Five days after back surgery

Today is the fifth day after having laser back surgery to remove a bulging L5-S1 disc in my back. Overall, I'm feeling pretty good. Taking into account that this was major back surgery, I'm doing really well. I do notice some pain in my right leg yet, which is a little disappointing, but I just have to remind myself that everything is still healing. I try to remind myself by putting things in perspective. If I had elected to have traditional back surgery, I'd probably still be laying in a hospital bed. Instead, I've been walking around since the day after surgery, and it's kind of been life as normal, although I'm not supposed to lift anything heavier than 10 pounds, and I need to be careful when bending and twisting.

Trip to Pau, France

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Originally uploaded by mechanicaldan1

Here are a few pictures of the trip to Pau, France that Dena and I took. She has a lot more photos, and they'll be better too. My pictures were taken with my fixed focus mobile phone camera. It was also Halloween the day before we arrived, so that should explain the funny picture of me. Oh yeah, and there was alcohol involved.

Here's the link to the pictures: http://www.flickr.com/photos/lifeasmechanicaldan/sets/72157603088020107/

Visiting Paris, France for the first time

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Originally uploaded by mechanicaldan1

I am still alive, I've just been crazy busy with work. I've been flying all over. I was going to be in Pau, France for a week, and we were flying through Paris, so Dena came along with me. It was really nice to have her along, especially when she showed me around Paris and I had a free translator. We had about 10 hours from when we arrived in Paris until our flight left, so we hopped on the Metro and headed downtown.

Go here for some of the pictures: http://www.flickr.com/photos/lifeasmechanicaldan/sets/72157603083749570/

General update on October 3

It's been nice to be home for a little while, after the wirlwind tour of Europe that I had been on. I spent Sunday in the garage working on the Ducati. The clip-ons that I ordered had come in weeks ago. They are really nice, quality pieces. Unfortunately, they aren't a perfect fit, so I've been having to add some shims under the clutch and brake perch to make them fit without hitting the clipons. I didn't make very much progress due to the issues, so the Ducati is still in pieces. It was a little shame because after numerous cold days, Saturday and Sunday were warm. I need to install the additional light fixtures I bought for the garage, so that there will then be enough light for me to work on the bike after work. Life's ongoing little projects...

My official patent application

Patents sure take a long time. I originally came up with my idea for a new down hole tool back in 2005, and the application has now officially been published! If you're at all interested, you can view it here. There is a view Images button to see the pictures, but you'll have to download some software to do it. If you want, click on the Images button, and then click on Help. Then you'll have to click on the first link, and then read the instuctions from there.

Roadtrip to Kristiansand, Norway

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Originally uploaded by mechanicaldan1

What a crazy couply of weeks. Last night I drove from Stavanger to Krisitiansand. My first roadrip in Norway, and I didn't get lost. The drive was absolutely beautiful. It took about 3.5 hours to get here. The road wound along the coast. It's not that far in distance, but the road was so windy that I was struggling to maintain 60 KPH. Yes, kilometers/hour which is around 37 MPH. It was a blast trying! I stopped to take the first photo in the set, which is me standing in the middle of a walking path. Then I realized how long it would take if I stopped to take photos as often as I wanted, so I just started taking them from the car. This tunnel picture turned out pretty cool.

When I arrived in Kristiansand and checked into my hotel, they only had one room left, so I got the Honeymoon Suite! Sweet!!! It's the size of an apartment. I love the view as it overlooks the harbor and town on the pretty side. The other side overlooks the shipping container business.

Here are all the photos.

YouTube videos

My previous post got my mind running in a bunch of directions. I ended up registering on YouTube and up loading an old FSAE video of me driving after returning from our 2004 competition.

It's still being processed at the time of this post, but here's the VIDEO

And then, due to having Legos on the brain, I seached for Lego on YouTube. There are some funny videos. Here's one that caught my eye. I like the ending.

Copenhagen, Denmark is awesome!

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Originally uploaded by mechanicaldan1

I flew to Copenhagen on Friday to visit with a customer. On the taxi ride to the office, I quickly fell in love with the city. The variety of architecture was just stunning! There are so many more colors and variety of buildings compared to Aberdeen. My hotel reservatation was right the part of the city center called "the Square", which was also the name of my hotel.
View Larger Map Fit me just perfect. The room was very modern and European, for lack of a better term. I do have to appoligize for the pictures. Dena's away on her own little vacation with a friend of her's, and they took the Sony digital camera to Nice, France, so I was trying to do my best with my camera phone. No zoom, no auto-focus, no flash, and I had to stop breathing as I snapped the pictures, so they wouldn't come out fuzzy. The pictures are better than my last phone, but still not up to par with my 5 year old Sony digital camera.

The first couple pictures (other than the one of me) were snapped from my hotel room window. I then took a little walk down one of the walk streets leading away from the Square. Walk streets are a bit like a mall in the states, with shops and food on both sides, and about the same width, except that you are outside, and when it's raining you get wet. I stepped into a toy store after passing a huge Lego window display. I guess it was a bit of habit from when I was younger. They now have remote controlled and robotic Lego kits. Hmm, seems the Legos have grown up too. The good thing is, I no longer have to wait for my birthday or Christmas to get a set. Luckily, I didn't have a large suitcase along, so I left the store and continued walking.

I walked for 8-10 blocks before finally stopping at a cafe for supper. I had a wonderful open-faced smoked tuna sandwich with fresh greens and scrammbled eggs on top. The sun came out as I was eating, and some of the pictures were taken on the way back. I liked all the statues and fountains in just a small area of town. A few other things that stood out during my visit were the wind turbines that were along the shore and easily seen from the customer's office. I really like that some countries are moving forward on clean energy generation. Wind energy is growing in the US also, but we are trailing the world, and will hopefully have some big offshore wind farms going up soon offshore Texas and somewhere on the east coast of the US. It was also really great to see Copenhagen having a fairly massive public transportantion system. I saw buses and trains, along with plenty of taxis. What really shocked me was how many bicycles there were. It was like I was on some massive college campus. There were bikes everywhere, and lot of places to park them, AND lot of people of all ages riding them. When I returned to the airport to fly back home, there was a Lego display for Vestas wind turbines. I was a Lego Maniac when I was younger, so it was expecially appealing to me having both interests.

I was only in Copenhagen for one afternoon/evening, but I sure enjoyed it, and hope I have reason to spend more time there.

Jet settin'

Been working lots. I'll be going to Copenhagen, Denmark on Friday for a meeting, flying home Saturday morning, then Stavanger, Norway on Sunday for some internal training, then driving to Kristiansand, Norway on Tuesday night to give a presentation on Wednesday, then flying to Bukarest, Romania on Thursday for a meeting on Friday, and then flying home. Yep, I'm officially a jet setter.

