While it was Memorial Day for the rest of the country, we had something else to remember today, too. Today was Stefanie’s birthday.

We never do anything grandiose as Stef is not a fan of big parties or surprises. Instead we set her up with a couple of books and the first season of The Muppet Show on DVD. Not only does she get the joy of watching those again, but she’ll get to share them with David who has never seen them.

Despite the fact that Stef doesn’t like the attention, I will take advantage of this space to say a few things. We met shortly before her 21st birthday. So, the first birthday of hers we celebrated was that momentous one. You’ll have to ask her about the gifts given to her that year as they have provided great conversation fodder for us since then. We’ve been through quite a bit since then: marriage, living in Cambridge, David, a move to Seattle, two layoffs, a move back to Portland, and a variety of other things. During that time Stef has proved to me her ability to learn, adapt, grow, and become the woman of my dreams. I cannot give you any logical reason that she should be as dedicated to David and me as she is, but I am grateful for her love.

Stef, every opportunity we have to celebrate our life together reminds me of how much more time I want with you. I look forward to many more birthdays and anniversaries.

I love you,

Wyatt

Admittedly, I’m an Oregonian at heart. As some of you may know, David is the only native Oregonian in our family. Stef was born in California and I was born in Arizona. However, we are all Oregonians deep down. One of the things that we all agree on is that a good rainstorm is quite cool. Throw in some good thunder and lightning and we’re having a ball!

Rain is good for our family for other reasons, too. Both David and I are on daily meds to control environmental allergies. These can get much worse in the spring when the pollen starts to fly. For some reason, this year has been especially bad as we’ve had more problems than we’ve ever had before. I can’t imagine how bad it would be without our meds. Even Stef has been fighting some classic sniffling and scratchy throat symptoms during the spring. She blames me. I’ve learned not to argue.
The rain, during this time, is a savior. Hot, dry weather causes the pollen to really fly and makes it easier to inhale and cause trouble. A good drenching knocks all that stuff to the ground and keeps it out of the air we breathe. So, we love the rain. This past week has been a relief from all of those symptoms and we’re loving it.

So, you can complain all you want about not being able to have a Memorial Day barbecue. We’ll happily celebrate our three day weekend (and Stef’s birthday) while watching the rain run down our windows.

Enjoy!

An article in the National Post in Canada is reporting that a new dress code law is on the way to passing in Iran. This law would require all Muslims to dress basically the same. That’s bad enough. More disturbingly, they report that it will also require non-Muslims to wear color coded strips at all times. Yellow for Jews, red for Christians, etc.

Read the full article here, but it boils down to this:

Ali Behroozian, an Iranian exile living in Toronto, said the law could come into force as early as next year.

It would make religious minorities immediately identifiable and allow Muslims to avoid contact with non-Muslims.

Mr. Behroozian said it will make life even more difficult for Iran’s small pockets of Jewish, Christian and other religious minorities — the country is overwhelmingly Shi’ite Muslim. “They have all been persecuted for a while, but these new dress rules are going to make things worse for them,” he said.

At the time of this writing, there’s some doubt as to the veracity of the report. But, it does seem to be holding up longer than hoaxes of this type normally do.

True or not, the fact that it’s believable speaks volumes about the kind of dangerous leader Iran has in President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. This man has called for Israel to be wiped from the map and for the supremacy of his selected group (in this case, Islam) and most of the world shrugs.

I feel somehow as if I’ve read about someone acting similary in the past.

I caught this blog entry by Jonah Goldberg over at The Corner. He neatly summarizes the problem of people seeking alternate religions and coins a term that nails it on the head:

They are moral irrationalists, by their own definitions, who want to replace one moral system with another more to their liking — one which usually champions their pet political and cultural priorities.

Incidentally, he points out that folks who do this almost reflexively deride Christianity. They want to tolerate everything except the truth.
This moral irrationality is the root of a spiritual issue that I come back to again and again. Presumably, religion and faith are attempts at connecting with the spiritual forces that created and may be actively involved in the world we see. If you start from the idea that you are attempting to connect with something bigger and more powerful than you, how can you take the approach of seeking the system you like best. Shouldn’t the search be for the system that reflects reality? Shouldn’t we be searching for truth rather than personal preference?

I am baffled by folks who will choose a moral structure or religion based on whether they agree with it or not. How backwards are we that we’ve decided that we can define reality the way we want.

I have set you an example that you should do as I have done for you. I tell you the truth, no servant is greater than his master, nor is a messenger greater than the one who sent him.
John 13:15-16 NIV

The fool says in his heart,
“There is no God.”
They are corrupt, their deeds are vile;
there is no one who does good.
Psalm 14:1 NIV

As usual, the Word speaks the truth.

