Welcome to the DeLaBarre family web site!
In lieu of sending out letters with our Christmas cards, we wanted to let everyone know about this little corner of the web where we provide sporadic updates on our family life. Feel free to look at some of the postings below this one. The post just before this one is a pictorial ‘year in review’ slideshow. It is being hosted by our photo album on Google, so it may be a little slow at times. You can go directly to the album through this link and have a little more control over the pace of the images. Once you are there, feel free to flip through any of our photo albums.
2007 was a busy year for us. We started settling in to our New England environment by exploring the areas around us. Anyone who has driven on New England roadways knows that this is no easy task - were it not for the wonder of GPS technology it is possible that we’d still be lost on a random rotary somewhere near the New Hampshire border.
We bought our first home in 2007 - a stylish Cape in the town of Arlington. We are a scant 9 miles from downtown Boston. When the air is not hazy with Atlantic mists, we have a beautiful view of the Boston skyline. Much of early 2007 was spent finding this house, and much of late 2007 has been spent making it our home. Our to-do list is slowly growing shorter and our trips to Home Depot have become somewhat less frequent, but I doubt that we will ever find ourselves short of things to do around the house.
Tyler is adapting well to his new surroundings. He attends a pre-Kindergarten 3-4 times a week, and will be starting real Kindergarten in a little less than a year. He has survived skating lessons from his dad, karate class with a crazed instructor (not his Dad!), and swimming lessons at the local Y. Currently he’s learning to tumble and jump in a gymnastics class - and performing more and more routines on the furniture at home.
Barb was the brains behind our house hunt. She organized the Sunday trips out to open houses and scanned through the on-line listings during the week. Now she is busy with that ‘to-do’ list I mentioned above. Also that Tyler guy - since he’s a few years shy of his driver’s liscence, he needs a little bit of help getting around to all of those activities described above. On top of everything, Barb has started a pottery craft business that she plans to run out of the house. Currently, WeeClayPrints is in product testing mode, but the plan is to have customers in early 2008.
And Byron? He’s still plugging away in his search for a cancer cure with Millennium Pharmaceuticals in downtown Cambridge. When he’s not doing that, there’s always that ‘to-do’ list to work on around the house. Sometimes he takes a break and tries his hand at reeling in striped bass from the local waters (their population is in no danger of declining anytime soon) or playing poker with some new friends in the area.
We all hope that the end of 2007 finds you happy and healthy. We’d love to hear from you (leave a comment here or email to byron.delabarre at gmail dot com / barbaraleigh at yahoo dot com). If you should find yourself in the area - please drop by. We have space at our dinner table, a spare bedroom, and plenty of lines on our ‘to-do’ list that we’d be happy to share with you 
Thursday, Oct 4 2007 in Boston was a warm day. For me it was a busy day that started with a plumber knocking on my door at 7:30 AM. It was supposed to be an hour long appointment to clean and check our 50+ year old furnace in our new (to us) house. Of course this went 3x longer then it was supposed to, involved at least 4 people (I’m not sure - we saw at least 3 trucks come and go) and cost me 2x as much as the estimate.
Sigh.
I rushed in to work and managed to prepare a shipment of samples that had to be in Chicago the following morning, and then dashed out to Waltham to look into an imaging system that we are considering adding to the lab. That went a half hour longer than I had wanted, which meant I would not be making it to Boston Common for 5 PM as planned.
We arrived to the Millennium registration tent around 5:45 and signed up for everything, receiving a laundry load of T-shirts in the process, and our balloons. They gave out two colours: red ones for those who had friends/relatives battling cancer, and white ones for cancer survivors. Some of the members on my team carried white balloons - I had no idea what to say to them, so I’ll say it here: I am so glad that you are here with us. I like the term ’survivor’, because cancer is a disaster, albeit one that happens in slow motion that we can do something about.
The balloons had lights inside of them, so that as dusk fell to dark in Boston Common the park was filled with thousands of floating red and white lights. A beautiful site indeed.
Ok - so how about some totals? We raised $1572, just shy of my $1727 goal $1727 thanks to a final large push donation to put me over the top.
Well, at the top.
Whatever.
I’d originally set a goal of $1027, but I blew past that in 3 days so I figured with over a week left I could try for something a little higher - I’m glad that I did! About 98% of that online through this site (you can still donate there if you wish). My team (Millennium Pharma) raised ~$20,000 (and I suspect gave more, as they were the main sponsor of the Boston event), and the Boston Common event as a whole raised ~$310,000 (they were shooting for $400K). Every donation, no matter the size, goes towards that number - so thank-you to everyone who gave. You are part of the search for a cure, you are part of making those who are facing cancer more comfortable in their fight, and you are a part of educating our society about leukemia and lymphoma.
The rest of the story I will tell with photos:
A view of the field while it was still light outside.
Dusk falls on the Boston Common Light the Night Walk
One of the obstructed view seats. No complaints from him - there were plenty of treats at the sign-in desk to compensate.
The balloon for my sister. At the end of the walk I cut the string and let it fly away into the night so that she could see it from Vancouver. A poetic thought, but luckily we have this technology so that she can really see it.
Starting line.
Walk underway.
My family along for the walk - Barb and Tyler.
Me and Tyler pose mid-walk.
I’d planned to get more night-time photos. Unfortunately, my photography skills/equipment aren’t exactly top-notch. This was about the best of the lot. This shot is about 2/3rds of the way through the walk.
