Category Archives: Home & Family

February 20, 2014 · 2:36 pm

Eleanor Dickinson’s 83rd Birthday & Art Show

Peter and Julie by Eleanor Dickinson 2013

My mother Eleanor Dickinson celebrated her 83rd birthday while I was with the TechWomen delegation to Rwanda earlier this month. While I was gone, she attended the College Art Association annual conference in Chicago. Now that we are both back home in San Jose, California, I delivered her birthday presents today and enjoyed seeing the “Sketch Book Drawings” exhibit of 64 small pictures that the Atria Willow Glen senior community put up. The images are of residents, staff, and visitors – most are in pencil but a few are in ink or watercolor. I am proud of my mother having two current shows at the age of 83! Her “Old Lovers” exhibit at the Peninsula Museum of Art is open through 16 March 2014.

Thalia and Fifi by Eleanor Dickinson 2012

Atria Art Show by Eleanor Dickinson 2014

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Filed under Eleanor Dickinson Art, Home & Family, News & Reviews

Tagged as Eleanor, San Jose, TechWomen, Willow Glen

February 17, 2014 · 4:50 pm

What’s the difference between copies, backups and archives?

While I was traveling in Rwanda, my husband John published a blog entry on the eVault website: “What’s the difference between copies, backups and archives?” John used the 2011 picture of our daughter Jessica as a bride to “…step back for a bit and ask ourselves what needs to be done to ensure that this precious digitally born image is still available in the future, for our (still hypothetical at this point) granddaughter’s wedding?”

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Tagged as Jessica, John, marriage, Matthew

February 15, 2014 · 3:59 pm

“Positive Women” by Sam Kambali

Last week in Kigali, Rwanda, I was one of the TechWomen delegates who bought a painting at the Inema Art Center gallery. Since my mother, Eleanor Dickinson, and son, Paul D. Goodman, are both artists, I have very little free wallspace. However, I very much liked “Positive Women” by Sam Kambali. The painting is a collage of carefully-selected strips of African cloth forming the bodies of women, many of whom are raising their arms in salute. “Positive Women” seemed appropriate to the subject of our delegation (encouraging women and girls to pursue careers in STEM fields) and to the energy, enthusiasm, and remarkable professional success of the delegation members themselves. Part of its charm is that this painting incorporates the delightful variety and color of cloth we saw everywhere we went in Rwanda.

I had the gallery take the painting off its stretcher bars so I could transport it rolled up. Today, I brought “Positive Women” home from being re-mounted: my new painting is now hanging in WP668 (my office in our backyard caboose in San Jose, California). Here I am in Kigali with Sam Kambali, the artist:

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Filed under Caboose Project and Other Trains, Home & Family, Mentoring & Other Business, News & Reviews

Tagged as Africa, Eleanor, Paul, Rwanda, San Jose, technical women, TechWomen, WP668

January 13, 2014 · 1:57 pm

“Old Lovers” by Eleanor Creekmore Dickinson

Eleanor Creekmore Dickinson has a new art exhibit called “Old Lovers” at the Peninsula Museum of Art (1777 California Drive, Burlingame, California), 5 January – 16 March 2014. The opening reception was yesterday – with many colleagues, friends, and family attending. Love between older people has been a favorite subject of my mother’s large-format drawings on paper over many decades, and this is her second exhibit dedicated to that theme.

This show was curated by Robert Flynn Johnson (Curator Emeritus, Achenbach Foundation for Graphic Arts, Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco) and created by Ruth Waters (Founder, Chair and Executive Director, Peninsula Museum of Art). My brother Pete and I worked with Ruth and Robert for many months to support their development of this interesting exhibit. In the photos below, you can see how the drawings to be included were picked last year. I was on a business trip, so John and Paul went to the reception yesterday and took many pictures.

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Filed under Home & Family, News & Reviews

Tagged as Eleanor, John, Paul, Pete, San Francisco

December 28, 2013 · 11:08 am

After Christmas

Only a few Christmas presents are left to be distributed. We sadly bid farewell to Jessica and Matthew, who have traveled back to their jobs. John and Paul and I are still happily investigating our own presents here at home. For me, this means watching the Joss Whedon’s “Much Ado About Nothing” and the four movie set of The Hollow Crown (Shakespeare’s “Richard II”, “Henry IV” i and ii, and “Henry V”). Yesterday, John posted his code and instructions on how to program a Christmas tree, on: http://www.spcoast.com/wiki/index.php/Christmas2013. Paul is enjoying post-final-exams, pre-quarter-start downtime. John and I went out on a movie date to see “Ender’s Game”, which was a good representation of that disturbing and superb book. It is pleasant to have some quiet days together.

Dickens Christmas Fair, 25th Birthday

Twelve of us gathered at the Dickens Christmas Fair at the San Francisco Cow Palace yesterday to celebrate the holiday with music, high tea, and shopping. John spent the day quietly at home, happily programming our Christmas tree lights with an Arduino.* After the fair, we met Jessica’s lifelong buddies (“The Uns”) in Mountain View to celebrate her 25th birthday.

* 12/27/2013: John posted how to program a Christmas tree on his website: http://www.spcoast.com/wiki/index.php/Christmas2013.

Silicon Valley Lines Holiday Party

John Plocher and I again hosted the Silicon Valley Lines Model Railroad Club holiday party at our home in Willow Glen last weekend. Highlights included visits to John’s N-scale layout (in our former garage), tours of WP668 (our backyard caboose), assembling a G-scale train route in the house, a potluck feast, playing with this year’s Conductor Duck party favor, and other delights of the season.

Category Archives: Home & Family

Eleanor Dickinson’s 83rd Birthday & Art Show

What’s the difference between copies, backups and archives?

“Positive Women” by Sam Kambali

“Old Lovers” by Eleanor Creekmore Dickinson

After Christmas

Dickens Christmas Fair, 25th Birthday

Silicon Valley Lines Holiday Party

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