A Day in the life of Matt and Megan

Well today was relatively low key. Until we decided to bite the bullet and clean out the fridge. Matt is getting over the stomach flu so I got to do the honors of dumping out the creatures that were hiding in the back of our fridge. I stuck t.p. up my nose to ward off the toxic fumes, and ventured into the unknown. After purging the monsters from their containers, Matt made a mad dash for the garbage can outside with the moldy food stuffed in a garbage bag. I didn't think he'd make it without tossing his cookies, but he made it back safe and sound. I'm happy to say my kitchen now smells like lemons, and Amy can now have her tupperware back;) This is a day in the life of Matt and Megan.

100 things about Megan

I thought you'd all enjoy this. It took long enough so you better like it! And as a disclaimer if you use any of these things against me you'll be sorry!:)

1. I love eating!
2. I love Classic Rock.
3. I enjoy playing with hair.
4. I’m not as gutsy about coloring my hair since I’ve been married. Matt prefers me natural.
5. I have a strict bed time routine that I never stray from
6. I wash my face every morning and every night before bed. (I read some place that for every night you don’t wash your face your skin ages 8 days!)
7. I’m more of a listener than a talker
8. I LOVE people watching.
9. I would look at hair all during sacrament if Matt didn’t nudge me to stop.
10. I enjoy exercising and lifting weights
11. Family is the most important to me.
12. I come from a very “huggy” family.
13. I despised high school…too much drama.
14. I’m generally mellow and easy going.
15. I’m practical
16. I’m scared to death to have kids and raise them in this crazy world
17. I’ve never been outside the U.S. (Hopefully that will change after we graduate and go to Europe!)
18. I will be the 1^st Garrett woman to graduate college.
19. I married the most patient man on the planet.
20. I hate washing my hair.
21. I love blue eyes.
22. I haven’t had my hair its natural color since I was 16.
23. I love pink!
24. I want a van full of kids
25. I’m not fond of public speaking
26. I love my dad. He is the ultimate example of hard work and sacrifice for his children
27. If I could I’d wear nothing but pj’s all day long
28. I love music
29. I have an ear for harmonizing
30. I can’t wait to have a home of my own
31. I have a very sensitive nose, I can smell everything
32. I am a big fan of intuitive eating
33. I think I would of liked being a hippie
34. I’m a nail biter. (Disgusting habit…I know)
35. I sneak sugary treats into my mouth when Matt’s not looking
36. I’m a sucker for LDS romance novels
37. I loathe Chemistry!
38. I sleep with my feet out of the covers
39. I love popping zits
40. I love Gilmore Girls
41. I’m a homebody.
42. I like Yoga
43. If Matt and I were to keep a received tickle tally, I’d win by a long shot.
44. I do better in small groups
45. I think I have cute feet
46. I have very noticeable veins in my hands and feet
47. I have to have the radio on when I drive
48. I was born in Arizona
49. I’ve played the clarinet since 5^th grade
50. Yes, I was in the marching band.
51. I played a lot of volleyball from 6^th to 12^th grade
52. I enjoy voicing my opinion about topics I am passionate about.
53. I like deep cleaning
54. I’m going to miss the Provo “bubble” when we leave
55. I don’t like it when people talk bad about people they don’t know
56. I always have toenail polish on
57. I have a 3” scar on my neck from when I passed out and hit the countertop when I was 14.
58. I’ve never broken a bone
59. I’ve never had a cavity
60. I’m afraid of heights
61. I hate the “stomach drop” feeling you get on roller coasters
62. I never answer my phone unless it’s Matt
63. I assume if it’s important you’ll leave a message
64. I lived off of refried beans and potato pearls my 1^st semester of college
65. I gave Matt “the cheek” when he 1^st tried to kiss me
66. I don’t like talking on the phone
67. My favorite movie is the “Anne of Green Gables” series
68. I don’t like to let the small things bug me
69. I love going to the temple
70. I admire my brother Reece and his wife Shana. They’ve gone through so much and have managed to come out on top just beautifully!
71. I love eye makeup
72. I enjoy being lazy and relaxing on vacations
73. I can’t wait to go to Europe next year with Matt!
74. I love sleeping
75. I like getting things done and being productive
76. I like being by myself to just think
77. My husband is a computer geek
78. I’m not competitive
79. I’ve got skillz when I play Bocce and Guitar Hero
80. If I put all the bobby pins I have together they would wrap around the world at least once.
81. I have weak wrists, I think from hairstyling
82. I’m the 4^th child out of 5.
83. My moms a twin so…I could have twins
84. I’ve had every hair color under the sun
85. See Laurel’s #85. I do the same thing!
86. I can’t believe side ponies are coming back
87. I have the cutest nieces and nephews in the world
88. I try to listen to by body, it will tell me if I need something
89. I have the cutest husband ever!
90. I’m a Harry Potter addict. (Matt converted me)
91. My nicknames are Peggysan, Missy Lyn, megs
92. I love hot showers
93. I’ve lived in 5 states since I was 12 and loved every minute of it
94. I’ve never had braces
95. I have the same bday as Harry Potter and James E. Faust
96. I love Brian Regan.
97. I have a brother with Schizophrenia.
98. I love the name Elora
99. I love reading
100. Diet Pepsi is my favorite soda

I thought you all would like this and it helps us to get to know each other better! Enjoy!

