I'm hardly a fan of commercials. In fact, I hate most of 'em. But this one cracks me up every time.

I think the line "This is kind of awesome" clinches it for me.

Today is a short day at work, because we're leaving early for a teambuilding event. We're racing sailboats in the harbor. Should be interesting.

What a weekend. I saw a lot of my friends this weekend, and that is always fun.

Friday after work, Diana and I met up with Iwan and Sara at Fidels for some margs and dinner. Afterwards, we headed to Iwan's parents house and hung out, meeting up with Eron.

Saturday, I golfed it up with Iwan. It was a beautiful day, and we celebrated by shooting a couple of terrible rounds. But it was still fun. Afterwards we hit up Frys where Iwan bought a cheapo optical mouse to go with his "new" computer (donated from Diana's parents).

That afternoon, Diana and I went to one of her coworkers houses for a 1st birthday party for his son. It was a little strange in that, from all appearances (food, chairs set out, etc), it looks like a lot of people were expected. Instead, we were about 2 of 8 or so folks making up the total (including the hosts). But we talked and ate and admired the little guy.

That night, the same group met up at Iwan's parents again where Eryn introduced us to the glory of Aqua Teen Hunger Force! We read Trivial Pursuit questions late into the night.

This morning, Diana hit up the gym while I played some BF2. I got my first combat ribbon for being a fantastic medic! The cycle of addiction begins... :) We met up with Eryn for lunch at a newly discovered seafood place in C-bad. Diana had eaten there before and loved it, but the second time around wasn't as good, I don't think. I prefer Pelly's until proven otherwise.

After lunch, we split ways and D and I hit up the mall for some new clothes. Let it be known that I've never had any real sense of fashion. I haven't actually bought clothes for myself in a couple of years, leaving my reliant on presents from friends and family for the most part. I have a lot of long sleeved heavy shirts and sweaters that I wear to work, but I needed something a little lighter. I ended up buying a couple vaguely metrosexual shirts, some jeans, khakis, shorts, undershirts, and socks. I'm always overwhelmed by shopping, but hopefully made some good choices. Diana was a big help.

Part of me wishes I was a little more fashionable, but apparently not a big enough part to do much about it.

I've been playing online Scrabble (called "Jamble") on itsyourturn.com, a play-by-email site. Good times. If anyone is up for a game, lemme know!

I saw Discostup do this, so I thought I'd give it a try. I hope it works!

Adman

Reason #9834 Why I Love the Internet:

I love little utility pages that just display a single, simple message. Links to these pages are frequently used as answers to questions on message boards and things.

For example:

Question: "I just got an email saying I have a relative in Nigeria who wants me to hold some money for him! In return, he'll give me over a million dollars! Should I do it?"

Answer: "This site (needs sound) has all the information you need to know."

Much more common are sites that tell you to GFY (that's NOT "good for you") or FOAD. But I thought this one had a certain flair.

(By the way, reason #9833 Why I Love the Internet are webpages featuring animated kittens playing White Stripes. This seems somewhat related.)

UPDATE: The sound didn't play for me on Firefox, but did on IE. So, whatevs.

So, I've officially retired from World of Warcraft.

I've played the game for a solid 7 months or so, whenever the open-beta started, and I have to say, it's one of the best games I've ever played. Combined with the fact that I have a number of workboys playing as well, it's really been a lot of fun. Many a night was spent adventuring, and the following days at work were spent recounting our online activities.

The psychological factors in a game like WoW are fascinating to me. The game is fun, and addictive. Sometimes those two qualities overlap, and sometimes they are at odds with each other.

For those not in the know, a game like this works as follows: You start out with your character who begins at level 1, and only has the shirt on his back and a pointy stick in his hand. You kill little monsters, who drop piddling amounts of copper coins. In enough time, you have enough copper coins to buy a bigger club and some leather gloves. This slightly better weapon and added armor lets you kill more monsters and collect more copper (and soon enough, silver, then gold!) coins. You also go up in level, which unlocks special abilities. Repeat this process basically until you're all decked out in magical plate mail, single-handedly killing dragons and so forth. No matter where you are, there's always the carrot of "the next level" in front of you. This describes the cyclic, addictive quality of the game.

