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/
Sunday, November 11, 2007
Visiting Paris, France for the first time
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/
Go here for some of the pictures: http://www.flickr.com/photos/lifeasmechanicaldan/sets/72157603083749570/
Wednesday, October 3, 2007
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...
Wednesday, September 19, 2007
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
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.
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.
Saturday, September 15, 2007
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!
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.
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.
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