So I’m in Washington again and this time I went back to Snoqualmie Falls and the Snoqualmie pass for a snowshoeing excursion. Now that I can cross snowshoeing off my list of things to do, I have to recommend it to all of you! Talk about fun – I’m definitely going back when I move up here next month. Snow might be melted by then but next year is just around the corner. Snowshoe rentals are not super-expensive, costing only $17 for the day. The State of Washington creates ‘sno-parks’ which are nothing more then parking lots plowed out of the snow cover and maintained for the duration of the winter. You have to pay a $10.00 fee to access these parks but they offer a pristine snow scape, ripe for the exploring. [Read more…]
Crazy Weather
Not much time for an update since I’m going up to Seattle in a few days but I wanted to post some pictures of the crazy weather we’ve been having in Petaluma.
It snowed! Went up on the roof and took a few shots. Apparently there was 4 inches of snow in some places – enough for a snowboarder to give it a try and get an article written about his experiment in the local paper.
I didn’t get any shots of the hail storm we just had though. Now I’m wondering what I’ll miss when I’m gone for a week!
Arizona the Beautiful
LOL:
Typical Arizona Backyard
Typical Arizona Street
Silicon Valley From 20,000 Feet
So I’m in Arizona right now but earlier today I boarded my 9th flight in the last 3 months. I flew out of Oakland airport which is much smaller and nicer then SFO. While we were gaining altitude we passed right over silicon valley so I took a few snapshots of the massive urban sprawl below me and now you get to see it too.
Bye Bye Californicate!
Yes, Arizona is even hot in the winter
Lossless Audio Codec!
50% of the original file size with no losses due to compression. This is very very cool. http://www.monkeysaudio.com
Here is the wikipedia article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monkey’s_Audio
Why I Love Europe
Do I need to provide any more explanation than this?
Apple Remote and Front Row
One of the projects I worked on at Apple has finally been announced so I can talk about it openly. I think this is the most significant project that I worked on since I wrote all of the firmware and worked on the circuit board. Apple will be making millions of these and shipping them all over the world. Its called the ‘Apple Remote’ and you can see it here http://www.apple.com/imac
An Apple Remote will ship with each iMac and can be magnetically attached to iMac when not in use (check out the picture on the bottom). It has a very simple design with only 6 buttons but only 6 buttons are necessary since the UI is designed so well. In fact Steve Jobs compared it to a 40+ button Microsoft remote and pointed out that it exemplified the Apple design philosophy of simplicity without sacrificing function.
If you have time, I highly recommend you view the keynote where Steve Jobs introduced the new iMac and Apple Remote. He starts off by introducing 3 new features and the remote is covered in feature ..3 so you can skip ahead to that part if you don’t care about the rest of the iMac. You can download the keynote here: http://www.apple.com/quicktime/qtv/specialeventoct05/
The keynote also introduces the new white ipod which supports photos, album art, and video (like music videos, home movies, etc) so its definitely worth a look.
Photos From Europe
Just a sample of the 2000+ photos I’ve taken so far. The rest need image processing in Photoshop and that takes more time then I have right now (or ever).
