Last night I went to the Seattle Podcast Meetup in hopes of meeting Jon Udell. I’m guessing that I missed him but the reduced panel and the random people mingling was entertaining. I learned some (retroactively obvious) things like, when you interview someone in a podcast form, have a series of questions and topics outlined out. I also saw that there was a huge focus on making money from podcasting this year. Unlike blogs where the bandwidth and level of involvement scales very well, podcasting is considerably more involving. As a result, the question of making money comes out much earlier and is a more universal concern. It was interesting to hear some of the thoughts about podcasting as a marketing device for retention. There was an example of a museum moving from simple letter Q/A to podcasting the answers to questions and charities podcasting as a way to inexpensively communicate to their donors what they are accomplishing with the donations. Chris Pirillo was very entertaining and brought up finger, a good-old-days protocol I haven’t thought about for almost a decade. Overall a fun little evening.
Category: Journal
Cruising on Carnival
I’ve been cruising pretty much all my life, and this is the first time I remember cruising on the Carnival Lines. Carnival has a reputation for being really good for families and we had set our expectations on that. As a result we were a bit disappointed on what they offered for kids under two.
While the night babysitting might be useful for someone who didn’t bring a supply of grandparents we were mostly looking for a place for Simeon to be able to safely roam and play. This turned out to be somewhat difficult. They allowed use of the kids area for Simeon’s age group 3 times out of 8 days (at sea periods from noon to 2pm). We also grabbed a crib for Simeon in the room, but it was much smaller then a normal crib and ended up being too small for Simeon, so he moved into our bed. We were hoping to just use the crib mattress on the floor, but they took it back when we tried to keep it since after giving up the crib they assigned it to another room. This seemed like a way too little service for charging a full third person in a cabin fare.
We did get a really good beach day with Simeon in Antigua which I would count as the highlight of the trip. The lowlight would be Nassau, which forces you through a very crowded building and makes you walk through a half a market before you can get to the street. However you are there, you are under constant assault be people trying to sell you a service. This extended all the way to the not so great beach on paradise island. This is after navigating the Atlantis Hotel in an attempt to find the beach. While riding the water taxi was nice once, the extra $1.50 for a cab instead was well worth it for the ride back. Totola didn’t make much of an impression on me since we stayed with the local shopping. Puerto Rico was cool because of the historical city layout, walls and forts. Which leaves Saint Thomas. Saint Thomas is my mother’s favorite shopping destination, especially a shop named Omni.
The food in the ship’s dinning room left a bit to be desired, and the main show’s volume levels were too loud for the speakers they were using, but it was obvious that they had put a lot of money in the productions. Carnival was a bit more pushy with the drinks and had a very well attended casino and karaoke. Overall I’d give the ship a B mostly over the food and the under two support. I’d give the staff an A. I’d give the itinerary an A-. If Pamela doesn’t talk more about traveling on a cruise with Simeon then I’ll post again on that topic.
The difference between Seattle and Chicago
In the Seattle Airport, the police had mountain bikes, in Chicago they have segways. I’m also conviced we are the only parents in America flying without a portable DVD player.
How to Mingle (and Exit a conversation)
I just listened to a NPR piece on party conversation based on Raymond’s Recommendation and found myself yelling in concert with the host “Stop the Party!”. This advice would have been helpful at last weekend’s playgroup meeting (Simeon is the one with the drool soaked shirt) where I knew none of the dads and didn’t really remember real well the moms (although I did attend the post birthing classes that formed the group). This party was also my first real experience with more then two babies in a room, and it defiantly was a different experience then anything I’ve seen before. Babies heading in every different direction getting into whatever they could find. I really liked the way they had set up toy containers (back right of this photo) and books and will have to set something like that up. I’m currently using a toy chest from ikea (MINNEN treasure Chest), that is not bad for storage but not so great for quick access.
Getting back into Cardio
So I was back at the gym this morning, did 45 minutes of cardio and got a nice headache as a result. This happend the last time I tried to restart cardio. I’m going to have to keep at it until I can get over this hump. I’ve also started diet tracking again. I think I’m going to have to focus on this for the rest of my life.
Raymond's Halloween Costume
In previous years, I’m told that Raymond went for Halloween as an Interoffice Envelope and a 
Nobel Prize, and we were thinking at dinner last Saturday, what would be a good costume for him this year? On the paper theme we reached a set of ideas around hazard warning signs. The favorites (of mine) were the Danger: Contents under High Pressure and the the standard diamond. The problem is that it wasn’t quite enough to be worthy of a Raymond costume. The Nobel Award was good because of the time he took to forge all the signatures. My last idea which I think would also be good is to be a signature gatherer. You could have a bunch of proposals for every possible sillyness, and try to convince people to sign them. Alas I don’t think he was too interested in that one either.
