RonO's Ramblings

As I've previously mentioned, this morning I walked (behind the serious runners, obviously) in the 5K Oceanside Turkey Trot.

Registration for the "Locals" race ran from 6:00 until about 5 minutes before the 8:15 start, so we headed towards downtown Oceanside, arriving about 7:15. We parked a few blocks (uphill) from the Civic Center where the check in was held and walked to registration.

When I saw the registration, I noticed that they were doing check in by bib number, and briefly panicked: I didn't know mine. Fortunately, they had a listing of names alphabetically with their corresponding bib number. As it turns out, the bibs were assigned alphabetically -- or at least appeared to have been since they other, unrelated, Oakes had the bib number just after mine.

I cannot help but think that this system would be akin to me setting up pre-reg pickup for DucKon (or any other con I might end up running reg for) by having a table where the people look up their badge number, and then get in the line to get their packet (or badge) which are sorted by number not name. But, perhaps, since bib number and the corresponding RFID tag, are crucial to get right, it may actually work better to do it this way.

After getting my and chip, we worked our way towards the starting line. About 20 minutes before the start, I found where the area for walkers was behind the starting line, and took my place fairly close to the walk/run dividing line since I expected to be fairly fast as a walker. I was a bit startled by the number of people with strollers in that area who appeared to be serious runners since running with a stroller (at least one designed for it) would still be faster than walking.

While I was waiting to start robot_grrl and Derrick sat at a bus stop, where no bus would stop this morning since the road was closed.

At 8:15 the race was started. They started it in three waves with the people who thought that they'd run a mile in less than 7 minutes in the first wave, then the people under 9 minutes in the second. The slow runners and the walkers made up the third wave.

Since the race is being timed (as most road races are these days) by RFID chips tied to our shoes, it didn't make much difference how early one started for their official time.

Shortly after starting I realized my first mistake of the morning -- I hadn't worn a hat with a brim. The course starts out by going south on Coast Highway from (pull up your maps of Oceanside California if you want to look at this) Pier View to Wisconsin. This whole way the sun was in my eyes, so a hat (and Tara thinks sunglasses) would have been very welcome.

About half-way to Wisconsin, I noticed that my legs were getting a bit stiff. I'm not sure if this was because I was walking faster than I should have been at first, the hard pavement, my body's current condition, or a combination of these factors. I think I slowed down just a hair at that point, because I soon loosened back up.

At Wisconsin, the race turns back north (ironically the southbound racers use the northbound lanes, and the northbound racers use the southbound lanes). A few blocks north we passed a 1 mile mark, and I determined I was on about a 14 minute pace (about what I expected, but not as good as I'd hoped). The route then continued back up Coast Highway, past at least one restaurant that had good cooking smells coming from it, back to Pier View. At that point we turned west and headed along Pier View towards the train tracks.

Somewhere along this stretch I realized my second clothing mistake. I was still cool when we started, so I was still wearing my coat. But I ended up taking it off and carrying it through more than half the race.


The run along Coast Highway and Pier View was mostly level, except for the tunnel under the train tracks on Pier View which, naturally, goes down and then back up. After crossing under the tracks, the route heads to Pacific and turns south again to Wisconsin. It was about half-way down this leg that we passed the second mile marker, and I was able to confirm I'd maintained a 14 minute pace.

The last legs of the race were a turn back west on Wisconsin, and down a fairly steep hill, to The Strand which runs along the inland edge of the beach. From there the race runs back North, ending just before the amphitheater and under the pier.

Along The Strand, I decided that I'd have been comfortable to remove my sweat shirt. But since I was already carrying my coat, and had strapped my water bottle on the outside of the sweat shirt, I left it on.


When I crossed the finish line, the clock there read 0:48, but I'm not sure that my time wasn't a bit better -- I don't know if it was displaying the time based on my chip crossing the finish line, or the time since the race had started.

At the finish line, there were some goodies, and I did get some water, a Souplantation muffin (a bit dry since it wasn't freshly baked) a bottle of a sports drink, an apple and a small energy bar. I passed on the bananas and the larger energy bars due to my allergy -- they make my mouth itch. I also missed the somewhat hidden place to pick up my t-shirt.

After I returned my RFID tag, I headed up the stairs (which was perhaps the hardest part) and then met Tara and Derrick where they were waiting by a coffee shop along Pier View on the east side of the tracks. We then walked back up the hill to Tara's car and headed home.

