Tag Archives: John

August 29, 2012 · 10:28 pm

DCC Brakeman

My husband John has been designing model train open source hardware for many years – as I have written about before. Recently, at the urging of fellow enthusiasts (or “Train Nuts” as their wives call them), John brought out his first retail product – the DCC Brakeman. The DCC Brakeman is now for sale for $6.99 at The Train Shop, 1829 Pruneridge Ave, Santa Clara, California, (408) 296-1050. (The first version sold for $6.25 but everyone wanted him to have a weight added, which costs a little more.) Some assembly is required.

The rule of the railroad used to be that “When a train stops on a main track, flag protection must be provided.” This little electronic guy is about one inch tall. He represents a flagman with a red lantern – as a visual aid to protect model trains when switching from fouling the main line. He is used in DCC (digital command and control) model train operations – about which you can find out more at the Operations Special Interest Group. He wears a baseball cap which says DCC. The little man’s front says Brakeman and his back says Safety First! (“Safety First” has been an American railroad industry motto since around 1910.)

Details on the DCC Brakeman are on John’s website: spcoast.com.

3 Comments

Filed under Caboose Project and Other Trains, Home & Family

Tagged as Geeks, John

August 19, 2012 · 10:53 pm

Camping at the Lair of the Golden Bear

Yesterday, we got back from our annual family camping trip at the U.C. Berkeley Alumni Association’s Lair of the Golden Bear near Pinecrest, California. We had 19 people in four tents, with 8 in just ours. As usual, we had an enjoyable and relaxing time. The car is unpacked and stuff is mostly put away but I am still working my way through the laundry. I have finished the towels and bedding and most of the clothes. I still need to wash the sleeping bags.

Some of the highlights of our week in the Sierras:

Hiking to the Natural Bridges swim-through cave. The air was so hot and the water was so cold! Carrying my camera in a zip bag to take pictures from the deep pool was tricky.
Seeing an eagle pulling big fish from the Pinecrest Lake right near the swimmers and boaters. One of the Pinecrest summer residents said it was a bald eagle but it may have been an osprey (fish eagle).
Watching a white headed woodpecker eating his way from pine to pine.
Walking along the creek (Tuolumne River, North Fork), looking for wild flowers, animals, insects, and pretty stones.
Watching the sunset from the Trail of the Gargoyles, in the Stanislaus National Forest. We could see Mount Diablo (a 3,864 feet or 1,178 meter peak in the San Francisco Bay Area) in the far distance.
Hanging out with family and friends.

This was the first time we have been camping since my father died – he loved the mountains. We stopped at Railtown 1897 in Jamestown on the drive home yesterday to collect more caboose pictures – see my Caboose Sisters Pinterest page for the whole collection. I also put up a Camp Blue Pinterest page with more images from our camping week.

2 Comments

Filed under Home & Family, News & Reviews

Tagged as birds, Eleanor, Jessica, John, Lair of the Bear, Matthew, Paul, University of California, Wade

August 15, 2012 · 12:05 pm

Sunnyvale Summer Street Party

Last week, John and I walked through a summer street party on Murphy Avenue in Sunnyvale, California, in the heart of the Silicon Valley. Murphy Avenue has several excellent restaurants (several named for herbs: Tumeric, Thai Basil, Tarragon), our favorite being Dish Dash. The night we went, the food trucks and street vendors were out and a band was getting ready to play. We of course checked the current offerings at Leigh’s Favorite Books. I picked up several Daniel Silva spy novels for summer reading – after hearing an interesting review on National Public Radio.

Leave a comment

Filed under News & Reviews

Tagged as John

August 9, 2012 · 9:06 pm

Cavalia – Wonderful Horse Circus

John gave me a belated anniversary present last night: we went to the Cavalia horse circus here in San Jose. It was delightful. The human circus performers and, for the most part, the horses seemed to have as good a time as the audience. John bought us good seats so we could see everything and we even got to visit the 4-footed performers in their tent-barn after the show. The horses are all male but both the men and women executed impressive circus and riding stunts. There was evident variation in skill among the people but good humor smoothed over the differences. The music and light shows accompanying each phase were very well done.

I could not take photos – the flash might distract and endanger the performers – but the action was so fast I am not sure how well the images would have turned out anyway. If there was one disappointment to this fun event, it was the lack of “airs above the ground”. I saw the Lipizzaner show when I was a girl and I was thrilled by the classical dressage movements: levade, courbette, and capriole. The Cavalia show offered one half hearted rear but everything else was four feet down.