Site Catalyst Implementation Guide

I finished reading the Site Catalyst Implementation Guide this morning. I wish I would have read it before the competition, as it included of lot things that would have been helpful in understanding Costume Craze's implementation. I especially liked the section on using Site Catalyst with AJAX code. With so much information to process, I think it will take awhile, including multiple readings of the document, before it sinks in.

It's Arrived!!!!!!!

Look what came in the mail today! Though not as nice as winning the championship, this will help ease the wounds of the loss.

Stake Conference

We had Stake Conference today and our Stake Presidency got released so Elder L. Tom Perry was there. I got to meet him! ( I sit up on the stand since I'm the Stake Primary President) This is the second Apostle I've gotten to meet! ( I met Elder Bednar in Arkansas) He is the most energetic person I've ever met. Especially for someone his age, wow! What an opportunity it is to meet one the the Lord's elect servants. You can sense the love and understanding they have for each and everyone of us. They really are examples and disciples of Christ. Anyways I just had tell everyone b/c I was very excited about it!

Web Services Assignment

1. The web service wasn't as hard to implement as I had imagined. I hadn't used my Java skills since the junior core and really wasn't looking forward to shaking the dust off my Eclipse. I decided to go with PHP, the language of choice at my work. I discovered that it was relatively simple to create and consume web services with PHP. There was a bunch of libraries out there for me to choose from. At first I didn't realize that I there were multiple libraries, but as I was reading tutorials about the PEAR soap implementation and finding they weren't working, I realized that I was using the nusoap library. Once I got past that hurdle, I was able to find several good resources, such as: Programming with NuSoap and Creating and Consuming Web Services with PHP. The most trouble I had was returning multiple variables as an output. My web service would only allow me to return only one variable and I finally figured out how to pass back an array filled with the weather information as my one output variable.

2. The wsdl of my service can be accessed at http://matt.circlepix.com/scripts/WebService/soapServer.php in a cool web services format. The wsdl can also be accessed by attaching ?wsdl to the address. Here is the sample code needed to access my weather web service:

<?php

//Get the Nusoap Library
require_once('nusoap.php');

//Create the client instance
$client = new soapclient(
'http://matt.circlepix.com/scripts/WebService/soapServer.php?wsdl', true);

//Testing variables
//$zipcode= 'provo';
//$zipcode= 'orem';
//$zipcode= '84057';
$zipcode= '84602';

//Call the soap method
$result = $client->call('getWeather', array('zipcode' => $zipcode));

//Print the result
print_r($result);

?>

3. Web services give you the ability to not rewrite code that has already been written. Whenever you want to do that same thing or anyone else for that matter, all they have to do is call that same function, with the same parameters and instantly you have what you want. Once you get the hang of creating a web service, I don't think it would be that hard to implement many of them. I believe web services separate the business logic out of the business objects and creates another layer to access. It would be difficult to integrate a web services framework into an already functioning system. Why use web services and access a service across the network, when you can create functions within your own system and include the other pages right into your code? It seems like it would be faster and the delivery would be less difficult, to use code that you've already written but use a different method to transfer it. Web services is also based upon standards that haven't been finalized. What happens if you base your whole company on RPC standard web services and then everybody adopts REST web services? I think there is a case to use web services to fill little niches in your code, such as a weather service portlet. As far as creating the whole system as a web service; I don't think that would be a good idea for any company who has already invested deeply in building their own information architecture.

4. I think Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) can essentially be found in any company in some form. We create common functions that will be used many times and put them in common files (i.e. database connection logic). We access these files at the beginning of other files and call these functions when needed. Are we not calling a service, to help us implement something? The only difference is the way we access the information. Accessing other functions the web services way, over the Internet, will significantly increase the time and bandwidth that a company uses up. One case where web services could be of use, is in a dashboard setting. If you want to create a home page filled with portlets of different kinds, a company could call different web services, such as weather, clock or news aggregators, creating a mashup of different web services. Whether or not SOA is the future; I think only time will tell.

Flowers

I came home yesterday from a long day of work to find these gorgeous flowers! Matt is such a sweetheart! He keeps me sane throughout the busy weeks. The other pic is of my niece Emmalee. This is the face of a 8 month old who hasn't slept and is sick with a cold/teething. Poor thing! She is soooo cute! Love her to death.

