtual test boxes in our internal cloud, building the gate with the new "lullaby" process, and all the new rules for testing, code review, etc.  I integrated two changesets - one was minor - a few lines.  The other was over 5000 lines  - mostly removal. 
• I've learned: 
• My team will 100% criticize my code, it doesn't matter that I'm their manager.  And they were right, despite the fear and anger from some other senior engineers.
• Coding while managing a large team meant lots of nights and weekends.
• Senior engineers do NOT like to see managers integrate code. They told me so.  But, some of us still do little things.  Then again, we don't usually have time and our team will do it better.
• Crypto Week 2015! I organized an internal crypto themed conference for about 60 people, including folks from our partner companies. This is where we do our big planning and discussions.
• Continued to co-chair the PKCS#11 Technical Committee, which is fun and also a lot of work.
• Spoke at the International Cryptographic Module Conference and the Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing. 
• Co-chaired the Grace Hopper Communities Committee, with more than 100 volunteers writing blogs, video blogging, note taking, speed mentoring, and leading lunch time table topics.  The conference had 12,000 attendees. We started working on this last spring for an October conference.  It was madness, amazing, inspiring and exhausting.
• Led Oracle's participation in the OASIS PKCS#11 Interop booth for RSA. Tons of fun meeting real customers face to face!
• Attended my first BlackHat. This was weird, because I attended 10 or so DefCons (starting with DefCon 2), but only possible thanks to my friend Runa, who gave me a pass :-) 
• Started leading another FIPS 140-2 validation for Solaris 11.3, because I am a glutton for punishment - but also because I think there is merit in these validations. Our algorithms will be better for it.

Personal:

• Built a gorgeous, drought tolerant, demonstration garden with my husband in our front yard. Our grass is gone. In one bed, we have California poppies (which have now spread EVERYWHERE) and a city tree (Chinese Pistache). The next, roses that did beautifully in the hot, dry summer. The next: peppers (bell, jalapeno, serano, pepperocini, poblano, banana, etc etc), tomatoes, herbs and squash. In the arbor we have roses, daisies, and other plants. In pots, we have things like "hot lips" that the hummingbirds LOVE.  Strange old ladies would walk the path in our yard and bring their tripod and take pictures. Pretty cool - and VERY low maintenance.
• Failed to take pictures, but did do a video... but need to post it. :-)
• Went home and took care of my parents when my dad had unexpected urgent surgery. My mom is disabled, so we needed all hands on deck. They are both, thankfully, doing well now.
• Read 29 books. Goodreads thinks I read 30, but one book is on there twice.
• Narrated 5 novels for Learning Ally, for people with dyslexia, blindness or other reading disorders.  That's over 45 hours of final recorded material.  Many more hours in the studio.  They are awesome - please give them money.
• Did a dream vacation with my husband and two friends from NYC to Italy! We visited Serrento, Rome and Florence. We took day trips to the Amalfi Coast, Mount Vesuvius, Pompeii, Lucca, Pisa and a Tuscan villa to learn how to make amazing pizza.  At the end, we stopped by England to see husband's family and friends.  We flew first class on air miles.  We used VRBO and saved a ton of money on lodging, had kitchens and washing machines!
• Hot tip: You need to book first class trips about 10 months in advance, to take advantage of "super saver" rates and must be flexible on dates. We were a little late (only about 8 months out) so we had to pick weird dates/times, and could not get direct home.  We also had to pay tax, which was about as much as buying economy tickets. But, first class was amazing on British Airways' A380. Not so much on the smaller plane back to Philly. 
• Found out my cat has allergies like me. She now takes the same allergy pill I do, but in half the dose. Well, sometimes she takes it. Other times, it's found hours later somewhere else in the house.  Sometimes we crush it into her food. Sometimes she falls for it. She's 14 and climbing all over my desk now as I write this.
• I had a few odd health issues this year, that meant I lost use of one hand for nearly 3 months.  That sucked. No, not RSI. No, I did not crash my bike. Yes, I am doing better. I had to use voice recognition software. It was awful. The worst. It believed I had a thick East Asian accent, and could not be convinced otherwise. Customer support was the worst.  This is the "best" software on the market. HATED IT. 
• But, it helped me to prioritize and focus.  Sorry if your email wasn't answered, but I get hundreds a day and I just couldn't get to them all.
• I lost friends, due to reasons. I found new ones, or good old ones. This is sad and awesome.  Support came from unexpected places, and I am so incredibly thankful for every one of you that called, texted, and hung out.  My anxiety levels have gone down. I no longer have to do everything for another person, just right, for fear of being ostracized. My husband was amazing, as always.  I am not perfect, and thank you to those that understand. I know you aren't either, and I like you that way.
• I managed to ride my bike 65 miles in the Marin Century in August! I want to do it again!
• I raised nearly $1600 in one week for the Valley Fire Victims as a part of the Levi's Grand Fondo. I couldn't do that hard ride, so I served free beer to thousands of thirsty cyclists.
• I was appointed as the official alternate for the Mountain View Bicycle/Pedestrian Advisory Committee - if a vacancy occurs before the next major recruitment process.  I attend nearly every meeting, and I'm getting positive changes done for bicyclists and walkers in Mountain View on a regular basis. This is awesome!

Not too shabby!

Best wishes to you all for 2016!

Valerie

My Hotel Rating System: Stars are not sufficient!

Here's my first stab at a more complete hotel rating system, let me know if I'm missing anything. It's not in a great "checklist" form, yet, but I tried to put more explanations in.

