There’s a song that I listen to by Daniel Johnston called Don’t let the sun go down on your grievances

Whenever I listen to it, I am reminded of my grandfather, Jesus Gonzales, born 1908. It paraphrases something that he knew, something deep. It was to clear your mind of any toils or stress from the day that just passed you by. Jesus, or Apa, was married to Margarita Gonzales for many, many years, and he rubbed off on more people than I’ll ever know. He was one of the happiest men that I knew, in one of the happiest marriages I will ever know, ever.

He was a simple man who simply loved life. That feeling and mission I can certainly share with him. He told me to never go to bed angry, at anything. This is before computers, before we began to live in a life surrounded by computers and overwhelming days. He was never too busy for anybody, including you and me.

So I paraphrase him, as Apa wouldn’t mind, and say not to let the sun go down on your grievances. Sleep well, tell the one you love that you love them, and breathe in all the we have. Thanks Apa. I miss the days where I would go “fishing” and hunt for the raisins in my Quaker Oats oatmeal.

You knew exactly how to live life, and we all learned from you to pass it on and on.

Don’t let the sun go down own your grievances:

Don’t let the sun go down on your grievances
Respect love of the heart over lust of the flesh
Do yourself a favor: become your own savior
And don’t let the sun go down on your grievances
And when you wake up in the morning
You’ll have a brand new feeling
And you’ll find yourself healing
So don’t let the sun go down on your grievances

Here comes this weather that is very foreign to me!

A good day was had talking with the president of a big conglomerate corporation and tons of cheese. Tim Ferriss totally has it down with talking to big CEOs, they are like the hot chicks of the business and job world – i.e. everyone is afraid to talk to them straight and never does, therefore they love to have some informal talk with you and wil remember you always. Also, free beer on campus is cool (hooray private schools without state school regulations)!

Which reminds me, I used to have this statement written in a marker right above my bed when I would wake up in the morning: “Your intention creates your reality.” And I have it on my fridge now. Same idea. It’s true, eh.

Two years ago I quit my job to follow my dream, and each day it gets better and better. It’s amazing what the human mind can do with the help of God. This is exactly what I wanted and there is so much more good to come.

An excellent time was had here as well with my mom visiting Worcester for a week:

And Katie came to visit for a different week as well. We all had a blast here with deliciously cheap happy-hour seafood, bone-chilling temperatures, bland Dominican food in Massachusetts, nuns racing through the park, endless drives along the cliffy coast, and just plain being together. It had been a few months since I saw Katie, and it made it that much better. Many good times were had and many more million to come.

15 days ’til I return to the big Texas. I really miss the people, but not so much the place.

I guess Texas is the home of my heart and Massachusetts is the home of my brain. The two can coexist in harmony you know:

“… and television on all over the place is leading to a steady dumbing
down of the American public and a corrosion of basic critical thinking in the population.”

- Jamie Raskin, American University law professor, November 2004 on the Democracy Now! radio program

Flickr user sandymichelle

Just this past Sunday I had to kill my television – in the best sense of the word. You know: denounce, unrecognize, and the such. It was really stealing away any free (and productive) time that I had. I mean, the idle brain cells spin out of control and zoning out in front of TV after a long day of work leads to: not caring about what you eat, not thinking critically about other great things in the world, not spending ol’ fashioned time with your family or friends. (Lots of great, original articles about Killing Your TV)

I remember about 4 years ago when I came across a similar “Turn Off Your TV” site online in the form of a podcast. And the 2 people were talking on and on about trans fatty acids. I was so compelled as to what they were saying I remember typing as fast as I could to take notes and replaying parts and looking up health terms and the such. Learning. Critical thinking. Sharing. I went on to write an article in the paper at my school and was excitedly telling everyone about my findings. I continued to look up more and more information – I was addicted to knowledge. Just a few minutes ago, I just finished my meal of baked chicken, couscous, and black bean soup with tomatoes, onions, bell peppers, and garlic. And I know that most of that motivation to eat healthy as I do today came from that little audio finding 4 years back. Now it allows me, 4 years later, a chance for me to just sit and enjoy a meal – in peace and quiet – and experience the flavors of life one by one. Hmm, there was life before TV.

I kept running past the idea that parents talk to their kids about 28 minutes a day while the average adult watches 2.5 hours of television per day. Hmm. What are we doing to ourselves? Now, I’m not being anti-fun here, entertainment is great, and I make it through most of my day with a humorous outlook on life. But I see people ignoring food as they eat, sitting silently among family or friends, just gazing. Paying lots of money – to be advertised to constantly and have this machine suck away brain cells.

