While in California, I thought I would try (again) to rent a Hybrid. Luckily, the rental company had a Toyota Camry Hybrid. This time I was able to figure out how to start the darn thing. Last time I was out here, I could not figure out how to start the Prius. I could turn on the power (there is no key with Toyota, only a key fob), but could never get the engine to engage or start. Seems you have to keep your foot on the brake for a couple of seconds, then the power button turns green and you press and hold the power button - bingo, to starts - in electric mode at first, then the engine fires once you put it in gear.
My first impression is the brakes are extremely touchy, but work well. On my ~31 mile drive down the 101 to Mountain View, in rush hour traffic, I got a little better than 50 mpg!
There is even a little gauge on the steering column that gives instant feedback on how well you've done on mpg. If you do a good job, the gauge displays "Excellent!". Very funny and does cause the driver to potentially treat driving and gasoline economy as a game.
Only concern is that when stopped for more than 30 seconds, the engine seems to go dormant and then when you press the accelerator, it is not instantaneous like a pure gas engine. This aside, an overall a good experience so far. Very zippy and responsive.
Back to work...
Tuesday, February 26, 2008
Monday, February 25, 2008
Off to Mountain View
Should be an interesting week. Off to Mountain View for our first face to face staff meeting with the new crew. I hope the weather is good and the meetings are productive :-)
Flying out of town from my city is always an adventure. The busiest airport in the world and things actually go fairly good considering the volume of people, cars, buses, vans and airplanes.
Sitting in the Delta crown room, working on email and participating in a conference call.
I would say "back to work..." but I'm already there dude.
Flying out of town from my city is always an adventure. The busiest airport in the world and things actually go fairly good considering the volume of people, cars, buses, vans and airplanes.
Sitting in the Delta crown room, working on email and participating in a conference call.
I would say "back to work..." but I'm already there dude.
Saturday, February 23, 2008
Black Hole of Time
Computers are a black hole of time.
I can't tell you how many weekends and evenings have just vanished from my life because of computers. Today for instance, the screen saver on my wifes new HP laptop has been non-functional for over a month now. After scouring the HP support forums with no luck, I tried a simple Yahoo! search for "Vista Screen Saver does not work". The search yielded a large number of results and the very first link in the results page had the answer - the wireless mouse was keeping the screen saver from coming on. Well known issue on the forums, but not on HP's site :-)
Then off to the basement office to work on this new Fedora 8 laptop I loaded a few weeks back. Moving files from the Windows machines could not be easier, but not having A/V on the Linux OS makes me nervous. I know viruses exist for Linux, but I've yet to find a good open source A/V solution.
All this in 3 plus hours. Thus, 'computers are a black hole of time'.
Off to have a nice beer of some sort...
I can't tell you how many weekends and evenings have just vanished from my life because of computers. Today for instance, the screen saver on my wifes new HP laptop has been non-functional for over a month now. After scouring the HP support forums with no luck, I tried a simple Yahoo! search for "Vista Screen Saver does not work". The search yielded a large number of results and the very first link in the results page had the answer - the wireless mouse was keeping the screen saver from coming on. Well known issue on the forums, but not on HP's site :-)
Then off to the basement office to work on this new Fedora 8 laptop I loaded a few weeks back. Moving files from the Windows machines could not be easier, but not having A/V on the Linux OS makes me nervous. I know viruses exist for Linux, but I've yet to find a good open source A/V solution.
All this in 3 plus hours. Thus, 'computers are a black hole of time'.
Off to have a nice beer of some sort...
Thursday, February 21, 2008
Random act of kindness
Rarely in my city do you see people stop to help others, unless there is a catastrophic event such as a bomb explosion, severe automobile accident, etc.
So I was surprise to witness a RAOK this morning. A small truck had stalled at an intersection and a couple of guys in a bright yellow GMC truck, did a safe & legal U turn, pulled over to the side of the road, jumped out and ran (fast) the stalled truck and helped the individual push it to the side of the road where he could get some assistance. Then the two guys jumped back in their truck and returned to their commute.
