View for lunch

Very clear water

More of the Mercedes

A beautiful McLaren

Apparently this is an appetizer for one person

Tweets for Today

• 18:21 Some quick updates... Sitting outside at dinner tonight and a brand new STi pulls up. *Beautiful*. #
• 18:23 Ordered appetizer and was brought like an entire gift basket's worth of sausage/salami/paté/head cheese. Looked like I barely touched it. #
• 18:23 Went to Monaco today. Very pretty. #
• 18:24 Am now convinced that Galveston:Texas::Nice:France. Nice is much better than Galveston, of course, but I think the analogy is apt. #
• 18:24 Wishing my PowerBook had the superior wireless reception of Becca's MacBook so that I could be using mine instead of hers. #

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Cactus garden: a bit like the home state...

More marina

Monaco marina

Window in Monaco

Window in Monaco

Climbing toward the Monaco palace

It found its niche

Artisanal French bier #4

Billed as "blonde". Fruity notes with a vaguely gueuze-y sourness.
Reminiscent if a Chimat but slightly sour instead of sweet. Would
drink again.

Artisanal French bier #3

Becca very thoughtfully picked up some micro-/artisanal beers for me
and carted them all over France before meeting me in Nice.

First two bottles got thrown away so no pictures or names for them.
Both were very flat, flavor-wise. If they were food I'd say they need
more salt. Not sure what the analogous ingredient is, but they needed
something to intensify the flavor.

This one was much better; I would have it again. Some nice stronger
flavors, almost ale-like characteristics.

Bad design

Some scattershot photoblogging of the European vacation shall now
begin. Sorry about picture quality; these are all iPhone camera
pictures.

When an armrest cannot be used to rest one's arms, it ceases to be an
armrest: functionally, at least.

Twice I hit the volume button of the armrest of the lady next to me,
turned her headphones up all the way. Whoops.

Tweets for Today

• 09:07 Bah. All these Handbrake moves I have won't transfer to my iPhone. May be limited to viewing one movie on the PowerBook... #
• 12:37 Packed, made it to airport, through security. About to board flight to Chicago. My ATT wifi account won't roam Boingo's network. Lame. #
• 12:38 Updated iPod/iPhone. Further amused myself by finally assembling photo albums for iPhone and going through already downloaded RSS news. #
• 13:14 time to go dark for a while. Boarded plane. Finished coffee, moving on to bottled water & stereophile. #
• 16:19 touch down. Flight to London soon. Obtained food. Enjoying EDGE before I pull SIM and rely on wifi/kindness of strangers. #
• 16:28 nothing like screaming babies to make you thankful for Ultimate Ears. #

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Tweets for Today

• 12:02 Running pre-trip errands. #
• 14:51 Last day of entrepreneurship class. There's an exam I'm ill-prepared for but I'm not taking the class for credit anyway... #
• 17:57 Walter's fights back, no one tased, yet: tinyurl.com/56272q #

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Tweets for Today

• 18:08 Papa Johns FAILED to deliver pizza for journal club. Not only do I have to pay for dinner, but I've been looking forward to pizza all day. #
• 00:31 Quentin Tarantino's *Death Proof* was as awesome as I remembered it being. #
• 02:39 Had Lagunitas barleywine tonight. Barleywines are hit/miss with me, and this one was a miss. Too sweet. At least on first try. #

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Tweets for Today

• 12:42 Everytime I install one Perl module it feels like it has to install everything in CPAN for dependencies. #
• 13:09 Leave for France/Ireland on Thursday. Can't stop thinking about good french cheese and bread. #
• 13:10 Also looks like I won't have to see the boss again before I leave. Fortuitous! #
• 21:12 God bless the people that bring me the wonderful food of Reggae Hut. #
• 23:58 beer & bocci @ Hans'. Life is sweet. #
• 02:29 FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, INTERNETS, PLEASE, THE NEW DEATH CAB ALBUM, PLEASE! #

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California pt. 2

OK, this one has been in the works for a while. Consider it a token of my intent to keep the blog going...

6/23

The flight was too damned early. The less said, the better.

But it allowed us to arrive in San Jose pretty close to noon. The first step outside, feeling that cool California air again, and I was a happy man.

