Todd Grooms

Over the last eight months or so, I’ve had difficulty separating work from my personal life. I have been unable to disconnect, which has left me with a low level hum of anxiety as a constant companion. To be clear, I am not working all the time; rather, I just carry work with me without release, no empty space to occupy my thoughts when I’m off the clock. I have been unable to sit in the moment in my downtime, unable to just enjoy or relax.

One stressor in this is that when I’m off the clock from work, I’m on the clock as father. There is no break, no rest, no solace. I chug through the work day and push through the evening for those one or two hours (if I am lucky) of “me” time. Once that time is available, I then feel guilt for not accomplishing more, not working more, not being involved as a husband or as a father more. Time is fleeting and our most precious commodity; once it is spent, there is no reclaiming it. It is finite and in high demand. I’ve been reading a 300 page book for months because I will not permit myself the time to just read.

Fall is finally here in Nashville

Mammoth Cave, Frozen Niagara

Columbus-Belmont State Park

Nature, uhh, finds a way

Driveway chalk art

The Classic chimed!

First vaccination down!

Starting to pop.

Just around the corner.

A few years back, a coworker kept a Macintosh Classic on his desk as an adornment. I was unfamiliar with the machine or what it was like to use one, but I loved the look of the machine. The first Apple computer I used was the Apple II, which we used in elementary school. We mostly used these machines for academic games and word processing. Between that time and my first Apple computer (the first generation MacBook Pro), I did not even touch another Apple computer. Although I was not given the chance to own or use one, I became enamored with Apple computers when the iMac G3 was launched. I wanted an iMac, but it was, sadly, out of our budget.

As we were preparing to move office spaces, we were asked to cull our personal items. We would have less personal space in the new office, which meant space was at a premium. My coworker was preparing to part with his Macintosh Classic. I learned that it was not functional and he did not care to take it home. To spare it from the e-waste bin, I took the machine home.

I had planned on keeping it as a desk adornment in my home office. For over two years, that is what I did. However, over the past year I started reading more about 68k Macintoshes. I found communities of people who have great affection for these machines. Some will lovingly restore the machines to working order. The bug bit me and towards the end of 2020 I decided I wanted to do the same.

For Christmas, I received an iFixit Pro Tech Toolkit. With this kit, I proceeded to pop open the Macintosh Classic to assess the state of the machine. The case was incredibly difficult to remove. In the walkthroughs I had watched on Youtube, the case slide off easily. This was my first clue that something was amiss. After thirty minutes or so, I finally had the case off. I was horrified to find rust. The metal chassis had quite a bit of rust, especially the part of the chassis that the cased mounted to with screws. That explained the difficulty in removing the case. Before removing the case, I had noted a knocking noise when moving the computer around. I soon found the culprits: the remnants of the PRAM battery and a capacitor were rolling around freely in the case. My guess is the PRAM battery acid corroded the metal chassis. I had heard and read stunning stories on the amount of damage these batteries can do.

I started inspecting the boards. The logic board looked pretty clean. I still need to remove the PRAM battery cradle, but I was relieved to see the logic board to be in good shape. Somehow the acid from the battery had avoided damaging the board. The analog board looked clean as well. I found a missing capacitor there, which explained the loose capacitor in the case. Now that I could see the boards looked clean, I decided to move forward. I would need all new capacitors (these are the most common failure points) and the tools to replace the capacitors (hello soldering iron). Over the past month, I acquired these items. Now I was ready to get down to business.

Pictures taken of the case removal

We recently celebrated Adelaide’s first birthday. It is simultaneously difficult to believe that she has already been with us for a full year and that there was ever a time that she was not with us. There have been some tough moments. However, this year has been quite fulfilling. We are now in that phase where she is developing her own personality and her own mannerisms. I love watching her progress. I adore her.

We are unbelievably fortunate to be in our position and in good health.

Opening up a Macintosh Classic for restoration.

A little late with the finished product, but I was able to finish my Christmas project before Christmas. I had a custom box built to house all of the components. I was able to mount the relay and the power strips. I used double-sided tape to hold all of the other components down.