Flickr user janz87

I also came across someone who said – if aliens came to visit us and checked out the layout of our homes, they would think the television is some sort of god of ours, as our entire houses are arranged around the careful placement of the television set. And then comes the arguments about using a DVR to save time. Of course, it is better than just mindlessly watching channels and surfing without barriers, but there are other ways to go about getting your fix without paying a crapload (ahem). But I can think of many better things to do anyway! I don’t think you’ll lose sleep at night or have regrets on your deathbed – just wondering and wishing that you you had watched more TV.

Flickr user chrisdonia

On another note, it is awesome to see change and progress going on all around the world, from the recent election all the way down to the small world of fire protection engineering. Every time I watch one of the videos about technology and change in this era – I get all giddy and warm on the inside. It’s true.

There’s a giant conversation going on. And it doesn’t depend on power or money or anything. Just a passion – a want. I think of how one person that I know revamped and forever changed the world of fire modeling by utilizing a couple of free tools to bring together thousands of users who were all previously working in dark corners. I think of how a few scratches I made on a notebook one night turned into a tool that hundreds of fire model users use every week – and I think of the next step, and the next, constantly progressing. I think of those that are “too busy” to participate in this movement and think this is only for nerds and computer people – and how bad I want them to participate.

I came to the conclusion that the two ideas I speak about here are interrelated. Apathy and social sloth. Here’s what I think: no one is any more busy than anyone else. Some of us just want something more strongly than others. And that used to be okay, praised even – when the dark corners were predominant. But now, everything is public – the world pushes upon itself.

Don’t be “too busy” watching TV or sitting out on this big movement – wherever you are or whoever you are. This is big. Join in anytime.

Earlier today, the professor for my Combustion class mentioned that for our final project, we will be working on a problem that currently has no solution. This intrigued me of course, as I wondered if our final grades would have no solution as well. After he explained, it made all the more sense and reminded me why my love and passion is in the field of fire protection engineering, the school I go to, and the people I work with: they all heavily align with my values and principles of sharing knowledge and making information available to everyone, everywhere.

[From NASA]

So, let me explain his model simply by example:

The professor said that when he first started this class 2 years ago, the students were working on a different problem with no solution… at the time. The class worked together and in the end the results were so significant that a couple of students took the initiative to publish the results in a scientific journal. The same happened when the class was taught last year – project done, paper published.

So what does this mean and why do you care? Well, all too often in the academic world, people can get caught up in working on projects and sort of work themselves into a dark corner where nobody gets to benefit from the results… and this is done in real life as well, not just academics. This is where the ridiculous amount of collaborative technology available to us comes in to play. Want to gather up notes on the Smagorinsky constant and publish them for anyone to find who is searching for them in the next 1000 years? Easy: 5 minutes. Want to publish your results in the most useful way? Easy: work on an open source project in your area along with your research – or make your own.

…Or you could write a paper, finish your thesis work, wrap up the loose ends in a few years and show a flashy poster of your work 5 years after anybody cares about it anymore or thinks it to be useful.

I digress. I just wanted to stress this new method of collaboration that is among us, and how it’s going to change the way that we work together and grow together in fire protection engineering and fire science.

[From Rowan University College of Engineering]

Why not make use of motivated students and brainpower when they come together? Here is me welcoming this new phase of community and collaboration in a field that directly impacts life safety and makes safer buildings around the world. So when we work on that final project in a few weeks, it’s not really at all about a grade anymore – it’s about a new way of doing science – together.

Update: This is exactly the kind of stuff that I’m talking about here, posted today on the SFPE National blog that I set up a year ago – collaboration: Foundation Funded Research underway at WPI

So there are scientists, and there are artful scientists. Here’s version 0.9999 of the graph from my last post in all of its full and smooth glory. It’s for a homework exercise in my combustion course (go ahead, click for full size – it’s fantastic):

Well, why do you care about my graph? I certainly do. There are many books about conveying information in statistics and how to present data in a very informationally dense format, sure. But let’s think about this graph that I made for a homework assignment. The purpose of the homework was for me to learn, yes? And that nice orange line bought me some extra credit worth 25 points, but that’s another story. I want to learn it inside out, run it amongst others, and in the end communicate great things to many, many people. Every time. With every action.

So I could have left the default Excel settings for the chart, but my soul cannot allow such a thing.

This graph shows relationships, it runs a conversation with itself and lets the numbers drive by each other and say hello. It’s living, and it talks to me. Check out the dark red diamond line called “Mixture Fraction”. This guy drives all of the others. Then the f’s come in. Then we go back to the real quantities like the mass fraction of oxygen (Yo) and fuel (Yf) and we can also grab temperature (in Kelvin) based off of what those f’s are telling each other.