My new drink of choice

I'm addicted to caffeine. It's not a bad thing, unless you move to a foreign country where they don't sell your favorite caffeinated beverage that you've been addicted to since high school. You become like a junkie, trying new products to get your "fix". Yeah, not having Mountain Dew over here troubled me for about the first 2 months. I was trying to like coffee, then tried tea. I could get Pepsi and Coke, but they have so much carbonation I was burping all the time. I tried the soft drink of Scotland called Irn Bru, but it just wasn't quite right. They have Red Bull here, and that worked for a while, but those little 8 ounces go down so quickly. Then I tried Lucazade Energy and I liked it. It was a happy balance of a soft drink in a bottle with a nice selection of flavors, but I still wanted something with a little more caffeine. I did get a fix of Mountain Dew for about a week, when Dena found that there is a Baskin Robbins Ice Cream shop in town that sells it. She bought me a 12 pack. I love her! It wasn't cheap though, and it was the only place in town to get it. Then one day while I was at a gas station about ready to grab a Lucazade Energy, I noticed a new fancy bottle with "Caffeine Boost" on it. So, I bought 2 and just about instantly fell in love. The only flavor is Lemon Plus, and it tastes just right. It's in a bottle, so it doesn't spill in the car, and there are 80 mg of caffeine in a 500 mL bottle, which is just about what Mountain Dew has in a 16 oz bottle. The stuff is lovely and makes me happy!

The combination of walking around town more, and not drinking so many liquid calories had made me loose almost 15 lbs. When I left the US, I was around 223, and now I'm around 208. We'll see how long I stay at this new weight.

You just never know when...

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Originally uploaded by mechanicaldan1

...you might almost get into a car accident. I've been over in Norway for almost a week now on business, and was riding with a co-worker on the way to dinner to meet some customers, when we almost got hit by a car. It was close. We were in the middle of a rounabout, when this black VW Golf enters the roundabout and just about slams into the passenger side of the car. I was on the passenger side and got to see the entire surreal thing. It was almost...like one of those Volkswagen commercials where the people are talking inside the VW, and then WAM!!! Luckily, my co-worker was watching the car and expected it, and slammed on the brakes just in time to avoid a collision. Unlukcily, the girl driving the VW swerved, ran over a center median after leaving the roundabout, and overcorrected and crashed into a ditch and drove over a sign. The two girls were OK, just very shaken.

You just never know when "it" might happen to you. So, give your significant other a hug, enjoy a sunny day, stay in touch with friends and family, stop to smell the roses, and overall try to enjoy life to the fullest.

Things to do around Aberdeen and Scotland

I thought I would try to make it a little more enticing for people to come and visit by adding a section that has hyperlinks to things to do around Aberdeen and Scotland. Dena and I will hopefully be able to get out and see more of Scotland as our house gets settled. We've been spending most of our weekends organizing the house, doing housework, or doing yardwork. I want to get out and see things and have fun! I missed the Great Britian Beer Festival , but I did find out with a little more surfing that there is one coming up in Aberdeen! The Aberdeen & North East Beer Festival will be be at Pittodrie Stadium November 22-24, which unfortunately is Thanksgiving Day for most of you back home. I'll try to get events posted to my Google Calendar, so you can see what's coming up, and so Dena and I have fun things to do.

It's Wonderful Wednesday!!!

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Originally uploaded by mechanicaldan1

What a great day it's been! It's just one of those days where the karma planets are aligned and everything goes your way. Today was simulateously one of those days for both Dena and I. My day started with a great ride to work on my motorcycle. There was an issue at work, but things all worked out by noon. Our collosal plle of cardboard was picked up by the moving company. The care package from Dena's godmother arrived with a bunch of goodies from the states.
Our US based HSBC bank account information arrived, so I can finally transfer money a LOT easier from US dollars to British Pounds. We finally heard back from the real estate agent that the owners of our house have agreed to pay to fix the hole in the wall in our master bedroom, and we get to paint it any color we want and won't have to repaint it before we leave. AND, the best news is that we picked up our BMW!!!


I've uploaded the first pictures of our shiny, white BMW 120d. It was really fun picking it up from John Clark BMW. Chris, our salesman, has been super friendly and helpful the entire way. I especially enjoyed having him show Dena and I all the little features of our car, and was just dumb-founded when he told me that the car does not have a dipstick to check the oil. No dipstick? Really, no dipstick! There are sensors that feed back to the computer to tell the level of the oil and the oil pressure. I'm kind of doubting if I'll ever have to open the hood while we're here. There isn't really a key to speak of, more of just the keychain remote. Our BMW is equiped with the comfort access, so the remote can just stay in our pocket. I just have to push the button on the dash to start the car. It really is a nice little car. It has LOTS of torque, and just had to do a little burnout since it was raining. The traction control light on the dash came on and fused at me.

I've also uploaded some pictures of some of the rooms in our house. As I've said, we're still unpacking boxes, but have a look around. I plan to add pictures as we make progress in each of the rooms, so that we can watch the progress. I snapped a picture of our house keys and remote on the kitchen counter. I thought the picture instantly points out that it wasn't taken in the states. The outlets are huge, and they all have their own on/off switch. The electric kettle for heating water for tea, and if you look close enough, you might find a reflection of me. There is also our house keys which have some skeleton keys on the keychain.

Not quite Edward Scissorhands and other random rants from Aug 11-12

On Friday, I brought my rear rim from my Kawasaki in and had a brand new Pirelli Dragon Corsa III rear tire installed. The III is for the three different compounds of rubber. The center is a harder compound than the edges, so I should get longer mileage, and still have really sticky edges when I'm leaned over. The weather has definately gotten better, and it's sunny more often, but still very cool. Most days don't get any higher than 70°F. It's like eternal Spring. I love it!

The hedges in our backyard have been looking a bit "bushy", so on Saturday I busted out the hedge trimmer. I had momentary grand visions of Edward Scissorhands, but anyone that has groomed hedges knows that they take years of grooming to fill out to a specific shape. I just eyeballed as straight of an edge on the top and sides as I could. Good enough for rental property. My forearms took a bit of a beating, and look like I was playing rough with an angry kitten.

We unpacked some more boxes, and are getting pretty close to being done. The pile of broken down cardboard boxes is over half way to the ceiling in our Dining Room. Dena's couch and chair that she had recovered for the reading room should be delivered this week, and the TV console and end tables for the living room should come in also. Funny thing is that we don't have a TV yet, which is another interesting topic, as I've just started to become aware that analog TV will be going away over the next 5 years. This is happening globally, as all the countries are switching to digital TV. So, if we buy a TV, we need to make sure that the digital signal works both in the UK and US, and the power cord can be plugged in both the UK and US.

The best news came just a couple of hours ago. Our Salesman, Chris at BMW called, and said we can pick up our car on Wednesday! I'm so excited!!!

Kawasaki pictures

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Originally uploaded by mechanicaldan1

I finally took the time to take a few pictures of my Kawasaki. I've always liked the blue. Overall the bike is pretty decent. The rims lips are polished, there is an undertail cover and a painted rear fender. I have a blue windshield to install and an anodized blue slip-on exhaust as soon as I can get the broken bolt out of the hole. I also snapped a picture of my garage and of the tires after a ride home after work tonight. It's really sweet to be able to scuff the tires just on the way home. The swingarm must be at a slightly different angle than my old 900RR. I've been able to really pin the throttle a few times on the Kawasaki, and it's fast, but it doesn't come up and wheelie as easily as my Honda would. That's actually a pretty good thing.

