Chapman Kids Blog

"In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world." –John 16:33

San Pedro Garza Garcia

Month: March 2020

Afternoons with Donald

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On Tuesday, March 31, 2020

In Christianity, culture, Health

Lorena and I try to never miss any of President Trump’s press conferences on the Chinese Corona-virus. This seems to be a historic time not only in terms of this current plague, but with the feel of the times. It all seems very apocalyptic. God seems to be working in ways that might not be easily understood, but at the same time, it is not too difficult to believe the world is in dire need of a moral and ethical reset and God has done this many time before. I am reading in Isaiah and it is full of the kinds of admonishments that appear to be warranted in a time such as this. My hope in all this is that this will serve as a wake-up call for a society that is hedonistic and needs to be more reflective.

We are thankful to President trump that he takes US seriously enough that he is willing to give us daily, very personal updates.

Stumbling forward

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On Monday, March 30, 2020

In Retirement PhD, WaterEval

The retirement PhD project is moving right along. We actually think we have stumbled onto something that might be important. We have had opportunity to work and reflect on what we are doing at a deeper level than might have been possible if we were still living life before the Chinese Corona-virus. We think it has paid off. Today we pretty much came to an agreement on what will be necessary to finish my PhD research. It is a good bit of work, but there is not too much science left because we have already done the heavy lifting in that regard. There is still the significant burden of the taking of classes, passing the prelims, and writing it all up, but that is just work, not invention. The graphs in the image are the result of our special insight. Now all we have to do is see if the NSF or some other funding agency buys into what we believe we have discovered!

Strange days

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On Sunday, March 29, 2020

In Art, Christianity

Strange days. We listened to President Trump’s talk about the China corona-virus this afternoon and learned his advisers have recommended we stay in self-quarantine through the month of April. That is really fine with us on a micro level. Lorena and I enjoy being together in the house. I have my work and school. Lorena has plenty of cooking, painting, and cleaning projects she not only does, but enjoys doing. The kids seem OK, too. Both of them have their jobs, but are getting a little stir-crazy staying in their apartments, albeit their apartments are very nice. Still, life seems somewhat surreal. Tío Lauro, who always seems to have his finger on the zeitgeist, paints a self-portrait that really captures the spirit of the moment. We love his art.

My reading of the prophesies of Cyrus the Great in Isaiah 44 and 45 have heightened my sense that something monumental is in the works. Somewhere around 150 years before it happened, Isaiah prophesied of the liberation of Israel by Cyrus to return to Jerusalem to rebuild the temple. Isaiah actually used Cyrus’s name in the prophesy. The archaeological record appears to strongly back this up and even Josephus pipes in with confirmation of what was believed about the event in the first century. This seems to be one of those kinds of things. At the same time, my Aunt Fern (99 years old and going strong) talks about this very same feeling people had during World War II. This might be the same thing.

But maybe not.

Talking to Andrew

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On Wednesday, March 25, 2020

In Blogging

Journal Clip Art

I had a long talk with Andrew, my buddy and colleague from our Raleigh days, yesterday. It was really good to get caught up. We talked about many things, but Andrew made mention of my journaling habit. I thought about it a lot after the phone call. Journaling–blogging in this case–really helps me stay on track with things that I want to accomplish. The writing helps me refine my thoughts and consider things I would not have considered if I were not writing about it.

I need to stay organized on several things that might actually be of interest to a few people, but that would certainly be improved with some writing to give myself some direction. I have talked about this before, but now that I am into a couple of projects, I can talk about them in more detail. I do not want to try to do too much so I am going to try to focus on just three things. I have talked about #1 and #2 before, but have really just started getting into #3. The things I want to talk about, but in more detail are these:

  1. Doing a retirement PhD — just the part of being old and going back to school.
  2. The technical aspects of the PhD program — hydrology, machine learning and machine vision.
  3. Flipping houses in Mexico — something on which we embarked almost by accident

I am doing this all for selfish reasons–it helps me stay organized and motivated. It also helps me decide if/when I am done or when it is no longer worth it. All good things.

