My Blog

Friends,

I am writing this note to clarify any rumors or truths that you may have heard about me and Ashley. For some of you, this will come as a complete shock; for others, not so much.

At the beginning of this summer (2007) Ashley and I became legally separated when my wife of 3 years and friend of many more walked out of my life and our home. This came as a complete surprise and shock to most of our closest friends and family. I have heard so many of you tell me how disappointed you are and how perfect our marriage seemed from the outside. To you all I must say that I am sorry. I feel like I tried to do my part in the marriage, but you simply cannot force someone to stay and love you in the same way you cannot force them to marry you.

The reasons are obviously more than I wish to broadcast to the entire world. This is merely an attempt to tell a large number of people at once since it breaks my heart to call each of you and go through the whole thing again and again. Please know that this is absolutely not what I wanted. This is absolutely not what I worked so hard for. I feel that now is the time to bring this to light for everyone to see since we are months into the process and about to sign our final goodbye to dissolve the marriage in the eyes of the law. Truth be told, the breakdown of a marriage can never be measured on paper or by attorneys.

Instead of diving into details with you all, I wish to offer you the one thing that has stood out in my mind throughout this whole process. It is actually so simple, yet so important. Getting married is most definitely the greatest thing I have ever done in my life. Nothing has been more meaningful and more rewarding than the kind of relationship you can only get when two hearts come together and join as one forsaking everything for the sake of the relationship. I can guarantee you that even after this situation, I still believe that this is one of the most important things you will ever do with your life.

I think back to my wedding and see all of the faces and the hope you all had for Ashley and me. What you saw and what we had was real. I have realized now that the part where we said "I do" was one of the most pivotal moments of my entire life. When everything is stripped away, that's all marriage really is. A few sentences we say to each other at one point in our life, then a lifetime of sticking by those simple, yet powerful words.

I know many of you reading this for the first time are wondering where I'm at now. Honestly, I am doing just fine. I was extremely mad, angry, sad, sick, numb, and afraid (to name a few) for a time. But time has a way of forcing us to move on and live life. This is what I am doing now with a new hope and a renewed sense of purpose for my life. I am reminded every day of the wonderful blessings I still have. These give me so much hope. You all have been so great to me and have seen me through much in my life. Know that you all are loved so greatly. If any of you feel that you need to talk more about this with me, I am here for you. The reality of a divorce is that it hurts everyone.

Remember that life is so short and that we are not promised tomorrow. Live life with no regrets.

Peace and love to you all,
BJ

Ah, time for another makeover of this site.  This design represents the 8th full overhaul of the site’s design.  I made the SiteX theme with div’s, a new step in the CSS direction for my CMS.  I just released a new SiteX core, 0.7.3, which this site is now running.  It is an awesome collection of new features and upgrades to old ones.  As you can see from this site, the ability to customize has increased greatly since the last release.  OK, enough about programming.

School is still going well.  This past month I finally selected a thesis topic.  Those of you that know me understand that I have been struggling with this for quite some time.  It’s hard to pick something significant, novel, and accomplishable.  I was finally able to tie my shape metrics work into the clinical problem of IGRT (image-guided radiotherapy).  Today was also a landmark day for me because I finally cracked the mathematics of a really critical part of my project.  I’ve been struggling over this since last November.  I solved the problem and was met with joy and anger all at the same time.  Funny how that works.

Ashley and I had a great holiday with our friends and family.  Control the Show was absolutely crazy this year.  The media attention was even heavier than last year with reporters calling 4 and 5 times each day in December.  I have to admit, it got to be a bit much.  At one point a camera crew came and destroyed hundreds of lights in the yard trying to get a good shot, or so it seemed.  They didn’t even have the nerve to tell me they did it (I saw it immediately after they left) nor did they sponsor any lights.  Oh well.  It was a great experience, and I am grateful for all who donated to the Ronald McDonald House.  I am also thankful for all of the wonderful emails I received from many of you around the world.

I’ve been doing some winter day hiking recently.  It’s been great to leave the city for awhile and get some altitude.  I’m posting up photos at my outdoor site - http://at.bjsintay.com.  Roxie is the best trail dog.  The guys and I are gearing up for a long section hike this summer.  We’re either going to call it the Nine Days in May or Nine Days to Die in July (depending on when we go).

Have I talked to you in awhile?  Shoot me an email, send me and IM, or call if not.  It’s always great to catch up.  Take care all.