The above isn't fun, though, by itself. So around this central addictive theme is built hundreds of quests, dungeons, interweaving storylines that transport you through many varying landscapes. Also, combine this with the idea that thousands of people are on at the same time, working with or against you in your growth, and you get a really neat overall experience. The grinding becomes actually fun and enjoyable.

The problem that I've encountered in the game is that I've hit the highest level. I can no longer advance my character further. I could still work to upgrade my armor and weapons, but since doing so doesn't help me advance any further, it seems more like a chore than a useful thing to do. The addictive cycle, for me, was broken. The "fun" aspects of the game have also been worn out. I've seen most areas of the game. I've done so many quests that they can all be neatly catagorized and recognized as copies of each other with the names changed. I still enjoy meeting up with friends online, but that by itself isn't enough to justify the time and monthly cost. I could certainly start a new character with a different role (a warrior instead of a mage, say), but the idea of going through it all over again, in spite of how fun it was the first time, doesn't appeal to me.

So, I'm calling it quits. I emailed my associates, and while many said they were sorry to see me go, there were many rumblings of people who were probably going to follow me out the door.

Luckily, a new game has come out to swoop in and occupy my attention. Battlefield 2. Just picked up my copy yesterday. Unlike the above, there isn't any sort of addictive cycle (well, actually there kind of is in that your performance is tracked). Instead, the draw to the game is that it's pure fun. Diana asked this morning what the draw is to a game where you play the same map (or small set of maps) over and over and over again? My answer was that, like chess, every game is different depending on how it actualy plays out, and in spite of it being "the same" every time, the actual playing out the game is fun in and of itself.

So, there's a short synopsis of my gaming life at this point.

In other news, Diana is officially on her summer break. I'm happy to see her taking some time to read book and take naps during the day and stuff. She's still finishing up her paper for her grad school class, but it's fun to see her without so much work hanging over her head. She's also home in the morning before I leave to work, which is sort of a change in the routine. I can no longer snooze more than once or twice (I'll never admit how often I'd snooze before!).

Last night, after work, we met at Seagrove Park for drinks and dinner and book reading (Adam: finishing Cryptonomicon, Diana: starting Under the Banner of Heaven). It was really nice. With the weather as nice as it is, I look forward to more post-work activities (picnics, golf (Iwan?), etc) outside.

That's about all I got. I went through a little post-vacation depression, but I think I'm over it. It's kind of a downer to go from lazy days on the lake with friends to going back to work. I have Hawaii and Montana coming up, though, which I'm looking forward to!

Out.

Diana's parents came over for dinner and a movie this weekend for Fathers Day. We watched "Citizen Kane", which seems to be commonly known as arguably "the greatest movie ever made." When this comment is made, it seems to be invariably followed up by how revolutionary the filmmaking was compared to it's 1941 counterparts.

I guess I haven't seen that many movies from the before the '60s. I don't have a lot to compare it to. Combine that with the fact that I'm generally not very aware of the technical aspects of filmmaking. I don't notice things like how the edits are done, how long shots are held, camera movements, lighting, etc. I certainly see things that make me say "Wow, that looks cool" or "that's a neat shot", but that's about it.

So I can't say that "Citizen Kane" is at the top of my "favorite movies" list. I enjoyed it, but I've seen a lot more movies that were more memorable, drew more of an emotional response, and generally made me feel good after watching them.

This is kind of a problem I have with art in general. There is this sense that I have that says that Good Art is found in fancy museums, and Bad Art is painted on velvet and sold on streetcorners. Where did this notion come from? I certainly don't believe in it, or do I? Why aren't I as good an art judge as anyone else? I'm not going to tell anyone else what they should and shouldn't like, but I can't think of a better person than myself to tell me what I do and don't like.

But at the same time, I know that I pay attention to critic reviews of movies. I don't think I let them influence my opinions, but I certainly use them as a filter towards where I spend my hard-earned movie budget. Not quite the same thing, but kinda.

Just kind of rambling now... losing... train of... thought.

Over the vacation I was introduced to the cover of "I'm so Excited" by Le Tigre, and I've been listening to it multiple times per day since. It's such a fun little song. 80's electronic femme-rock wrapped in a layer of tangy bubblegum. Or something.

