Woke. adj: chiefly US slang : aware of and actively attentive to important societal facts and issues (especially issues of racial and social justice)

– https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/woke

In the past year, the term “woke” has come to be an ugly term by some and seems to somehow signify something terrible. However, nothing could be further from the truth. While I personally do not like the term and I find it annoying, like many things happening today, I wanted to still finally publish a new post with my views on the general sentiment behind the word.

Those on the right like to throw around the word “woke” as an evil thing. That those on the left are trying to destroy some fantasty of how they see the world. However, being “woke”, as mentioned at the top in the definition from Merriam Webster, makes clear that being woke makes one aware of and attentive to societal facts and issues particularly around racial and social justice. This implies that one who is woke is also interested in social equality. How is that anything but a good thing?

Almost twenty years ago, before I finally accepted who I was as a gay man, I was the most privileged type of person – a straight white male. I may not have come from a wealthy family, but my parents made sure my brother and I were raised well and were well rounded individuals who were able to have lots of opportunities in this world. We knew very little inequalities growing up.

Once I came out as a gay man, and especially once I started to live a more authentic life, inequality started showing up in my life. This started with losing the ability to donate blood due to discriminatory policies. It continued by experiencing physical threats and slurs hurled at me when I was with my now husband walking together in areas. It also happened with our long struggle towards finally getting married in 2013 after marriage equality was achieved at the federal level in the United States.

While I do still retain some of my previous privilege as a white male, losing the straight part, which by the way is not a choice, allowed me to see the world from a different perspective. That perspective was further expanded by having the opportunity to work with many different people of many different cultures at Purdue University, and even moreso when I moved to the Seattle, WA, USA area in 2018. So many more cultures were represented in the greater Seattle area allowing me to learn from many others about their struggles – what they’ve gone through in their background to get to the place in the life that they’re in now.

I also gained a much greater appreciation of the various ways that racial and societal issues of the past have affected some in the US even generations later. This is evidenced by much higher levels of discrimination against people of color (POC) and higher rates of scrutiny from law enforcement to these groups because of tremendous amounts of racism in the past that have ingrained huge stereotypes and such into the culture. Who can forget what happened to George Floyd and others like him, yet too many people who are not POC get away with incredible things with barely a slap on the wrist.

This doesn’t even touch on the incredibly difficult immigration issues affecting so many people in the US today. Many families are being ripped apart cruely, people who have lived here almost their entire life and who have no ties to the country that they’re “from” are being forced back to potentially life-threatening situations, and even those who I work with have to make difficult decisions about if they’re even able to go back to their native country to visit family or if they’d be able to get back into the US due to even more random and bizarre immigration process changes.

This also doesn’t touch on the difficulties faced by our transgender community who are such a small minority yet are tremendously disproportionately targeted for discrimination.

I will also never understand how those who they themselves have been the subject of discrimination are injustices then subject others to the same treatment. There are countless instances of this happening in the US alone recently.

However, I digress.

What I have gained through my wonderful interactions with so many different people, cultures, and having experienced discrimination myself, is the need to have much higher empathy for what others are going through. The vast majority of people are simply trying to live their lives, love who they love, and just be in this world. Because they want to have the same rights as what the most privileged have in this country – the straight white person – they’re seen by some as trying to take away those rights or denigrate them in some way. This couldn’t be further from the truth.

Being aware of what others are going through, having even the most basic empathy towards others and striving towards a more equal society where all can enjoy the same rights and privileges as everyone else. Anything else is cruel and wrong.

This apparently makes me woke. I think that’s a great thing.

So, woke is dope.

Tonight I happened to click back into my ChatGPT tab and thought of a prompt. The response provided was quite sweet and I felt worthy of posting on this infrequently-updated site. It is as follows.

Write a short story about a six year old girl named Kaili who travels to China to cuddle with a panda.

Kaili had always dreamt of cuddling with a panda, ever since she saw a picture of one in a book. So when her parents surprised her with a trip to China, she couldn't contain her excitement.