What’s up!?  I'm back once again for a new blog entry – you’re all stunned.  Hah, blog just came up as a misspelled word.  I’m coming at you from our home in Winston-Salem, NC.  I’ve got just a few moments to spare between roughhousing with the dogs, kicking everyone’s butt in cards, hiking the trail, and getting’ my learn on.  When I last left you I was in the middle of Control the Show 2005.  What a blizzard of media that was.  The grand finale was either the featured American story in the London Times or the Wolf Blitzer prime time CNN segment.  I’ll never forget seeing that on the caller ID!  Things finished up well and preparations are under way for 2006.  Stay tuned.

In January Ash and I got two more puppies.  I know, it’s a bit crazy.  They are lil’ min pins: Roxie and Rex.  Raisin absolutely loves them.  It’s cute watching them play together and especially fun when we form a large “dog pile” together on the bed.  Head over to the beegeandash.com site for photos.

As far as school goes, well, it goes.  I’m in my third year of the Ph.D. program at Wake Forest and things have become much more stable now that I have my course work out of the way.  Courses are done, quals are done, on to the prelim!  I’ve moved down to Radiation Oncology and am working with the Medical Physicists there.  The main things I get to do include IMRT QA (making sure people get the right radiation treatment) and weekly machine QA (making sure the machines are treating correctly).  I also help out with the radiation biology research.  It’s fun being in the clinical environment.  My research on the pain devices has finally concluded with the result of a few really neat devices I designed that are now entering into research protocols.  The biggest project I had just wrapped up last month after nearly two years of development.  A lot of code, solder, and metal went into making the device.  If it weren’t for the lawyers, I would tell you what it is!  Basically, I used all of my skills as a machinist, electrical engineer, computer engineer, and a programmer to put together a new class of research instruments for examining chronic pain.

In April I started playing with a small band here in Winston-Salem called Covered Dish.  Since then, we’ve played regularly downtown, often we play once a week.  I’m actually playing the drums for this group and doing a little bit of backup vocals.  It’s been a nice change from singing and the types of low-key venues we play are great fun.  Check out the band at www.covereddishmusic.com.

This summer I started my quest to finish the Appalachian Trail before I die.  I’ve since put in about 110 miles (about 2,000 more to go!) on 3 separate trips.  I’ve put a lot of info online about the trips including photos – check it out at http://at.bjsintay.com.  I’m always looking for hiking companions, so let me know if you’re in.

That’s about all I have time for – see ya!

So it's been a long while once again... I hate starting an entry like that, but it's true.  Thank you for believing that some day I would update this whole blog/journal thing.  Which brings up a good question: what should I call this, a blog or a journal?  I started this thing a bit before the word blog was widely used so I've always called it a journal.  Leave a comment with your thoughts.  As most of you can guess much has happened since last spring when I wrote before.

First and foremost, controltheshow.com released in early December and the world has gone crazy for it.  Within one week of launching the show we had appeared on several local news stations in the Winston-Salem/Greensboro area.  Even since then, I have received emails confirming news appearances across the country each morning and evening.  Even today the story aired in 5 different states!  Yesterday we were on the front page of the local section in the Winston-Salem Journal.  I also did a radio interview which also brings up the fact that radio stations around the nation have been broadcasting our site as well.  Basically, it's been pretty crazy.  I am encouraged by all of the email that streams in all day.  Thank you to everyone that has expressed warm wishes to Ashley and I this holiday season.  We're delighted to have all of you in control of our house.  By the way, in case you don't know what controltheshow.com is, it's a way to personally control all of the Christmas lights on our home from the Internet.  It's really crazy, I know, but it was a ton of fun making.

Secondly, SiteX is alive and well in version 0.7 now.  This has been a huge accomplishment for me as this version supports world-wide localization.  That means that people all over the world can translate the SiteX language text into their own native languages.  Support like this opens up my CMS (which bjsintay.com now partially runs on) to gain momentum across the globe.  SiteX 0.7 has a lot of nice features that I spent many hours developing.  Be sure to check it out!