• Quiet room - 15 points possible (yes, this can be negative)
• If the hotel is in a city, near an airport or busy highway: do the windows sufficiently block noise?
• There should be no gap under the door. If the hotel can fit the bill or GOD FORBID a newspaper UNDER your door, you will not be able to get sleep. -5 if there is a gap big enough for a bill, -10 if a newspaper could fit.
• If there is an adjoining room, is the adjacent door relatively soundproof? I should not be able to hear my neighbors speaking in normal voice tones, nor be able to identify the TV show they are watching. -10 if this adjoining door is not sound dampened.  Hint: hollow core doors are NOT acceptable.
• Are the pneumatic closers on the bedroom doors quiet or result in door slamming?
• Are hallway floors dampened? For example, with carpets or rugs. Or, do you have an echo chamber?
• I'd better not be able to hear the ice maker. Put those things in a closet or only in the lobby.
• Wifi/networking - 15 points available
• If you advertise yourself as a "connected" hotel or mention "high speed Internet in the room" - you MUST have wifi. Wired only is not acceptable.
• I should be able to read email, twitter, facebook and other web browsing without significant delays or drops. The hotel should reasonably expect 2 connected devices PER ROOM. If you're hosting a technical conference, assume 5 connected devices per room.
• I should not have to type "I agree" to your terms and inane services more than once a day.  Who do these "agreements" actually protect?  Couldn't the hotel just post a notice on your key card and save me the annoyance?
• If I pay for 1 day of network access, that needs to be 24 hours from when I pay for it - not 24 hours from when I checked in.
• Clean room - 10 points available
• Pillows should not be dusty/musty.
• Blankets/duvets/comforters should be clean.
• Spare pillows/blankets should be stored in bags to keep dust mites out.
• Other items are assumed to be clean.
• Environmental policies - 10 points available
• If you have signs up in the room saying the sheets are only changed every 3 days and towels left hanging up will not be changed: is your cleaning staff aware of these policies?
• Does your cleaning staff leave 1/2 used amenities (like soap and shampoo) or replace items every day? (I once had a maid cleaning my room while I was there throw out a bar of soap that she saw me open and use once. She knew it was new, because she had just thrown out the "old" one.)
•  Do you have cream, sugar, sweetener, etc - packaged separately or in a "combo pack" that gets thrown away if one item is used?
• Well lit room - 5 pts
• Mood lighting is great, except when I'm trying to find that black charging cable.  You should have a ceiling mounted light in addition to bedside and table lamps.
• Counter space in the bathroom - 5pts
• Fancy designer "pedestal" sink? Subtract 20 points. I need somewhere to put my toothbrush, face wash, contact lenses, makeup, etc.
• Easily accessible outlets - 5pts
• Can't be filled with your devices, nor "worn out" (loosey goosey so that plugs just fall out)
• Usable shower - 5pts
• Shelves to put things like mini shampoo and conditioner, that don't just slide off and hit my feet.
• Good water pressure, high enough to get my head under.
• If shower curtain is properly employed, I should not get water everywhere.
• Amenities - 5pts
• Coffee pot in room?
• Shampoo, conditioner *and* lotion? (Note: "Shampoo plus conditioner" is a joke for people with long hair).
• Pillows and bedding - 10pts
• Some people love feather pillows, but I'm allergic so foam should be readily available (in the closet in a sealed bag).
• Some folks love a squishy pillow, some need more firm. If there are 4 pillows on each bed, at least 2 should be firm and 2 soft.  All four the same is going to leave 50% of your guests unhappy. 
• Duvet/comforter/blanket should NOT be made of feathers, unless alternatives are readily available (calling to front desk is okay).
• Desk/task chair - 5pts
• If you're advertising yourself as a business hotel, you should have an adjustable hight/pitch chair.
• Hair dryer - 5 pts
• 1 point if you only have the super compact ones that eat long hair in the most painful manner
• 4 points for full sized hair dryer (okay if it needs to be requested).
• Sufficient mirrors - 5pts
• Assuming that one person might be wanting to do things like blow-dry their hair while someone else is using the toilet, have a mirror outside if the bathroom

I have a whole separate rant on disabled rooms as well, from traveling with disabled relatives (I'm sure their list would be longer):

• Disabled people like nightstands, too, as they also wear glasses, have a cell phone, etc.
• Disabled rooms should be available with a second bed for a care taker, who is not necessarily their spouse.
• Disabled people have things like toothbrushes, glasses, contacts, makeup, etc, too - give them counter space in the bathroom!
• Disabled showers should drain and not run over, as it turns out people with disabilities don't like water every where and all over their stuff, either. 
• Are the doors to and in the room easy to open for someone who may not have "normal" muscle strength and agility?
• Remember: you can meet the letter of the law and still have a completely unusable room for both those with physical disabilities and those without.  Would you want to sleep in this room?  Could you take care of an elderly or disabled relative in this room?  If not, rethink your design.
• An example room in the Travel Lodge in Bath, UK: no counter space in bathroom, no nightstands, no closet (just a rack, as apparently they didn't think disabled people could open a door?), an extremely heavy fire door (but they could open that thing?), no tables in the room and no suitcase rack.  We took furniture from the lobby to give my folks somewhere to put medication, glasses and phones to charge that wasn't the floor.

Any additions to either list? Would you weight other items more heavily?

Most Influential Books in my Life

These books have changed the trajectory of my life. I've read many other good ones and have a 2 foot stack next to the bed of "to-read", but these are the books I think back on, re-read, reflect on and have changed the way I live my life.  Yes, I mean that. Changed my life.

