Rick Umali
Rick Umali

Born in the Philippines in 1968. Moved to the United States with my family when I was three years old. Raised in Jersey City, New Jersey. Went to Catholic schools (St. Aedan's, St. Peter's Prep). Graduated college from Rensselaer in December 1990. Moved to Boston. Married Jenn in 1995.

I have two brothers, Ron and Renato. My parents live in New Jersey.

Jenn and I live in Burlington (outside Boston). We have a daughter named Mia.

Yes, I write a blog. I've been writing Rick's Ramblings since 2001.

WJIB AM 740 (RIP Bob Bittner)

May 31, 2023

On the Facebook group "Friends and Lovers of WJIB", there was a post requesting songs people had learned by listening to oldies radio station WJIB. The poster wanted...

Jersey City

April 30, 2023

I was in Jersey City, New Jersey a few weeks ago, the city where I grew up. The GPS put me on Rt 440 near Lincoln Park, and though I know these landmarks from my...

A Fox in Space

March 31, 2023

Last year, my old college friend Paul pointed me to "A Fox in Space". It's a cartoon in the style of Watership Down (1978), The Plague Dogs (1982), or Iron Giant...

Doing the Dishes

February 28, 2023

Over the last several years, doing the dishes after dinner has become a welcome part of my day. It wasn't always this way. This task is called a chore for a reason:...

My 2022 Books and Movies

January 31, 2023

In 2022, I read 28 books (Goodreads) and watched 91 movies (Letterboxd).

Wordle

December 31, 2022

Wordle is my favorite new thing from 2022. It's a part of my morning routine to sip coffee and eat cereal while solving this puzzle. I like comparing my solves with...

Started Invisalign

November 30, 2022

A few weeks ago I started Invisalign.

My (Almost) Self-Driving Car

October 31, 2022

Earlier in the year, I bought a new car, a Honda CR-V. It has two remarkable features that make me think the self-driving car is perhaps a bit closer than I thought...

Procrastination

September 30, 2022

In a little over three weeks I have to give a presentation. It's about eBooks and how to make them. I haven't started preparing for it however. Since I made the...

I work in computers. At least that's how I put it when people ask me what I do. Below are some posts from my technical BLOG.

I'm the author of Learn Git in a Month of Lunches (Manning Publications).

Falling Text (in JavaScript)

July 14, 2020

Sometime in May, about two months into my forced "work from home" stint due to the novel coronavirus, I caught a bit of inspiration.I had been playing Cataclysm:...

Relearning JavaScript

February 3, 2016

For the past few weeks, I've been participating in Boston PHP's jQuery jAM. This virtual learning group is scheduled to run through the book Eloquent JavaScript,...

Learn Git in a Month of Lunches

May 28, 2014

I'm writing a book for Manning Publications called Learn Git in a Month of Lunches. It should be out early next year, but you can purchase a copy of the book via...

Praising "Code" by Charles Petzold

February 14, 2014

Last year (2013), I finished a most remarkable computer book titled Code. It's by Charles Petzold, who wrote the venerable Programming Windows 95, among many others....

Creating Top-Level Variables With CoffeeScript

June 23, 2013

I've been working on a small "Word Finder" game, mostly as exercise to learn CoffeeScript, a language that compiles down to JavaScript. CoffeeScript hides the tricky...

A View from a MOOC

November 22, 2012

I just recently finished taking an online course titled "Functional Programming Principles in Scala". The course was offered by Coursera, and it is an example of...

Indie Game: The Movie

June 24, 2012

Indie Game: The Movie (IGTM) is a documentary about independent game developers. When I saw the trailer in July 2011, I saw a shot of a real computer screen filled...

Making Wireless Work on a Dell D600 with Ubuntu

February 5, 2012

I recently inherited an old Dell Latitude D600 laptop, but the wireless wasn't working on it. After some investigation, I learned that it somehow didn't have a wireless...

Getting Twitter User IDs with PHP

November 26, 2011

When using the Twitter API's "Streaming API", you often have to pass in Twitter User IDs as arguments, rather than Twitter usernames (aka "screen name"). I wrote...

Getting PHP Debugging with XDebug Working (on Windows)

November 14, 2011

I've been learning about Drupal Module Development the past few weeks. I'm using the venerable "Definitive Guide to Drupal 7" and a few times in the module development...

For a long time I didn't follow sports. But now I do. The links below will take you to posts from my sports blog.

The Queen Roars

August 31, 2022

Talking about Serena William's 2nd round match of the 2022 US Open.

Super Bowl LVI Pick

February 12, 2022

Time for my Super Sunday pick!

2022 AFC / NFC Picks

January 30, 2022

It's a juicy Sunday of football! Against the spread, pick the Chiefs and the 49ers.

Boston's Playoffs

June 10, 2021

The only good thing about the Boston Celtics and Boston Bruins playoff runs is that it briefly signalled a return to normalcy from COVID-19 pandemic.

Super Bowl LV: Prediction

February 6, 2021

With about twenty-four hours left before Super Bowl LV (aka COVID-19 Super Bowl 1), I'm ready with my prediction. The Tampa Bay Buccaneers will win the big game...

These COVID Sports

September 10, 2020

COVID-19 has upended the US sports calendar. It is September as I write this, and the NFL starts tomorrow. But also on the docket is a compelling NBA playoff game....

Super Bowl LIV Pick: 49ers

January 30, 2020

Go Jimmy G! What can I say? The San Francisco 49ers have a ground and pound game that I think will wear down the Kansas City Chiefs. The game will also be a study...

2020 AFC / NFC Picks

January 15, 2020

The table is set: the AFC title is between the Tennessee Titans and the Kansas City Chiefs, and the NFC title is between the Green Bay Packers and the San Francisco...

Divisional Weekend 2020

January 8, 2020

Yes, this is 2020! And its first weekend features the best weekend of football: four games featuring arguably the best teams remaining. Who do I like? Minnesota...

Wildcard Weekend 2019

December 30, 2019

The wildcards battle it out this weekend as the 2019 NFL playoffs commence. I'm a Pats fan, so I'm surprised to be watching them this weekend, I'm not going to lie,...

I have plenty of pictures at a bunch of places [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11], [12], but I primarily update Flickr and, more recently, Instagram.

The Lowell Sun Building

April 7, 2021

On the New Tappan Zee

March 11, 2018

Outside Vegas in My Truck

November 16, 2017

Burger Joint Outside Vegas

November 16, 2017

Alma Mater (Columbia)

November 1, 2017

Rock 'n' Roller Coaster (Starring Aerosmith)

September 30, 2016

Walt Disney World Dophin

September 30, 2016

Boston Heat

November 8, 2015

Cloud Formation

October 31, 2015

Click here to get the feed for Rick's Pictures