todd.wallentine.com

Movember Wrap-up

Todd — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 05:42:56 +0000

Movember is complete and I got to shave off my Mo today. And let me tell you, it feels great to have that caterpillar off my upper lip.
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But the best part is that I was able to raise $393.55 for a good cause. Final standings: #2 in Kansas, #554 in the US, and #6940 internationally.

Update: The wonderful Appelgate family just donated $20 to push me to $413.55! I am now #593 in the US and #7373 internationally. I guess processing paper checks takes a little bit longer than online donations!

So I owe everyone who donated a huge thank you for supporting me and my Mo. I am looking forward to hitting everyone up next year. So if you are a friend and have the ability to grow a Mo, I will be bugging you next October. And if you have a wallet or purse, I will be begging for more donations. That is assuming Kari lets me do it again!

More Movember Role Models

Todd — Thu, 27 Nov 2008 17:00:25 +0000

My mom was kind enough to track down some more pictures of my family sporting great Mos. So I figured I would share the wonderful pictures.
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You can see pictures of my dad, my grandpa Ted (although it is very hard to see the Mo in that picture), uncles, and cousins.

And don’t forget to donate – only 4 days left in Movember.

Movember Day 26

Todd — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 23:00:55 +0000

Only 5 days until I cut off my wonderful Mo. Donate now! And to make it a fair trade, here are some pictures of my Mo.
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Thanks to my sister, my in-laws, and my cousins for donating. What about the rest of you family and friends – where is your donation?

Movember Day 24

Todd — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 04:00:38 +0000

I am now only 7 days away from shaving off this fantastic Mo. So hurry to donate before I shave it off!
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And now for the public service announcement (cue the theme song for “The More You Know”).

Prostate Cancer can be diagnosed using with a DRE (digital rectal exam) and a PSA (prostate-specific antigen) test followed by a biopsy if necessary. The biopsy consists of a procedure where needles are inserted into the prostate (ouch!). The good news is that it is likely an out-patient procedure (no nights in the hospital). The American Cancer Society recommends the PSA and DRE on a regular basis for men over 50. Or those with a higher risk (African American or those with a family history) the tests should be performed on a regular basis starting at 45.

Once diagnosed, Prostate Cancer has many treatment options and depends upon many factors. For details on each one please consult a physician (I am no doctor but I play one on my blog). Here are just a few methods of treatment:

removal of the prostate (prostatectomy)
watch, wait, and see (active surveillance)
radiation and chemotherapy

For more information about Prostate Cancer, visit the Prostate Cancer Foundation, the WebMD Prostate Cancer Health Center, or the Mayo Clinic Prostate Cancer Center.

And don’t forget to donate. I am sitting at $293.55 (640th in the US and 9058th internationally). Please help me double that and get into the top 500 in the US!

Movember 17

Todd — Tue, 18 Nov 2008 04:00:59 +0000

Yippee! Donations are over $200 dollars after the the generosity of my lovely wife, my mother, and a great guy named Clay!

And just for Jeremy, here are some pictures from this evening. Enjoy!
[[Show as slideshow]] And now for something completely different – the serious part. For the most part I avoid serious topics on my blog but this seems like a great opportunity to help educate the men (and women) around me. So here is a quick list of symptoms.

Frequent urination; especially at night
Difficulty starting or stopping urination
Weak or painful urination
Blood in urine

Those are just a few of the symptoms. If you have any of these you should see a doctor – the earlier that it is caught the more likely you will beat it.

Movember Role Models

Todd — Mon, 17 Nov 2008 13:00:48 +0000

I spent some time this weekend tracking down pictures of Mo role models.
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My biggest role model is my dad (Virg Wallentine). For the first 16 years of my life he had a Mo. And it turns out that my father-in-law, my brother-in-law, my uncles-in-law (Bob and Millard), and even Kari’s god-father had a Mo at some point in their life. Unfortunately, I found very few pictures of my family (uncles, cousins, grandparents) – I wish I had pictures of my cousins (TJ and Justin for sure).

So enjoy the fantastic Mos that my role models had. And don’t forget to donate!

Movember Day 13

Todd — Thu, 13 Nov 2008 18:00:28 +0000

Day 13 and I am starting to feel the pain. My Mo is getting itchy and the skin is tighter than normal. But that isn’t the toughest part – I had two job interviews over the last 7 days. Luckily, one of the guys at the company had read my blog about it so I didn’t have to find some way to bring it up.
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Anyway, the Mo is coming in and I hope to be getting more donations soon. Hear that family and friends – SOON!

And thanks to my good friends and neighbors (Scott and Angie Wallace) for a generous donation. FYI, I am currently sitting at $113.55 which puts me in 850th place in the US and 15256th place internationally.

Trouble with Eclipse Execution Environments

Todd — Tue, 11 Nov 2008 14:23:25 +0000

Developing software is a very tough business. But days like this make me believe that the world would be better off without software! For two days I have fought a very simple but elusive issue in Eclipse. Basically, when I installed Eclipse it wasn’t picking up any execution environments so no project would compile nor run. A screenshot of the empty Execution Environments screen is below.

Empty Execution Environment

I first thought this would be an easy problem to fix so I used the world brain. When that failed, I had to actually use my brain. It turns out, Eclipse gathers information about JREs available and stores that information in a configuration file (libraryInfos.xml in the .metadata/.plugins/org.eclipse.jdt.launching/ directory inside the newly created workspace). And I think this auto-generation is where the bug lies. Specifically, when Eclipse grabs the version information from a newly added JRE/JDK it can get corrupted. When it works correctly the Execution Environments screen looks like the following. FYI, in this case I used the Sun JDK 1.6 to run Eclipse.

Available Execution Environment

Here is a snippet of the libraryInfos.xml file when the bug is visible:
<libraryInfo home="/opt/sun-jdk-1.6.0.07" version="CompilerOracle: exclude org/eclipse/core/internal/dtree/DataTreeNode.forwardDeltaWith 1.6.0_07"> and here is a similar snippet when the bug is not visible:
<libraryInfo home="/opt/sun-jdk-1.6.0.07" version="1.6.0_07"> Notice that the version information is pretty funny looking?

And it looks like it is connected to the .hotspot_compiler file that I am using. The contents of it are:
exclude org/eclipse/core/internal/dtree/DataTreeNode forwardDeltaWith
which causes the following to be printed on the command line when Eclipse starts:
CompilerOracle: exclude org/eclipse/core/internal/dtree/DataTreeNode.forwardDeltaWith

So I assume this is a bug since it would be a crazy feature. My work-around is to move (or rename) the .hotspot_compiler file the first time I run the new Eclipse. I then add the Java JREs, close down Eclipse, move the .hotspot_compiler file back, and then restart Eclipse. Once the JREs are added the issue no longer persists (unless new JREs are added).

Code Monkey

Todd — Sun, 09 Nov 2008 23:56:43 +0000

I saw this and it made me smile. I am a code monkey but without the tab, cigs, and hot blonde. And I prefer Doritos over Fritos but close enough.

Movember Day 5

Todd — Wed, 05 Nov 2008 22:00:13 +0000

It is now day 5 of the Movember challenge and I almost have something that would be considered a moustache. I will let you judge for yourselves.
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I also wanted to take this opportunity to thank Brooke and Jeremy Krause as well as Kent Johnson for their donations. Y’all are wonderful and generous friends.

And to the rest of my friends and family: Are you going to take that lying down? Don’t let them show you up. You can be more generous than them right? Click now to donate!