Peter A. Bowen

My son is participating in the Lego Mindstorm robot contest.  It’s been a pretty steep learning curve trying to not only understand how the Mindstorm works, but then trying to teach him how to program the darn thing.   First he tried a GUI based procedural system and then gave up and so I’m trying to teach him C.  The good news is that there are a number of ways to try to solve the problem of following a line, and he’s trying them all.  I’m a little worried about what happens when the line breaks, but I’m sure he’ll figure it out.  I’ll be sure to let you know how it goes.

-Peter

I’ve been pretty busy - I decided to raise the price on the house to $400K so that it shows up on the first page of the Utah MLS search.  It seems to be working because we’re getting more showings.  I think that we’re going to end up at the same price, but trying to second guess the buyer and lower it to closer to the expected sale price really didn’t work.  In this market, buyers are expecting to talk the seller down, and if it’s already at a lower price, there must be something wrong with it.  Who can figure?

We are doing some upgrades though… Granite on Friday, Floor Refinishing next wee, and new appliances in two weeks.  After all of that, maybe I should stay… nah… I gave my word and they’re depending on me.

www.pghouse.info
-Peter

As I mentioned, I’m selling my home.  I’ve listed it for about $375K because I think it’s worth $400K but I want it to sell.  I’m worried that people coming from out of state or even out of area are missing it because they’re looking for houses in the $400 - 450K range or the $350-400K range.  So here’s the question:

In this day of SEO and saturation, am I hurting myself because I’m in the middle of the range, thus requiring potential buyers to sift though lots of houses from either end?  Do you search from the top or bottom of a price range?  Would I be better served moving the price up to $399,999 or $400,000 so that I’m at least at the top of one search?  I’m really not trying to get more money, I’m trying to get in front of more eyeballs so that I can get sold, packed up and move to California. Thoughts?

Further reading:
www.pghouse.info
Utah MLS Listing
I’m on page 17 of a county wide search (164 of 435)

A couple of days ago, Fred (A VC) wrote a quick post about coding up ideas instead of power-pointing them.  It got me thinking back to my days at Excite@Home…

I remember sitting in a meeting with Phil Windley and Steve Fulling and one of the developers was going on and on about the way that he thought the project should move forward.  The more he talked, the more complicated and expensive it got.  When he was done, another developer presented another solution and there was code behind it.  It worked, and between the two, I could see going down that path.  I don’t remember what happened, or even which project it was, but what I do remember is the first guy started taking shots at the second guy’s idea and somebody said… “Stop it!  Ideas don’t matter unless they’re backed by working code.”  That has always stuck with me.

I’ve accepted a position closer to my parents in Southern California which means that unless I want to earn some serious frequent flier miles at my expense (which i don’t), I’m going to be moving.  Unfortunately for me that means that the nerd house is going on the market.  (The whole house is a technology cocoon)  It’s also a Maker house with a sweet workshop - great for tinkering, metal work, wood work, scrap booking, or whatever your “thing” is.  If you or anyone you know is looking for a home in northern Utah county (Pleasant Grove), let me know and I’ll try to hook you up with what I honestly believe is the best house for the money in the area.  I’m also quite motivated.  Seriously, It’s the variable for which I have no solution, so you could probably rob me blind and we would both be happy.

-Peter

When my family plays games, there is always someone that is ahead.  Often it is in everyone’s best interest to try to keep that person from winning.  That way the game goes on longer, and the others improve their chances of winning.  For the second place person, that can be a great advantage because they can gain critical ground while everyone is pulling down on the player in first place.

In West Virginia, that happened today.  West Virginia uses a caucus system where supporters of each candidate get together and figure out who is going to be the candidate recommended at the convention.  Many other states use a primary election and then dole out the delegates either by district or in a winner take all electoral contest.  In this case, McCain knew that he wasn’t going to win West Virginia, and can see what we all do, that Mike Huckabee is not a viable candidate.  To hold Mitt back, he instructed his delegates at the caucus to vote for Mike Huckabee.  Remember these are people who chose him – not Mike Huckabee to begin with.

Why does that matter?  It matters because McCain was only up by about 20 delegates, and the 18 from West Virginia would have helped to close the gap.  The interesting part is that 47% of the delegates were for Mitt.  I suspect that had Mike Huckabee dropped out (like he should have weeks ago) , Mitt would have easily picked up 3% of the delegates.  I think that he would have handily trounced John McCain. Through manipulation of the system, John McCain denied the people of West Virginia their voice, and effectively negated their vote.

Way to go John – That’s exactly the sort of disregard for the American people, to further your agenda, which I was expecting from you.

-Peter

Now that the primaries are underway, I’m going to need to vent.  It’s been four years since I’ve needed to vent politically, so this space has been relatively free of my rants.  Brace yourself, because the season has started and I can’t hold back.

-Peter

I’ve seen this photo floating around, and it is of a Martin Luther King Jr. rally in Texas.  For whatever reason, a few of the signs were mis-spelled.  I’ve heard some suggestions as to how this happened, none of them very nice, but I think the point here is that a mistake can mask your message.  Snopes chased down the story, and the local television station confirmed that the photo was authentic, however the news director, Richard Longoria, pointed out:

It’s obvious two signs were misspelled, bunches of others weren’t. It’s such a shame that the person who put it on the web didn’t put the entire story, which showed members of the Black American community and others in Corpus Christi respectfully honoring the life and memory of an American hero, Martin Luther King.

In school, we spent a lot of time working on presentation skills and removing the distractions that can take away from the message.  The next time that you write a note, update your web site, talk on the phone, etc.  prepare yourself, prepare your message, and prepare your surroundings.  If it’s a big thing, run it by a couple of people.  Your friends will help you. (If you don’t have friends that will help, find new friends.)  As my mom used to say, it’s not what you say, it’s how you say it.

-Peter

An anonymous coward commented that he (or she) found a dvd writer for $400.  That’s  getting really close to where I want  to be… now if they would just allow it to play through something other than HDMI so that I could watch it on my (very old) component HDTV.

• http://www.meritline.com/lg-ggw-h20l-lightscribe-6x-blu-ray-3x-hd-sata-drive.html

With all of the recent press about Blu-Ray winning, I was looking at prices for burners, and I can’t believe that they are getting close to $500. I remember when CD burners were $1200, and DVD Writers took a while to get cheap too. I wish that a winner would be declared so that prices will come down faster. Here’s the link at newegg for the burner in question - the sale ends in a few days:

• Sony BWU-200S Black Dual Layer Blu-Ray Writer - $539.99 (after coupon code sony60) at Newegg.com, exp 1/31