Category Archives: General

Things so normal as to not fit neatly into any other area.

You Just Never Know Who Knows You

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I had an interesting talk today with someone I’d never met, but had worked in the same industry with for the last 10 or so years. Without having talked to me before, and based solely on where I had been and what I had said in the public eye this person recommended me to others. I just sat there stunned.

It seems that whenever I need a reminder of the old rule “don’t burn your bridges” one comes along to remind me. This occasion offered just such a reminder and I’m greatful that, thus far, I haven’t managed to make all that many technology people mad at me over the years. Customers, well, they are a different story :P

Short Take: Driving on a Saturday

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It was warm out today so I decided to take the car out for an extended spin. Little did I know that I would get to experience all of the following:

  • - Massive amounts of traffic
  • - Crazed drivers who must race and pass me every 5 miles
  • - That “bad fish” smell that comes from certain areas near the ocean
  • - Many dead skunks on the road (and now on my tires)
  • - Large 4×4 trucks with muck falling off of them
  • - Roads closed due to mudslides
  • - A Saturn that nearly became part of the rear of my car

All that for a few pictures and some driving around town (and then some). Sometimes I wonder why I bother getting up in the morning.

Good Flights, Bad Disposal

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As the ski season has drawn to a close, I switch my attention to aircraft again. This past weekend saw both of the airplanes up and flying again after the winter weather kept them indoors. I was a little rusty, but quickly found my skills coming back after some circuits around the field. That is good news, to be sure, since it means no need to quickly replace another airplane (or all the parts that go with it) in the fleet.

On the down side, my under sink disposal unit decided to go belly up. For those who have not had to replace one of these devices let me just say that its a hard, ugly, and smelly job that you really should pay someone else to do if you can afford to. Me, I thought it would be cake, so I opted to do it myself.� Half a day after I started I finally had all the parts and tools needed, minus about $120 for the disposal unit. It works now but I certainly don’t want to have to replace something like that again any time soon.

A Friendly Reminder: Don't Valet Park

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I just had another of those experiences where I kick myself for knowing better, but then I go ahead and do something anyway. I convinced myself that it might be OK to allow someone to valet park the C6.

The guy who took the keys could barely speak English, and he couldn’t tell me how he was going to park the car (yes, the vette requires a special shutdown and park procedure) and he had to summon someone over who spoke a little English to notify me that yes, he had parked “one of these” before. I would later learn that he had not.

So, with that pain behind me I went in to eat, trying not to think of that fateful scene in Ferris Bueller’s Day Off where the valet’s fly out the back of the garage at full speed.

When I exited to retrieve the car, a new set of valet’s were around, and sure enough, they had problems. First, they tried to bring the car around with another car parked directly in front of the C6. Once they woke up enough to realize that wouldn’t work (and moved the other car) one of them hopped in my car and proceeded to wave his hands around frantically, starring at the dash for what seemed like minutes, only to exit the car and say “I need some help.” Yes, the C6 managed to befuddle him to the point of not being able to find the start button.

In the end, I took my key back, hopped in the car, fired it up, and got out of there before someone else took a swipe at the vehicle roulette wheel. Lesson learned, again.

In Sickness, Not In Stealth

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Here I am, trying to recover from time off, spending just 4 days up in Tahoe and coming home feeling the most sickly I’ve felt in quite some time. Ear and head congestion, ringing in the ears, and a general feeling of unbalanceness (is that even a word?).

Serves me right for trying to take time off while at the same time dealing with the aftermath of work and the complete lack of outside-of-work issues. Save for the taxes. This time of year is oh-so-much fun thanks to taxes.

The PSP is taking over

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I held off for a while, but I now own a PSP.  While this is not totally unexpected, given my employer, what is surprising is the speed at which it has consumed my personal time. 

This is due in large part to the PSP’s WiFi abilities.  You see, it can browse most web pages and stream music wirelessly.  This means I can listen to virtually any podcast anywhere I go, as well as any music I happen to find.  Combined with GTA I find less and less free time on my hands.

The next step for me, obviously, is to setup some PSP specific web pages to stream my own MP3 collection, as well as make it easier to get to the information I want. I hope I can do it soon, though, as I really don’t do well on less and less sleep.

One Step Closer to Wired Bliss

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Tonight (or this morning) I took one small step toward hardwired ethernet and phone line goodness in the house. I’ve now wired the spare bedroom directly into the downstairs office, eliminating what I hope will be the last of the connectivity problems with the remote PCs.

There is still stuff to do, like cleaning things up, painting and patching walls, and the like.  But with the connection now working up and downstairs, it seems like things are on the road to networked utopia.

Tahoe Skiing 2006, part 1

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On Saturday and Sunday, January 14 & 15, the California ski season began for me. It wasn’t the greatest skiing in the world, thanks to some high winds, wet snow, and really cut up trails at Heavenly, but it was skiing nonetheless.

I’m now at home and really tired, having realized that my legs are just not in the kind of shape they need to be in order to squeeze maximum vertical footage out of every day on the slopes. Guess its time to get on the treadmill and start eating my Wheaties.

Back in Town and Driving Around

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After a long dry spell with no postings, here’s an update. I’ve just gotten back from two full weeks of travel plus another two days on the road inside California. Due to all of this I’m spending the Christmas and New Year’s holidays here at home. This is the first time in nearly two months where I’ll have a stretch of time to sit down and just be at home.

Of course, I can’t sit around and do nothing (besides watch movies and Tivo) so I got brave and zipped out in the rain with the new car. It was a big step for me, as I’ve been very protective of it, and kept it out of the water as much as possible. As the pictures I’ll post in the gallery will attest, I think it was worth it.

Chalk this one up to being one of the reasons its good to live in California.
c6/c6_sea