Officially Answered OU

Well, I sent an email to OU last night saying that we coming. Lots still to get in order, though. We currently hope to visit in Arizona and Texas along the way in August. And spend some vacation time with grandparents here this summer camping or something if possible. Jacob is still unhappy with leaving. David says he's for it but has indicated he'd like to move back afterwards. Sam wants to move to a bigger house but stay in California. Anna and Zeke of course have no clue. Hopefully we can keep everyone happy and make it a good experience. And also learn how to cinch the belt a lot on the budget.

I've also been thinking some recently about Mr. Holland's Opus. Quinn Pack, Mark Spencer, Ann Trainer (nee Jensen), and I all went over to Quinn's house after we got back from our missions to watch the movie. I guess it must have been Quinn's idea. I'm not sure what spurred that on, and I don't approve of everything in the movie, but I've thought about it now and then since that time. No particular exact moral at the moment, but it makes me think about things. President Monson's message in the latest Ensign also has some interesting related subject matter. Most important is that we feel good about what we're doing, that it's an acceptable decision. Later on down the road there may be both good and bad to come of it. Hopefully more good, but we haven't been inspired against it. Rather again, as I said, we've felt good about it. And there's something to be said of that.

On other subjects, they had our monthly activity at work last Friday. Some indoor soccer. I got a big dude's shoulder right in my chest. Still hurting. I manage to get injured too frequently at physical company activities. I guess that makes me the common element. Hmm.

Instigoration

Here's the YouTube page for the Pooh movie we made last week.

Feel free to send that link to others (rather than sending links to this blog post).

Apartment Reserved

Well, we reserved an apartment with the plan (somewhat due to their availability date) to move in mid-April. So hopefully the house can be fixed up soon after that for selling. It all scares me. Big things always do.

We made a Winnie-the-Pooh movie last night about the letter A. Jacob, Sam, and I are in it. Kristine filmed. Once the editing is done, I want to put it on YouTube to encourage sharing it. I'd like to try new movies again in the future. So, to avoid encouraging linking now, I won't show an intermediate movie version. But I do hope to have it done soon.

I sang with the choir for the ward Easter program today, and the Spirit was very strong during much of the program. Things didn't go as well for Kristine, since Sam got worked up. So I probably won't be spending all sacrament meeting in front much for a while.

OU Visit and Sickly Kids

I enjoyed the visit at OU. Flew out on Wednesday and met with Mom and Steve during a layover in Dallas, which was nice to be able to do.

At OU, I mostly met with Dr. Andrew Fagg, but his wife Dr. Amy McGovern and another AI researcher Dr. Dean Hougen are in related topics on the CS faculty. I also got tours of various labs, met with other professors (including in ME and art), attended some classes, got to see their robotics labs, and also got to experiment with Bion a bit. I even had lunch Thursday with the dean of the College of Engineering. I was nervous, but I think it went well.

Came back Thursday night.

Kristine and the kids survived while I was out, though all the kids got sick. Yucky sinus stuff and some with fevers. David was especially hard hit. So only some of the family got to the Easter activity at church yesterday.

Today was a special fast day in the stake for missionary work.

Birthdays Last Week and to OU This Week

Had Kristine's and Sam's birthdays. I'll try to put up video sometime soon. Sam had a big party yesterday, something we allow for the five year birtdays.

I'm off to visit Oklahoma this week. They are paying. I also let Dr. Andrew Fagg know that I'm married with 5 kids. I hope he doesn't stress too much over that. In any case, I need to make sure he knows that if I go to school there (or wherever), it will be to take school seriously.

OU Offers Money; Kristine's Birthday Coming

This week, the School of Computer Science at the University of Oklahoma said they are offering me their CS Graduate Fellowship. That's $21K per year plus tuition. I'd have to work as a TA then RA 20 hours/week. I presume so far, but better ask, that the RA hours could include working on my dissertation research. Probably a matter of how it's all coordinated. I think it could work out.

Also, at the Shaltes house today, we sang happy birthday to Kristine. She'll soon be joining me in the society of trigenarians: