Month: November 2016

My Reading List

I try to read as many books as possible.  I have the bad habit of reading too many books in parallel and then quickly losing interest and not finishing the majority of the books I read.  I’m working on it.

Currently I’m reading:

“The Art of the Start” by: Guy Kawasaki

This one is a classic business book and a must read.  I actually just completed this one, and will probably do a detailed review.  Overall I highly recommend it.

The Nomadic Developer: Surviving and Thriving in the World of Technology Consulting

This book is about the life of a software consultant.  So far I’m about 80% of the way through it.  It’s more geared towards a junior developer who is thinking about joining a consulting company.  Not really targeted towards me but so far I’ve found it interested to get a glimpse into the lifestyle of a consultant developer.

The 4-Hour Workweek: Escape 9-5, Live Anywhere, and Join the New Rich

Another absolute classic.  I first read this one many years back.  I actually lost it for many years and just found it, so I thought I’d give it another read through.  This book is chock full of tips on managing your work life and improving your productivity.

Buying a Second Home: Income, Getaway or Retirement

Michele and I are thinking about getting a place up in the whites as a home base for skiing, hiking, and potentially water sports.  I’m about 25% through this one and so far the content is pretty obvious.

So, four books in progress is fairly light for me.  I’ll try to post some detailed book reviews.  I figure the blog would be a good way for me to reinforce any lessons from these books.

I Hate Mice

I Hate Mice.  I’ve been battling them all summer long.  We never had an issue in previous years, but for some reason this year they are everywhere.

It’s so bad that one night I opened my hockey bag in the locker room and a mouse jumped out and ran all around (I store my bag in the garage)!  Another time I was walking in the backyard and stepped on one with my bare feet!  Yuck!

I’ve caught several in the garage and a bunch more in the shed.  I now have traps everywhere.  I feel bad killing them but I don’t really see another option.  Where are all the hawks?

Anyways, I store the Christmas decorations in our shed.  Most of the things are in plastic tubs, but we bought these nice vinyl bags to store our garland.  So, turns out mice have been nesting in there for a while, since the bags were all torn and they were wet with pee and feces.  Mouse turds are a pain in the ass to clean and they are everywhere!

Does anyone know a good way to deter mice from entering a building, rather than just trapping the ones that are already there?

My Intellivision Collection

Geek Alert!

Ok, so I know it’s a totally geeky hobby, but I’ve started collecting Intellivision games a few months ago.  For those that don’t know, Intellivision is a gaming console from Mattel that was released in 1979.  It was very popular in the early eighties and then lost steam when more powerful systems game out like the NES.

We had an intellivision growing up and I get nostalgic when I think about playing these games as a kid.  It turns out that the system isn’t super collectible, so you can get a console and games for relatively cheap on ebay.

Here’s a pic of the console I recently picked up:

intellivision system

My current game collection:

intellivision game collection

I’ve been trying to only buy games in boxes.  The artwork back then was pretty awesome.

Here’s my current list of games:

  • Beauty and the Beast
  • Nova Blast
  • Microsurgeon
  • Atlantis
  • Dragonfire
  • Swords & Serpents
  • Bump n’ Jump
  • World Cup Soccer
  • Blockade Runner
  • The Power of He-Man
  • Mission-X
  • Burgertime
  • Frogger
  • Tron Deadly Discs
  • Tron Maze-a-Tron
  • Pinball
  • Space Armada
  • Space Spartans
  • B-17 Bomber
  • Bomb Squad
  • Space Battle
  • Star Strike
  • Astrosmash
  • Sub Hunt
  • Advanced Dungeons & Dragons
  • Lock N’ Chase
  • Night Stalker
  • Pac-Man
  • Major League Baseball
  • Poker & Blackjack
  • Sea Battle

Most of the games only have a few screens in them.  I’ve tried to get the kids into it, but they lose interest in less than a minute.

In addition to collecting, I’ve started listening to a podcast dedicated exclusively to the console, called Intellivisionaries.  They have some great interviews with original programmers of the games.  Also, it turns out there is quite the homebrew game community and indie games sprouting up for the console.

Who starts a blog in 2016?

I’m starting a personal blog, yup.  It’s a couple decades overdue.  Actually I had a livejournal in college, my wife and I had a baby blog for the first 2 kids, and I have an anonymous blog on work related things (maybe I’ll reveal it in the future!), so I’m not too new to these things.

I’ve had the daveweatherwax.com domain registered for 5-10 years now and put no more effort into it than a ‘coming soon’ landing page.

I thought I’d give this a try and see if I can stick to it.

Is anyone reading this thing?