Category Archives: News & Reviews

On our nightly walks in the winter of the year, John and I noticed many small business quietly closing where we live in Willow Glen. Sadly, we have lost restaurants, a wine shop, a hair cutter, a sports clothes shop, and a furniture store.

However, recently that downward trend has thankfully reversed and we are seeing new and transformed retail and service startups repopulating the area.
For example:

• • Willow Glen Books said they were closing but then new life was announced by the new owner
  • Conte’s Aaron Doors was transformed from a garage door shop to a consignment shop which also sells garage doors. I was told that
    people who buy garage doors are often looking for a place to sell the stuff in their garage. Makes sense.
  • I have seen a sign on the street for Get Fit which now offers personal training and fitness mornings and evenings in a local park and in the basement of St. Francis Episcopal Church.

It is good to see local business looking up after so many dreary months.

Interesting photos I have taken recently that do not fit well into any other blog post:

Butterfly Iris

Images Copyright 2009 Katy Dickinson

One of my quiet joys on weekends is going to garage and
estate sales.
I am not methodical about finding garage sales: I go to the ones
I happen to see driving around rather than reading listings. However,
I am on the mailing lists of two estate sale companies called
“To Each His Own” or TEHO, and
“Unexpected Treasures”.
I usually find stuff of interest at their sales. If I have time and
the home being cleared is local, I try to attend the preview sale
before they open to the public.

Some estate sales are sad: I feel uncomfortable seeing wedding albums,
baby pictures, and hundred-year-old family Bibles available for a few
dollars. Others offer only stuff which is worthless to me, like Hummel
figurines, or cowboy, movie star, and military memorabilia. Last
weekend, however, John and I attended a very interesting sale. We got
there late but in about half an hour, we bought a laser level, ladder,
storage cabinets, antique keys and doorknobs. We had planned to buy
most of these things anyway and were happy to have them at about a tenth
the price of retail.

1910 original brass doorknobs

Antique keys

Laser leveling tool

Images Copyright 2009 Katy Dickinson

Gilda Garreton,
Valerie Fenwick, and I were
invited to visit the Media Center of the
San Francisco 49ers Academy
in
East Palo Alto, California, this week to talk about science
and technology in our lives. We spoke to the mostly-girl students of an
extracurricular course on media who are studying video production
skills and critical thinking.

Gilda, Valerie, and I work in different parts of Sun. We got
to know each other well during our work on the annual

Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing. Of course, we
talked about Engineering women in addition to telling the students
about our work and lives! I passed out Sun pens and stickypads plus

“Why Should Young Women Consider a Career in Information Technology?”
cards from the National Center for Women
& Information Technology as well as NCWIT’s

“By the Numbers” (compelling statistics on women’s participation in IT)
and other materials.

The students asked us questions and then
videotaped interviews with us. Each student very capably took on
a job: interviewer, director, camera operator, etc. This is an
impressive and well managed program. They even have their own
blog called Girls’ Tyme!.

San Francisco 49ers Academy

Media Students with Rebecca and Valerie

Images Copyright 2009 Katy Dickinson

Last week I attended a fascinating
National Center for Women & Information Technology (NCWIT) workshop
called “Women in IT: Think Globally, Act Locally”. In addition to meeting
many interesting and impressively accomplished technical women, I heard
presentations on research and programs to bring technology to women worldwide.

I found the talks about specific programs of most interest. For example:

• Dr. Vivian Lagesen (Norwegian University of Science and Technology) spoke about perceptions of gender and computer science In Malaysia. CS is seen as a
  woman’s profession there because it private, indoor work.
• Dr. M. Bernardine Dias (
  TechBridgeWorld at Carnegie Mellon University) spoke
  about Information and Communication Technologies for Development (ICTD), such as:
  designing multiple mice for computers in education in developing countries, literacy
  games, and user interfaces for illiterate and semi-literate users.

After the workshop, there was a party to celebrate the

Computing Awards recently given to 32 young women in high school.

Workshop Program

Dr. Vivian Lagesen

Small Group Session Leaders

Dr. M. Bernardine Dias

Dr. Lucy Sanders

NCWIT Awards to High School Girls

Images Copyright 2009 Katy Dickinson

Symptoms of the H1N1 Flu (“Swine Flu”) which I have observed recently
here in the Silicon Valley:

• Friends have shown detailed knowledge in casual conversations of how many
  H1N1 Flu cases have been reported in the US
  (see
  CDC H1N1 Flu Update: U.S. Human Cases of H1N1 Flu Infection)
• Friends have revealed detailed knowledge of which face
  masks are supposed to be most protective
• New signs are taped up in bathrooms and break areas on how to cough and
  wash hands to reduce transmission danger (see photo)
• Face masks and hand sanitizers are sold out week after week at local
  drug store (see photos)
• After school tutoring program was canceled for a week to reduce
  transmission risk
• Update emails arrived from Sun’s crisis management team and from
  Congresswoman Anna Eshoo on what
  to know and do (good information!)
• More questions than usual for everyone entering the lobby of
  
  Packard Hospital: “Do you have a cough, rash, cold…?” plus
  new signs suspending VIP access to parents so that everyone can be
  screened before entry (see photos)

Cover Your Cough

sold out face masks

sold out hand sanitizers

new Packard Hospital signs

new Packard Hospital lobby sign

Images Copyright 2009 Katy Dickinson