90/365 Packing for Business and Pleasure

90/365 Packing for Business and Pleasure
Originally uploaded by tallasiandude.

Well, we're off in less than 2 days, and we've got lots to do between now and then, so we're starting the packing process early.

The trip to San Diego has been on the books for a while now. Balboa Rendezvous. (yeah, I definitely see that link dying in 6 months) It'll make up for the dance workshops I missed last weekend. And it's better to be healthy for this trip.

Then, on the way back, I have to stick around for some meetings in LA, the first one starting at 8AM Monday morning. Joy. On the plus side, I can expense the hotel for that night.

We were planning on heading straight home after that. Red-eye. Not even time to catch a movie at the Cineramadome because of the work obligations.

March has been tough. I've been busy, but also sick. The SOOTTAD has been working like crazy on a project with a crazy aggressive schedule and crazy team logistics (most of her team is one hour back in central time, but one of her developers is based 18 hours ahead). She probably got 9 hours of sleep over the last 4 days of development, bring-up, troubleshooting and debug, plus travel across country to pacific time to present the finished product. It all went well, and they were scheduled to start phase two with another aggressive deadline for sometime in April.

During this time, a bunch of events seemed to nudge us towards our eventual destination. Wil Wheaton tweeted about watching Maui sunsets via webcam. I randomly started playing my ukulele again. A friend who grew up in Hawaii has had a bunch of pictures from high school (in Hawaii) tagged in Facebook. And then the hotel where we stayed for a night in Waikiki on our honeymoon sent me an email. Which led me to google plane fares (which seem to be at historic lows recently) to Hawaii. And then to check frequent flier rewards.

We kept looking at different flight itineraries, but they kept bumping into this work thing or that client appointment. Another workshop. A local dance weekend. And, of course, Spring in New England. It's one of the nicer times of the year -- really a shame to be away, even for Hawaii. We might have been able to pull off a shorter trip, but you really need to spend more than a week to really give yourself time to acclimate and appreciate the place.

And then her company was notified out of the blue by the client to just stop work.

And with that, it was time to Gee the Eff out of Dodge.

We figured out that we could just tack the trip onto the end of our California trip, still spend 2 weeks there and get back in time for the SOOTTAD to make another client meeting.

Which I guess is how you book an extra 2 weeks of vacation, 4 days before you leave for the trip you were already planning on taking.

Oh, and we're closing on a refinance of our mortgage 4 hours before we fly to California.

Life is good, but you have to admit that it's still kinda crazy.

Crazy AWESOME.

89/365 37 cents

89/365 37 cents
Originally uploaded by tallasiandude.

Payment for our accountant -- and another sign that we do most of our financial transactions on-line. I guess if our accountants were on-line, they'd be TurboTax.

88/365 WATER

88/365 WATER
Originally uploaded by tallasiandude.

87/365 Soup Circles

87/365 Soup Circles
Originally uploaded by tallasiandude.

Chicken soup is getting me through the cold that's clobbered me most of this weekend. Tasty. And I love the patterns formed by the thin layer of rendered fat on the surface of the soup.

Although I'm still bitter about being sick. And basically throwing money away for a dance workshop that I couldn't attend. Not to mention being unable to enjoy the beautiful spring weather. Hopefully I'll at least be well enough to see the client scheduled for tomorrow. (and even then, it's small consolation.)

86/365 seedlings

86/365 seedlings
Originally uploaded by tallasiandude.

85/365 Flow like a river

85/365 Flow like a river
Originally uploaded by tallasiandude.

Yes, this was my day at work -- it's like an artist's interpretation of North Dakota.

Sinuses have kicked in all crazy like -- doesn't feel like a cold, so I'm assuming this is just part of the onset of spring. I guess I should be happy about that.

84/365 Slow Down

84/365 Slow Down
Originally uploaded by tallasiandude.

It's the law.

(sorry, not really any decent pictures today)

83/365 C is for...

83/365 C is for...
Originally uploaded by tallasiandude.

cookie.

And cold. (which is why I'm wearing a hat in the office.)

82/365 Think Positive!

82/365 Think Positive!
Originally uploaded by tallasiandude.

Wore my new shirt today (designed by Jeph Jacques).

Had it on at the dance tonight -- I don't think anybody noticed the zombies, which I think is even more awesome.

81/365 FISH

81/365 FISH
Originally uploaded by tallasiandude.

80/365 Red Hot Blues

80/365 Red Hot Blues
Originally uploaded by tallasiandude.

