http://www.43things.com/person/darktortoise
I've started my own list on 43 Things (and on the companion site, 43 Places.) This website is an incredibly cool idea, just the sort of thing that makes me happy to be living in the age of the Internet.
Saturday, August 27, 2005
Call Me Overton?
I've been toying with the idea of asking people around me to refer to me as "Overton" rather than "Aaron." I like my last name better than my first anyway. I wonder if it would stick? Or just seem ridiculous?
My grandfather was always called Overton, even by my grandmother. She explained to me recently that she had met him at work where everyone was referred to by their last names rather than their first names. Even after they got married, she thought of him as Overton and just kept with it.
Think of the other examples: Wasn't it cool in the movie, "Aliens," that everyone called the heroine Ripley, her last name? On the TV series, "Alias," don't you like that Sid's romantic interest is called Vaughan rather than Michael? How about "The X-Files," with Scully and Mulder? No apparent lack of intimacy, but so much more interesting than "Dana and Fox."
My readers on this list are mostly the people that know me best, mostly. (Another little "Aliens" reference, there.) What do you think?
My grandfather was always called Overton, even by my grandmother. She explained to me recently that she had met him at work where everyone was referred to by their last names rather than their first names. Even after they got married, she thought of him as Overton and just kept with it.
Think of the other examples: Wasn't it cool in the movie, "Aliens," that everyone called the heroine Ripley, her last name? On the TV series, "Alias," don't you like that Sid's romantic interest is called Vaughan rather than Michael? How about "The X-Files," with Scully and Mulder? No apparent lack of intimacy, but so much more interesting than "Dana and Fox."
My readers on this list are mostly the people that know me best, mostly. (Another little "Aliens" reference, there.) What do you think?
Thursday, August 25, 2005
Car Accident Continues
When I imagine a car accident, I now picture it differently. Instead of engine oil, metal, and plastic flying around, I picture an enormous explosion of paper that covers the entire neighborhood.
Contributing to this mental image is the delivery of the civil case now filed against me King County Superior Court for unspecified damages covering a host of complaints. The trial date is set for February 12, 2007.
I guess I need to talk again to my insurance company (that's been uncomfortably quiet) and find an attorney that I can't afford but need to have.
Contributing to this mental image is the delivery of the civil case now filed against me King County Superior Court for unspecified damages covering a host of complaints. The trial date is set for February 12, 2007.
I guess I need to talk again to my insurance company (that's been uncomfortably quiet) and find an attorney that I can't afford but need to have.
Monday, August 22, 2005
GenCon Weekend
The rest of GenCon was great fun. Elizabeth and I played more games, including a second pass at the True Dungeon game, this time for the other adventure. There was one particular room in there that was worth the entire price of admission. In it, we entered a room with a silence spell over it. In play terms, that meant that anyone who communicated through sound would take damage. A riddle written on the wall indicated that to exit the room, we had to ring a bell that was there, which meant lifting the silence.
Lifting the silence required four different people to put their hands into the mouths of skulls mounted on the wall and "endure" the experience. I went first and it was really freaky. The mouth of the skull was filled with what felt like spiderwebs. Then, as I was standing there with my hand through a hole in the wall, it felt like something started licking my hand with a big, gross, slimy tongue. I almost yanked my hand out, but then settled down and let it happen. Finally, my hand was pushed out and had a letter stamped on it.
I knew Elizabeth was going to freak out at it, and two other members of our group had done it already. She put her hand through it and I moved over behind her and held her arm in place. The rest of the guys with us gathered around and encouraged her (silently) to keep quiet. It was totally obvious when the hand-licking thing started, because Elizabeth stiffened and clapped her other hand over her mouth. So there we are, six guys huddled around a teenage girl who's hand is stuck in the mouth of a skull where something unseen licks at her, all trying to stay totally quiet, the scene lit only by a couple of small green glowing bulbs. That's an incredibly tense situation that was about as entertaining as anything that weekend.
Most of the rest of our time was spent exploring the exhibit hall, although we played a game of Pirates of the Spanish Main with our newly acquired ships and participated in a free session where you get a free miniature and get to paint it using paints and brushes supplied by the sponsors, in this case Reaper Miniatures. It was the first time I'd painted a figure in quite some time, so I wasn't totally happy with it, but it certainly got me thinking about picking up painting again.
I think four days was enough (and Elizabeth agreed) but I'm looking forward to another convention when I can, and GenCon next year at a minimum.
Lifting the silence required four different people to put their hands into the mouths of skulls mounted on the wall and "endure" the experience. I went first and it was really freaky. The mouth of the skull was filled with what felt like spiderwebs. Then, as I was standing there with my hand through a hole in the wall, it felt like something started licking my hand with a big, gross, slimy tongue. I almost yanked my hand out, but then settled down and let it happen. Finally, my hand was pushed out and had a letter stamped on it.