Night at the Symphony
So last night I went to the Seattle Symphony: Rachmaninoff, Piano Concerto No. 3. 
We were all somewhat concerned about the World Premiere piece, Black Swan, but it turned out quite nice. The second piece required what appear to be super human dexterity on the piano, but often then more complicated playing didn’t seem to be the best parts of the piece for me, it was however impressive to watch. I found that the late hour and the Beethoven conspired to try to put me to sleep. I definitely closed my eyes but I don’t think I actually feel asleep. The violist who shared a music sheet with first violist of the right group had a direct line of site to my seat and appeared to be staring at me the entire time. Of course he was just following his music, but it was motivating for trying to stay awake. There was another violin player who had an amazingly long beard which appears to not be very common. Another Asian violin player appeared to be seizuring, but I guess he was just really into it.
We had dinner before the concert and desert afterwards at Earth and Ocean. I had the Hanger
Steak with some blue cheese, but probably would have done juts fine with a salad. My steak came with four types of imported salts. It was very tasty. I also had some seven hills wine shared with Mark and Hillary. This was the first time I can remember doing Earth and Ocean for a main meal that wasn’t 25 for 25. For desert I had trouble choosing between an apple dish, the petit fours and the sherbets. In the end I went for the sherbets but they were not as wild as they used to be; chocolate and peanut butter, mixed berry and a third I can’t remember.
Unfortunately since I was at the Symphony I missed Ben’s Birthday party which is where Pam and Simeon spent the evening. Earlier in the day I had brunch with Mike at the Brown Bag Cafe. All and all, way too much food during on Saturday.
W. Lewis Johnson on Tatical Iraqi
Today I watched a presentation by W. Lewis Johnson on Tactical Iraqi, which is language and culture training for the military.Coverage of this work was on NPR last year. They combined the Unreal engine, AI, modelling and voice recognition to create an addictive training tool. Between thinking ahead about Simeon’s education and my own trouble learning a foreign language in high school, this stuff is especially intresting.
The implicit hubris
Slate’s commentary on Alito’s confirmation hearing’s third day gets pretty close to my concerns with this nominee. Specifically Alito appears to have the belief that he should look at every last issue with a complete fresh open mind. Sounds good at first, but it quickly becomes worrysome. People don’t like change, and when only a case like Brown v. Board of Education is a settled matter to Alito, there is alot of room for change. This lack of deference to the past is exactly what causes much of the desire for constitutional originalism from thoose around me. It’s when the courts seem to create something completely new that seem to be at the heart of every conservative complained about judicial decision. Alito’s lack of deference points that he is going to be a very much an activist judge, which is exactly the reason he was nominated. The difference is that he’ll be activist to a different set of beliefs. So what are the specified beliefs? At one point Alito talks about traditional values, about safe neighborhoods and preventing your children from getting exposed to values and beliefs that you don’t agree with. Stuff that sounds good on the surface but then one can recall some of the more racist and ugly beliefs that can hide underneath such a noble veneer.
Even more then that there are a couple things I worry about with his philiosophy. First there is the implict implication that a judge can shake off thier implicit biases when interpreting law. This does not seem likely to me, but it’s amazing that conservatives claim to believe it so wholehartily after so often critizing the media which strives for the same thing. Second, if all a judge is, is the execution of something as mechanical as a program, then as a programmer and tester I am doubly scared. There are bugs in code, and the law is exactly that, code. I expect the judicial system as a human sanity check and part of the system to make sure that we don’t end up with insane outcomes. In the end for a judge, the law matters, but so does the person. The attempt to remove the person and this extra and important role from the judicial process isn’t healthy.
Spawing Cycle Ride
Which reminds me, I did the Spawing Cycle ride this year for a 37 mile ride around Seattle with 1000 feet of elevation gain. The cardiac test of the ride is going up Discovery Park from the Locks to Magnolia. I made it with reasonable speed, but it took more effort and shortness of breath then I would have liked. I’ve really got to get back in the habit of longer rides if I can afford them after my first is born this October. The ride also clued me into Myrtle Edwards Park which would be an awesome place for a picnic along the sound. It’s accessable by heading north along the pier near the Old Spagetti Factory in downtown. Next suprise was Interlaken Park which is between the lake front area and capital hill. It sort of sits in the middle of a steep cliff where you can see expensive looking houses above and below you as one rides through the woods. I was also happy to learn about Thorndyke Rd (and the side road to get access to Myrtle Edwards) which is a safer way off of magnolia. Overall a nice ride and good to do again next year.
Doubt's Blog 