Very nice. Somewhat unexpected.
Back to work...
So I was surprise to witness a RAOK this morning. A small truck had stalled at an intersection and a couple of guys in a bright yellow GMC truck, did a safe & legal U turn, pulled over to the side of the road, jumped out and ran (fast) the stalled truck and helped the individual push it to the side of the road where he could get some assistance. Then the two guys jumped back in their truck and returned to their commute.
Very nice. Somewhat unexpected.
Back to work...
Tuesday, February 19, 2008
What is AADD anyway?
Is it real or just a function of our busy lives? I have a ton of things going on each day and struggle to keep all the tasks up to date. For instance, as I post this note, I'm on a conference call, on IM chatting with a couple of co-workers, and replying to email.
Is that normal? Do others in their work environment do this type of multi-tasking? Or is this a result of the increase in available communication methods?
Back to work...
Is that normal? Do others in their work environment do this type of multi-tasking? Or is this a result of the increase in available communication methods?
Back to work...
Monday, February 18, 2008
A near perfect day
Sunday was a near perfect day. We had breakfast as a family at the kitchen table. Lots of laughs and stories to share. Then some project work around the house. Then some overdue cleaning of the covered patio. Then some "work" work. Then some TV. Then off to bed.
Even got some needed rain.
A near perfect day.
Back to work...
Even got some needed rain.
A near perfect day.
Back to work...
Sunday, February 17, 2008
Saturday, February 16, 2008
New kitchen table ordered!
We've been looking for a different "kitchen table" for some time now. We've been to antique shows, furniture showrooms, etc. We still couldn't find the right piece at the right price.
Well, last weekend, on the way back from Savannah, we stopped at Scott's Antique Market. A once per month show in a old exhibition hall south of town. Not close to our house at all and we only stopped because we were in the area on the drive back from our 4 day weekend.
We found this furniture maker that uses old pine floors from buildings being torn down in Canada. On Saturday, we visited his showroom and ordered our table. We got two benches for the table as well. Should arrive at the store in 6 weeks. Can't wait to get it in the house!
Friday, February 15, 2008
Got my Rush tickets!
Seems Amex was having a pre-sale and so tonight when I got home, I purchased my two tickets.
I can't wait, it will be so good to see them again.
Rush rocks!!!
I can't wait, it will be so good to see them again.
Rush rocks!!!
Rush is coming back to town
My favorite band in the whole world is coming back to town for the last show of their extended tour. Visit www.rush.com for details.
They started their Snakes and Arrows tour in Atlanta last year and had finished in Helsinki Finland. That was supposed to be their last show, but they've decided to head back out on the road. Could be they are reverting to their old process of writing new songs while touring, playing them during some shows and then going into the studio to record them. How cool would that be.
Any way, tomorrow the Atlanta tickets go on sale and I'm sure hoping to get some good seats. The opening show was nearly flawless and I'm sure the last show will be excellent as well.
Back to work...
They started their Snakes and Arrows tour in Atlanta last year and had finished in Helsinki Finland. That was supposed to be their last show, but they've decided to head back out on the road. Could be they are reverting to their old process of writing new songs while touring, playing them during some shows and then going into the studio to record them. How cool would that be.
Any way, tomorrow the Atlanta tickets go on sale and I'm sure hoping to get some good seats. The opening show was nearly flawless and I'm sure the last show will be excellent as well.
Back to work...
Thursday, February 14, 2008
I am now officially a geek?
Today, between conference calls, replying to emails, RDP'ing into servers and responding to IM - I loaded my old Dell laptop with Fedora 8 and Gnome.
How cool is that?
We are now using Red Hat and I figured if I could get some knowledge out of Fedora, it would be a good thing.