As soon as they landed in Beijing, Kaili begged her parents to take her to see a panda. They went to the Chengdu Panda Base, where Kaili saw pandas for the first time. They were even cuter in real life than she had imagined!

But Kaili didn't want to just see the pandas; she wanted to cuddle with one. Her parents told her it was impossible, but Kaili was determined. She spent hours watching the pandas, trying to figure out which one would be the perfect cuddle buddy.

One day, as Kaili was eating bamboo shoots with the pandas, she noticed that one of them seemed to be paying extra attention to her. It was a young panda, with a mischievous glint in its eye.

Kaili approached the panda tentatively, holding out her hand. To her surprise, the panda nuzzled her hand, then leaned its head against her shoulder. Kaili's heart swelled with joy as she realized she had found her cuddle buddy.

For the next few days, Kaili spent all her time with the panda, who she named Mei Mei. They played together, ate together, and cuddled together. Kaili felt like Mei Mei was her best friend in the world.

Eventually, it was time for Kaili to go back home. She said goodbye to Mei Mei with tears in her eyes, promising to come back and visit her someday.

Years later, when Kaili was all grown up, she returned to China to visit Mei Mei. Even though Mei Mei was now a fully-grown panda, she recognized Kaili immediately, and they cuddled like they had never been apart. For Kaili, it was a dream come true, and she knew that Mei Mei would always be her friend, no matter where life took her.

However, today I would like to come back and start talking about home automation. In the past four years, I have gotten deeper into home automation, specifically with Home Assistant. I’ll post more later on how I’m now running the Docker container for HA, but today I’d like to talk about one specific use-case I recently solved.

My ISP is Comcast, which unfortunately still believes in data caps – specifically 1.2Tb of usage per month across all of their consumer plans. They provide access to your “usage” via their app or website, but provide no data on how quickly it is being used and the data can be delayed by up to 24 hours. I wanted something better and found a way to vastly improve my tracking in real-time.

Below are three graphs showing hourly, daily, and monthly traffic usage for my home. Note: since I just set this up on April 9, there is limited “daily” and “monthly” data in the graphs.

To accomplish these graphs, I am leveraging SNMP traps on my router which is then being captured by HA and brought into template sensors and utility_meter tracking sensors for time-period accumulation. I am then able to display this data in a variety of ways as well as wrap notification automations around it for alerting if certain thresholds are exceeded.

To begin, let’s capture the WAN In/Out data and accumulate it. I use high-quality networking equipment from Ubiquiti – specifically an EdgeRouter Lite 3 (ERL3), several Unifi Access Points, and their controller software to manage the APs. For this write-up, we are only focusing on the ERL3. In the setup section of the ERL3 UI, enable SNMP and configure the Community name and other relevant details.

Next, setup several new sensors in HA. These will need to be manually added in your configuration.yaml and are all defined as below. Remember that if you already have a sensor and utility_meter section, just add the sensors and utility meters and don’t create another new section or your other sensors and utility meters will be ignored by HA.

sensor:
  - platform: snmp
    name: wan_in
    baseoid: 1.3.6.1.2.1.2.2.1.10.2
    host: !secret erl3_hostname
    version: !secret erl3_snmp_version
    community: !secret erl3_community
    accept_errors: true
    scan_interval: 10
  - platform: snmp
    name: wan_out
    baseoid: 1.3.6.1.2.1.2.2.1.16.2
    host: !secret erl3_hostname
    version: !secret erl3_snmp_version
    community: !secret erl3_community
    accept_errors: true
    scan_interval: 10
  - platform: derivative
    name: wan_in_der
    source: sensor.wan_in
    unit_time: s
    unit: B
  - platform: derivative
    name: wan_out_der
    source: sensor.wan_out
    unit_time: s
    unit: B
  - platform: template
    sensors:
      wan_in_mbps:
        value_template: "{{ [((states('sensor.wan_in_der')|float*8)/1000000)|round(2),0]|max }}"
        unit_of_measurement: 'Mbps'
        friendly_name: "WAN In"
      wan_out_mbps:
        value_template: "{{ [((states('sensor.wan_out_der')|float*8)/1000000)|round(2),0]|max }}"
        unit_of_measurement: 'Mbps'
        friendly_name: "WAN Out"
      wan_total_mbps:
        value_template: "{{ states('sensor.wan_in_mbps')|float + states('sensor.wan_out_mbps')|float }}"
        unit_of_measurement: 'Mb'
        friendly_name: "WAN Total"