Since April was the last time I wrote something here, I should catch everyone up on our summer.  In May we bought our very first house in Winston-Salem (see beegeandash.com for photos).  We spent an entire month painting every wall and half of the ceilings.  In late June we moved out of the good ol' apartment and into our first home.  We absolutely love it here... the neighbors are great and the location is perfect.  Our house has room for a secret science lab AND a guest bedroom.  Heh.  There's even a nice backyard area with a grill and screened porch.  Come drop by any time and visit us.  We also went on a cruise this summer to celebrate my father-in-law's 30th, I mean 50th, birthday.  We got to see a lot of neat stuff including Belize and Mexico.  A hurricane forced us to trade Grand Caiman and Cozumel for Nassau.  We still managed to have a great time.  It was a lot of fun going as a family and the memories we made will last a lifetime.

Academically it was also a notable summer.  I spent the first part of my summer doing my clinical rotation in the hospital.  This was an amazing time for me as I experienced many new and exciting things like watching a live beating heart, assisting in epidural procedures, watching over the 32 week-old babies in the NICU, seeing a gastric bypass, and taking the heart out of a cadaver.  This summer also brought around the qualifying exam for my peers and me.  This was a fairly painful time that ended up taking nearly 3 months to complete.  About all I'd like to say is that it's over and I passed.

There are probably 100 other things I should say here because it's been so long and so many things have happened, but I'll leave that for another time.  I worked extra hard to install SiteX myself (only took me 18 months to get around to it!) so that I could keep things running smoothly around here.  I plan to write more, so you should plan to come back more.  : )  Until next time...

It's amazing that the end of my second semester at Wake Forest is nearly coming to a close. It's also amazing that my one year anniversary is creeping up! What a year it has been, so many changes, so many amazing blessings. I have so much to be thankful for... for a beautiful wife whom I love more each day that goes by, for my wonderful opportunity to be educated at one of the premier institutions in the world, for a great scholarship that makes the Ph.D. life less stressful, for friends that always keep life interesting (Yu, Allen, Brian, Michael, Scott, and many others), for creativity which keeps me inspired to realize my dreams, and for a life which has been full of happiness and joy. It has been far too long since I've put up a journal entry, maybe even far too long since I've spoken to you, visitor. If so, be sure to give me a shout out... I'd love to hear from any and all of you.

Many things have been afloat in my personal life. Ashley and I are continuing to discover the joy of having each other every day. Marriage is an amazing way that people can share their lives together. I cannot express to you the joy and fulfillment that it has brought to Ashley and me. The Sintay family cookbook has continued to expand with delicious entrees and treats good enough for the Queen of England to eat. We've also taken to playing cards often which keeps a little healthy competition going. Our hunt for a house started last month, and we are hoping to purchase by May this year. I am making sure that there is a good space for plopping down my music gear (and workshop!). Overall, we're very excited about it! And more importantly, through it all we are growing closer and closer. Even after 5 years of being together it is still amazing.

School continues to be a great experience. I am taking three full time classes this semester: nonlinear optimization, medical imaging physics, and MRI pulse sequence programming. The pulse programming class is an amazing opportunity to get my hands dirty designing sequences for the GE scanner. Yu Cai and I have been working on a gradient echo sequence this semester with a few side projects in between. Hopefully we will have a nice finished product by the end of April. Dr. Kraft deserves a big round of applause for teaching 3 hours of class in addition to a guided test/debug session at night on the research scanner which sometimes lasts until 11pm. Dr. Plemmons and his lovely wife deserve a big thank you for having our small optimization class over to his house for a special class session over breakfast. I'm also involved with the Pain Research Lab in Neurology at the hospital. I have been designing the hardware, analog/digital circuitry, and the application suite for a pain research actuation device. On the side I am also consulting with Samir on the snot machine. I have also been doing some MRI research. I am still working on small descriptions for you all on my portfolio site.

As far as personal projects go, in January I finally finished the first large-scale release of SiteX (version 0.6) which has many new features. Crazy enough, I've had almost 2,000 downloads and about 20,000 unique visitors to the site since January 2005. The software continues to get updates many of which are aided by the help of people throughout the world who have visited the site and come to enjoy SiteX. If you're looking for a way to have a website with all the standard features you need without the hassle of programming them, check it out.

My weather station has also been overhauled with a new system I've designed to work with my website. I am taking weather readings from my porch and sending them to the site for you to see live 24/7. I'm also producing some nice dynamic charts which plot out historical data (more to come as well). Be sure to check it out... it took a lot of work!