I knew Elizabeth was going to freak out at it, and two other members of our group had done it already. She put her hand through it and I moved over behind her and held her arm in place. The rest of the guys with us gathered around and encouraged her (silently) to keep quiet. It was totally obvious when the hand-licking thing started, because Elizabeth stiffened and clapped her other hand over her mouth. So there we are, six guys huddled around a teenage girl who's hand is stuck in the mouth of a skull where something unseen licks at her, all trying to stay totally quiet, the scene lit only by a couple of small green glowing bulbs. That's an incredibly tense situation that was about as entertaining as anything that weekend.
Most of the rest of our time was spent exploring the exhibit hall, although we played a game of Pirates of the Spanish Main with our newly acquired ships and participated in a free session where you get a free miniature and get to paint it using paints and brushes supplied by the sponsors, in this case Reaper Miniatures. It was the first time I'd painted a figure in quite some time, so I wasn't totally happy with it, but it certainly got me thinking about picking up painting again.
I think four days was enough (and Elizabeth agreed) but I'm looking forward to another convention when I can, and GenCon next year at a minimum.
Saturday, August 20, 2005
GenCon Friday
Friday at GenCon started with some aggravation that was happily averted. Late Thursday, my badge fell off somewhere between when I looked at it while crossing a street coming back from dinner and entering the convention center a block away. I noticed it was missing no more than three minutes after it fell off, but after retracing my steps three times, I figure it was just gone. That's bad, because replacement of the badge was both necessary and $70. Fortunately, Zev was able to wrangle me a GM badge under the Z-Man Games name, and I was able to avoid paying for a new one.
I realize I forgot to mention that on Thursday, Elizabeth and I tried out Pirates of the Spanish Main by WizKids. You get these little plastic cards where you can punch out pieces and assemble them into pirate ships. Then, by taking turns moving them and firing with cannons, you fight the other players ships and try to sink them before they sink you. The basics are very simple and the game is very compact, so we bought a few packs of ships.
After some more time poking around the exhibit hall, we went to play the National Security Decision Making Game. Not the most exciting title, but it's a game of role-playing political leaders, military leaders, and so on in a real-world setting with a near infinite number of scenarios to play. Elizabeth found the briefing very confusing, so she instead went to watch some anime and go back to the exhibit hall. I stayed to play and ended up in a dual role of Air Force Chief of Staff and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. There were about 50 people in the game, half playing US roles, half playing Iranian roles. In the game, the Iranians were developing nukes, an Ebola outbreak was spreading through Africa and bounced to continental Europe, and internal intrigue was going on in both countries. The winners are determined by judgement call of the group of facilitators, and I nabbed a very respectable fourth place by being the instrumental player in containing the Ebola outbreak and building some Air Force-controlled bioweapons despite international treaties and without the Secretary of Defense or President knowing that it happened.
We also tracked down my good friend Bobby, who has left his "regular" job to become a full-time miniatures sculptor. I hadn't talked to him in some time, but we picked up right where we left off, which to me is the best indication of true friendship. No matter how long it's been, it's like no time has passed when you get together again. I caught him at his sculpting demonstration table, put my camera in front of my face, and called out, "Mr. Jackson, a picture please?" He looked up, I got the photo below, and he only figured out it was me when I lowered the camera. Warm welcome number two!
Bobby Jackson, Cool Sculptor Guy
Later, Elizabeth and I got into a game of Seafarers of Catan on a "giant" board. It wasn't as large as I expected, but it was still fun to play on a cool board. It was an incredibly close game, as I was prepared to win on my next turn when another player, Carol, picked up her last victory point and won ahead of me. Here's a look at the special board:
Giant Seafarers of Catan Board
We then went to a seminar, where I was the "expert." One of my StormReavers, Steve, helped me set up two seminar sessions where I would discuss the WarEngine rules with experienced players as we try to figure out what a new edition of the game might include. The seminar included only three attendees for this session, Steve, Ray, and David, but that was okay, as we worked through a better movement system, a better way to define weapon characteristics, and a few other smaller fixes. There's another session tonight and Bobby at least will likely join us for that one.
After the seminar, it was back to the Hong Kong Action Movie room, where Elizabeth again fell asleep, but I watched the last hour of a funny movie. I have no idea what it was, though, as I never saw the title.
Now, Elizabeth is ready to go and we're headed for the convention center again, prepared to fight for parking with fans coming to the Colts game in the RCA Dome right next to the convention. More True Dungeon today, too.
I realize I forgot to mention that on Thursday, Elizabeth and I tried out Pirates of the Spanish Main by WizKids. You get these little plastic cards where you can punch out pieces and assemble them into pirate ships. Then, by taking turns moving them and firing with cannons, you fight the other players ships and try to sink them before they sink you. The basics are very simple and the game is very compact, so we bought a few packs of ships.
