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Tychoaussie

Artist, student, and engineer
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Hello!
I feel rather sheepish in that I haven't posted very many new photographs for you here on Deviantart. Truth be told, I have been doing exciting things this summer, and July was action packed. August has been stressful, as I work on my thesis proposal and thesis outline. It is a lot harder to write scientific methods than it is to write artistic prose. My professor complains that my style of scientific writing is more "fireside chat" than serious academic. 

That is about the time I glance over my shoulder at the 27-inch poster of Tycho Aussie hanging above my desk in the office. 

Well, in about two weeks I will be leaving on a month-long trip to central Asia again. It's my third overseas trip this year, actually. I am REALLY tempted to bring Tycho along with me in a small carry-on suitcase, so that I can entertain the local people in Baku, Azerbaijan, Almaty, Kazakhstan, Bishkek Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and in Istanbul, Turkey.

I'm not sure that anyone has ever fursuited in those countries, except maybe Istanbul. 

So, stay tuned - I will be there for the last half of September and the first part of October. When I return, hopefully I'll have some cool photographs from my Nikon of the countries, people, and architecture. That, and some stories. When I get back though, it's back to work for me as I try to wrap up the thesis and research, and attempt to get the Masters degree done before I die of old age! 
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What a busy few months, and it's just getting busier!
This week I have been designing a pre-amplifier for our seismometers, trying to make one that is quiet enough to help boost the signal without boosting the noise. I'm trying to work with signals as low as a few microvolts however; so all it takes is a few microvolts of noise and the signal gets lost... A * (noise+signal) = A*noise + A*signal. The non-technical way of saying this is what happens to a good voice recording when there's a computer fan running in the background. No matter how high you gain up the voice, the fan will still be there , just as loud as the voice. I'm working on it!

- Some good news is that our research was well received in Vienna at the U.N. CTBTO SnT2015 conference, which is an international conference on science and technology that supports efforts to ban nuclear weapons tests all over the world. It was a good week. We got a lot of pictures in the evenings after the conference, and my wife even got to come along with me. Now the hard part - Tallying all my receipts and getting the travel reimbursement vouchers all turned in. That's pretty important, because this wasn't a cheap trip... Especially for a grad student.

- Tycho Aussie is back, after being sent in for some 'tuneup' work at Beastcub Creations. The fursuit is safe and sound, all brushed and ready for the Anthrocon in Pittsbugh, PA which I will be attending next week.

Only one week to go !

After that, it's all research & developmetn as well as writing on the thesis. Speaking of which, I need to get some lunch and get back to the other screen where my abstract is staring at me... :)
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Since my last journal, I have:
- traveled to Florida and been the guest fursuiter on the Funday Pawpet show
- gotten the motorcycle out of storage and started riding it to work every day (even though it's just 17 degrees today)
- Traveled to the other side of the world & back, to Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan, for two weeks of 12-hour work days
- Read Anne McCaffery's book, "Moreta, Dragonlady of Pern"
- Fixed another dirt bike
- Sold my snowmobile
- Bought another race car
- learned how to run a saw mill and roll 1,000 lb. logs with a cant hook (now I am a bit muscle sore)
- created a seismic wave travel path simulation as part of a homework problem
- revised my seismic calibration software for the central Asian seismic networks

Some things I need to do over the next month:
- complete & file my income taxes
- lose a few pounds of middle-age belly fat. I think it's related to getting older because I haven't really changed my diet. I think I need to move more lumber.
- Attend the Motor City furry con on Friday afternoon and Saturday morning
- Order some new paws for Tycho Aussie
- Implement a new velocity model into my epicenter relocation code for varying velocities due to sediment / basement rock for my close-in stations
- Do some manditory requirement b.s. on "sexual harassment reporting requirements" for the graduate program. Just don't get me started or it'll turn into a rant.
- wash my car and motorcycle, fix the suspension on my Trans Am and get it ready for Saturday.
- practice a new song for singing in church.
- re-record "Gloom Despair, Agony on me" and recruit some singers in preparation for Anthrocon

Heh. I wonder if anyone even finds this list interesting or not? :)
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Say, I have an idea: It's not a new idea by any means. In fact, it's so old fashioned as to be revolutionary. It's an idea that might save a LOT of people a lot of anxiety and drama if they bought into it:

Family and good friends are where it's at, and dating is just something you do when you are looking for someone to marry.
All this 'my mate', and 'my girlfriend', and 'my boyfriend' stuff... How about just simply calling them 'best friend', and leave it at that? Personally, I am glad I missed out on all the drama of dating when I was younger. I did some dating back in my early 20's - mostly one-offs that never went anywhere. I did have a girlfriend when I was twenty, and of all things, we met on the computer and chatted & got to know one another before even seeing each other face-to-face. It sounds like no big deal, but this was before the internet existed. It was short and lasted about a year. The friendship sort of faded away when she went one way, and I went another, but I still wish it had remained just a good friendship. Dating took it to another level.

All the other dates were just me taking a friend who happened to be a girl out for some fun, and it never went anywhere, which is fine. A couple of them are still friends, though it's more like a 'facebook' kind of friendship where we just keep up with each other's lives.

It wasn't until my late-20's that I finally grew up, and found the love of my life. So, for those first ten years of my adult life, I simply made memories with good friends and our adventures. I'm really glad that I never felt the pressure to date someone - I always looked at a 'date' as a way of sizing someone up for possible marriage, and I wasn't really ready for that sort of commitment. It was liberating and pretty much drama-free.