I am also working on some new hardware projects. In March I successfully launched my embedded web server which implements FTP, TCP/IP, STMP, and more. It's on my home cable modem line, so I'll try to keep the domain name routed to my IP. Check it out... http://home.bjsintay.com. I am going to put some fun things for you to do on there including drawing on a etch-a-sketch, two player racing, and more. I am going to use the chip to do some great things for me, many you won't get to see. The core chip is about the size of a dime. Now that's a small web server! It plugs directly into any network or router, takes up about 3 square inches, and can run for months on a small watch battery. I am also working on my digital knowledge and have learned to program several different microcontrollers for fun. I am growing my Wiki on the web for my own personal use... http://wiki.bjsintay.com. You may not find it helpful at all.

There are so many other things I could say... I've been pretty busy. Since the last post here are some fun things I've got to do: see Anberlin live; take Ashley on a surprise weekend vacation to a vineyard (see beegeandash.com, 1); visit Alea, AP, and the baking baby; take Yu to get his first burrito; judge a science fair; take my 11 year old sister-in-law to a sports bar on a Friday night to watch some March Madness games; drive a Ferrari (ok I lied about this one, 1); watch a live liver surgery; read Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy; eat lamb, sea bass, sole, duck, and scallops in one setting (thanks Mrs. Duhan!, 1); help out at the annual Egg Drop Competition with Yu (and watch him get covered with a flying bowl of Jello!!!, 1); learn to manage a lathe; explode a battery; and much more I'm forgetting...

Greetings! You may have noticed big changes on my site. I finally decided on a new format for my website... after 18 months, 23 designs, and 4 different betas the 7th edition of bjsintay.com is here. I have continued to work up new content in addition to revising the current content of the site.

In other news...  SiteX, my long awaited PHP automated site software was release in September. This new package will allow anyone the ability to launch a completely dynamic site including a guestbook, photo gallery, link page, journal, and more without any knowledge of PHP. The current version is stable and ready for download. Be on the lookout for more changes coming within a few months including a forum, user manager, an expanded photo gallery with searching, and more! The photo gallery used in SiteX is a stripped down version of another one of my web projects, phpgal, which I haven't had any time for.

Jake and the Munster, my first ever published comic book, has also be released. The book is 52 pages of humor from yours truly. It includes all of the strips from the 2003-04 run in the Technician at NCSU as well as some revisions, character sketches, and a final farewell strip. Order yours today at www.jakeandthemunster.com. A limited number are available so don't wait.

Ashley and I have settled into our new lifestyle fairly well. We are greatly enjoying each other and our new life in Winston-Salem. Ashley continues to enjoy her job as Branch Manager of Strataforce in Statesville. I am still running fast toward my Ph.D. at Wake Forest. Things are going great in the program, and I'm excited to see what the next few years have in store. Currently, I am focusing my research on MRI pulse optimizations as well as the development of my haptic glove. Class is amazing... I'm not used to having such a small number of people in my classes. It's great! I've made a lot of new friends... Yu from China (a fellow MRI enthusiast), Scott from VT (my office-mate), Nicole (from nano-science physics), and many other great students and professors. Look for more information on my research at my portfolio website.

Hello! Greetings from Winston-Salem, North Carolina. There is so much to tell from the past two months it's hard to know where to begin. I know all of you feel so neglected this year. The journal is nearly dead and I'm hearing about it from a lot of you, so here goes the massive update!

When I last left you I was killing myself working RocketSense and finishing my graduate microprocessor design course with a healthy dose of operating systems projects. Bleh! Well I finished all of that, and on May 15th I finally graduated with my two degrees!!! So I said goodbye to NC State University and Ash parted with Carolina on the 9th and we set our sights on the upcoming wedding. It was a crazy month, Ash started work the day after her graduation at StrataForce. I packed up my stuff and at the end of May we moved our stuff into our lovely new apartment in Winston-Salem. I continued to live there for a week, preparing the place and getting things cleaned up and organized. After that, Ash and I were both at home getting ready for the wedding, practicing for our first dance, and spending some great moments together.

Then it happened...

About one week to go, Brian threw a great bachelor party at Jillian's in a private room, complete with four pool tables, two big screens, and plenty of awesome fixins. Who could forget the unfavorable balloon release? Thursday before the wedding everything started rolling fast. We kicked things off with an incredible Caribbean party at the Wills?s new house that featured a steel drum musician, catered Caribbean food, and tons of friendly faces. The party lasted all night and ended up with a fierce battle at the pool table. The next day A.P. and Brian threw my tool party at Midtown. It was a great time to spend with the fellas while the ladies were at the bride?s festivities. Thanks for all the great tools guys! That night we had the rehearsal and dinner at Zapata?s. The meal was absolutely fabulous, the mariachi band was incredible, and the speeches were heart warming. Grant snapped a ton of pics for us to save the moment. I?ll try to get them here and on the wedding website. Brian and I spent the night calling security at the Marriot downtown while Ash spent a fun night out on the town.