Yes, yes, Kris. You are talking nonsense, I don’t like it. Well, perhaps I’m not as eloquent and direct as this guy (watch this great motivating video, do I ever let you down?):

But our messages are the same. Do what you love, and work your ass off at it. All the time. Not the old and dead cliched way of “do what you love” – but the minute by minute, day by day, just got home tired from work but I need more, but I don’t have the time, wake up and do it, it keeps you up and night, but I want to watch TV every day, what you REALLY want to do, an exact thing/action/pursuit every day until you die – kind of way.

If I wasn’t here loving my graphs at 2:34 AM in the morning and pondering the million things I just learned from this 4 day exercise, I’d quit. If I doubted for a second (as the guy in the video says), I’d do us all a favor and leave here. But I want this knowledge, and these relationships so very badly. And when the end-result comes along, I have a sick urge to spend so much time and detail on things so that others may benefit. Make your life, thoughts, and business public, and see what happens to it. It skyrockets.

Now do you see why I care about my graph? I’m proud of what it represents. Now go off and care about your own graph. For the rest of us.

I just finished the longest problem that I think I’ve ever worked on in my life. It took about 14 hours to complete this one problem in my combustion homework, but damn was it satisfying to finish and solve!

There is a serious amount of knowledge being learned here by all, and it does take time, sure; but it is very satisfying work. I could tell you about all of the above data points and how the mixture fraction of the fuel is a localized and conceptual version of the mass fraction or how the Shvab-Zel’Dovich parameters help to make such analysis possible, but I’ll leave that for you to learn in the combustion class if you take it.

Instead of that kind of talk, I was driven last night to my stove. I often get distracted while reading about fire and start fantasizing of ways that it actually connects to real life – I want to see it. And it just so happened that I was reading about the subject of diffusion flames.

Understandibly, I still have many unanswered questions about the love of my life: fire. Things like why it looks at me how it does with different colors representing how efficient the flame is burning or how much carbon is being produced and thereby how much radiant heat energy is being lost (I’m looking at you, sleek yellowy flame on the left).

So I was led to removing the cover panel on my gas stove last night and equipped only with a wet towel, I wanted some answers right then and there. Long story short, after 30 or so minutes of messing with the disassembled stove at midnight, I had a much better understanding of diffusion vs. premixed flames. For you, just know that there is an amazing amount of philosophy, fire dynamics, and fluid mechanics going on as soon as you turn the knob on your stove to on. Enough there for me to spend my whole life pondering about with passion, even.

In other news, on the opposite of my topic, it is quickly getting cold up here in MA. Tonight it’ll hit around 45 F before the sun peeks around the roof shingles. Life is good. Cool weather, good friends, and lots and lots of dedication to studies. And a bit of fun, come on now.

Well, I’m off for a much needed break. Take over on tackling your passion for me.

Peace.

Three fire engines and a ladder truck just blared by my house going southbound on the street and stopped about two blocks away. What a beautiful sound of the QO2 siren screaming by on a chilly city night. It takes me back to a few years ago, hearing the fire dispatch alert going out, gearing up in seconds at the station with 45 pounds of firefighter bunker gear, and peeking around each street corner as the truck leaned away from the turn – not knowing if there would be a small car fire or a huge commercial building fire. Terrified people waiting with nobody left to turn to as their family members are endangered by the power of fire. Their life history, photo albums, accomplishments, and material possessions having flames licked at them and could be vaporized into an ashtray within only a minute.

That blaring sound is why I do what I do. And people ask me, why do I like this field so much? Fire is mesmerizing, fire is better understood each day that passes by, but still greatly misunderstood. Fire is extremely useful. Fire is extremely devastating. Fire has context to define its will.

To me, understanding the dynamics of a fire dancing and licking around can be like trying to understand the psychology of billions of different humans. It can be like trying to catch something running away by using differential equations and fluid dynamics. It can be like painting a picture for hours or days and the end product is something that sticks with you every day for the rest of time.

It is like playing on a sports team and working with your family when working in the lab. We work for 3 hours on setting up temperature sensors and calorimeters and even more hours discussing and brainstorming in a room boiling over with a mental flood of science, passion, logic, deduction, and induction. All about fire. Then we burn our creation in 1.73 minutes and forever destroy it, releasing yet another drop in the endless pool of ongoing knowledge.

Here is a video that exhibits a very successful test burn from today. The box is filled with small plastic cups and packed like one that would be shipped. We set up instruments inside to measure the fire size, temperature inside at different places, cameras to record the flame standoff distance, and a ton of other information.

