Weekend :)

The week went really fast. Hard to believe we were in Mexico just over a week ago. John and I have been getting ready for the Job fair next week. We will be traveling to Anchorage for most of next week hoping to fill the last few spots left in BSSD. I will be responsible for scheduling and maintaining all of the video conferences during the week. BSSD and other school districts will have video conferences set up to bring in administrators and or principals into interviews with prospective hires. BSSD is also providing a large portion of the computers at the job fair which will be used for the attendees to check into the fair, or to sign up with ATP (Alaska Teacher Placement), which is the best way to get a job in the state.

We got an xServe in last week we are hoping to use to set up quicktime streaming of our video conferences for the rest of the year, and for the years to come. Currently we are using GCI’s Starbak system which only streams in Windows Media player. This pretty much doesn’t work for us. It is a really finicky media codec, and doesn’t work reliably on Apple machines. Quicktime on the other hand is truly universal, and when using the new H264 codec has a very small file size, yet still has very good video quality. So I have been working on setting that up this week. we are bringing the server down to Anchorage next week, hoping to install it.

The weekend hopefully will involve a lot of relaxation. Erin and I fly out of here on Tuesday evening. Erin will be heading over to Valdez on Wednesday morning. I will work the rest of the week in Anchorage with John, then fly into Valdez on Friday night. I guess my dad will be in Anchorage Thursday through Saturday, so hopefully we will be able to hang out a bit before Valdez. He is in for a telephone board meeting. He will join us back in Valdez on Saturday evening. I took Monday off, so we won’t have to leave Valdez till that morning, getting back into Unalakleet that night.

Got an email from Mike Svir tonight. Sounds like he and Amanda had a good time down in Florida for their spring break. I am looking forward to seeing them this summer. They are really cool, and I miss hanging out with him. So this summer should be a lot of fun.

I’ve been stumbling around the internet and ran across a couple interesting sites.  The first one has some amazing 3D sidewalk art, and the other one had “The worst analogies ever written in a high school essay”.  I thoght it was funny, so I’ll pass it on.

Brownies

Today went pretty fast. Work was good.  We have a lot of video conferences (vtc) this month since it is job fair season.  The powers at be like to connect to colleges across the country so they can interview prospective hires.  There is a VTC tomorrow morning starting at 6:00 AM.  :(  Ick…  We have a couple later this month that start at 5:30 AM.  The reason for the early hour is we are connecting to schools out east, so the time zone change is really against us.

Erin and I decided to go to Valdez next weekend for Easter.  It will be nice to hang out with the family.  Wish Katie could sneek up to join us.  I know that isn’t always that easy.  So I am taking the Monday after easter off giving us a little more time there.  I will be traveling into Anchorege to help out the the job fair there.  So my ticket out of Unalakleet is taken care of by the district.  Erin got her ticket using miles, so we just need to get from Anchorage to Valdez.  I think my parents bought a book of tickets with Era, so hopfully we can use a couple of those.

Had a hankering for some brownies, so about an hour and a half ago I started making some, dumped in all of the ingredients into a bowl minus the eggs, and realized I was three eggs short.  Erin was kind enough to run to the Igloo and get a carton of them for me.  So we just got done eating warm brownies right out of the oven with a tall glass of cold milk of course.  Well, its time to brush teeth and hit the sack.

Back @ Work

Well, today was the first day back after a very nice vaccation with Erin down to Mazatlan. I got up this morning wanting desperatly to stay in bed. I went to have some cereal for breakfast, and as I was filling my bowl up with Honey Bunches of Oats, I realalized that if I filled the bowl up to the normal stoping point, there wouldn’t be enough left in the box to fill up the bowl for someone else. So I decided to finish it off. This decision however caused me to have an enormous bowl of cereal for breakfast. It took me forever to eat all of it, and I was really stuffed afterwards. So off to work I go.

As I entered the building I ran into Randy Fleharty one of my co-workers. He said he had something for me, so after we swiped in for the day. We went over to his desk where he presented me with my fist MacBook Pro. Which is what I am blogging from at this moment. For those of you who don’t know it is the new laptop made by apple. It is five times faster than their previous laptops, has a built in webcam right above the screen, and a remote control for switching through your music, pictures, and movies.

One of the cool applications that comes with it is called Photo Booth. It works just like like a photo booth at the archades or in the malls. You sit in front of the computer and puch a button, it does a count down and takes your picture. It also has some features that allows you to play with how the picture is taken. Here are some examples….

So thats kind of fun.

