Holiday Letter – 1987

In 1980s by Steve Sliwa40 Comments

To: Friends & Relatives

From: Tabitha, Nancy & Steve Sliwa

Date: December 1987

Subject: Annual Christmas Newsletter

It has been a very busy year for all of us. Tammi (the name she goes by with her friends) is twelve and is making her way through the eighth grade. This past year she continued her art lessons and went to sailing class. In the latter she became proficient enough to begin racing Flying Juniors (FJ’s). We hope to fix up Nancy’s old FJ this spring so Tammi can continue developing her sailing skills. Tammi is still participating in the Extend Program at school and has been selected to be in the Girls Chorus and on the Math Team. However, most of her time is spent doing homework, socializing with friends (principally via the telephone) and reading. We have noticed a marked improvement in her maturing and taking on responsibility this year and we attribute it at least partially to the new addition to our family.

A golden retriever puppy joined the family in April. It’s AKC name is Tabitha’s Wildflower Honey, or Honey for short. Honey is an important family member at this point. In fact, it seems as if she thinks she is human. She wants company at all times and listens fairly well. She follows Tammi all around and typically sleeps with her on her water bed. Honey has a pretty good command vocabulary. One of our favorites is to shout Tabitha. That translates to: run upstairs, push Tammi’s bedroom door open with your nose, jump on her bed and lick her face. Very useful for waking Tammi when she stayed up late reading the night before.

Nancy’s year at NASA has been challenging and rewarding. In fact, Nancy has had more official travel days than even Steve has had during the past year. It’s principally due to being selected to participate in a number of important advisory groups. Probably the most noteworthy is a task force of the NASA Strategic Planning Committee. Nancy is the Langley representative to this group that attempts to assist NASA senior management in planning the future of the Agency. You may have-read about it in the papers when Sally Ride was the chairman. Nancy is also a member of the Systems Autonomy Intercenter Working Group (which helps orchestrate artificial intelligence research at NASA) and the AIAA Computer Systems Technical Committee, and is chairperson of the local Special Interest Group in Artifical Intelligence (SIGART).

In spite of all the travel and committee work, Nancy has successfully continued her own personal research and development projects. Her research interests in neural nets for planning systems is now being funded and she continues to manage a small group adding advanced capabilities to
the Langley robotics laboratory. Since Nancy did not think she was busy enough she also taught a college credit course on LISP (a computer language useful for artificial intelligence) at Old Dominion University last year. Her travels have helped her line up good deals on seriographs and posters by Patrick Nagel. Although Vie justify them as good investments, they have also added considerably to the decor of the house.

Steve has also had a very busy but fruitful year. The first big piece of news is that SEI has been sold. Actually, the exclusive marketing rights for North America and Great Britain have been sold to two separate concerns. A number of profitable projects still loom on the horizon, but the day-to-day operation has been shut down. For awhile, Steve will be busier than in the recent past, with no staff to handle the administrative details, but over the next 6 months the pressu.re and time load will be reduced significantly. The company closed fundamentally in the black, which is pretty good for a small business and a software company, in particular. Parting with SEI, metaphorically his 8 year old child, was not easy, but the timing was ideal based upon personal circumstances and market conditions.

At NASA Steve has been pursuing a number of new projects for his division. It was an unusual year as a key area under his supervision was missing some managers for most of the year due to transfers or illness. Recently, the area was reorganized aIld new managers selected to relieve the burden of his doing multiple jobs. The new projects for the most part llave been successful and the researc~b~ in the division has been receiving kudos. It has also been personally rewarding for him as he has received a number of awards and a promotion during this past year. Steve also filled some of his “spare time” by teaching a graduate course in Automatic Flight Controls. As you might imagine based on his academic background, feedback from his students indicates that they worked fairly hard throughout the semester trying to keep up with the various design projects. He reports, however, that he gave out mostly excellent grades.

Next year should provide some new opportunities for our family. If everything works out, Steve will be sponsored by NASA to return to Stanford University as a Sloan Fellow and will spend the academic year earning the equivalent to an Executive MBA. NaI1CY and Tammi will go as well, with Nancy taking a temporary job at NASA’s Ames Research Center. Lots of logistical arrangements will have to be made once all the approvals have been secured. In addition, it looks as if Nancy will take 10 weeks out of the time in California to attend a special program at Simmons College in Boston on a NASA fellowship. The program is aimed at helping women prepare for management responsibilities.