I guess in my version of 1984, things make sense in this way: fire is knowledge, community is power, and intuition is freedom.

This is why I do what I do.

Update on the big move to MA

In just over 9 days, I will be departing for the big move to Massachusetts with nothing more than 16 boxes holding 30 cubic feet (about 224 US gallons) of my belongings. I will be traveling with my dad and cousin Abel and leaving behind 23 years of memories physically in the good old Houston of Texas.

The trip will involve a little-engine-that-could Ford station wagon and a Nighthawk 750 motorcycle with the three of us alternating riders for all of the comfort and enjoyment that the 1800 miles will bring upon us. The trip will look something like this:

I was fortunate after looking at 2200+ postings on craigslist to find a place to live for a good price (good by New England’s standards) which has all bills included AND is fully furnished! All I have to go on is a few pictures from the landlord and a few external supporting pictures thanks to modern technology (Thanks Google and Microsoft!):

I’ve tried to make it a focal point just to be a listener for my last days in Houston. My story is already known; I just want to slowly and patiently take information in as the final days leak through the drain.

Tianguis Cultural del Chopo

Last night, I met someone who was embarking on an adventure at the same time as I, except in a much different direction. She lives in Austin and will be taking THE bus down to Monterrey, Mexico then flying into Cuba for a few days. Just to explore the world and take in more experiences, couchsurfing style. What a great idea.

While I was looking around and making a customized Google map to share with her some cool spots that lay back in my memory, I was trying hard by visual cues and street names and picture order to find a punk/hippie/skater flea market that I ran across in Monterrey. I believe that it was fashioned after this concept in Mexico City:

The Tianguis Cultural del Chopo is a Saturday flea market near Mexico City downtown, known locally as El Chopo. [...]

Originally, the Tianguis was a place for hippies to trade sixties memorabilia including not only records but also clothing, magazines, books and other collectibles. Eventually, the Tianguis has also given place to more recent musical styles like metal, goth, punk, grunge and ska, among others. Almost always, some local and touring bands play live gigs at the back of the market, where you can also find the casual traders standing and looking up for that rare and collectable record or CDs.

On the northern end of the market at Aldama and Camelia is an area called Espacio Anarcho-punk. Vendors in this part of El Chopo sell mostly books, movies, and other materials that have an anarchist or radical perspective. Many of the Espacio Anarcho-Punk vendors contribute to a weekly zine of the same title addressing local social issues and radical politics.

(from Wikipedia)

Lots of cool stuff to be seen in the world.

Information R/evoultion

An excellent video about how information access, sharing, collaboration, and all of my other favorite things going on in the world is here:

Wordle.net says that if you took my public brain so far and blended it into oblivion, it would look something like this. Looks about right to me!

WPI

Welp, I’ve been accepted to start my M.S. and eventually start my Ph.D. at Worcester Polytechnic Institute this fall! I will be studying fire protection engineering, a continuation of my bachelor’s degree. The school is populated with just under 4,000 students and it is a private engineering school. Not only does this school house one of the top fire protection engineering programs in the US, but the faculty and their work align closely with my values and passions in life.

The big move will look something like this in 8 weeks:

Some cool info about the school includes the fact that Robert Goddard went there and graduated in 1908 – he was the gradnfather of modern rocketry with the first liquid fueled rocket. Also, the fire protection engineering department has about 150 masters of science students and 4 (!) doctoral students. This is quite the opportunity I smell.

What I did during the summer of 2008

So far this summer I’m being funded by UHD as a last request to make a catalog of fire models for various textbooks. The work is very refreshing and I love to work when I learn much more than I expected. Another cool side effect of this work is that I can include the FDS models and example writeups on my website, free for anyone else in the world to see and learn from. The technical writeup is located here and it gets updated automatically anytime I change a single word in there. Eventually it will have links to FDS files for FDS users and students around the world to download and use on their own – I love technology.

FDS MESH Size Calculator tool

Finally, to finish off a nice post about fire protection engineering and FDS: I updated my FDS Mesh Size calculator on my other website to include some awesome and never-before-done functionality! It now takes in x, y, and z dimensions and an expected heat release rate and gives the user three MESH lines (coarse, moderate, and fine) to guide them on making an FDS file that has an adequately resolved MESH.

The tool can be found here on my FDS/sciency website and the nice folks at NIST gave me a link on their third-party tools page of the FDS website: http://fire.nist.gov/fds/thirdparty.html

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I know I post out-there stuff like this on my blog here sometimes, but this is what is on my mind and taking up my mental cycles and daily days. Jump in and read the linked pages or play with the tools of my creation!