Year: 2007

Olive Oils

Olive OilsWe went out with our usual group to our usual Aiken haunt tonight. Good times with good friends, but it was a bittersweet evening. I returned my Godson Gnorm to his parents. 🙂

Bruschetta for appetizer. I had the Sun dried Tomato & Prosciutto Personal Pizza. Donna had her usual Seafood Ravioli. We both had a glass of wine to drink.

Meal Cost: $42.80
Tip: $7.20
Spent Today: $50.00
Year to Date: $1219.61
Meals out 66 of a possible 474.

In Yesterday’s post I listed a couple of Spenser’s Crime Buster Rules. Later in the book he mentions “Spenser’s Rule.” Seeing as he is mainly involved in busting crimes is that to be understood here? I think in this case it must be, considering the rule in question is obviously related to that endeavor.

Spenser’s Crime Buster Rule #113: As a last disparate fall back position, you find someone to follow, and follow them.

If it was more along the lines of, “Always keep a cold six pack of Sam Adams on hand for guests.” I might have been labeled as just Spenser’s Rule…

Started up, went down, back up, down again, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/07: 184

Spenser Crime Buster Rules

WakeAnother vacation outtake. This is from the Olympic Sculpture Garden in Seattle. The title of this piece is Wake and it is by Richard Serra. 10 big ol’ rusty metal plates welded into 5 wave shaped forms. To get a sense of scale look to the left and you will see Donna in her red jacket.

I ran out of books to read after I finished the one on the plane home and haven’t had time to get to the used bookstore yet, so I had to re-read something I had around the house. Picked “School Days” by Robert B. Parker. Tonight I stumbled on the section of the book I was thinking of back in March. Here for posterity are the Spenser Crime Buster Rules so far:

#8: Always look.
#8a: Don’t blunder into something while you’re looking.

If I find more I’ll make a separate page for them.

A couple more camera contenders surfaced today, both of them Canons; 1) PowerShot A710IS & B) PowerShot SD800IS. The SD800 is about the same size as my current Kodak and it’s zoom’s widest angle is 28mm, not the 23 I have already, but it meets ever other criteria. The 710 is the least expensive option, but it’s zoom starts at 35mm. Plus it, like the Panasonic DMC-TZ3 I mentioned yesterday, are about and 1-1/2″ thick compared to my little more than 3/4″ Kodak. I will need to go to a store and put one in my back pocket try it out first (hopefully not getting picked up for shoplifting in the attempt.)

Started up, went down, back up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/07: 181

Tired Of Me Already?

Washington CoastI’m digital camera shopping. It has only been 14 months since I bought the Kodak V570 and I still really like it, but there are a couple of features that it doesn’t have that I want. 1) Image Stabilization. Have you ever tried to take a blur free photo while standing on the vibrating deck of a ferry? 2) I really miss some sort of manual exposure control. Ever try and get a crisp image of something close and something far at the same time without aperture priority or a manual mode?

Any of my needs taken alone are not too difficult fulfill;

  1. Less than $350
  2. Image Stabilization
  3. Manual Mode or Aperture Priority min.
  4. 7 Megapixels min.
  5. 23mm Wide Angle Lens
  6. Fits in Shirt Pocket
  7. 6x Optical Zoom min.
  8. SD Storage
  9. Optical Viewfinder

(the last two are not deal breakers, but nice to have) all together they add up to something nearly impossible to find so far. Right now real close to and leaning towards: Panasonic DMC-TZ3

Donna had a tough morning, so we went out to the Evergreen Chinese Buffet for lunch:

Meal Cost: $12.31
Tip: $2.00
Spent Today: $14.31
Year to Date: $1169.61
Meals out, 65 of a possible 468.

Started up, went down, back up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/07: 179

Pictures

Red BlurI took 293 pictures on the trip northwest. I started separating the wheat from the chaff tonight by getting rid of the crummy exposures, the out of focus images and the what was I thinking pictures. Eighty three of the photos included Gnorm the gnome which came out too. The best of Gnorm’s Gnorthwest Photos cam be seen on my Flickr page. After the first run through I got it down to 62.

The above photo is one of the outtakes. We went for a walk at dusk on the beach at Kalaloch and I set up the camera on my gorillapod for the long exposure while Donna continued on down the stairs. The red blur in the lower right is her in her red jacket walking through the scene.

Started down, went up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/07: 177

Oh, No, Not Again

White Rock MoonriseYes again. At 5:00 PM eastern time on the USA Network TDPM was broadcast and I watched the whole thing. This makes about 2 dozen viewings of Dead Man’s Chest. I’ve seen the second movie twice, once in the theater and once at home on DVD. In spite of the pan & scan, in spite of the editing, in spite of the commercial interruptions the first is far superior to the second. I haven’t seen the third yet and will probably rent it when it comes out, but I’m betting it won’t top the original either.

Take 8 days off and you forget. We went out to breakfast yesterday and I didn’t write in the post, so here is the wrap-up and I’ll try not to do it again. Toasted bagel with cream cheese for her and a cranberry pecan muffin for me. Donna drank a hot chocolate and I had water.

Meal Cost: $3.75
Tip Jar: 25¢
Spent Today: $4.00
Year to Date: $1155.30
Meals out, 64 of a possible 465.