Orion the Quarter Horse:

Emilio the Percheron:

Iman the Lusitano:

Kinder the Spanish Purebred:

Leave a comment

Filed under Home & Family, News & Reviews

Tagged as John, marriage, San Jose

July 24, 2012 · 9:10 am

John’s Trip Home

My husband John Plocher is flying home from his most recent two week trip to China, on business for Huawei. I have received an interesting series of text message emails as he worked his way through the weather and mess of a typhoon from ShenZhen to the Hong Kong airport. So far, his flight is about two hours late.

On way to airport – roads flooded, slow traffic, not worried – looking forward to seeing you SOON!!
Typhoon coming in to south of us in morning… More info as I find out,,,
Coming->came…
Only 1 route to hk open, ferry closed, shekou bridge closed, luohu closed, trees down across only road open.. Glad we have several hours b4 plane leaves
At hk airport
Flight delayed (no surprise).checked in ok
On board! Good seat

Later… John arrived home safely despite Typhoon Vicente, only two hours late.

Leave a comment

Filed under Home & Family, News & Reviews

Tagged as China, Huawei, John

July 21, 2012 · 1:36 pm

Non-Travel Diary 4

While my husband John is in China on business for Huawei, I am keeping a non-travel diary. This has been a relatively quiet week. In addition to working full-time at Huawei:

There was a small amount of progress on our home construction projects. The painter spent a half day painting the wrong color stain on the baseboards. When I pointed out the error, he spent about the same amount of time sanding that color off and re-staining. Nobody was happy.
Thursday, I joined the monthly Board meeting of the Santa Maria Urban Ministry. We said an appreciative goodbye to our summer intern. The SMUM Tech Team (of which John and I are members) was assigned some new projects by the Board.
My newly-assigned 2012 TechWomen mentee from Lebanon and I made first contact. We exchanged introductory emails and are starting to make preparations for her visit to the Silicon Valley in September. Her background is impressive – I very much look forward to working with her in person. TechWomen is an initiative of the U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs (ECA).
I communicated with the 2011 TechWomen mentees with whom I am presenting a panel at the Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing in October 2012 (Baltimore, MD). I am the moderator of the panel called “Technical Women in the Arab Region: Challenges vs. Aspirations”. We have travel funding confirmed for three of the panelists and we are working on support for our fourth. The ladies are traveling from Algeria, Palestine, Egypt, and Lebanon for GHC12. I am very eager to see them again!
Paul and I took our Wood Shop basic safety and equipment introduction at TechShop San Jose last night. We enjoyed learning to use the miter saw, table saw, band saw, electric sander, and drill press. The scroll saw is being repaired so we will learn how to use that later. I made a heart for John and Paul started work on an infinity symbol using the band saw. One of the other students laser-engraved the heart for me. I want to take a TechShop laser class next!
This morning, we had a community yard sale. Despite being on Craigslist and putting signs up on nearby corners, it was very poorly attended. However, it was fun to hang out with the neighbors. Our neighborhood apparently has 7 boys and 1 girl aged between 6 and 12 years old – who spent the morning rocketing from sale to sale comparing stuff and giving updates.
John comes home Tuesday morning!

Leave a comment

Filed under Home & Family, Hopper - Anita Borg Institute, Mentoring & Other Business, News & Reviews

Tagged as China, Geeks, House Work, Huawei, John, Mentoring, Middle East, Paul, San Jose, technical women, TechWomen, Willow Glen

July 17, 2012 · 10:45 pm

Wedding Ceremony – Shaodong County, Hunan Province in China

John and his boss Jim Hughes were in Shaodong County, Hunan Province in China for a wedding of friends this week. See the first part of this story for more.

The big day started at the bride’s family’s home (or hotel room in this case) where the groom was locked out and had to negotiate with her family and friends through the closed door while she sat on the bed – with good humor all around. He eventually got in and picked her up without her shoes. Then everyone drove to another hotel for the ceremony and reception.

The food was set out during the end of the ceremony so lunch started immediately after. During the meal, the groom visited each table to drink a toast while the bride and bridesmaid passed out two cigarettes to each guest. There was singing and speeches and much joy.

Leave a comment

Filed under News & Reviews

Tagged as China, Huawei, John

Tag Archives: John

DCC Brakeman

Camping at the Lair of the Golden Bear

Sunnyvale Summer Street Party

Cavalia – Wonderful Horse Circus

John’s Trip Home

Non-Travel Diary 4

Wedding Ceremony – Shaodong County, Hunan Province in China

Email Subscription

Categories

Blogroll

Recent Posts