Dawn of a New Year

New Year’s Day — Now is the accepted time to make your regular annual good resolutions. Next week you can begin paving Hell with them as usual. –Mark Twain   (with thanks to Jean Anne)

Life is lived forward, but understood backward. –Soren Kierkegaard

 

Aloha kakou,

I hope you have all enjoyed the holiday season and that you are in good health and good spirits on this dawn of a New Year.


Dawn of a New Year

My friend John got up early and took this picture of the New Year’s sunrise in the Berkeley hills.

 

My thoughts on this past year and the upcoming one are not fully cohesive or coherent, but in the spirit of lists, here are some reflections that act as a kind of chronicle. Writing this is both an attempt to share this past year and make sense of it at the same time.

This last year has been a mixed bag of excitement, disappointment, achievement, reflection, effort, and wonder. This year I turned 40 years old, finished my PhD qualifying exams (finally), moved once in June (after once last November), took classes, taught classes, gained weight, lost weight, quit smoking, began smoking, quit smoking. In sum, it was a collection of constants, cycles, and changes.Dawn of a New Year

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p>I served the university and neighborhood communities in the role of Treasurer of the Board of Publications, and member of the Manoa Neighborhood Board. I resigned these positions in May and August, after terms of 1 year and 8 months, respectively. 

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p>I took the month of July and much of August as a time for sustained research, which was extremely productive, especially after purchasing a new computer at the end of June (necessitated by hardware failure). This allowed me to research the semantic web, advancements in social media (blogging, wikis, bookmarking). In addition, I began research in multi-user virtual environments in late August, beginning with looking into the Croquet toolkit, and making my way through ActiveWorlds, There, and Second Life (where my rez date is August 21, 2006). Second Life in particular, as well as investigation into a variety of research methodological approaches to collaborative learning phenomena, occupied my attention to a great degree from September through November.

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p>(On reflection, I realize that I really should do a reflection at 6 months, as the first 6 months of the year is simply not as vivid as the most recent six months.

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p>There are quite a few books I have read this past year (which are worth recommending), some of which were re-reads. These are heavy on the business, managerial, marketing, and branding side of things.Dawn of a New Year

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p>(This is not to mention the innumerable journal articles, popular press articles, blog and wiki entries, detritus and errata, and a fairly large number of technical and academic books. Also missing is the hundreds of short videos, few dozen movies, gigabytes of MP3 files, etc., etc.!)

Dawn of a New YearIn the midst of all this study (and poverty), I can say that I am by no means bored. I find this sort of thing to be extremely interesting, and carry that enthusiasm into the classroom. I find that my students are an excellent gauge of what is of value. If I cannot interest them in a certain phenomena or concept, on reflection I find that either I have not communicated or presented it effectively (because I myself have an insufficient grasp on the topic), or that it is a somewhat geeky and technical detail that is interesting me, but is not of intrinsic interest.

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p>On a sad note, a former boss of mine Mina Millett passed away in November from cancer at the age of 51. She had a profound impact on me, having hired me for three years each (six total) at two different companies, and providing me with amazing opportunities and wise guidance. It has been difficult to come to grips with her death, especially her suffering, and the enormous loss to her husband David.

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p>Dawn of a New YearI guess coming out of this past year, I can say that I know myself more. Not by any means perfectly, but I know better who I am, and Hawaii as definitely helped me to do that. What is to come for the next year? What sort of goals, what sort of challenges await? I will leave that for another post. For now the vision of the future has not resolved itself.

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p>I will leave you with a few items found today on the web:

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p>Dawn of a New Year

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From Father to Son, Last Words to Live By

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p>By DANA CANEDY

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p>Published: January 1, 2007

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p>He drew pictures of himself with angel wings. He left a set of his dog tags on a nightstand in my Manhattan apartment. He bought a tiny blue sweat suit for our baby to wear home from the hospital. Then he began to write what would become a 200-page journal for our son, in case he did not make it back from the desert in Iraq.Dawn of a New Year

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p>For months before my fiancé, First Sgt. Charles Monroe King, kissed my swollen stomach and said goodbye, he had been preparing for the beginning of the life we had created and for the end of his own. He boarded a plane in December 2005 with two missions, really — to lead his young soldiers in combat and to prepare our boy for a life without him. 

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p>…

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p>The journal will have to speak for Charles now. He was killed Oct. 14 when an improvised explosive device detonated near his armored vehicle in Baghdad. Charles, 48, had been assigned to the Army’s First Battalion, 67th Armored Regiment, F ou rt h Infantry Division, based in Fort Hood, Tex. He was a month from completing his tour of duty.

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p>continued … http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/01/us/01charles.html

Dawn of a New Year No to 2007!

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Published by Rob January 1st, 2007 in Uncategorized (at Hacker Friendly)

Dawn of a New YearLast night, crowds gathered at a rally in France to protest the new year.

“…the demonstrators in the western city of Nantes waved banners reading: “No to 2007″ and “Now is better!”

  The marchers called on governments and the UN to stop time’s “mad race” and declare a moratorium on the future.”

Dawn of a New Year

 

    Happy y2k7!

 

      With much aloha,
                                   Jeff




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January 1, 2007 • Posted in: Humor, Quotes

One Response to “Dawn of a New Year”

  1. Charrice - March 29, 2007

    I wanted to express my condolences regarding Mina. She hired me at Dolby a few years ago and I just adored her. I had no idea of her passing until today. I relocated back to SF and wanted to stop by and say hello to her. I am just shocked at the loss of such a wonderful person.

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