It was a good night.

The Racky Thomas Band played tonight at the Uptown Swing Dance at Brookline Tai Chi. A tight band with great energy. I hope to see this band again, even if it's not in a dance setting.

And lots of good dances -- probably the best dance night I've had in months. (BONUS: no freaky wrist pain...hoping to keep it that way.)

79/365 F O U R

79/365 F O U R
Originally uploaded by tallasiandude.

We ended up at this new kinda hipster-y burger joint in Central Square after being unable to find parking in Harvard Square to go to Charlie's Kitchen, and not being able to get a table at Green Street Grill. It turned out to be a perfectly acceptable alternative for the burger-minded (which we were this evening).

There was a slightly longer wait than expected based on the size of the line because they've only got a single register with one guy taking orders, but once the order was in, it took maybe 7-8 minutes for our burgers to show up.

Branded "All-Natural" beef (Brandt Farm -- rep for high quality, although based in CA), cooked to order (only slightly medium rare for a medium) my burger was juicy and quite tasty. And a significantly better value than Green Street or the stupidly named Tavern on the Square nearby.

78/365 F I R E

78/365 F I R E
Originally uploaded by tallasiandude.

Yes, there was a fire alarm today.

Yes, the alarm is really loud.

...but not as loud as the one right next to my cubical.

77/365 Another crocus

77/365 Another crocus
Originally uploaded by tallasiandude.

It's the middle of March, but the spring flowers are still novel.

It reached the mid-60s today -- I even went for a run outside in SHORTS today. And totally expected to get caught in a freak snowstorm or something, because I know that's just how New England weather rolls sometimes.

76/365 Everybody's Irish on St. Patrick's Day

76/365 Everybody's Irish on St. Patrick's Day
Originally uploaded by tallasiandude.

...at least in Massachusetts.

Paisano -- the local Mexican/Guatemalan* restaurant around the corner from us normally has mariachi on the weekends, but is hosting an Irish band tonight.

I think they already had a green margarita on the menu.

* And, whenever we mention the name of this place, people think it's Italian.

75/365 State House at night

75/365 State House at night
Originally uploaded by tallasiandude.

Passed by the State House on the way to a very late dinner at No. 9 Park. We had friends who got a last minute reservation for restaurant week at 10:15PM and another couple had backed out.

NOM. But we are oh, so going to pay for it tomorrow morning.

74/365 Northern Ave Bridge

74/365 Northern Ave Bridge
Originally uploaded by tallasiandude.

Another beautiful weekend day, and probably in the high 50s.

Kind of exhausted -- up early for two clients this morning, bal practice in Southie, and a lot of walking because we took the commuter rail into town and walked to and from the stations at both ends. And that after maybe 4 hours of broken sleep because of an attack of heartburn late last night.

The heartburn thing did not manifest in its usual way, but given the rather heavy and spicy (but delicious) Sichuan dinner we had, followed by what may have been a slightly sketchy pie (even though it was from whole foods), I'm not going to give my body a hard time for exacting punitive measures. The one constant* is the recovery, which always seems to kick in almost instantaneously sometime around the 5 or 6 o'clock hour.

Perhaps it's just a distorted time perception due to the fatigue, but it really feels like the body does a magical hard reset and suddenly systems are back to normal and I can finally get some sleep. (Except for the part when you have to get up less than 2 hours later.) The SOOTTAD has been reading The Mood Cure and thinks it may have something to do with a circadian rhythm of seratonin production. I'll have to check out the book when she's done with it.

* Excluding effective mitigation procedures (exercise, which can't be effectively utilized at 2 in the morning)

73/365 Pie in Hand

73/365 Pie in Hand
Originally uploaded by tallasiandude.

I used to think the idea of Pi day was pretty silly. I mean, c'mon, pi is an irrational number; to say 3.14 (and thus, March 14th) is pi just seemed inaccurate to me. I guess I've come to accept that all that stuff they used to teach in school about significant digits and proper rounding actually makes a good deal of sense, because in most practical instances, can you really measure out to the fourth or fifth significant digit? (seriously, when was the last time you measured something out to the 1/1000th of an inch?)

Anyway, we kind of dropped the ball and didn't actually get the chance to make our own pie today, so we ended up buying an apple/berry crumble pie and this mini key lime pie at whole foods on the way home from dinner.

Happy Pi Day, people!

72/365 F-major-7

72/365 F-major-7
Originally uploaded by tallasiandude.