utility_meter:
  internet_usage_in:
    source: sensor.wan_in
    name: 'WAN IN Usage'
  internet_usage_monthly:
    source: sensor.wan_total_mbps
    name: Monthly WAN Usage
    cycle: monthly
  internet_usage_daily:
    source: sensor.wan_total_mbps
    name: Daily WAN Usage
    cycle: daily
  internet_usage_hourly:
    source: sensor.wan_total_mbps
    name: Hourly WAN Usage
    cycle: hourly

Let’s break these down.

First, we defined SNMP sensors for the WAN In and WAN Out traps from the ERL3. The exact entity IDs you will need to utilize will vary highly. I used a tool on the Mac to navigate around the MIB for my ERL3, but it was really trial and error for me. I’m not an expert in how SNMP works and this is my first introduction into that world.

Next, we need to do some math on the values coming in. I leveraged examples from this page and modified them to match my setup. This ensures that the data we use are cleaned up.

Finally, we need utility_meter sensors to accumulate the data. I have setup several including three with cycles on them so that the data will reset each hour/day/month. Without a cycle setting, there’s no way to accumulate data into discrete time periods and you’re only seeing real-time data that will build up over time and never reset. This is fine if you want to use a history card, but not very useful for more robust analytics and automations. Restart HA and your new config changes will be picked up and data will start to accumulate.

Now that we have the data, let’s circle back to our graphs. I am utilizing the mini-graph-card installed through HACS. This guide will not go into how to install that, but you can find it on the HACS store. Be sure to restart HA after the install.

Below is the YAML I am using for the cards displayed above.

type: vertical-stack
cards:
  - type: custom:mini-graph-card
    entities:
      - entity: sensor.hourly_wan_usage
        name: Hourly WAN
    hour24: true
    hours_to_show: 24
    name: Hourly WAN Usage
    points_per_hour: 1
    show:
      extrema: true
  - type: custom:mini-graph-card
    entities:
      - sensor.daily_wan_usage
    name: Daily WAN Usage
    hours_to_show: 744
    aggregate_func: max
    group_by: date
    show:
      extrema: true
  - type: custom:mini-graph-card
    entities:
      - sensor.monthly_wan_usage
    name: Monthly WAN Usage
    hours_to_show: 8760
    aggregate_func: max
    group_by: date
    show:
      extrema: true

Next, let’s create some automations! I wanted to be notified if my daily usage is above 20 GB and if my monthly usage exceeds 600GB and 900GB thresholds. This would be sufficient to alert me to high daily usage as well as high monthly usage both before Comcast would notify me and also as I am nearing my cap for the month. Here’s an example of an automation which alerts me to high daily usage.

alias: Internet usage - high daily
description: ''
trigger:
  - platform: numeric_state
    entity_id: sensor.daily_wan_usage
    above: '20000'
condition: []
action:
  - service: notify.notify
    data:
      message: Internet usage for the day has exceeded 20GB!
      title: Home Assistant
mode: single

Finally, let’s kick things up a bit more. How about we add in an Apple Watch complication and a custom push notification?!

I have an Apple Watch Series 7 and wanted to tightly integrate it into my Home Assistant setup in a useful-yet-geeky way. To do so, I created a custom Complication as shown below.

The top left corner is setup to show me my electric usage for the day along with my monthly Internet usage at home along with a guage that will fill as I get closer to my monthly Internet cap. In order to create the displayed Complication, add a Graphic Corner complication with a Template of Gauge Text. The code to display all of this data is as follows.

