Technologist For Hire

In Memory.

Zula on Day 1 of her new, adventurous life.

After months of searching and sifting through all of the cats available to us, we found the perfect one. On June 18th, 2009 we were delighted to meet a cat named Abby. She was a 1 year old Abyssinian cat. Shortly after meeting her for the first time we, my Fiance Katie and I, instantly fell in love with her. We almost did not have enough cash to cover the adoption fee, but realized we could buy a candy bar and get cash back at the register! $50 later, and $50 more in toys, she was ours. We thought long and hard about what we should name her. Katie came up with “ZULA”, because it was the name of the first ever Abyssinian cat and also reminded her of Zuul from Ghostbusters. We brought her home and the first thing she did was hide from us. She hid so well that it took us over an hour to find her. For the next 3 days she constantly hid from us, and I even thought she had escaped a few times or jumped into some of the open a/c ducts, but we always ended up finding her in the strangest of places.

Zula, hiding under our bed

We would put her in the bathroom when we left for extended periods of time, to keep her from getting into anything (we were renovating our house at the time). She began to sleep in the bathtub each night, it was so cute. She slept in the bathtub for the first week we had her.

As she began to hide less and less from us over the next few days, we began to notice hat she had a peculiar smell about her. I thought it was her nerves, and Katie thought maybe she was just dirty from her foster home. We tried to get the smell out with pet wipes, but that did not work. We eventually decided to take her for her first vet visit once the smell wouldn’t go away and her ear began to bother her. Turns out she had an ear infection, which was causing the smell… ew. We were given a liquid penicillin and told to “just squirt it in her mouth each morning and night”. We attempted to give her the medicine directly from the syringe several times, using various methods found on the Internet, but we generally ended up with more scratches and penicillin on us than we wanted. We eventually tried mixing it with her food, which the doctor said she would hate, but she actually loved it and ate all of her medicine. We didn’t think the liquid penicillin did anything tho, so we bought a fungicide from PetsMart and sprayed it on her ear a few times a day. Within 2 weeks her ear was healed! She was still bothered by it tho, and would make a crazy meow noise and violently shake her head from time to time. Katie would call her a Demon when she did this. Katie thought she was possessed by demons and this was her way of trying to get them out of her head. Turns out she just needed regular cleaning of her ears to keep the demons away!

Zula and her favorite place to sleep

Zula decided she was going to sleep on Katie’s computer chair, whether Katie needed it or not. We would always find her on the chair, night or day. Katie decided to make her a bed, so she found an awesome fabric, and put it on the chair so Zula would get used to it. After making the bed, we realized it was a bit too small, but Zula didn’t mind. Zula slept in her new, small bed, with her hands sticking out.

Zula loved her tiny bed

She looked uncomfortable, but always came back to it. Zula loved small, enclosed spaces. She really loved cardboard boxes! We were renovating the house, and a lot of the furniture and the entire kitchen was from Ikea. Well, Ikea packages everything in cardboard boxes, so we had HUNDREDS of cardboard boxes. Zula always climbed on top of the piles of boxes, and it was as if she was exclaiming “These are mine! I own them!” She would also frequently step into a box, even if it was too small. She really did enjoy cardboard boxes, more than anything. We saw those corrugated cardboard scratching blocks at the pet store and decided to make our own out of Ikea corrugated blocks that we found. We glued them together and gave it to Zula. Instead of just scratching on it (which she did EVERY morning before jumping into bed with us) she also just loved to sit on it. I called it her boat, because it looked like she was sailing on our carpet. I wrote on the side of it “S.S. Zular”, and it became her very own little boat.

Zula, watching the world

Katie and I would take walks around our neighborhood, and noticed lots of cats that would be outside in their owner’s lawn, or sitting on a window sill looking outside. We called these lawn kitties and window kitties. We considered Zula a window kitty because she was always sitting on our window sills, looking out at the world. She would also growl at people as they walked by, just like a dog. She was a good guard cat! Every time we came home from a trip, she would be waiting in a window, watching for us. Then she would get down, run to the door, and meet us there. She always seemed to miss us when we were gone, or even going to the bathroom. Every time we went into the bathroom, and closed the door, she would wait right outside for us, and then roll on her back when we got out.