In other news, I downloaded the demo for Battlefield 2 and am loving it. I think this might be the nail in the coffin for World of Warcraft. Still seeing how it works out. Fun game. I'm looking forward to joining up with some boys online.

While writing this I got an email from Liz about my IT guys post. The second part of her beef, which I forgot, was how out-of-touch they were with the company. Guys who don't know or care about what the company does and the sports it's involved with. Totally a fair beef. (I don't like speaking for other people 'cause I invariably get it wrong. Sorry!)

(This isn't a direct response to the above, but some thoughts that spawned from it...) Lots of computer guys are odd people. I'm not sure why. As a result, lots of them were teased as kids. Lots of them began their education with computers as a purely solitary activity. Many probably were never on a sports team in their lives. It's no surprise to me when I hear about computer guys have a hard time being part of a team. Working in a team is a skill all unto itself, and it's completely disjoint from being "good at computers". The skills aren't mutually exclusive, but they can sometimes be at odds with each other.

I'm thankful to have had friends growing up, been part of sports teams, etc. But I've certainly seen the guys in my CS classes who could barely carry on a conversation with another person.

Here's a quote from Neal Stephenson's "Cryptonomicon". It's a great description of computer geeks:
---
Chester nods all the way through this, but does not rudely interrupt Randy as a younger nerd would. Your younger nerd takes offense quickly when someone near him begins to utter declarative sentences, because he reads into it an assertion that he, the nerd, does not already know the information being imparted. But your older nerd has more self-confidence, and besides, understands that frequently people need to think out loud. And highly advanced nerds will furthermore understand that uttering declarative sentences whose contents are already known to all present is part of the social process of making conversation and therefore should not be construed as aggression under any circumstances.
---

Not sure how it's related to the above, but I loved it.

Now I'm completely rambling. Smell you later.

Over my vacation, Liz (who I imagine is a fairly typical business computer user) vented a bit about the IT guys that she's worked with. She would be in the middle of important business stuff, her computer crashes, and all of a sudden she's at the mercy of generally inconsiderate and tactless computer nerds, who can make her life a lot easier or a lot more difficult. The message that I got was basically "I need to kiss *this* nerd's ass just so I can get back to work? Who the hell does he think he is?" (I'm paraphrasing here).

I totally understood where she was coming from. I've observed it myself. There's even a Saturday Night Live skit about "Your Office IT Guy", where the joke is this nerdy guy who berates people and lords power over them for not knowing "simple" computer knowledge. I think those guys are pretty common.

It was sort of eye-opening to get a user's side of the story. It really made me think about my own job, and my own dealings with users. I'm not a "front-line" support guy, but I still do deal with users pretty regularly.

It's always a tricky subject. When people are having computer problems, particularly when they really need to get stuff done, they are sometimes in a strangely vulnerable, defensive state of mind. It gets even more interesting when they actually screwed up (deleted an important file or something) and caused their own problems. I've seen generally good, upstanding people "forget" what they did, or even directly lie to cover up a mistake they made. No one wants to have their mistakes drawn out to the light of day, and unfortunately, sometimes that's what we have to do.

A good example: There was a trade error a while back. The trader received a PDF file that had 4 pages of orders that needed to be executed (an "order" is something like buy x shares of this, sell y shares of that, etc). He executed the orders on pages 2, 3, and 4, but not the ones listed on page one. When this came to light, he accused the email system of dropping the first page of the PDF attatchment. It wasn't his fault, it was "the system". ("The system" gets blamed a lot).

Well, when errors that involve dollars happen, they are investigated. We try to figure out what happened, and see what we can do to prevent them from happening again. When "the system" is blamed, it's sometimes my job to investigate.

My strong inclination was that it's impossible for a page to be dropped from a PDF file in transit over email. I can't explain technically WHY it's impossible, I just know it to be so. So I talked to the user, and asked him exactly what he does when he gets these files. He showed me that he opens the PDF, and prints it by right-clicking to bring up a pop-up menu, and then choosing "print". When he was doing this, I noticed that the option just above "Print" was "Delete Page" (whoever designed that menu should be... punished).

I talked to his supervisor, saying that I couldn't explain how a page was dropped from the fax. But that I did notice the menu thing, and IF the user accidently deleted the page, and then re-printed, that would yield the same results as what we were seeing. The supervisor, being a smart guy, smiled knowingly and they accepted responsibility for the error report.