It was far easier than I thought it would be. I just changed the boot order of my Dell to boot off the CD rather than the hard drive, then inserted a bootable CD with Fedora loaded. The configured a few options, clicked on the install to disk and boom - an error :-( My first Linux issue to resolve. Seems you can't have the target drive "mounted" (in Linux terms) or the installer thinks the disk is in use. After two retries at the install, I thought "hum, let me unmount the target hard drive and try again" - success!
After that, I just shutdown the laptop, removed the CD and rebooted - all done. Even the mouse worked. Now I'm updating all the out of date packages on the Fedora build that was on the CD - about 193 updates and it's taking forever, but at least the ethernet adapter loaded effortlessly and my download speeds are great. But still, 193 package updates - geez...
Okay, back to work.
How cool is that?
We are now using Red Hat and I figured if I could get some knowledge out of Fedora, it would be a good thing.
It was far easier than I thought it would be. I just changed the boot order of my Dell to boot off the CD rather than the hard drive, then inserted a bootable CD with Fedora loaded. The configured a few options, clicked on the install to disk and boom - an error :-( My first Linux issue to resolve. Seems you can't have the target drive "mounted" (in Linux terms) or the installer thinks the disk is in use. After two retries at the install, I thought "hum, let me unmount the target hard drive and try again" - success!
After that, I just shutdown the laptop, removed the CD and rebooted - all done. Even the mouse worked. Now I'm updating all the out of date packages on the Fedora build that was on the CD - about 193 updates and it's taking forever, but at least the ethernet adapter loaded effortlessly and my download speeds are great. But still, 193 package updates - geez...
Okay, back to work.
Work at home day
My company and work assignment is nice enough to allow for work from home frequently. My objective is 1) reduce my impact on the environment, 2) improve quality of life (no stress from the drive to work) and 3) increased productivity due to fewer distractions & interruptions.
The downside is it reduces my face to face interactions with my team, I have a group of ~23 engineers and managers. Nice people, hard workers, very talented. I love my job! Sounds corny, I know, but I do - at least 90% of the time :-)
The other thing about working from home is that I actually spend more time "at work" than if I were in the office. Nice commute though, just up the stairs from the basement office.
Back to work...
The downside is it reduces my face to face interactions with my team, I have a group of ~23 engineers and managers. Nice people, hard workers, very talented. I love my job! Sounds corny, I know, but I do - at least 90% of the time :-)
The other thing about working from home is that I actually spend more time "at work" than if I were in the office. Nice commute though, just up the stairs from the basement office.
Back to work...
Wednesday, February 13, 2008
Bad drive into work
This morning, on my drive in, I saw a horrible accident. Looked like 3 vehicles; a Ford truck, Lincoln Continental, and some unrecognizable vehicle.
Turns out one of my team member's wife knows the occupants of the unrecognizable vehicle. She works with her. Dad, Mom and Baby were in the UV and Dad & Baby are back at home, but not Mom. She's still in the hospital, in a coma.
Not sure how it happened, but it was horrible to see and think of a family involved. Not that you would ever want anyone hurt in an accident.
Small world when you can live in the Atlanta area and see an accident on the way to work and then find out someone you know, knows the occupants of the UV.
Wow...
Turns out one of my team member's wife knows the occupants of the unrecognizable vehicle. She works with her. Dad, Mom and Baby were in the UV and Dad & Baby are back at home, but not Mom. She's still in the hospital, in a coma.
Not sure how it happened, but it was horrible to see and think of a family involved. Not that you would ever want anyone hurt in an accident.
Small world when you can live in the Atlanta area and see an accident on the way to work and then find out someone you know, knows the occupants of the UV.
Wow...
Open for business
So the title of this blog says it all; I have nothing clever to say. A few of my friends have blogs and I'm way behind since I'm just starting. But what the heck.
Hopefully, I'll develop a habit of updating this when I have something interesting to say or have new photos to share.
Back to work for me.
Hopefully, I'll develop a habit of updating this when I have something interesting to say or have new photos to share.
Back to work for me.
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