Must be time to get on a plane

My fingernails need filed. That can take me from Roch to Chicago. And, besides, the house is clean, I knocked a couple of items off the to-do list (got an iPod, and player; cleaned a couple closets out; got my external hard drive loaded with all my pictures) and I had lunch with Dad a couple times, the pool is now clean and beautiful. So, why stay here? Time to head back to HQ to get the next projects started.

It is much less fun to leave Rochester in the summer. This area is so pretty - and everyone gets outside and enjoys it, as the next day may rain. Very different pace of life than in Silicon Valley. And I know I will love being there, too, as soon as I get off the plane!

Best summer ever, so far

Oh such fun interesting times. I have been in Rochester for over a week now. And that’s the first that has happened in over 4 months. So I feel like I have a few moments to catch you up.

I’m getting on top of the house thing in Rochester, having hired a lawn service and found some handy help. Thinking about what to do for living in CA when I’m out there. I have started looking through the classifieds to see what’s available. A condo perhaps?

I had a great time last visit to California. Went out with Renee, who took a look at what I was wearing and said “Oh no, you’ve gotta try this!”





I would have never even seen this dress in the store. But it was a good look for me. And, it was great fun. Who knew? Of course, the cosmos may have helped. All of a sudden I started feeling the cougar thing. This is getting interesting. I think I’ll let that play out . . .

A couple days after that, I visited Kristen and told her the story. She thought I should go shopping in her closet to see what look we could pull out of there. None of the dresses were any good for me, but then she pulled out this scarf. A couple of knots and it looked elegant.







I swanned around her place, having her take pics. And then we went shopping in Santa Cruz. It was really interesting to stroll around town dressed only in a scarf. Well, I had shoes too.

We ended up in one store where I fell victim to several more dresses. Most of which are now hanging in my storage space in Saratoga. It’s still got stuff in it from when I started preparing the house to rent out, in March 05, before I moved to Germany. The plan was to rent the house out furnished, and I started clearing out the bits I wouldn’t want a renter to have. A couple weeks into that, got advice from a property manager to rent the place out empty. The movers then came and packed & stored all the other stuff, about a third of which is now in my house. But all the sentimental bits stayed in California. Hmmm, do we think there’s a metaphor in that?

Leaving California the last time, I looked at all the clothing I had, and the very very small likelihood of wearing the great dresses in Rochester. Ran to WalMart and bought a free standing clothing rack which I assembled in the storage space. Glad I bought two racks, between them I got one unit put together. What is it with cheap stuff? I guess the warning is that there’s always an insert in the package that says “If there’s a problem with this product do not return it to the retailer. Call this 800 number.” They were missing pieces and the instructions only vaguely resembled what was in the box. But there were enough supports to create one finished rack – with dust cover – so my booty is safely hanging there.

My addiction for little black dresses is getting worse. I think I now have 4 in each state. And they have friends – a beautiful coral dress (in which, I’m told, I look like a princess!) and a gold trench/safari thing. They’re all insisting I take them out. I need to remedy this soon. And Kristen pointed out that I should start buying dresses that I can wear to work. Gee, ya think? Duh!! I can wear most of them to work. … Some of them.

Months ago I had planned to go to a seminar in NYC, June 28 – 30th. Since I “live” so close, it was going to be just a quick hop down & back. Of course, I ended up flying in from CA instead. It was at the Plaza. My god, it was good to be back in NYC. I think it’s been a decade since I’d been. I must plan a touristy weekend there soon.

I got back to Rochester very early July 1. Was supposed to be home 6 hours before I actually arrived, thunderstorms had the eastern seaboard shut down for a few hours. Has anyone else noticed the weather-related travel disruption this summer? Is it worse than it’s ever been?

