Year: 2003

…and now I’ve booked a spot. If anyone wants me to bring them back a penguin…

Disaster! Cheeseman’s isn’t doing a trip in 2004-2005, so I’ll either need to hold off for a year or else find another group to go with…

I’ve spent the past four hours online browsing trips to Antarctica. Since the February 1984 issue of Ranger Rick it’s been the place I’ve most wanted to visit in this world, but the costs are extraordinarily prohibitive. I’ve always said that I’d go “some day” when I could afford it — tonight’s epiphany was that I’ve gotten to the point where this dream is no longer impossible, so “some day” is now the winter of 2004-2005. Yeah, it’s still extraordinarily expensive, but I’d rather die broke having lived my life than rich but unfulfilled.

If anyone browsing this site has ever been to Antarctica (hello Greg) or knows anyone who has been then I’d appreciate any tips about what the best way to see that part of the world is — the message board works, or you can e-mail me (ryan.holliday@gmail.com if you don’t know my regular e-mail address). After lots of browsing the best option I’ve found looks like Cheeseman’s Antarctic Tour. They aren’t cheap, but they offer more time in Antarctica and seem geared towards people who want to get the most out of their trip rather than take it easy and relax on board. It would be nice to keep costs down, but at the same time this is probably a once in a lifetime thing, so there’s no point cutting costs if it means less time exploring.

Now that I’ve realized that this trip is not only possible, but that I’ve actually made up my mind to go, I’ve been driving JB crazy talking about it. Sleep is suddenly hard to come by…

It was a year ago this weekend that Jason and I went backpacking in the Sierras and I decided to quit my job with Accenture. I didn’t really have any doubts at the time as to whether it was a good decision or not, but a trip to Alaska, another trip with family and friends to the Galapagos Islands, and a new life as an independent contractor have since proven what a huge turning point that weekend was for me. If anyone else is debating whether it’s better to be comfortable or to try something new, based on my own experiences I’d have to wholeheartedly urge you to go for it.

It just occurred to me that by posting the previous story I will become a target for web searches on “naked hairy ass”. God help me.

Lest people stop checking the site since there aren’t any updates, here’s a story from a couple of days ago that probably shouldn’t be repeated, much less put on a web site.

Last week I had finished my workout and was getting changed when an old Italian man came strolling by in all of his glory. Seeing as we were in the locker room it didn’t really phase me, but as time went on this man simply refused to put on any clothing. He was walking back and forth through the locker room, and you couldn’t help but notice that the guy was hairy as a gorilla — back hair, front hair, everywhere hair. Finally he stopped roaming around, only to plop himself in front of a mirror where he proceeded to blow dry the hair on his ass. I have never really felt that there was a need for all of the laser hair removal and other clinics out there, but at that moment I would have gladly paid this man to go to one. The moral of this story: if you see a naked, hairy person reaching for a blow dryer, get away fast. Definitely do not look back.

The Helicopter Game used to be my favorite mindless diversion on the web, but Defend Your Castle has now taken the top spot. Be sure your computer volume is on while playing — the “splat” noises are particularly gratifying.

An awesome although ridiculously full weekend:

• The insomnia continues, so after an hour nap and two hours of lying in bed I took off at midnight Friday for San Francisco via Highway One. Stopped near Hearst Castle at 4:00 AM and fell asleep.
• Woke up at 6:00 and within ten minutes found a huge group of elephant seals. The secret to elephant seals is apparently to catch them early — when I’ve seen them at mid-morning in Ano Nuevo they barely move, but from sunrise until almost 8:00 AM this group was bellowing and fighting. Got a few photos that should be nice.
• Continued moseying along the coast, eventually stopping in Monterey to search for sea otters (saw one) and chowder in a bread bowl (ate one).
• Got back to Concord, unloaded some old clothes to Goodwill, some old books to various used book stores, some hair at Supercuts, then scanned in more of the Galapagos photos. Nap time followed.
• Took off with the Goob, Jenn, the Tall Guy and Dave for Sam Woo’s and then a rather painful three hours watching the Hulk at the Metreon. The only highlights of that movie were Lou Ferrigno’s cameo and Jennifer Connelly’s close-ups.
• Finished scanning in photos today, watched a bit of the USA Track and Field Championships on TV (Jorge and Goucher qualify in the 5000, Lincoln takes second in the steeple, Teter qualifies in the 800, woohoo!), and now I’m cruising back home.

