For some reason it seems like it has been a long week. I have recently started going around fixing some things in my house that have been broken, either through normal use or by the kids. I held off for a while because I was afraid they would just re-break whatever I fixed. As a part of that I have had to re-hang the door to my daughter's room, replaced curtain rods, and will probably replace the garbage disposal this weekend. I really understand when people say that owning a house is a never ending project. Later this summer I am going to build some shelves in our garage, and repair the gate to my back yard. I think we will need to paint this year as well, and possibly put down new flooring in our kitchen and dining room.

Tomorrow I am going with my Venture Crew to hike up Mount Si in North Bend. That should be a good challenging hike. Afterward we are going to take the Venture Scouts to Triple X Root Beer in Issaquah. That should be a good day trip. We need to do a lot of hiking over the next few months as we will be doing a hiking centered High Adventure activity this summer.

Tonight I'm taking my wife out to dinner. Since I had some conflicting appointments around Valentine's Day and she was recovering from her back injury we weren't able to get out then. We are going to The Melting Pot for fondue. It is one of our favorite restaurants.

Sunday will be church of course, and a good stay to spend with my kids. The hike tomorrow will be too tough for them, plus I can't bring them on scout activities. I am hoping I get home early enough on Saturday to spend some time with my kids since I don't get to spend much time with them during the week.

I hope everyone reading this has a fun production weekend as well. See you next week!

Apparently David Stern thinks there is no chance for Seattle to keep the Sonics here. It seems to me from his comments that he blames the city and state for that. Now I will admit that the city and state leaders have mostly shown little interest in keeping the Sonics it's not like the owner, Clay Bennett, has done anything to improve relations either. I also think some blame has to go to the NBA which has a financial model that is broken.

I have written before that I believe the city of Seattle, King County, and Washington State should build the Sonics a new arena. At the same time I understand the objection when Key Arena was remodeled back in 1994, but is not being considered outdated for a state-of-the-art arena. At the same time, when you look around the league there are a large number of teams that are seeing attendance drop-offs and are having some tough times financially.

The fact is, Oklahoma City is not as good of a market for an NBA team as Seattle is. That is not a shot at Oklahoma City, but is simply based on the size of the media market, the income level, and the number of potential fans to draw from. Keep in mind that the Sonics draw fans from Vancouver B.C. to the north and Spokane on the east, and almost down to Portland on the south. Seattle also has a natural rival in the Portland Trailblazers which they won't have in Oklahoma City. This region has had the Sonics for 40 years. I really believe it would be a tragedy to lose them now.

I'm pretty ticked at David Stern right now. Over the last 2 years I have written to several of the state and local representatives and blogged about wanting the team to stay. Over the time I even changed my opinion on how important it is to have an NBA team in the city. I have also supported the work on Save Our Sonics and have even encouraged people to keep attending the games. The fact is that David Stern has done nothing...nothing to help the situation up here. I realize that he works for the owners and he has one of his bosses wanting to move the team, but the fact is that for the NBA it is much better to have the team in a city that makes the NBA seem stronger, not bush league.

I haven't written much about technology recently, but based on a meeting I attended yesterday I started thinking about what it's like to work in Microsoft IT. I find that it is one of the most unique environments to work in for several reasons.

Advantages

1. We don't spend lots of time deciding on platforms and software packages to use. Obviously we are going to use Windows Servers and Microsoft technology everywhere that we can. I consider this a plus, because I have seen projects have to make major shifts in other places I've worked based on the current management's perception of certain hardware and software vendors.
2. We have sufficient resources to make projects happen. IT is a cost at most companies. Since there is no revenue generated by the IT Department there is always pressure to keep costs low in order to maximize revenue. Since the IT department here helps test "dogfood" the software we are actually contributing to making the products better and thus contributing to revenue.
3. IT has a direct impact on the features and changes that are made in our software. Since we use the products, often while they are still in Alpha or Beta testing, we get to provide useful feedback to the product groups on how we think certain features work or don't work.
4. One of my favorite items is that we have an incentive to do things right. Since we need the ability to go into our customers and help them with the implementation of our products it is important that we can use our own set-up and experiences as an example to our customers. I believe this is our greatest asset although we probably don't utilize it as much as we could. If we expect people to use our products we need to demonstrate how to use them in a "world class" way.

Disadvantages

1. I am sure it's apparent, but we have to use our own software. In 99% of cases this is fine of course as our products are very good and accomplish what we need. Of course there are cases where there are other products on the market that our better than what we currently have. In another IT shop one would just have to convince the management to use the better software, and provide business justification for the purchase, but here we need to use our products and provide feedback on missing/broken features.
2. Working in a software company can also be a challenge. When we work with teams there is often the mentality that they will just write the needed functionality themselves rather than take a dependency on another product or service. In other IT departments I have been in this isn't always an option, but here it seems easier to justify writing your own code.
3. It can also be difficult to be in the same company as the team who wrote the product. Mostly the relationships here are good, but I'm not sure that we always get the same amount of attention that a customer would when reporting a defect or requesting a product enhancement. This varies by team of course, but can be a challenge at times.