We hope you are happy, in good health, and poised to enjoy the holidays and the new year.

Best Regards,

The Sliwa Family

Print Friendly, PDF & Email

Share this Post

Comments

  1. You really make it seem so easy with your presentation but I find this topic to be really something which I think I would never understand. It seems too complicated and very broad for me. I am looking forward for your next post, I will try to get the hang of it!

  2. I do accept as true with all the ideas you have presented in your post. They are very convincing and will definitely work. Still, the posts are too brief for newbies. May you please extend them a bit from next time? Thank you for the post.

  3. Hi there, yup this piece of writing is truly good and I have learned lot of things from it about blogging. thanks.

  4. I am sure this post has touched all the internet viewers, its really really nice post on building up new webpage.

  5. My coder is trying to persuade me to move to .net from PHP. I have always disliked the idea because of the expenses. But he’s tryiong none the less. I’ve been using Movable-type on a number of websites for about a year and am worried about switching to another platform. I have heard great things about blogengine.net. Is there a way I can transfer all my wordpress content into it? Any kind of help would be really appreciated!

  7. Pretty section of content. I just stumbled upon your blog and in accession capital to assert that I acquire in fact enjoyed account your blog posts. Any way I’ll be subscribing to your augment and even I achievement you access consistently rapidly.

  8. Hello! Do you use Twitter? I’d like to follow you if that would be ok. I’m undoubtedly enjoying your blog and look forward to new updates.

  9. If some one desires to be updated with most recent technologies afterward he must be visit this site and be up to date daily.

  10. Excellent blog here! Also your website loads up fast! What host are you using? Can I get your affiliate link to your host? I wish my site loaded up as fast as yours lol

  11. We are a group of volunteers and starting a new scheme in our community. Your site provided us with valuable information to work on. You have done an impressive job and our whole community will be grateful to you.

  12. No matter if some one searches for his necessary thing, so he/she wants to be available that in detail, thus that thing is maintained over here.

  13. I really like what you guys are up too. Such clever work and exposure! Keep up the fantastic works guys I’ve added you guys to blogroll.

  14. Thank you for the auspicious writeup. It in fact was a amusement account it. Look advanced to far added agreeable from you! By the way, how can we communicate?

  16. I was very pleased to find this site. I want to to thank you for your time for this wonderful read!! I definitely liked every bit of it and I have you saved as a favorite to see new things on your web site.

  20. No matter if some one searches for his essential thing, so he/she needs to be available that in detail, thus that thing is maintained over here.

  21. What’s up mates, how is everything, and what you desire to say regarding this piece of writing, in my view its in fact remarkable designed for me.

  22. What’s up to every body, it’s my first go to see of this blog; this blog contains awesome and really good data designed for readers.

  26. Hi there i am kavin, its my first time to commenting anywhere, when i read this article i thought i could also make comment due to this brilliant post.

  27. First off I want to say wonderful blog! I had a quick question that I’d like to ask if you don’t mind. I was curious to know how you center yourself and clear your thoughts before writing. I have had a difficult time clearing my mind in getting my thoughts out. I do enjoy writing but it just seems like the first 10 to 15 minutes are wasted just trying to figure out how to begin. Any suggestions or tips? Cheers!

  31. Yesterday, while I was at work, my sister stole my iPad and tested to see if it can survive a 25 foot drop, just so she can be a youtube sensation. My iPad is now broken and she has 83 views. I know this is entirely off topic but I had to share it with someone!

  33. Today, I went to the beachfront with my kids. I found a sea shell and gave it to my 4 year old daughter and said “You can hear the ocean if you put this to your ear.” She put the shell to her ear and screamed. There was a hermit crab inside and it pinched her ear. She never wants to go back! LoL I know this is entirely off topic but I had to tell someone!

  35. It’s remarkable to visit this website and reading the views of all friends regarding this article, while I am also eager of getting knowledge.

  38. Link exchange is nothing else except it is only placing the other person’s website link on your page at appropriate place and other person will also do same for you.

  39. Fantastic website you have here but I was curious if you knew of any message boards that cover the same topics talked about in this article? I’d really love to be a part of group where I can get opinions from other knowledgeable individuals that share the same interest. If you have any recommendations, please let me know. Cheers!

Leave a Comment