We had a pretty relaxing evening.  Tried to play a little Mario 3, but the game kept glitching up.  Gotta love the stability of 8 bit gaming.  Well, I had probably get to bed.  I now have to get up early and go to work every day, so I should get back into the routine.

A new site…

Sunday has been a pretty lazy day.  Erin has been working on the laundry a bit and catching up with family on the phone.  I watched the Detroit Red Wings beat the Minnesota Wild in a fast paced hockey game this morning.  Aside from that I have been realaxing in front of the tv, and playing around on the web.

I started working on my “professional” website.  If you are so inclinded you can check it out at www.whb3.com.  It is just getting started, so there isn’t any content on there yet, but I think its a pretty good start.

Well back to work tomrrow.

Lazy Day

Got up this morning around 8:00 AM. I know that is crazy early for a weekend, but I think I am still on Mazatlan time which is two hours later. So I really didn’t get up till 10:00 AM on my time clock.

Erin and I had blueberry pancakes for breakfast. They were pretty tasty. We followed that up with some TV time on the couch. After relaxing for a while we walked down to the store and the post office. Vin sent me a couple batteries for my laptop which was awesome. The batteries I have now don’t last very long at all, so it will be nice to get some length back into the amount of time my machine runs on a charge cycle.

Erin has done some cleaning today which is really nice. The place seems to get messy on its own. Im sure I have about 99% reponsability for that happening. We need to get laundry done from our week down south, and get ready for the last 9 weeks of school.

The big plan for next year is to build a climbing wall in the apartment. Erin and I are starting to price out options, but I kind of have my mind set on this design. It’s a 9 foot cube shape with an open bottom, and an one open face.

This picture shows the top open, but there will be a “wall” on the top so you can utilize holds that will be screwed into the celing, both side walls, and the back wall. The floor will hopefully be a couple of matresses for cushening the falls. As you can see the back wall has a bit of slant to it which really can build up your strength. Having not climbed in so long, it will take a lot of work to get my strength back to where it was, if I ever can.

Erin has suggested I look for holds like thsee from MooseJaw.com. The picture is from their website. This is a package they sell, it has 60 holds, and the T-nuts to screw them into the wall. It seems like a pretty good deal. I don’t know how many holds I will need, but it would be a good start.

I have to still do some messuring, but I think it will fit in our other bedroom. Im pretty excited about the idea. I have really missed climbing since I have moved up to the arctic.

Well I had better get going. We are heading down to the Johnsons to visit in about 45 minutes, and We are making salsa, guacamoli and homemade tortila chips. Hopefully they will be a hit. It has been a rough transition coming back to a lack of warm weather, having to clean for ourselves, and no chips and salsa. So we are trying to make up for some of those losses.

Back in Alaska…

Well we are currently sitting in the Alaska Airlines Boardroom here at the Anchorage airport. It seems like we have been living in the boardrooms forever. In the last 24 hours we have been in the San Fran, Seattle, and now the Anchorage boardrooms. We his the LAX board room on the way down. I’m ready to be done traveling. It was nice while we were in Mexico, but having spent more time in airplanes in the last 24 hours than doing anything else is getting a little old.
Our flight out of San Fran was delayed last night for a couple hours. The plane that was scheduled to take us from San Fran to Seattle was stuck in Vancouver due to weather. They finally made it in around 10:00, so we didn’t get off the ground till after 10:30. We had a nice tail wind, so we flew really quickly up to Seattle. We didn’t get into our hotel until close to 1:00 AM. We were pretty wiped out. We also had to be back to the airport at 6:30 the next morning, so sleep was way too short. Our flight to Anchorage what leaving at 8:00 AM.
So we drug ourselves out of bed this morning at 5:30 AM, and got to the airport. The line for security was really really long. Once we finally made it through that joyous experience, we went and hung out in the boardroom there (Seattle) for a while. It came time for our plane to board, so we headed down there, got on the plane, and got all settled in. Looking around the plane was only a third full, we were sitting there for a while, and then over the PA we are informed that they are going to delay our flight for two hours, canceling a later fight to Alaska, and combining the two flights. So back to the board room we went, where we killed the next couple hours reading, and surfing the web. The second time we boarded the plane it was full to the brim. The flight went well, and delivered us safely in Anchorage. We are now waiting for our last flight of the trip back up to Unalakleet. We have to head down to that gate in about an hour.
Erin and I were thinking about heading to Valdez for the rest of the weekend, but it turns out the flight to Valdez was already booked up. So that was a bummer. We are going to try to find a weekend to head down there before the year is out.
I talked to Katie on the phone today. She spent her spring break working in soup kitchen down in I think LA, some where in California for sure. So she had a good experience doing that. She just found out she is going to have to drop out of her sailing class this spring because she found out it conflicts with all of her ultimate frisbee practices and competitions. So that’s a bummer. She is planning on taking it in the fall when frisbee isn’t an issue. She also is for sure working for Stan Stavens this summer. That is going to be a lot of fun for her. She is going to get some amazing pictures and video. I’m jealous…..
Well, not a lot else to talk about. I try to keep the blog going this time. See if I can get my list of readers back up to a number above zero. 🙂

