Somethin' for my Bro's

How to mount a tire using WD40!
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Two posts in one day? What's wrong with me?

I had to mention that I've added a couple of tunes to my playlist. They're from Material Issue, one of my favorite bands of the 90's. I started getting hooked on them back in the early 90's And then after a while I never heard from them again. I recently was reminded of them by some other music I heard and started looking into what happened to them.

After a bit of Googling I ran across some interviews of the band members and blogs of people that were their friends back then. Turns out that the lead singer, Jim Ellison, killed himself back in the mid-90's. Over an ex-girlfriend. What a waste.

Jim was the primary songwriter of the 3-piece band, and according to accounts I read he would just show up one day with a song he wrote and say "This is going to be our biggest hit ever." Then the next day he'd show up with another song and say the exact same thing about the new one. Turns out he was usually right and almost all the songs were worthy of a single. Without Jim the other band members didn't want to continue with Material Issue and moved on.

I miss them. Have a listen to tracks 66 and 67.

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More on Washington (No, not MORON Washington)

A strange feeling overtakes me when I arrive in Washington again. As I drive around and see place-names on signs I have the overwhelming sense that I'm home. More than any other place I've lived - Washington seems like home. I don't know why. It doesn't even have to be a place I've been or that I know well, but all of Washington just feels like home. Peggy has similar feelings, although I don't know if they're as strong as mine. Maybe we're supposed to go back there some day. We'll just have to see where life takes us...

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Kia Sedona

We rented a car while we were on vacation and it just turned out that the 'small minivan' class was one-third the cost of any other vehicle, including sub-compacts! Works for us! When we picked it up they gave us a Kia Sedona with just 21 miles on it. I was a little dubious at first, but I've changed my mind and figured I'd share my thoughts.



If you have 5 kids or less and are on a tight budget (aren't we all these days!) you should have a serious look at this car. Everything worked very nicely, although I don't personally care for the placement of some of the dashboard controls (wipers, etc.) I suppose I could get used to them eventually, though. The interior is very comfortable and easily reconfigured - seats can be stowed flat into the floor (copied from Dodge). Ours had a CD player with MP3 capability and Sirius Satellite radio. It sounds pretty good for a stock system, but not awesome. The sliding doors move almost effortlessly and the windows in them roll down!

The real surprise was how much power was under the hood! That little bugger just gets moving in a big hurry for a mini-minivan! The tranny changes gears smoothly and immediately kicks down when asked for a burst of acceleration. Even more fun, the console-mounted shift lever can be slid through a gate that allows the driver to manually control shifting by bumping up or down a gear at a time. It was most fun using it to force engine braking to assist in hard deceleration.



My only real complaint is that the road noise was almost unbearable, but it should be taken into consideration that the freeways in Washington are very rough concrete with no asphalt to quiet them down. We never really got up to freeway speeds on any roads paved with asphalt, but the road noise seemed less obnoxious while on tar.

I'm not ready to give up my Dodge Grand Caravan for one of these, but if you're thinking about a 'mini-minivan', have a look at the Kia Sedona. It might make you smile.

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More fun with no sun!

Here's a little more of a look around the Great Wolf Lodge...

Charlotte and Klara made some stuffed animals.

Here are some of the trees I mentioned in my last post that assign our quests and monitor our progress.

This is a room for tweens and teens. There are computers with internet access, giant screens to play X Box on and a big movie screen that plays movies when a video game tournament is not under way.

Playing in the Wave pool.

The red and yellow thing outside the window is a huge funnel. A tube drops riders in at the large end and they swish up and down the sides until they drop out the drain at the bottom. It's especially fun at night when it's pitch black inside!

A wide shot of the wave pool.

The kiddie pool.

A giant fort. The big splash is the result of the big bucket on top dumping, which occurs about every minute or so. Water is constantly pouring out of every part of the fort and there are two small water slides on the back.

Slowing down for a minute to color some pillow cases.

Speed racer Klara in the arcade.

Charlotte collects some skill tickets.

Back in the wave pool floating around.

The stairs to the big slides. I think I've climbed these about 1.7 million times in the last two days!
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I've made a horrible mistake!

