Thinking About My Friend Chris Lee: Macintosh Aficionado, Music Guru, and Eidetic Memory Man for Movie Dialog

Chris hanging out in Brunswick. This was my second photo with my Sony Cybershot 2MP camera.

Recently, I was telling my City Tech colleague Kate Falvey about a habit of thought that I have when I encounter things that I would ordinarily want to share with a specific person who I think would be interested in that thing even though that person might have passed away. That kind of thought happens more often with my friend Chris Lee, who passed away in 2016. Our mutual interest in computers, pop culture, and video games was the currency of our friendship over many years that began when he saw me pull out my Apple Powerbook 145B in Mr. Norris’ Graphic Design class at Brunswick High School. Later, after we had a falling out around 2000, he mended the bridge and we became good friends again.

Me in a green hoodie and Chris in a blue jacket outdoors at night.

When we were younger, our great ambition was to open a computer repair shop and publicize it with a video of us marching through flames as Rammstein’s “Du Hast” blasts in the background. He pushed the limits of good sense by loading what I believe to be a record number of Control Panels and Extensions that would dance along the bottom of his Mac’s boot screen–at least three full lines of icons at 1024 x 768. He created archives of sound that surpassed mortal lifespans capable of listening to it all. He mastered anything released for the Nintendo GameCube. He had a phenomenal memory for movie dialog–a specialized eidetic memory that would have been a superpower at trivia night.

Chris Lee dancing in his parents' living room.

The last thing that we talked about was how much had gone on in our lives so far. I texted him, “Too bad we don’t have a time traveling DeLorean. We could stop by and blow our younger selves’ minds 😎.” His reply and last text to me was, “I wish I had a DeLorean.”

LEGO time travel DeLorean with the driver side door open and Doc Brown hanging out.

Not long after that, I got a call from our friend Kenny. Chris had died. He was back in Brunswick where our friendship had started. I couldn’t really write about it then, and even now, it’s difficult. I’m not able to say all that I feel and how I wish that I could share just a few things with Chris again.

When I visit my parents, I try to visit Chris’s grave in Smyrna Cemetery, which is between Nahunta and Hortense. His grave marker highlights some of his life’s loves, including Apple Computer. Of course, I wish that Chris could hear when I talk, but I know that what I say is only heard by regret.

LEGO Folding Cooling Stand for Lenovo ThinkPad P1 Gen 4 Laptop

As I wrote about yesterday, my Lenovo ThinkPad P1 Gen 4 maintains lower temperatures when it has improved air flow under its body where the twin cooling fan intakes are. Without raising the laptop, the laptop’s support feet only give it about 3 mm of space underneath it, which chokes the intake fans. Since getting the laptop late last year, I’ve used a variety of at-hand objects–books and small boxes most often–to prop up the back of the laptop when I was stressing the laptop with a heavy workload.

ThinkPad P1 Gen 4 rear support foot that runs about 80% of the width of the laptop.

I wanted a permanent solution, but the portable options available in retail are either bulky adjustable metal or plastic platforms or folding 4-point stands. The former takes up a lot of room and those with fans don’t always translate to lower temps, and the latter might not provide the support needed on the ThinkPad P1’s lengthy support foot at the rear of the laptop. So, I turned to LEGO to create a customized stand that gives the ThinkPad the support it needs while also being compact and easily carried in my backpack.

What I made to solve this problem mostly used LEGO Technic elements with some brick elements (plates to provide support underneath its joints and the bright yellow smooth plates on top to orient the stand and provide a stop against the ThinkPad’s support foot).

LEGO Folding Cooling Stand for Lenovo ThinkPad P1 Gen 4 Laptop holding up the laptop, side view.

The ThinkPad’s support foot fits perfectly in the center of the stand without the studs toward the front or the flat plate in the back touching the laptop’s body.

Essentially, the stand is built like a sandwich: the bread is the Technic bricks with holes on either side, and the filling is the Technic liftarms (straight and L-shaped). I used 3-stud wide pins to hold the sandwich together. The red pins are only used to provide stability to the support legs when they are deployed for use.

LEGO Folding Cooling Stand for Lenovo ThinkPad P1 Gen 4 Laptop with legs folded

On the back of the stand, the red pegs can be partially pulled out and the feet folded.

LEGO Folding Cooling Stand for Lenovo ThinkPad P1 Gen 4 Laptop shown side by side.

The LEGO stand completely covers the support foot at the rear of the laptop (seen at the top of the photo above). When folded, it easily slips into the backpack that I use to carry this ThinkPad.

LEGO is a versatile, rapid prototyping medium for building art, expressing ideas, and in this case, creating something practical to solve a specific problem.

If you have some LEGO bricks laying around idle, you might stop and think about what problem they might be able to solve for you!

DIY LEGO Display Stand for Holding Heavy Objects On My Desk

DIY LEGO Display Stand for holding two heavy objects on a desk, 3/4 view

This past weekend, I dug through my LEGO to build a display stand that could hold two heavy objects on my desk between my monitor and keyboard. It has a wide, lower space and a narrow, higher space for the two objects. To add some visual details, I used window panels along the front with transparent red cylinders in each window center, illuminated by ambient light entered through the top of the front.