The next day flew by... the fellas had a great breakfast complete with arm wrestling at Bob Evans. After, we enjoyed a relaxing limo ride downtown until it was time to get ready. At 6pm, we were ready to roll out the door. Chris wins the award for first to cry, but I didn't take much longer after her. Ash looking absolutely amazing coming down the isle and the ceremony was surreal. Ashley, Pastor Paul, and I all fought back our emotions to finish the wonderful ceremony without any tearful breakdowns. : ) Afterward, the party that took place downtown was something to be remembered for the rest of our lives. About five thousand roses gave their pedals to set the most romantic evening we had ever experienced. The floating candles sparkled through a room of lush topiaries. The food was amazing. The photo booth captured hundreds of smiles. The Motown band rocked our souls past midnight. The video brought tears. Our first dance was so much fun (we heard your oo's and ahh's). Thank you so much for all who came to our wedding from near and far to be with us in the biggest party we've ever been a part of. May the celebration continue for years to come. We love you all.

After the wedding we escaped to the western Caribbean on one of the world's largest cruise ships for a week-long excursion of paradise. We stopped in Labadee, Hispanola (island of Hatii) for a day of relaxation on the private beaches; Ocho Rios, Jamaica for a day of excitement in Dunn's River Falls and Dolphin Cove, ya mon; Georgetown, Grand Caymen for a day snorkeling with the wild stingrays out in the ocean (tons of fun!) and duty free shopping; and Cozumel, Mexico, an exclusive island where we rented a scooter and snorkeling gear and explored the wild parts of the island far away from civilization. After eight days on the ship, we returned home for a great feast with both of our families. The next day we picked up our new '04 Toyota Highlander Ltd and headed up to the Gatlinburg, TN to our private mountain cabin. We enjoyed the village atmosphere and the Great Smokey Mountain National Park close by. We spent hours relaxing in the hot tubs in our cabin and enjoying the sights of the Smokey Mountains. It was such a great honeymoon, and don't worry, we have hundreds of pictures to show!

We are currently living in our apartment in Winston-Salem. Ash is working temporarily for the branch in Statesville of her company and I am working to finish up my last few deals for RocketSense. Grad school is slowly closing in on me, and that's half exciting, half scary. It's time to buckle up for another great ride through the ranks of another awesome University. Look out Wake Forest, here I come...

Greetings! It's definitely time for an update on my life. : ) I'm very sorry for keeping you all in the dark for so long. As many of you know, it's been a long, busy semester for me. It's April and that means it's time to start finalizing plans for the future after NC State. In late January Ash and I traveled to NASA to reveal the first prototype of the haptic touch glove to the engineers there. It was well received and shortly I was given a verbal job offer for some time in May. I was astonished and excited at this great opportunity. In March I was granted a day of interviews at Wake Forest University with the Biomedical Engineering department. A couple weekends ago Ash and I were out driving around Raleigh in a limo (a just because wonderful date night) when my parents called in with some news... Wake Forest had accepted me to start working on my Ph.D. in the fall with a full scholarship and stipend. We were extremely excited and partied the rest of the night. Since then more things have come together. Ash received a verbal job offer for an excellent job in Winston-Salem (yes, that's where WFU is) as a manager of a company that works directly with staffing many Hispanic workers. If you know Ash, she really has a passion for this sort of thing. It will combine her Spanish and PR majors from UNC into an awesome job for her. With all of this, I have decided to pursue my Ph.D. (and M.D.) at Wake Forest. Put it on the map folks, we'll be in Winston-Salem for at least another 5 to 8 years. : ) I'd like to say a special thanks to all of those involved in making things happen for me in the past couple months. To Steve Jurczyk for his hard work opening up a position for me at NASA. To Dr. Bourland and his associates in the Wake Forest Biomedical Arts & Science School for their decision to invest their time and resources into me. To Ash, my family, and her family for being great supporters during this time of big decisions and transitions. And to all my friends who are great at encouraging me.

