Networking and More

A favorite family picture!  Onam is an annual harvest festival and major event for Keralites.  It the official festival in the Indian state of Kerala.    

Did I mention that I was able to meet up with our new Online Community Director, @olivierlp  in Boston last month? The oval building in the background I am pointing to is our PTC Boston Seaport Headquarters.     It was a beautiful night, warm in the high 60s before the first December frost crept in over that weekend.              

Hi, PTC Community,   This is our last "Top Engager" post for 2021. We are taking a break next month to review the entire last year contributions and pass out our Annual Recognition Badges for 2021. If you have been following our Recognition Series  you might have some guesses on who the 2021 honor recipients might be!   But for now, we want to end the year on a Good Note and recognized November 2021 Top Engagers!   Thank you for all your great engagement!  Hope to see you continue making music(?) with us next year!   @VladimirN @StuartBruff @ValeryOchkov @Werner_E @TomU @LucMeekes @MartinHanak  @Fred_Kohlhepp @JS_9824412 @StephenW @tbraxton @Patriot_1776 @ysinitsin @Dale_Rosema  @LawrenceS @Sathishkumar_C @JD_2779181 @BenLoosli @ttokoro @BG_9869104 @avillanueva  @RPN @KenFarley @STEVEG @muser  @Sergey @Mukul_467346 @kdirth&

The Shanghai STAR Committee had a great "Office Escape" Christmas Event in Shanghai!  

Where do I start???  2021 had its challenges - but those just made the really special moments that much more!   🎓 Pre-School Graduation!  🎓     🎆Watching my son really experience 4th of July Fireworks for the first time!  🎆     🚀  Walking around on Halloween in a blow up rocket to encourage my sons love of space!  (Guys - no joke - waddling around, in what basically amounts to an adult size balloon for 3 hours, is definitely NOT a walk in the park!). 🚀     🎄And last, but not least, successfully organizing man and beast for a family Christmas picture to share on the PTC Community.  As a side note - the fact that Bella (our dog) kept that bow on her for longer then 5 minutes is proof positive that miracles really do exist.  🎄     🎉. I wish you and yours a wonderful holiday season and look forward to working with all of you in the New Year!  🎉

The best part of Christmas is celebrating with loved ones!    

When I moved to NC from CO, I threw away my ugly sweater...but I have this one!  😬     A big 2021 memory for me is joining PTC and getting to know the extended PTC Community Support Team!   and I make friends easily… 😃  

Two big celebrations!    My wife and I celebrated our 25th Wedding Anniversary.  The day started with traditional blessings, followed by a big party!         ________________________________________________________________________________________________     An unexpected surprise 45th birthday party - still trying to figure out how my wife and kids made that happen since we were in Covid lockdown!     Not pictured in the below is Dollar, our dog, chasing me as I protect my "birthday bottles"!  😃    

                    My name is Maple and I am pawsitively excited to share with you my 2021 thoughts.             2021 went by so fast! I actually loved it.  My mama was still 100% working from home so I loved curling up by her feet. I would start licking her fingers and flip flop...naked toes if I thought she was working too long and needed to go for a walk.  When the shiny box starts talking, I enjoyed meetups with @Leigh .  She seems so very knowledgeable and such a devoted mom to the little blonde boy that pops on from time to time.  He really reminds me of my boy.  My boy is 8 years older, but still I would really love to jump through the screen, lick his face, and play frisbee with him too  some time!  I know my mama doesn't think of Leigh as just a coworker but a friend!  This year I saw two more faces on the shiny box @AndrewK and&nb

What’s makes my Autumn mood? Cool, crisp walks through Moscow area with my wife. After watching our walk, please add your own foliage pictures 🍁.       Several photos from the video are presented below and in the attachment. Here, behind the photographs, the following music should sound for autumn mood: Explosions in the Sky - "Chisos" (2021), link - https://bit.ly/3lFG0nl    

This is my family's favorite time of year! Every year we look forward to spending time together during the holidays. Everyone takes a break from work and school and we get together with family and friends to celebrate.  

Romania in the winter season has great light displays!  My favorite part of winter!             

The Christmas Season always recalls two fond memories of my son when he was younger.  He's all grown now!  😊          

  ....I have a funny picture......             AND.....a collage of what Christmas means for me.  🤗        

  My favorite holiday of the year is CHRISTMAS , because I get to see the family reunited, give and receive gifts as well as eat traditional food like sarmale and the best of the best COZONAC!!! 😃    

 

I couldn't decide which tradition I enjoy more, so invited my Halloween date to share in my Christmas celebration!        

