Here’s all the places I visited last year.
Los Angeles, CA*
Redmond, WA*
Las Vegas, NV*
Bass Lake, CA*
Costa Mesa, CA
Carlsbad, CA
San Ramon, CA
Chico, CA
Honolulu, HI
McMinnville, OR
Edmonton, Canada
Mexico City, Mexico
At least one night was spent in each place. Cities marked with an asterisk indicate multiple visits.
Thanks to Jason Kottke who has recorded his ‘year in cities’ on kottke.org since 2005 for the idea.
While spending a regenerative Christmas vacation in Bass Lake I stumbled upon the poem “Sierra’s Call,” by Clifford Corlieu.
Corlieu left city life behind to settle the valley next to lake, where the waterfall there bears his name. I imagine he was a better mountaineer than poet, but his words retain their wisdom nearly 100 years on. Here’s to “quiet repose” in the grand Sierra, in county Madera!
Sierra’s Call
By Clifford Corlieu
Give me the mountains,
The glorious mountains,
Whose beauties all come from the snows,
Where nature’s hand blesses
The soul with caresses
Of free life and quiet repose
Where free from all business
And commercial fizziness,
And straight jacket ‘ciety rule,
I can eat and drink and slouch it,
And not have to couch it
Neath pretense, or be called a fool
Give me grand Sierra
In county Madera
To live among its great peaks,
With climate that’s peeree,
And forest so deery,
And rainbows a-swarm in its creeks
Where a strenuous hike it
Soon leads you to like it
For it hardens your corny foot mellows,
Expanding your muscle,
Reducing your bustle,
And makes your lungs work like a bellows.
Where camp fare and clime,
Soon make you feel prime;
Make steely your sinew and bone,
Your muscle and bust
Swell out like crust
Often an old time dutch oven baked pone.
Hie then to Sierra’s mountain
Where joys are beyond your countin,
There are fountains of health
And ledges of wealth
Call with favors abounden.
Reprinted the book Exploring The Sierra Vista National Scenic Byway.
“Advertising is fundamentally persuasion, and persuasion happens to be not a science, but an art.”
– William Bernbach
“Perfection is reached not when there is nothing left to add, but when there is nothing left to take away.”
– Antoine de Saint Exupery (1900 - 1944)
Gordon Moore, co-founder and Chairman Emeritus of Intel Corporation and the author of Moore’s Law, personally wished me a happy birthday this year.
This is Mike’s birthday gift to me this year. He’s spending so much time with important billionaires he was a little late getting a card in the mail. I guess I can forgive him.
I was driving back from lunch with Seattle friends I hadn’t seen regularly since 2003. One of them prodded the other to ask how I felt about President Bush. They’re a west coast/blue state/liberal to moderate group and wondered where I stood.
In the intervening years I went from Bush supporter to apologist to feeling totally disenfranchised. It was the Harriet Miers nomination that pushed me over the edge (he’s gone crazy!), but Bush had long since left the reservation, selling-out conservative principles in a gambit
that lost many within his constituent base.
Alan Greenspan, discussing The Age of Turbulence with Tim Russert this morning, summarized my discontent wonderfully:
MR. RUSSERT: You said this: “I think Bill Clinton was the best Republican president we’ve had in a while.” Republican?
MR. GREENSPAN: I’m sure he doesn’t like that joke, but if you look at his record compared to what I think appropriate policy ought to be, he’s for free trade, he’s for globalization, he was for welfare reform, fiscal restraint and—true enough, he’s not a Republican. I’m sorry, President Clinton, I didn’t mean to say that. But I must say, I had to follow an awful lot of your particular guidelines and found them very compatible with my own.
[…]
‘My biggest frustration remained the president’s unwillingness to wield his veto against out-of-control spending. Not exercising the veto power became a hallmark of the Bush presidency. To my mind, Bush’s collaborate-don’t-confront approach was a major mistake. The Republicans in Congress lost their way. They swapped principle for power. They ended up with neither.’”
Who knew that at the end of the Bush presidency that those in the Republican fold would honestly feel Clinton nostalgia?
On Saturday Lowell took me on a 32 mile loop around Maple Valley, Washington.
The weather was cloudy and low 60s and I complained just for the sake of it. Truthfully, the temperature was perfect for riding. Just like the roads out here!
Here I am at the middle of a single-lane bridge across the Green River Gorge.
From What Would Tyler Durden Do… “Thank god Bear Grylls didnt fall into that terrfying crevice in Hawaii. He would have had to hike dozens of feet to get to help. Literally … dozens.”
Two players compete for high scores to an off the wall They Might Be Giants cover. IGN said “Wow. Just wow.”
Fingers, Nemesis and I rolled to Blizzcon 2007 in Anahiem yesterday to mingle with several thousand other rabid Blizzard fans and be amongst the first to play World of WarCraft: Wrath of the Lich King and my personal favorite, StarCraft II.
StarCraft II was running on rows after rows of Intel-sponsored PCs. Anybody could sit down and play either a 20 minute single-player skirmish or a multiplayer battle as either the Terrans or Protoss. And as we’ve come to expect from Blizzard, this first-hands on build, with who knows how many months/years left in development, felt as good as any other developer’s final retail product.
StarCraft’s gameplay is very true to the original. Gone are the hero level characters of WarCraft III or the chokepoints and cover of Company of Heroes. It’s a true back-to-basics approach, fast-paced and simple, that’s sure to sell millions and keep the competitive leagues playing this game for another 10 years.
To my surprise the developer discussion panels were even more in-depth and enthusiastically received than those of the original Blizzcon — I’d say they’re now the biggest fan panels this side of ComicCon.