After some more time poking around the exhibit hall, we went to play the National Security Decision Making Game. Not the most exciting title, but it's a game of role-playing political leaders, military leaders, and so on in a real-world setting with a near infinite number of scenarios to play. Elizabeth found the briefing very confusing, so she instead went to watch some anime and go back to the exhibit hall. I stayed to play and ended up in a dual role of Air Force Chief of Staff and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. There were about 50 people in the game, half playing US roles, half playing Iranian roles. In the game, the Iranians were developing nukes, an Ebola outbreak was spreading through Africa and bounced to continental Europe, and internal intrigue was going on in both countries. The winners are determined by judgement call of the group of facilitators, and I nabbed a very respectable fourth place by being the instrumental player in containing the Ebola outbreak and building some Air Force-controlled bioweapons despite international treaties and without the Secretary of Defense or President knowing that it happened.
We also tracked down my good friend Bobby, who has left his "regular" job to become a full-time miniatures sculptor. I hadn't talked to him in some time, but we picked up right where we left off, which to me is the best indication of true friendship. No matter how long it's been, it's like no time has passed when you get together again. I caught him at his sculpting demonstration table, put my camera in front of my face, and called out, "Mr. Jackson, a picture please?" He looked up, I got the photo below, and he only figured out it was me when I lowered the camera. Warm welcome number two!
Bobby Jackson, Cool Sculptor Guy
Later, Elizabeth and I got into a game of Seafarers of Catan on a "giant" board. It wasn't as large as I expected, but it was still fun to play on a cool board. It was an incredibly close game, as I was prepared to win on my next turn when another player, Carol, picked up her last victory point and won ahead of me. Here's a look at the special board:
Giant Seafarers of Catan Board
We then went to a seminar, where I was the "expert." One of my StormReavers, Steve, helped me set up two seminar sessions where I would discuss the WarEngine rules with experienced players as we try to figure out what a new edition of the game might include. The seminar included only three attendees for this session, Steve, Ray, and David, but that was okay, as we worked through a better movement system, a better way to define weapon characteristics, and a few other smaller fixes. There's another session tonight and Bobby at least will likely join us for that one.
After the seminar, it was back to the Hong Kong Action Movie room, where Elizabeth again fell asleep, but I watched the last hour of a funny movie. I have no idea what it was, though, as I never saw the title.
Now, Elizabeth is ready to go and we're headed for the convention center again, prepared to fight for parking with fans coming to the Colts game in the RCA Dome right next to the convention. More True Dungeon today, too.
GenCon Thursday
Elizabeth and I have been very busy here at GenCon, doing lots of fun stuff. Thursday, we browsed the exhibit hall for a bit and found my friend Zev, working his booth for his company, Z-Man Games. Elizabeth was amazed at the warm reception I got when I found him. When I was running DemonBlade Games, she was really too young to appreciate the kinds of friendships I established with some other guys in the industry.
Just walking around is interesting in and of itself, not just because of exhibitors, but because of other people attending. These two guys posed for me in mock combat:
Elf Guy Battles a Ghost Buster
We signed up for several events, then we got to play in a True Dungeon adventure. This is really pretty cool, as you walk through these incredibly dark rooms that are tricked out to look like carved dungeon halls. In any given room, there are either traps to puzzle past or monsters to fight. I played the cleric of our group. To make it more interesting than just rolling dice, the power of the spells I cast was dependent on memory. They gave me a set of about 15 prayer beads, all different. Each corresponds to a word, such as piety or fortitude. When I want to cast a spell, I would tell the guy running the room which one and he would ask me to show him a particular one. "Show me your bead of grace," he'd say, and I'd pick out the one that looks like a little melon. The less tries to get the right bead, the better the effect of the spell. I got them on the first try every time, so I was very effective. In the end, out our group of seven characters, two were killed by a failed attempt past a puzzle room and the rest of us died in the last room by not figuring out the final puzzle fast enough. That wasn't all that uncommon, apparently, and it was still lots of fun. There's a second adventure, and Elizabeth and I will play that one later today.
We dropped by the miniatures hall after that to see how some of my old StormReaver demo guys were doing running games of Shock Force and variants, that being one of the games I wrote. There was a Shock Force game, a Stargate variant, a Civil War variant, and a WWII variant all going. It's so cool to see people still playing my games. The WWII game looked particularly well planned out, and I got a picture of one of the battles in progress that came out rather well:
WWII Action Using WarEngine Rules
We had dinner with Zev and Paul (Zev's friend that helps him with Z-Man.) Elizabeth and I then tried out a game of Memoir '44, a much simpler WWII battle game by Days of Wonder. Finally, we headed over to one of the hotels where Zev's company sponsors a Hong Kong Action Movie room that runs movies from 8am to midnight every day of the convention. We started watching Big Trouble in Little China, but by this time it was really getting late and we were both kind of nodding off, so we headed back to the hotel for the night.