Influence: Science and Practice

This is a short book that's just jam backed with information.  This is a science based approach to understanding how to influence others and, most importantly, to realize when you're being influenced!  Robert Cialdini covers everything from salting tip jars to how a car dealer pushes you into a car sale.

I learned simple things to getting people to do what you ask: get them to verbally commit - or even better, in email/writing. People love to be seen as "consistent", so even if they get more information later they will stick with their original statement and even create reasons why it's the correct one.  It is great when I can catch myself doing this - but is also handy when you want people who, let's say, join a group to commit to performing a certain task.

[Aside: This is what gets politicians in trouble, in my book. They don't want to be seen as "flip-floppers" so even when they are presented with new information, they refuse to change their opinion. That's absolutely horrifying to those of us with background in science and those that know the value of data driven decision making.]

For example, this is why it is important for theater producers to make sure they get all actors to sign a form committing to the performance. Each actor has just now promised they will do the show, so it will take something extreme for most to back out of the show.  I know I've stayed in shows that I was not happy with for that very reason - well, and not wanting to get blacklisted from a theater group as well!

Having this knowledge also helps you to influence your peer group and others at work, and to protect your self from compliance professionals. This should be mandatory reading in all high schools and colleges.

This book is powerful, and when you read it, you MUST promise me you won't use it for evil.

Women Don't Ask: Negotiation and the Gender Divide

This book was recommended by the incomparable Valerie Aurora, who even set up a scholarship for this book, so that more women could read it and get access to it.  Before I read Linda Babcock and Sara Laschever's book on Gender and the Negotiation Divide, I had no idea of what I was missing out on by just not asking for what I wanted!

As a good student, I was used to being recognized for my efforts - I'd get an A on a test for studying hard. Very simple effort/reward dynamic.  It's different in the real world.  If you work really hard on a project, but don't tell others why you are doing it (for a raise, promotion, comp time off, recognition, etc) - you may be lucky if you get a pat on the back in the end. You've got to say, "I'm working my tail off on this project, which is not what I'm really interested in, so you can see how dedicated I am and make me the lead of the next, more interesting project."  Or, "I really want to take a few extra days off for my honeymoon. I'm willing to work a few weekends to make sure the project is done before I leave, if I could then have a few more paid days off. Does that work for you?"

I was also blissfully unaware that most men do ask for what they want and need.  This isn't small potatoes, this stuff adds up.  A small salary negotiation before you start your job can make a big difference in your salary and retirement savings just 10 years down the road.

Most surprisingly?  Most people don't say "no" when you ask for something reasonable.  Since reading this book and "Influence: Science and Practice" , I've gotten discounts on furniture, appliances, clothing, shoes and services.

I'm by no means an expert negotiator, nor am I one of those annoying pushy people we've all met. Neither Women Don't Ask nor Influence are asking you to become pushy.

I just simply ask.

People do not read your mind. You must ask. You'll be surprised what happens.

Leadership Presence

My old mentor recommended this book to me - bringing two of my favorite things together: theater and corporate leadership. Belle Linda Halpern and Kathy Lubar use years of their own personal research and their study of theater actors into what makes a good leader.

Empathy and mindfulness are two big take aways from this book. How can you lead a team if you don't have any empathy with them? If you are not self-aware, you won't see the mistakes you're making or how you are making people uncomfortable - that's where mindfulness comes into play.

The anecdotes resonated with me, and I find myself reflecting back to them often.  How can I play a character that I can't relate to?  On stage, now, I always have a back story for my character. I always find some part of me in them and vice versa. For the first time, I've been able to cry real tears on stage.   Not stage tears. Not fake tears. Real tears.

I recall rehearsing for Best Little W*****house in Texas. I was playing a character named "Shy". She had run away from home because her father molested her.  I do not share that experience, so I read about the real women who worked at the famous Chicken Ranch. I read about how molestation breaks a young child. I listened to stories on Love Line. I found the pain, the heartbreak.

Running that scene where Shy tells the madam about her father over and over again in rehearsal physically and mentally exhausted me. Even now, I am tearing up writing about this.

Shy was not a real person, but her story was based on many real women who had lived this. I put myself in her shoes and I felt it.  [Aside: I'm in no way saying I truly understand what someone in that situation feels or went through, but merely just a slice of that. A moment.]

I do this as well in the corporate world now: I listen to my team members, hear what is going on with them, I listen for vocal variations and physical cues that tell me when someone might be uncomfortable. I take all of this in before I speak, and I'm finding it's easier to find out what works and what doesn't.

Additionally, when I do presentations now at work, I am actually acting. I think about people who I like seeing their presentations, and I simply take on that role when I get up in front of people. It's amazingly effective.

Crucial Conversations Tools for Talking When Stakes Are High

I once got in trouble at work for saying "no" too often as the technical lead of Solaris 10 Update 1.  For those of you who have been a technical lead of a large project, you know it's your job to say no - when appropriate. You need to maintain high quality, meet the customers needs and stay on schedule.

This was very frustrating when my upper management didn't "get it" and told me that I had an attitude problem.  I was irritated and hurt.

One week, the program manager for one of the projects trying to integrate into my gate complained to my upper management about how unhelpful I was and how I didn't have good reasons for my "no".  That same week, the engineers and managers on that same team brought me a literal mountain of chocolate to thank me for my patience and helping them to understand why they weren't ready and helping them get to the place they needed to be. A little behind schedule, but with the necessary quality we demand. Of course, they didn't go and compliment to my upper management.

