It’s been a busy semester as Team Wombat has been working at a feverish pitch in order to successfully complete their senior design project: The RFID Hacker.

For those that don’t visit this blog often, our senior design project is a device that will read and write RFID tag information. What is RFID? Well, you know when you walk into FootLocker at the mall and the security alarms go off? That’s an RFID tag system. The book you bought at Barnes & Noble still have an active RFID tag embedded in the spine of the book because the bookstore clerk forgot to disable the RFID tag. An RFID tag is much like an electronic barcode, except you don’t need to wave a laser at the purchased item in order to determine it’s sale price.

Why build an RFID hacker? Well, RFID is used for security purposes and we at the University of Iowa Engineering College have an RFID security ID card so that we can access the Seamans Center during off-hours. RFID technology is great, but since it is an open-source technology, almost anyone with enough time and electronics background can defeat RFID security measures.

So far, our project is going well. We’ll be populating our 2nd printed circuit board throughout the upcoming weekend, not to mention the final project report AND a huge poster for our final presentation. For more information regarding our progress and more about RFID technology, visit our senior design project website here.

Come on out to the University of Iowa and see a little of what I’ve been doing this semester. Intermedia is not my major, but somethign I’ve been working on to keep my brain in-check. My Intermedia project consists of something I’ve been working on using the Processing 1.0 [Beta] IDE. The open house is April 18, 2008 at the Communications Building here at the University of Iowa campus in Iowa City. I’d sure love to see you.

It must have been a freak of nature or a massive aligning of the planets that allowed my University of Iowa Spring Break to coincide with my kids school break. But nevertheless, it did happen and my kids and I were allowed a weeks worth of chilling around my parents house for seven days.

As usual, it was a fairly relaxed week in Van Horne. This was a particularly different Spring Break, as we were getting accustomed to the new life my Mom and step-father, Larry, are getting used to themselves following Mom’s release from the University of Iowa Hospitals.

Haley did what she does best: bake. Not only did she mix together a wonderful pan of brownies, but she slapped together a batch of chocolate chip cookies that barely made it through the night without being entirely consumed. I spent a considerable amount of time in front of my PowerBook G4 laptop; programming a Java-based peer-2-peer Chord network simulator. What? Yeah. I’m a geek. Ask me about it later.

The week ended with the kids and I hooking up with the gaming friends (including Brian and Danuuc) of mine at Gamerz in Cedar Rapids. As has been typical since last October, the night was spent fragging our beloved friends in an all-out competition of Battlefield 2. I’m not sure why we like this particular game so much. Perhaps, it’s the right mix of pace and patience. It’s not the ‘twitch’ game that Unreal Tournament is, and not as mind-numbing as multi-player Quake 3 can be.

Jared held his own, switching teams more often than I switch subjects in the middle of a sentence. Well, that’s an overstatement. As the night wore to a close, both Jared and Haley teamed up with me against a more experienced three-person team. We did just fine as far as I am concerned. Apparently, my daughter is a veteran of Gears of War, so her ‘Medic’ persona worked well with my ‘Support’ and Jared’s ‘Sniper’ perfection.

Now if I can only get a job that pays well enough to fortify a basement full of gaming PC consoles.

We can only hope.

While I am stressing the LIFE out of me this Spring (and final) Semester here at the University of Iowa, Angie is having the time of her life in Oregon. What is she doing in Oregon? Well, not much as far as I can tell. The crew has been keeping a video-blog of their escapades for Geonetric. I don’t know what this has to do with web development, but it sure looks like they are having the time of their lives. Check out the YouTube clip below.

I sure wish I were in Oregon right now. It sure beats mid-term exams.

Spent last weekend at the folks house. Mom is doing much better since i last visited two weeks ago. She’s getting around MUCH better than before. Mom has pretty much discarded the walker and was pretty pleased with herself when she found she able to get in-and-out of the rocking chair that’s been a fixture in the living room.

Larry was gone much of the weekend on one of his many bowling excursions. Beth, John and Emmett watched over Mom from Friday through Monday. Christine came over Monday and hung-out until Larry got back on Tuesday. Things went pretty well.

