Mikael Fernstrom

>Thursday evening, she told me that she wasn’t comfortable and that her lower abdomen felt sore. Then her temperature increased. Friday morning, we called in to our GP and then to the Regional Hospital. By 5 p.m. she was on IV antibiotics and by 6 back in the ward. What’s next?

>The last couple of days have been beautiful but IMHO too warm. The other evening we stayed in the garden until around 9 p.m. – in shorts and T-shirts. Unfortunately the temperature in the labs at UL is unbearable and I wonder what it might do to our experimental results. We’re talking about people testing a new human-computer interface and humans tend to feel uncomfortable when the temp hits 30 C and it’s really humid.

It’s been a good day, though. With the assistance of Mark Marshall we got Larry de Cleir’s latest song recorded and then Terence’s thesis survived Liam’s final review, so it’s a great day after all. What remains today (or rather tonight) is to finish reading Bruce’s thesis and hopefully spend some time on analysing preliminary results from our experiments with soft-buttons and try to write it up before Friday.

>A very good friend died today, or rather yesterday, John Hunt. I had the opportunity to get to know John through the Hunt Museum, or vice versa. When we (Mona and I) had moved to Limerick, Ireland, in 1991, we wanted to understand the country and its people, so I signed up for a course in Irish Archaeology. After completing two years of night classes, I found and advertisement in Limerick Leader that the Hunt Museum (which we had visited, at UL, during our first pre-immigration visit to Ireland in the spring 1991) was looking for Docents guides. I applied and was accepted into the program. This is also how I got to know Mairead Dunlevy – the most amazing, passionate and learned curator any museum on Earth could have. Every now and then, John was around, talking about the collection, art, archaeology, or, just having a pint and a chat. I guess it was John who enabled me to attempt experimental archaeology in Craggaunowen as well. I think he really liked the methods involved, and also that we allowed the public to be involved in our exploration of pre-historic methods.

Last time I had a good chat and a pint with John was at the opening of an exhibition in Castlebar where he had asked me do to the honours. Last summer, leading up to the Living Exhibition in the Hunt Museum, I missed the occasion when John was around, but I think and hope he liked what we were doing.

John!

You will have a very special place in my heart and mind forever. I already miss you. Not that we met that regularly, but when we met I felt we were on the same planet, wavelength and fellow human beings. I hope I will get the time to sit and contemplate issues we did discuss and never resolved. I will enjoy it and I’ll try to anticipate your responses. One day we might meet again, I hope.

>I hate repeat exams. Not as a student but as lecturer. Apperently one (1) student last term didn’t make it and therefore I had to write a completly new exam paper. This is silly. To write an exam paper, I probably have to read and think more than any of the students ever did during the course. It wouldn’t surpise me if the bugger doesn’t show up, hence my effort will be totally waisted. OTH, I’ll have some good questions for next year in store 😉

>Finally, fixed my callback bugs, redefined my filter coefficients and – yes, it works. It’s amazing what a good night’s sleep can do. Now the code ticks, tacks and tocks, and makes various noises that should map quite well to the Tactex device.

>I’ve had a good day. I found a bug in my sound model code – fixed. Then I decided to change my filter model as I wasn’t happy with the way it sounded.

ZAP!

As the filter (and the rest of the synthesis) runs in a callback controlled by the audio device driver, the debugger just refuses to give me more info. Forget printf’s as well.

Apart from this, I also added a test tone, just to verify that the main code is working OK. That worked .

I’m currrently trying to decide if I should stay hacking and hope to make it for an 11 o’clock meeting tomorrow morning (red-eye syndrome), or go to bed, try to sleep and still show up in a mess after dreaming of hex dumps.

I’ll print the code on paper tomorrow and use the olde bio-debugger (=brain)…

>So, UL’s ITD has yet again managed to shut down our email systems and proper network access. The university went off-line Saturday morning for network maintenance and came back on-line late in the afternoon. After this latest maintenance, the email servers cannot be used for sending email and appears to have great difficulties receiving email from the outside world. Perhaps this the ultimate fix for all the spam we’ve been getting 😉 Just screw up the whole system. Unfortunately this has the side effect that we can’t use the system for real communication.

By the way, it’s almost the same with the new voice mail system they installed. They have now upgraded it so that the usability is now at an all time low. What used to take 2 button presses now requires 3, and what number is “delete” at one level is something else at another level in the incomprehensible hierarchy of voice menus. The system now has a web interface as well that is weakly integrated by the handset control dialogue, hence it’s now possible to totally confuse your setting between handset and web. And, it cannot be accessed from outside campus.

To err is human, to totally screw up, use a computer – or even worse, ask ITD to fix it.

>This evening we went to Paddy Guerin’s pub in Castleconnell. It was long overdue. Liam, Bill (Liam’s father), Annette, Thomas, Mona and yours truly. We had a wonderful evening, full of conversation and interaction, and of course a drop of Guinness or two to oil our thoughts. I can definitely say that I’ve missed Paddy and Mary and their absolutely outstanding pub. It’s the best!

>For several months I’ve been fascinated by the sound works of the Garrison Keiler show on RTE radio, especially his sound effects guy, Tom Keith. Eventually I Googled him and found a number of interesting links. This resulted in a serious hit on Amazon, 8 books on sound effects and sound design that I had missed in my previous research. At the moment, I’m reading and reading – going YES YES YES! This exactly the material I need to finish my PhD 😉

>It’s been a beautiful Sunday in Limerick. Sunshine, blue skies (most of the time ;-).

I went for a walk down to the river Shannon with Charlie. On our way down, I told him to find a stick so that we have something to throw (and fetch) in the river.

Well, I guess dogs are like their owners. It’s all about how you define “a stick”. Today he found a piece of a fence, or whatever it is.

Eventually we got down to the river and we found a piece of wood that was slightly easier to throw.

We also walked down to the old pipe bridge, where the river Mulkear meets the Shannon.

It’s a real pity that the bridge isn’t done up and in working order. Just imagine what a great walk, or bicycle route, this would be – all the way from Lisnagry to UL and all the way to the city.

Also, spotted some nice looking and pleasant scented orchids.