Motivational bike pics

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Originally uploaded by mechanicaldan1

I was sent a link to these photos from a co-workers. I've saved the Adventure on as my current background. There's just something about seeing a brand new GSX-R in a foot of water. Most of the pictures came from http://www.mac-pac.org/temp/motivation.html Have a laugh as you read through all 24 pictures. Enjoy.

Awesome ride to work, house progress

Wow, what a fantastic ride to work this morning. It was raining, a bit cool, and traffic was backed up for miles. Normally, in the states, this would not have been a good ride, but here, in Scotland, where I can legally lane split and ride in between cars and trucks made it a AWESOME ride. I had a grin on my face from ear to ear. Oh, and it gets better. Many times, cars will actually move over and give you more room! I'm pretty sure I've arrived in biker heaven. Want more proof? On just a normal ride to or from work, when I arrive, my tires are plenty warm, and the rubber on the edge of my tires is all scuffed. It's just wonderful how much lean angle I get riding to and from work. I'll take a picture sometime this week. On Friday, I'm getting a new sticky Pirelli Dragon Corsa rear tire. Wo Ho!

Dena and I got a lot accomplished on the house over the weekend. I cleaned the garage, so I can actually work on the bikes. I did manage to bleed the brakes on my Ninja, and they are better, but still not great. Our new bed came in during the middle of last week, so we're actually sleeping on a bed, instead of on the floor. It shouldn't make that much of a difference, but I'm sleeping a lot better. We managed to unpack a few more boxes. I've found that all our lamps can be easily converted with just a 240V bulb and some new plugs. On Sunday, Dena and I did some yard work, and started the process of grooming the back yard hedges into a somewhat defined shape. We also painted her upstairs Art Room a very bright green. It literally dried to Kawasaki lime green!

Saturday night, I played with my phone a little more. The HTC S710 is really brilliant. I've been a little bummed that my company SIM card has the internet deactivated, but the phone does have Wi-Fi, so I play with it at hotspots around town, and at home on our wireless network. I was trying to send MMS messages, but I stumbled on to setting up email accounts. I was able to have email from my Yahoo, Gmail, and my work email all pushed to my phone. I wasn't on Internet Explorer, my email was being pushed directly to my phone. Maybe this isn't too big of a deal, as the phone can do all this, but it was really easy to set up. What makes email and texting really nice is the slide out keyboard. I can also edit Word, Excel, Power Point, and read PDF files. I'm just impressed with how much can be done on mobile phones, in some fashion, that laptops could 10 years ago.

Let's take a poll

Blogger added a new poll feature, so I'm going to try it out. I wanted to know how often people check my blog. I probably need to write more for you to read more. I'll work on that.
I've been putting a lot of hours in at work, which probably isn't surprising, considering I was brought over here to help increase business.

A beautiful night for a motorcycle ride

We finally have insurance on our motorcycles, so Dena and I went for a short ride. This is the first time we've ridden the motorcycles. We just shoved them in the back of the van when we bought them, without riding them. First impressions are that the Ducati rides wonderfully. The suspension and brakes are top notch. The motor is very torquey and does not like to be revved. It's taking Dena a little bit to get used to, and I need to lower it so she is more comfortable on it. The automatically retracting kick stand is taking a little getting used to. I think it's a great bike, but needs one immediate change. The clip-on handlebars are mismatched. I have no idea why, but they are different, which means that your left hand and wrist are in a noticeabley different position than your right hand. The Kawasaki is less refined, but I can just tell it's going to be crazy fast. It's geared tall, so I will probably get a smaller front sprocket for it. I think I rode around most of last night in first gear only. You just finally shift to second at 40 mph. The front brakes are only OK, compared to the Ducati. They need to be bled, and could really use different brake pads and braided stainless steel brake lines. The seat is hard, but I don't notice all that much due to all the movement during riding around roundabouts. We both had a lot of fun even if the ride lasted less than an hour.

Roses and a Newel Post

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Originally uploaded by mechanicaldan1

Dena snapped some pictures of the roses in our front yard. Our roses are red, pink, yellow, and orange. They add some much needed color to the gray and green of Aberdeen. The grass in the backyard is growing quickly due to all the rain.
We finally have an internet connection at home! We streamed some KRVS on Saturday. It was so nice to have a some Cajun music and DJs to listen to. If anyone has some other streaming radio stations they listen to, drop me an email with the address. I got an update from our BMW salesman. He said the car should be arriving in August, but I didn't get a date. I'm getting really excited.
We're making decent progress unpacking all our boxes. Our master bedroom is still on pause due to needing a decent amount of repair work. In the lease negotiations, the owners agreed to let us paint various rooms, but it's kind of disappointing that they left one of the rooms that we wanted to paint is such bad condition. There is literally a large hole in one of the walls. The property manager is sending someone this coming week, so maybe we'll get to paint the room next weekend? We're not in too big of a hurry, as we ordered some bedroom furniture. It'll be a couple weeks before it comes in.
If you didn't know, a newel post is the post that is at the top or bottom of a staircase. The newel post in our house in Aberdeen is not special, but it's causing a lot of special problems. Things are just different here, and for whatever reason, the newel post is 33 inches from the wall instead of 36 inches. Why does three inches matter? Well, it's the distance that would be needed to let our queen size box spring up stairs. It's also what is preventing our new bedroom furniture from going up the stairs. We just fell in love with some solid teak pieces that have marble inlays. After much discussion of possibly having our bedroom downstairs, we decided against it. Upstairs, there is a very large window that swings open to the side in the room that will be Dena's art studio. We've figured that the furniture pieces will go through the window. After a few days of talking over different options, we're pretty sure we can buy a couple of extension ladders and drag and push the pieces up the extension ladders, with a lot of help from my coworkers. It's not the most delicate option, but due to the position of the newel post at the bottom of our stairs, it's the best option we could come up with. If we had bought the house, a saws-all would have been the quickest option. :)

Finally moved into new house, and used the hovermower.

We finally moved into our new house in Aberdeen. The lease was written that we have the house for a year and then it goes in to month-by-month payments. Hopefully the owners, who moved to London, will be there for 2-3 years also, so that we don't have to move a second time while we're in Scotland.
The house is really nice, and we love it more and more as we spend time in it. It really was the best choice for our needs. The house is so much bigger than our little temporary Skene Apartment that Dena and I have to call out and ask where the other person is in the house when we want to talk.
My head just barely clear the doorways, as long as I slouch a little as I walk through them. The fridge is tiny, so it's taking a little getting used to. We've definately be shopping weekly. We met our neighbors that we share a driveway with. Very nice couple.
Our back lawn needed serious mowing, but the lawnmower that was left in the garage didn't have a cord. I borrowed one from our new neighbor, and got to learn the obvious lesson that one should know when using an electric lawn mower, which is: Don't run over the cord. Well, I did, so I got to splice it back together and finished the yard. The lawnmower is best described as a hover mower. It's a bit weird, but works. When you grab the safety handles and push the on button, the motor spins to lift, and slightly lifts the mower off the ground.