It’s all good.

As a public service, I’d like to warn people against giving their money away to movie theatres in order to see The Hulk. If a movie theatre should try to take your money in exchange for a ticket to this movie, grab your money from them and run away as if you were being chased by packs of rabid pit bulls. Do not look back.

Not a lot worth recording in a web log lately. The running is going well, insomnia has struck again, and hopefully I’ll get the remainder of the Galapagos photos scanned in this weekend. Since my life is fairly dull to read about, here are a couple of links to someone who’s life has been pretty exciting recently:

• Gabe Jennings feature from Track and Field News
• Gabe Jennings feature from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Also, on a very random note, www.powergenitalia.com is not what you would expect.

I think when a person’s car alarm goes off more than three times in a night that it should be OK to blow the vehicle up.

Someone’s car alarm is now going off for the sixth time in the past hour and a half. Rather than trying to sleep only to be woken up every fifteen minutes I’ve been updating the software page with new photo gallery code. The new code still isn’t very user friendly, but it’s getting better — the current version will automatically determine image width and height when generating the required XML files. I may also add some logic to simplify the properties file, as that seems to be a source of confusion for people. While the code is still meant primarily for those who understand Java, if you do use it and would like to see it changed in any way let me know and I’ll see if I can get around to updating it.

Dave Barry’s log entry for today:

TECHNICAL ADVISORY (posted by Dave 5:05 PM)

This blog has thoroughly screwed up everything in its house related to computers. It started when this blog, which has always been a PC kind of blog, bought an Apple Powerbook computer. Please understand: This blog loves its Powerbook very much. But the Powerbook was not getting along all that well with this blog’s network, the rest of which is PC computers. Sometimes they would let the Powerbook in, but sometimes they would laugh and call the Powerbook names, and not let it play their PC games. So today this blog, having learned NOTHING, EVER, IN ITS WHOLE LIFE and being A COMPLETE MORON, decided to make a few little tweaky adjustments to the network, and now this blog is in TOTAL LINKSYS ROUTER HELL, which involves 53 MILLION SETTINGS with Martian names like “PPPoE” and “Subnet Mask” and “DHCP” and God only knows what else. And of course NOTHING WORKS, NOTHING, and NOTHING EVER WILL AGAIN until Technical Support arrives, if it ever does. This blog is publishing this item via a primitive telephone line made of rope. It may be the last one for a while.

The moral is: If you have a computer, DO NOT CHANGE ANYTHING. Just LIVE WITH IT.

TECHNICAL UPDATE (posted by Dave 5:27 PM)

If your computer system is working properly, be advised that this blog hates you.

Today was my second day running again after just over a month off, and I am a hurting puppy. Meanwhile there are a half dozen high school kids out there on the verge of breaking four minutes in the mile, and a number of collegiate guys getting ready to race in Europe this summer. I’ve got a long way to go.

In other news, moving in with JB has thus far been a good thing. With Felicia more or less a persona non grata these days we’re living the bachelor life, highlighted by last night’s three pounds of sushi. The only things in the fridge are some Dr. Pepper, a jar of olives, and one of JB’s vacuum pumps (no, I don’t know why it’s in the fridge). Life is good.

First, a question: what is it in your brain that will allow you to drive along, completely bored, for hours, but as soon as you leave the flat, straight stretch of highway for a curvy, busy stretch through the mountains you immediately think “I need to look under the seat to see if there are any Junior Mints there RIGHT NOW?” This also happens when construction causes traffic to become bumper-to-bumper and suddenly it becomes imperative that the CD be changed — why is that? Maybe my brain is missing an important filter that should re-schedule these sorts of events, or maybe I’m just a statistic for Darwin waiting to happen.

Rambling aside, not a lot going on lately. I scanned in a ton of photos over the weekend, although unfortunately I only made it about two-thirds of the way through the Galapagos pictures. I’ve also got my brother’s Galapagos photos online — I think on this trip he got better pictures than I did. I should have the rest of my photos online after the next time I get home, probably in a couple of weeks. Captions and such will get added as I have time over the next several days.