So it's a weird thing. To a certain degree, there are battle lines drawn. I'd be lying if I said that we (computer guys) didn't joke about how idiotic the users could be. They screw stuff up, and it's our job to fix it. How could there not be some resentment? And I'd be stupid to think that they didn’t have jokes at our expense as well. I mean, how could you not? Have you SEEN us?

Yet we still meet in the lunchroom, and smile and say "hi" to each other. I've had my ass kissed by users. We've been on the receiving end of "thank you" awards, cookies, candy, nice emails, etc. I like to think that it's genuine, but some part of me knows it's also proactive back-scratching.

In my own personal experience, I like to think I'm pretty good at dealing with the users. I understand that we're all on the same team, and have the same goals in mind. I realize that they are helpless when their computer is down, and I like being a hero (in my own mind, at least) when I can help 'em out. It's harder when they are impatient or difficult or defensive, but I understand that that comes with the territory. I try not to be too elite and holier-than-thou, but sometimes it can be difficult to not sound smater/better than someone when you ARE "smarter" by the very nature of knowing more about computers than they do.

So it was interesting to hear uncensored comments from Liz. It kind of makes me want to informally talk to business user friends here and get a better idea of what their experiences are like.

Any of you have any good/bad stories, from either a user or support standpoint? Just curious.

PS: Check out Lake Powell vids, courtesy of Baditude! Thanks buddy!

http://baditude.net/Home/video/powell_partone.wmv
http://baditude.net/Home/video/powell_parttwo.wmv

Powell Pictures...

Try going to my flickr site. Click on the "Lake Powell" set on the left, and do a slideshow.

For those who might want full size versions of any of these, I'd still like to get a full collection together. This is just a quick and dirty publication.

Oh, also, for those on the trip, check out the cupboard in the upper right in the second to last picture. :)

It's safe to say that Team Baditude dominated Lake Powell.

Thursday night, Diana dropped Iwan and myself off at the airport, on the
way to Vegas. We arrived and got our bags, and immediately noticed that
the cab line was HUGE. Apparently (we learned later), the cabbies have
some beef with a new law being passed, and were showing protest by
slowing service to the airport that day, and increasing slowing of
service through the entire weekend. The cabbie we talked to said, and I
agree, that without cabs in Vegas, the whole place would turn into a
huge Charlie Foxtrot.

The debate is actually an interesting one. Apparently strip clubs give
cabbies a kickback for taking patrons to their club. But the amount
isn't equal between clubs, so the cabbies, of course, will urge patrons
to the highest bidder. The new law (that the cabbies are fighting),
says that kickbacks cannot be given to cabbies, but it still allows for
limo drivers towncar drivers to get these incentives, which kind of
singles out the cabbies unfairly.

Anyhoo, we headed over to the Hard Rock (we were staying at a hotel
you've never heard of next door), and met up with Baditude, Nemesis,
Senor Dips and PPR, all of them getting schooled at various table games.
The group of us headed out to Slots of Fun, which is one of the most
budget casino's I've ever seen (especially after having just left the
Mandalay Bay, which we had to swing by on the way). Mick joined us at
some point when his delayed flight landed, and I was glad to see him.
Eryn and Nemesis departed early, leaving just me and Iwan and Mick.
From there, the night turns into a happy, fuzzy memory of gin and
tonics, "Let it Ride" and late night (er, early morning) hot dogs.

The next day, we dragged our sorry asses out of bed at the ungodly hour
of 10am, braved the piercing light of day, packed into a pair of SUVs,
and rolled out to Lake Powell. The drive was about 4.5 or 5 hours. I
spent the drive in the shotgun seat of the rented car driven by Nemesis,
with a groggy Discostup in the back seat. I talked a lot to Nemesis (a
friend of Eryn's from college), a fellow geek, about movies and books
and computer games, and I enjoyed getting to know him more. He seems
like a really good guy. He works as a GM (game master) for Sims Online,
Ultima Online, and another game I don't remember. His job sounds a lot
like a kindergarten teacher, without all the "education" stuff, but with
all the argument arbitration that would entail.