Last Day. :(

Today was our last full day in Mazatlan. The week has flown by. We started the day just like normal heading down to the pool around 9:30 AM. The sun was out and everything was very relaxing. the fog started to roll in a bit, so I decided to go out para-sailing before it really clouded up. The flight was really fun. The takeoff was extremely smooth. I thought I would jerk up into the air, but it was like going up in an elevator. I went up a couple hundred feet in the air. The boat took me down the beach about a a half a mile, and then we turned around and headed back. There were about 5 other people up with different companies at the same time I was, at one point the boat that was pulling me when it turned around crossed the path of another para-sailing boat. Our lines crossed, but I was considerably higher than the other person, and I was well clear of the other persons flight path when he came by. When I came back in for my landing, there is a guy on the beach with a flag. When he raises the flag I pul down on the inland side of the parachute cord. This makes the parachute fly inland. The point is to get quite a bit inland, so the boat can pull me back toward the beach for the landing. This way I won’t land in the water. The landing was pretty smooth just like the take-off. You can see a video of it on the gallery.
After the parasaling adventure we spent the rest of the day reading by the pool. I finally finished the Da Vinci Code. It was a pretty good book. I wasn’t as hooked on it as I have heard other people have been, where they aren’t able to put it down till they finish it. I must have started it a couple weeks ago, and I didn’t get through it till today. It was a good book, and I’m glad I read it. I think its back to some Sandford books before I tackle Angels and Demons.
We are going to get packed up tonight, so we can spend a couple hours by the pool before we have to head to the airport.

Hopefully our last few hours in Mexico will bring us nice weather before sending us back to the frigid north.

A Walk Around the “Golden Zone”

Today was another relaxing day.  We went for a walk around the “Golden Zone” this morning.  It was really foggy out when we got up, so we decided that would be a better use of our time.  When we got back it had cleared up quite a bit, so we donned our swim suits and headed pool side.  Erin’s heat rash or sun rash whatever it is had gone away over night, but came back quite quickly after we had been outside for a while.  I went and tracked down some Benadryl for her, but I don’t think it helped too much.  The fog came back in, and since Erin’s arms weren’t getting any better we decided it would be best to go relax in the room.  I got in a nice long nap, which may end up to be troublesome for getting to sleep this evening, but it was awfully nice.  After I awoke from my slumber we watched a little TV, and then headed down to watch the sun set.  There are some more beautiful pictures at the gallery if you are interested.
After the sunset we took off for some dinner.  We went to the Guadalajara Grill where we had a coupon for a free drink with dinner.  So erin got the enchiladas and I stuck with the ever trusty chicken fajitas.  It was a nice place to eat, and the prices were pretty good too.
After dinner we walked over to Dairy Queen so Erin could get some ice cream.  By the shop, there was a guy doing paintings with spray paint.  It was pretty impressive.  I will post some pictures on the gallery, and a movie of him at work.  The movie is about 5 MB, so it will take some time to download on slower connections.  Still worth the time though I think.  So we watched him do a couple of paintings which is really amazing.  Then walked back to the hotel to pick up the computer before going to the coffee shop to get this stuff up on the web.  That was today in a nutshell.
Tomorrow is our last full day in Mazatlan, so I hope the weather is nice, but Im sure we’ll have fun either way.

Vaccation Almost Over :(

Well, we only have two full days left down here in sunny Mazatlan. Erin and I have been having a blast. We decided to hop the stone island cruise yesterday. They took us out in a tripple decker catamaran. Erin and I sat on the top deck to catch some rays on the boat ride over. We had an awesome view looking out the front until a couple of girls came an stood right in front of us blocking out the horizon. The boat took us over by the worlds highest natural light house. It is up on a clif face over looking the ocean. By a couple of caves. One of which is actually a tunnel through to the other side. We went by bird shit island. It looks like it has been white washed…. Completly whight. They then took us over to some rocks protruding just above the water by a few feet. On it were some really lazy sea lions. They didn’t move much even with our huge boat right next to them. After our little tour around the area went over to the much sought after stone island. Erin has been building up this place for the last few years. Durring our stay at stone island I got a coconut loped open for a little drink. Check out the gallery for some pictrues of the afternoon.