I'm a bit sore. In addition to slightly stiff legs, I think my shoes (which are walking shoes I've had for years and may be getting on their last legs) or my socks, have given me a "hot spot" on the sole of my right foot.

But I'm glad I walked, enjoyed myself and feel good for having gotten some exercise on what is often a day for sitting around and eating too much.

---

On the other hand, it sounds like Derrick should have walked. Tara says he spent the entire time griping about everything -- including how hot he was. As we were walking back up the hill to the car, he was even complaining about having to walk up the hill -- at least until I reminded him that I'd walked a lot more than he had this morning.

In just a few minutes we'll be off so that I can ramble behind the trotters in the Turkey Trot (the serious racers are kicking off now, but we've got an hour before the locals only event, where I'm entered).

After that, we need to finish packing and start heading North for LosCon. Somewhere along the way we'll stop and get something to eat.

Hopefully, we'll also have time to reflect on being thankful (not that we haven't been doing some of that recently)

Now, if we can just get The Kid to think and listen we might actually survive the day.

It is now official. Sometime, I'm guessing in the next month, I will be transitioning between teams here at Qualcomm.

As I (think I) mentioned before, since part of the team I'll be moving to, including many of the people I'll be working with, is based in Santa Clara, I'll probably be up in that area a couple of days a month for at least a while. Unless the transition happens with great rapidity (i.e. I'm officially moved by the end of next week), my first trip won't be until January at the earliest. {I don't really want to be traveling during the same week I have surgery, and won't be traveling the couple of short weeks afterwards until we go to New Mexico for New Years}.

But, once I'm heading that way I'll let people know what evenings/nights I might be free in case someone wants to offer me activities.

As I mentioned on Monday, I had an appointment with an ENT to discuss a large nodule in my thyroid.

At this appointment we decided that the best course of action would be to remove it. So I am now scheduled to have it removed (or as I morbidly put it to robot_grrl a bit ago "have my throat cut") on December 17.

This should give us enough time to not disrupt our travel plans over New Years, but will take me away from work for a few days -- and knock me off the blood donation list for a few weeks at least.

At least getting this out now is a good thing, before it actually started choking me or turned into something less nice.

This should be a fun week.

This morning I'm working from home for a while. Later I have an appointment with the ENT about my thyroid (I have a benign nodule that has apparently grown between 2 and 3 cm over eight months between ultrasounds -- and he wants to talk to me about "the risks of just monitoring it") After that it is to work.

I also have work Tomorrow and Wednesday. Since Derrick is off school this week, I should be able to catch the earlier train, and should be able to leave earlier as well. (Aside, when did schools start giving the rest of this week off? I never had more than 2 days off for Thanksgiving -- actually I've had 2 days off every year but one, and that was the year I was on a business trip)

Thursday will start with me walking 5 kilometers in the "Locals Run/Walk" as part of the Oceanside Turkey Trot. This part kicks off at 8:15 (the regular run kicks off at 7:00), but we'll need to get down their and get me registered fairly early.

After that, we'll need to get ourselves packed up, find someplace to eat (so far, we've mostly found expensive, fancy places in the LA area, and decently priced places here in Oceanside), and head for the LAX area.

The rest of the weekend will be spent at Loscon. I know, or fully expect, to run into several people we know there (including quite a few who will at least be exposed to this LJ Posting/Facebook note). We should have a good time. I won't be surprised if I can be found for at least a few minutes behind the Chicago in 2012 bid table (hazard of being bid committee), but probably won't be trapped there.

As for other updates:

Last week, and continuing today, I had some good conversations with several people on another team at work. From what at least one of the managers said, it sounds like he has a position that he very much wants me for, and it sounds like a pretty good match (at least as long as it evolves in the direction he was proposing).

The team in question is split between Santa Clara and San Diego, and many of the people I'd be working with are in Santa Clara. But, this manager was very interested in having someone who would be based in San Diego so that there would be a local presence to work with the San Diego part of the broader team.

On the other hand, he was expecting that I could easily be spending two or three days in Santa Clara each month for the next several months. Fortunately, getting from San Diego to Santa Clara isn't too big of a deal (Southwest look like it has 9 direct flights, each about 90 minutes -- probably a total of 3 or 4 hours of travel commitment. My dad suggested I could also drive, but Google warns that could take almost 9 hours in traffic, which I'd undoubtedly hit given I'd have to leave in time to hit LA at rush hour), and we could work around me being gone for a couple of days.

