Winter's Arrival
It's still three weeks until December 21 but winter arrived last night with snow and twenty degree temperatures.
« October 2006 | Main | December 2006 »
November 30, 2006
November 26, 2006
Blogroll
When I first setup this blog I ran a list of the blogs I regularly read as an homage and thanks. When I upgraded Movable Type, the template didn't include one and I just never set it up. Well now it is back . . . there . . . on your left . . . down a little . . . thats it.
Chess Lesson
This afternoon while I was hanging Christmas lights, from across the street I heard instructions. I looked up to discover Darian teaching Michael a version of chess where the winner apparently gets to draw on the loser's face.
November 25, 2006
Greeting the Season
Got the first round of Christmas lights up.
Day Two With the New Camera
Sitting on the front porch
I have been intrigued by this house by the highway. They keep their yard freshly plowed but don't plant anything.
Geese over the southbound highway at dusk.
November 24, 2006
New Camera
We have had our eye on upgrading our digital camera for some time and had settled on the Canon Powershot S3 IS. Yesterday we spotted an online special at Circuit City which allowed us to get an online price as good as any we had found but to pick the camera up at our local store. This morning we piled in the car and drove to the store. Though there was a black friday line at least 60 yards long, we were able to just walk up to the pickup desk and walk out with out camera . . . in and out in about 5 minutes.
I just got back from my first walk with the new camera.
Jean's new orchid by our wooden carving.
There is a sizable prairie dog community in the park near our house.
November 23, 2006
Reflections on our Las Vegas Vacation
We've been back almost 2 weeks now and have had a chance to sample the aftertaste of our Vegas trip and come up with some remembrances and lessons learned. The trip was thoroughly delightful and just about the right length. We have discovered that 48 hours is just about the right amount of Las Vegas for us. Less left us wanting and more left us burnt out.
The biggest lesson from this trip was that it significantly improves our experience if we stay at a hotel with a casino on the strip. We last did this at the Mirage. Our two most recent trips we have stayed at Marriott hotels off the strip. We lived at a San Jose Marriott for a year while training and determining where we would be locating in the bay area and accumulated a gazillion Marriott stay points. This has allowed us upgraded free stays on all of our trips for over three years. But this trip drove home how convenient it is to just make a quick elevator trip to freshen up or take a nap or to just zip down for a show or a brief run at the slots or the tables. Our current plan is to make our next stay at the Bellagio with a room overlooking the dancing waters.
November 22, 2006
"May Ve See Your Fingers, Please"
I read this article in the BBC this morning that British police are now fingerprinting people on the streets using portable electronic devices to prove their identity. The article says that it is primarily being used to verify the identity of drivers without licenses.
I admire the technological efficiency but find the big brother implications troubling. The Brits have been wrestling with terrorism for a long time and seem more comfortable with police power than we do in the states where there isn't even a national ID card. I don't know how this street fingerprint project would fare in the US with our stronger focus on personal rights and liberties. Post 9/11 we are submitting to procedures I would never have expected a decade ago.
November 20, 2006
Pecan Season
For weeks now Jean has been bringing in apron loads of pecans every day from her trips to the back yard and every time we went out there would be more. Every step felt them under foot. Yesterday I enlisted Kirk, Darian and Michael and we scoured the grass for about an hour. The result was over five gallons of nuts. Kirk said that if we provide the pecans, Mikki has offered to bake pecan pies.
November 19, 2006
Gillette Fusion Razor
I try to share information on the products and processes that have interested me or improved the quality of my life. For several months now I have been shaving with a Gillette Fusion Power razor and it is simply the best razor I have ever owned. When it first came out I was skeptical: five blades and a battery seemed a bit much but I am such a tecnophile that I had to give it a try and the result was a closer, smoother, more comfortable shave than I had ever had. The combination of the five blades and the motion generated by whatever the "power" does simply resulted in a quantum improvement in my shaving experience.
I consider it a hassle that I had to shave every day in order to avoid looking like I lived in a cardboard box and that was compounded by the discomfort of nicks, cuts and razor-burn so any significant improvement to the experience was a real boon. When I first used the Fusion, I could tell a difference and Jean actually commented that she could tell it made my face smoother. Shaving ads to the contrary, this was a first for me. Because the shaving surface is too large for working in tight spaces, there is a single blade on the back of the shaving head. This works for trimming my sideburns and the hairs that sprout from my ears and nose with frightening regularity since I passed the age of 50. But my increasing age has brought with it an enhanced appreciation for comfort and that too gets the Fusion my vote. Not once have I nicked or cut myself in the months I have been using the Fusion.
