Spent some time poking through Richard Gabriel's essays. ∴
Spent most of the week in Dulles, VA. (My first trip to The Mothership.) Suffice it to say that it was good to go and get perspective on stuff. We leave for Tahoe tonight, and sadly, my grand plans for automated sprinkler systems have gone nowhere. So, Alison bought a new timer switch. It looks like Ariel may be falling behind, I am sad to report. ∴
Mom pointed me to an article in the NYTimes that talks about all the wacky stuff going on that used to be scifi fodder. I'll need to check out LongNow.org, where people can place bets on future "out there" events. ∴
Oof. One too many margaritas Friday afternoon. I had to crawl home, then try to tidy up for an appointment with Alison's doc. She has to go take a blood sugar test Tuesday, poor thing: three hours of boredom after drinking a jar of corn syrup or something similar.
Since my head hurt so badly Friday afternoon, we put off heading to the mountains until early Saturday morning. Nice day at Kirkwood, hiking some of the fire roads with the dogs. I took pics, but am still too lazy to figure out how to reduce them from their gargantuan 1600x1200 size. So, you'll just have to wait to ogle.
Afterwards, sleep, and then putt-putt golf to raise the spirits. This morning, I showed my uncanny handyman skills by moving our cable wire so that snow avalanches from the roof will no longer kill our television. That, and putting up nasty plastic pokers to keep the birds from nesting in the eaves and pooping all over the deck. Ick.
But now the rub: the little cheap sprinkler timer seems to conk out after two or three days. This makes it less than useful if you're away from the house for weeks on end, like we were this month. (All the things we planted in April are now scorched, sadly.) So, I went to investigate "real" automatic sprinkler systems, and was enchanted by the fact that the valves are run by 24V AC solenoids. This got me to thinking, "hey, I've got an old 486 laptop that's not doing much: maybe it should be running the sprinkler!" Alison, wise woman, mocked me and recommended I spend the $50 for the timer apparatus, but I was not fazed. So this week, to Radio Shack to figure out how to convert 120V AC to 24V, and then to figure out how to run it from the 486's COM port. I am such a geek!
Oh, one more thing. Neal sent me an email -- from Ariel at sea. Cool. According to the website, they are currently here: 32-18N 131-02W. Or at least, they were this morning. Oh, here is a much prettier view. ∴
dbaron goes back to the east coast today; dp's last day of work before leaving to India. We're taking them both to La Fiesta for margaritas. (Well, as it turns out, neither of them drink. So it's more like a wake: the booze is really for those that are left behind.) Then to the doctor later for Alison's six-week checkup. ∴
Good session with Neal this morning: kinda small, but clean. Of course, I only caught two or three waves and chundered the rest. Oh well. Must. Surf. More.
The digital camera came today: yay! So, as soon as I can figure out how to make little JPEGs out of the giant ones that I'm currently creating (of say, dbaron and brendan commandeering my cube), I'll not post them here for fear of causing this page to take aeons to load.
The ever-wise John Morrison recommended that I look at some of Hal Varian's papers and books since I liked his recent article in the New York Times. ∴
Drove over to Berkeley last night for Jim Freeland's retirement party. In honor of the event, I spent an hour or so trying to figure out when I might retire. Let's just say that thirty years is looking to be a bit optimistic. But...the party was great: it was good to catch up with the ever-elusive Ryan, who's just finished up working on Aimee Mann's next album. Jim looked like Sean Connery with his (new?) beard. We all recounted memories of Lake Erie sailing days.
Hopefully surf with Neal tomorrow before the whole Freeland clan is off to Hawaii for the Pacific Cup. John should be moving into his purportedly fine Scotts Valley digs. ∴
Oy. Three or four cubic yards later, the basement is clean. Goodbye to the ab roller, carpet fragments, at least four hundred hangars, and boxes galore.
Last night, I read an article about ALICE, which looks to be Eliza on steroids. I tried one of the Alice-bots, and it was cute, sort of. It liked opera.
Sarah is back from her ride down the coast, and is now looking for a job. John leaves Tahoe this weekend, and will be taking up permanent residence in Scotts Valley with Lynne and Scotty. He's got his board all waxed, too! Sounds like he and Scotty have already been out several times...punks! ∴
A late (for us) dinner with Neal and Julia last night at the Pacific Cafe. After which we tried to call Phil, a little bit drunk, to see when on earth he'd ask Colby to marry him. Sadly, he wasn't to be found.
Sadly, Neal is going to be spending the rest of the weekend training for the Pacific Cup with the rest of his family, so no surfing with him until later in the week. Which might be good, because Alison's nesting urge has seemed to kick in to high gear today. It looks like I'm going to have a fun time cleaning the basement this afternoon. ∴
Alison and I were vegetables yesterday after talking a long walk with the boys around Lake Merced. After a scrumptious dinner of popcorn and peanut butter sandwiches (having a pregnant wife leads to interesting dietary choices!), we watched six straight hours of cable television, interrupted by ten or fifteen minutes of ogling at Oakland's fireworks display. The Family Man, American Gigolo, and, I'm ashamed to admit, Dungeons & Dragons, which I just had to watch given my sordid high-school history. It was awful.
Off to do some errands, maybe some surf, and Neal & Julia later this evening.
Ugh, I am so weak! Left at home alone today, and I decided to buy a digital camera, since it was "such a good deal". Well, everybody's doing it, and it sure will beat scanning pictures, which is what Alison and I just spent an hour doing. Here is a good one of the two of us at Phil's premier for Bug. This is one of Mark, Neal, Phil and I that same night. ∴
Happy 4th! Last night, we heard about a fire that started up in Lake Tahoe over by the Heavenly gondola: oh no! Fortunately (for us, anyway), it's not that close to our cabin, nor is it moving west. Unfortunately, it's only "5% contained", whatever that means. Needless to say, we're keeping our fingers crossed and hoping they can get it under control before anyone is hurt. Apparently, this is one of the busiest weekend up there, and traffic is an absolute mess. I guess we lucked out by staying home. ∴
Spent some time poking around the Times. I have to say that I agree that vendors who stifle innovation in their own products aren't doing anyone any favors. Maybe I should write Dianne Feinstein or something. Started reading Sandra Carberry's Plan Recognition in Natural Language Dialog: looks to be pretty good. Rick Lewis mailed back today: lunch the 23rd, yay! ∴