With luck, we'll know for sure how things stand soon.

(And, should I end up in the Santa Clara/San Jose area at loose ends, I'll probably let people know in case someone in the area wants to offer suggestions).

...or perhaps more generally between the Midwest and Southern California.

When I worked in Chicago, had anyone ever left excess bounty from their home gardens in a break room -- or equivalent -- to share with their co-workers, it would probably be something like zucchini or eggplant. But here in San Diego, I've seen lemons, oranges and robot_grrl has brought home avocados.

I'd grab some of the lemons, but I'm not sure what to use them for. I don't think Tara has time to make a lemon pie, and I drink my ice tea straight.

This afternoon, robot_grrl and I went to the kick-off meeting for the, expected, 2010 ConJecture. Because of church, needing to pick up lunch, and the drive from Carlsbad to Tierrasanta we were a bit late.

But when we got there and got settled, Val, who is chairing this event (and the 2011 World Fantasy) was going through a list of key jobs that were missing. The first one I heard was "registrar." So, for better or worse, I was quick to speak up and, by the process of stating that I have plenty of experience in the job, volunteer.

Now all we need to do is get a hotel, and dates, nailed down and we'll have a convention. There are a couple of other positions that need to be filled in, or at least confirmed. And we need to nail down a Guest of Honor (but without confirmed dates, that is difficult, and without a hotel, dates aren't confirmed).

I need to get the database, tomcat pages and parts of the application cloned so that I can start taking registration.

I've also already used some of my Chicago fannish contacts to help out. I've e-mailed the person whose run the DucKon media room for several years (at least if his e-mail address is still accurate from a couple of years ago) for information he may be willing to share.

I may pull in my Chicago and other contacts for other pieces of information as well.

So, anyone want to come to San Diego to work registration for a weekend in October 2010 :-))

Today on their Facebook "Fan" page (here), The Newsboys (a Christian Rock -- more or less Alternative, I think -- band) mentioned that when they got into their dressing room at (I'm guessing) Olivet-Nazarene University they found a tiger head sitting on the counter of the bathroom.

In this case I'm pretty sure that this is the head of some college mascot (either Olivet-Nazarene's or visiting school).

But, this got me thinking: how much interest could have been generated if this was next weekend, they were playing in Wheeling or somewhere nearby, and staying at the appropriate hotel. How would a Christian Rock band get along sharing the hotel with a Furry convention?

Have fun.

It looks like a pretty good con (at least from the quick glimpse of programming I took). Both robot_grrl and I would like to be there, but both the vacation and the money budgets didn't allow for it this year. Maybe sometime in the future we'll find time to make a second (or all three) Chicago cons in a year.

We'll probably hear from some of you on Saturday night between 6 and 8 (if you don't know what I'm talking about, check your program schedule and you may be able to guess).

{This morning, it occurred to me that if we hadn't moved to California, I might still miss much of Saturday since the Chicago area National Karate schools have this knack of scheduling against Chicago cons -- most years the November tournament is against Windycon and I think the June Black Belt exam usually is against DucKon. I suspect that this would have been my first chance to compete as a black belt, so I probably would have gone. It might also have been the tournament that Derrick couldn't miss if his black belt ended up six months behind mine}

We'll see some of you (and many others) at LosCon in a couple of weeks, and more of you at DucKon next June and in Australia. The rest, we'll just have to catch up with at other times and places.

(AKICSN == All Knowledge Is Contained In Social Networks)

The current family plans for November 26 are for, at least, me to walk in the Oceanside Turkey Trot in the morning and at some later point head toward the LAX Marriott for LosCon. Somewhere along the way we should probably try to get something resembling a Thanksgiving Dinner. (The traditional turkey not required)

However, my Google-Fu is failing me (as is robot_grrl's), and I've been unable to find a listing of chains that will be open on Thanksgiving. We've turned up a few references to places that will be open, but none with posted menus. I've also found, repeatedly, a site that lists a lot of high-end places in LA that are open, but few obviously along our route and none with menus and prices (except, perhaps, an obscenely long string of dollar signs). But nothing that would list mid-tier individual places or give me enough clue how far off route they are.

If anyone can point me to a source of this information so that over the next couple of weeks we can make a decision before ending up eating at the Denney's down the road from the Marriott.