Remember meals out on vacation don’t count. Good thing too, as I’m a little embarrassed by how much we spent on the evening meal at the Mariott last Friday.

Poor Donna because the day after we arrived in Washington she came down with a sniffley, sneezey, coughing thing and she is just now getting over it. At first we though it might be an allergy to something out there because spring is in full bloom out there, but we are not too sure. I’m thinking it is something she got at work before we left because a couple other folks at work reported similar symptoms. She is pretty much over it now and I think how she managed to get rid of it was by giving it to me. I started with a slight sore throat on Saturday night and today I’m flirting with a runny nose and some body aches. Didn’t I already have this crap once before not to long ago?

Started up, went down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/07: 176

Sunday Stuff

98290 - Snohomish, WAWe were on vacation and did not seek out any Post Offices, but this happened by pure chance. We went into the food store in the same shopping ceter.

We expected a Sebring for our convertible rental in Seattle, but ended up in a PT Cruiser. Not a lot of trunk room in it, more than a Miata, but no where near as much space as in a Sebring. It was a smaller car than we normally get, so you would have thunk it would be easier to maneuver in tight spots, but you would be wrong. It had the turning radius of a bus, which I guess goes right along with the very high seating position. I’ve always kind of liked the looks of the PT Cruiser and the convertible has only 2-doors which I think looks even better than the standard 4-door version, but apparently it is not as distinctive as I thought. On one of our ferry rides we were stopped next to a car load of twenty-something females and the driver asked me what kind of car we were in. I replied, “PT Cruiser.” “Oh,” she says, “I thought it was a Beetle.”

Just over a week ago I was reading Ain’t Chicken where Carol was talking about her first spawn and I was sort of jealous. I’ve been blogging a year and a half longer than her and I’ve never inspired anyone to start blogging. Well, I’m jealous no more, CT started What Do You Drive? last Friday and credited me with “inspiring” him. I’ve of course linked it in the Miata Blogs sections in the sidebar.

A hazy long term memory made me think that I might have actually inspired another one, but my initial search didn’t turn up any evidence. Deeper probing resulted in a confirmation of my original thought, it happened way back in May of 2004 with Rick’s Obsession (that link to me in his post is dead by a couple generations though.)

I’ve also added another category of links for folks who blog that also live in South Carolina, appropriately titled, SC Blogs. So far there is only one link, Random Connections, an upstate blogger who stumbled onto me via my SC Post Office page on Flckr. I will probably go Googling for others in the near future.

Started up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/07: 175

Home Again, Home Again

Home Again, Home AgainWell we made it back home. We were just about 4 hours too late for Gnorm get his photo taken with any of the “Smiling Faces” inside the SC Welcome Center. We spent 6 days in the northwest where it rained one morning and the rest of the time it was sunny with above average temperatures. When we got back to the southeast, it was raining.

It was a mostly uneventful trip back.

When we got to Sea-Tac and checked our bag we were given our boarding passes. Our first flight was number 337 to Phoenix and left from gate A4. When we got to gate A4 it said flight 337 was going to Las Vegas, so did all the digital flight display boards. I got in line at the only US Air counter open to ask where we were flying to while Donna went back down to our gate to see if anyone came to there. I was second in line, but the woman in front of me was taking a long time. Donna found out that the display boards were wrong, some sort of glitch, flight #337 was indeed going to Phoenix.

Unlike the 2-1/2 hours we had to kill at Sky Harbor airport on the way out we had like 15 minutes this time. The Phoenix to Charlotte flight started boarding at 11:25 AM and #337 landed at 11:15 then took 6-7 minutes to pull into it’s gate. By the time we got off the plane it was 11:25. Of course we deplaned at gate A11 which was at one end of the terminal and needed to get to B14 which was at the ned of the next terminal. We were about halfway through our speed walk when us and another couple heading for the same plane were picked up by one of those beeping motorized carts. We made it just as the last of the ticket passengers were boarding. Had we not got the ride, some standby passenger might have gotten our seats.

Much to our surprise our luggage made it to Charlotte. We were convinced it wouldn’t be because of 1) our mad dash to change planes in Phoenix and B) the skycap in Seattle was not too pleased that I didn’t tip him when we checked in. He solicited us from the regular airline queue and we rolled our own bags to his station, all he did was print the boarding passes and tag the bag. I would have given him a buck or two, but all I had was a 10 and a 20 dollar bill.

After we loaded the car, left the airport and got on I-77 south we picked a place to get dinner. Ended up a Ruby Tuesday at the Arrowood exit not too far from the HI Express we spent the night at 8 days prior. The ribs were good, but the Caesar’s Salad and the service left a lot to be desired. When we left to get back on the interstate it got exciting. I hit the on ramp at a good clip and stepped on the go pedal to get to speed and the back end started to come around. Yikes! fortunately it was a three lane on ramp with nearly zero traffic, so I had plenty of room to do a 180 and then a modified 270 trying not to hit the guard rail. Weee! Scared the crap out of Donna, me and the folks in the Audi Q7 a hundred yards behind me. The last 2-1/2 hours and 130 miles were much calmer.

Started up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/07: 175