Just walking around is interesting in and of itself, not just because of exhibitors, but because of other people attending. These two guys posed for me in mock combat:
Elf Guy Battles a Ghost Buster
We signed up for several events, then we got to play in a True Dungeon adventure. This is really pretty cool, as you walk through these incredibly dark rooms that are tricked out to look like carved dungeon halls. In any given room, there are either traps to puzzle past or monsters to fight. I played the cleric of our group. To make it more interesting than just rolling dice, the power of the spells I cast was dependent on memory. They gave me a set of about 15 prayer beads, all different. Each corresponds to a word, such as piety or fortitude. When I want to cast a spell, I would tell the guy running the room which one and he would ask me to show him a particular one. "Show me your bead of grace," he'd say, and I'd pick out the one that looks like a little melon. The less tries to get the right bead, the better the effect of the spell. I got them on the first try every time, so I was very effective. In the end, out our group of seven characters, two were killed by a failed attempt past a puzzle room and the rest of us died in the last room by not figuring out the final puzzle fast enough. That wasn't all that uncommon, apparently, and it was still lots of fun. There's a second adventure, and Elizabeth and I will play that one later today.
We dropped by the miniatures hall after that to see how some of my old StormReaver demo guys were doing running games of Shock Force and variants, that being one of the games I wrote. There was a Shock Force game, a Stargate variant, a Civil War variant, and a WWII variant all going. It's so cool to see people still playing my games. The WWII game looked particularly well planned out, and I got a picture of one of the battles in progress that came out rather well:
WWII Action Using WarEngine Rules
We had dinner with Zev and Paul (Zev's friend that helps him with Z-Man.) Elizabeth and I then tried out a game of Memoir '44, a much simpler WWII battle game by Days of Wonder. Finally, we headed over to one of the hotels where Zev's company sponsors a Hong Kong Action Movie room that runs movies from 8am to midnight every day of the convention. We started watching Big Trouble in Little China, but by this time it was really getting late and we were both kind of nodding off, so we headed back to the hotel for the night.
Wednesday, August 17, 2005
Aaron and Elizabeth
Elizabeth's here now, too! I asked the woman at the hotel front desk to take this picture of us together. Actually, she was so happy to take pictures of us that she practically grabbed the camera out of my hand. She then raved about Elizabeth's hair, which is somehow the same hair Elizabeth herself had just said was so awful. Judge for yourself:
Aaron and Elizabeth
Aaron and Elizabeth
Coming to You Live from Indiana
I am in Indianapolis, Indiana, at the Courtyard by Marriott Indianapolis South. I arrived a short time ago and figured I'd go ahead and get my rental car and check into the hotel instead of just waiting three hours to get Elizabeth from the airport. She's arriving shortly on her first flight without parental escort.
We're here for GenCon 2005, a huge gaming convention I have attended before, but not in a few years and never with Elizabeth. I've also never been to the Indianapolis location for the convention, as it was still being held in Milwaukee the last time I went. I plan to take a lot of pictures, as there are lots of things to see, and to play a lot of games.
I did have a great conversation with two flight attendants on the flight from Seattle to Chicago. It was really good to get a different and positive experience from a previous one I've described elsewhere in this blog. For now, though, I'm going to go get Elizabeth and begin what should be a really fun extended weekend with my eldest daughter.
We're here for GenCon 2005, a huge gaming convention I have attended before, but not in a few years and never with Elizabeth. I've also never been to the Indianapolis location for the convention, as it was still being held in Milwaukee the last time I went. I plan to take a lot of pictures, as there are lots of things to see, and to play a lot of games.
I did have a great conversation with two flight attendants on the flight from Seattle to Chicago. It was really good to get a different and positive experience from a previous one I've described elsewhere in this blog. For now, though, I'm going to go get Elizabeth and begin what should be a really fun extended weekend with my eldest daughter.
Don't Be That Guy
I went to a lecture today, "Getting Started in Podcasting." There were parts of it that were interesting although it certainly feels like there's a certain amount of much ado about nothing. Podcasting is mostly about recording some audio or video then posting it on the Internet. That's about it.
The thing is, part of the title is "Getting Started." It seems like there were several of "that guy" there, though. You know the one. He comes to the introductory session, but already knows all that stuff. Then, he doesn't just ask questions about advanced topics while the people sitting around him stare at him blankly, he peppers those questions with his own comments. Comments that effectively highjack the presentation so he can show how smart he is.
The first guy like this that I recall distinctly was in a college course in computer science. I forget the exact title of the class, but the examples were all written in Pascal. Almost every class session, and often multiple times in the same class session, he'd start his question or comment with, "Well, I use C and...." (For those that don't know, Pascal and C are two computer programming languages. Pascal was mostly used as an instructional language. C and its descendents are probably the most popular mainstream languages.) You could just hear it in the guy's voice that he thought he was just the coolest guy ever because he was in a college class and already was using C at work.
Eventually, whenever he'd be about to say something, I'd mutter under my breath, "Well, I use C and...." Seconds later he'd say it. When I say mutter, of course I mean "say quietly but not so quietly the half-dozen people around me couldn't hear me." It was all so entertaining for us, and way better than listening to that guy.
Don't be that guy.
The thing is, part of the title is "Getting Started." It seems like there were several of "that guy" there, though. You know the one. He comes to the introductory session, but already knows all that stuff. Then, he doesn't just ask questions about advanced topics while the people sitting around him stare at him blankly, he peppers those questions with his own comments. Comments that effectively highjack the presentation so he can show how smart he is.