Picked up the rental car; despite reserving a compact we got a Pontiac G6—reminded me a lot of my Dad's old Lumina. Certainly a fairly bland domestic car, but at least it wasn't something cramped and underpowered. I'd take it over a PT Cruiser or Aveo or, hell, a Corolla, at least for a rental.

Keys in hand, we were off and putting the car to work. Cindy's brother was living to the north, in Concord, so we took off in that direction. It was a relatively quick drive from there, maybe 45 minutes or so, before we arrived at his apartment. Apartment was nice—overlooked a pond, lots of ponds all over the complex. We grabbed lunch at a Hawaiian BBQ restaurant, which had some great grilled meat reminiscent of Korean BBQ. And a macaroni salad that was a bit mayonnaise-y for my tastes. But the meal was enjoyable.

After that the plan was to head up to Sonoma and hit a vineyard, but by the time we dealt with some traffic and got there they were closing. Still, it was fun to ride around and see the grapes growing, and then we grabbed some coffee (the early morning was starting to catch up with me) and turned around.

Cindy and I bid Steve adieu and started heading back the way we came, through San Jose, continuing South through some mountains, to the sand dunes, and then, suddenly, ocean! We hit Monterrey and I remembered the local geography well enough (how many times had I been there before? 8 or so?) to take Cindy in through the scenic route: through the marina, then "historic" Cannery Row, then past all the beautiful oceanside homes of Pacific Grove, finally arriving at the good ol' Andril Cottages. Kevin, the owner, wasn't there, but some friends of his were tending shop, so we got checked in to one of their few hotel-style rooms (no kitchen or separate living area, primarily) and headed out again just in time to catch the sunset.

Cindy had her camera out and was trying to figure out the timer, and I had to remind her to watch the sunset; after that we got the timer set and got some good pictures (check out the picture book if you haven't already). Then, it was dinner time. We got some recommendations and picked up some menus from the office, but nothing really fit, so we just went for a drive, and settled on pizza. We ended up at Round Table pizza, grabbed a pitcher of some local, inoffensive beer, and got a pizza. After that we swung by the store and grabbed a six pack (selection was again lacking; I think we got Guinness), enjoyed a couple of bottles in the Cottages' courtyard, and then called it a night.

But not before noticing that the new Okkervil River album had leaked and setting it to download overnight via a weak wireless signal...

6/24

Woke up the next morning, had leftover pizza for breakfast, and then made a Radioshack run to get a charger for Cindy's un-charged camera (again, I was proud of my navigational skillz). Then we hopped on Highway One south to enjoy a drive through some of the most beautiful scenery in the world (at least, to my understanding).

It's hard to overstate exactly how beautiful the drive is. Dramatic cliffs, hillsides painted in greens, yellows, and reds, an ocean that is the most beautiful shade of blue, and a twisty two-lane road running through it, just waiting to be carved up. The new Okkervil River provided perfect driving music, and everything was bliss. We made a few stops for pictures and then continued down south, into the redwoods, and stopped at Nepenthe for brunch.

Nepenthe is another surprise—just when you think you're started making your way away from the ocean, you climb the stairs from the bookstore/gift shop up to the café on the second level, and there's yet another dramatic view of the ocean.

We ordered some coffee and brunch; I selected what was essentially bacon, eggs, and potatoes, but was sold better than that in the menu, and Cindy opted for french toast spread with a blueberry cream cheese, but we shared. We made friends with the ladies at the table over from us as part of a sneaky move to get them to take a picture of us. We stayed a while, taking in the view, went up stairs to check out the restaurant, browsed the bookstore a while, and then took a short drive up north.

Our destination was Andrew Molera State Park. The Wards had gone there once, back in the day. We paid the entry fee, grabbed Cindy's camera, and got started. A very clear stream winds its way through the park. We crossed once at the beginning of the trail, and then worked our way through some trees, a field, and more trees, about a mile or so, before reaching a secluded beach. We worked our way down the beach for a while, working our way between the rocks and the ocean. The way back was a bit of a fiasco; we were walking into the wind and the sand in our faces was more than a little unpleasant, so we took off our shoes and waded until we got by some of the bigger rocks that were causing the wind to build.

Once we got our feet washed off and our shoes back on, we checked out a bit of one of the cliffside trails before heading back, stopping to watch some deer on the way.

The scenery was beautiful, the weather was crisp, cool, and sunny, and the entire experience was a few hours or so. That's my kind of nature experience.