Overall though, I really enjoy my time here at Microsoft. There are many incredibly smart people and I get challenged each day. The culture was a bit of a shock when I started, but I am now getting much more sued to how we do things. I can also say that I feel very well treated as an employee. We get wonderful benefits of course, but also there are many small things that make me feel valued to the company. It is also great to work for a company that is involved in so many different areas as that gives me great options to direct my career into the areas I'm interested in.

My friend Harry (Devhawk) posted an interesting entry on his thoughts on the Washington Caucus and how the race seems to be shaking out. He says that we are free to write a comment telling him what an idiot he is if he insults our favorite candidate. I won't say he is an idiot because I consider Harry to be a very smart individual and enjoy the talks we have about politics since we are on opposite sides of the political spectrum. I also found his points to be very thought out and worthy of consideration. With that being said here are my thoughts on the race.

Republicans

I think that the Republicans have some serious problems heading into this presidential election cycle. Look, I voted for George W. Bush 2 times, but even I can recognize that the choices his administration has made have done no favors to the GOP. Honestly, I am one of the very conservative bunch that isn't sure that I can support John McCain. Unlike some, I don't believe McCain is a traitor to the party, but I find him to be too moderate for my tastes. Since I have discussed my faith (LDS) here on a few occasions I will also say that I did not and do not support Mitt Romney either. So at this point it looks like I will have to either:

1) Vote for McCain while holding my nose.

2) Vote for a third party knowing I am helping the left.

3) Vote for the Democrat because at least it will be a change from the Bush administration.

At this point I am leaning towards option 2, although I haven't ruled out option 3 either depending on who gets the Democratic nomination.

Democrats

One area I thought Harry neglected is the strife in the Democratic party with the delegate count between Hillary Clinton and Barak Obama being so close. At this point it doesn't seem that one candidate can land a knock-out blow on the other, although if Obama keeps winning he may accomplish that feat. It appears that the Democratic convention could be quite entertaining/contentious depending on what happens with the delegates from Florida and Michigan. I'll have to ask Harry his thoughts on this, but if things stay so close going into the convention, will their be significant anger from the opposition against the winner of the nomination (Clinton or Obama). While I admit as a Republican I would find that entertaining as it may be the only chance a Republican has of winning the presidency this year, I also wonder about any long-term effects to the Democratic party.

Conclusion

No matter what happens I think this election year will still have some fascinating twists and turns. I hope that no matter your political affiliation you study out the issues and the candidates and chose the one you fell will best represent you and this country. I've always felt that voting is not simply a right but is an obligation as a citizen, and our best real chance of getting our voices heard.

P.S. The Washington State GOP made a horrible blunder regarding their decision to stop counting votes during the caucus on Saturday. That was a reprehensible decision.

Basically the same disclaimer I wrote the other day when I discussed the death of Gordon B. Hinckley and his impact on me applies here. I am in no way attempting to push my religion on anyone reading this, just expressing my own personal religious views. If that offends you please don't read this post.

As expected on Monday, President Thomas S. Monson was announced as the 16th President of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. President Monson announced that his 2 counselors would be Henry B. Eyring and Dieter F. Uchtdorf. Both of President Monsons counselors are among the younger members of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, but both are very well respected and great servants of Jesus Christ.

      President Thomas S. Monson

        President Henry B. Eyring

      President Dieter F. Uchtdorf

I will be very interested in the upcoming months and years to see where this new presidency leads my church. President Hinckley was known for building many temples throughout the world. Below is a picture of the San Diego Temple which is my favorite.

President Hinckley also traveled widely and met with Latter-Day Saints throughout the world. He encouraged us to be more open and interact with members of other faiths. I assume that these things won't change.

I expect that what will change is how messages are delivered to the church. President Monson teaches through story telling, and I believe that much like the Savior giving parables we are expected to think for ourselves to get the message of what is being taught. President Monson will also have a specific message for members of the church. If I had to guess I expect he will concentrate on Christian service to others as he has been a great example of this during his life.

As this new leadership begins to serve I want to express my support for them and prayers for them and their families. I know that these men were called of God to serve the church at this time, and I hope that we will listen to and follow the counsel they give us. The new First Presidency are great leaders, but they are also great servants of the Lord, and I know they will tell us what we need to hear, not what we want to hear. I look forward to hearing from them often during the time they serve.

I am a huge fan of YouTube and am amazed at the quality of the videos that show up there. The other day I came across a series I thought was particuarlly well done so I decided to link to them.

The series is titled: Chad Vader - Day Shift Manager. Here is a link to all of the episodes.

Episode 1

Episode 2

Episode 3

Episode 4

Episode 5

Episode 6

Episode 7

Episode 8

You don't know the power of the dark side!!! :-)

I watched the Super Bowl on Sunday. Honestly I expected to turn it off at half time as I expected the New England Patriots to roll, and I had no interest in either team. Instead I ended up watching one of the most interesting Super Bowls of all time. I'm not sure I'm ready to claim it was the best as I have fond memories of the Bengals /49ers game back in 1989.

As the game ended I thought about how the fortunes of both teams might change going forward. Obviously the win was a tremendous one for the New York Giants, and will do a lot for the perception of Eli Manning to the New York fans, but it almost seemed like karma for the Patriots as well due to the cheating scandal from early in the year.

In any case it was a great game. Congratulations to the New York Giants on the championship, and enjoy it while you can since the Seahawks are taking the title next year. :-)