The wedding on Sunday was beautiful. Byran had made some small changes to the service to include a few other rituals. And he had written a piece of music that was sung by his sister during the service. Everybody all hung around the church for pictures, then we headed back to the hotel to change and get ready for the reception.
The reception was down in Loveland, as you head into the canyon near Rocky Mountain National Park, and Estes Park. It was all at a little ranch next to a river. Nice spot for everybody to hang out. The usual speeches by family and friends were very emotional. Many of the bridesmaids etc cried non stop most of the night.
Monday was a lazy travel day that ended up being a lot longer than we hoped. We got lunch and made a final fairwell to Cynthia, Roger and Shelly Bermingham, then headed for the airport. Jen and I were scheduled to be on a 8:05PM flight, but we showed up REALLY early to attempt to get on the 5:15 flight. We were 5th and 6th on the standby list, and had close to no chance of getting on the flight. But we were entertained by #1, #2, #3, and i what i think were #7 and #8. #7 we will now call crybaby. So long story short, the first 3 people on the standby list were the biggest assholes i have ever seen in an airport. When the plane had boarded and the flight attendants were counting extra seats, there was a little time to wait. The guy who was #3 got up and stood directly over the gate attendant and started to hassle her. It built up to the point where he was abusive, all the time screaming at her. Jen said, why the fuck doesn't she call security? So 5 minutes later when the gate attendant calls his name and actually is telling him to get on the flight, what do you think he does? Yup, in perfect asshole form he still yells his ass off right in her face. So will #1,2 and Asshole #3 on the plane, #7 and #8 figure that that's the appropriate way to behave. Jen and I realize at this point there is going to be a couple more minutes before they call anybody else, and we're the next 2 on the list. So we watch the show. #7 and 8 stand in the exact position #3 was in. The guy starts a feeble attempt at the asshole approach, but you can tell he's just a wimp. So the girl starts another approach. She starts to cry and make a scene. I'm 30 feet away and Jen and I are both laughing our asses off. At one point, the gate attendant says something that suddenly make the girl smile, and Jen gets worried, that she's just gotten our seats. Nope, i think the gate attendant faked her our and got her hopes up, just to announce that the flight was now full and boarding was complete.
Jen and I now have 3 hours before boarding of our flight, so we screw around and get something to eat. When we show up at the next gate for the new flight, we find a few familiar faces. Crybaby and boyfriend are now waiting for this flight. When boarding starts they are first in line. BUT, they're section had not been called. The gate attendant here tells them to go back and wait for their section to be called. Jen and I get on board. 2 minutes later crybaby is seen coming down the aisle. She tugs her boyfriend into a few seats about 5 row in front of us. I think the show is over. :) I am happy to find that it continues. A few minutes later a guy gets on board and stops just past craybaby, then steps back lookin at his ticket and the numbers over the seats. Well, they'd just plopped down in the first place that they found cause they want to sit together. Guy and flight attendant tell them to move. And they move all of 2 rows to another open 3 seats. I'm already laughing cause i know they're just gonna get bumped again. Sure enough a mother and two kids comes down and looks at the seats. The flight attendant comes down again and tells them to sit in their ASSIGNED seats. The best part about this one is, the kids have no problem lookin at these two dumb fucks. Kids have a great way of saying "What the fuck do you think you're doing?" just by looking at somebody. I was dying. Ok, show over and the flight took off. I imagined somewhere in the back of the plane, as we taxied down the runway, crybaby sitting between two large smelly passengers, sobbing to herself.
flight was uneventful, although jen got a little sick. we both switched off using the ipod and reading Angels and Demons. When we landed we waited for our bags which DID NOT show up on the conveyor. We got worried, but were relieved that they had been on the earlier flight. They were waiting in a little office so no major dilemma.
I got home at about 10:30 after picking up the Ford Exploder from Jen's father. Yup, i still don't have my car. Hopefully i'll get it this week.
I've got 4 Macs and 1 Windows box. The 1 windows box gives me more trouble than all 4 Macs.
thanks to annie for this one
Now its all about writing the code that will do this little trick automatically.
So i read this article on Engadget awhile ago. I loved the entire idea of building a simple remote out of my iPod. While my car was being smog checked today i walked over to the local Radio Shak and bought a few items that would allow me to build my own little IR signal transmitter. I got a Infrared LED, a Panel-Mount LED Holder, and a standard 1/8 inch Phone Plug.
Pull the phone plug apart and cut off the end.
Then remove the rubber stopper from the LED holder and screw the holder into the new cut end of the Phone plug. The other piece of the phone plug also will need to be cut. The metal end that is usually used to crimp the wires in place after they are attached can be removed.
The IR LED will need to have its wires cut down just a little to adjust for the length of the phone plug. I just eyeballed the length and it came out at about 3/8 inch.