Been playing around with my ukulele, one of the few souvenirs from our belated honeymoon in Hawaii last year.

Got a good chunk of Mood Indigo figured out, but I can't keep the whole melody in my head -- I forget sections, keep getting a bit stuck, finding myself in little closed musical loops. Eventually gave up and spent a little time tonight trying to figure out what chords I've actually been playing.

71/365 Brick 'n Blue

71/365 Brick 'n Blue
Originally uploaded by tallasiandude.

Beautiful blue skies, although much colder than it looked. On the plus side, left the office early enough to see it.

We went out to dinner in Chinatown tonight and then saw Watchmen at the Boston Common theater. I found it actually a little disappointing, although it definitely had it's moments of glory. I particularly liked the opening montage, and the actor playing Rorchach was absolutely brilliant -- his scenes were among my favorites.

Anyway, trying to get to bed before 2 for the first time in a while.

70/365 Mill Window

70/365 Mill WIndow
Originally uploaded by tallasiandude.

69/365 Daylight Saved

69/365 Daylight Saved
Originally uploaded by tallasiandude.

Another unremarkable day -- should have taken a picture of the 2.5lb bag of spinach I bought at Costco. Oh well.

I guess I should be happy that I seem to have successfully fought off the cold that's going around and I haven't been working at the computer since I got home.

Reminders for the future: remember to take more shots with different focal points.

68/365 Workin' from home

68/365 Workin' from home
Originally uploaded by tallasiandude.

67/365 Interloper

67/365 Interloper
Originally uploaded by tallasiandude.

Heard a lot of knocking and scratching around the ceiling of my office in the house. When I went outside to investigate, apparently so did its source.

Really hoping they're only in the gutters and we get them out of there before they get into the soffits or attic.

66/365 Winter Wanes

66/365 Winter Wanes
Originally uploaded by tallasiandude.

65/365 Drummer Blue

65/365 Drummer Blue
Originally uploaded by tallasiandude.

Gordon Webster Quintet at Boston Swing Central.

64/365 Research

64/365 Research
Originally uploaded by tallasiandude.

I feel like this photo is kind of a cop-out, but I didn't really get out of the house today -- worked from home because I was feeling a bit under the weather -- so I didn't really have much material to work with.

Wanted to look at the comic subplot in Watchmen, what with the movie opening... in, like, 15 minutes. Ended up falling into the Dark Knight Strikes Again series (Frank Miller's Batman: The Dark Knight Returns sequel). Probably a good think we didn't get tickets for the midnight showing -- I have enough trouble staying up late to begin with, and add in being a school night and not feeling 100% and you have a whole lot of doing the right thing.

This is actually my 2nd copy of Watchmen -- my original disappeared a few years ago because I can't remember who I lent it to.

Hunger

Just got a link to this via Twitter from Cammy:

I'm not a big fan of Tyson Foods, but they're supposedly donating 35 pounds (translating to 140 meals) for each pledge at this website. If the goal of 1,000 people taking the online pledge is reached, a semi-trailer filled with 140,000 meals will arrive at the Capital Area Food Bank of Texas in Austin during the SXSW ’09 Interactive Festival.

Pledge to end hunger.

And for you local folks, while we're on the topic of giving, please check out Project Bread (who sponsor the annual Walk for Hunger) and the Greater Boston Food Bank.

And for you non-local folks, I'm sure you can find something local to you guys, right? Or maybe this can help.

63/365 Leave a Penny

63/365 Leave a Penny
Originally uploaded by tallasiandude.

Pennies left on top of one of the vending machines at the office.

62/365 Lights Out

62/365 Lights Out
Originally uploaded by tallasiandude.

Last one to leave the office again.

Fortunately, it was only 6:15PM -- most people are in and out on the earlier side, and no 10+ hour work days here.

Except when I'm working from home it seems, and am trying to finish a spec for a deadline. Like Sunday night / Monday morning... Oy.

What a difference a day makes

61/365 Cold framed

61/365 Cold framed
Originally uploaded by tallasiandude.

60/365 A Clear Path

60/365 A Clear Path
Originally uploaded by tallasiandude.

Just a light dusting this morning. The SOOTTAD swept a path clear on her way to get coffee for herself and a friend who was visiting this weekend.

The snow apparently continued through most of the day, but we thankfully ended up with maybe an inch of accumulation which was easily cleared. Unfortunately, forecasts are less than optimistic for the next day or two. (It'd be a good option to work from home, but I think I need to be in the office tomorrow.)