That I am a kcrw mbe fan you know already

Remember catherine wheel. RobD, he's live today there.

Other upcoming artists on kcrw mbe:
Death cab
stellastar
sigur ros

need I say more?

hurrrrrrrikane Karrrrina!

Floor urethane - do you care?

If you're going to refinish floors, oil-based Varithane rocks. I saw lots of posts on water-based. They all said "it's almost as good as oil-based without the cleanup".

OK - what cleanup? I wore nitrile gloves and a mask with filters for organic vapors, then was careful. I didn't have to clean up anything . . .so that's good.

Cool

Amsterdam was fun, back to the real world

Was just in Amsterdam for MSFT Tech Ed Europe. Amsterdam is a great city, and a great deal smaller than I thought previously. I was able to walk from one side to the other in 20 mins, and if you take the tram (aboveground subway system) it is quite good. My recommendations for what to see (brief):

• Walk the city - the canals, people, streets, are the best part of the visit
• The Van Gogh museum was great
• The KIT (Tropical institute) has a museum that is great, and currently has an exhibit on the history of evil! Not to be missed there are some of the smells (ie they have herbs and spices - little display, but lets you smell some things that my spur memories of faraway places)
• Some kind of canal trip, maybe with food?
• bring a book to read at a cafe
• rent a bike if you're brave and ride around! Everybody else does.
  

Amsterdam is funny in that there are very few people on the streets earlier than 9. Then the shops close at 5 or 6, so things are pretty quiet at times. Thursday nights there are lots of people in the streets and shops stay open late.

I found it a safe and relaxed city, without a lot of museum stuff to see. It rains here and there as well, so pack your gore-tex.

enjoy

Amsterdam was fun, back to the real world

Was just in Amsterdam for MSFT Tech Ed Europe. Amsterdam is a great city, and a great deal smaller than I thought previously. I was able to walk from one side to the other in 20 mins, and if you take the tram (aboveground subway system) it is quite good. My recommendations for what to see (brief):

• Walk the city - the canals, people, streets, are the best part of the visit
• The Van Gogh museum was great
• The KIT (Tropical institute) has a museum that is great, and currently has an exhibit on the history of evil! Not to be missed there are some of the smells (ie they have herbs and spices - little display, but lets you smell some things that my spur memories of faraway places)
• Some kind of canal trip, maybe with food?
• bring a book to read at a cafe
• rent a bike if you're brave and ride around! Everybody else does.
  

Amsterdam is funny in that there are very few people on the streets earlier than 9. Then the shops close at 5 or 6, so things are pretty quiet at times. Thursday nights there are lots of people in the streets and shops stay open late.

I found it a safe and relaxed city, without a lot of museum stuff to see. It rains here and there as well, so pack your gore-tex.

enjoy

Amsterdam rocks

very nice here - and i don't partake!

Lance Armstrong - wow. You gotta be amazed. Barring crashes - he will win the TdF again. That is astounding.

Business Travel vs 'regular' Travel

I travel around a bit, and people always ask me if I am going to visit cousin x or y while I am there. I don't always have the patience to explain this, but business travel is very different from regular travel. Here are some reasons/thoughts:

• You see a lot of the inside of office buildings, but you don't see "the sights" so you don't really see the city ("Oh I looooove Chicago - Michigan Ave is soooooo nice - what do you think?" p "Well the inside of the office tower was a lot like anywhere else"
  
• You go from the inside of the plane to the inside of the taxi (which you don't see because you're on your laptop the whole time prepping for the preso) to the inside of the building. Repeat in reverse. Multiply by 3 cities in 1 day. Multiply by 3 day trip per week. Ponder that.
• If you're in some hotel, you're busy the whole freaking night catching up on the email you missed while you were on the plane, or because you'd actually prefer to see your significant other when back at home, so you pile on the work while on the road.
• you never know which city you're going to be in, or even when you'll be done that night, and can only spend 1 hr with somebody and you call them to tell them you'll be there in 3 hours. Dunno - most family just doesn't get that - there's going to be nagging about staying for dinner, etc. .
  
• you're tired and just don't want to hang out with folks who are really, really excited about you being there when you keep dozing off because you're seated

OK - that's my rant for the evening.

I'm now a Paul Anka fan.

Yup.

Rumsfeld as poet

Dunno how I missed this before, but did you know that Rumsfeld is a poet?

Type Nutty Kooky Whacky into Google

I just did. . .

Horrible hairy things. . .must read

This is a blast from the past. Click here, then search for "horrible" and enjoy.

Plaintive

a younger me looked at the older people and tried to say that I wasn't going to end up like that. Like what? Limited -- I was intent on transcendence.

I think I figured it out - pay attention here young ones - it's about choices. Its about making the right choices. And making the right choices is all about being in the right space when you make the choice.

What does that mean? When you're making a big decision, make sure you're living how you want to live for ever. If you're in the "desired" space when you make the choice, you enforce the future in the present

esoteric huh.

bet you didn't think I thought like that.

that's it - all there is for today.

Oh, and this.

it's been an eternity!

Here are the things I should have blogged about:

1. Digital photography
2. Linux on the corporate desktop
3. Cheap zoom lens saga
4. the plaintiveness of it all.