Rochester was a good place to be, for the Fourth. Low-key evening for me, us, we ended up across the street from my brother’s house, at Jamie’s on Long Pond. They had lots of food and a bonfire set to go. As the day ended – before it was even dark - the fireworks started. There were 2 barges in the pond, 5 or 6 big displays straight across, and several to either side of us. And we could see displays going off at the shore of Lake Ontario too. The show went on for 2 hours. All put on by the local homeowners and one of the better displays I’ve ever seen – reflecting in the pond; with the fire going; several of my favorite things on this planet all in one place!

It’s been hot & humid here. The pool was slightly green. I’ve chemicaled it into submission, and had the family over a couple times. It was so good to have the pool to cool off in. This being upstate New York, the weather changed abruptly – it poured rained yesterday and the temperature dropped from 90 to 60, last night.
I’ve been working so much that I have hardly gotten out to do anything since I’ve been here.

This morning I rolled out of bed around 6:30, headed, down to the computer. Took a break at 11 to go pick up Gavin from Youth Adventure Camp (YAC, such an unfortunate acronym) as his mom had a doctor appointment this morning. We got back to his house, I pulled out my computer, plugged in my phone and fired it up. Through the VPN, into the dev servers where I’m finishing our VAR portal. Worked on that into the afternoon, got back home, continued. Stopped at 7 p.m. Flung myself onto my bike and got out for a ride. That’s been a typical day. 12 hours and still I’m up 300 emails in my inbox this week. Still love the job and the people I work with.

This project has been going on for weeks, but I think it’s finally going to be finished. I look forward to the next phase – which includes a couple weeks of vacation in September. But first, back to CA for the last couple weeks in July. In August, who knows?

all sorts of 'firsts' to report

Wowie! I've spent the last 18 days in CA working working working. Hardly saw anyone. Been doing the 12 hour days 6+ days a week to get a big project done for work. Which I still love. How did this much fun and yummy validation escape me in my earlier years? Sure glad I'm tuned in, now!

So i was also cat sitting while I was there. For Mougie - a personality-ful and sadly flat faced persian. No kidding, the poor dear's face is flat. He burbles when he breathes because he's got no sinuses! I know he was bred that way, cannot figure out for the life of me why. His human, Renee, was just on the first of a series of trips to Europe to ride a BMW mororcycle through the Alps - German to Italy and all around. She had a blast and if I can find her pics I'll throw in a link. She got back home on Thursday.

Saturday she threw leathers at me & said come on, let's got for a ride. Sure, what the heck, I can be a passenger. We got dressed, pretty heavily, and I'm thinkin hmmm - and we walked out front to her Honda 600 sport bike. Lane split our way up to highway 9 and f2kin zoomed up that hill. She stormed it! I especially liked the bit where the a** in the vette tried to race us around a curve. Hah! We won hands down!

So I'm perched up on the back, on what feels like a bandaid on a piece of metal, knees level with my chest, clinging on to her like a baby monkey hangs on to its momma. We hit Skyline and then she opened it up. At one point I glimpsed the speedo - she asked me later if I did cause she could feel me see that it said 84. I was rather wishing I hadn't known that! Man, is she a superb rider. I loved it - especially the return trip, when she took it a bit easier on me.

It was load of fun rolling up to Alices & getting off the bike. Not too many 2 hetero chicks on sport bike combos up there. All in all, I will do that again. Hopefully soon! I noticed today that the insides of my legs feel like I had a serious workout at the ad/ab machine - I was really hanging on with everything I had.

So my other new thing is that I am stuck in Chicago for 24 hours due to weather related flight delays. No clothes. No one to answer too. Blogging from the Red Carpet Club in the airport, I stopped in here to get online and get a room. There are about 500 people in line outside to get a voucher. Heck with that. Gonna close up now, get to the hotel and perhaps find some trouble.

Lilacs in Rochester

I got back to Rochester Friday morning. Had been in CA for a week of work. Left a 100-degree day, Thursday. Friday in Rochester, it was 55. Yuck! The compensation is that the spring blooms are lasting a long time. The Lilac Festival ran through this weekend, I got out early in Saturday sunshine and took these pics at Highland Park.









