Empty Thoughts

Yes, I’m alive! The past six months have been grueling and a ton of hard work but definitely worth it. I’ve ignored pretty much every aspect of life except for coding. And I’m talking about heads down, all night, coding. It’s what I love; it’s who I am, but still after a certain amount of time you feel like you need to come up for air.

Well I’m coming up for air. I’ll be posting more to my blog, I’ll be contributing more to open source projects like SQLAlchemy, I’ll be working on some of my own stuff, and I’ll be entertaining my brain in whatever interests me at the moment. If that’s all you care about then know that I’m back. If you want to know more about what I’ve been doing then read on.

For the past year I’ve been involved in a very large project at work. The project involved the redesign of our websites at Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.). The first two sites went live this past week. They are:

http://www.pcusa.org/

http://gamc.pcusa.org/

Both sites are built on Python. So in addition to building out these sites, I’ve also been training and transitioning my development team to Python programming. That means a lot of Python 101 / 102 classes, pair programming, code reviews, and unit testing. To say we’re transitioning is a bit of an overstatement. In one sense we’re transitioning from .NET development, but in another we’re not. We’re supplementing the current architecture with Python. Most upcoming projects will make more sense if written in Python, but not all. Regardless, we’ll always use the right tool for the job.

Things have been going quite well and I’m very pleased with where we are at the moment. Hopefully I’ll have an opportunity to talk about some of the interesting technological and architectural decisions we’ve made along the way. Until then I’m happy to be back in the game.

I got this from Leah Culver. You’re supposed to highlight the items in the list that you’ve experienced. Kinda cool. So here it goes:

1. Started your own blog

2. Slept under the stars

3. Played in a band (guitar in high school and college)

4. Visited Hawaii

5. Watched a meteor shower

6. Given more than you can afford to charity

7. Been to Disneyland

8. Climbed a mountain (does Half Dome count?)

9. Held a praying mantis

10. Sang a solo (not really, but sang a bunch)

11. Bungee jumped

12. Visited Paris

13. Watched a lightning storm

14. Taught yourself an art from scratch (guitar?)

15. Adopted a child

16. Had food poisoning (I’ll never eat nachos again)

17. Walked to the top of the Statue of Liberty (saw it from the ferry :))

18. Grown your own vegetables

19. Seen the Mona Lisa in France

20. Slept on an overnight train

21. Had a pillow fight

22. Hitch hiked

23. Taken a sick day when you’re not ill (duh!)

24. Built a snow fort

25. Held a lamb

26. Gone skinny dipping

27. Run a Marathon

28. Ridden in a gondola in Venice

29. Seen a total eclipse

30. Watched a sunrise or sunset

31. Hit a home run (little league)

32. Been on a cruise

33. Seen Niagara Falls in person

34. Visited the birthplace of your ancestors

35. Seen an Amish community

36. Taught yourself a new language (Spanish sort of. It’s rusty these days)

37. Had enough money to be truly satisfied

38. Seen the Leaning Tower of Pisa in person

39. Gone rock climbing

40. Seen Michelangelo’s David

41. Sung karaoke (Maggie May, lots of drinks that night)

42. Seen Old Faithful geyser erupt (no but others)

43. Bought a stranger a meal at a restaurant

44. Visited Africa

45. Walked on a beach by moonlight (Florida)

46. Been transported in an ambulance

47. Had your portrait painted

48. Gone deep sea fishing

49. Seen the Sistine Chapel in person

50. Been to the top of the Eiffel Tower in Paris

51. Gone scuba diving or snorkeling

52. Kissed in the rain

53. Played in the mud

54. Gone to a drive-in theater

55. Been in a movie (foreign film)

56. Visited the Great Wall of China

57. Started a business (several)

58. Taken a martial arts class

59. Visited Russia

60. Served at a soup kitchen

61. Sold Girl Scout Cookies

62. Gone whale watching

63. Got flowers for no reason

64. Donated blood, platelets or plasma

65. Gone sky diving

66. Visited a Nazi Concentration Camp

67. Bounced a check

68. Flown in a helicopter

69. Saved a favorite childhood toy (raccoon radio)

70. Visited the Lincoln Memorial

71. Eaten caviar

72. Pieced a quilt (please)

73. Stood in Times Square (not sure was pretty drunk)

74. Toured the Everglades

75. Been fired from a job

76. Seen the Changing of the Guards in London

77. Broken a bone

78. Been on a speeding motorcycle (raced)

79. Seen the Grand Canyon in person (sort of)

80. Published a book

81. Visited the Vatican

82. Bought a brand new car (when I shouldn’t have)

83. Walked in Jerusalem

84. Had your picture in the newspaper

85. Read the entire Bible

86. Visited the White House

87. Killed and prepared an animal for eating (crawdaddys?)

88. Had chickenpox

89. Saved someone’s life

90. Sat on a jury

91. Met someone famous

92. Joined a book club

93. Lost a loved one

94. Had a baby (well not directly)

95. Seen the Alamo in person

96. Swam in the Great Salt Lake

97. Been involved in a law suit (HR Bullshit)

98. Owned a mobile phone

99. Been stung by a bee

100. Read an entire book in one day

Hayden started taking drum lessons about a month ago and he’s been really into it. He comes home most nights and practices his drums. He also often sings and plays although I have a real hard time capturing him on video. He will stop as soon as he is aware I’m recording it. Anyway, it’s a lot of fun to see him learning drums.

Hayden Drumming from Michael Trier on Vimeo.

My good friend Justin Lilly just posted a great short screencast on using Vim macros. In the screencast he walks you through using the Vim macro commands to record and play back key sequences. Justin, several other friends, and I have been helping each other get the most out of MacVim. I highly recommend you take one minute and give it a viewing.

Since I forgot to blog about it earlier he has also created a excellent post on his Vim setup called Vim: My new IDE. If you’re into Vim or want to get going on it, this post contains an awesome collection of stuff that Justin has found useful.

I think I’m hanging out in the wrong channels:

Thanks Alex Gaynor, that was very creative.

I’ve really been enjoying Dave Thomas’ PragDave blog series on Writing a Book. In this series of posts Dave Thomas gives some guidance for those whom desire to write a book, or may be in the process of writing a book.

A long time ago in another life I was very close to accepting an agreement to write a book for Jeff Duntemann’s now defunct publishing company The Coriolis Group. Due to a lot of circumstances, mostly personal, I decided not to do it. It was the right decision at the time, but I have nonetheless thought about writing a book ever since. Perhaps someday the opportunity will present itself once again, and I’ll have both the time and the right life situation to follow through with it.

If writing a book is something you’ve thought about or posted on your list of 43 Things, take advantage of Dave Thomas’ helpful notes.