Rockville Volunteer Fire Department

Today was also a trip to the Rockville Volunteer Fire Department with Gregory's Tiger Cub den. Here's my artsy take on one of the trucks.



The boys got a chance to look over all the gear a fireman uses when going out on a call. It was kind of like watching a knight prepare his armor for battle. They were looking at the fire truck when there was an alarm, the boys were quickly moved out of the way, and the firemen and truck roared out to answer a house fire call.

A member of the second team gamely took over and showed the boys all the equipment on the medical rescue truck until a further call for assistance came and the second team roared out of there with the other trucks.

A guy from another station that was filling in for someone off on vacation was just suggesting we wait in the firefighters' common room when the alarms went off for the third time and he had to go, too. At this point, we figured the boys had seen enough and we should probably head out before they got drafted to go on yet another call, and headed home.

What part did Gregory like the best, as evidenced by being the first thing he told Olympia about when we got home? The foosball table.

Call of Duty 2

This afternoon, I completed the last of the missions in Call of Duty 2 on the Xbox 360 and on the hardest level, Veteran. That makes me a true Call of Duty bad-ass. It's amazing what a little free time on your hands can help you achieve!

Next week: Call of Duty 3 hits stores and my copy is already reserved and paid for. Look out, Jerries!

Fright Fest at Six Flags

Last night, I took "the little guys" to Fright Fest at Six Flags. I'm really feeling pretty good about getting season passes!

Despite it being chilly and windy, we got out there with (most of) another family, Kevin and his two kids, Preston and McKenna. It was dark, so I didn't really get much in the way of good pictures, but here's one of the four of them lounging around one of the Halloween displays.




We went into the haunted house as the first thing we did there, and it scared the bejeezus out of the three younger ones. Katerina was quite as scared, but it started to get to her by the end, too. Particularly scary for them was being chased out of the final room by a madwoman swinging an actual, running chainsaw (sans chain.)

There weren't many rides to go on, but there was some trick-or-treating, a really bad Monster Mash show, and the Prop Room was open. That's a big room with thousands of little Nerf-like balls and stuff like air-burst ball launchers. I was standing there watching the kids run around and throw balls around when I got hit in the back of the head with a ball. It didn't hurt, it was just startling, so I didn't really care. Then a moment later, I got hit in the back of the head again. It was too directed to not be intentional. I waited about ten seconds, then whipped around and caught some little kid trying to look innocent, about to throw another ball at me.

Trying to be a good sport, I spent the next ten minutes following him around and trying to pelt him with balls, too, apparently to his great amusement. I thought I had him cornered on a platform up a few ramps near the top of the big room, but he flung himself down a slide I hadn't even realized was up there. I tagged him a couple times, though mostly, he was pretty good at eluding me by going in areas not really conducive to adults. And then he left with his mother, who probably would have been none too pleased with him (or perhaps with me) and also probably has no idea that she's raised a hellion.

Leaving after 9pm, there was the usual whining about not wanting to leave, but the park was going to close anyway, so apparently the trip was a winner for the kids.

Google Docs & Spreadsheets

Google sure is doing some interesting things designed to directly compete with Microsoft. I'm writing this using their beta of Google Docs & Spreadsheets, which seems to have been largely acquired from Writely. The part about which I'm particularly curious is the blog publishing. Of course, if you're reading this on my blog, I guess it works.

(Update: I didn't get a title in my first attempt at publishing this direct from D&S to my blog. I have to see if there's a way to define the title without revising the post.)

Gregory Goes Camping

This past weekend, I took Gregory camping for the first time. We went with his Cub Scout pack to Greenbelt Park. My first job in Maryland was about a mile away and I had no idea that there was a park this size that supported overnight camping. That area is very urban otherwise. As the website says, it's only twelve miles from the White House.

Here's Gregory in his Cub Scout uniform in front of our tent:


Gregory Goes Camping

The big white and black plastic attachment on the right side of his uniform is his Tiger Cub "instant achievement" badge. He gets beads to attach to it as he completes different activities, fifteen of them in three categories, plus a large selection of electives. He's earned two of his fifteen. His left pocket is where his rank badges will go. He's actually earned the first one, his Bobcat badge, but he only received the badge two nights previous, so it didn't get sewed on his uniform until after this trip.

I was in Cub Scouts, then Boy Scouts for most of my childhood and I think it was the best part of growing up. I didn't quite make it to Eagle Scout, mostly because my troop sort of disbanded when the long-time Scoutmaster left, but didn't shut down entirely. I had plenty of time to complete Eagle, but needed a good troop and didn't switch to the other really strong troop in Fairbanks. So I left with the rank of Life and lots of great experiences.

Getting back into Scouting with Gregory has only just begun, but I'm finding myself deeply drawn to the involvement. I met a Scout leader named Joe this past weekend who reminded me very much of the late Mr. J, the Scoutmaster of Troop 92 when I was a boy. He has patience, respect for the boys, and takes the time to talk to them about the why of things, not just giving commands (except for "Step away from the fire!") He's invited me to join the Boy Scout troop on their camping and hiking trips as an adult chaperone. We were talking about hiking and I'd mentioned how I go alone on some hikes when I want to go on one too long or difficult for Olympia or the kids. I think I'll go.

Back to this camping trip with Gregory: He mixed with the other boys as much as he ever does, which is sometimes distressing less than I might hope, but he had a fantastic time. I'd forgotten to bring a flashlight, but I had a headlamp and a couple of those green glowsticks. I used the headlamp and gave Gregory a glowstick. He was fascinated by it and held onto it that night even when he was sleeping. It also had the advantage of being distinctive and visible from some distance, so I could spot where he was out in the dark pretty easily.

There was a capture-the-flag game that was almost pure chaos, egg races that were a little better, a short walk through the woods, hamburgers and hot dogs cooked on a huge grill that Joe brought, and a campfire with s'mores and skits by the various dens in the evening. It brought back very positive memories and helped build some new ones.

The next Cub Scout activity? This Sunday we take the Tiger Cub den to visit the Rockville Fire Station.

Trip to Seattle & Victoria

I mentioned in my last post that I had taken a trip to Seattle and Victoria. I've finally managed to get the pictures off my phone, find the best ones, and get them up here.

The main reason for the trip, my first significant batch of time off since January's well-documented cross-country drive, was to visit friends and family. I pretty much found myself hanging out with other folks every lunch-time and every evening except for the trip to Victoria. That was great, as I've not really had enough time to make many friends in Maryland, and those I have tend to have a different set of interests and backgrounds than those people I know from Microsoft.

I didn't take a lot of pictures of people, but here's one of Trevor (now a Google guy,) thinking hard during a game of Goa we played with Adam and Ally. It's good he did so, since he won.


Trevor Thinking Hard About Goa

The side trip to Victoria resulted in a lot more pictures. I took a seaplane out and back, operated by Kenmore Air. Taking off and landing on water was a new experience for me, although I'd been on small planes before. Both directions, the plane I was on seated about eight passengers, plus a co-pilot seat that was available for a passenger both times. Here's a photo of the plane:


The Seaplane to Victoria

I sat in the co-pilot's seat on the flight back, so I got a great picture of the approach to Lake Union, in Seattle. If you look very closely in the upper middle of the photograph, you can see the Space Needle.


Seaplane Approach to Lake Union

Victoria is a nice little town that is very friendly to the large number of tourists that visit. I'd gone there to go hiking in the area and generally relax, and only had two full days to spend, but I could see spending a week there some time. I pulled a U-turn at one point while driving in town and sort of cut off someone coming out of a side street. He pulled up along side me at the next light and I could see he was trying to get my attention. I thought I was about to get cursed out or something, but once I looked over at him, he said, "Your headlights are off! Have a nice evening!" New York, it ain't!

This guy playing violin on a street corner was very odd, but also not a typical Victoria resident.


Darth Vader Playing Violin in Victoria

I took two hikes while I was there. The first was to Thetis Lake, intended as a kind of warm-up, since I hadn't been hiking in awhile. I bought a book of hikes on Vancouver Island, so I had what I thought would be a pretty good map of the various trails around Thetis Lake, but it proved to be just awful. At one point, I was basically lost, or would have been if I hadn't known which direction was south and after heading that direction for a bit could hear the highway. There was another lake north of Thetis Lake that I'd wanted to find, but I never did.

Here are a couple of pictures of the lake:


Thetis Lake


Thetis Lake

The second hike I took was to the top of Mount Finlayson, generally touted as a fairly difficult one in the area. I was pleasantly surprised to find that I didn't really have any trouble climbing it. So far, no hike I've done has really compared to the one I took up Mt. Dickerson north of Seattle in 2004. It was steep, but not terribly long, so the steepness was very manageable. I snapped a photo of the marker at the top. I also got a pretty good picture of the distant Mt. Baker from the summit of Finlayson.


Mt. Finlayson Marker


Mt. Baker from Mt. Finlayson

Coming down the back of the mountain was much less steep, but the down side was you end up walking some two miles down a winding, narrow blacktop road, which is less than pleasant. I did pass a farm with llamas and a goat, though, so I got a great up-close picture of a friendly llama. He did have two ears, his right one just happened to be folded back.


Hello, Llama

So finally, I'll leave you with this self-portrait I took while on the seaplane. I believe it is fine expression of me having a good time.


A Self Portrait

A Volatile Life

Last night, Adam and I were talking about some stuff that's going in my life, and he described my life as highly volatile. After my initial protest against such a term, another ten minutes or so of discussion had me admitting that, yes, he's right. While a little less volatility would be nice, I don't think I really want to change that.

By volatile, he meant that I tend towards activities that have greater risks, more change, but greater opportunity for reward, as well. It's kind of a, "Bet big, win big" point of view. I do try to mitigate risk and I've become much better at mitigating risk over time, but I'm also much less risk-averse than he is, or perhaps than most people are.

This discussion is a direct result of my recent and abrupt departure from Columbia Books. I can't really go into details here yet, as there are now lawyers involved, but that further illustrates the volatility point.

As an aside, I haven't posted much over the last several months because I've been very busy in my role of President and many of the things I was thinking about involved staff or other internal-only work that I could really discuss. In fact, I found that the work was about all I'd spent any significant time thinking about. Certainly the last ten days or so have had some elements of thinking about much wider subjects.

I'd taken a trip to Seattle with a side trip to Victoria, in Canada, just a couple of weeks ago. Partly because of the expense of travel for a lot of people and partly because I'm the only one that was interested in such a thing at the moment, I made this trip without Olympia and the kids. It seems I need to do that sometimes anyway because I need introspection time. It's very hard to introspect when you are in a house full of people.

As it stood, I didn't really get the usual amount of introspection time I might otherwise have had because I spent most of my time visiting with friends and family. That's also incredibly valuable, but different. What introspection I had time to do had revealed to me that I was actually working too hard and was ignoring too many other things I care about doing. I'd decided to change that when I came back, then a week later I wasn't working there anymore. Not quite what I had in mind, but I suppose it works.

What I'd had in mind was to do more hiking or other exercise, take up my guitar lessons again, get actively involved in Gregory's Cub Scouting, and spend some of the time I was spending in the evenings and on weekends working on Columbia Books stuff on some of the small projects that interest me, too, like developing a new edition of my WarEngine miniature gaming system. I'm starting to do those things, although there is a little short-term distraction as I figure out what form my future income will take. I've read a lot of articles by Steve Pavlina, and I think "a job" is out of the question. I may have to take employment with a company I don't own for shorter-term financial reasons, but if I do, there will have to be some form of profit-sharing involved, because a straight salary just doesn't cut it.

There's a lot to think about, but in a volatile life, there always is. I think that's one of the things I like about it.