We reached Lake Powell in the early evening, where we met up with Liz
and Eryn's mom Kris, completing our fellowship of nine (Adam, Eryn,
Iwan, Mick, Eric, Mike H. Papa Roston, Kris, and Liz). A solid crew.

At this point, the boat was being rented, some people did grocery
shopping, stuff was unloaded from the car and loaded onto the boat in a
frenzy of activity. It was really fun to be with Eryn at this point.
He was as giddy as I've ever seen him. Clearly, Lake Powell was a very
special place for him, and being back brought back a ton of happy
memories. I was stoked to be there with him.

In spite of the houseboat tied up to the dock on a flat lake, my
nervousness of seasickness set in as soon as I boarded.

A note about seasickness. I've only had one instance of seasickness in
my entire life (and I've been on various boats at various times
throughout my life). That time was on a very rough ocean fishing trip,
and I spent the half day either throwing up or asleep on the deck,
completely miserable. Worst day ever. Since then, I've been relatively
terrified of boats (or more specifically, getting seasick), rationally
or otherwise. In spite of everyone's assurances that I wouldn't, I was
still nervous.

Unfortunately, nervousness feels a lot like seasickness, and the two can
be confusing. We spent the evening on the boat, catching up and
chatting, and I paid very close attention to every motion of the boat
and the status of my body. We went up and had dinner at the lodge, and
I bought some Dramamine just in case, and took half a pill after dinner.
Either physically or (most likely) psychologically, I felt a lot better
afterwards. I didn't get sick or uncomfortable at all for the rest of
the trip (except the last day a little... more on that later).

That night, in spite of it being a little windy and cloudy, we decided
to sleep on the top deck of the boat. It was a warm summer night, and
we were all jazzed to be there. I woke up with the others in the middle
of the night to a howling wind. No big deal, as it was warm and cozy in
my sleeping bag. However, when the first few drops of rain started, we
all got up out of our bags, and moved everything under the tiny tarp
that covered a portion of the upper deck. It only took a second to
realize that the rain was coming down sideways, and that a tarp above us
was practically useless. So we all moved downstairs and concluded our
sleeping on various floors or in various cabins. It was all very fun.

The next day, we set out on the lake, ski-boat in tow. The plan was,
after deciding on a good spot on the map, to head out, find a good
docking point, and dock the boat on a beach or somewhere solid and make
that our base camp for the weekend. We struck out and made our way to a
different portion of the lake, and our new home. Iwan and I had some
fun with the map, once we discovered that it had GPS coordinates, water
elevation contour lines and stuff like that. My GPS said that our
elevation (and therefore, the elevation of the water) was 5600 feet.
The map of the lake listed the water level at 5700 feet. That meant
that on the map, where it said the water was 100' deep, it was actually
dry land at that point. This made some routes impossible to follow,
obviously. I also was pleased to use the GPS to figure out our exact
spot on the map, and discovered that we'd missed a turn. GPS's are fun!

A little note about Lake Powell. The lake is manmade via a dam at the
south end. The dam has filled the various nearby canyons with water,
which means that most of the lake was surrounded by high, vertical
ridges of striated sandstone. There were lots of narrow areas (that
would be impressive canyons, I think, if not half-filled with water) and
high buttes and stuff. It was all very beautiful, in a rugged,
desolate, Grand Canyon kind of way. Eryn and I decided it looked a lot
like Thousand Needles or The Badlands, if you're familiar with those
areas.

After a few hours, we made it to the end of one of the thousands of
fingers of the lake, and found a very nice spot under a huge cliff wall,
with a large pile of sandstone rocks nearby, which at some point in the
last hundred years was probably part of the wall above us. The "rock"
that made up the shoreline was all sandstone, and you could break many
rocks in half with your hands.

At camp, we got the boat anchored to various spots on the surrounding
beach, and thus began our stay in the wilderness. Unfortunately, the
first afternoon was windy and a small thunderstorm brewed. But we
enjoyed watching it from our cozy porch, and chatting amongst ourselves.
After the storm was the most intense, brilliant rainbow I've ever seen,
joined by a second, fainter rainbow, which I'd never seen before.
Fantastic. That evening we slept indoors.

