Points of View

Today at work a bunch of coworkers and myself got into a political discussion when most of us were getting ready to head out the door. Normally taboo in the office, but all of us have worked together pretty happily for 6 years or more and this happens every once in awhile with no ill effects. The amazing thing about my group is that we are very diverse both in backgrounds and political views. The great thing is most of us can have frank discussions and discuss "why" people feel the way they do and understand at least where people are coming from even if you don't agree. More often we find common ground and wish congress would try this "talking" thing once in awhile since it just might work.

But there is one guy who is adament in his defense that he is right and having a "discussion" kinda gets derailed very quickly when he walks by and joins in. But beyond that, he thinks Dubba-ya is doing a great job, has been 100% right in everything he's done, its all turned out peachy, and history will judge W as being a great american president. I do respect people's views, but really? Nothing in the last 8 years could have been done better? Not even one tiny thing? The Easter Egg Roll, maybe? Oh BTW, he did say he's not "big on facts" (his words).

R.I.P. Randy Pausch

Randy Pausch passed away yesterday, which is sad because the world only needs more people like him. He was a computer science professor at Carnegie Mellon that was diagnosed with terminal pancreatic cancer awhile ago. They have a lecture series called the "Last Lecture" and the presenter is supposed to imagine what they would want to say if they knew this would be their last one ever. For Randy, it kinda of was but instead of being depressing it is a really great thing to watch. In case you haven't seen it, I really do recommend it and it is as nice a legacy as anyone can really leave in this world.

View from My Desk

Another view from my desk while at work today. It's a little far but, yes, that is Air Force One. Bushie jr. is in town this afternoon for something in River Oaks, maybe visiting Bushie sr?? Anyhoo, warning to all pilot's in the area, TFR in effect till around 6pm local. Don't really want those F-16s on your tail.

Not What I Thought... or can explain

Anyone who has ever done remodeling knows there are bound to be surprises when you get to work, often the result of some very strange construction or repair jobs by previous owners. So in our bathroom, I had always assume these two panels were some sort of access covers for the jetted tub.













I took the first one off and thought wow this is the stupidest thing ever. To patch a large hole with a piece of plastic covered in wallpaper and then badly screwed on top is just a terribel way to do things. Now leaves me a fun task of actually patching this hole properly.

But then I realized, that can't possibly have been the stupidest thing ever once I took off the second panel. I can't begin to understand why.

Bye-Bye Bathroom

When John and I bought our house the things we hated most were the awful yellow trim, the deck in disrepair, and the 80's bathrooms. The deck and the front bathroom have already been taken care of, a crowbar went a long way on the deck and the front bathroom was made presentable years ago. Now its time to do something about the master bath. I am really not a fan of wallpaper, and even less so for fugly 80's floral wallpaper. So as of around 7pm last night, the bathroom will never be the same again. Here are the "before" pictures, give me a few weeks and I'll hopefully have some snazzy "after" pictures.

Soccer Hiatus

As of Saturday, the spring (essentially summer) soccer season has come to an end. Our team was 4th place going into the playoffs/final (only the top 4 go to the playoffs) which meant we we played a 9am game against the 1 seed. We have a good team but all of our loses during the season to get us down to 4th place were because we often are playing short. That is our biggest weakness, attendance.

But the good news is... WE LOST!!! YAY!! Obvisouly, not a typical reaction to losing a playoff game but it was 98 million degrees Saturday and humid as always so it was not "fun" playing soccer. We lost because the otherside had a whole platoon of subs and neither of our regular keepers were in town this weekend, so whatever. We lose, we go home and go back into the air conditioning. The other team won and had to play the championship game at peak-heating 1pm. They eventually won and each got a stupid plastic 4-inch trophy. Losing was definately the way to go at 9am.

With that though, we are off until the earth stops melting around Houston and the fall season picks up sometime in September. For now, here is a photo after the game with most of the team (a couple people had already run home for the AC).

I Love The Russians

For the last 6 hours I have been on-console being the most entertained I think I have ever been while here. We have seen and done many wacky things on the ISS since this thing started flying, but watching the crew perform a hack job surgery on the Soyuz MLI with a glorified steak-knife is definately the craziest thing we've done. The crew got told many times to slow down and be careful not to cut their gloves with the knife, masses of MLI has drifted away from the ISS, they thanked God once the explosive bolt was secured in the case, they get getting reminded to stop working when ordered to break because for the first time ever they are using the helmet cams and MCC-M can see that they aren't breaking, and now a jettisoned thruster cover has hit a US radiator. Best quote: "I think we've ravaged the vehicle." The Russians have once again pulled off a highly inventive way of doing something that would have never gotten past risk-averse NASA. I love 'em.

I will post a picture of the knife hacked Soyuz when I can find one. For now, here is an image of the crew working.

Chip-flation

John had today off from work and we got to spend the day relaxing. This afternoon we went to the Seminole Hard Rock Casino in Hollywood, FL. The casino/hotel is nice but the variety in table games was limited to blackjack, three card poker, and paigow poker. We played a little blackjack but I am extremely disappointed by the effects of inflation in a casino. You used to be able to find loads of $5 and $10 tables and now the minimum bid is $15 on everything. It just sucks because you used to be able to take $100 and do quite a lot of playing (20 hands) and it was below a threshold where the loss would hurt. For a $15 table that means you only get 6 hands in that $100 and, in blackjack, that's not enough to really get going and can too easily disappear quickly. So you either have to spend a lot more or hope you win quickly. Lame. I miss the cheap tables.

However, while wandering around the casino we saw none other than Jason Taylor playing blackjack on the $500 minimum table. That would be Jason Taylor of the Miami Dolphins or Dancing with the Stars fame depending on your taste in TV. He was sitting there with, what I would estimate, was about an 18 inch stack of $500 chips, so roughly $45,000 or a house down payment to the rest of us. Must be nice. He doesn't miss the $5 table.

4th of John

For the holiday weekend I came out to FLorida to be with the hubby and it has been great even though John had to work both yesterday and today. It's a great vacation for me since when he's at work I go do whatever. Yesterday's whatever was several hours on Lantana beach on a beautiful day. Today's whatever was a round of golf and I got paired up with a trio of folks who were around the same age as me a super fun. They also played the way I like to play, mulligan's if you want 'em and ready golf. It is certainly more relaxing that way.

Last night after John got off work we went to Legal Seafoon in Boca Raton for a nice 4th of July dinner. Paul also came with us and we had an excellent meal. The best part was the blackened tuna sashimi, that was a new combo of flavors but it certainly was tasty. Tonight I made lamb kabobs and sweet potato fries for the boys. Tomorrow John has off so I'm sure we'll go find something fun to do!

Sunrise over the Bayou

I've been trying to get up and get some more stick time in the Cessna 150 to get comfortable in the new plane, but between the weather and the plane availability its been rough. So this morning I got up like I would for BC but instead headed over to LVJ. I had a nice flight and practiced some more landings and also headed over to Kemah for a little cruise around the lake. Here is your Tuesday morning sunrise photos over Clear Lake with Galveston Bay beyond.