I have been meaning to post my experience for some time but shaving is such a mundane daily ritual that I had just never gotten around to it, but now I have. I hope your results are as good as mine.
November 18, 2006
Gaming Session
When we go garage saling Kirk is on the lookout for computers & components. This has allowed him to move toward his goal of 8 working computers. It also allows him to invite Darian and Michael over for some serious electronic gaming sessions.
Stranger Than Fiction
We just got back from watching this touching movie and I heartily recommend it. I have not been a big Will Ferrell fan but when I saw the trailer for this movie, the premise and the presence of Dustin Hoffman and Emma Thompson made it a must see. The premise, in case you have missed it, is that one day an IRS auditor (played by Ferrell) starts hearing a voice in his head, narrating his life, moment by moment. The phrase "Little did he know it would lead to his eminent death," really catches his attention and he begins his quest to find out what ride he has gotten onto.
We went to see this film because of its cast and entertaining premise but were pleasantly rewarded by its thought provoking depth and characterizations. It was a positive and delightful way to spend two hours.
November 17, 2006
That box to your left
I have been playing around for some time with the idea of adding Google ads to this website and finally did it. Jean did the research and Kirk did the coding and the result is the box you see to the left of this page.
November 13, 2006
Off to Vegas
We just got back from a delightful roadtrip to ring in Jean's 64th birthday in Las Vegas.
We stopped off at the meteor crater before overnighting in Flagstaff. We then drove on to Vegas. Jean's sister Gerry met us there and the ladies went off to gamble.
Kirk and I took in the Amazing Johnathan's show and Kirk was chosen to go up on stage. He was up there for over half the show and had a ball.
He even danced with Psychic Tanya.
The next morning we toured some of the casinos starting with the grand canal at the Venetian and moving on to Treasure Island and the Mirage. Then back to check Gerry in at the Riviera. While the ladies played the slots, Kirk and I took in the Star Trek Experience at the Hilton.
Kirk had to leave the bridge to take care of some business.
This was also where I saw my first Ipod vending machine.
The evening included the Arabian bazaar at the new Aladdin . . .
the Brooklyn Bridge and a ride on the roller coaster at New York New York
the dancing waters at the Bellagio . . .
and wound up at the Paris.
We gambled briefly Sunday morning and started the drive home just after noon. We got in to Albuquerque about midnight and were back on the road by nine. We pulled gratefully into the driveway about 2:30 this afternoon.
November 05, 2006
Vacation!!!!
Well, I have made it to a glorious ten days of our own to be filled with copious relaxation and a few projects leading up to Jean's birthday on the 11th.
Lately I have had several people at work ask me why I had not applied for management. My standard reply is that, after decades of either management or self-employment, I truly relish the ability to simply walk away from the job at the end of the day or week and not have to carry it home. As a member of labor, I can be truly dedicated and involved when on the job but the job is structured so that it does not require (in fact prohibits) my working on it on my own time. Though I may give some off-duty thought to how I might improve my performance on the job, I cannot take work home or go in to "catch up." There is a delightful freedom in this which I deeply appreciate. Though I have always known that my home and family were the reason for my work, the demands of work had often hobbled the very enjoyment I was working for.
Well a time set aside for that enjoyment is upon me and I am thrilled . . . in a very relaxed way.
November 02, 2006
In the face of cold - fire
Last spring when we bought the house, Home Depot was having a clearance on gas logs. We bought a set which has sat in its box in the cellar waiting patiently for cold weather. Halloween brought Lubbock's first freeze and so up went the gas logs.
November 01, 2006
Got Market: Supply and Demand and the Price of Milk
Had an interesting experience which appeared to be an insight into supply and demand at work. We buy 4-5 gallons of organic milk a week to support our latte and smoothie habits. A while back there was a shortage of Organic Valley milk at the distributor level and our "Alternative Foods" healthfood store could not keep a dependable supply. In shopping for options, we found that United Supermarkets' MarketStreet carried 1 gallon bottles for $5 vs Alternative Foods $3 for cardboard 1/2 gallons, so we changed suppliers. Within 6 weeks MarketStreet upped their price to $6.50 a gallon. We grumbled but continued to shop there, thinking perhaps organic milk prices went up. A while later, when back at alternative foods, we noticed their prices were unchanged, and were now .50 a gallon less than MarketStreet. They said they now had a dependable supply so we switched back. Within 3 weeks we noticed that MarketStreet had lowered their prices to $5.50 a gallon.
I think a 5 gallon a week swing in a specialty product like one brand of organic milk was probably a fair market change and I wondered if our moving our business had caused MarketStreet to think demand had changed and change their prices. As I said, this might have been an insight into the invisible hand of the market at work or it might just be early symptoms of megalomania.