So, I had to take this class. Being the good student I referenced earlier, I bought the book in advance and started reading it.

Wow.

Okay, so I had every right to say "no" to some projects, but how I said it and how I listened - boy, that makes a big difference.

The biggest takeaway from this book, that I still use every day, is that humans use shortcuts. We have to. We're too busy. Part of that shortcutting is to tell stories to fill in the gaps of something you hear from someone or something you see.

For example, I might see a man hold a woman's arm and my brain fills it in with the story that they are dating, but really she may have just slipped and he was helping to stabilize her or she is blind. My story is wrong, but quick.

When someone comes to me with a demand at work, I could say that they are doing it because they are an asshole who doesn't understand the process and is trying to get someone else to do their job.  Or I could tell the story that they are overworked because their boss is out on emergency medical leave and they are suddenly on multiple projects, so they are seeking help.
Neither of those might be true, but being aware that each person has a motivation for their actions, and it's rarely "because I want to be an asshole" has again helped me to live for a moment in someone else's shoes.

Another great thing I learned was how to know when my brain was taking other shortcuts that weren't going to be good.  That is, when is the lizard brain kicking in?  For me, I get tense and get butterflies in my stomach.  Now when I feel this, I realize my "fight or flight" instinct is kicking in and that I need to be careful not to raise my voice, take a deep breath, and tell alternate stories for the others - or, heck, just ask them, "what are you trying to accomplish?"

Atlas Shrugged

Whether you love or hate Ayn Rand's Objectivist philosophy or the woman herself, you have to admit she had a novel way of presenting philosophical ideas to the masses.  An ex of mine told me he thought I'd like the book. I couldn't put it down (okay, I always skip most of John Galt's ridiculous 60 page speech), but this book changed the way I read fiction, opened my eyes to a philosophy that seemed to have great promise in impacting the way we all lived.  I joined the Objectivist club on campus at Purdue, met many intelligent people and had great in depth discussions on Ayn Rand's philosophy.  I never agreed with everything she said, and I must say I am greatly disappointed at people who have taken this philosophy to the extreme to the detriment of others.  I am disgusted by what has happened when classically public run things like prisons are privatized (for example, in AZ the private companies running the prisons lobbied for MORE laws so that they could get more prisoners and make more money).

But, beyond all of that, this book opened my eyes to a  new way of thinking. A place where rational thought and logic were supreme and had merit. Showed me that I could apply logic to making decisions about my life. I did not merely need to let things happen to me, but could control what was around me.  I didn't need to stay friends with someone, if the friendship was toxic, just because it was the "nice thing to do". I didn't need to work myself to the bone for someone else for no reward.

Yes, Rand's characters are very black and white, and the movie was just awful, but as a young college woman, these new ideas changed my life.


What books have changed your life? Thoughts about any of mine?

When Geeks Attack: Marie Claire Article, featuring me.

My heart has been broken over and over again by the recent news stories about women in tech simply being attacked online. What's worse, is when someone like Alissa Quart writes an article about the types of online abuse women face along with in person abuse at conferences, she herself becomes a target.

Let me say, that I've been to many awesome conferences where nothing worse than a bit of mansplaining occurred.  But I've also been to my fair share where people called me a "scene whore", constantly asked who my boyfriend was (because why would a woman attend a technical conference by herself?), and flashed me (yes, a man showed me his genitalia on the conference room floor), to know that not all conferences are equal.

+Valerie Aurora started the Ada Initiative to help conference organizers make their events more female friendly, and encourage participation of women in Open Source.  Those of you that know Val know how active she's been in Linux and Solaris kernel development over the years: she's smart and compassionate.

Val and I met at an early DefCon - 3 or 4? At the time, still a small community with mostly nice guys (I only got 1 or 2 creeper emails following my first DefCon - which was also the last one where I used my real handle on my badge).  The conference is much larger now, and has definitely had some growing pains. It's definitely a place where you'll meet really awesome people and learn fascinating things - but there are less savory people there as well.

I have my DefCon stories. After seeing the fallout on other websites about this article and to the Ada Initiative blog entry that seemed to shine the light brightest on all of this, though, I don't feel comfortable sharing the details at this time.



Val and I were both interviewed by Alissa and photographed by Nicolas Silberfaden, a strange thing for both of us.  Two nerds in a fashion magazine? And both named Val? 

Please do check out the article.  You can find it online, but neither Val nor I had our pictures in the online version. To see our pics, you'll need to pick up the June 2013 issue of Marie Claire at any store that carries magazines.

Update: There's a great article from The Raw Story about online and in person sexual harassment covers the odd phenomen we're all witnessing now where the harassment is seen almost as a game, and when someone like Val tries to speak out against it, she's seen as a "Feminazi" and being overly political.

NerdFun: Basic internals for a Tricorder?

I read this article on an "electronic nose" in the Mountain View voice today with glee!  This is basically the essential building block to an actual tricorder.  C'mon, admit it, you're a Star Trek fan, too.  How awesome will it be, when we can all carry around a device to see if the air is fit for human respiration? Check ourselves for toxins?  Very neat!

Resolutions: Email and writing more

I haven't really done resolutions in a few years, besides little fun thing, like ... well, do more fun things! For example, in 2011 it was take a trip to the Grand Canyon, and we did!

I wasn't going to do any this year, either. But, after reading Meg Bear's post on email management, which was in line with earlier email advice I'd gotten from Rich Burridge, I realize I really have to get my email under control.