I’ll get back to the story in a sec. We are at a coffee shop down the street from our hotel that has free WIFI. This is where we came the last time we posted. I just had my computer taken over by a seven year old girl selling roses, while she played flash games and ate Erin’s chocolate cake. I have some pictures of her and her friend that I will post later this week. They were pretty cute.

So back at stone island we had a steller bannana boat ride, that took us over to bannana boat turnaround (see picture in gallery) and back. It was kind of lame. We did get to lay out on the beach where I burnt my head to a crisp, and Erin bought a shirt thing from some lady.

Today we were back to the normal ritual of sitting by the pool drinking cold drinks and eating chips and salsa. I did buy a hat today that I may never wear outside of Mazatlan, but it kept my poor head from burning any more. I also bought a shirt, that I may never wear outside of Mazatlan either, but it may be decent for climbing.

Tonight we went out to a little classier resturaunt for dinner. Erin stuck the good old chicken fajitas, whereas I had the special, a sea food platter with lobster, clams, fish, crab, and shrimp. The coolest part of dinner was the cesar salad prior to the main course which was prepared right at our table. They used real anchovies and the whole nine yards. It was very tasty.

Im looking forward to relaxing by the pool with erin for the next couple of days, and possibly even doing a little parasailing. There is a video of someone taking off right in front of us from this after noon if you want to see what it will be like for me. You can find it at the gallery.
Im enjoying Mazatlan….

Mazatlan :)

We finely made it into Mazatlan after an extremely long day and a half of flying.  When we arrived we came in just behind another Alaska Airline plane, so there was already a considerably long line for immigration.  I unfortunately led us to the line that decided to move the slowest.  We finally made it through immigration without any troubles except the loss of time.  From there we went on to pick up our luggage and head over to customs.  In Mazatlan they utilize the “red light, green light” method for screening passengers.  You had the customs person your card, and then push a button on a big street light.  If it turns green you go on about your way.  If it turns red, you move over to a table where they search through all of your belongings.  We were lucky enough to catch the green light.
Once outside there are a bunch of people trying to get you to use their taxi service, and it is a bit overwhelming.  Erin had set us up with a shuttle from the travel agency.  They crammed a bunch of us into a van, and we were on our way.  It is about a 30 minute drive from the airport to the hotels along the beach.  Erin was stuck sitting next to a couple that had been there 10 years prior and felt it was their duty to tell Erin all about Mazatlan.  We were the last ones to be dropped off at our hotel.  We got checked in and were provided two keys, two towel cards, a remote for our tv, and a bell hop to take us to our room.  So as we follow the bell hop to our room instead of going deeper into the hotel he takes us back out the front door across the street to where our room was.  we were on the first floor of the building, where our key that didn’t quite work well let us into this dark room with bars over the windows.  It felt very dungeon-like.  We went out to check out the beach which was back across the street, and through the hotel.  We took a look around, things looked nice, but we weren’t too excited about our sketchy room.  So on the way back through the hotel we stopped by the desk and inquired about an upgrade.  They said they could accommodate us, but not until the next day.  That was fine by us.
We then went out to dinner ordering some very tasty fajitas, and margaritas.  After which we were exhausted heading back to our room and were asleep by 7:30.
The next morning (yesterday) we got up around 8:00 and went to the desk to change rooms.  After getting our things moved over to our much nicer room in the main building on the third floor with a balcony, we headed down the the pool to lounge in the sun.  During the day we ordered some chips and salsa and a few Coronas that were delivered to us in a bucket of ice and a cup of limes.  The salsa and chips are very tasty here, and you can’t beat laying out in the sun with a bucket of Coronas chilling in a bucket of ice.
After laying out in the sun we went out for dinner once again having fajitas and margaritas in a restaurant overlooking the ocean.  After dinner we went out walking around town last night picking up some ice cream along the way.
Today held much of the same for us with the addition to some guacamole to go with our chips and salsa and corona.  The guac was a good idea.  We are about to head out for dinner, and sign up for a tour of “Stone Island” which is a glorified booze cruise out to an island where you can play in the sun for the day.  Lunch is included in the package.

Be sure to check out the pictures at the gallery.

Well thats all for now.  Hope to blog more later