November 10, 2004
A road to Nowhere
Guess what I did over the weekend? You're right, SUOC!
While some of us consider running away from our new overlord, the rest of us are happy to cool out and see things through. Myself, I'm learning to kayak the right way (rolls first) at a SUOC rolling session in the gym swimming pool. Lots of good instructors make sure that I can flip myself over when the inevitable happens. I managed to get a somewhat shaky roll down, and with practice I started screwing it up big-time. So I'll be back this coming weekend to make things perfect.
We went deep into Onesquethaw cave on Sunday, me with an aching shoulder. It is a gorgeous one, with an beautifully carved opening (much easier to crawl into than Clarksville, too). We tramped into it for hours, admiring the neat-o rock formations and fun barnyard smells before getting too cold and tired and calling it quits. Then we got somewhat lost trying to find out way out, making for a total trip time of about 5 hours. Thank goodness for Burgelene underwear, which kept me warm the whole time. I even lead a blind exit, where we turned off our headlamps for the last stretch of cave and I felt around trying to tell the group how to navigate over what I found. It was pretty dicey -- there were some climbs to go up -- but the reward of coming out into sinking sun twilight on fully-opened pupils was just amazing
The way home from the cave was equally fun, as my car hit 200,000 miles. That's quite a ways, and it will definitely hit many more miles as the winter wears on.
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Further back...
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Previous Trips...
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Hiking Mount Whitney, 2007 
Spring Break in West Virginia, 2005
New Year's in Paris, 2003-2004
Coming to America, 2003
Protesting in Berlin, 2003
Prague Bier-Tour, 2002
Dresden, 2002
Recent Reading
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Stealing the Network
I first bumped into the Stealing the Network series when reading the exploits of Joe Grand, one of the book's many hacker authors.
The 'Stealing the ...' series of books follows a rather disparate group of computer hackers as they help a former NSA spook (many of them unwittingly) gather the money he needs to retire.
The stories themselves are not fantastic fiction. The writing is uneven and choppy, the characters are stereotypical and not very well thought-out. What is fascinating about this book series is the technical accuracy of the exploits (at some points *too* accurate, with screen shots and step-by-step instructions).
It's a great series to read if you're a system administrator, or just getting into the wonderful field of computer security.
Rated 
by reid
on March 06, 2011
by reid
on March 06, 2011
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Close to the Machine
Ellen Ullman is one of those authors that somehow avoided my radar. Until now...
Close to the Machine is less a book than a collection of loosely related personal anecdotes from Ellen's time as a very rare thing -- a successful female bisexual independent computer programming consultant.
In the course of her work and relationship life, she learns hard lessons about programming, running a business, being lonely, and loving the wrong people. I found it particularly poignant being a crypto-nerd with difficult times in relationships and a more-or-less NDA'd, secret work life.
This book is a must-read for anyone into running their own business, programming, or anyone dating a person that is a business-a-holic or programmer.
Rated 
by reid
on November 23, 2009
by reid
on November 23, 2009
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The Long Trip Home
I had the joy of dining with the author in Florida. We went to a little Brazilian BBQ where he spoke with our waitstaff in (what I can only assume was) flawless Portugese.
Brian Wyllie spent 1969-1971 living in Brazil working for the Peace Corps. His recent book outlines his trip back to the United States via Bolivia, Peru, and the Carribean chain, by way of bus, train, and sailboat. The format comes spattered with observations from the modern day, and makes me think, "this must be what John McPhee's journal looks like."
The trip sounded like a fantastic one, but I was left wanting more detail...where did the gun (being snuck through customs in a variety of places, no doubt) come from? And how did Geneve's hair smell? Alas, we'll have to wait for another book to find the answers.
Rated by reid
on April 16, 2009
by reid
on April 16, 2009