The next day was beautiful (as was the rest of the trip).
Unfortunately, it was Sunday already, and some of our team needed to
leave (Eric, Nemesis, and PPR). We got in some skiing time in the
morning, and the above were driven back to the dock by Iwan and Eryn
where they were would get back in one of the two cars and depart (I'm
not sure if they drove back to Vegas or what). That whole crew was gone
for quite a while, leaving Liz, Mick, Kris, and myself at the boat for
much of the afternoon.

The beach (well, outcropping of rock) that we were staying on was
bordered by a large hillslide of sandstone rocks of varying sizes, from
pebbles to huge boulders. I thought it might be fun to stack some up,
and try to make a little tower. Balancing things is fun. It requires a
neat mix of concentration, patience, and coordination which I enjoy.
The standstone was perfect in that it would break up into rocks that
were usually pretty flat on opposite sides. I made a pretty good stack.
Liz and Mike came and joined me, and we made a bunch more. Liz and Mike
made a lot of smaller ones, and the three of us teamed up to me another
big one. It was really fun to do, and nice to look at afterwards. They
blew over later in the afternoon when the wind picked up.

Sunday and Monday were spent waterskiing (me and Eryn), wakeboarding
(Liz), dueling tubes (everyone), and kneeboarding (Iwan). In between
ski trips we read, sunned, fished for little bluegill, snacked, threw
the Shockey Ball, and generally hung out. New lingo was introduced.
People were schooled left and right. Eryn bird-dogged it the most...
Iwan held out the longest. Everyone got it done, in a general sense.
Nights were spent on the top deck, watching stars on the ManBed. It was
all really great and relaxing.

I spent a lot of time in my bathing suit this weekend, which isn't
really where I'm the most comfortable. I'm really skinny, and I think
skinniness on a guy is somewhat similar to fatness on a girl. Mind you,
I'm not complaining about being skinny, as I don't really do anything to
bulk up, but I'm still self conscious about the way that I look. And in
spite of being happily, monogomously married, and not looking to impress
women with my physique, somehow having an attractive female around only
compounded matters. So I waffled between self-consciousness and mild
embarassment to generally giving in and saying "this is how I am, I
might as well work with it".

I'm reminded of bringing up the concept of being self conscious about my
weight to an overweight guy at work. He didn't have much sympathy. He
just shook his head and said "The grass is always greener..." in a way
that closed the conversation. I guess I shouldn't worry about it too
much.

Monday afternoon, we decided to go on a hike on some open land across the
mini bay where we were camped. We ended up walking up a quite steep
mountainside until we reached a notch way up in the cliff up above. I
was a little sketched to hike up that high, wondering how we were going
to get back down, but I'm glad I did. The views were awesome. We
took some pics and headed back down, which turned out to be easier than
going up, since the sand was soft and we could kind of sand-ski down the
hillside. Good times.

Tuesday was travel day. We got up early, and did a final ski outing in
the morning, and then pulled up anchors and started the journey back to
the dock. Along the way, we did lots of cleaning and packing and got
all ready to go. The boat that we were on had a slide that went from
the top deck to the bottom, and into the water, but unfortunately it was
unable to be used when we were docked because it was over some rocks in
shallow water. So on the trip back, we decided to stop in the middle of
a channel and get some slide time in. People started sliding, and I
went into a cabin to get my bathing suit on. While in the cabin, the
boat started rocking violently. Apparently a big tour boat had just
passed and created some really big waves. Also, since we were in a
pretty narrow channel, the waves bounced off the vertical cliff walls
and rebounded back in on each other, making it a big choppy mess. At
the worst of it, we heard some very loud crashing, and those who were in
the right areas were able to see the ceramic dishes being ejected from
their cupboard 7 feet off the ground and showered down into the main
room of the boat, shattering and creating nasty glass shards everywhere.
It was quite a mess. At this point, I started feeling seasick from the
significant rocking of the boat. We got the boat started moving again,
and set to work cleaning up the mess. It was pretty exciting.

