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filed a complaint with the BBB against the BBB for wasting 20 minutes of my time, i'm not paying you $40/mo in protection money

Finished the Alpine Loop Gran Fondo today, it hurt a lot. The "gravel" climbs were rocky enough that they alone could've been a challenging gravel ride. Garmin: http://connect.garmin.com/modern/activity/601612346 Strava: http://www.strava.com/activities/200990676 Descent from High Knob: Gravel Descent:

Visited K&L and Beltramos. Picked up these: The Benrinnes is fantastic for the money and easily bests any similarly priced non-sherried, unpeated whisky on the market today (a disappearing art, if you ask me). The mezcal is also good. It is deliciously complex but the smoke is a little too challenging for my palate. I think I'll stick with quality tequila in the future. If you love peated floral whisky (think Port Charlotte, Caol Ila, maybe Bowmore and Bunnahabhain), this might be worth a try.

Went for anniversary weekend at a fancy hotel on the beach. It was only 35 blocks away, but it was very 'vacation'.

Pasta with smoked salmon, zucchini, and peas in a cream sauce.

I just ordered a Caran D'ache 849 pen. I will tell you all all about it when it comes. The pen I bought 3 weeks ago is working out just fine. Because Head-Case. Edited: The Fisher refill I have now does take about an inch of writing to get "up to speed" and writing at full darkness if it has not been used for more than about 20min, but it requires very little downforce. Once it is writing properly it just keeeeeps on going. Still no skipping & quite smooth considering its utilitarian origins.

Pffft. I have an old half frame that shoots vertical. Awesome camera.

Got poshed up for a wedding in wine country.

Had a great day today. Thanks for all of the well wishes. Got a big surprise actually, which turned out to be one of the best birthday presents I've ever received. Ironic, because it wasn't intended to be a present and I'm pretty sure nobody even knew that my birthday happened to be today. I was in a bit of a grumpy mood this afternoon as I left for a college event hosted on the other side of the Island when I would have rather been watching the game 162 excitement in a baseball season that I've followed more closely than ever in recent years. But off I went, duty called. It was an event to celebrate the 44th anniversary of the little college that I teach at here in Cayman, the so-called founder's day. Little did I know that I had been selected as one of two inaugural recipients of the first ever (official) teaching award presented by the college during its entire existence. Lucky me. It's nice to feel appreciated. Anyway, it was totally unexpected, and way cool that it happened on my birthday. I didn't even realize that they were introducing "formal" teaching awards today (or that they ever intended to). So I feel honored, yada yada. It's actually nicely framed.

I don't think they mean "caramelized", but I'm not going to complain -- yes, please.

Windows: ZoneAlarm, paid version. Sorry, I've been meaning to get around to finding one for linux, I usually don't worry about it because linux is...whatever the opposite of ubiquitous is..."low profile"? Or I'm doing research, in which case I use WireShark to monitor both incoming and outgoing network activity. But it does nothing to stop it. EDIT: I think linux is finally becoming popular enough to become a concern however.

Nicely done! I got back out, still used the chesty to less than impressive levels of footage but explored some new-to-me sections of the area where I've been riding the MTB the last few years. There's just so much good stuff.

Well, the Microcenter is an evil, evil place and I'm sorry for my wallet.

Here's a little greeting from the OG. Merry Birthday Wayne! Cheers:

Happy Birthday, Wayne! :prettyprincess: Hope it's nice and relaxing after your long trip.

If you and your partner drive an Accord and want to eventually upgrade to something a bit more luxurious and refined then I can't recommend the TLX enough (if it is within your budget!). It was a fantastic and refined ride, smooth, quiet, and it had plenty of power. You'd be amazed at how much of a step of it feels from a loaded Accord. It probably ranked 2nd of the cars I drove. That being said, one of my bosses drives a 2014 Acura TL and I just don't think I can show up at work driving a better car than him. I don't think that would go over well. I crossed any BMW off the list for the same reason. It just didn't feel like a good idea. I also thought about trying the Fusion, but there are a number of them that park in my work parking lot and I don't really love the Aston Martin-y looks of it. Size wise the WRX is slightly smaller than the 6, but still larger than the 3. I sat in the back seat of each of em and they all would be fine, I just liked the slightly bigger size of the WRX and the 6. Those Mazdas are darn fine cars. The dealer lot/showroom had only one 6 on display but about a million 3s. Goes to show which one is the better seller . We actually had to drive to their back-up lot to go try the 6 as the only other 6 was the one in the showroom! -- In the end, it seemed pretty clear to me that each manufacturer made certain trade-offs to hit the 25-30k sweet spot price point for loaded mid-size 4 door sedans. As such, each car has a slightly different flavor. I was really glad to be able to test drive them all and experience it for myself. You can only learn so much from their websites. There is no bad car in the bunch. The market at the 25-30k price point is just too competitive to tolerate anything sub-par. My preference for something sporty but still fine for the types of long highway drives that I have to do for work lead me to the Subaru. Its pretty clear they traded off some of the cabin tech and some of the other luxuries like lane departure warnings, adaptive cruise control, etc. that the rest of the competition has. It was a trade-off I am willing to make, but definitely we all will have different priorities.