I’m including more photos below of all sides to inspire others. Since it was a trial-and-error build, I didn’t create instructions for the build.

DIY LEGO Display Stand for holding two heavy objects on a desk

Intrepid Air and Space Museum, Manhattan, New York, March 2019

Intrepid Museum, WWII Aircraft Carrier turned Air and Space Museum, Manhattan, New York, Front of Ship

In March 2019, I met up with my buddy Alan Lovegreen to visit the Intrepid Museum, a WWII-era air craft carrier that had been repurposed as an air and space museum moored on the west side of Manhattan.

Alan and I had been hired the same year to work at City Tech in the English Department. While he was there, we worked together to inaugurate the City Tech Science Fiction Collection. Soon after that, he moved back to California for a new job. He was back in NYC to give a talk, so we picked a cool place to meet up.

Some exhibits overlap those at the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum and its Steven P. Udvar-Hazy Center that I wrote about last week, such as the latter also having a Concorde airliner. Also notable is that the Space Shuttle Enterprise, which had been at the Udvar-Hazy Center, is now at the Intrepid Museum. Space Shuttle Discovery is now at the Udvar-Hazy Center. But, some similar looking aircraft are actually experimental or specialized versions, such as the Intrepid’s Lockheed A-12 compared with the Udvar-Hazy Center’s SR-71 Blackbird. There’s also some other unique displays involving LEGO: a 1:40 scale model of the Intrepid and a 50,000 brick mosaic image of the Space Shuttle Enterprise flying over New York City atop a Boeing 747.

We couldn’t have picked a better day to go. It was a cool and clear day, so we spent most of our time on the outside exhibits on the flight deck and hanger deck, but we also went under the water line to explore the submarine USS Growler tied up at the same pier (I’ll post pictures of the Growler tomorrow).

Flight Deck

Conning Tower

Bell 309 KingCobra

Bell UH-1A Iroquois “Huey”

McDonnell Douglas AV-8B Harrier II

McDonnell Douglas F-4 Phantom II

Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-17

Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-21

Northrop T-38 Talon

Grumman F-11 Blue Angels

Lockheed A-12

Grumman F-14D Super Tomcat

Grumman F-9 Cougar

Intrepid Museum, WWII Aircraft Carrier turned Air and Space Museum, Manhattan, New York, Gumman F-9 Cougar

Israel Aircraft Industries Kfir/F-21A

General Dynamics F-16 Fighting Falcon

Intrepid Museum, WWII Aircraft Carrier turned Air and Space Museum, Manhattan, New York, F-16

Anti-Aircraft Batteries

Hanger Deck and Interior

North American FJ-3

Martin-Baker Mark V Ejection Seat

Grumman Avenger Ball Turret

Mercury Capsule

Ship Interior

Space Shuttle Enterprise and Exhibit Area

Intrepid Museum, WWII Aircraft Carrier turned Air and Space Museum, Manhattan, New York, Space Shuttle Enterprise

Intrepid Museum, WWII Aircraft Carrier turned Air and Space Museum, Manhattan, New York, Space Shuttle Enterprise's Star Trek Connections Exhibit

Intrepid Museum, WWII Aircraft Carrier turned Air and Space Museum, Manhattan, New York, Space Shuttle Wind Tunnel Model

Intrepid Museum, WWII Aircraft Carrier turned Air and Space Museum, Manhattan, New York, Space Shuttle Enterprise LEGO Mosaic

The LEGO mosaic that capped off the Enterprise exhibit area was a cooperative construction project let by Ed Diment, who created the scale model of the USS Intrepid (below). The mosaic above depicts the Space Shuttle Enterprise’s flight over NYC before its arrival at JFK and eventual move to the Intrepid. It was constructed out of 50,000 LEGO bricks by hundreds of children and adults between July 26-28, 2013.

LEGO Build of the USS Intrepid

Built by Ed Diment, this recreation of the USS Intrepid with LEGO bricks is a 1:40 scale model. It is 22 feet long, 4 feet wide, and over 4 1/2 feet tall. It weighs 550 pounds and contains 250,000 pieces!

Concorde Airliner on Pier

Carrier Aft

Intrepid Museum, WWII Aircraft Carrier turned Air and Space Museum, Manhattan, New York, USS Intrepid Aft

Brick City in Niagara Falls, Nov. 2009

Brick City in Niagara Falls, LEGO sets, custom models, and minifigures on display.

Y and I drove to the Canadian side of Niagara Falls for our honeymoon in 2009. One of the places that we stopped at among the many kitschy and wonderful tourist traps there was Brick City, a huge world constructed out of LEGO sets and populated by minifigures. There were trains, planes, and automobiles. There were science fictional time-and-space juxtapositions of the American West, Ancient Egypt, and 18th century piracy. There were space shuttles landing while another stood waiting on the launch pad. There is an AC/DC concert stage and the Golden Gate Bridge. Among the beautiful discord of scenes, sets, and characters was a custom model of Niagara Falls complete with a tightrope walker and the Maid of the Mist. For a LEGO maniac like myself who was eager to explore what’s there, it was a worthwhile place to visit. Unfortunately, it seems to have have closed down since then.