We eventually got back to the dock, dropped off the boat, and got the
cars packed (Liz drove one car down from Idaho, and Eryn had his dad's
car), and we hit the road, headed back to Vegas. I somehow ended up in
the car with Liz, who drove with us for a portion of the trip until our
roads parted ways. I don't know Liz that well, but it was really fun to
get to talk to her more. We talked about her job, and relationships and
so forth. She's a cool chick. She knows a lot about music, and
generally oozes a certain edgy style and hipness. Her job, as a
marketing and PR rep for an "extreme sports" fashion brand basically
means she takes products and makes them cool. By comparison, I felt
pretty geeky, but I'm used to it. She's moving down to San Diego soon,
hopefully with Eryn, and hopefully in such a way that we'll get to see
more of her.

It was great to see Mike, as well. I don't keep in touch with him very
well, but whenever we see each other, I feel like it's like we talk to
each other every day. He's always silly and fun and cracks me up.
Which isn't to say that Iwan and Eryn are slouches either. At work, I
feel like I'm a pretty funny guy, but with these guys, I feeling like
I'm struggling just to keep up. It was really great to spend some
quality time with those guys.

When we did part ways, I got in the car with Eryn and Kris and Iwan and
Mike, and got the back middle hump ("I called it! I call the hump!").
We drove the rest of the way to Vegas, playing a lot of Hangman and
schooled each other. After many rounds of 'Man, I noticed that no one
picked the letter "F", so I tried the word "fluffy" and schooled 'em
good. It was fun.

I was dropped off at the airport two hours early, got in some good book
reading time, and eventually made it to San Diego. Dad picked me up and
brought me to his house, where I got in my waiting car and made it home
to my sleeping wife. I was exhausted after a long, long day of
travelling.

Now, back at work, I'm totally wiped. Eryn's cousin was sick during the
trip, and I'm kind of worried that I've picked up what he had. My
sinuses and head feel generally unhappy. In spite of that, though, I'm
really pleased at how the trip went off without a hitch, and I think
everyone had a really great time. I'm sure I did.

Look for pictures coming soon!

The other day, there was a life-threatening tragedy. Not MY life, or Diana's, but some baby birds.

We have a beam that runs under our roofline outside, and some birds have made nests on the protected ledge. We've kept our eyes on 'em, watching them build the nest, watching for babies and so forth.

The other day, I noticed one of the nests was missing, but the adult bird was standing where the nest used to be. I looked down, and on the ground was the nest, and a couple little newborn baby finches squirming on the ground, covered with ants. It was terrible. Two were dead, but two were being eaten alive.

I was able to collect the nest and the babies, scare off all the ants, and replace the babys in the nest, and finally replace the nest on the ledge. However, checking back in an hour or so, the ants were now attacking the nest on the ledge, and the parents were nowhere to be seen. Desperate times called for a new course.

We transferred the babies into a homemade nest in a shoebox, constructed a dry island in the middle of a baking dish filled with water, and set them under a hot reading lamp for warmth.

We were able to feed them a little by dipping a paper town into Gatorade and chicken drippings and blueberry goo. Watching them rear back and open theirs mouths to be fed was one of the cutest things ever, but also made it readily apparent how ill-prepared to actually take care of these guys we were.

That night (Saturday) we went to a play with Diana's parents. We saw A Midsummer Nights Dream in San Marcos, and I found it surprisingly good. By the time we got back, one of the birds had died, and the other seemed ravenously hungry. We fed him as best we could, but by the next morning, he was in really bad shape.

Our last option was to try to replace him in the nest and hope his parents came back. It was pretty much a death sentence, but it was kind of our last hope. It didn't work out. Poor little guy. It was a fun little adventure while it lasted, though. Diana was especially fun to watch taking care of them. She's going to be a really great mom when the time rolls around.

Not a whole lot of other news. I golfed with Iwan on Sunday, and afterwards we watched some of the World Juggling Federation that he caught on ESPN. Really neat stuff. Far and away the best jugglers were the Galchenkos, a brother-sister team from Russia. They were absolutely incredible, scoring a 9.95 while second and third place took like 8.6 and 8.2. Check our their videos at the site. Incredible, incredible stuff.

We also watched "Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back", which I'm not sure if I liked or not. It started off kinda slow and silly, but really picked up towards the end.

I leave on Thursday for Lake Powell for a long weekend of house-boating and water-skiing. I think it will be a lot of fun, and I'm really looking forward to it. Hopefully I'll remember my camera and there will be plenty of pictures.

That's about it for now.

Oh yeah.... how about another chess game?