I’m still finishing my last semester at the University of Iowa. Much of my time is taken up integrating the PIC18F452 and EM4095 for my Senior Design Project: Hacking RFID. To learn more, just visit here and you’ll get a gist of what I’m dealing with.

When I heard that OK Go would be playing at the University of Iowa for the 10,000 Hours show, I nearly wet my pants. Unfortunately, I may not have the spare time to put in my 10 hours of community service in order to attend the concert, but at least I can revel in the fact that it’s a pretty big deal. Some years ago, they got Ben Folds, followed by Cake a year-or-so later.

It’s a novel idea: Get enough participants to each put in 10 hours of community service, with the total goal being 10, 000 hours. I love it. Probably one of the reasons I love Iowa City so much.

Anyway, here’s one of my new favorite songs and videos by OK Go. I know. It’s not the ‘Treadmill’ video, but still you got to give them props for this one:

On Tuesday, July 31st of 2007, one of the finest people I have met here at the University of Iowa will be boarding a plane in Cedar Rapids and flying back home to Libya. I have no idea why Tariq has decided to leave this fabulous jewel of the Midwest, but I’m sure he knows what he’s doing. I’ll have to trust his judgment. In all likelihood, I will never see him again and it is just now starting to sink in. Until last week, I had never hung-out with him outside the Engineering Building at the University of Iowa. Until our dinner with Mehmed, Ahmed, Ahmed, Mike and myself, I had never chatted with him extensively in a more social environment. Of course, he was always picking my brain on the latest audio/video editing software or clues to solving his Data Structures homework. I was always more than happy to add my two-cents worth. He has always maintained a very relaxed sense of self that was refreshing and a tad addictive. I’m sure he was just as stressed as the rest of us, but he seemed to take it all in stride. Tariq has always appeared a rather level-headed guy.

During my tenure here at the Univeristy of Iowa, I had never had a class with the guy. He was always one semester ahead. We became acquainted through mutual friends, Mehmed Diken (“Bill” for short) and Ahmed Halaweish. I had gleaned from several conversations that Ahmed was a native of Egypt, which unwittingly caused me to assume that Tariq was from Egypt as well. Oddly enough, this facade continued for an entire year and I was none the wise. It wasn’t until shortly Angie’s graduation party did I realize my unintentional assumption. I had posted a photo up on Facebook with the title, “Two Egyptians, a Turk and a Cowboy walk into Buffalo Wild Wings…” I had struggled with the title; then realizing that there is a general “rule of threes” in common joke writing (i.e. “A Lutheran, a Catholic and a Protestant walk into a bar…”) I had inadvertently tossed Tariq into the “Egyptian” category and he called me on it less than a week later. “You know I’m not from Egypt, don’t you?” I had to admit that I had failed to ask where he was from… I just assumed. Fortunately, Tariq has one of the most forgiving attitudes, so he let my “faux pa” slide.

The joke continued later that summer when Tariq, Mehmed and myself went out for lunch at The Airliner. While we were waiting for our pizza (sans pork products). We were chatting about the last semester and the many difficulties that we had to overcome when I simply looked over at Tariq and stated rather dryly, “You know, you were so much cooler when I thought you were from Egypt.”

I remember Mehmed nearly busting a gut on the other side of the table as Tariq simply sat there with a slight smile on his face. “Dude. Why you gotta’ do me like that” was all that Tariq could muster.

Now, all these guys call home somewhere near the Middle East. Mehmed and his brother, Ahmed, are from Turkey (via Saudi Arabia), while Ahmed is from Egypt (close enough as far as I can tell) and Tariq (obviously) from Libya. Chilling out with this bunch has been the best thing for me because they have broadened my horizons and broke every stereotype that a guy like myself from the Midwest could ever possibly conceive. They are a funny, generous and intelligent group of guys that I can’t conceive of a life without having a chance growing to love and admire.

Hopefully, Tariq will continue his Libyan Mentality TV blog while back home. He’s been working on it as “…a venue to show sides of Libya that are unprecedented, whether it is in depth interviews of common everyday characters or events that rarely take place.”

So far, it looks like he’s off to a good start. Tariq. I’ll miss you, dude. Thanks for being a fine friend. Allah willing, perhaps I will get the chance to chill-out with you again.