Then solder the IR LED onto the phone plug.
Screw the two pieces of the phone plug together now with the IR LED inside.
To make sure your unit is working you can download the little test power.WAV from engadget. Pop it into your iPod and grab your digital camera or video camera. Look at the tip of the new IR unit through your camera. The IR light will become visible through the camera's pickups and you'll be able to see if its working. (Even if you have the "wrong" sound file) Now I've gotta now build a IR detector microphone so that i can record all my remote control signals and set up the sounds on my iPod. But that's tomorrow.
2 hours a day, 10 hours a week, 500 hours annually at least. If you calculate this by comparing it to normal 8 hour work days... It would mean i spend 12.5 work weeks in the car. Just think if i got paid for this!
2. What music is in your car, right now?
40GB iPod means.... all of it. But it doesn't matter what mood i'm in, i can always listen to underworld while driving.
3. What do you do while stuck in traffic? Eat? Sing? Primal scream?
People watch. If you're stuck in traffic, it usually because you've chosen the wrong place to be. People rarely admit that its
their own fault that they are in traffic. So when i've made the mistake and i'm stuck, i watch other people. You always see
really really pissed off people that blame everybody else for their situation. Best entertainment in the world
4. If you could give citations to other drivers for bad behavior, who/what would you ticket?
Speeding in an SUV. Speeding alone is bad enough when you're too close to anybody. BUT you add useless tons of weight and
you're looking at a nice long stopping distance. If you're in a H2 going 90MPH, you have to think this... How far will this 8000
pound piece of shit travel even after i slam on the breaks.
Other than that... here are the minor infractions that i believe should be awarded $50 to $100 fines. Not signaling a lane change or a turn. Talking on the cell phone while driving. Reading the newspaper while driving. Not paying attention in general while driving. Driving at or slower than the flow of traffic while in the fast lane.
5. What's your favorite place/freeway to drive in LA?
This question really misses the point. Its not about where you drive. Its about WHEN you drive. LA has some of the most
beautiful freeways and open streets to drive on. They're all just a pain in the ass to drive any time during normal hours. So if
you make the assumption that all of the following places are driven at 3AM (without the fun of construction), here's my top 10.
1) Pasadena Freeway - 110 anywhere north of downtown los angeles.
2) Mulholland Drive
3) 101 through the hollywood hills
4) downtown 3rd and 4th street tunnels between Hill and Fig
5) Sepulveda Tunnel under the runways of LAX (really really fast)
6) the back road up to the Griffith Observatory - see any episode of A-team or Back to the Future
7) 90 freeway, marina del rey, westbound
8) 6th street exit from the 110 northbound to broadway
9) anything in Los Feliz
10) pick any canyon in the hollywood hills that goes through all the way to the valley
6. What's your least favorite?
Does not matter what time you're there... the fuckin 405 between the 10 and 110.
7. What's the craziest thing you've ever seen another driver do?
Stop completely in the left lane of the southbound 110 freeway around USC and the Coliseum. Turn on his right blinker.
Proceed to make a U turn that ends up leaving him in the right lane going the wrong way. Then as i fly by him, see him make
another U turn to lead him off the off-ramp he had obviously missed.
8. What's the craziest thing you've ever seen left on the side of the road?
The craziest thing i see left on the side of the road is railroad tracks. You drive EVERYWHERE and you still can see the
remnants of the old Red Car Tracks. There used to be a great mass transportation system in Los Angeles. In order to sell more
automobiles, General Motors bought the Red Car System and dismantled it.
Today's Drive in Time Lapse A shot every minute for the duration of the drive. The camera is attached to the back of my rear view.
*******We interrupt this blog entry *******to bring you the *******blue screen of death
(while writing this on my mac, my windows box just went blue)
in old town Pasadena. We had a late reservation and walked in a little early. A good friend of ours Melissa is now working as the Hostess there and we all are surprised to see each other. We blab for a few minutes and then she seats us. Jen and I both know exactly what we want, and order a bottle of wine and are quickly just talking for the first time in awhile. Work has just completely killed both of us. Jen's got a great class this year, but she's already swamped with everything. I'm just always tired. I've been working normal 8 hour days on the other fuckin side of LA, and been working nights at home on as many projects as i can get my hands on. So last night we sta there and talked and had a incredible dinner. We talked to Melissa on the way out for a long time. And during that time the Brewers walked in. (Jen's family's next door neighbors) So it was a little weird seeing all these people. We both came home and promptly went to sleep. We're trying to catch up after the week.
oh, and they're 624bytes.
well its 1 AM now and i've only got sound FX to add now. I think thats going to have to wait til morning. I need to get to work at a decent hour tomorrow.
if you don't get it... go read Dune. (if you really love David Lynch, then watch the movie)