The first guy like this that I recall distinctly was in a college course in computer science. I forget the exact title of the class, but the examples were all written in Pascal. Almost every class session, and often multiple times in the same class session, he'd start his question or comment with, "Well, I use C and...." (For those that don't know, Pascal and C are two computer programming languages. Pascal was mostly used as an instructional language. C and its descendents are probably the most popular mainstream languages.) You could just hear it in the guy's voice that he thought he was just the coolest guy ever because he was in a college class and already was using C at work.
Eventually, whenever he'd be about to say something, I'd mutter under my breath, "Well, I use C and...." Seconds later he'd say it. When I say mutter, of course I mean "say quietly but not so quietly the half-dozen people around me couldn't hear me." It was all so entertaining for us, and way better than listening to that guy.
Don't be that guy.
Sunday, August 14, 2005
Emmons Glacier Hike
Emmons Glacier
That's right, after several weeks of no wilderness hikes, I was out hiking again on Saturday. This time was to Emmons Glacier Basin in the Mount Rainier National Park, about seven miles. The best picture that I took was the one above, which happened to be only about 1.25 miles in, so someone wanting to get a great view would only have about 2.5 miles of walking. Of course, from Seattle that's about 90 miles of driving each way, so you'd really have to want to see this particular view to only walk 2.5 miles.
Emmons Glacier is the largest glacier in the "lower 48," and the trail to the glacier basin is a commonly used route for climbers headed to the summit of Mount Rainier. The Wikipedia entry for the glacier has some information on that and a good diagram of the area.
Gaurav went with me again, becoming my first two-hike companion. He vowed to quit smoking forever as we were driving back, but by the time I got around to writing this blog entry, he'd started again. What an insidious habit smoking is. I don't get it myself, because while I actually kind of like the smell of a lit cigarette, the couple of times I tried smoking back in college, it just wasn't all that appealing. I don't understand drinking coffee, either, for that matter.
We (and I use "we" to mean "me, while Gaurav listened) did chat a bit with a woman that was headed to the summit. She was going to spend the night at a shelter around 10,000 feet, then strike for the summit at the usual starting time of 1am, when the snow and ice near the top are at their most solid. She said it was her second time climbing Mount Rainier. The first time for her was four years ago and she described it as, "Easy." She started with a basic mountaineering course from The Mountaineers. They have a basic mountaineering course of study that starts in January and prepares you for a climb to the summit by mid-summer. Getting all of this information was my way of researching what it would take for me to climb the mountain myself. I plan to sign up for the course next January, so perhaps this time next year, I'll be headed to the summit.
In the meantime, it was great to be back in the wilderness again. It's a great contrast with my city walks. And today, Sunday, I was all primed to do Walk 5 in Seattle, for a total of some 14 miles of walking/hiking this weekend.
Thursday, August 11, 2005
Jack of All Trades
Yesterday, I finished up some SQL views that will allow our internal customers to create ad hoc reports about beta program participation. This is a task that had been languishing for some time, waiting for a developer to come available who could do the work. But now, I'm doing it.
At Microsoft, there are six general disciplines defined on a team: Program Management (feature design and schedules,) Product Management (requirements and customer interaction,) Development, Test, User Experience (usability, documentation, and interface design,) and Release Management (deployment.)
With the work I just did for these views, it's my first work as a developer at Microsoft. My primary role is as a program manager. We don't have a dedicated product manager, so we're light on representation there, so I've picked up some of that work, too. I've filed as many bugs as anyone on the test team and have even had some days where my bug report total exceeds that of the entire test team combined. And I recently contributed as editor for our administration site's documentation. When we were deploying, I worked with the Passport team to make sure our site met compliance. That means I've now done some work in every discipline. And that is cool.
At Microsoft, there are six general disciplines defined on a team: Program Management (feature design and schedules,) Product Management (requirements and customer interaction,) Development, Test, User Experience (usability, documentation, and interface design,) and Release Management (deployment.)
With the work I just did for these views, it's my first work as a developer at Microsoft. My primary role is as a program manager. We don't have a dedicated product manager, so we're light on representation there, so I've picked up some of that work, too. I've filed as many bugs as anyone on the test team and have even had some days where my bug report total exceeds that of the entire test team combined. And I recently contributed as editor for our administration site's documentation. When we were deploying, I worked with the Passport team to make sure our site met compliance. That means I've now done some work in every discipline. And that is cool.
Monday, August 08, 2005
Something Interesting about Alaska
One thing that I always liked about Alaska is how it dominates US geography. Through a rather roundabout way, I was reminded of that tonight. I watched "xXx: State of the Union" and it was absolutely horrible. Rather than watch attentively, I ended up looking it up on IMDB while it was still playing. (4.0 out of 10, truly awful.) Then, I submitted a "goof" because they didn't even get the presidential order of succession right in the movie. I had to check my facts somewhere, and ended up on InfoPlease. I clicked around a bit there while I was already on the site and found a page on Extreme Points of the US.
