danaleeling

My statistics textbook has been built on top of hand coded HTML since 2003 and remains online as of this writing. While copying the text over into the Instructure Canvas LMS, I stumbled back across notes in the comments that document some of the tech trajectory underneath the past 18 years of development. Eventually even the comments were no longer being updated.  Originally Copyleft (c) 2003 http://www.dsl.org/copyleft/dsl.txt Text originally developed by Dana Lee Ling 26 February 2003 using a personally owned computer at home and personally owned software. HTML-Kit Version 1.0 (Build 292) OS: Windows XP Home Version 5.1 (Build 2600: Service Pack 1) Components: IE 6.0.2800.1154, COMCTL32 6.0, SHELL32 6.0.2800.0 Memory: 31,896 KB out of 129,008 KB of physical memory available on an eMachines T1.440 GHz 128 Mb RAM. Further development in 2007 and 2008 using an Equus Nobilus ...

Every term in MS 150 Statistics I use a body fat monitor to measure the students weight and to estimate their body fat. The data is primarily used, with names stripped out, as number sets to play with during the term. Secondarily this provides information to a population at high risk of obesity and associated metabolic syndromes, number two on the planet as a percentage of the population with a BMI higher that 25. The 2012 International Diabetes Federation atlas puts the FSM at number one on the planet for diabetes. The students become inured to my exhortations to exercise, eat right, and to track their numbers. Because I get to see the students numbers, and because I exhort those around me to get annual physicals and exercise, I always feel that sharing my numbers is incumbent on me. Although I do try to take a pill for my health, my health habits are not yet well aligned with modern heart attack prevention guidelines. Indicator 2007 2008 2009 2010 20...

In the wake of a recent Runner's World article, Sitting is the New Smoking - Even for Runners , I returned to using a standing desk at work. I had tried one before, but I could not get the right height for my keyboard, nor an optimal distance for my monitor. My current work station has permitted a return to a standing desk. My keyboard is up on a box that is just the right hand for me when I type while standing. My trackball is slightly low, perched atop my computer case. I will probably boost it up at some point - there are no standing desks on line. I have been using my new rig for a week and in general I find standing useful and not too uncomfortable. 35 years of running along with over two decades of pacing while teaching have gifted me with decent standing legs. The air cleaner seen on the floor is a relic of a time when the central air conditioning unit - now defunct and replaced by split units - pumped dust into the air. My office is in the common hallway airspace ...

I rarely buy raffle tickets. This is not a moral or ethical position. I simply do not want to risk winning. I facilitate learning in statistics. Unlike those who play the lottery or gamble in Las Vegas, I do not only do not believe I am lucky, I do not want to be lucky. Lucky means that a rare and unusual event has occurred. An event in the tail of a distribution. I do not want to be in the tail of the distribution. I want to be safely in the middle of the distribution. Live a life of average length with the average assortment of the usual issues of aging. Average is good, average is safe. Lucky is in the tail of the distribution. Lucky is rare. Rare is being struck by lightning. You have to be lucky to be hit by lightning. Or to come down with a rare, untreatable condition that baffles doctors. Or to slide off the road at the one small place where there happens to be a cliff. Engaging in raffles is risking being lucky, is asking to be lucky. I fear lucky. I needed a phone card t...

Being as Christmas fell on a Sunday, the Kolonia Kosrae Congregational Church marched on Christmas eve Saturday. The day starts with food preparation at the house. Marching is not until the afternoon. Joseph and Mary star in the Sunday School skit. Baby Jesus is no plastic doll either, a real live baby starred in the lead role. Mary was very skilled - singing and marching while carrying a bag of candy and the baby Jesus. Joseph is very fortunate to have such a skilled wife. First she removed her angelic hair band, then she proceeded to rip off those wings. She was clearly fed up with being type cast once again as the angel. A family star bearer on the left. The front line of Yonkumi choir. Joseph also joined Yonkumi. This was the last shot I got off before being strangled by that same towed. Three sisters and a distant cousin as star bearers on the front line of Ichikumi. Shrue, Elterina, and Hanna take a turn on the front row. ...

The Christmas concert, an event where parents dive into a photographic mosh pit with the latest in digital technology to get that blurry, unbalanced photo of their angel or little prince. A shepherd out watching their flock and singing. A singing shepherd is a happy shepherd. Was also a shepherd, here standing with his instructor.

Pre-halloween the kids played with their cyalumes sent by their sister and grandmother. Slow synch night mode produced the following images. The gang geared up the next evening for treating. Three princesses, one from Europe and two from the Pacific. SDA school fair included spending the whole day wet.  Slipping and sliding post-Halloween! If you spend the whole day wet, one is abed under the late afternoon sun. His first arm's length "FaceBook" self portrait! Of course he is eleven years from having an FB account, but no sense waiting eleven years to practice these critical life skills. His arms are still a tad short, but a modern digital adjusts for the overflash effect quite nicely.

The MiCare Healthy Lifestyle 5k fun run is a new addition to the annual running calendar. The run is unique in featuring a health screening tent. I stopped by pre-race and checked my numbers. Heart rate 58 bpm, blood pressure 130/72, fasting blood sugar 101. Those last three numbers are not good. My son stayed with me longer and farther than ever before, running with me out to the Lidakida turn-around on the causeway. He finished hot on my heels at 31:06, thanks to his push I managed to just barely eke in under 30 minutes at 29:35. That is a PR for him, and a long time since I have seen a two as the leading digit. My son with race director Bong. My youngest daughter also joined the run, also pushing harder and faster than ever before. For the first time on the lower route, I met her while I was still on the causeway. We met just in front of JBI at the Edwin's place. Post-run poster posing. My son was the second under 12 to cross the finish line, good for a medal today...

Kacl money Akira and his cats First Joy lunch. The tables and chairs are a recent renovation.

Checked in for abdominal discomfort, ultrasound reveals a gall stone. Juggling children was the nature of the week. Tuesday and the three were up at the college. A dear friend whomped up the most wonderful all organic spaghetti with salad and whole wheat muffins for the children one evening. A very happy customer! A couple nights later a noise in a cabinet at Genesis... ... and this is how babies arrive! Not from the stork but by popping out of cabinets in the surgical ward. No fear of either the dark nor enclosed spaces. In on a Sunday, removed on a Tuesday, discharged on Friday. The cause of the discomfort: a gall stone of some size. Water swirling at bath time. A ring of water off of the heel of a brush.