I've been notoriously bad about this for years. Since the new year rang in, I have deleted half of the emails from my personal account, which only has a web interface so it's a tedious process to find irrelevant and unwanted emails.  My personal email box is now down to 1000 messages (66% of my quota). That's good - it's a start.

But, my work email... boy. It's bad.

It was a mess when I worked at Sun. I tried many mail readers to see if it would help, finally settling on pine - which is, at least, quick and dirty and easy to delete things.  Alas, my Sun.Com inbox still swelled up to 4-5000 emails.

Determined to not let it happen again, I declared "email bankruptcy" in February 2010 when we became Oracle employees.  My Sun.com INBOX is still there, and I've occasionally gone and dug something out of it, but it's mostly ignored.

Things started off really well at Oracle. I switched to Thunderbird, which had better folder support and integration with Oracle's Beehive infrastructure. I kept my inbox down to just "to-do" type items, under 100 messages, for many months. Then I went on vacation. So, then I was keeping it around 300 messages. Still, totally manageable.

Then, I got busy on some projects. Then, more travel. Then, I became a manager. Then, I was involved in a very intense project to migrate our Sun defects from the Sun priority bug tracking system to the Oracle Classic system. That involved many subteams and hundreds of emails coming into my inbox every day, along with my normal workload.  In the middle of all of that, I got my appendix out.

Now my inbox is hovering around 6000 messages.

I am missing things. People send me emails with weird subjects that I delete without reading, only to later find out that the message contained a specific question for me. Things I really want to respond to are quickly buried, never to be seen again.

Filtering doesn't work, as I never open the folders those things go into (though, it was useful for me to then go and unsubscribe from some aliases when I realized I could live without those updates).

Now, how do I get out?

Even trying to keep to the "zero-inbox" going forward isn't going well. I routinely have 8-10 emails left at the end of the day that require too much time to reply to (like review a large document) or require action very soon.

So, those of you that do zero-inbox, did you ever have such a hole? How do you escape?

For 2013 I'd like to practice better email hygiene.

Once I get my email under control, I hope I'll have more time to write here.  For example, I've been tasting many outstanding beers lately, but no time to write them up.


Help! :-)

Appendix no more!

Last week I was supposed to fly down to San Diego to do some training on our migration from Sun's defect tracking system to Oracle's - you know, to get folks up to speed on the changes and a basic down and dirty training on how to use the new tools.

Well, that didn't happen - I got my appendix out instead!

What started as "gas" on Saturday night (painful bloating feeling), got more and more severe as time went on, including nausea and loss of appetite. Sunday, October 28, I had my husband take me to the ER.

I was convinced it was an ovarian cyst, as the last time I had this same pain (not too long ago), that's what it was diagnosed as by the ER doctors, so I nearly didn't bother to go in again, not wanting to spend the night in the ER before flying to San Diego on Monday morning.

I did have a small cyst (perfectly normal for a woman of reproductive age), but the cyst was on my left and the pain was on the right. So, the doctor's still refused my request for food/water, gave me a giant bottle of contrast to drink and left me to sleep, with my dear husband uncomfortably curled up in a "recliner" at my side.  Once the contrast settled in, I was taken to get a CT scan, moments later, my ER doctor (my 3rd since arriving) told me I was getting my appendix out.

A couple of quick visits from the surgeons, I was talking to the very kind anesthesiologist, Margie, about my health history and previous times I've been under general anesthetic. Then it was time.

I checked into the ER at about 8PM, had my CT scan about 4:15AM, was in the OR prep room at 6:10 AM (last time I remember looking at the clock) and *home* before 8AM feeling a thousand times better.  As painful as surgery can be, it beats appendicitis any day!

I encountered so many friendly nurses and doctors in the hospital, all very patient, caring and kind.

Now, just more than a week later, I'm just a bit sore and still a tad tired, but overall feeling good.

Put quite a damper on my week's plans, but I'm happy the surgeons got to it before it burst!

This Blog is Read in Russia

Futzing with my blog this AM, trying to get the "Labels" gadget to work correctly again (currently, you can either see a cloud with every label I've ever used, or none - selected labels no longer works) - I was paging through the various blogger pages and discovered that I get the most readers from the US. No surprise, but then the second highest readership comes from Russia.  Not just by a little bit, but way more than any country.  Sure, Russia is big, but this is a big gap.

So, Hello my Russian readers!  What brings you here?

New job!

Okay, I haven't written for awhile - and boy, have I had things to write about! But, I've suddenly found myself much more busier than normal.  I've taken a new position at Oracle, I'm now managing the Solaris Cryptographic Technologies team.

That's right. I'm a manager now.  I've done it. Gotten the lobotomy. Working on my pointy hair.

I'm sure you've heard me say that I've been a manager before... at a record store and a dollar store.  The biggest management concerns we had at both were: hiring people that could count, knew the alphabet, weren't mean to the customers, and didn't steal too much.

Managing software engineers is, obviously, very different, but a natural progression from the team leadership I've been doing for a few years.  It's hard work - much longer hours, and the price for screwing up is more severe.

So, my postings have gone down - I'm using this to break the ice again, so to speak.

Wow, Ten Platelet Donations This Year!

And it's only just November!  I got an email this morning from the StanfordBlood Center telling me that last night's platelets donation was my tenth of the year. I still have 4 or 5 more appointments scheduled, so as long as I can stay away from sick people, hopefully I can get to 15 by the end of the year!