If you check the footnote, you'll see that measuring from the Greenwich Meridian, Alaska is the most western, most eastern, and most northern state. (Maine gets most eastern only if you measure from the geographic center of the US - sure that makes more sense, but I'll stick with the one that makes Alaska even more interesting.) Since Denali, or Mt. McKinley as most people outside of Alaska know it, is the highest mountain in North America, Alaska picks up highest state, too. In fact, the sixteen highest mountains in the US are all in Alaska.
Incidentally, it has the largest land area of any state, more than twice Texas, the second largest (although with only 3% of the population of the Lone Star State.)
And remember, if you find any of these facts about Alaska boring, at least you're not watching "xXx: State of the Union!"
If you check the footnote, you'll see that measuring from the Greenwich Meridian, Alaska is the most western, most eastern, and most northern state. (Maine gets most eastern only if you measure from the geographic center of the US - sure that makes more sense, but I'll stick with the one that makes Alaska even more interesting.) Since Denali, or Mt. McKinley as most people outside of Alaska know it, is the highest mountain in North America, Alaska picks up highest state, too. In fact, the sixteen highest mountains in the US are all in Alaska.
Incidentally, it has the largest land area of any state, more than twice Texas, the second largest (although with only 3% of the population of the Lone Star State.)
And remember, if you find any of these facts about Alaska boring, at least you're not watching "xXx: State of the Union!"
Sunday, August 07, 2005
Some Random Thoughts
I have a bunch of relatively random, surprisingly serious things buzzing around in my head today, so I'm going to just write them down here. Perhaps I'll be mistaken for a big-name columnist.
People with big goals sometimes do stupid things in pursuit of them. Sometimes it works out for the best in the end, sometimes not. My latest was part of my Seattle City Walk, as I pushed for 20 miles in one day on Walk 4. There have been plenty of others.
Our executive branch of government became much stronger than originally intended around a century ago. More recently, over perhaps the last three decades or so, our judicial branch has become similarly overpowered. It seems our legislators are letting the balance of power get away from them at the expense of the American people. They should fix this while they still have the ability to do so.
Marriages that last a lifetime are much more challenging now that people's lives change so significantly in as little as a few years. The same is true for careers, homes, hobbies, and the like.
Racial segregation today is far more by choice than not. Go to, say, a university cafeteria and take a look the groups of students. Whites will be with whites, blacks with blacks, Asians with Asians, and so on. They aren't required to do so, but they feel more comfortable that way. I also don't think it's external pressure.
I'd rather have a member of today's Republican Party as commander-in-chief, but when it comes to spending, both our major political parties are absolutely out of control. Speaking of which, I'm not sure why the President gets all the blame for governmental overspending, since Congress has a say in the budget, too.
One last thing. I'm hungry.
People with big goals sometimes do stupid things in pursuit of them. Sometimes it works out for the best in the end, sometimes not. My latest was part of my Seattle City Walk, as I pushed for 20 miles in one day on Walk 4. There have been plenty of others.
Our executive branch of government became much stronger than originally intended around a century ago. More recently, over perhaps the last three decades or so, our judicial branch has become similarly overpowered. It seems our legislators are letting the balance of power get away from them at the expense of the American people. They should fix this while they still have the ability to do so.
Marriages that last a lifetime are much more challenging now that people's lives change so significantly in as little as a few years. The same is true for careers, homes, hobbies, and the like.
Racial segregation today is far more by choice than not. Go to, say, a university cafeteria and take a look the groups of students. Whites will be with whites, blacks with blacks, Asians with Asians, and so on. They aren't required to do so, but they feel more comfortable that way. I also don't think it's external pressure.
I'd rather have a member of today's Republican Party as commander-in-chief, but when it comes to spending, both our major political parties are absolutely out of control. Speaking of which, I'm not sure why the President gets all the blame for governmental overspending, since Congress has a say in the budget, too.
One last thing. I'm hungry.
Friday, August 05, 2005
Who's Afraid of an Empty Page?
Not me, not any more. I started blogging as a way to improve my writing, both in quality and quantity. Quality is much harder to self-judge, but I occasionally ask people like Trevor or Olympia what they think and I've had generally positive feedback.
Quantity, though, I can judge for myself. I always wanted to write when I was younger, but I'd get what many frustrated authors and artists get: fear of the empty page. How do you take the perfectly clean piece of white paper (or its digital equivalent) and dare to mark it with your lines?
A clean sheet of paper has a certain elegance to it. A piece of paper with your markings is changed. It no longer has the basic simplicity of a blank sheet and the complexity added may no longer have elegance. Let's face it, you may well have just ruined it. After a certain age, when quality and a desire to be excellent kicks in, ruining stuff that way is something we avoid. Little kids don't have this problem. Just watch a three year old with a stack of blank paper and a crayon. He'll go through twenty sheets, drawing grotesque and unidentifiable squiggles on each, in under three minutes if you let him. Some of the kids that keep it up become the famous artists of three decades later.