Eventually we headed back up the highway to Pacific Grove. Kevin invited us to go to dinner with his family, so we walked over to his house next door to the cottages, and then rode with him in his BMW 7-series over to an eclectic diner.

Once we got back, we caught another sunset, and then decided to head downtown and see if we could find any nightlife, and, well, not so much. We walked around Cannery Row. I think we spotted a cigar shop but weren't really in the mood; the only other bar looked thoroughly crowded, commercial, and generic. We probably could have gone down the list of other bars in the phonebook, but we elected to hang out at the cabin for the evening instead.

6/25

In downtown Monterey, another Ward tradition—particularly for Father's Day—was breakfast at the Old Monterrey Café. After that we checked out a camera store to get Cindy's lens cleaned after the windy time at the beach.

Our next destination was the 17 Mile Drive. It goes along several nice ocean views, featuring lots of wildlife, the copyrighted Lone Cypress, the Pebble Beach lodge, etc. I managed to get us a bit lost after leaving Pebble Beach, but we eventually found our way to Carmel, where I drove Cindy around to check out all the unique beach-front houses. Another frequent stop on previous vacations was the beautifully landscaped Barnyard shopping center, overflowing with flowers. Dad had wanted us to pick something up from the aptly-named Succulent Gardens.

While checking out what used to be the Thunderbird bookstore, we noticed that the Mexican restaurant now inhabiting it had a happy hour special on margaritas, which sounded good, so we grabbed a round, and the deal kept getting better: free appetizers!

After that, we headed back through Pacific Grove one last time, stopping downtown at the Ghirardelli chocolate stop there for an ice cream Sunday before heading back north to Palo Alto to check into the hotel there for the conference.

After negotiating the streets of Palo Alto and their disgustingly slow speed limits, we checked in. The hotel was nothing great for what we were paying. There was an OK pool area and a koi pond which seemed a bit ill-maintained.

We decided to grab dinner at the closest In 'N Out, a chain I became acquainted with through its being name dropped in The Big Lebowski. We were greated by happy employees, and I got a double cheese burger prepared with my customary ketchup and pickles, and some fries; Cindy's order was similar.

The burger was a great fast food burger, with a nicely grilled bun being a highlight. I think Whataburger may be better, but you can definitely count me as an In 'N Out fan. The restaurant was located in Mountain View, and I discovered that the Googleplex was just across the highway, so we drove by to check it out before calling it a night—I had been told to be sure to be at the opening session of the conference the next morning so that our program didn't look bad when we were introduced, something that hadn't gone well in previous years when most people had still been in bed, or at Starbucks.

Tweets for Today

• 14:38 "As an Amazon.com customer in Oregon, you might like to know that you can now subscribe to Texas Monthly magazine..." So much wrong... #
• 14:50 New post-graduation goal: performance driving school. #
• 15:09 Hmnm. Trademark violation? tinyurl.com/5r2ffw #

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Tweets for Today

• 20:01 Tweets untwittered from yesterday: 1) yay for free pizza @ student talks. #
• 20:02 2) Yay for nice weather and cheap beer @ Valhalla. #
• 21:09 3) Tollhouse pie @ the Chocolate Bar is surprisingly disappointing. Not substantial enough. Should be more cookie and less pie. #
• 21:12 4) Drinks with Grambo and Angela at their place. First time in a year. Char & Alison there too. Always want to play Graham's speakers louder #
• 21:13 5) Dexter back at home. Bed. #
• 23:02 6) Leftover Indian + more Dexter. #
• 23:04 7) Shoe shopping at shoes.com Saturday sale, spent an hour, found good stuff, didn't have my size. FAIL. #
• 23:05 8) Symphony was good tonight. Violin concerto played on a Stradivarius & a nice organ piece. #
• 23:06 And... caught up. #

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Tweets for Today

• 12:23 Morning so far: haircut; student seminar with free pizza. #

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Tweets for Today

• 12:09 Bah. Committee meeting day. At least it will all be over soon. #
• 17:13 Good feedback with CM, but need to further negotiate conditions for graduation with boss. Dreading that conversation. #
• 20:06 Dinner @ Mission Burrito. #
• 22:52 I totally called this after I started Twittering: tinyurl.com/6crsup (via TMN). #

