Clear skies, Jeppesen. Hello, ServiceNow!

Today is my last day at Boeing / Jeppesen. I will miss all of my colleagues in Information and Knowledge Services there. I'm excited for my new opportunity at ServiceNow, especially to work with such great folks as Toni Mantych, Tony Morales, and Dawn Bunting. I'm also excited to get to know the rest of the team and make work, work better!

Farewell, Young Arius

One of the greatest, Oscar-winning actors of our times has passed away. Godspeed, Mr. Heston!

Charlton Heston starred in many of my favorite movies, chief among them: "Ben Hur", "The Ten Commandments" and "Planet of the Apes". He was in over 125 movie and TV productions, so he was very active.

My wife had the honor of meeting him at a CBA convention. You'll have to ask her about it!

I also appreciate the amount of work he did for the NRA and other conservative organizations. He will be missed!

Red Bull Air Race in San Diego!

We happened to be on vacation in California the week of the Red Bull Air Race in San Diego. Thankfully, our itinerary already included 2 days in San Diego, and the entire family was interested in seeing the race instead of going to the Wild Animal Park.

We even got to see it for free! You could buy tickets to watch it from the Embarcadero, but we went to Seaport Village and found a spot near a fountain where we could see the entire course! It was absolutely incredible. These guys fly at 300+ MPH and have to do very tight maneuvering in a timed course.

We could only see the Pre-Qualifying runs, since we had to start driving back the next day, but it was one of the best, cheapest events of our vacation!

UPDATE: I've made a public album of race pics here.

Ready to RIDE!

I have never ridden a motorcycle before this weekend, but thanks to high gas prices and a gas-guzzling V8 Dodge Dakota, I was highly motivated and even got the nod from my wife to go ahead!

This weekend I took the Basic Rider Course (certified by the Motorcycle Safety Foundation) from Thunder Mountain Harley in Loveland, CO.

It was an AWESOME experience! The instructors, Jeff, Tom and Betty were outstanding. I feel quite prepared for riding a motorcycle safely and responsibly. Here are a few pics:

We rode Buell Blast cycles, and I was the only one in my class to score 100% on the written exam! I did get docked 5 points for going too slow negotiating a curve during the riding evaluation, though. In all, a complete success and I can get my motorcycle endorsement on my drivers license!

Next on the agenda: save up for a bike!

UPDATE: Got my license today, so now I just need gear and that bike!

David Megginson's cool new Airport website

David blogged about an issue with Google maps and their use of a mercator projection (a problem if you want to use Google maps in aviation). His post, which was very interesting, also pointed me to a new website he has created: http://www.ourairports.com/.

This is a very cool website for many reasons:

• You can plot where you have been in the world (via aircraft) and get a KML file of it quickly and easily
• You can get search on any airport and get aviation info, accident history, photos and many other facts!
• You can read comments from other members who have visited these airports

Thanks for creating such a useful service/site, David! I plan to use it for all of my trip planning and tracking! Also, if you are interested, you can see all the airports I've been to here:
http://www.ourairports.com/members/shudson310/

Plaxo now uses OpenID

The folks at Plaxo (http://www.plaxo.com) have done a really nice job with their 3.0 beta. I like the new calendar sync features, and the ability to sync across multiple services (Yahoo, Outlook, Gmail, etc.)

I also like the fact that they are now using OpenID! Life is starting to get easier, now that all of these cool services are coming together!

What I did on my summer vacation

This year has been a big home improvement year, and summer vacation was no different!

Over the 4th of July week I built a dog run (with about 4" of pea gravel at the base):

And we converted the boys' Train theme (complete with working train set around the top of the room) to a NASA theme.

We did have to buy the 4'x6' Shuttle for one wall, but the rest came out of my Lego/NASA/space collection and existing posters that the boys had. I did make the face for the clock on the wall, too, reusing the train clock they previously had. We also plan to get a futuristic bullet train to use with the existing track.

Rain in New York

Okay, this week, it's actually been snow and biting, cold wind.

The Rain I'm talking about is a great restaurant we went to yesterday. Our VP of Publishing Solutions and resident New York expert, consistently provides us with excellent dining recommendations when we are in the Big City.

Rain was no exception. It's an Asian Fusion restaurant with a great atmosphere, and great food. Website is here: http://rainrestaurant.com[Orange Beef Spicy Fried Rice]

Check it out!

He's also taken us to a great Cuban restaurant (named, "Cuba"), though I don't remember the location...[Mojitos!]

Another great recommendation is Jerry's: http://www.jerrysnyc.com. [Brick Roasted Chicken]

Tonight, I went by myself to the Brooklyn Diner on West 43rd. [Chicken Soup]

My lovely wife is flying in tomorrow, since I have to stay over for meetings next week as well and it's our 11th Anniversary! Can't wait to show her the sites!

Happy "Holly" Days!

We welcomed a new member of our family this weekend: Holly!

She's a Soft Coated Wheaten Terrier, and absolutely adorable.

We were planning to surprise the kids on Christmas Day with a puppy, but saw her this weekend and decided it would be better to go with a puppy we really liked early, rather than wait and have one not be available, or have no choice in the personality. Holly and our collie, Duncan, get along famously. They already run and play together.It's fun having a puppy again, except for a few accidents and waking up at 2am, she is very well behaved. I think she has made a great addition to the family. Merry Christmas and Happy "Holly" Days!

Categories: General