I realize my fear of the empty page is gone. My next post here will be number 250 since I started this blog over a year ago. When I comment on others' blogs, I find my comments are sometimes longer than their posts, but they just flow out of my head and onto the (digital) page. Hopefully, most of that is of value. (OK, I think it is. Setting aside the humility for a moment, I do feel my writing quality has improved significantly over the past year, and I don't think I was so bad to begin with. Now it would be up to you, the reader, to tell me I'm wrong instead of being not-so-subtly encouraged to tell me I'm right. I think it's easier that way.)
Quantity, though, I can judge for myself. I always wanted to write when I was younger, but I'd get what many frustrated authors and artists get: fear of the empty page. How do you take the perfectly clean piece of white paper (or its digital equivalent) and dare to mark it with your lines?
A clean sheet of paper has a certain elegance to it. A piece of paper with your markings is changed. It no longer has the basic simplicity of a blank sheet and the complexity added may no longer have elegance. Let's face it, you may well have just ruined it. After a certain age, when quality and a desire to be excellent kicks in, ruining stuff that way is something we avoid. Little kids don't have this problem. Just watch a three year old with a stack of blank paper and a crayon. He'll go through twenty sheets, drawing grotesque and unidentifiable squiggles on each, in under three minutes if you let him. Some of the kids that keep it up become the famous artists of three decades later.
I realize my fear of the empty page is gone. My next post here will be number 250 since I started this blog over a year ago. When I comment on others' blogs, I find my comments are sometimes longer than their posts, but they just flow out of my head and onto the (digital) page. Hopefully, most of that is of value. (OK, I think it is. Setting aside the humility for a moment, I do feel my writing quality has improved significantly over the past year, and I don't think I was so bad to begin with. Now it would be up to you, the reader, to tell me I'm wrong instead of being not-so-subtly encouraged to tell me I'm right. I think it's easier that way.)
Thursday, August 04, 2005
Andrew Tobias' Book
I just finished reading Andrew Tobias' book, "The Only Investment Guide You'll Ever Need." I think he's right. For anyone who wants the incredibly short version without needing to read the book: Get out of debt, then invest at least 10% of your income in no-load mutual funds.
If somehow that doesn't seem like enough, there's plenty more in the book. Tobias is an entertaining writer, which is hard to do with investment as the topic. I actually laughed out loud a couple of times. (Your mileage will vary. I have an admittedly unusual sense of humor.)
He starts out the book with a bunch of interesting tips on saving money and explains why saving money on your expenses is actually way better than any investment you'll ever find. Well, once I understood how the Microsoft Employee Stock Purchase Plan (ESPP) works out to an 89% or better rate of return, I see that it's right up there, but that's an exception rather than a rule. If I could put 100% of my income into ESPP, I'd do immediately. But when he describes how simply buying your favorite wine by the case every quarter at a 10% discount rather than by the bottle once a week works out to a better than 40% return on investment equivalence, you're hooked. (In an appendix he goes on to describe how "better than 40%" in this particular case works out to 177%, which blows the socks off even ESPP.)
Later in the book, after warning the reader not to bother with playing the stock market in favor of those no-load mutual funds, he describes what all the terminology around stocks mean. If you've ever wondered what puts, shorts, limit orders, or margins are, you'll get it after you read this. In other sections, he describes the differences between 401k, regular IRAs, and Roth IRAs, and other mysterious acronyms related to investment.
I'll just say it one more time: what a good book, a must read for anyone that's trying to get back to zero (unfortunately, that's me) or finally has a positive net worth and has no idea what to do with it to make it grow.
Here's one of the things I thought was really funny, just to give you an idea. His definition of "margin calls": A margin call is what alerts you to the fact that your life is going to hell and that you never should have gotten into the market when you did, let alone on margin.
Get it and read it now.
If somehow that doesn't seem like enough, there's plenty more in the book. Tobias is an entertaining writer, which is hard to do with investment as the topic. I actually laughed out loud a couple of times. (Your mileage will vary. I have an admittedly unusual sense of humor.)
He starts out the book with a bunch of interesting tips on saving money and explains why saving money on your expenses is actually way better than any investment you'll ever find. Well, once I understood how the Microsoft Employee Stock Purchase Plan (ESPP) works out to an 89% or better rate of return, I see that it's right up there, but that's an exception rather than a rule. If I could put 100% of my income into ESPP, I'd do immediately. But when he describes how simply buying your favorite wine by the case every quarter at a 10% discount rather than by the bottle once a week works out to a better than 40% return on investment equivalence, you're hooked. (In an appendix he goes on to describe how "better than 40%" in this particular case works out to 177%, which blows the socks off even ESPP.)
Later in the book, after warning the reader not to bother with playing the stock market in favor of those no-load mutual funds, he describes what all the terminology around stocks mean. If you've ever wondered what puts, shorts, limit orders, or margins are, you'll get it after you read this. In other sections, he describes the differences between 401k, regular IRAs, and Roth IRAs, and other mysterious acronyms related to investment.