Valentines Day 2007

Matt and I had a fabulous Valentines Day. Matt was sick on V-day so I decided to surprise him with a cute dinner (well, as cute of a dinner as a cheap student with no time could do) So I went and got a heart shaped pizza from 5Buck, made a healthy salad to go with our unhealthy pizza, and to top it all off I made some chocolate covered strawberries! yum! Matt was very surprised. Then on Friday it was my turn for a surprise. I got home from class at 12:00. We went to a much needed temple session, and hit this great steak place in Salt Lake. It was sooo good! We had to pick our jaws up off the floor once the bill came, but it was worth the splurge. (Matt's proposed we eat nothing but beans and soup for the next month to make up for it. Yeah right!) We were in the mood for something free after that, so we went to Brookstone for a free massage! It was heaven! Now we are at home snuggling and watching a movie! Ahh (sigh)! I love the weekends!

Ethan Dover has arrived!

Amy Dover (Matt's sister) had her second baby on January 31st at 8:22 a.m. Yeah! He is sooo cute and chubby! Amy and baby are doing fabulous and she apparently has the pioneer adrenaline:) They have decided to name him Ethan Michael Dover. Very cute!

Matt & Megan

These pictures are courtesy of the beautiful, talented Amy Dover. She did such a good job! These aren't even proofed yet and they still look great. Thanks Amy, we love you!

Garret Family

Jim & Freida

Standing (Matt, Megan, Aaron, Freida, Jim, Devin)
Sitting (EmmaLee, Kiersten, Chase, Nathan, Reece, Shana, Rebecca)

Kiersten, Megan, Shana

The Boys

Nieces & Nephews

Nathan

Rebecca

EmmaLee

The Babysitter's Club

Matt and I had the pleasure of babysitting Olivia on Friday, while mom and dad enjoyed their last weekend of having only one child! This girl is a hoot! She would run down the hall and yell, "MATT!", wait for him to chase her, then run behind a bedroom door and shut it just as Matt would catch up with her. She loved it! And of course Matt had to do it five hundred times before Olivia grew bored of it. Then we danced to this funny CD that Amy and Mike had. Then I HAD to play with her hair so we gave her a cool fohawk!(f.y.i- a fohawk is like a mohawk but just in the front, as opposed to all the way down the head) And yes those are goldfish in her mouth. Needless to say it was a really fun night!

Icicle Heaven

Due to the cold front, we had these beautifully hazardous icicles on the house. They were huge!! Luckily they melted before anybody got their eye gouged out!

eBusiness Wikipedia

Yesterday I contributed to my a wikipedia for the first time ever, the eBusiness Center Wiki. The pages that I contributed were:

• Web Portals
• Online Communities
• Online Auctions
  

It takes a lot of time to publish a relatively small amount of data. Don't wait until the deadline to finish your research.

Information Integration

In the rapidly changing business world of today, the importance of information has increased the need for better information management tools. Almost all major companies are driven by information, including Google, Amazon and Wal-Mart. Whoever controls the information, has the power. So it is not surprising that IBM has come out with their Websphere Information Integration platform and their Information Management software. The articles contain a brief overview of how the process works, but I would like to see a company that has information problems and see how bringing in the IBM information server would change things. I think every company is in need of controlling their information more efficiently. This is the Information Age and Information is power.

Web Services

Since my family also reads all of the posts for my class, I though I would start off with the definition of web services. A service provided by a website that can be accessed by anyone as long as they know how use the proper protocols to obtain the service. I was excited when we started talking about them in class, because my friend Nate Skousen and I were starting to develop a website that used Google's web service, Google Maps. The website address is www.ldstemplemaps.com. We want to make it the first stop for people trying to obtain information about LDS temples and we want to eventually expand to LDS places. It took us about two hours total to setup everything up. Web services are changing the web. It's so easy to do something like this with anything. I was thinking it would be a lot of fun for a family website. People could add anything they wanted to the map, simply by putting in a name, picture and address. You could create a personal Anderton family map with our own memory places. Hope that wasn't too technical family!

I wanted to show everyone my darling new purse that Laurel got me for Christmas. I love it! I seriously use it all the time (as you can see by the wonderful disorder of its contents.Everything just shoved in, just the way I like it!) Thanks Laurel!

Web Analytics and YouTube

Here is a list of some of my favorite web analytics websites:

• Google Analytics
• Google Trends

I love Google. I'm hoping for a google fantasy football website. I think if anybody can do it well, Google can. The articles that we read for class were insightful. It's an extremely efficient way to drive tons of traffic to your website. All you have to do is to get people to like your video. It made me think of another way of marketing your website. My grandma loves to forward messages to all her friends and family. If you have a cool website that you want to get out there, a few well-connected forwards and you could be reaching thousands of individuals, obviously based upon the excellence of your website. If your website isn't cool, no one is going to want to forward it.

While trying to unplug his computer from the outlet in our tiny kitchen, Matt accidently knocked over an entire jar of candle wax I had on a candle warmer onto the floor. Hence the cringing look on my face as I scrape it off the floor with a butter knife. I never knew wax could dry so fast!

You can't see it very well in th picture, but the wax is everywhere! There is still some stuck to the floor, and I often find myself sliding into the kitchen in the morning! (Note the extremely attractive 70's linoleum)