Markus Randel's Blog

Dear Joseph and Lucia,

As I told you last week, Michèle and I went to the Renaissance Festival last weekend. It was her first time and the first time for me in 25 years.  A lot has changed.  I’m sad we never went when we lived so close.  There was so much to see.  Shops for period clothing of all kinds; Armories with swords and armor; Specialty shops with herbs; Food from all around the world; But the best thing was all the people and how they dressed up.  Michèle and I even got into the swing of things and dressed up for it. By the time we left, we were completely exhausted. We made it to the hotel and collapsed.

Sunday morning, I stopped by the old house and visited with Jimmy and Prissy.  It was Jimmy’s first time to meet Michèle.  As expected, Prissy was extremely supportive.  Our old house still looks good.  The current owner has horses. They closed in the back patio.

Well, all said and done, we had a wonderful weekend.  The only thing missing was you two.  Hopefully, we can go back as a family one day.  Until then, I’ll be here waiting.

Love,
Dad

Dear Joseph and Lucia,

I don’t have much to say today. I’m in the thick of writing drivers and making plans for this weekend.

Be ready for anything. I’ll be waiting. Just wanted you to know I’m thinking about you guys.

Love,
Dad

Dear Joseph and Lucia,

I’ve had a fairly good week at work.  I upgraded another test cell to my new version of the control software.  Three out of seven done so far. There was a minor bug I fixed this morning, so now it looks like it’s ready to start steamrolling through the tests.  I was also requested to write control software for a blower motor in LabVIEW.  The current control software is compiled from a 3rd party and we don’t have any way to interface with it.  This one might take a while.  The first challenge was the checksum.  That’s a value at the end of a serial data packet you use to make sure all the information is correct.  It’s normally done by adding all the bytes together ignoring the overflow, or using an exclusive OR.  This one uses Fletcher’s Checksum algorithm.  I’ve never heard of it.  It took me two days to get it to work.  So now I’m slowly building all the commands to control it.

I told you I was geeky on this post.

In the back of my head I keep thinking about this upcoming weekend.  It’s going to be a big walk down memory lane.  The Ren Fest is only a few miles from our old house in Dobbin.  I hope to stop by with Michèle to see how it looks now-a-days.  My time at the festival is going to be in celebration of Papa Gene. All the while, I know I’m just a hop skip and jump away from your guys… I’ll be feeding my emotional hole the entire time.  That’s the place where you two used to be every day.  I’m so glad I’ll have Michèle holding my hand.  She is my best friend and supporter.  You should never fear about love and understanding when you finally reach out to me.

Until then, I’ll keep waiting for you.  I’m not going anywhere soon. Just search for me. You’ll find me.

Love,
Dad

Dear Joseph and Lucia,

I must admit, I feel a little silly at times writing to you.  These letters aren’t likely going to be read until a few years from now. It’s easy for me to lose track of time and skip a day or two from lack of urgency. Also, I usually write them from my work computer during breakfast or lunch.  My work system has been out in the lab this week running some new software until the upgrade computer comes in, so I don’t have any privacy.  I lugged Papa Gene’s laptop to work so I can work in my office. Long story short… I finally have a moment to relax and write to you.

Today is Friday. I get to go home.  Michèle hasn’t been feeling well this week, so I’m looking up recipes for chicken noodle soup and onion soup.  I know they come in cans, but I’d prefer to start from scratch if I have the whole day.  I hope I can put her on the couch and queue up a whole bunch of movies.  I’ve got several episodes of Dr. Who she hasn’t seen yet.  I’ll cover her in the Magic Blankie. (Explanation to come) and serve her some comfort food.  I would do the same for either of you two if you were under the weather.

The Magic Blankie is an Indian print blanket I had while I was homeless during the winter in Iowa.  I consider it special.  I survived.  I also wrapped Papa Gene in it his last week. He never felt any pain. I leave it at the house in Richardson folded on the back of the couch.  Its amazing how much it gets used.  I’ll try to remember to take a picture of it this weekend and post it.

I’ve been busy at work this week, which is a good thing.  I was able to get test cell 5 up and running with the current version of the software.  It was a challenge considering how unique it is to the rest of the cells.  I was able to maintain the same source code. Also, I was handed a new project to write control software for a blower motor.  It is so much fun writing drivers from the ground up (frustrating too).

A lot’s been going on this week.  I haven’t gotten any feedback from the doctor yet about scheduling from my CT scan.  Hopefully, I’ll find out Monday. I’m just looking forward to a quiet weekend taking care of Michèle and cooking something wonderful.

As always, I’ll be here waiting.

Love,
Dad

Dear Joseph and Lucia,

Michèle had to fly out to Washington DC this week.  After all the sunset photos I sent her from the train, she finally got treated to a wonderful one.  I wanted to share this with you.

I really don’t have much more to add other than I’m waiting for you and love you both so very much.

Love,
Dad

Dear Joseph and Lucia,

I’m writing to you today from a Windows 10 Technical Preview in a virtual computer.  One day I’ll explain how all that works.  The gist of this is I’m working on a computer that won’t be released until next summer.  That’s one of the things I love about my job.

It was a very charged weekend. One of Rachael’s friends rode to Fort Worth with Michèle on Saturday to pick me up from the train station. We all ended up having sushi and (with his mother’s approval) kept him for the rest of the weekend. It was nice to have a girl and boy around and listening to the dynamics of their friendship.

Michèle and I spent time with Craig and his lady friend Saturday night.  We never did make it to the art festival (pffft).

When I got off the train last night, I helped an elderly lady disembark.  She was met by an older gentleman.  They immediately hugged and kissed.  They both started crying.  I did my best to hold in my emotions until I was off the station platform and in my own car.  It was beautiful to see.

There were a lot more events that came up over the weekend that don’t need to be explained here.  If you ever want to know, just remind me of an umbrella and I’ll share it with you.

I should get back to work. I’ll be here waiting for you.

Love,
Dad