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Tweets for Today

• 11:45 Bah. Committee meeting tomorrow. Must finish presentation... #
• 12:01 Pitchfork's new fonts: difficult to read at chosen size, exacerbated by using serif for heads and sans for body, rather than vice versa. #
• 12:03 Body text is Calibri; head text is Cambria. I need per-site font settings. #
• 15:51 Made mistake of taking iBuds on the shuttle instead of Ultimate Ears. Regretting. Too many people talking engine noise. #
• 21:37 Somebody thinks they're clever, and they're right: bg5000.tumblr.com/post/31854880 #
• 21:37 Did you know Jack Handey was real? www.cnn.com/2008/SHOWBIZ/books/04/15/books.jack.handey.ap/index.html #
• 21:43 Seems like Jack Handey and Douglas Adams had use similar techniques to construct their sentences to comedic effect. #
• 21:49 "Eldest children are punished more". I knew it! tinyurl.com/yvrra8/news/2008/04/16/npunish116.xml #
• 22:52 Dairy Queen ad narrator sounds like Dubya, or at least a Dubya impersonator. #

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Tweets for Today

• 11:05 ACL '08 lineup: meh. twurl.nl/5br5z6 #
• 12:18 Boss "suggested" I come to the genetics seminar. Hate it when that happens. Better things to do plus bad signal in here. #
• 15:08 Annoyed, for some reason. Construction in adjacent rooms not helping. #
• 15:25 Monster Cable, you just got served: twurl.nl/hnyhrj #
• 15:31 That letter to Monster Cable just brightened my day. I read the whole thing. #
• 15:44 PowerPoint 2008, though less ugly than the previous version, is also less fast. I am undecided which compromise I prefer. #
• 16:15 Oh Excel, why won't you let me make a *series* of pie charts, formatted identically? Sometimes one pie just isn't enough. #
• 16:35 Finding the Raconteurs album aurally fatiguing. They may be professional, but whoever mixed it wasn't. Low dynamic range, I think. #
• 16:46 The last White Stripes album had some bad clipping. Why be all anal about analog recording and then screw it up in mastering? #
• 17:05 Up next, Love As Laughter's vintage "The Greks Bring Gifts" which I finally tracked down. Contains "Singing Sores Make Perfect Swords". #
• 17:06 Which sounds lo-fi in a My Bloody Valentine haze of sound sort of way. #
• 17:09 Maybe also in a Times New Viking way too. There's a line that was crossed, somewhere. #
• 17:47 This LaL album is all over the place. The MBV-ish tracks are good. The more garage-ish tracks are iffy and a bit too demo-ish. #
• 18:04 Mmm... Grado SR60s never fair to satisfy. An amazing pair of headphones. #
• 18:20 Next, Silkworm's "Firewater". Good stuff. Better than "Libertine", close to son-of-Silkworm Bottomless Pit's great "Hammer of the Gods". #
• 19:22 So far, I'm iffy on this Why? album. But it seems that music listened to and work accomplished on any given day are correlated. #
• 19:46 Why's not bad, but I keep feeling like I have more rewarding things to be listening to. I may come around to it, though. #
• 00:48 Ever wonder about the &? www.adobe.com/type/topics/theampersand.html #

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Tweets for Today

• 12:01 Monday. Bad: have to work on CM presentation. Good: free Goode Co. BBQ after class; boss has not yet returned. #
• 12:21 Monday. Ugly: guy in lab's fiancé has temporarily taken up residence in lab; they whisper to each other a lot. #
• 14:41 This will end well, too. Blockbuster is on a roll: twurl.nl/0ife8j #
• 15:39 Time to trek over to Rice... #
• 16:09 Jack White is a *professional*. New Raconteurs album may be more artisansl than artistic, but I marvel at the sheer competency on display. #
• 16:10 Now this is a beautiful spring day. Ever so slightly crisp, sunny, some nice wind. Beautiful day to tackle a couple walks. #
• 16:51 Microsoft was not a competitor to Compaq. Please refrain from asking asinine questions, classmate. #
• 16:53 Lesson learned: Compaq, like M$, succeeded on the pure dumb luck of being in the right place at the right time. #
• 23:25 Bad neck ache ruined my afternoon/evening. Just woke up from a very therapeutic nap. #
• 01:53 Shoe shopping online is about 100x less annoying than having to do it in person. As is true of most forms of online shopping. #
• 02:31 2 days of having no tabs in my browser at the end of the day (at least at home). This is down from ~100 tabs usually waiting to be read. #