Why do I give platelets? First of all, I can give more often - once every 72 hours (though a maximum of 24 times a year). Platelets are also the most precious component of the blood - when they take platelets from you at the center, they use an apheresis machine that puts the red blood cells back in your body. The platelets are needed for premature babies and cancer patients, among other critical need patients.  I've had enough friends and relatives that were very sick and needed platelets, so I want to make sure the blood bank always has plenty on hand.

Unfortunately, platelets don't have as long of a shelf life as regular blood - so, it's a good think I can give more often!

I'm going again in a couple of weeks (November 14th at 5:30PM in Mountain View) - who wants to come with me? If you've never donated platelets before, you'll have to donate whole blood and get tested to see if you have enough spare platelets in your blood stream that you donate.

This post syndicated from Thoughts on security, beer, theater and biking!

Bugs in my oatmeal

I made a bowl of oatmeal this morning, threw some fresh black berries on it, and was about to pour milk on top, which I noticed some movement out of the corner of my eye in the clear plastic container we keep the oatmeal in... at first, I thought it was an ant, and wasn't too creeped out. Then I noticed more. I remember getting these things in our flour when I was a kid, though our flour wasn't in an airtight container. All the same, I couldn't eat the oatmeal I had just made (though I did salvage the black berries).

I'm going to pretend that the bugs (and larvae) weren't in there yesterday when I did eat that oatmeal.

Guess we get to clean out our pantry tonight! Ah, so nice to be back from vacation.... ICK!

This post is syndicated from Thoughts on security, beer, theater and biking!

TSA, Thanksgiving Travel and Me

After reading all the articles on the risks of the back-scatter technology (never mind the privacy implications) and watching the videos of screaming children getting "enhanced" pat-downs, I was nervous about traveling for this Thanksgiving holiday in the US. I was ready to 'opt-out', but wasn't sure how I felt about the "enhanced" pat down.

Back in October I received an 'old-style' pat-down from a male TSA agent in LAX. I was fine with it. I did not feel violated, nor did I feel that the agent was missing out on anything by not feeling the underwire in my bra.  The agent was friendly, apologetic for the inconvenience and even found a place he could search my bag where I could sit and watch (my injured knee wasn't up to doing anymore standing after a day at the Women's Conference).

Then I saw the videos of the screaming children and I suddenly became very uncomfortable with this. Many women, including myself, (and men) have an event in their past when they were touched/fondled/groped/etc in an unwelcome manner. To have to relive that moment in public at the airport just to travel is unsettling.

So, very nervous, I entered SJC on Thursday morning... only to find most of the back-scatter machines turned off. The one I saw in use was being used to scan a women's personal wheelchair - I couldn't help but think that was a perfect use for the scanner!  The woman, like all travelers in wheelchairs, was receiving an 'old-style' pat down.

I went through, like everyone else, in the same fashion I have for years - removed my belt, watch, shoes, jacket, liquids, laptop and medications...*whew* and "simply" went through.

It was the same on my return through Seattle. One machine was on, but people could just choose to go through a different line. No questions asked, no extra screening.

What made me angry was all of the main-stream news outlets, including our local KGO, reporting that the back-scatter machines had not slowed down the lines. The main report I heard was that passengers would rather get the scan and get through quickly.

But that wasn't true at all. The machines were not on. The "enhanced" pat-downs weren't happening.  How dare they say the launch weekend was a success when they were not using them?

That's a waste of our money and a gross misrepresentation of the events. I'm afraid Bruce Schneier has it right - the TSA is not going to back down, because they'd seem like idiots.  Another example of how lobbyists for manufacturers are shaping policy, instead of policy shaping manufacturing.

The TSA is inconsistent at every airport I go to. During that trip to LA, the TSA ID checker screamed at me when I approached his podium with my traveling companion.  He would not begin her screening until I returned to behind this blue line, which was difficult as the entire line had already moved up.  Yes, I can read (but thanks for pointing it out) the sign saying to stay behind the line until he was ready to process us - I just assumed that, like every other airport, you could go up with your entire party.  At least the agent that had to do my pat-down in LAX was friendlier.  Oh, yeah, in Seattle, they actually have a sign on the podium directing people to be at each side - they can process you faster if you come up with your entire party or 2 at a time (even with strangers).

Another disconcerting thing I noticed: no where to do a private screening if requested!  Why not have a few privacy screens up?  They could be set up like a maze or other formation to take up the least amount of space while still providing privacy (and room for your witness, if requested).

Boy, am I glad I'm not flying for Christmas!

Dancing with the Stars mini-rant & question...

Spoiler Alert.... if you didn't watch last night, then don't read this.

Before I start my rant, anyone know who the dancers were for Annie Lennox's "Universal Child" performance? They were amazing!



Bristol Palin somehow, yet again, was at the bottom of the leader board and sailed into the next round - this time, the finals!  Sure, she is charming and an "every day person" - not a celebrity (but, why is she on Dancing with the Stars in the first place if not for being famous?). I get that. She seems like a wonderfully sweet young woman, but her dancing is not up to par. Routinely she freezes in the middle of the routine and stops dancing, and yet she makes it into the next round.

Last night she claimed that her success of moving forward was not politically motivated, yet there are actual political sites running 'Vote for Bristol' campaigns.  Come on people, this is a dancing competition! I've always loved it for not turning into a popularity contest, and it's worse now that a contestant is moving forward based solely on her mother's political affiliation.

Okay, it is only a TV show, but one I really enjoy watching. Great music, great performances and real personal journeys without fake drama.

