I'm Celebrating

It's 10:23pm and both childrens are in bed. I spent most of today at work creating an Excel model for an algorithm we call "dithering". I'm not going to explain what that means. The algorithm that was there when I was hired doesn't work right. It's too optimistic and will cause the part to overheat. So I kicked off a giant battle to not commit to making this feature work. The end result of that battle was that we did not commit to making it work, but I got the job of making it work.

I was supposed to do that by the end of March, but I didn't. I had thought about it a lot, but couldn't figure a way to make it work that wasn't a big bandaid mess. Then, a few days ago, I was struck with a revelation while in the shower. The $12,000 shower that no longer leaks. There's something inspirational about a good hot shower with a showerhead above and four body wash sprays all going. It was an idea so simplistic I figured no way could it work.

Today I finally got time to work on it. I worked and worked and worked. Bozzetto even came over at one point, and I didn't talk to him I was so engrossed in this thing. I think he thought I was mad at him, cuz as I was hustling out to pick up HannahC from dance class (which I had exactly 6 minutes to do without being late - I wasn't late), he said something that sounded like, "Are we OK?" I wasn't sure if it was the royal we, or if he meant was I mad at him, or if I just misheard him. But I had zero time to spare and simply replied, "Yup," and kept walking.

He'll be OK.

Then, at home after dinner, I kept working on it during the time I'm normally watching MaxieC watch TV. I almost never work from home anymore. Not since I had kids. So far, I've evaluated the basic case that I was thinking of when I had my revelation as well as two of the four possible scenarios that might break the underlying assumptions, and the theory has worked in all cases. It's not even that far off from the theoretical optimum in most situations. And these were the two scenarios I expected might break it. The other two I'm pretty sure won't.

The beauty is that it is an almost trivial modification to the pre-exiting algorithm. Just simple linear scaling of one of the terms. Damn it's good stuff. I must be doing something wrong because real life never works out this well. But tonight, the heady glow of triumph is about, and I am taking advantage of it.

I am right now sitting on my front porch with a glass of Maker's Mark on the rocks and a Partagas Black. It warmed up like 40 degrees today from yesterday (really), so I can do this without a jacket despite it snowing all day yesterday. I've never actually sat on my front porch before. It's nice. The koi pond waterfall is right below me, and it provides a wonderful background din. I can't even smell Greeley.

OK, well now I need a jacket.

Had lunch with Cavitation today. We went to Carl's Jr., where they messed up both our orders. That place messes up orders about 50% of the time. It's amazing. On the way home, we got to discussing a certain idiosyncrasy regarding cancer risks in women, and I told him something that probably ruined his day.

This morning, the most bizarre thing happened. I got out of the shower, came downstairs, and The Mrs. told me that last night's post was one of the best ones I've done in a long time. I liked this one a lot more, and the Hooters one, too. Hell, the Something Not to Do post had Tinfoil in hysterics in his cube. Someone even walked all the way over to my side of the building to report that to me. But it was really weird to have The Mrs. compliment me on a blog post. I checked all over the basement for pods.

FreddyC goes in tomorrow for a tooth cleaning. General anesthesia is called for to clean a dog's teeth. It's his second time in his 8 years. Probably his last. They don't like to do general on older dogs. I sure hope he doesn't die. I love that dog.