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Tweets for Today

• 13:22 Circumstances last night prevented me from Twittering, so I will attempt to recap now. #
• 13:23 1) Nice dinner with Jeff, Jim, Jerry, and Cindy at Buca di Beppo. Well, nice company. Mediocre dinner. #
• 13:23 2) Drink back at Jeff & Jim's. The man makes an excellent martini. #
• 13:24 3) Leave, discover my car along with several other has been egged. Hastily go after my car door with paper towels. #
• 13:25 4) Aside: who says drugs are bad? If those little shits that did this had been strung out on heroin, they wouldn't have been egging my car. #
• 13:25 5) Manage to find car wash that's open at midnight (59 & Kirby). Feel a little better. #
• 13:26 6) Decide it's too late to catch Trail of Dead at #s. Instead consume pitcher of Lonestar at Late Nite Pie with Char & Alison. #
• 13:26 7) Beer makes me feel better. #
• 13:28 8) Who the *fuck* eggs cars anymore? Couldn't they have just broken in and stolen my iPod? Would have been cheaper. #
• 13:29 Now at the car wash getting some *other* cosmetic issues taken care of. Good thing I didn't get that done yesterday. #
• 13:30 Oh, apparently the little fuckers that did this got caught. There are phone numbers, but no guarantee they're real. Feeling litigious. #
• 14:57 Is money that used to buy CDs paying off credit card debt incurred buying CDs? tinyurl.com/589n8b Probably not the whole story... #
• 15:03 My car has been washed 3 times in 3 days. Strange. #
• 15:37 Hick high school kid: why are you playing crap country on your laptop speakers in the car wash waiting area? Because you are a douchebag? #
• 02:54 Cindy & I split the Dogfish Head Red & White tonight. Not as good as I had hoped. Reminded me of their Jiahu or one of the Chimays. #
• 02:55 Watched Batman: Mask of the Phantasm. The Bruce Timm/Paul Dini DC Cartoons (Batman, Superman, Justice League) are *so* excellent. #

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Tweets for Today

• 12:12 Writing a song with Colin Meloy: tinyurl.com/5f9v5v #
• 12:18 If I can't take the new Death Cab album on vacation, I will be very disappointed. Internets, you have 2 weeks to meet my demands. #
• 17:47 I can't go to Central Market without spending $50 on beer. And I don't even buy that much of it! Got some good stuff this time, though. #
• 17:50 Some DFH Aprihop, their Red & White, last six of NB's Springboard, cheap barleywine, IPA, a special edition mix from 2 breweries. Good haul. #

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Tweets for Today

• 09:57 Thank God for wireless at the car dealership. Though I always feel a little dirty that it's filtered: no mazda3forums.com for me. #
• 10:03 Wait. Penny Arcade blocked. This just got worse. #
• 10:16 And Houstonist is blocked. Well, it's not that good anyway. #
• 10:19 & Joystiq. Nothing fun allowed, apparently. #
• 10:48 Pitchfork blocked. Now I'm really feeling oppressed. Thank God for the iPhone... #
• 13:31 Having lunch with 'Brina. #
• 15:20 And now, to try to get some work done. #
• 17:21 I realized last night that I just don't get or give enough drunk dials anymore. #
• 18:13 Okkervil River are a blessing. #
• 18:53 Friday and Battlestar Galactica. What a great combination. #
• 01:07 Wow. Didn't realize how much I missed the office until it came back. #

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Tweets for Today

• 13:28 The mystery of the unknown key has beensolved. It's to the complex's pedestrian gate. No wonder I didn't recognize it. I've never used it! #
• 14:10 Hah. This will go well. tinyurl.com/6krmrq #
• 15:17 Cool houses: tinyurl.com/5voudp #
• 15:50 Preparing for thesis committee meeting. Worst 2 parts of my year. God willing, this is my second-to-last one. #
• 17:38 First take on Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin's new album: too damned slick. #
• 18:51 I'm glad that on my iPhone, Mobile Safari no longer causes the iPod app to crash with great frequency. #
• 03:01 Enough No More Heroes for one night; I suppose it's bed time. #