For what it is worth, our likely route is along I-5, to CA-73 and then along I-405 to Century Blvd. If it got us someplace worthwhile, taking the extra mile or two to skip CA-73 might be OK. CA-22, CA-91 to I-605 to I-105 and CA-91 to I-110 to I-405 might also work. (Google Maps puts all of these variants within 10 miles and 10 minutes of each other barring traffic -- which may not be too big of an issue on Thanksgiving) We might also be talked into driving the old Coast Highway through Orange County, but either the drive or the meal and value better be pretty good for that -- especially since Tara may be driving instead of me.

Somewhere on Facebook recently someone who is in my "Authors/Celebrities/Public Figures I'd Really Know" category (I'm guessing either Jay Lake or John Scalzi) used a term similar to "Jukebox in the Head" referring to the phenomenon I've usually thought of as "having a song go through my head." This got me thinking that there is a real difference between an "Ear Worm" and the song being played by "the jukebox in my head."

( Read more... )

This evening as I was getting off the train, I started thinking about the rate of change of the sunrise and sunset times -- prompted by the fact that it seems to be noticeably darker this week when I get home than last week (and much darker than the week before).

As I was walking to the car, I was struck by the realization that the title of a song that a 1973 Helen Ready hit that my iPod had dug up earlier in the day would also be the correct description of one of the values I was pondering
( In case want to guess, or not groan )

Last night, I watched most of a show on The Travel Channel about Monorails. After this I've had some various musings.

( On the program itself )

( Alternate History )

( revisiting my San Diego solution )

( An engineering challenge )

This evening, robot_grrl and I ended up watching Cats 101. One of the breeds they were talking about was the Abyssinian. During the segment, we saw plenty of examples of this breed, as well describing their personality and athletic ability.

As it was nearing the end, I turned to Tara and started to ask her if this reminder her of one of my cats, and she answered before I hardly got through the question.

Abyssinians are long, athletic cats, with easy to maintain coats and a dislike of being held too much. My first cat -- other than the ones that lived with my full family -- Cream Puff (1989-2002), was quite the athlete, never had any serious coat or grooming problems, but never liked to be held too much.

On the other hand, Cream Puff was a yellow tabby which is not a color for Abyssinians, and was quite the lap cat. Of course he was 100% street cat, having been taken into a shelter before or shortly after being born, six weeks before I adopted him.

But I'm now suspecting that he may well have had a significant amount of Abyssinian ancestry.

I like Christmas. I like Christmas music. I like Christmas decorations.

But... November 7 is too early for people to have already decorated their yard, like we saw this evening. It is also too early for Santa Claus to be at a mall, but they just announced that he's already at Fashion Valley Mall (at least).

Since we won't have bad weather around here before Thanksgiving, people can wait to decorate. I understand doing some setup before the weather gets too bad up North, but that doesn't apply around here.

I'll also admit I can understand retailers trying to get the shopping season moving as early as possible. But having Santa Claus before black Friday isn't necessary for that, is it?

For me, I'll wait.

This morning as I was waiting to get of The Coaster, I noticed a new flyer in the flyer area near the exit. This flyer, which looks like it was produced either in-house or at a low-end print shop (i.e. it is 8.5x11 paper, printed and hand folded), announces "San Diego Vintage Trolley, Inc." They flyer explains that this is a new 501(c)3 subsidiary of the Metropolitan Transit System (MTS), dedicated to restoring 3 vintage trolleys to run on the MTS trolley lines near downtown. The flyer includes several nice pictures, a form to mail support (including donations) and a link to a web site: www.sdvintagetrolley.com.

This interested me enough -- largely because the map showing where the trolley would be running was not readable (or showed no actual "silver line" for the vintage cars) -- so I tried to access the website. That was were things got interesting.

When I pulled up the site, I got one of the "parking sites" that is just a bunch of links. From this, I concluded that the flyer was one of three things: a mistake, in that it was released before everything was ready; a prank; or a scam.

I did a bit more poking around when I had a brief break this morning. I was able to determine that the phone number led to someone at the MTS offices, where I left a voice mail letting them know that they either had flyers with their number on The Coaster, or that their website was down. I was also able to confirm that the mailing address at least resolves (according to Google) to the MTS offices. Based on those, I have mostly discounted the idea that this is a scam -- a scam would have had somewhere else to get mail and donations, and might not have sent the phone to someone at the MTS. (Of course a well done scam would also have had a live website since those are probably as easy or easier to set up than a PO Box).