Graduation time is right around the corner for Ash and I. I've been burdened with tons of projects and homework. I decided to drop my weekly editorial comics and I may have to drop Jake and the Munster for awhile. It's very sad, but I'm running out of time in my daily life to get the important things done. I'm also trying to slow down the engine of my business in preparation for next year. Archery is still a ton of fun despite the times when I have bad days shooting at the line. : ) I guess it happens to everyone.

The wedding is right around the corner! Ash and I are so excited to share this time with you all. Everything is going great with the plans. If you haven't signed our guestbook, please drop us a line at wedding.beegeandash.com. That's all I have for now. I promise I'll write more often. : )

It's almost February, and that means I'm one month closer to sharing my life with Ash! I'm very excited for the coming wedding and for seeing all of our wonderful friends. Plans are pretty much complete and ready for the big day. We just released a new website for our wedding, wedding.beegeandash.com. It's a great site full of details and pictures for all of you great people! I also am linking bjandash.com to beegeandash.com since I hear tell that some of you are having a hard time with the phonetic spelling of my name. : )

It's been icing/snowing here the past couple days which means I've had some time to get things accomplished around here. We've had the past 2 days off from school and I sometimes wonder if I'll ever get to go back. Data Structures is mounting up against me, but I'm fighting back with everything I have left in me. Java is not the greatest thing in the world, but I'm surviving the programs just fine. Archery is turning out to be a sinch as I shot 4 bull's eyes with 4 arrows on our first test shoot. He said we'd get an A+ for the course if we could group that tight. I guess he was lying. >: | Nuclear engineering has been kinda lacking as we've only had one class where the professor has actually taught. The rest of the time something has come up and we haven't had class for one reason or the other.

RocketSense is booming ahead into the new year with tons of new contracts for the rest of the semester. I'm going to be releasing a new RocketSense website in the next month full of cutting-edge technology and ready to serve a whole new generation of clients. Be sure to check it out when it launches.

The big announcement for the day is that Jake and the Munster now have their own website located at www.jakeandthemunster.com or just www.themunster.com if you prefer. Soon I will be selling merchandise and preordering comic books for the final strip releasing in the Technician at the end of April. The comic book will contain all of the adventures from this year as well as a few unreleased ones and some of the first sketches ever made of the characters. This will be a limited edition professional bound print, so be sure to get yours when they go on sale!

First let me apologize for being so late in posting up a new journal entry. I know all of you are just dying to gain even more insight into my life. Things have been busy for me these past couple months, and I'm looking forward to some quieter times ahead.

Last month I finished out my senior design project with Haptrix in the EEP program. We finished strong with a working prototype that would not have been completed had it not been for all of the wonderful friends we had along for the ride. Many thanks to all of you! Our booth was extremely popular and even caught the attention of capital investors who were dropping hints. I have lots of pictures which will be online soon. Most of all, thanks to Ash and my family for surviving the challenging semester and giving me strength and encouragement. If you're interested in the glove technology, be on the lookout for a small section on my site dedicated to inventions which will showcase things I come up with much like the haptic touch glove.

After senior design day and my exams, I headed home for surgery on my ear. I received a tympanoplasty on my left ear drum on Wednesday the 17th which left me down and out for a week and groggy for a good while longer. The surgery took 2.5 hours, 1 hour longer than expected due to the doctor needing to remove a good chunk of my skull just above my jawbone to access the inner ear. The pain from drilling was extreme and left me with painful migraines which extended throughout my entire head. Narcotics left me feeling pretty terrible but by day 8, I was on the upside of things. I was well enough by Christmas Eve to enjoy the family festivities and even eat a little better than I had been (I still have a hard time eating with my sore jaw). As soon as I could I cranked back into gear with work.

Other things that have happened since I last wrote... I took the GRE in November. I did so-so on the verbal and killed the math. I also feel like I did well on the writing sections. I ended up with a 4.0 GPA this semester, which is a first for me. That puts me in range to graduate Cum Laude in May. Wish me luck! : ) I also finished my application to Wake Forrest for a Ph.D. in biomedical engineering and a M.S. in computer science. I'm not sure if I will attend in the fall, but I wanted to create as many options as possible for me.

The wedding plans are still moving ahead at full speed. We have the guest list nearly completed which has been hard. Today we went shopping for tuxedos and yesterday we finalized some things with the flower designers and the decoration people. We're also picking out the songs for the band. We've pretty much finished all the major details, it's just time to focus on the small intricate things. Before you know it the day will be here!