I'll just say it one more time: what a good book, a must read for anyone that's trying to get back to zero (unfortunately, that's me) or finally has a positive net worth and has no idea what to do with it to make it grow.
Here's one of the things I thought was really funny, just to give you an idea. His definition of "margin calls": A margin call is what alerts you to the fact that your life is going to hell and that you never should have gotten into the market when you did, let alone on margin.
Get it and read it now.
Monday, August 01, 2005
Low Importance = High Interest
I've noticed that when I send or receive email marked with "Low Importance" it's actually another way to mark the email as particularly interesting. In essence, "It's low importance? Oh, then it's probably something personal or otherwise much more intriguing than a simple work-related message."
Do you read low importance messages before normal importance messages? Before high importance messages?
Do you read low importance messages before normal importance messages? Before high importance messages?
Back in Bellevue
It’s Sunday evening, and I’m home – in Bellevue, that is. One thing I’ve discovered is that in some ways, after living elsewhere for longer than I lived here, Fairbanks is still home. I kept looking around hoping to run into someone, anyone, I’d gone to school with in Fairbanks, but even after almost ten days, I didn’t. Granted, places like the clinic or Denny’s, where I took my grandmother for lunch a few times, might not have been the most likely places to run into people in their mid-thirties, like I am, but still, I had hopes. It’s hard to leave now, as I think my dad could really use my help here for another week, but while my manager at Microsoft has been very generous about letting me come up here for as long as I have, another week would probably be an unreasonable burden on my team.
On the good side, I’m an Alaska Airlines MVP from all the flying I did last year, and that means I’ve been upgrade to first class for my both segments of my flight home. I was also in first class on the trip up, so my pricey $730 coach flight (it’s a killer buying airfare on short notice) has become a pretty reasonably priced first class flight. If only I wasn’t getting back to Sea-Tac at 2am. If I’m keeping track of things correctly, I think I only need one more trip back to Maryland to reach MVP again for next year, so there are probably quite a few first class flights in my future.
After being away for ten days, there were tons of things I needed to get caught up on. My mailbox was incredibly full - enough that there was a slip in there that they were holding some of my mail (not the USPS, but the Pony Express place where I actually get my mail.) Except for a break to add to my Seattle City Walk project and dinner, I just ground away at a long list. I only finished about half of it anyway.
There was one other break this evening. The fire alarms went off in my apartment complex, all four buildings. What an incredibly obnoxious sound that was. My cat, Flicker, immediately ran over to me and was meowing piteously about the sound. I pulled out her carrier, stuffed her inside, and headed down to the courtyard. Only after I got down there did it occur to me that I brought her, but not stuff like my phone or my laptop. I'd had a conversation about that with Trevor once - what stuff do you own that you consider core. I'd figured I'd never leave either of those two items behind, since I can pretty much continue my present lifestyle with just that. But I guess when it comes to fire (or really, the horrible piercing noise of a fire alarm,) just getting my cat out of there was sufficient.
In the end, I think it was someone in the next building over that burned something in their oven, then opened the door to their apartment to try to keep their apartment alarm from going off. Instead, it set off the hallway detector, which triggers the entire complex' alarm system. Oops.
For now, though, I have to get to bed. I'm back at work tomorrow morning and I'm sure I'm going to have a long day ahead of me.
On the good side, I’m an Alaska Airlines MVP from all the flying I did last year, and that means I’ve been upgrade to first class for my both segments of my flight home. I was also in first class on the trip up, so my pricey $730 coach flight (it’s a killer buying airfare on short notice) has become a pretty reasonably priced first class flight. If only I wasn’t getting back to Sea-Tac at 2am. If I’m keeping track of things correctly, I think I only need one more trip back to Maryland to reach MVP again for next year, so there are probably quite a few first class flights in my future.
After being away for ten days, there were tons of things I needed to get caught up on. My mailbox was incredibly full - enough that there was a slip in there that they were holding some of my mail (not the USPS, but the Pony Express place where I actually get my mail.) Except for a break to add to my Seattle City Walk project and dinner, I just ground away at a long list. I only finished about half of it anyway.
There was one other break this evening. The fire alarms went off in my apartment complex, all four buildings. What an incredibly obnoxious sound that was. My cat, Flicker, immediately ran over to me and was meowing piteously about the sound. I pulled out her carrier, stuffed her inside, and headed down to the courtyard. Only after I got down there did it occur to me that I brought her, but not stuff like my phone or my laptop. I'd had a conversation about that with Trevor once - what stuff do you own that you consider core. I'd figured I'd never leave either of those two items behind, since I can pretty much continue my present lifestyle with just that. But I guess when it comes to fire (or really, the horrible piercing noise of a fire alarm,) just getting my cat out of there was sufficient.
In the end, I think it was someone in the next building over that burned something in their oven, then opened the door to their apartment to try to keep their apartment alarm from going off. Instead, it set off the hallway detector, which triggers the entire complex' alarm system. Oops.
For now, though, I have to get to bed. I'm back at work tomorrow morning and I'm sure I'm going to have a long day ahead of me.
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