I'm kind of hoping that this is just an early release of the flyers, a release of some draft flyers, or a mistake with their web host. Ten years ago I thought that it was neat that Melbourne used mostly vintage trams on their downtown loop (which is, or at least was, free -- something for people going to Aussicon next year to remember), and would think that this was just as neat in my city.

My mind has been digesting a discussion on the e-mail list where the people who often do a lot of work at Worldcon and other similar events hang out about scheduling of programming and key programming items.

Now, I've never tried to schedule or set up programming for any convention of significant size. (My one experience was for a con that never got off the ground, nor got to the point where we were actually trying to program our one track). So I'm talking without any experience, but here is how I might (in very broad strokes) schedule a Worldcon sized event -- that is a 3000-6000 person convention that runs over 5 days, with the first and last day being only half-days.
( Read more... )

Since my unplanned, internal, job change 11 months ago, I've been what I've often termed a "misplaced resource," in that my strengths and interests lie with writing and debugging software, but my teams job (as I found out after agreeing that it sounded like the right place for me, mistakenly) is primarily performing builds. After a few months of struggling and hampering operations because I could not engage with the build in any way to be efficient or proficient at it, I was moved off to doing tools work within the team.

However, that work has been of limited scope, and is pretty much winding down. So, once I hit the one-year mark from my start date, I started looking internally for other opportunities.

Out of my internal applications, I keep talking to people in one group. I had a very positive conversation with someone who is looking for a tools person and was very impressed (but also has at least one other person he was seriously considering also). One concern both of him and me is that the majority of the team is based in the Santa Clara office.

I'm pretty sure that I'd be able to stay in San Diego, where there is a contingent, but most of the other people I'd be working with would be at the other end -- well two-thirds of the way to the other end -- of the State. As long as I could do most of my meetings remotely, this shouldn't be a problem. Flying from San Diego to Santa Clara once or twice a month wouldn't be too bad as long as I wasn't doing too many overnights either.

But there is a small chance that they would prefer that I relocate to near Santa Clara if I accept the job.

At least if this were to happen, we don't have a house to sell.

And I also know at least a couple of people more or less in the area (alas given the size of the Bay Area metros, I suspect that it is more "less" than "more").

On the other hand, I've heard that he cost of housing is still more there than here (even if my look a few weeks back didn't quite look that way) and I might not be getting a raise to go with my new locale.

For right now, I think this is mostly a wait and see.

Yesterday and today I took several pieces of action, which I hope will improve my computer situation at least until the budget is ready for a replacement.

1: I uninstantiated Norton 360 and replaced it with AntiVir. While Norton used to be a pretty good product, the last few generations have increasingly become bloated, and watching my task manager yesterday I noticed that it was using more time than any of my other applications -- to the extent that when the only other things I was running were iTunes and Windows Remote Desktop and both were having to wait for Norton's "background" applications.

I'll also note that on AntiVir's initial scan it turned up about 30 files, all Trojans not viruses, that Norton had missed.

2: I upgraded my RAM from 512MB to 2GB, greatly reducing, I hope, the need to waste time swapping memory.

3: After discovering that my iPod wouldn't sync yesterday, I realized that my firewire card was probably bad. So I got a cable to connect my external DVD Writer by USB instead of firewire (I also moved my iPod over to its USB cable) and at least it is being recognized so far.

At Fry's getting the memory and USB cable, I did confirm that they have at least one kind of IDE CD/DVD Writer so if needed I can replace one or both of my internal optical drives and get a bit of an upgrade as well. But I held off since the new cable was much less expensive.

Now I just completed these, and haven't tried to put it through its paces to see if it has really improved or not, but at the moment I'm optimistic.

On the other hand, while at Costco for facial tissue I did post something to Facebook I should be sorry for, but am not.

Yesterday, the family stopped at a Family Christian Stores location (we'd parked directly in front of it when heading to Souplantation -- the same restaurant instantiated elsewhere as Sweet Tomatoes), where I picked up several new CDs. Given that the only CD players easily available are the ones in the cars, and other related reasons, the obvious first thing to do with these was to rip the contents into MP3s for loading onto my (and possibly robot_grrl's) iPod.

( didn't go as planned )

Bottom line: I either need to fix these computers, or get a replacement for at least one.

( Details on fixing or replacing computers )

Current Mood: frustrated