There's too much emphasis on having a girlfriend/boyfriend these days, I think - - really: Just be happy being single for now. Singledom doesn't generally last very long.  Statistics show that the average age of first marriage is now in the late 20's and early 30's anyway. Most people have been married by the time they are 40. About half of my best friends got married in their late 30's and early 40's and so far, they have stayed that way. So, why worry about being single before that? You might as well be happy being you, and just enjoy the first decade by discovering the beauty of life, and working on your character so that you are a solid person for that future spouse.

For now, stick to family, and cultivate friendships with good people. That's where it's at!
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Success is measured in many ways, and it totally depends on your stated goal. That said, you have to state your goal in order to find success. In fact, success is 50% planning, 25% effort, and 25% persistence. That's good, because fundamentally I am, like most people, rather lazy at times. That's where the persistence part comes in. Persistence is the toughest part of the formula and is the catalyst to ignite the fuel of effort. It's the "will", you might say, to put in the effort, even when your body and heart are telling you to back off, take a rest, and go browse art on Deviantart, watch TV, eat some chocolate, drink a beer or hang out on reddit. Procrastination is rampant - and it's the failure of persistence that short-circuits many goals. Even I procrastinate. I'm likely doing it right now, by typing this up rather than that abstract that's due at the end of the day... However I've got a plan, and will put in the effort as soon as I'm done here.

Something that many people don't understand about life, is that life is like a small cafe serving table: It can only hold about four or five modest size plates of food. If you try to push any more plates on the table, one of the plates falls off the other side and makes a nice little mess on the floor. One of the plates on your serving table holds your family and marriage. Another holds your career. Yet another holds hobby A, and another holds your lesiure time. Sometimes you have to consciously pick up a plate from the table and put it on the shelf for some other day, to keep it from falling to the ground by mistake. Usually when that happens, it costs you, either in terms of broken relationships, lost career opportunities, or financially. Planning is the technique of keeping all your plates of life organized so that you can have a collection of rich life experiences. Only, you can't keep them all out at the same time.

So what is my metric for success in 2015? More importantly, what is yours? Most formulas are unwritten, but if you are a person who struggles with persistence, writing it down might be just the remedy to help you see and visualize your goals. Here's mine:

" In 2015 I will complete my Master's degree, prepare for a new job, help my son get settled into college life, and get the house repairs done while staying happily married."

The plan:
1) In 2015, I will crack the mystery of the Myatis thrust fault and the Valentine's day earthquake sequence, and write it up into a dandy Master's thesis paper, which will be completed and ready by August 15th, so that I can defend it and earn my degree.
2) At the same time, I will finish the creation of a functional suite of calibration tools for calibrating electromechanical seismometers, and training materials for seismic networks in the states of the former Soviet Union.
3) I will start networking with my peers, and getting the word out that I'll be looking for a job in the fall.
4) I will lose the 18 pounds that I've gained since 2012 due to dropping my exercise plan. I've just repaired my P90X DVDs that had gotten scratched and unplayable, and the home gym is now cleaned up and ready. This ought to help with my energy level.
5) I need to fix the ceiling in the dining room, repair the upstairs shower, and re-roof the house above the dining room, and rebuild the little garage this summer. That will also be part of my exercise plan. - and I need to save a few thousand dollars to do it.
6) Get tough but encourage my son... I love him, but am distressed to see him not get excited about the possibilities that surround him - He's 18 now, and an adult - It's time he starts practicing being one by working on his independence. He's either going to have to succeed at college or else get a job and move out. That might be our toughest, saddest challenge yet but it's really in his court. I refuse to be a parent of a 20-something year old child. He'll either succeed in college or else transfer to the college of hard knocks.

Note that there's no mention of Tycho Aussie in the above statements. Tycho is a facet of myself that I truly do enjoy, and I do love the furry guy and the joy he brings. However I will be setting him aside for a little while in order to realize my above stated goal. It doesn't mean I won't be fursuiting: On the contrary, I plan on attending Anthrocon this year for my 50th birthday. It just means, it won't be a primary goal and I'll fit it in around the other stuff when I can. Tycho Aussie and the exploration of this wonderful hobby was a goal of 2012 & 2013, and wow - it opened up a colorful new world to me of new friendships, people, and characters. It's just that now, I need to put that plate on a shelf to make room and keep other plates from falling off the table. The Master's degree is a pretty big plate and it requires some intentional clearing of the table.

How is YOUR serving table looking? What are the plates that you think you want to keep from falling? Which ones will you intentionally put on the shelf to preserve the rest? Did you realize that you can eventually dust them off and put them back onto the table at a later time? Do you have a plan yet? Writing it down is 50% of the formula. Putting in the work is 25%, and being persistent to your plan is the rest.

Well, now I am off to write that abstract. It's due today, and once it's turned in, I will get cracking on making it into a presentation and paper: It'll be about half of my Master's thesis, and I have found out that I've been given the privilege (and the air fare & hotel!) to present it at an international conference in Vienna, Austria in June.
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Featured

Tycho's upcoming adventures by Tychoaussie, journal

Back from Vienna, then off to Pittsburgh! by Tychoaussie, journal

What has Tycho Aussie been doing these days? by Tychoaussie, journal

Family and friendships are where it's at by Tychoaussie, journal

The Formula for success in 2015 by Tychoaussie, journal