Wonderful weekend in a crapy van

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Originally uploaded by mechanicaldan1

What a long and crazy weekend! One week ago, Dena and I were simply looking at bikes online, and a week later we now own two of them. Dena wanted a Ducati, and after a few searches of Ebay and Bike Trader, we found a nice '98 Ducati 600 SuperSport in yellow that she liked, but it was 350 miles away. I bid on a '98 Kawasaki ZX-9R on Ebay and won the auction, and it's about 400 miles away. So, Dena and I start making plans to get the bikes in one trip. After several phone calls to van rental agencies without any vans, we finally find a place that will rent us a van. Dena finds a cute hotel in a town about half way between both bikes. I email the owner of the ZX-9R to let him know I'm coming to get the bike, but someone else has already picked up my bike from the owner! So, back on Ebay, and luckily I found a second blue '98 ZX-9R, and after a quick phone call to the owner because he posted his mobile number, I go for the Buy It Now. Even better is that it's closer to the Ducati. I pull cash out on Thursday, and we're driving South in a terribly uncomfortable van on Saturday morning. The weather is fairly nice with mostly sunny skies, and the occasional shower that passes quickly. After driving 350 miles, and taking a wrong turn after I confuse right with left, we arrive at the Ducati's home. The Duck looks OK, so exchange money for bike, and load it into the back of the van. Away we go to find the hotel. It's dark, I'm not wearing sun glasses, we have a full tank, no smokes, so we hit it. Roll into Sheffield at around 11:30 PM, find hotel, check in, quick shower, check out for the night.
We wake up Sunday morning, and have a quick continential breakfast for the first time together in England! The hotel has been converted from three old houses, so it's a fun maze of short stairs up, down, left, and right. I get a text from the Kawi owner, so I call him back and give him an ETA. We check out and hit the road. Once again, get lost, but find the Kawi. Looks good, so load it into the van, and start the drive back to Aberdeen.
Heading south, we went through Glasgow following Google maps directions. Dena picks a more direct path on the way back North, and we end up driving through Edinburgh on a back road. The drive was really beautiful. It was nice to be off the main motorway and checking out England and Scotland. We arrived back in Aberdeen around 9:00 PM, and unloaded the bikes at our new house and parked them in the garage for the first time!

When it rains, it pours

It's been a crazy week. Suddenly, after a few weeks of not much happening, everything is now happening at once. I bid on a motorcycle on E-bay and won it, but someone else picked up the bike. So, I bid on another bike and won it, and talked to the seller personally so that he wouldn't sell it to another person. Then, we've also spotted a motorcycle for Dena. So, we've been planning a road trip this weekend. It was also a little madness to try to rent a van, after the first place we called didn't have any vans for rent in all of Scotland. To make matters more stressful, it's been a pain in the ass to get our money from our US bank transferred to our UK account. We did figure out an alternative, so we're going to buy a Kawasaki ZX-9r and a Ducati 600 SS this weekend.
The lease was FINALLY approved, so we picked up the keys this afternoon to our house! Dena worked on arranging for the movers to bring our stuff. Luckily, they had a cancellation, so our stuff will be at our house on Tuesday. Otherwise, we would have had to wait until the end of July to move in.
Oh, and it's the rainiest summer in Scotland in the last 50 years. Happy, happy, joy, joy. :)

BMW 1-series coupe coming to America

It's official that the BMW 1-series is coming to the US. The US version will be a coupe, not a hatchback, and it will have the 2 biggest gasoline engines, not the diesels. An Autoblog article covers the release pretty well. Apparently the 3-series was getting too big, and there was a need for a little sports coupe reminent of the 2002. So, bring over the 1-series, and hopefully it'll be a big hit. I'm really hopeful that BMW will be bringing over diesel engine choices soon. A second introduction of cars with diesel engines has begun, and hopefully Americans latch onto them as hard as they have in their big pick-ups. Bring on the 50 mpg clean diesel cars!
I'm getting really excited about taking delivery of our 120d. We finally placed the order and it should be coming in toward the end of July. :)

iWait for iPhone

iAdmit that the iPhone is cool. I couldn't help but share a little happiness with the guy in the photo from a Forbes article. If a picture is worth a thousand words, then I think it's the best one I've seen regarding the iPhone mania. I do hope Apple has a lot of success. I think this huge reaction to a mobile phone points to a turning point in mobile technology. Do I want one? Simple answer is no. I finally got my new HTC S710 smartphone running Windows Mobile 6.0 and am really happy with it. No, it doesn't have a touchscreen, but it does have a sweet slide out keyboard.

A sunny day in Aberdeen

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Originally uploaded by mechanicaldan1

Dena and I took a walk around our neighborhood and down Union St. to blow off some steam. The temporary accomodations are starting to get to us. We're expected as much, knowing that it was going to be stressful completely uprooting and moving to a foreign country. I'm sure glad that we have less than two weeks until we get to move into our house. It'll be really nice to see our stuff. I'm tired of the shower curtain that is so close it touches me constantly. I'm tired of having to close the kitchen door so that we can open the refrigerator. I'm tired of the nasty couch pillows that blow feathers out when you lean on them. I'm annoyed by the noisy kitchen and bathroom fans that seem to make more noise than move air. Yeah, this is an honest post. I love being here, but just like home, there are days that suck. Today, for whatever reason the alarm sounded at it's set time, but refused to shut off. I pushed every button on it, turned the switch on/off/whatever, and it just kept blaring. I finally turned the volumn down to nothing. I'm about to go to bed, and it wouldn't surprise me if it's still ringing. It's not always sunny, and lately it hasn't been sunny often, but when it is, it's very lovely as you can see in the pictures.

Looking forward to our BMW 1-series

I'm really looking forward to getting our BMW 1-series. I've been in contact with a couple dealers, and have been trying to figure out where to go on the internet to get the dealer cost for a car. Well after brousing the forum on babybmw.net I found someone refering people to broadspeed.com to find out how much they could have saved. I checked it out, and yep, it's what I was looking for. Cost on the vehicle and every individual option. I spec'ed a car, and will follow up on the email tomorrow.
I went back to babybmw.com to surf a little more and came across this great video. Reminds me of my days with my Lightning. The car in the video is a 130i. Very sweet! They are supposed to be bringing the BMW 1-series to the US as a coupe, so maybe when I get back? Enjoy the video. I sure did.

A drive along the coast

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Originally uploaded by mechanicaldan1

Dena and I took another short road trip. This time we headed south out of town on A92. We decided to take a trip along the coast. It was overcast, but still beautiful. We stopped a few times to enjoy the scenery and take some pictures. Enjoy.

What a great week for being a techie! Wireless Electricity

Yep, wireless electricity, being dubbed "WiTricity" by the MIT scientists. Very cool stuff.