I have not said much about the current upheavals surrounding illegal immigration because there are so many opinions flying around. To be honest, I’ve had to let the different ideas percolate in my head a bit to really understand what I’d be willing to support. Just as I was coming to some firm conclusions, the President decided that he needed to address the nation last night about his position on the matter.

After the address, Stef asked me what I thought. My answer was, “It’s better than I feared, but not as good as I hoped.” I do think that the President is about as far away from his base on this issue as he is with anything else. I have a very difficult time with any solution that downplays the current law for some kind of compromise. I’m all for plea bargains in the courtroom, but I’m not so excited about pleading out several million people who don’t seem to have much love for this country anyway.

To me the bottom line is that there’s no point in discussing the illegals already here or how to discourage more from coming until we actually have a firm handle on the border. I feel like we have about ten guys with sandbags trying to stem a tidal wave while we make allowances for how much water we’ll learn to live with in our house. That’s not enforcement, that’s capitulation. Stem the tide to a trickle, and then we can talk about the next step.

I guess my fear of any so-called “comprehensive” solution is that we’ve tried that in the past. The result usually is that the items that are easy (welcoming the illegals, overlooking existing laws, etc.) happen quickly and forever. Items that are hard (enforcing the border, deporting illegals, denying services, etc.) happen slowly and after many lawsuits and usually fade away. I’d rather see an attempt to do just the hard things and prove that it can be done.

I applaud the President for discussing some details about the hard part, but I’ll believe it when I see it. There just hasn’t been enough intestinal fortitude in Washington to pull it off in the past. I do worry about too much reliance on technology. He discussed a tamperproof ID card. In my industry I’ve discovered there there really is no such thing as the unbreakable code, the unhackable computer, or tamperproof technology. If there’s enough money in doing it, someone will figure it out. Besides, there will be some requirement for employers to have access to machines that can verify the card. I’d prefer a way for employers to give names and SS# to a secure website and have it validate that they match, that the person is alive, and that the person is the right age. Combine that with some severe penalties for employing illegals and the employers become part of the border enforcement team. Make the jobs for illegals dry up, and they’ll deport themselves. No need for trains or buses.

I’m a believer in free markets. If you want to change behavior, you should change the markets not simply make laws and build barriers. We know enough when we raise our children. When a baby wants to play with something he shouldn’t, don’t just put it on a higher shelf (he’ll start climbing for it). Remove it from view. Remove it as a possible choice. We need to come up with a way to make coming to the US illegally unpalatable. If it was next to impossible to get a job as an illegal, they’d line up to get citizenship. I’m happy to allow them in that way.

So, I guess I have to say that I differ with the President’s conclusions about what to do with the folks already here and how to discourage more from coming. I think we need to be more serious about this and recognize the threat to our national security and our culture. I love George W. Bush, but I just think he’s wrong here.

Here’s hoping it won’t create an unrepairable situation because it’s not going to get appreciably better anytime soon.

As some of you know, we have David take a standardized test every year so we can assess which areas of his education might need more attention. We have been proud to tell you that each year he has tested above his grade level. This year was no different. I’ll give you some highlights, but I should explain the terms first.

Each of the sections is scored separately and each score is assigned a grade equivalent. That grade equivalent means that David scored the same as the average student in that grade would have scored on the same exam.

His overall score had a grade equivalent of a junior in the third month. All of his individual scores were at grade level or above with all but one score being a grade equivalent of a sophomore or above.

His highest scores were in Social Studies, Science, Language Expression, Mathematics Computation, Spelling, Vocabulary, and Reading Comprehension. Of those subjects, I teach Math and Stefanie was responsible for the rest. Nicely done, Stef!

This year, the test acts as a warm up. The State of Oregon requires that we get David tested by a third party after his third, fifth, eighth, and tenth grade years. He’ll be doing that in June, so wish him luck.

Once again, though, David has proven that our choice to homeschool was the right one. He’s doing very well and we’re very proud of him.

Way to go, David!

As you may know, I recently accepted a promotion to Software Development Manager that has put me in a position of being a front line manager to four developers as well as ScrumMaster for up to three Scrums at a time (you can read more about Scrum here). I knew my day to day life would be a little different, but I didn’t realize just how different until this week.

Here’s my meeting schedule for the week of April 25-29, 2005 (about a year ago) on the left and my schedule for the week of May 1-5, 2006 (this week) on the right. Notice any difference?

I am enjoying the new job responsibilities, but sheesh!