The celebration continues

Today we celebrated

- Karen's birthday, and also Amelie's birthday (Karen's cousin's daughter) by Skype.

- Jill submitting a proposal to the Design Management Review coauthored by 5 members of the Business & Design Lab

- Karen making headway on her poster presentation

- Steve demoing various web 2.0 opportunities

- Jack transferring all his Palm info to his PC

And I bought a new 13 inch fully loaded Mac-Pro from the online Apple store.

My Thanksgiving cooking task

I was assigned to bake dinner rolls from a "simple" recipe clipped from a magazine. It was simplified to the extent of omitting certain technical details. I think I'll stick to pies in the future!

But they all disappeared along with many other delicious dishes at the Thanksgiving dinner with Steve's brother and his family at their home in Redondo Beach.

Thanksgiving Eve

The day included traditional chores such
as shopping and baking, though not in traditional mode

It also included two good work events - things to be thankful for: Hearing that I now have an official affiliation at the University of Gothenburg (including a salary!) , and FINISHING the Worldview paper.

And things were left almost finished so there is something to do tomorrow morning while watching the Macy's Thanksgiving Parade - but I'll wait to give that news when the tasks are complete. I didn't read my book about Design Thinking.

Workday in Irvine

In some ways my work environment was no different from any other day with Skype connections to Massachusetts while I worked with Jeanie on the Worldview paper, and to Gothenburg while I worked with Ulla on the DMR paper. I did learn that research group at the Business & Design Lab has nicknamed me Miss Marple! In other ways my work environment was quite different, with bougainvillea climbing over the garden wall, and decorated palm trees at the mall (That's Karen and Steve on the right.)

Switching coasts

One of the good/bad things about going away for a festive weekend is finishing work due before/not having enough time to do everything needed on the project. In the last couple of days I sent back my piece to coauthors of three different papers/proposals. I'm hoping for a few days of peace, but past experience suggests that they too will try to get work off their desk before the holiday. How many times can we trade drafts before turkey day on Thursday?

On the 2,800 mile flight across the land mass of the US I started to read Peter Rowe's "Design Thinking." For the trip I decided to pick the oldest unread book on this topic from my collection, and it is providing me with good background on the topic. I especially enjoyed the first chapter with various case studies of the architectural design process, and the second chapter fills in theory on different forms of decision theory -- which I believe I've met before as "design methods."

So, now I'm on the "left coast".

Condo in depersonalized design

It's real!

Friday marks the end ... for a while

How many times have I said, "We're almost ready to put the Fairfield Condo on the market"? That day has arrived. Even the basement is "ready"! It will be listed tomorrow. To celebrate our final work day we stopped at the Equinox Diner at the corner of I95 and Rt27 for supper on our way home. The place opened earlier this year, (there was a Howard Johnson's there for years) and we've joked so many times about stopping there that this time we actually did it. Like getting the condo ready for sale, it was an experience I'd prefer not to repeat.