Holi is a popular Indian festival, also known as the "Festival of Love", the "Festival of Colors" and the "Festival of Spring". Holi celebrates the arrival of spring, the end of winter, the blossoming of love and for many, it is a festive day to meet others, play and laugh, forget and forgive, and repair broken relationships. The festival also celebrates the beginning of a good spring harvest season. It lasts for a night and a day, starting on the evening of the Purnima (Full Moon Day) falling in the Hindu calendar month of Phalguna, which falls around the middle of March in the Gregorian calendar.          

Diwali is the festival of lights. This festival is celebrated all over India and Indians all over the world. It symbolises the victory of light over darkness and good over evil. “Diwali” is also known as “Deepawali” which means "row of lights/lighted lamps”. It is celebrated in memory of victory of "Lord Ram" over the demon "Ravan".     The Ganesh festival marks the birth of Lord Ganesh, the god of wisdom and prosperity. It falls in the Bhadrapada month of the Hindu calendar, which falls in August-September and lasts for 11 days. Lord Ganesh is considered a symbol of wisdom, writing, travel, commerce and good fortune.      

This may be my last post for the year. We'll see how I fare after tomorrow. I am getting a total knee replacement on the right side, so I'll be out of the office until after the first of the year. Have a blessed Christmas celebrating with your family and friends.   Why do engineers often confused Halloween and Christmas? Because Oct 31 = Dec 25! 

Hi,,,,before everyone in the U.S. unplugs I wanted our October 2021 Top Engagers to help wish everyone a  "Happy Thanksgiving!"  We appreciate the contributions from all our PTC Community Members!   @VladimirN @StuartBruff @ttokoro @LucMeekes @ValeryOchkov @TomU @Werner_E @StephenW    @MartinHanak @Fred_Kohlhepp @Dale_Rosema @pshashipreetham @Chris3 @KenFarley @tbraxton @AP_9587236    @Marco_Tosin @BenLoosli @STEVEG @KB_10074140 @BG_9869104    Well Done! (....not Over Done ;)....can you really "over do" engagement?  NOPE.  Can turkey be overdone?   Perhaps  🙂 Check out Dale_Rosema' s  Thanksgiving post on tips for cooking the best turkey from an engineering perspective!     Be sure to add your turkey pictures and Thanksgiving blessings!      

Have a blessed weekend. Watch a Christmas pageant or two. Enjoy this little ones in the sheep, shepherd  or wise men costumes.    Once upon a time, in a kingdom not far from here, a king summoned two of his advisors for a test. He showed them both a shiny metal box with two slots in the top, a control knob, and a lever. "What do you think this is?"   One advisor, an engineer, answered first. "It is a toaster," he said. The king asked, "How would you design an embedded computer for it?" The engineer replied, "Using a four-bit microcontroller, I would write a simple program that reads the darkness knob and quantizes its position to one of 16 shades of darkness, from snow white to coal black. The program would use that darkness level as the index to a 16-element table of initial timer values. Then it would turn on the heating elements and start the timer with the initial value selected from the table. At the end of the time delay, it would turn off the heat and pop up

Have blessed weekend. Are you anticipating anything? This is a season of celebrating waiting / anticipating...... both past, present, and yet to come!   Out tomorrow so an early post:   The Top 10 Things Engineering School Didn't Teach 10. There are about 10 types of capacitors. 9. Theory tells you how a circuit works, not why it doesn't work. 8. Not everything works according to the specs in the databook. 7. Anything practical you learn will be obsolete before you use it, except the complex math, which you will never use. 6. Always try to fix the hardware with the software. 5. Engineering is like having an 8 a.m. class and a late afternoon lab every day for the rest of your life. 4. Overtime pay? What overtime pay? 3. Engineers rule the world until the next revision. 2. If you like junk food, caffeine, and all-nighters, then you should go into software. 1. Dilbert is a documentary.

If you are in the States, enjoy your long Thanksgiving weekend. Start a list of all the things for which you are blessed when following the instructions below. Enjoy.       Thanksgiving Day Preparation - An Engineer's Help Manual Preparing the turkey for Thanksgiving can be a monumental task. With stuffing, proper basting and long cooking times, it can be both difficult and intimidating to hold the responsibility of preparing the turkey. This helpful guide will step you through the process of preparing your turkey utilizing appropriate engineering concepts in order to reduce time, scrap and rework. Table of Contents Selection Process Procedures Software Tools and Updates Thermal Deformation Internal Components Final Assembly Assembly Troubleshooting for Build Issues Reporting Methods NOTE: No animals were harmed in the creation of this document. Some marketers were, but they will not be missed. Selection Process Procedure Collecting Raw Material Before beg

During the up coming week, start writing a list of all the things for which you are thankful. You may surprise yourself.  (Count your many blessings, name them one by one........)   George Washington Gale Ferris Jr, the man who invented the Ferris Wheel, never met Thomas Bradshaw, the man who invented the Merry Go Round / Carousel.   They ran in different circles.