... for now.... :-)

Neil Young's LincVolt has gone up in flames

I was sad to hear the news today that Neil Young's 1959 Lincoln Continental that he had converted into a hybrid caught fire and burned up. Seems that not only is this neat car that Neil brought to the Sun Menlo Park campus for a visit gone, but so are some of his other memorabilia from his long and interesting career. Luckily, nobody was hurt and the team seems to have learned something about the charging system.

Progress!

So, on Tuesday morning, I went in for my reevaluation of my partial tear in my quadricep tendon - and the PA from Orthopedics said I could take the torture device, I mean, knee immobilizer off! No more crutches! Now I have a cane! I need some more decorations on it, though, it's pretty boring with just a couple of dinosaur and OpenSolaris stickers.

The best part is? I can wear jeans again! It was getting pretty cold to be wearing skirts (I couldn't wear tights or leggings, either, because the knee immobilizer had to be directly against the skin).

Actually, the truly best part is I can now sit in a chair like a normal person. The pain in my back and healthy leg are starting to recede now that awkward angle sitting (either sitting on the edge of the chair so my foot could rest on the ground or with my leg up on the CPU and the leg brace digging painfully into the back of my leg) and bizarre pirate walk are done with.

I started rehab on Tuesday and am learning how to walk again. I never thought I'd be one of those people that didn't move the opposite arm to the leg that's going forward (I've heard a dozen dance choreographers yell at people for this), but here I am consciously telling myself to move my left arm as my right leg goes forward. I guess walking with crutches for a month creates some weird coping mechanisms!

Thank you all for your good thoughts - I can bend my knee to 90 degrees - hopefully more as the rehab continues!

Adapting...

These last few weeks have been a big lesson in adapting for me. Vertigo, knee immobilizer, and an office move.

Life as an Oracle employee is finally sinking in - things are different. Some things are better, some are ... well, different. Packing up my old office in Menlo Park was quite a walk down memory lane - I found old CDROMs full of SunScreen source code, old Solaris install media, cards from friends, pictures of family, and stacks of old design notes.

I've moved around a lot in my years as a Sun employee, but my very first office was a double window office in Menlo Park (MPK17) overlooking the foothills - probably my favorite office to date. From there I went into Palo Alto (PAL1), Mountain View (MTV21), back to Menlo Park (MPK18) then back to my favorite building, MPK17. I moved back into Menlo Park 17 right after September 11th. Everything seemed so surreal, joining the OS group and working on a product with a seemingly endlessly large team. I couldn't believe how strict the integration standards were (and now, as a CRT advocate I enforce these and as chair I document them), nor how large the scope of our overall project was.

I sat across from a woman, Renee. And over the next 9 years, even as our offices moved, we were still across the hall from each other.

Now I'm in Santa Clara. I still have one box left to unpack. Renee is on the other side of the building, not too far, but not shouting distance either (of course, the rest of the people around me are probably grateful for this). The commute is nicer, though I'm further from my friends in San Francisco. I think I'll like it here.

About two weeks ago, I sat up from a massage and suddenly found the room spinning. No matter how long I sat, it wouldn't stop. Hours later I found myself visiting a doctor at Kaiser who diagnosed me with Benign Paroxysmal Positional Vertigo (BPPV) which is a vague diagnosis which basically means: "Something in your inner ear relocated. You're dizzy and you're just going to have to learn your new spatial environment". He performed the Epley Maneuver and gave me some exercises to do. So, I've been adapting to my new inner ear. It's taken awhile, but the dizzy spells are very infrequent and typically only happen when I turn my head upside down (like when drying my hair!). So, yoga is right out... oh, it was anyways....that knee immobilizer....

Apparently during my 105-mile bike ride for the American Lung Association, I partially tore the tendon that attaches my knee to my quadriceps. This knee has always had a tight quad, so swelling in my knee wasn't unusual. After a few weeks, though, of having it swell up every time I tried yoga or short bike rides, I made my way to Kaiser. Initial x-rays showed a perfectly healthy knee, but the MRI (which I had to wait more than 2 weeks for) showed the tear. Now I'm in a knee immobilizer. The device goes from just above the ankle to most of the way up the thigh. It needs to be worn directly on the skin, 24 hours a day. This means no jeans! I can wear short-shorts or skirts. Thank goodness I have a lot of skirts! I can walk with crutches (which results in sore ribs/hands/shoulders), or kinda like a pirate (which results in sore back). I alternate. I'm adapting.

I have a long recovery ahead of me. I can already see the muscle in the effected leg melting away. I don't know when I'll be able to ride my bike again. I'm so afraid I won't be able to. I am already tired of driving everywhere. I don't even want to think about skiing - I can't miss out on ski season, too!

As much as I want to feel sorry for myself and have a great big pity party, I realize that I am very fortunate to have medical care and an incredibly supportive husband who has been doing most of the driving and taking care of the house. I can put Renee on speed dial. I can adapt.

Goodbye, Grandma Dianne

2009 was a bad year for the women I called Grandma. I lost Grandma-ma (mother's mom) on January 1, 2009. Grandma Dianne, my father's stepmother, passed on December 30, 2009, after a long battle with osteoporosis and COPD, at the age of 87.

Some would say she wasn't my grandmother at all, as we had no blood ties, but to me she was the only grandmother I ever knew on my dad's side. My dad's mother, Ginny (aka Munner to my siblings) died when my mother was pregnant with me, so I never met her (though I heard many wonderful stories about her).

I have many happy childhood memories of staying at Grandma Dianne's house, and walking through the woods with Grandaddy and visiting with my cousins, Leslie and Mike, that lived nearby. Grandma Dianne always had a few pesky, yet photogenic, raccoons living in the woods behind the house - we loved to watch them as children. Grandaddy passed away in 1981, but we still visited Dianne often for years to come.

After I moved away to school, I couldn't visit, but regularly exchanged lengthy letters with Grandma Dianne. She often included pictures of her dogs and shared stories of her youth, and I was always so happy to see a note from her in my dorm mail box.

As the years went by, Dianne stopped replying to my correspondence, but did tell my mother how happy she was to receive them. She was embarrassed of how much her hand writing had deteriorated, so I started calling her instead. It was always nice to talk to her, as she would reminisce about Grandaddy (Danny, to her), her sister and father, her beloved dogs: Missy, Daisy and a charcoal colored one she had as a girl, and about her travels to England as a young woman. She was always excited to hear about the shows I was in or had recently seen and all of the trips I had been taking, always asking for more pictures.

She spoke frequently of how much she loved her 6 grandchildren and 13 great-grandchildren, even though some of the great-grandchildren lived far away and she never got to see them in person.

This year for Christmas, my parents gave me Grandma Dianne's china. I was pretty sure this china was passed down from her English ancestors, but when I called her to thank her for them, she was already too weak to answer the phone.

I will miss my phone calls with her. To me, she was always my grandmother.

Blog about to explode... in a good way...

In case you hadn't noticed yet, I'm in beautiful Tucson, AZ staying at the wonderful JW Marriot Starr Pass Resort for the Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing. I'm an official blogger, plus I just like to use my blog as a way to take notes for sessions I'm not even the officially assigned blogger. What this means is that I'm about to have MANY posts over the next few days. The should all be under the GHC09 feed, and I'll try to start all the subjects with "GHC09" as well, in case you aren't interested. I should be back to irregularly scheduled and randomly themed blog posts by next week. :-)

Mirror-Mirror

You haven't entered an alternate universe where evil men that look like your friends except they have goatees.... I've just mirrored by blog. Okay, I just created the account on blogger and Katy Dickinson’s daughter, Jessica Dickinson Goodman, took my extracted entries and comments from 5 years of blogging and got my mirror on blogger.

Jessica was easy to work with and completed the move in just a couple of hours, fixing it up so it looked oh so nice.

For those of you that read my posts via Facebook as "notes" won't notice anything different. Most of you probably don't even know you're reading my blog right now. Gotta love this Web 2.0 stuff! :-)

The Triumph of Women's Suffrage

Mr. Robert P. J. Cooney, Jr. came to Sun Microsystems today to talk to the Women@Sun group about the triumphant women's suffrage movement in the United States that took more than 60 years to gain success. Sixty years! Just for women to get the right to vote! [1] Mr. Cooney became interested in this movement in the 1970s when attending school to become a graphic artist, when he realized the large prejudice that women needed to overcome and that they were able to do this in a nonviolent way.

This was such a difficult task, as the women had to convince men that not only were women prepared to vote, but that women were educated and informed. Only men could decide whether or not to grant women the right to vote, and many of these men were ignorant, uneducated and even illiterate. A difficult task at hand, indeed!

Suffragists started with parades in different states to raise awareness of their concerns, along with organizing peaceful rallies. Getting women to join in these events was difficult, as many were afraid that their participation would be seen as too forward by the men and scare the men off of giving them the vote even more, but the suffragists knew they could not be silent. They need to be seen to be heard.

The US Supreme Court had ruled that it was an issue that should be decided by the states, so the women had to levy campaigns in each and every state, a very arduous process indeed! These campaigns were most successful in the progressive west. East of the Mississippi, the only suffrage many women could get was the ability to vote only for school boards and other small, local positions.

Susan B. Anthony strongly believed it was really a federal issue, and began the push for a federal amendment to the US Constitution. Unfortunately, she died before seeing this come to pass, after 45 years of tireless effort on her part. Fortunately, there were other women ready to take up the task at hand and push the movement forward, even in times of war.

The women found they were ignored by both major political parties, so their took their parades to the democratic and republican conventions. At one of them, the women actually had a silent, still "parade" - where they all wore white with golden jewelry and parasols and lined the street and stood silently while the delegates were participating in their own march down that same street. The eerie silence had great impact on those delegates, bringing the rights of women to the forefront of their minds.

When the suffragists were not getting momentum they wanted at the national level, they began to leverage their vote in the western states to oust seated national politicians, targeting, in particular, the democratic party. I find this an interesting historic note, as the democrat party is now associated with women's rights, but apparently the turn of the 19th century told a different story.

Mr. Cooney has documented this in his book, Winning the Vote: The Triumph of the American Woman Suffrage Movement,
which is filled with outstanding images of the buttons and posters the suffragists made, as well as pictures of the rallies and events and documentation of the cruel treatment several women received for protesting peacefully outside of the White House during World War I.

Mt. Cooney is an eloquent speaker and I really look forward to reading his book in the up coming weeks, but all of this reminds me that all over the world today, women still do not have the right to vote and have themselves represented. It's so disturbing to me, because it seems like such an inalienable right. How can we be citizens and pay taxes and not vote? But, if it took more than 60 years to make such thing a documented right in a progressive country like our own, it may be many more lifetimes before women the world over have these same freedoms and the same voice. Let's hope it comes sooner than later, for all of our sakes.

[1] As pointed out during the Q&A session, not all women gained the right to vote in all states in 1920. For many women of color, particularly those that lived in the south, that quest took another 40 years, where they had to fight along side their brothers and fathers to get the same equal representation.