#Leading section:
{% if states('sensor.monthly_wan_usage')|int < 1000 %} {{ states('sensor.monthly_wan_usage')|int }}M{% elif states('sensor.monthly_wan_usage')|int < 1000000 %}{{ "%.2f"|format(states('sensor.monthly_wan_usage')|float / 1000) }}G{% else %}{{ "%.3f"|format(states('sensor.monthly_wan_usage')|float / 1000000)}}T{% endif %}

#Outer section:
⚡{{ "%.2f"|format(states('sensor.grid_energy_consumed_daily')|float)}}

#Trailing section: (blank)

#Gauge section:
{{ states('sensor.monthly_wan_usage')|float / 1200000}}

For the final component, I have custom actions setup in my Home Assistant Companion app which display on the Watch. I have one specifically that will send me a push notification “report” on the status of my home, but only if it’s triggered from my Watch. It shows door sensors, motion sensors, electric/internet usage, as well as locations of me and my husband. Below are screenshots of that along with code for the “report”.

alias: Action - Send Keith a status report
description: Send Keith a status report via push notification
trigger:
  - platform: event
    event_type: ios.action_fired
    event_data:
      actionName: Send Keith Status Report
condition: []
action:
  - service: notify.mobile_app_keith_iphone
    data:
      title: Home Assistant
      message: >
        🚪 F:{% if is_state('binary_sensor.front_door_2','on') %}🙋{% endif %}{%
        if is_state('binary_sensor.front_door_3', 'off') %}✔{% else %}❗{% endif
        %} P:{% if is_state('binary_sensor.patio_door_2','on') %}🙋{% endif %}{%
        if is_state('binary_sensor.patio_door_3','off') %}✔{% else %}❗{% endif
        %} O:{% if is_state('binary_sensor.office_door_2','on') %}🙋{% endif
        %}{% if is_state('binary_sensor.office_door_3','off') %}✔{% else %}❗{%
        endif %} B:{% if is_state('binary_sensor.master_bedroom_door_2','on')
        %}🙋{% endif%}{% if
        is_state('binary_sensor.master_bedroom_door_3','off') %}✔{% else %}❗{%
        endif %}

        ⚡ {{ states('sensor.emu2') }}kWh / {{ state_attr('sensor.emu2',
        'Delivered kWh') }}

        👨🏼‍💻 {% if states('sensor.monthly_wan_usage')|int < 1024 %} {{
        states('sensor.monthly_wan_usage')|int }}Mb{% else %}{{
        "%.2f"|format(states('sensor.monthly_wan_usage')|float / 1024) }}Gb{%
        endif %}

        Keith: {{ states('sensor.keith_iphone_geocode') }}

        Zhengbin: {{ states('sensor.zhengbin_iphone_geocode') }}
mode: single

In conclusion, I am still finding more ways I can extend the configuration created above, but it’s already been very powerful to gain new insights into our Internet usage. I look forward to finding new items I can integrate in similar ways!

We’ve moved to Washington state and I’ve changed jobs twice – moving from Purdue to Amazon Web Services and then over to Oracle where I am very happy!

Our daughter has grown considerably and is now our “pink princess” as she likes to say! More about her on her site – kailixu.com.

I recently switched hosting providers and am rebooting this site as well. When I first started keithmcd.com in 2004, I was hosted with IXWebHosting. A few years ago they transferred all customer data to site5.com. It worked OK, but I’m now very happily hosted by NameCheap.com – the same company which I have transferred all my domains to.

Along with the new hosting provider comes a new desire to write more technical content for this site. Coming up soon will be a post about my home automation and related Docker setup. Other articles are in the works as well!

Until then…

One option is to purchase a small device from Ubiquiti called a Cloud Key that has the management software pre-loaded. Another option is to install the management software on a Mac, PC, or Linux machine. However, that requires your personal computer to be on anytime you could want to use the software and is a lot of overhead.

I opted to go with a third option – using an old (generation 1) Raspberry Pi model B from 2011 and run the management software from that. I had one just sitting in my desk drawer unused, so it was a perfect opportunity!