Unfortunately, the relay had a bit of an issue. The first channel would not completely shut off. So the relay would kick that channel on, then the lights would remain lit after kicking it off. I ended up starting a return process with Amazon and they shipped a replacement which made it a few days before Christmas. Unfortunately, the replacement also had an issue: the sixth channel would not work at all (lights would not kick on). I believe I will cancel the return, keep both, and start looking at part replacements. It seems like that component can be replaced with a little solder work and if I can fix these boards, I will have two functioning boards moving forward.

I plan on keeping everything together and adding on in the future. I really need to figure out how I am going to add more sequences in the future. There are websites that sell sequence files, but I would need to update my script to parse those new sequence files. I could also make my own sequences, but that would require me to analyze music file waveforms and come up with patterns myself. This seems to be quite a bit of work, especially for someone like me who is a novice when it comes to working with audio software. Oh well, that is a Christmas 2021 problem.

I typically do not set resolutions for myself. I believe that most resolutions are destined to fail. However, Ashley promptly asked me what my resolutions were for the new year. After a year in which I mostly focused on “hanging on”, I decided it was probably a good idea to set resolutions for myself for 2021. Without further adieu, here are my resolutions for 2021, why I chose them, and how I plan on achieving them.

Read a book a month

I spend most of my day on a computer or wrangling kids. I’ve never been a big reader, but I feel better when I read more often. I typically read 3-6 books a year. This year, I want to read a book a month. My plan to accomplish this is to read in the morning, instead of procrastinating to reading at night when I am too tired to read or even really retain much of what I am reading. I figure I can read a bit in the morning with my morning coffee and a bit in the evening before bed and I should be able to read more than I have in the past.

Be better organized (Take notes)

I am not disorganized, but I would not classify myself as organized either. I spend a not insignificant amount of time every day retracing my steps on where I was yesterday so that I can continue with today’s work. Things have not been falling in-between the cracks, but I believe that I can take small steps to avoid the extra time and brain power involved with retracing my steps, which will incrementally make my life better. My idea is to take notes, almost keeping a journal. One thing I realized when I was in college was that I retained information better after writing it down. This led to me rewriting my notes while studying. I believe that writing down what I have been doing will help me retain that information. Additionally, if I do not retain it, I can spend a few minutes reading through the previous day’s notes and I should be ready to go.

Mail birthday cards to close relatives

I have done a pretty good job of adding birthdays to my contacts. However, I usually just end up sending a text message on their birthday. Instead, I would rather take the time to send them a birthday card. I plan on buying a box of birthday cards. Then I plan on taking some time to look at my upcoming birthday calendar for the next week at the beginning of every week. Then I will make out cards for family and friends with upcoming birthdays. I might write a small script to query contacts for upcoming birthdays and compile a list to help speed up this process.

Restore the Macintosh Classic

This is a bit of a fun one. I saved a Macintosh Classic from the trash heap a few years ago. It has been an office adornment ever since. However, I recently received an iFixit tool kit for Christmas and was able to open the Classic. The PRAM battery had burst and a capacitor has popped off the analog board. The metal chassis is completely wrecked with rust. However, the boards seem to, somehow, be fine. I plan on replacing the capacitors on both boards, then I plan on seeing if it will boot up. If I can get it to boot, I will then look into acquiring a metal chassis to replace the rusted one. Then if everything goes well, I plan on retrobrighting the case and completely restoring it.

Ho Ho Ho

Christmas Project

After finishing the light sequence, I modified the breadboard to wire an LED for each channel. Then I modified the Xmas.py script from the Instructables walkthrough. I then grabbed an mp3 copy of Let it Go from Amazon. Now I am in business.

The next step will be wiring up the relay and stringing up the lights.

Source

The next step for my Christmas project was to setup a breadboard with LEDs and to light those LEDs in a pattern. Once I had one LED working, setting up more was trivial. Now that I have the pattern lit up, I’m ready for the next part.