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Tweets for Today

• 12:45 It's the patio. Done deal. #
• 12:49 Silliness: paying $10 for 2 day birthday present shipping, realizing it shipped to wrong address, paying $8 to ship to intended recipient. #
• 13:09 Considering this spectacular deal for the new patio: rickroll.it/830781 but worried about theft potential. #
• 14:05 Buried in this article, looks like I might be getting an HEB! Finally! tinyurl.com/69wzp6 #
• 15:49 Taking the shuttle to Rice is lazy and takes as long as walking, but it looks an awful lot like rain... #
• 18:00 If there's a projector problem, b-school prof usually jokes "Is it Mac?" But It isn't a) a Mac or b) funny. Laughter anyway, though. Sad... #
• 18:02 Kevin Rose's home theater: lame. tinyurl.com/5jcsu2 #
• 18:36 Wow, Office '08 sort of does look less ugly. #

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Tweets for Today

Daily Twitterings:

• 13:17 So Walt *doesn't* know when the next iPhone comes out? tinyurl.com/3pausx #
• 17:22 Feeling patio-ish. #
• 17:31 Signal is always bad in this one room... #
• 23:55 So *that's* what rancid peanut butter tastes like. Date on the jar said best if sold by 10/06. Which, to be fair, it probably was. #
• 02:37 3.5 years later, I finally finish Pikmin. Now back to all the other games I haven't finished. Zelda, you're next. #

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Tweets for Today

Daily Twitterings:

• 08:17 Had a dream last night where I lived in a sane world that allowed harmless pocket knives on planes. #
• 16:08 I know I'm spoken for, but trying to sit by the cute girl in class still seems reasonable, if only for purely aesthetic reasons. #
• 16:22 Quizzes. I'm to old for this shit. Good thing this isn't for credit. #
• 17:10 Speaker, your makering spiel is not useful. Give me the benefit of your experience. You're not trying to sell me something. I hope. #
• 17:31 For the love of God, stop referring to your corporate "DNA" #
• 17:32 number of cell phones that rang in class today: 3. #
• 20:28 Highlight of day may have been correcting an error in an iLounge review of speakers. #

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Tweets for Today

Daily Twitterings:

• 14:13 Patio or balcony? Light or dark? Flood risk or no? Slightly cramped or slightly spacious? Decisions, decisions... #
• 14:14 Not sure why, but I *love* leftovers. Maybe because they're already prepared and paid for. Yay Pappasito's grilled platter. #
• 19:43 Finally, somebody addresses the question of new iPhones and the FCC: tinyurl.com/4jycry #
• 19:45 Accomplished: picked up comics, went by Sam's. Did not: pick apartment, sign lease, wash car. Pending: school stuff. #

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Tweets for Today

Daily Twitterings:

• 15:55 Look, leasing office, I know you're short-staffed in Saturdays, but *someone* should always be in the office. Poor. #
• 16:17 Twitter means always having someone to roll your eyes to. #
• 21:25 Had a kangaroo burger for dinner. #
• 22:08 Hanging out with Jeff & Jim. We're discussing lamp shades. These are, of course, my gay friends. #

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Tweets for Today

Daily Twitterings:

• 11:35 Vegan cooking is like trying to drive somewhere only making left turns: you can do it, but it's sort of silly. #
• 11:36 I was referred to last night as a beer expert. I'm honored but it's overstating things quite a bit. #
• 12:18 Papa John's thin crust is ~5x better than their regular crust. But regular *does* have garlic butter. #
• 12:37 "Acquired" very nice pilsner glass and wheat beer glass from bar last night. Brought them $300 of business so I don't feel guilty. #
• 15:14 Take that link and rickroll.it ! #
• 15:15 Sadly Nick and I have discovered that fuck.it is registered. #
• 15:44 Ah, crap. Thao & Xiu Xiu are playing tonight at the Orange Show, but I'm already commiteed to hosting a Battlestar Galactica viewing party. #
• 16:14 Thank God for webcasts. Too rainy to walk to Rice today. #
• 16:15 Stupid QuickTime player won't stay maximized on my second monitor. #
• 16:40 OK, too much math in this talk. #
• 17:30 Battlestar Galactica is back tonight! #
• 02:39 Playing around with Pwnage. Nothing exciting so far, except that I've proven to myself that I won't brick my iPhone. Living on the edge! #
• 04:00 iPhone does look awfully sexy displaying terminal text while booting. Wonder if there's a verbose booting option hidden somewhere? #