To build my UnifiPi Controller (as I am calling it), I took information from two guides and merged them together as described below. This made for a very responsive dedicated device that works quite well!

1. Begin by downloading and installing the latest Raspbian image from the Raspberry Pi website. This is outside of the scope of this article, but it is fairly trivial to do.
2. Setup the Raspberry Pi using the raspi-config script. I highly recommend setting the proper keyboard layout for your region first, reboot, then change your passwords and configure the rest of the device defaults. I did the keyboard last and had issues logging in over ssh since the special characters on the default UK keyboard are in a different order than on a US keyboard layout!
   1. TIP: set the memory split to 16MB for the GPU. We’re using this in a headless environment, so wasting memory on the GPU is just going to hurt you.
3. Fully update the Pi
   sudo aptitude update; sudo aptitude upgrade
4. reboot
5. Next fully update the firmware for your Pi
   sudo aptitude install rpi-update; sudo rpi-update
6. reboot
7. Set ssh to run on boot
   systemctl enable ssh
systemctl start ssh
8. Install and configure the Unifi software
   1. Add the repository
      echo 'deb http://www.ubnt.com/downloads/unifi/debian unifi5 ubiquiti' | sudo tee -a /etc/apt/sources.list.d/ubnt.list > /dev/null
sudo apt-key adv --keyserver keyserver.ubuntu.com --recv C0A52C50
sudo aptitude update
   2. Install the software
      sudo aptitude install unifi
   3. Disable the default MongoDB or you’ll have two databases running wasting resources!
      echo 'ENABLE_MONGODB=no' | sudo tee -a /etc/mongodb.conf > /dev/null
   4. Update the Snappy Java Library as Unifi’s version is quite old
      cd /usr/lib/unifi/lib
sudo mv snappy-java-1.0.5.jar snappy-java-1.0.5.jar.old
sudo wget http://central.maven.org/maven2/org/xerial/snappy/snappy-java/1.1.2.6/snappy-java-1.1.2.6.jar
sudo ln -s snappy-java-1.1.2.6.jar snappy-java-1.0.5.jar
   5. Remove the Unifi Cloud Library (ONLY NEEDED FOR ARMv6 devices – basically anything prior to the 3rd generation Pi)
      sudo rm /usr/lib/unifi/lib/native/Linux/armhf/libubnt_webrtc_jni.so
   6. Switch to the official Java client instead of OpenJDK. OpenJDK is horrible and resource intensive
      sudo aptitude install oracle-java8-jdk
sudo update-alternatives --config java
#Select Java8 - was item 2 for me
java -showversion (to confirm it's set properly)
9. reboot

You can now access the Raspberry Pi via the IP address pulled from DNS:
https://192.168.1.100:8443
ssh pi@192.168.1.100

Using the web interface running on port 8443 you can also configure any new Unifi APs.  You can also connect the Unifi iPhone app to manage your AP from your mobile device.  However, as I do not have a Unifi Secure Gateway, I am unable to get WAN/LAN stats.  But, I can get those separately through the EdgeRouter web UI.

Notes:

• I decided to not setup a static IP address as I will use functions in my EdgeRouter Lite to set a static IP via MAC address.
• I currently only have one Unifi AP but can expand to more as needed. However, given the size of my house and the location I was able to place the AP, that is unlikely to be needed.

Sources:
http://www.lowefamily.com.au/2016/06/02/installing-ubiquiti-unifi-controller-5-on-raspberry-pi/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aZYGiZI48oc
https://www.raspberrypi.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=81&t=101543

Today we are going to take a look at how to test various Linux authentication methods. As an example, let’s assume we have an MTA and which validates users against a LDAP database. We are unable to authenticate to the MTA but we also are unsure where the process is breaking down.

Typically, in this setup, the MTA talks to Cyrus SASL. SASL then communicates to PAM. The relevant PAM module then talks to LDAP.  Here we have four layers to test. Let’s test each starting from the bottom.

