More rocket ships

I found the ISO setting on my digital camera this trip. Whee!

Rocket ships

Here are the rocketships at Tomorrowland.

In general, Tomorrowland is getting quite dated, don't you think? The Kodak 3D movie is getting tired, and they should replace the diesel-sucking cars at Autopia with fuel cells or hybrids.

Maybe GM should step up to sponsor it (instead of Chevron) and put little mini-Volts on the track. And they should add some of the cool automated driving technologies: adaptive cruise control, automated highway systems, and lane departure warning systems.

Anyway, this is what I thought about while standing in line.

Brother Bear

Of course, Katie wanted to pose like the Brother Bear totem pole...

Who seems the most excited about Disneyland?

Um, excited or something like that. :-)

Space Invaders

We interrupt the Disneyland pictures to answer the pressing question: what can you with 1 empty auditorium, 1 digital camera, 4 spare hours, and 67 extremely patient friends?



BTW, visit the artist's site to see the same treatment for Pong, Tetris, and Pole Position.

Ritual stopover at the Kettleman City In-n-Out

Click here for the same shot in December 2004. Wow, time flies!

Bugs

This year, Cameron enjoyed posing with the Disney characters. Katie continued to pose enthusiastically, and Colin continued to not be into it at all.

All aboard!

We enjoyed a week in Southern California with the Kees. Occassional rain didn't dampen the kids' spirits -- and they did make the lines at Legoland and Disneyland a little shorter. Especially true at Legoland -- and since many of the rides at Legoland aren't worth waiting more than 5 minutes for, this worked out nicely.

Farewell, Passat!

Well, it took over a month, but we finally sold our VW Passat. I kept on lowering the price on Craigslist until -- with the last posting -- I got an avalanche of interest. Guess I lowered the price a titch too much at the end, but hopefully it will be a faithful vehicle for its new owner (who was just on the verge of getting his CA state driver's license!).

See if this helps...

Can you identify these objects now?

Can you guess what this is?

The answer next week...

On the way home from the park

The great Colin bridge

Colin makes a bridge for Cameron to go underneath.

BTW, can you see the green person-looking like thing in the background? They're the green plastic ribs holding up the canopy.

Doesn't this look like a person?

Looks like one to me. :-)

Arrrrr....a pirate

At the airport in Jamaica. We got home via Charlotte: with mild headwinds, we got home in 8 hours of flying time. Farewell Jamaica!

Farewell dinner

The farwell dinner menu: it was a fine meal, though maybe not quite as good as it sounds. :-)

And no, that's not my camera's white balance malfunctioning -- the mood lighting was quite red.

This way to the Jerk Center

We just thought this was a funny sign. It's really pointing to the cafe where the hotel serves jerked meats and sides, but that's not obvious for non-Jamaican folks. Note how Fedora is carefully standing on the right of the sign. :-)

Mmmmm...jerked meats

The local Jamaican speciality is jerk meats, a barbeque with special spices and a hot sauce on the side. Tasty, though I think the folks who prepared ours might have used a too-hot fire, as the meats were less tender than they could have been.

A few other unfamiliar items from the pineapple menu:
- Breadfruit: A starchy fruit which can be roasted, fried and mashed.
- Festival: a savory fried bread
- Bammy: Sliced casava, deep fried (at least at this restaurant)

Rose Hall

One of the evenings during the trip, we enjoyed a dinner outside the Rose Hall Great House, an 18th century mansion made infamous by Annie Palmer, the aptly named "White Witch". Apparently Annie -- aided by black magic -- murdered a whole set of husbands and slave lovers before being murdered herself. Legend has it her ghost still haunts the mansion.

We didn't see her ghost, but we did see how rich folk lived in Jamica in the 1800s. The house was brilliantly lit, and it was a beautiful backdrop as Ben delivered a farewell speech of sorts for Opsware.

It was a bittersweet experience, just like the acquisition overall. Exciting because our product will get into the hands of many more customers on the strength of HP's brand and (especially overseas) presence. Sad because it's the end of our run as a small independent company.

The welcome reception

The welcome reception was held on the hotel grounds: it was beautifully lit and the weather was delightful. You just don't have those kinds of evenings out here in the Bay Area where you can wander out in shorts and and short sleeves and be perfectly comfortable.

Horseback riding

At the last minute, the company offered us a spot at the annual award trip for sales people. (It was last minute because some of the sales people who had won a spot weren't able to go.) We had a great time last year in Cancun, and this year's venue was Jamaica. Ya mon.

Since this year's trip was in February rather than May, the weather was milder -- 70s and 80s instead of 90s. This made all the outdoor activities much more enjoyable, including this horseback riding trip through a local village, through some streams, and finally into the ocean -- yes, on horseback!

We were very thankful for the opportunity to go, and for my mom staying at our place to watch the kids.

Google Reader

After using Mozilla Thunderbird and a few Web-based apps to read my RSS feeds for years, I've switched over to Google Reader.

Why, you might ask?

Here's the rundown:

1. Access from anywhere. The obvious reason: the list of feeds and unread articles is available from any browser. Now I don't have to be at home to follow the feeds I care about.
   
2. Compelling user experience. This is really a first rate Web application that does almost everything as well or better than a rich client. Don't get me wrong: Thunderbird is a 10x better email/RSS client than Outlook. But since Google Reader isn't trying to double as an email client, it's easier to navigate, supports more features, has plentiful and intuitive keyboard shortcuts, and even supports offline viewing with Google Gears. Speedy, too.
3. Easier sharing. If you look in the right column of this blog, you'll now see a handful of the articles I found interesting. I don't have always have the time inclination to comment on what I'm reading -- so this is the lazy man's way of just saying, "hmmm: mildly interesting...check it out."
4. Spot-on recommendations. Google Reader suggests blogs based on what other people are reading, and the recommendations are much better than Tivo recommendations (which I've found to be generally bizarre).
   

Congrats, Kina!

Congratulations to Kina Grannis who just won the Doritos Rock the Super Bowl contest. Hurah!