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Tweets for Today

Daily Twitterings:

• 15:10 Today... is... so... slow... #
• 15:42 Counting the minutes until free recruiting dinner at Pappasito's (78m). #
• 15:42 I'm gonna get me a margarita with Cazadores in it. #
• 16:41 w00t! Off to dinner. Yay margs! #

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Tweets for Today

Daily Twitterings:

• 14:53 The construction going on in every room abutting mine melds surprisingly well with the Fuck Buttons album. Surprisingly well. #
• 15:09 What kind of publisher doesn't give the author a chance to proof the final layout? #
• 17:35 How fucking hard is it to silence your phone in class? 3 phones went off today! And then people don't silence them when they do ring! Mo ... #
• 21:27 Every morning I think 5 minutes of sleep would benefit me more than a freshly-trimmed beard, and every morning I'm so wrong. #

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Inevitability

I just wonder how long those trees can hold out against med center
construction. Seems inevitable a building will be there. Five years,
tops.

Twittering

Nick has officially gotten me started on Twitter.

It's sort of an odd combination of Facebook status messages, microblogging, IM/texting, and IM away messages. The concept didn't sell me at first, but once I started paying attention I realized that all the alpha geeks were using it. Now that may mean that it's just trendy and will fade away, but it also means there's some value to the system.

In this case, the value comes from the simplicity. Relationships between people are directional by default: I follow you but you may not follow me. That's useful. I want to know what John Gruber is up to, but he doesn't care about me (because he doesn't know me, not because he's a heartless bastard), for example.

So anyway, I'll be twittering away. Some of the content is things I might normally blog, but I'm hoping that the ease of posting will lead me to write something more often, like daily. Work frustrations, first impressions of new albums, Apple news commentary: these are things you can expect. Check the web page yourself, sign up for the RSS feed, get your own account, or, for the truly lazy, my full day's worth of tweets should be published early the next morning on the blog. So, worst case scenario, you're still getting more postings out of me. And this way, I know that Nick is not the only one reading my tweets.

I also hope to continue posting to this blog via iPhone camera/e-mail. Give things a little more visual flair, get posts up more frequently.

And once I kick my Pikmin 2 addiction, I'll get some long-form posts written. Randa requested commentary on the new Counting Crows album, and God knows I have 9 months of my life to document.

Anyway, see you kids around more often.

Addendum:

Tweets didn't post last night. So I'll just put them in by hand; hopefully tomorrow's works:

• Shiner '99 is out! 01:11 AM March 26, 2008 from web
• For some reason twittering in class feels not only appropriate but also requisite. 03:13 PM March 31, 2008 from web
• Lessons learned from life science entrepreneurship class: FDA evil! 03:34 PM March 31, 2008 from web
• Apparently the world of academic publishing is too good for PDF files. Has to be an effin' TIFF file. Which Preview makes at 72 dpi *only*. 02:41 PM April 01, 2008 from twitterrific
• Most evil thing I've done today: VNC to my mac mini, and then VNC *from there* to my PowerBook. Since there's no port forwarding for the PB. 02:58 PM April 01, 2008 from twitterrific
• PDF->TIFF reminds me of Simpsons where Lisa gets gum in her hair, everybody has a different way to get it out, none of them work. 03:33 PM April 01, 2008 from twitterrific
• Photoshop to the rescue. Ideally I would have liked to have accomplished this entirely with programs already on my computer. 04:44 PM April 01, 2008 from twitterrific
• Why does everything this year sound like Panda Bear? And by "everything" I mean El Guincho and Ruby Suns. 04:57 PM April 01, 2008 from twitterrific
• The Fuck Buttons' album has the monkey noises way too high in the mix. 05:04 PM April 01, 2008 from twitterrific
• Isn't a surprise 3G iPhone release unlikely due to lead time on FCC approval? 05:24 PM April 01, 2008 from twitterrific
• Plants and Animals: a little too jammy for an indie band. 07:03 PM April 01, 2008 from web
• One day I will get to bed on time. Trouble is I define "on time" differently in the morning and at night. 03:08 AM April 02, 2008 from web
• Pikmin (well, Pikmin 2 specifically) is a) evidence for games as art and b) hella addictive. Does anyone still say "hella"? 02:13 AM April 02, 2008 from twitterrific

More to come...