LDAP

As all of our users are stored in a LDAP database with proper credentials, we should have no issues authenticating. If errors here are encountered, then there are problems with our ldap.conf file, firewall issues, or possibly even a configuration error on the LDAP server itself. However, it’s always best to start by looking for issues with the local client.

To test LDAP, we need to know what our base DN is, what the LDAP uri is, and some authentication credentials to test with. The following command will perform the required test.


ldapwhoami -vvv -h some.ldap.host.com -p 389 -D uid=keith,ou=ldapou,dc=somewhere,dc=com -x -Z -W
ldap_initialize( ldap://some.ldap.host.com:389 )
Enter LDAP Password:
dn:id=82471855,ou=ldapou,dc=somehwere,dc=com
Result: Success (0)


As we can see, we were returned a success, so this layer is fine. A note that the -Z flag tells the ldap utility to use a TLS connection to the remote server. This is required in most cases for authentication requests or just for improved LDAP service security.

PAM

The next step is to test PAM. PAM stands for Pluggable Authentication Modules and lets a system administrator decide how a specific system service will authenticate users. This idea lets the service or application not worry about the details of authentication but rather just know whether an authentication attempt was successful or not. Because of the modular nature, this also lets the administrator swap out one authentication method for another at almost anytime.

In this case, however, we will be using PAM against an LDAP database.  As I do not know low-level programming, and I was unable to find a way to test a specific PAM module directly, I took to Google and found pamtester.  One note is that I had to install pam-devel and gcc-c++ for the binary to build properly.  Once built, the small utility will allow testing of a specific PAM module very easily from the command line.


pamtester smtp keith authenticate
Password:
pamtester: successfully authenticated


As we can see, we can authenticate using the PAM smtp module (typically /etc/pam.d/smtp).  This ensures that PAM is able to communicate over ldap to our authentication source.  If any errors are displayed, you will need to debug from there.  Perhaps you do not have enough packages installed, or something is configured incorrectly.

Cyrus SASL

Next up is to test SASL.  SASL stands for Simple Authentication and Security Layer and lets authentication act in a more modular method.  Here, a configuration file for our MTA tells SASL which authentication methods to support.  In this case we will support both plain and login.  plain is a password authentication method.  While this can be insecure, our MTA will only allow the transmission of login data to be sent over a TLS encrypted channel.  login basically just checks against system logins available and is a backup but never used if plain is setup properly.

To test the SASL configuration, use the built-in testsaslauthd command.  It should be included with your sasl package.


testsaslauthd -u keith -s smtp -p CleartextPassword
0: OK "Success."


Great – our test succeeded!  If any errors are shown instead, you may have issues either with your sasl configuration in general, or possibly even with PAM again.  The -s smtp tells SASL to essentially use the smtp PAM module.  One thing you can do to debug is to enable debug mode in saslauthd.  I did this by editing /etc/sysconfig/saslauthd and adding the -d flag after -l.  Restart the service then it should dump debug output to the screen.  Revert the change after you’d fixed issues found.

Also, because you must type your password on the command line, be sure to go back in your history, backspace through the password, then press the down arrow.  That will modify your bash history to remove the password from visibility.

SMTP

Finally, let’s test your MTA.  This will make sure that everything is tied together fully – from MTA, to SASL, to PAM, then finally to LDAP.  Since we’re going to be sending login credentials, we’ll test over port 587 using TLS.


openssl s_client -connect mta.hostname.somewhere.com:587 -starttls smtp
ehlo localhost
AUTH PLAIN [base64 encoded user/pass goes here]
235 2.0.0 OK Authenticated


The above test succeeded.  This means we are able to authenticate successfully through all four layers.  If encountering errors above, ensure that your SASL path is configured correctly.  This means that if you’re running a 64bit distribution, you have your MTA built against /usr/lib64/sasl2/ and you have the appropriate configuration in that directory as well.  For sendmail, that would be a properly setup Sendmail.conf file.

