April 29, 2004
Three day weekend
Vacation - I don't often take a day off from work. Sometimes I'll take a day when I have family coming out for a visit. This week, though, is the NH school spring break. Since Claire is already home, I taking tomorrow (Friday) off. It's supposed to be warm and partly sunny. I'll likely give the lawn its first mowing of the season and work on Claire's bicycle tires. To kick the three day weekend off, I asked Michelle if it would be alright to take Claire into Nashua for a little shopping. We went to Toys R Us to pick her up a new bicycle helmet. I found the tire levers I needed to change her tires. I also picked the boys up two new Baby Einstein DVDs: Baby MacDonald and Numbers Nursery. Afterwards we headed over to Barnes&Noble. Earlier this evening I had stopped on my way home at Toadstool Bookshops in Milford and was surprised to find that they have sharply cut back on computer related books. While B&N has more such books, they still didn't have the books I was looking for (this and this -- yes, geeky, I know). I did pick Claire up a Junie B Jones book. She's always been a fan, even though the grammar in intentionally awful. On the way out we swung by B&N's little cafe and got a hot drink and a big cookie to go.
Zoombinis - When Claire and I got home, I expected Michelle would be in bed. I was surprised to see her sitting at the iMac playing a Zoombinis game. Lately this series, along with the I Spy series, have been Abby's favorites. The games are interesting enough that Michelle has also started to get hooked on them just from helping Abby out. They are more like educational puzzle games.
Gelato - Years ago at my office we used to make regular lunch trips to get chicken wings and strips from the Chicken Hutch on 101A. About a year ago it went under and was replaced by Tony Tomatos, a pizza, sub, calzone shop. Two co-workers and I decided to try it out this afternoon. After I ordered I noticed that they also offered Gelato (aka "Italian ice cream") and Sorbeto. I hadn't eaten gelato since we left the Chicago area. I missed its smoother, more frozen custard-like consistency. I ordered a dish of white chocolate with raspberry. MMmmmm... It took me back to the little shops in the Chicago suburbs.
BASIC - Dial up the way-back machine, Mr. Peabody. The year is 1964 -- 40 years ago. On May 1st math professors Thomas Kurtz and John Kemeny at NH's Dartmouth University released Beginners All-purpose Symbolic Instruction Code, BASIC for short. Back in 1981 BASIC was my first introduction to computers -- on the TRS-80 model I (with Level 2 BASIC ... ooooh!). It was in the development of commercial BASIC interpreters that a tiny company called Microsoft got its start. Today's Windows based PCs are still dripping with BASIC. Many Windows viruses are based on exploiting holes in the Visual Basic used in scripting Microsoft Office applications (Word, Excel, Outlook). Hard to believe this all had roots nearby in little Hanover, NH. Read the rest of the story at Fosters Online.