And Tanya was with me, enjoying the beautiful day.



This isn't a lilac, but what a beautiful backdrop!



The rain clouds came in. It was showering on & off all afternoon, but in a sunny moment I got out in my neighborhood to capture the current beauty. Looking out my back door:



This is across the street:



And three doors down:



And my tulips held their petals for me:

Much Silliness Ensues

Give a ten year old a Fresnel lens and a Lucha Libre mask, and much silliness ensues. On my last trip to Rochester ... uh, visit home, uh... whatever it was, we gathered at Greg & Andrea's for dinner. Gavin kept us all entertained.

Lesson learned

Do NOT lock your car keys inside the trunk of a new car!

I was leaving work yesterday. Was all set to go when I saw I had left a bag in the office, so I grabbed 2 sets of keys - my car keys with the building key on it; and the rental car keys. (I had my backpack & purse already in the trunk, as I was going to go to an outdoor concert next.) Ran back inside, grabbed the bag I'd forgotten, back out where I opened the car trunk, tossed in the bag, dropped the car keys in my purse, shut the trunk and oh my god - it was the rental car keys I'd tossed. in. I had my New York set in my hand.

I'm now locked out of the office, with my phone & computer in the trunk. Thankfully I had my wallet, and a co-worker was still inside. He let me back in where I first called Hertz, then AAA. An hour later, I flagged down the AAA truck as it was passing by, turns out somehow they had gotten past me on their first swing through - and since I didn't have my cell phone, it being locked in the trunk & all, they couldn't reach me. So he opened the door with a wire through the crack in the window, setting off the alarm. And, of course, disabling the electronic trunk release. Perfectly logical from an anti-theft point. So, he called a locksmith out. After he finally arrived, it took him a couple hours to get the trunk open. By then I was cold, tired, and emotionally on the edge. I was observing myself trying to go to the "oh poor pitiful me, no one to call, no one to care, I'm all alooooone" place. I would then think how wonderful it was that AAA and the locksmith were available to be called upon. And both people were great, and helpful.

So Saturday in CA started out great - worked out, did work on the computer in the hotel room, then got a pedicure, lunch, got great work done at the office. But instead of seeing the Robert Cray band perform, I hung out in a parking lot as the sun went down, watching guys working on the lock. I finished the evening with some badly needed bathrobe therapy at the hotel.

Well, I'm back

Back in California again, drinking in the beauty. I am now working fulltime at IronKey, loving it even as it takes just about all of my time. Great company, great people to work with.

April was a whirlwind month. The first week, FOSE show in DC went very well:



The next week, RSA in San Francisco, went even better; IronKey won Best Mobile Security Device. As the CEO said "this definitely doesn't suck!" (Degrees of not sucking are his compliments.)

I was in Rochester for a week, then off to London for the Information Security Europe show. That one was easier - we just showed up to work it; one of our partners did all the logistics.

I was "home" for 8 days in April! Who needs a house?

It has been such a wonderful year for Spring. It started in California, in February, where spring explodes like a sneeze - everything in bloom at once. But it sweeps through in colors. First, it's white. Then yellow, then purple & blue. It was so familiar.

Then, I was in DC for peak cherry blossom season. Incredibly beautiful and subtle at the same time:










Rochester was just starting to thaw when I returned. London was at mid-spring, with lots of tulips and daffodils in bloom.

Finally, late April, back in Rochester, spring had finally arrived. It was breathtaking. I had forgotten how many blooming trees are there - cherry, crabapple, magnolias, and 2 as-yet unidentified white blooming trees. These pictures are on a walk through my neighborhood, a couple weeks ago.





This is my brother's backyard, on Cranberry Pond.


And, 3 blocks from me, Lake Ontario:


Kuan Yin, at the local Buddhist Temple. I greet her every time I drive to my house.








And this is my next door neighbor's spring show: