Upcoming vacation

Wow - sun - that has become somewhat rare here in the last couple weeks!

Cloudy is generally fine with me though - it feels like winter at least - and everything's still green - so it's not like there's the winter 'dead season' like in NC.

Allison and I are headed to Wisconsin to meet my family for Christmas - it looks like temperatures there will be moderate - highs near 30, lows in the upper teens. I was kinda hoping for single digits :-p The warmer weather means good odds of snow at least. The really cold air is typically very dry as well.

Last weekend we took the 'new' car out to the foothills east of the city - absolutely stunning scenery from sweeping twisty roads - followed by green tea frozen yogurt at Red Mango (yes, it's in a huge suburban mall). The Merc is definitely no Porsche, but it provides good feedback, and the engine goes from silent to muted-roar when called upon. Hopefully it will be easy to live with in the longer term.

Thinking ahead to the next vacation - odds are that will be to NC at the end of May for my brother's wedding.

However I'm already figuring out a way to get to the other side of the Pacific for a couple weeks. Still undecided on Japan, Hong Kong, Australia or New Zealand. Japan seems to be the most easily accessible, as it is only a 10 hour flight. Australia is 18 hours - that is near insane. I was looking forward to being closer to that half of the world from here, but it's still rather far away.

Well that was quick.

Didn't really mean to jump back into car ownership so quickly, but I found another exceptionally mint old Mercedes and took the jump.

This one is half as old as the previous Merc (1995 vs. 1980) and is powered by gas instead of diesel, so that it will actually start in the winter. Otherwise it's pretty similar: imperial ride quality, quiet, understated and well cared for appearance, 4 comfy seats, entertaining rear wheel drive handling dynamics, lots of torque from 3L inline engines.

However the extra few grand over the older one brings modern electrics, antilock brakes, and effective HVAC - so hopefully it will not meet the same end as the old one (rain, old tires, pickup truck)

Barring any accidents this is it for a while. I've seen the world, car wise, and it's time to settle down.

Social stuff.

The Moore - a local theater a few blocks down from the apartment - celebrated it's 100th anniversary last night - and threw a great free party to celebrate - free food/drink from local businesses along with a completely random assemblage of entertainment, from jazz saxophone to opera to juggling to burlesque to a guy playing spoons with the end of the show being an audience sing along to 'Age of Aquarius' - and the ability to wander around an old theater at will. Great way to spend an evening.

The GTI sold. It ran exceptionally well and to the normal observer, looked fine, however I am a bit of a perfectionist, so I couldn't live with it. I'll find a car eventually, though it is somewhat nice to know that I don't really need one and can really evaluate what it will be used for and find the perfect replacement.

Other notes from the weekend - Allison and I walked around Capitol Hill - it's a bit the Myers Park of Seattle - some parts have aged more gracefully than others, but still there are many streets of grandiose old homes (though the activist groups in the city spray paint "Capitalist" on the sidewalk in front of the larger ones). In any case it would be a neat place to live - esp. due to Dilettante Chocolates. It's very much a small (eastern) European cafe - truffles and cakes, soups and sandwiches, excellent coffee.

Other things coming up: some graphic designy thing that Allison signed us up for, and a bit over a week from now, a Winter Solstice festival, followed by a week in Wisconsin.

switch

out with pc, in with mac - it's nice - vista was at least a bit annoying, and xp was old - too many patches to get it stable

Odds are I'll pick up a cheap storage computer and put linux on it, as the mini doesn't have expandable storage space, however considering I haven't played a game on a computer in a year or so, this seems like the way to go.