Levii.com

So it has been just over a month since my last short post which, as always, is more due to a tight schedule than a lack of desire to keep friends and family at least partially informed of my life.  To keep this short and sweet the reasons of course remain numerous, but the key items are: work, wife, toddler, school, and business.

On work: many of you might have heard about the upcoming split of SAIC into two separate companies.  If you haven't there are plenty of articles on the 'net which would give you every bit of detail that you might be interested in.  That and a busy early part of the year (partly due to budget cuts, partly sequestration, and partly busy projects) have kept my time in the office well-spent.  I remain the Chief Engineer and Technologist, and the scope of responsibilities in the position continues to grow.  It's fun, challenging and rewarding ... when it isn't a day of pure paperwork.

By wife; of course I mean Tara. She's doing well, and it's important to me that I spend quality time to visit, talk and just relax with her each day.  The same holds true for Aemilia who is now into the toddler stage I suppose (2+ years right?).  While she's pushing her boundaries, she's still smart and sweet. I need to get some photos and videos uploaded during my next term break; but her and Tara get my full attention until after dinner.

School is going well. I'm finishing my first quarter of year 2 in my doctorate.  It is a lot more work than I had anticipated going into the program, but rewarding and valuable nonetheless.

Business is an interesting subject and is actually Tara's business. For more information on that check her online storefront out at http://www.thevapingshop.com.  It's been interesting getting that going with her, and now we await the FDA decision on what they are going to do in the market.  The market, which was virtually untapped in the mid-west a mere 6 months ago, is already starting to fill up.  Come April 1 we'll know if we can make a full press on the idea - or if it was an idea to early.

And there you have it. The major events and direction life is going right now, we'll keep the site updated as time allows - but we'd love to talk to anyone that wants to give us a call or send an email.

//Levii

Happy Birthday to Aemilia, or as we coaxed you into saying ... "to me". It's been a great experience so far, you grow like a weed and really are a sweet little girl. 

Having a birthday near Christmas might be less fun as you get older, but for now the presents and activities last from Christmas Eve and run the 12 days of the Holiday.  I think you've opened them all now (you like to open one present, and then play with it for a good long while. 

We'll get photos and updates posted on how everyone is doing shortly.

//Levii

While I'm certain that I wrote an entry with the original incarnation of this site, its no longer available through the wayback machine so it seems appropriate to put at least a basic introduction together.

This site is the landing ground for information about the general lives and times of Levii and Tara Smith. An addition to the scope was added January 4th 2011 when Aemilia was born and now the site covers the three of us. This site is largely personal in nature; with photos, short updates and other information that may be interesting to people that have a personal connection to us. Even so, I'll be placing significant sections of some of my academic work, thought on industry, personal projects, and analysis of current events/trends (for non-sensitive and non-inflammatory subjects ... yes that means no politics or religion) on this site as well. This is partly for my own record, and also to share my thoughts and receive comment from anyone that feels inclined to participate in the discussion.

I've been asked, and of course of I've heard of the myriad of social networking sites specific to these purposes. Don't worry, I'm not a social media troglodyte - I just don't care for them and no single site will do everything I'd like to eventually get up on Levii.com. I've got a paper I've been piecing together on the subject and one day I'll post it out here to more completely answer those questions. In the meantime I need to work out how to move this site to my own server where I can transition from Joomla! to a custom system that's better suited to my needs.

The itch is almost over (that's how it happens right?) As it so happens though, today (7/22/2012) is the 7th anniversary of Tara inexplicably deciding that she actually wanted to marry me. I'll get a picture from today included soon, but in the meantime - take a look back in the 2005 photo archive. Check Chris out ... hmmm --- he doesn't look like that any more.

I think I might be starting to get old.