Conclusion

I hope to post these types of things more regularly as they help me to document items I have worked on, as well as provide assistance for others who may have similar issues in the future.  Additionally, this type of post, while not for everyone, is interesting to me and is fun to write!

Looking forward to enjoying this and other local events in the future!

Last week, the hair straightener I bought arrived from Amazon.

Today, I started off with hair that looked like this.

I didn’t use any product today and just let my hair air dry. After lunch I went upstairs and bravely tried to do my first solo hair straightening session!

I think the results are pretty good!

I’ve got some more learning to develop technique and speed, but I think it’s a solid first go!

http://terimcd.com/2015/06/10/the-evidence-is-stacking-up/

My new office is pretty nice, but the new office mates sure are lazy! Sparky and Bob sure do like to lounge around a lot!

A short time-lapse video of my 10 minute drive to work.

Taken with an iPhone 6 mounted to my windshield at 8 AM Monday, January 5, 2015.

A short video from 2012 starting most of the way through showing John Cleese, from Monty Python, talking about stupidity.

During that time, I’ve gotten to know a great many people across the University and have expanded my knowledge far beyond what I had dreamt when I first joined Purdue.

On June 30, 2008, I began working for the Physics department as a Desktop Support Specialist.  I helped the faculty, staff, and students with their UNIX/Mac systems – fixing issues and improving their experience wherever I could.  I also helped out with the server-side environment when possible, as well as greatly enhancing the user-facing technical documentation.

On October 17, 2011, I began a new chapter in my time at Purdue as a Messaging Systems Administrator.  I joined a great team and quickly gained much technical knowledge along with a great deal more responsibility.  My new position was managing systems used by the entire University.  However, the biggest change was in being introduced to a world of greater collaboration across all departments and units of Purdue.  Ensuring superior communication during both good and unfortunate events has been a skill I’ve been able to hone the past three years.

I look forward to many more years to come at Purdue University and seeing my career and skills continue to advance!

This year, I’ve made it my goal to finish the entire fence before the year ends. I’ve finally completed the first phase by completing the inside of the fence. It has taken about almost 14 gallons of stain, but the results look great!

Next up: the entire outside while trying to use less stain if at all possible!

In the past year, I’ve bought a house with Justin, gotten married, assisted Justin in obtaining his permanent residency and we’ve celebrated being together for 6.5 years.

Coming up are even more advancement in my career, we will be initiating surrogacy, and I have another ten years until I hit the big 4-0!

Google helped me to celebrate yesterday with the image above.  We had a low-key evening last night with Justin studying after a nice dinner while I painted even more of our fence.  Mom and Dad came down for the weekend as well and we had a nice time together.  Tonight, Justin and I went to HuHot, where the Grill Warriors treated me to a Happy Birthday and a huge oil fire on the grill for my “birthday candles”!  He had to do it a second time because I didn’t make a wish on the first fireball!

As many are aware, Chick-Fil-A, the company, is led by a bigot – Dan Cathy.

Regardless of the views of Dan, my husband and I enjoy eating at Chick-Fil-A when we do go.  We wouldn’t recommend their new grilled chicken as the classic tends to taste better, but I won’t stop eating there.

Plus, the peach shake is back!  Come on, who can resist a shake made with real, delicious, pieces of peach in it!?

Today, a tragedy occurred on campus.  Andrew Boldt, a senior in ECE and TA for ECE 362 was shot and killed by fellow TA Cody Cousins.  The shooting is said to be targeted as no-one else was involved and Cody went outside and waited to be taken into custody.

While completely senseless, the Purdue community has come together to support each other and the family and friends of Andrew.  My thoughts go out to his family during this difficult time.

Myself, I was in class in KNOY which is the next building over from EE where the shooting happened.

Photo source: @MissHabig on twitter

I am a part-time graduate student at Purdue University while also working full-time for the University.  This means that while maintaining a full 40+ hour work-week, I also have two classes which will place considerable time constraints on my calendar as the semester progresses.

Despite this, I have started working out drastically more than ever before.  Since I have started PowerHour, I have yet to miss a single session.  This is also a five-day-a-week commitment.