Happy birthday! Hope you haven't needed to spend any money on razor blades this month.

Got out on the MTB again today and started playing with the chesty that I picked up this week. Didn't get the angle right the first time but the few stills that I accidentally took actually came out ok somehow.... It was a great day, temps in the mid 70s, not so many leaves on the ground as to completely obscure the trail. I'm going to head back out tomorrow afternoon which is supposed to provide the same weather all over again. I've already reconfigured the mount so with a little luck I'll have usable footage.

After a long day of test driving I decided to go with the Subaru WRX! I'm super excited. It was an absolute blast to drive. You lose a lot of the tech features on some of the other cars I drove but it feels like you get a more sporty car in return. I just wish I knew how to drive manual so that I might be tempted by the STI version. That being said, I wouldn't be caught dead showing up to a meeting driving a car with a wing on it, so just going regular WRX, no STI. I also really liked the Mazda 6. IMO it was the best looking car inside and out that I drove today, but it just needs a little more ooomph. If they ever do a MazdaSpeed 6 now that would really be something. Mazda is on to something here. I sat in (but didn't drive) the Mazda 3 as well. Its a great looking car, but the 6 felt a lot less cramped on the inside. Sat in a Miata too. It felt great when the top is down. It felt really cramped with the top up. I wish I could get one as a secondary car. The Camry SE was also very impressive. I've always thought of the Camry as being boring, but it was quite a bit more sporty than the exterior would lead you to believe. The V6 had plenty of get-up-and-go and the handling was very good. The 2015 model looks like it is going to be a great buy. I looked at the Avalon as well but it didn't look like it was for me. Also drove the Acura TLX. A bit more pricey, but its a hell of a lot more than an Accord Plus. This car had the best tech of the ones I drove by a mile. In fact, it was really the only car where the tech made much sense to me. On the downside, I did not at all care for the 9 speed transmission. Yeah, it made for smooth acceleration but it killed the sporty feel. Even in sport mode. Still, probably my 2nd or 3rd favorite. Last was the Accord V6. Yeah... I've driven Accords before. The V6 is surprisingly responsive, but the car had floaty handling compared to the others. They don't seem to offer a V6 4-door model with a sporty suspension. I was wondering whether or not a TLX would be worth the price premium over the loaded Accord, but now I don't need to wonder anymore. It absolutely is if you can spring it. At the end of the day, the Subaru is for me. It has a sporty suspension without being too unforgiving, and its an absolute blast to drive around. I can't wait to go bombing around in it. Thanks everyone for all the advice! Edit: This review basically matches my impressions exactly.

This week at SF Jazz, we saw some jazzy classical and some classy classical jazz. On Wednesday we saw the Calder Quartet with Christian McBride, performing Bartok's quartet nos. 1 and 4. The quartet played #1 themselves and it sounded amazing in Miner Auditorium. Then Christian McBride came out and improvised for awhile on his own, which was good as always even if a little incongruous for the program. All five came out for the second half of the show, which featured quartet #4. There are five movements, which were played just by the Calders, but in between each movement the Calders and/or Christian would play an interlude. They were some short early pieces by Bartok called Microcosmos, something by another composer I am spacing, and some improvisations as well. Finally, they all played Bartok' Romanian Dance together. All in all, a really nice program. Last night, we saw The Cookers, and it is hard to imagine another group with this much jazz history on one stage today: Billy Hart (drums), Cecil McBee (bass), Eddie Henderson (trumpet), David Weiss (trumpet), Billy Harper (tenor sax), Donald Harrison (alto sax), and George Cables (piano). They were on fire from rehearsal (according to SF Jazz folks) through their two sets that totaled almost 2.5 hours. They are playing 11 cities in 14 days to promote their new album, which they pulled from for the second set. The first set had amazing renditions of Cecil McBee's Peace Maker, Billy Harper's Croquet Ballet (originally recorded with Lee Morgan), and a Freddie Hubbard tune. Powerful stuff that had some old timers in the audience fleeing due to high decibel levels and the blast of the trumpets and saxes. I was in the fourth row and leaned in most of the time. As an indication that this was a special night, Bobby Hutcherson was in attendance and stayed and clapped with his oxygen canula in place all the way through the incredible encore, Billy Harper's Priestess (with amazing bass intro by Cecil McBee and drum solo by Billy Hart). Seriously good stuff.

I'd still lean towards Ubuntu because fanboi.

Great shots Ari. Some more from the weekend.

You know what I like about some of your posts? You're not afraid to say what everyone else is thinking. You manage to say it without malice, and without fanboism at the same time. Also, you sometimes just go off the deep end into left field. You're not afraid to say what no-one else is thinking.