MIT Team Powers Light Bulb Without Wires

MIT WiTricity Press Release

iPhone vs HTC Touch (aka P3450)

The techie in me is really excited. Yesterday, HTC, maker of many mobile phones and PDAs for numerous mobile phone services announced a direct competitor to the Apple iPhone, and it's available NOW. Well, it's available in the UK and Europe now, and will be available in the US later this year. Apple's iPhone is set to be released at the very end of June in the US, and then become available in the UK and Europe later this year. The Touch has a "touch" interface just like Apple's iPhone, except it runs Microsoft Windows Mobile 6.0 software. So, it's going to be really intersting to see how the two devices battle it out. I'll give the iPhone a few points for coolness, but it has been announced that it will probably be locked down, so you won't be able to add 3rd party programs. For user friendliness, the Touch is a clear winner. It's very tiny, and will allow you to add games, videos, music, pictures, programs, whatever to your heart's content, and it'll sync very nicely with Outlook. You'll also be able to open, view, and edit Word, Excel, and PowerPoint files and view PDF files as you're checking your email on the go.

As cool as the Touch and iPhone are, I've had my eye on the HTC S710 aka the Vox. It's a perfectly pocketable candybar phone with a HUGE screen, slide out keyboard, and runs Mobile 6 software. I love all the features like Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and is a quad band phone so I can use it anywhere in the world. It's going to be a great upgrade from my Audiovox SMT5600, which is kind of a great-grandfather to the S710. In just 2 short years, mobile phones and PDAs have come such a long way. The only thing really missing from the Vox is GPS, and HTC is rumored to have a phone like the Vox with GPS that will probably be released later this year. Dena and I went mobile phone shopping two weeks ago, and Vodafone had one in stock, so the sales rep let me play with it for a few minutes in the store. Mmm, candy!

Dena's point of view

I just had to post my wife's comments from a recent email, as they are pretty damn funny. Enjoy.

"Life for the most part has been business as usual, with Dan working and fantasizing over the BMW catalogues and me being awe-struck by some-or-other British behavior that tickles me. I refuse to write another yawning epic like last week (you’re welcome!); instead, here are the things I found interesting lately in a bite-sized, easy to digest format:

- Legal smoking age in the UK : 16
- Number of hotel employees to take a dump in my toilet: 2 – the electrician and the housekeeper. While I was there.
- Number of cathedrals converted into bars: 3, so far – the big one on Union is called “Soul”
- Local electronica hits: “This is My Church and God is the D.J.”
- Accepted unit of measurement for distance: miles (thank God), inches, etc – the Imperial System
- Accepted unit of measurement for weight/volume: grams, liters, etc – the Metric System
- Number of Brits who think this is wacky – 0
- How to say “zero”, “nothing”, or “none” in Brit: naught or nil
- How to say “pee”, like, “you can pee in my toilet, but please don’t poo”: wee
- How to say “a little” or “some”: wee or tad
- Number of Brits who don’t think “pee” and “a little” should get the same word: nil
- Name of Domino Pizza’s “Meat Extravaganza”: Mighty Meaty
- Number of pepperoni slices on said Mighty Meaty: 7
- Number of disappointed Cajuns: 2
- Latest exhumed hit from the 80’s to play in a commercial: “What a Feeling” for a laxative (!)
- How to say “cookie” in Brit: biscuit
- Availability of canned biscuits (like Pillsbury): naught!!
- Description of the mysterious “crumpet”, as in tea and crumpets: English muffin (go figure…)

That’s all I have for today! I hope y’all are doing well – I miss you!!"

Love and Cheers –
Dena

First trip to Norway

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Originally uploaded by mechanicaldan1

It seemed a little bit like home in Wisconsin. While flying in, I was able to look out the window because the weather was really nice. After landing, I was quite surprised to find out it that was 28°C, which translates to 82°F. In addition to a lot of water and the rolling hills, I noticed that there is a lot more color with the buildings compared to Scotland. They use a more familiar method of construction on the residential houses, which is a wooden construction with siding, but the roofs had either slate or clay tiles. There are a lot more tall, blonde haired people just like me, so I’m pretty normal here. Many of the people have a similar “look” to my relatives in Wisconsin, but I definitely know I’m in a different county as soon as I see anything with letters on it, as they aren’t in English, and many are considerably longer than English words.

I stayed at the Quality Hotel in Stavanger, and after giving my hotel a once over, I was pleasantly surprised to find a mini frig stocked with beer and wine! So, the first thing I did was to open one of the Troika candy bars and a Ringnes beer. Cold beer and chocolate was just what I needed. The hotel just happens to be less than a mile from a beach. My coworker pointed this out when he dropped me off, so after dinner, I took a walk down to the beach. It was really pretty, and I snapped some pictures with my phone because I forgot my camera in Aberdeen. The pictures are a little on the crappy side. Mobile phone cameras aren’t quite up to the task yet, but they are getting close.

I’m not sure if it was a common site, but on the way to the hotel, we ended up following an electric car. To me it was fairly obvious because it was a little on the square and ugly side, with just a little bit of kit car flavor. It was really neat to see, and as we got close to it, the license plate did identify it as an electric car. Speaking of cars, I had some additional proof that boys are pretty much the same everywhere. As I left the beach, I bent down to tie my shoelace, and suddenly a beat up station wagon with a couple of teenage boys comes sliding across the gravel parking lot. The windows were down, some music was blasting, and they were smiling as they slid and stopped in a parking spot. I had to smile too. Norway seems to be my kind of place.

A History of the World in 6 Glasses

I've got a growing interest in world history and religion. I'm not sure really where the two interests come from, but I can point to a few things. Regarding my religious interest is the fact that I haven't been to church in quite a while, but still pray regularly. Another fact is that living in Louisiana brought me in contact with lots of Catholics, a few Buddhists, and I just had a diverse Christian background growing up Reformed, Methodist, Baptist, and Souther Baptist. It's just interesting when you open your mind and try to get the big picture. The fact that so many Christian religions all worship the same God. You could even argue that some of the world religions worship the same God, or did a one time, and then split and starting making their own differnt rules. It's weird to see pictures of Jesus as a white man. Anyone that knows anything about geology knows that Jesus was born in the Middle East, and thus would have had darker skin. Things like this get twisted throughout history. I think the same thing goes for the Bible itself. How many times has it been translated? How many pages or chapters were edited or removed due to beliefs at different centuries throughout time? It just makes one curious. Regarding my interest in history is just that so much can be learned from history. A favorite verse of mine is "those that do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it." It's so true. Even in my job. We learn things, and try to write them down and pass them on. It's upfortunate when they don't get passed on, and I read about the same thing happening.
So, just before I left, I spent a few hours with my friend Joey at Books-A-Million trying to find a couple interesting books on religion and history. I actually bought three. One of them is titled, "A History of the World in 6 Glasses." It's a really great book. It's easy reading and very interesting, as to how world events can be linked to different beverages. If you are curious, the six beverages are beer, wine, spirits, coffee, tea, and Coca-Cola. It's also interesting that the first three are alcoholic and the last three are not. One history fact that we all know about was the Boston Tea Party of 1773, which was just the first of more "tea parties" where the American colonists were not happy about having to pay a tax to Britian. Chapter 12 opens with, "A billion hours ago, human life appeared on earth. A billion minutes ago, Christianity emerged. A billion seconds ago, the Beatles changed music. A billion Coca-Colas ago was yesterday morning." Anyway, it's a good book to read if your interested in a slightly different view of history.
And, while we're talking about sodas, I'd LOVE a Mountain Dew. I've gone so far as to email Pepsico in the UK and asked them if there is anyplace I can get one. If you're coming to visit, bring some Mountain Dew. Thanks! :)

I have photos!!!

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Originally uploaded by mechanicaldan1

I've finally taken the time to set up a photo album. I've added the link to the album on the right hand side above my profile. The sweet thing I just found out is that Flickr allows me to click on an individual picture in my album and then blog it. Awesome! So, this is the first test.

I've started adding some more pictures, because they are much better than what I can write. I've loaded pictures from our going away party at Festival International, some initial pictures taken up on arriving, and our first trip out into the Scotish Countryside. Flickr also has a mapping feature that I can add to the photos to specific global locations, so I will probably play with this in the future.

Dena and I are going to Pirates of Caribbean: At Worlds End later this afternoon. I'm excited! Arrrrgh.

Rising gas prices, or are they?

I'd be able to get a little better feel for everyone's reaction to the rising price of gas in the US, if I were actually in the US, but I can't so I have been following gas prices at www.automotive.com/gas-prices If you want to save some pennies, you can enter your zip code to find the cheapest gas station near you.
Now, the interesting thing is that the price of gasoline has been pretty stable in Aberdeen the whole time we've been here at 0.94 pounds per liter. That converts roughly to $7.11/gallon. Obviously, the price of fuel could be much worse. I just find it interesting that the price of crude oil isn't that high, yet gas prices are at record highs in the US. Kind of makes you wonder. Kind of makes you wonder about investing in oil company stock before prices peak mid summer.
I really like the fact that I'm getting to experience a small car environment. It's really great to park easily. There may be the same number of vehicles on the road, but they take up less room, and it's just terrific to have everyone's windshield, bumpers, and roof at the same height. It makes seeing things up ahead much nicer.

The Search Continues

We're still looking for that magical residence to call home. We'll have seen over 30 homes in the last 2 weeks (I've actually seen 8 less than Dena) by the end of today. It's exhausting. I don't think our criteria is all that picky, but we'll be renting, so we can't really make major changes if we don't like a bathroom or a kitchen. I will say that we've found some nice properties, but there has always been just one deal breaker. We're a bit emotional and edgy. If we're close to downtown, usually it's the lack of a shed to store my toolboxes, mountain bike, and other garage items. If we're out on the edge of town, we're too far away from amenities and social activites that might be within walking distance. We have a few more properties to look at this afternoon, so we're keeping our fingers crossed.
Saturday afternoon I'm going back to the BMW dealership for a test drive of the 120d. Last time we were there, they only had a 118d to drive, and it was really nice, but just didn't have a lot of get up and go. I'm also going to do some haggling, to see what kind of price I can get. The sales brochures have kept me excited like a little kid in a candy store. There are so many options! Just like the house, we'll have the car the entire time we're here, so we want to get it right the first time.
Last night we ended out in Cults (yeah, that's the name for the part of Aberdeen to the Southwest) looking at a house that is being remodeled. It's really exciting, but it's just on the edge of town, so it seems like it's in the country. Once again, almost perfect, except for it's location. We drove down the street to see just how far it was from the downtown area of Cults with some shops and grocery store, and driving down the street meant literally driving down the hill to get to the shops just under a mile away. Dena and I had a good laugh about the fact that I might never hear the end of her saying, "The whole time were were in Scotland I had to walk uphill with the groceries while it was raining." We drove further into Cults and it's really lovely. Lots of beautiful granite buildings, lots of rolling hillsides, and plenty of green vegetation. We stopped at a place called the Bieldside. I had a couple pints of Tenants, Dena had some bottled spring water, and we both ordered a couple of homemade pot pies. We talked and ate and looked out the big glass windows at the countryside and just had a wonderful time.

Looking for a place to call home

Dena and I have spent most of this week looking for a permanent place to live. It's not an easy search. We only annoyed each other a few times, and have still not died in a car accident. Horray!
We have a defined housing allowance, and we're finding that most of the houses/apartments (or flats as they are called here) are either cheap and small, or big and out of our budget. We're also finding most of the places are fully furnished, so we have to ask the current owners if they are willing to put most of their belongings in storage. And, our final requirment has been a close proximity to the downtown area so that Dena can be within walking distance of some stores and restaurants. There are a couple of flats that might have worked for us (if the owner removed their items), but there was no garage, no shed, no any place to put my toolbox and our other garage items. We sent in our list of top picks, so we'll see what happens.
I've been asked by work to get a visa for Russia, so it looks like I might be getting to see a little bit more of the world, and the first of June I'll be heading over to Norway for a meeting. Yeah!
The weather has been a bit colder and rainy the last few days. I guess we're finally gettting to see the real Aberdeen. Rain here is nothing like Louisiana. It's a lot more like what I grew up with in Wisconsin and Iowa. When it rains here, it's a light drizzle that lasts most of the day, not the torrential downpour of tropical southern Louisiana.

Sleeping late, Open air market, & Driving

It's late, so this is going to be a short post. I have a bunch of pictures to post, but I'm also considering an online photo album of some kind. If anyone has a suggestion, feel free to comment. I think Google now has one.
Dena and I had big plans for Saturday, but apparently our bodies aren't quite on local time. Our plans were to have breakfast at the hotel cafe, try to get Dena a mobile phone, and test drive some cars. We ended up sleeping late on Saturday, and really enjoying it! We walked downtown for lunch and found out that they had a open air market on a portion of Union St. There were a bunch of vendors and we got some spices, some cheese, some delicious cookies! We did a litte more research into a mobile phone for Dena, but unfortunately everything seems to depend on us getting a permenant address and some utility bills. We can't set up a bank account, get a mobile phone, or buy a car until this happens. We might be able to get a UK driver's license instead of a utility bill, but we still need a permentant address.
On Sunday, Dena finally got to experience driving. Yes, we both think driving here is like trying to write with your opposite hand. It's just awkward, but I'm sure we'll get the hang of it in a few more weeks. We drove over to the BMW dealership and had a pretty nice talk with a salesman regarding leasing a 1 series, probably a 120d with the Sport package. I test drove a 118d. It's a really nice car. I've been drooling over the sales brochure and all the available options. My biggest fear was that the seat would move back enough to allow me to fit and drive the car comfortably, and it does! The interesting thing is that there is only about 2" front the back of the front seat to the front of the rear seat when I'm driving. So, now all we have to figure out is what options we want, and there are a LOT to choose from. Good night!

Isle of Mann TT race 1 month away

The Isle of Mann TT race is less than 1 month away. We haven't done any research regarding going, so we'll see if we end up there this year. Without bikes, probably not.

Home, Sweet Aberdeen

We arrived in Aberdeen on time and OK. The flights weren't too bad, although we did have to scramble to get through customs in London. I'm really surprised we made it, due to the fact that we had less than an hour. It was pretty crazy running through the airport trying to find a gate in an airport that we had never been.
So, I suppose many of you want to know what's different over here. It's really interesting all the little things that you notice, and the obvious things. The currency is different so we get to learn the 1p, 5p, 10p, 20p, 50p, 1 pound, and 2 pound coins, and the 5 pound, 10 pound, and 20 pound bills. The bills themselves are interesting because the same bill can be different due to being issued by a different bank. Driving is the similar, but also much different. Having to drive from the right side of the car is almost like trying to write with your other hand. You can do it, but you're probably going to be a little rough and slower at doing it. I've been driving for four days now, and I'm almost up to speed on most of the traffic signs. I do love roundabouts, but there are some special rules that go with using them. You may enter a roundabout with two lanes, but a cross street may only exit with a single lane, so lane placement and signaling is important. The streets are marked with signs, but not very well. Many times the street signs are on the side of a building corner about waist high. The one thing I do like a lot about driving is almost everyone drives a car. It's amazing how many more small cars you can get in a limited amount of street space. Our Honda Civic and VW Cabrio were midsized cars by Aberdeen standards. The cars do get much smaller, and speaking of cars, there are many brands not in the US such as Seat, Citroen, Alfa Romeo, Renalt, Peugeot, Proton, Skoda, Vauxhall, Smart, and models not in the US by manufacturers such as Audi, Ford, BMW, Mazda, Mini, Suzuki, Mercedes-Benz, Toyota, VW, and Volvo.
It's hard waiting to get a motorcycle. As far as I can tell, lane splitting is legal!!! The bikes just drive around the cars and are on their merry way. There aren't very many straight roads, so I think I might get a supermotard bike for buzzing around town. I tried on my new Joe Rocket jacket and overpants tonight for the first time together, and they look and fit really great.
Our apartment is a nice two bedroom, but once again small. The kitchen is absolutely tiny, along with the 3/4 scale appliances. The wall outlets are much bigger, and each one has it's own on/off switch. The best part is that we have off the street parking and are only about 2 blocks from downtown, which is along Union Street.
Our air shipment arrived today, so we got the rest of our clothes. They are needed, because the average temperature is around 50°F. I went running in short and a long sleeve shirt tonight, but I was a little cool.
Dena and I are going to get her a mobile phone tomorrow and do some car shopping. I'm hoping there is a little time to swing by some of the motorcycle shops also. :)

Crazy April

April has been really crazy. On April 1, I still wasn't sure exactly when I was moving to Scotland, and then everything came at once. I officially accepted my new job which I start in a couple of days. We fly out on Monday, April 30th and arrive in Aberdeen, Scotland on May 1st. I start my first day of work the next day. Dena and I had a long list of things to take care of which included getting my passport renewed, getting Visas for both of us, taking an inventory of all of our stuff so that it could be moved. We were originally looking into bringing our motorcycles, until we found out how expensive it was going to be. Then we scrambled to sell our motorcycles in a little over a week and half. We sold the Cabrio to a Belgium couple that is working and teaching here in Lafayette. It was really nice talking to them to get an idea of what we might expect when we visit Europe.

Festival International has started, and we've been REALLY enjoying going out downtown and listening to the music, and pretending it's all for us as a going away party. It's nice seeing friends that have come in from out of town.

I've added a link to a Google Calendar. I plan to post our major event weekends, and also use it as a scheduling guide for friends who want to come and visit.

One month to go

It's now official, the Little Red Racecar has been sold. I'm going to miss it, at least until I have something to replace it with. Dena still has her VW Cabrio, but it's just not the same.

Lots has been happening regarding our move to Scotland. I'm working with the HR department to try to get everything on the long checklist of items taken care of. Realistically, we'll probably be getting on a plane around May 1. I'm very excited, but I'm going to be really busy trying to coordinate everything that going to take place. It's not like moving across town or to a new state, because we are going to have to sell both our cars (maybe motorcycles) and all our appliances. The voltage is 240V, 50 Hz which means that we would have to get converter boxes for our current appliances. I think it's just going to be an opportunity to get some new appliances.

Congratulations to my friends Brad and Shea on the birth of their second daughter, Isabel Marin!

Me against the world

I think I might be turning into a grumpy old man. I was heating up some dinner tonight when the doorbell rings. I stroll over expecting to see one of the neighborhood kids, when I see an older gentlemen holding a clipboard. I know it's going to be long Presidential election process, but this soon? "Hi, I'm so and so representing so and so who is trying to get speed bumps installed along the street to slow down traffic. I was wondering if you would be willing to sign my petition?" Immediately, I repond with a "I like like speeding." He seems a little shocked and slightly offended, but quickly leaves. Now, after my wife pointed out that my response may have been a little rude, I defended myself to her by saying I was honest.

Now, the interesting thing is that I do like speeding, but I do live in a neighborhood that has a lot of kids, and I have noticed that people do seem to speed. The posted speed limit is 25 mph, buy myself and many other people seem to be doing 30-35 mph. I do see the gentleman's point about wanting to slow down traffic, so I started thinking, as I like to do. I'm a car guy, and I HATE speed bumps. Driving a lowered car over speed bumps just plain sucks.

There are a few side streets in Lafayette, that would actually allow people to cut through neighborhoods from one major street to another, but their are speed bumps installed, so traffic avoids those streets like the plague.

Why not install a couple stop signs instead of speed bumps? There are quite a few intersections that could be set up with a 3-way stop. This would definately slow traffic down. People almost completely stop at the speed bumps anyway, and you would be completely without the annoying up-down motion. There might be a little additional wear on people's brake systems, but there would be less wear on the suspension. Is it just me, or is it the world? Maybe it's just the engineer in me searching for a better solution.

Being healthy is great!

I'm finally starting to feel better, and it's amazing how much more energy and motivation I have. It's been almost 3 months since I had an MRI that showed that I had a herniated disk in my lower back. I believe an extended mountain bike ride with a co-worker started the fire in my back, but the bonfire had been building for years of slouching and bad posture habits. After 6 weeks of physical therapy, I'm finally starting to feel normal again. It's interesting what a little exercise and stretching will do to make you better. So, what's one of the first things I did? I washed and waxed the Little Red Racecar, and finally took a picture of it. Then, I sold it. Well almost. I have it for a few more weeks, but it is spoken for by a friend of mine in Lafayette. I'm going to miss it. It's been a lot of fun, and unfortunately I never got around to putting the turbo on it, but I did learn a lot about Civics. The 92-95 Civic really is the Mustang of the import world.


UK update: I'm slowing moving through the process of checking the boxes next to the long list of things to do to move to the UK for work, but things are moving along. Work permit has been filled out, passport has been sent off to be renewed, physical exams and shots took place, salary was negotiated, waiting on work permit approval and work agreement paperwork. Then, the packing and moving begin...

Heading across the pond

Well, I'm about 95% sure at this point that Dena and I will be moving to Aberdeen, Scotland. Ah yes, the land of castles, lochs, whiskey, and learning to drive on the wrong side of the road. It's a biker's paridise, when the weather is nice. I'm getting really excited. I'll be going over on a 3 year work assignment to support the UK, Norway, Kazahkstan, and other parts of Europe.

I love red!!!

My Christmas and birthday gift finally arrived today! I've been needing a tool chest for the top of my tool box for a while, as it's pretty much overstuffed. Now all I need to do is take a Saturday and organize everything. I'm at a point that I can pretty much fix any automotive or motorcycle related repair. :) It's pretty nice.

I feel a little bad about not posting much over the last month, but I haven't been really motivated due to an injury. I think it may have happened in November, but in late January, an MRI showed that I had a herniated disk in my back. After six weeks of physical therapy, my back is much better, but I'm still stretching out my hamstrings which are causing some cramping in my right calf. Not a lot of fun when it hurts to drive. I did find out that I can ride my motorcycle more comfortable than driving the Little Red Racecar, and the weather has been really nice, so there are a couple of nice reasons to put some miles on my 900RR.

Happy Birthday to me!

Yep, it's my birthday today. It was a pretty good day. I'd like to thank my roommate Shane for the wonderful birthday art.

Recognition is a good start...

Recognition is a good start if there is going to be a change in the way we do things in the US. I listened intently to the President's State of the Union address, and I was very excited when he specifically mentioned biodiesel, ethanol, wind and solar energies. I'm also glad he mentioned trying to improve fuel economy standards in cars. I wish he would have said trucks and SUVs would get improved fuel economy standards also. Diesels are already helping trucks and SUVs get better MPG than gasoline engined equivilants, so it's already kind of a good thing. There will be diesel engines in small SUVs and 1/2 ton pickups by 2009.

This article by CNET.com describes how we have a long way to go with the US's production of biodiesel. The US used 62 billion gallons of diesel, and will be soon be producing 150 million gallons of biodiesel. Yeah, LONG WAY.

The US has made great advances in the production of ethanol. For 2006, 4.9 billion gallons were produced, which is a good number if we are to meet the Energy Policy Act of 2005 goal of producing 7.5 billion gallons of renewable fuels by 2012 and the President's new target would bump that figure up to 35 billion gallons by 2017. Check out this CNET.com article.

Ethanol 2.0 is a nice way of stating cellulosic ethanol. We need to get away from competing with food supplies by using corn to produce ethanol. The ethanol industry had to start somewhere, and corn was an easy place to start. Watch DuPont in the near future. They were the first stop on the President's alternative fuel tour, they own Pioneer, and recently revealed that they had co-developed biobutanol with BP.

What will February bring?

Lots happening at the end of January. President Bush will make his State of the Union address for the first time in front of a Democratic controlled House and Senate. I'm looking forward to what he has to say about renewable energy.

I've been following the increase in wind energy, ethanol, and biodiesel on a couple different websites and blogs since leaving college. I know some of my interest in alternative energy was planted in college when we decided to power our Formula SAE racecar with E-85. My interst has been growing steadily since, and even fertilized by my current career in the energy service industry. Ethanol is a good direction, but not when it's competing for resources with our food industry. I hope that there is a large shift in the ethanol industry in the near future toward using feedstock for production. My hope is in the future of biodiesel. Diesel engines are much more efficienct than spark iginition fueled engines.

Secondly, Microsoft will be releasing to consumers both Windows Vista and Office 2007. Office 2007 has a new user interface that reveals a lot more of the features that are already available. Windows Vista is Microsoft's solution to the ever growing security problem. Let's see how many bugs Microsoft has fixed since Vista went RTM in November.

iPhone and changing the world one device at a time

I must admit that I've been an Apple fan for years, but Microsoft's dominance over compatible software has kept me a loyal Microsoft user. I've never been into music as much as most people around me. As I was finishing college, the iPod appeared on the scene. I saw my fellow classmates displaying them proudly in the computer labs. Would I get one? No. I've never had a large music collection, until getting married, and it's still not large. It's kind of always just been background music while I was working on my car or on a computer.

I've always been a little bit of a techie. I've had a mobile phone for a little over 5 years now. My current phone is an Audiovox SMT5600. It's been a really great phone, and has a crazy amount of features. A year and half ago, as the cell phone companies were marketing cell phones with MP3 players, Microsoft snuck onto the scene with Window Mobile 2003 software in mobile phones. It was a little weird to see advertisements for brand new "music phones", when I had just that in my pocket already. What was the big deal?

Fast forward to about 2 weeks ago when Treo released it's 750. Beautiful. I think I found a replacement for my Audiovox. I've always had a little dilema though. I needed a phone first, then a multifunction devise with contacts and a calendar that can sync to Outlook, then an MP3 player, camera, and internet connection. All of this had to be small enough to fit in my pocket comfortably, which is the reason I have not updated to a PDA sized device.
Just days ago, Steve Jobs reveals what everyone has been waiting for. The holy grail iPhone. It has made a glorius entrance into a market that already has products that have the same features. (OK, I can't get an 8 GB memory card for the Treo 750 just yet, but it's coming.) I do have to admit that I love the iPhone. It's super cool. It's quite amazing that it runs that same software as Apple computers, which is a one up for Apple compared to the Windows Mobile 5.0 and Pocket PC software packages on smartphones and PDAs. The iPhone is kind of like the Treo LifeDrive, but can also be used as a phone.

So where are we headed? The UMPCs are coming. Bigger than a smartphone or PDA, smaller than a laptop. Being a gearhead, the auto industry is trying to plan for the integration of infotainment systems in the new cars you buy. There were a significant number of cars this year that had a provision to hook up your iPod. PDAs and UMPCs have just about the perfect screen size for GPS navigation or watching videos in a car. Cars, trucks, and SUVs have a much longer life than most electronic devices. How is the iPhone going to change things? I think the radio in the dash will just become a hub for distributing all the informaton we have on a personal device that we attach to it, or a screen with a storage device that we sync our home's PC to before we leave on a trip.

New Year's in New Orleans

I ended up spending New Year's Eve in Jackson Square in New Orleans with friends. I had a great time. It seems as though many of us will be hoping that '07 brings us all a little luck, as we look forward to many of us having changes take place regarding work and our lives.

The older I get the more I really cherish spending time with friends during an activity. Although we spent a lot of the time in our friends' house in New Orleans, it was great to get to share some new memories together. The fireworks in Jackson Square were expecially wonderful to see, considering all that New Orleans has been through and what is still to come.

I only got to observe a little of New Orleans as I was driving to and from the city, but there are still lots of repairs taking place. It's a shame that it's taking so long to rebuild the city.