In addition, Justin and I do still enjoy a life with our doggy, Sparky.  I visit with family from afar when possible as well.

A full schedule can be very stressful and tiring, but the rewards can be large as well.  In my case, this hard work will pay off.  I will end up with a Master degree and a much fitter body.  I’ll be able to live an even better life with Justin, Sparky and our future family.

Photo Credit: nicksarebi via Compfight cc

This morning at 6AM I went to my fourth PowerHour workout session. This is a one-hour workout that is pretty much non-stop and really pushes you. Cindy Cox, the instructor, makes sure to push you while also making sure your form is correct while providing constant encouragement.

Due to some pretty severe weather this week in the area, the schedule for the past week follows:
Saturday 8AM
Wednesday 6AM
Thursday 7:10PM
Friday 6AM

I am pretty sore after and am quickly finding out how weak my core is. My arms and abs are definitely not able to support my body weight yet but with enough work I will get there.

As Cindy says, you’re not in competition with anyone but yourself. And I’ll try my best to do better than the me from yesterday!

Justin shared some very nice memories with me of times with her. This has inspired me to write a bit about my Great Grandma and Grandpa Cummins.

Great Grandma lived in LaPorte, Indiana and passed a few years after her husband. I vividly remember the entire family going to her house each Halloween and going through the neighborhood for candy. I remember Great Grandpa Cummins and all the amazing things he built in his little shop. I have a cradle he made that Corey and I both were in as babies. I remember burning a winter coat on a heater in his shop as well.

I remember visiting them both often as a kid. They had a large beautiful grandfather clock and a massive stuffed animal that was a dog next to the clock.

I was relatively young when they passed but I thought I’d share a few memories I had.

Happy New Year!  2013 was a productive year for Justin and I so let’s look back!

• January – Justin’s 28th Birthday
• January – Sparky’s 3rd Birthday
• January – St. Louis Vacation
• March – Justin started work at his new job
• March – We closed on the purchase of our first house
• June – Keith’s 29th Birthday
• August – Denver Vacation
• October – Justin and I got married in Davenport, Iowa!
• October – We celebrated our wedding with family and friends while also celebrating our 6th year together as a couple
• December – First Christmas in our new house and first year actually having a Christmas tree setup

Here’s to a prosperous and adventure-filled 2014!

Photo Credit: Jon Glittenberg via Compfight cc

This past weekend, we became the new home for a beautiful vintage piano. A coworker of Justin’s is moving to a new opportunity and we were able to provide a great home for this beautiful piece.

The piano, a Wurlitzer 591, looks to have been produced in the 1940’s. It is a Wurlitzer spinet piano. While not very tall (around 4′), it is very heavy and difficult even for two people to move.

We have already started to enjoy playing it and look forward to truly learning to play. I look forward to cherishing this beautiful piano for many years to come!

This post is quite delayed! On October 5, 2013, a very amazing and happy event happened. I married the man of my life, Zhengbin Xu! We traveled to Davenport, Iowa and were joined by Mom, Dad, Corey, Danielle, Zach, Aaron, and Nathan. We were married in a short ceremony right on the bank of the Mississippi River by Magistrate Carrie Coyle. Afterward, we all had a nice lunch and had photos taken by Danielle at several beautiful locations around Davenport.

Fantastic meeting him and although I’m not a scientist, it was still inspring.

They go by several names including Magic Lillies, Naked Ladies among others, but these are one of several bunches that are now in full bloom. Today, during a nice rain I decided to try and get a photo to capture their look. Enjoy and a big thanks to the previous owners of our house for the great landscaping work!

Quite the helper!!

Last week I put it by the windows on the back side of the house and let it have full afternoon sun. That has made a dramatic difference as the following pic shows. I have to keep rotating the plant so it grows evenly, but it’s thriving quite well now!

These are Price Pfister Treviso 4″ center set faucets. They are quite an improvement of the ones which came with the house (pictured below).

More upgrades coming soon!