Source

We have friends who put out a huge Christmas light display every year. The lights are connected to a computer and that computer will drive a light show that is synchronized with music. They also invested in an FM transmitter to broadcast the music to cars who want to stop and watch the show. I have always loved this idea and have often entertained the notion of putting together our own light display. Unfortunately, we live in the rear house of a two house lot, which means we have no street visible area for a light show. We still put out Christmas lights every year, but these lights are mostly for us to enjoy as no one else will see them. I had mostly given up the idea of putting together a large light project. However, this year I stumbled across this: Raspberry Pi Christmas Light Show. After I saw this project, I knew I wanted to try and put one of these together for our house.

I made a hard sell to Max. My idea was to have a project we could work on together. After he agreed, I ordered the parts. The parts arrived the weekend after Thanksgiving and we started to test out a few things. We started by prepping the Pi, which means we had to apply the heat sinks, and install Raspberry Pi OS on an SD card. I had already purchased an Adafruit console cable for when I bought my first Pi to setup our Pi-hole. Connecting the console cable is a cinch:

Black -> GND
White -> TXD
Green -> RXD

If you’re connecting to the Pi through the console cable on a Mac, you’ll need to install drivers. If you’re connecting to the Pi through the console cable on Linux, the drivers should already be installed (or at least were for me on Pop!_OS). You can just use screen to connect:

$ sudo screen /dev/ttyUSB0 115200

The ttyUSB0 might be different on your setup.

After ensuring we could connect to the Pi, it was time for our Hello World equivalent: wire a push button and LED on a breadboard through the GPIO pins and write a simple Python script to run the circuit. When the push button is depressed, the LED should emit light; when the push button is released, the LED should not emit light. After setting up this test, I demonstrated it to Max. He was nonplussed; tough crowd.

Source

Autumn colors in Nashville.

Finally

Rainy day walk near Kentucky Lake.

Ashley was helping Max cast while fishing this weekend. As she went to cast, Max leaned forward. Instinctively, she released the fishing pole to catch him. The pole was flung into the water. I watched with dismay as his Lightning McQueen fishing pole slowly faded into the murky water. I briefly considered diving in after it, but noticed the line was still in the boat. I yelled for Ashley to hand me the line. As I started to pull in the line, I immediately realized I was simply pulling the line out of the reel; the catch mechanism had not been triggered and I was unspooling the line. I started to get anxious. Max started to cry. As Ashley consoled him, I carefully pulled the line up. I hoped the line was tied-off correctly and would not simply come completely unwound, leaving the pole to continue its descent. Finally, I could see the pole at the top of the water. I kept pulling, but could not get it to come up high enough out of the water to grab it from the boat. Panic was setting in. I knew the end of the line was coming. Thankfully, enough of the pole breached the surface and I was able to rescue the fishing pole from meeting a cold, wet resting place.

I have been reflecting on why I found this event to be so traumatic. I, of course, do not want Max to be disappointed or to lose something that he loves. However, I think it is a bit deeper than that. I felt as though I was watching Max’s childhood fade from me; slowly receding from view and reach and I was devastated. Over the last few months, as Max phases out things that he has outgrown, I have become quite sad. He is growing up. He is growing up fast. I am not ready for this.

We had originally planned a trip to Disneyland for Max’s fall break. I wanted Max to experience Cars Land. Cars was one of Max’s favorite movies. He adored those characters. We specifically chose to stay at Art of Animation for our Disney World trips so that he could stay in Radiator Springs (part of the resort is Cars themed). I realized that Max would be outgrowing Cars soon. I knew this October was possibly our last shot of him getting the most out of it. It was not long into the pandemic before I realized that our trip to Disneyland was increasingly unlikely; as we approach October, it is a certainty.

I become a little emotional when I think about the things that Max is missing out on. That emotion largely turns into anger given enough time. It feels like his childhood is slipping away from me. Even though I flail and grab at what is left, it feels as though it slips away even faster. I am not sure I am ready for him to outgrow Cars. I realize that Cars is a placeholder here. I am just not ready for him to move into that next stage. We have not watched Cars in months, possibly over a year at this point. I think we missed our window.

I found this friend while cleaning up brush in the backyard. Closest look I’ve gotten in real life. I was so happy to share this with Max.