Not only did she guard us, but she also tried to guard our pet hamster, Hammy. Well, guard or try to eat, not sure. Every night after she played with us, and after she bolted from one end of the house to another wearing herself out, she would go lay next to our hamster’s cage. Zula would sometimes paw at the cage when Hammy was on his wheel, but she never tried to get inside the cage. She was just curious about the little furry ball that she couldn’t play with.

Zula would greet us every morning by jumping into bed, before we were awake, and poking her face into Katie’s. She would do it until one of us woke up and fed her. She was always asking us to feed her, even if we already did. Sometimes I wouldn’t feed her before work, on purpose, just so she would go bother Katie more and get her out of bed (Katie loves to sleep in!), and it always worked. Zula would also trick us into trying to feed her more by asking both of us to feed her, at different times. She was sneaky!! Whenever it was time to eat, she would come running from wherever she was.

On Zula’s 1st birthday, we allowed her to choose her own food. We put all of the flavors in front of her, and she eventually touched one and meowed. It was Turkey & Giblets.

During the day, and at night, we would sometimes sing songs to Zula, which always resembled the Mean Kitty song on YouTube and various other songs that we could fit “Zula” or “Zulacat” in to. Zula would also sometimes sing us a song, modeled after the 1936 Merry Melodies cartoon/song “I Love To Singa“.

Zula loved to lay on Katie's chest

Zula interacted with us every chance she got. She was very very affectionate and loved our company. Zula especially enjoyed playing with Katie, because Katie “let” her play-bite her fingers. Zula would never play-bite me, but always Katie. Zula also found that Katie’s stomach was the best place to lay, besides her tiny bed. At least once a day, Zula would rest on Katie, and a few times she layed on my back. I guess we were warm and squishy! We had this game we would play with her at night, we would move our feet under the covers and Zula would race to catch them, and then bite our toes through the covers once she did. That was her favorite game ever.

Zula, in her Crackly Tunnel

And of course, Zula found all of the toys that we bought for her to be very fun. Everything from the 4 tiny mice, to the homemade boat, and the crackly tunnel we bought from Ikea. They were all her favorites, and she would make her way through each and every toy during the day. Eventually throwing them into a vent or under a couch, where she couldn’t find them. We would always pull them back out for her though.

On Saturday, the 29th of August, 2009, Zula switched where she slept suddenly. She decided to sleep in Katie’s closet behind a shoe rack. Rather than thinking this was odd, we simply thought it was a fun new place that Zula found to hide/sleep. Monday morning at 8:15am I was leaving for work early, so I did not have time to feed Zula. I knew she would wake up Katie shortly with her usual “Feed me!” routine. As I was leaving, I saw Zula jump onto the bed to wake up Katie. 45 minutes later, at 9:00am, I received a call from Katie while I was at work. She said that Zula had puked 3-4 times and was breathing funny. As the morning progressed she was not getting better, so I took a half day from work and we got her to the Vet by 3:00pm. The vet did not see anything too serious and sent us home with Penicillin and gave her an anti-vomit drug. Zula appeared better and was responding playfully, but was extremely lethargic and not eating her normal amount of food. We thought a good nights rest would allow her to recover.

On the morning of September 1st, 2009, Zula woke us up at 6:30am with a loud cough. We found her and noticed she was in extreme stress and had very labored breathing. We immediately looked up an Emergency 24/7 Animal Care center and rushed her to it. We found out that Zula was born with a rare congenital heart defect, tiny veins around her heart that could only support the heart up to a certain age, which caused her to have congestive heart failure. As her heart began to fail, it filled her left lung with liquid and poorly processed her oxygen. She slowly, and suddenly, began to deteriorate. Zula was put into an oxygen tank to help her breathing and blood-oxygen level.

Katie and I were absolutely devastated, horrified, and in shock. Zula was dying, and there was absolutely no signs and no way of fixing her. We had to make a decision. If they could stabilize her, she would still routinely go into heart failure and be required to take medication for the rest of her shortened life. We did not want Zula to have to suffer and be in pain all the time. We also never wanted her to have to go through this stress and pain ever again.