Ok - that’s about it. Thanks again for your support, and thanks to the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society for organizing such a great event to battle such a nasty disease.
Inspired by the contest over at Problogger.net, I want to share some of my experience. I’ve been blogging for approximately 3 years now, here are a few things I learned -
1) Write what you know. Just starting up a blog to make money may work for some, but I know it wouldn’t work for me. Blogging is a pleasure, not a job. There are plenty of corporate blogs staffed by journeyman writers being paid to write about stuff they don’t know. You can recognize them on the spot - if you are like me you move on before you are halfway through the first paragraph.
2) Lower your expectations on ‘blog income’. I make a modest income from my blogs, enough to pay for things like trips or tickets to Red Sox games (go Sox!) but definitely not enough to quit my main line of work. Since I don’t depend on the day-to-day income to feed my family or put a roof over my head, I don’t get stressed about things like traffic and page ranking. I don’t want to be stressed about something I take pleasure from.
3) Become part of an on-line community. Blogging is an easy access hobby. If you have a computer and an internet connection, you’ve paid all of the access fees you have to pay. The technology is push-button stuff now, anyone can blog if they wish. On-line communities are not terribly different from real world relationships. Be courteous, apologize when your not, and make as many friends/connections as you are wired for. Being part of a community means linking into other people’s work, or at the very least mentioning their names now and again! Comment sections are a great way to keep a discussion running amongst dozens of people across multiple time zones and life schedules.
4) Make efforts to connect face-to-face with members of that community. Ok, not really a blogging tip, but it will actually keep your desire to blog alive. The blogscape is littered with blogs that were started with enthusiasm and then quickly abandoned. Non-virtual connections (I won’t say ‘real’ since despite the actual defination, virtual relations are real relationships) are important for keeping your interest. It is how we are wired - we want to interact with friends.
5) Blogging is writing. A lot of blogs run on bullet points and very short observations. For a few moments distraction, these do the job. The ones that keep my attention are the blogs that stick to writing standards that were taught to all of us or that the more talented (e.g. not me!) writers somehow draw upon naturally. Make no mistake - being a good writer is work for everyone. How do you get to blog about Carnegie Hall? Practice, man, practice.
Mom (Grandma) and Dad (Grandpa) Staley are celebrating their 50th wedding anniversary this year, so all the kids and grandkids gathered in Venice, FL to help celebrate.
The Whole Clan
One More
Grandpa, Grandma and the two big grandkids
The littlest one puts in an appearance
The cake doesn’t quite make it into the picture, but it’s the best pic of Grandma and Grandpa!
Quality cousin together time on their Leapsters!
Tyler and Lizzy spent the day at Boston Common. It was opening day at the frog pond and they had a blast!
warming up after fun in the sprinklers
A nice day for a swan boat ride
Deep in conversation
Leading the way on the Make Way for Ducklings statues
Yum- ice cream at the end of a fun day in the park
Hugs and a long goodbye
The astute readers amongst you will notice that we’ve changed the title of this here blog. It was our intention to document the search for our new home, but that is over. I still plan to go back and revisit a few of our strategies, but truth be told - it’s all just a matter of keeping your head. We certainly aren’t the first to buy a house and most definitely are not the most experienced. So - with that little preamble, let me announce that we will be expanding the contents of this blog to cover not only house related details, but to keep family and friends in the loop as to what is going on in our lives here in the Boston area. We’ll include photos when we can, but feel free to click through to my galleries over at the Google photo site (click on photos to the left to get there).
***
As the first new post on this newly incarnated site, I want to tell you about an event that we will be taking part in here in Boston on October 4th.
About a year ago my sister was diagnosed with a form of cancer called chronic myeloid leukemia. This diagnosis came within months of me shifting the focus of my own scientific research to the battle against cancer. Coincidences like this can happen, but surely they make one look to capital F Fate and higher powers. My sister is doing ok - a little tired from fighting the fight and raising two young children, but she is a strong woman and she has the help of friends and family. The prognosis is still unclear, but thanks to research and therapies developed by my colleagues she has a fighting chance.
Cancer touches everybody. When I tell people that I am in cancer research, I inevitably get a cancer story back. Sometimes it is good, sometimes it is bad. My latest experience happened during my high school reunion where my old football coach told me that he is being treated for the exact type of cancer that my company is leading the way in on therapy. It was an emotional moment for us both.
In my professional life I put my mind, heart and hands to work against cancer. It is a complex disease that comes in many forms and differing degrees of severity. We can hope for a cure, but hope only goes so far. To bring that hope to fruition we need to support both the basic and applied research that scientists like myself and my devoted colleagues are undertaking.
It is a difficult time for research funding in our society - over the past 5 years and for the next forseeable future the money spent by the government (which is to say *OUR* tax money!) on basic reasearch funding has flattened and in some instances decreased. As citizens we cannot let this continue. We are a wealthy society - we hold the power in our hands to work towards a future that is free of disease. It may not happen in our lifetimes, it may not happen in our children’s lifetimes - but if we do nothing, it will not happen in any lifetime. The fight must continue and it can continue with your help. Cast your votes with the needs of basic research in mind, and when you can’t vote with a ballot, vote with your wallet. If everyone in the US and Canada were to give as little as $4 per year, we would have over a billion dollars a year to fund the research that ultimately leads to defeating disease.
This October 4th we are going to walk on the Boston Common in honor of my sister and for all the people who are battling or have battled cancer. I am inviting you to walk along with me - please donate what you can afford here.
Thank-you.
Byron, Barb & Tyler.
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