Tuesday morning we went to our true destination; Great Wolf Lodge. We weren't here but 10 minutes before I found out I had made a horrible mistake. We were speaking to some other guests while waiting for our room to be readied and found out there's no way to do everything here in less than three days, let alone one-and-a-half like I'd planned! The website just wasn't clear enough about how much there is to do.

Front entrance

Main Lobby


The kids have their own cabin built right into the room. It even has it's own T.V. and desk!

One of the activities is to get a magic wand and go around the hotel activating magical things. It seems like there must be thousands! There are quests assigned by some of the trees inside the hotel and then players run around the hotel activating the items listed in the quest. They must then find a certain Nymph, Faerie, Princess, etc. and collect the reward for that quest before being assigned a new one. There are ten quests and ten adventures. We spent over three hours running up and down stairs and through hallways and just completed eight quests. Between that and spending hours in the waterpark, we're whipped. I have the feeling Peggy and I are going to need a 'grown-ups only' vacation to recover from the family vacation!

Charlotte activates some magic crystals.


Receiving an 'award' from the wood faerie.

At the end of the night there is an animatronic show in the lobby. Families are encouraged to show up in their jammies and stay for story time afterward.

Everyone gets a wrist band at check-in. This allows access to the waterpark and some of the other activities. Moms ans Dads get special wristbands with an RFID tag inside that acts as the room key and allows them to charge anything in the hotel to the room. That way we can lock all our valuables in the room safe and cruise the enire place with just a bathing suit and the wrist band. Very nice!

I can't be sure, but this just might be a family place...look at all the mini-vans and SUVs in the parking lot! Also notice; rainy and cold outside, 84 degrees and awesome inside!


I'll put up some pics of the waterpark and other activities in my next post. Stay tuned!

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Afternoon in Seattle

We arrived at SeaTac in good shape and got our awesome rental car...a Kia Sedona. LOL! All I can say is; at least it's not a Ford Focus! We cruised straight downtown and spent the rest of the day at the Pike Place Market. After capping it off with a table full of crab and shrimp we boogied to our hotel.

First glimpse of the market

Mounted policeman at the market. Notice the horse has his own badge...it's on his halter.


Fish mongers throwing huge fish back and forth. It can't be very easy catching a 20-pound slippery fish flying through the air, but they manage!


Enjoying all the vendors at the market. Notice the all-hazelnut vendor! Yum!


Klara stopped to primp at a mirror along the way.


On our way down to the waterfront for some seafood.


Some very sour wheat sourdough and a pile of crab, shrimp, potatoes and corn on the cob. What could be better on a cold day?


Charlotte catching up on her computer time back at the hotel.

I found this hotel, The Arctic Club, on the internet. It's a very nice place and I got the room at a super bargain for booking it on-line. It was originally founded as a gentlemen's club that catered to the super-rich folks who benefitted from the gold rush. Our room is awesome and there are three domed ball rooms. Here's a pic of the very detailed domed ceiling of one of them. Just gorgeous.

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Off at an epic crawl...

We were a little slow starting out our vacation this morning and got to the airport too late to check our bags. Exactly 7 minutes too late. What? When did that happen? Now we're stuck sitting here for three hours until the next flight. That's the last time I book a 7:30am flight! Now that we've had the glitch, the rest of the vacation should go perfectly. Right? Why are you laughing?

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Busy Week

I'm working nights and overtime this week to finish a modification on one of the simulators. It's been hanging over my head for over year, but it got put on a back burner while I've been working to test and accept the new sim for the past year and a half. The demands of the new sim started to ease up a bit so I'm taking a run at finishing it this week. Well, that, and the fact that I told the boss that I'd do everything possible to get it done before we take the kids out of town for spring break!

Last night I finished the cabling and adding the new I/O (Input/Output) to the sim. I was able to test the hardware by manually manipulating the I/O through the computer, but things weren't working quite right. Bummer. I quickly found that I misplaced a couple of wires on the backplane and got it fixed in a couple of minutes (see picture). After that everything was working super-duper!

Now I just have to install the hardware in the correct locations and add new code to the software to operate it. I should be able to wrap that up today, then I won't feel guilty about going on vacation!

All the yellow wires are mine. Don't worry, they'll be all neat and organized when I'm done!
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