At 12:45pm on September 1st, 2009, Katie and I made the decision to put Zula to sleep. At 1:00pm, in my arms and with Katie’s hand petting her softly on the head, Zula slowly fell asleep and her pain went away. Her heart was fixed and she was in a better place.

Zula Cat Flickinger: July 2008 – September 1, 2009; God Speed.

Zula was put to rest next to a rose bush in our backyard. She was buried in her favorite, a cardboard box, which we wrote “S.S. Zular II / We will always love you! / – Katie & Christian / Zula 7-15-08 thru 9-1-09″ on, with her favorite stuffed mouse toy. We laid some roses on top of the grave and said some kind words.

• You can view our Zula photo/video archive here: Katie’s Flickr Zula Set
• You can contact me on twitter @spooons and Katie @redthreaddiy
• Please, adopt a cat! You can find rescue information here: ASPCA Shelter Locator
• Donations in Zula’s honor can be made to the ASPCA through their website: ASPCA.org/Donate

In December of 2008 Katie, my Fiance, and I set out to buy our first home together. Our plan was to purchase the house sometime around May of 2009. We live in Michigan, so foreclosures are very common, so we focused on finding one to save some money. Well, we found the one that we loved, after looking at more than I care to mention, and have successfully closed on the house as of Monday, March 9, 2009.

The house was built in 1955, very solid construction, no structural issues, large basement, lath & plaster walls, and everything else that comes with a 50 year old house.

We have begun the process of updating everything. We have already torn out the carpeting, patched & sanded the walls, and prepared the house for our mini-renovation.

I made a decision early on that I wanted to be environmentally aware with everything that we put into this house. Below is a list of everything that is planned so far in my “Green Initiative”, some environmental and some economical:

• Every light bulb has been replaced with a CFL bulb.
• Every appliance is an Energy Star model, if available (which, so far, includes Fridge, Stove/Oven, Microwave, Dishwasher, Washer, Dryer)
• Televisions are all Energy Star rated
• Carpet is Mohawk brand everSTRAND. An amazing, extremely affordable (cheaper than standard carpet!), very soft (softer than standard carpet, in my opinion), naturally stain resistant (but still treated with Scotchguard), carpeting made from recycled plastic bottles.
• Toilets are water conserving models.
• Windows were brand new when we moved in, so no worries about that.
• Water heater is Energy Star rated and wrapped in an insulating blanket (I would have preferred a tankless system, but I’m also trying to be wallet-friendly at my end)
• Kitchen cabinets are being purchased from a company that has very strict environmental policies.
• Thermostat is set at an Energy Star recommended daily programming schedule.
• Water heater is set to a lower temperature.
• Katie’s computer is made using “Green” products such as the new WD Caviar Green 1TB hard drive.
• Our city has a recycling program, which we intend to use heavily!
• I will be purchasing a battery operated Lawn Mower, which will mow my entire lawn using only $0.10 of electricity, zero emissions.
• Katie plans on having a garden, which is as Green as you can get.
• LOW/NO VOC PAINT!

So, according to Michelangelo van Dam’s helpful “Who Tagged Who” tool, I can see that I was “tagged” by 4 people in this amazing PHP-Community-based-blog-meme. The rules are simple, and I have waited long enough to fulfill my duties to contribute. Better late than never!

7 Things you may not know about me:

1. I’ve been working at the same desk job since I was 15 (now 22). I was a hardware technician at first, then became the network engineer/system admin, and am now a systems developer (fancy title for programmer).
2. I have a slight obsession with collecting and passing out stickers.
3. My nickname (spoon) originates from a mock stand-up comedy routine I did during a class in Middle School. In the script, someone was insulting me with names of common household items. One of the insults was “SPOON!” Ever since then, it just stuck with me. Yes, boring, lame, I know. I used to tell people I was either obsessed with The Tick! or an ex-heroine addict.
4. I use PHP on windows, exclusively. That isn’t the shocking part. Are you ready for it? I use PHP, on windows… with Apache – exclusively. *GASP* Yes, I am one of the few, the proud, the WAMP stack users (in a production environment, no less!!!)
5. I co-own a few web properties with my Fiance, Katie Soltysiak, which include: DIYscene – Alternative Craft and Indie Design Forum, eBurl – Short, Trackable eBay URLs, OwnTheHour – Independent Etsy Promotion
6. I am scared of Linux.
7. I have a police record in the state of Wisconsin.