Coronavirus: Work and study from home

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On Wednesday, March 18, 2020

In Education, Health

I am currently fighting slovenliness as there is no end in sight to our self-quarantine. All our church meetings (Sunday morning, Wednesday Bible study, and Gospel meeting) have been cancelled. Everyone with whom I work at my day job in Boston works from home whenever they can which usually only leaves one or two people in the home office each day. Even at University of Nebraska, all classes are currently being delivered remotely. The UNL remote class thing might work well for me because it might allow me to take some of the required classes I need online as opposed to the current minimum on-campus component. The picture is my new online meeting, scruffy, work-from-home look. Lorena is in rebellion about this.

Kelly showed me yesterday the university where she works has the oldest epidemiology program in the entire world and they are focused very heavily on helping solve the Coronavirus problem. She does not have any special insights to what they are doing, but she is working near a lot of people who work on it. Maybe she will learn some things as we move through this period of upheaval.

Forced homeschool

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On Tuesday, March 17, 2020

In Homeschool

The Chinese Coronavirus is cause for lots of reflection on a lot of things. One of those things is what people are saying about having to have their children home with them because the schools have closed for weeks and in one case (Kansas) for the rest of the school year. It is sad to me that people view this as a burden. I understand all the economic reasons why this is difficult and I have some empathy, in most cases, for that. But the idea that having ones children around is a burden is completely foreign to Lorena and I. Why even have kids if you do not want them around.

The corollary to the above issue is hearing that people do not feel equipped to teach their children and that a trained teacher is required to do that properly. That makes me crazy. The very thing that helped our kids to start to succeed is to get them away from “trained teachers” if what one means by that is teachers trained at teacher education programs in colleges and universities across the USA. My honest belief is that kind of thinking is both selfish and lazy.

Spring is on the way!

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On Monday, March 16, 2020

In House and home

Lorena took this picture this afternoon. A couple of days ago we woke up with a blanket of white on the ground. Really looking forward to seeing some leaves on the deciduous trees. With the Coronavirus lurking around every corner, it will be nice to have some sunshine to give us hope for summer and health.

The diploma wall

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On Monday, March 16, 2020

In Education

Lorena and I did some (very minor) home improvement projects this weekend. We moved a sofa downstairs so Lorena can join me when I am down here working and we mounted Kelly’s and Christian’s diplomas to the wall in the upstairs main bedroom. The consist of:

  • Associate of Science from Wake Technical Community College (Kelly)
  • Bachelor of Science (Statistics) North Carolina State University (Kelly)
  • Bachelor of Science (Applied Math) North Carolina State University (Christian)
  • Master of Science (Business Administration) University of Washington (Kelly)
  • PhD (Electrical Engineering) Arizona State University (Christian)

We plan to add my diplomas here–all but the worthless one from my wasted time at the government high school in Newberg. God willing, Lorena will be able to add an Associate Degree pretty soon and I might finish my PhD in a few years. Maybe this will serve as inspriation.

One more start

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On Saturday, March 14, 2020

In Blogging

It is a beautiful snowy day in Centralia. The view is from my office. Western Washington State is kind of a crazy place to be right now. The current count for the coronavirus for the state is 37 dead and 568 infected. Kelly and Christian in Baltimore and Boston, respectively, have both been instructed to work from home until things calm down a little. As for me, I have been asked not to visit our home office in the Boston area for the same reason. That does not change much for me. It is nice to be home with Lorena, but we get cabin fever with no one going to the store unless they really need something.

The situation does lend it self to allow me work on my PhD project and I am making good progress. Since things are moving forward nicely on the doctoral front and I have the time, I thought it might be nice to start writing again. I will try to write several times per week going forward. There are lots of changes taking place in the world right now and it will be nice to have a place to comment on those things, too.

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