7 More people to add to this meme.
Now, since I am so late with getting my post written, almost everyone I can personally think of has been tagged. So I will do my best.

1. Cory Mawhorter: Cory is a past co-worker and friend. He went on to become a professional vagabond and created FLIR (FaceLift Image Replacement) – an alternative to sIFR.
2. Tony Bibbs: I don’t know you, but you started this, and have yet to be tagged. TAG *runs*
3. Jack Bauer
4. I give up.
5. -
6. -
7. -

Ok, so, I failed. Anyways, here are the rules for… Cory & Jack to follow:

• Link your original tagger(s), and list these rules on your blog.
• Share seven facts about yourself in the post – some random, some weird.
• Tag seven people at the end of your post by leaving their names and the links to their blogs.
• Let them know they’ve been tagged by leaving a comment on their blogs and/or Twitter.

So I went to see the movie Quarantine, which is a scene-for-scene remake of the 2007 Spanish movie [REC], and thought it was an awesome movie.

Quarantine is a “Quarantine-and-kill” movie, just like I am Legend, 28 (Days|Weeks) Later, The Happening, and even The Simpsons Movie. The perspective of the movie is “first person viewfinder”, just like in Cloverfield.

So, the story was unoriginal, but because the perspective was more realistic, it made for an interesting and scary experience.

Now, for the point of this post. I don’t do movie reviews on my blog, so what is up with this post? Well, just like in Cloverfield, there is a hidden message on a recording in Quarantine. During the last 15 minutes of the film, when they are in the attic, Angela finds a reel-to-reel tape under some papers and presses play. In the movie theater it just sounded like Satan (or, a voice is super slow motion). I isolated that scene (about 1:17:15 in) and played it back at 3x speed. Sure enough there is an audible message on the recording. Here is what I can decipher:

[...] this better be impossible to contain.

November 7th.
Something unexpected has happened, our brothers in Houston have come under suspicion [...]

So there you have it. The rats were being infected on purpose. The news clippings on the walls about cults and biochemical attacks were about the terrorist group/cult responsible for this. The virus was an advanced form of rabies that had a gestational period of around 15 minutes and was initially spread via infected rats.

I believe there will be a sequel, since there is already plans for a sequel to [REC], but because origin of the virus is different from [REC], the sequel will probably be completely different and focus more on large scale containment or on the terrorist group/cult that created the virus.

So, a week before PHP|TEK 2008 I came up with the genius idea to take the Ruby on Rails logo, and parody it. I wanted to express my views of Ruby on Rails (though never have using RoR) through this modification.

I took the logo and simply changed the “R” to an “F” using a font that was almost identical to the original (I used WhatTheFont to find a similar font).

I took my FAILS logo and made a bunch of buttons/magnets and brought them to PHP|TEK 2008. Apparently they were a bigger hit than I had prepared for, because I ran out of buttons and still had people asking me for them (note: you can purchase a button & magnet set at my etsy shop http://spooons.etsy.com).

At one of the PHP|TEK 2008 keynotes, Terry Chay included (at the last minute) my new FAILS logo in his The Internet is an Ogre presentation. I also hear that the logo is still in his presentation, to this day! He properly credited me upon the first use, so I am happy!

Well, for ZendCon 2008, I decided to order a batch of my FAILS logos as a sticker! So I re-created the logo in a high resolution format and got them printed, die-cut (the logo has 2 rounded corners), and shipped before the conference started. They came the DAY BEFORE, and looked AMAZING.

So now I have high-quality vinyl stickers, which plenty of people are enjoying, and I will be adding them to my etsy shop shortly. They will be $1 each. You can also purchase a sticker, button, magnet set for $2.25.

UPDATE: Read the comments, including my response. The purpose of “Ruby on Fails” is Satire/Parody. It is meant to be funny, for all – PHP and Ruby developers.