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Sunday/ the smartphone jungle

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The Nokia Lumia 1020 has a 41 megapixel camera, outrageous and unheard of! Is it a camera with a phone on? Is it a phone with a camera on?

I know I cannot hold on to my aging iPhone 4 forever, but I’m going to hang in there a few months longer. There’s always the iPhone 5 (to be replaced by the 5s or iPhone 6 come November; no one knows for sure).  The Android phone universe has the Samsung Galaxy S4 and the HTC One. And Google has just demonstrated their upcoming Moto X phone, the product of their acquisition of handset maker Motorola.  It seems to be a phone aimed at the masses – not a phone for geeks that want the latest Snapdragon processor and the sharpest display. What do I want in a phone?  For me the camera specs are paramount. Soo .. should I spring for the Nokia Lumia 1020 with its monster 41-megapixel camera? A big drawback is that it’s a Windows 8 phone.  (Interface probably OK, but still very few Windows 8 applications out there).   Time will tell.

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Google’s new Moto X phone has middle-of-the-pack hardware but some innovative voice command features.
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Friday/ rain, finally

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Hopefully there was still enough sunlight with the rain on Friday to keep the Big Belly compacting trash can operating !

1.  Friday saw a 35-day day streak broken here in the city with a few welcome rain showers. (Per the Seattle Weather blog July was the driest in 50 years here! .. but we did have plenty of rain in April).

2.  I spotted a new (new to me, at least) ‘Big Belly’ solar trash compactor on the corner of Yale and Stewart.  It looks like a US Mailbox.  It uses solar power to compress trash put into it, and electronically alerts trash collectors through a web-based system when its belly is full.  The smarty pants trash can with the big belly comes at a price, though : they cost about $5,000 apiece.

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Thursday/ STOP the Project!

Alright, Vienna-convention-sign-B2a.svgI will have to ‘fess up. I went out to Antelope Island State Park on Wednesday, because I knew I will probably not be back in Salt Lake City for work for quite some time. We received word that the funding for our project had been cut.  So Thursday was our last day at the site – at least until some time in 2014 at this point.  So there is still hope that the project will be resurrected, but the work may be shifted to another site, and the current team members may no longer be available.

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There was some cloud cover, and a few drops of rain fell as we arrived at Salt Lake City airport on Thursday to go home.

 

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Wednesday/ Antelope Island State Park, Part 2

Antelope Island State Park smSo here are ‘real’ pictures of the State Park.  I jumped at it last night when we got back to the hotel, and drove out there.  I only had my cell phone with me, but it was good enough to take some pretty spectacular pictures.   It was very dry and very warm (99 °F/ 37°C), but there is a musty, salty smell in the air close to the water.  There are ‘beaches’ and campgrounds in the park, and some hiking trails.   I think one needs a shower after swimming in the Great Salt Lake, though! (The beach that I stopped at, had showers).

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A roadside plaque explains the history of the causeway that was built to connect the mainland to the northern part of the island.
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This sign is on the island itself, after you have driven onto it using a causeway that connects it to the mainland.
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This is the view from the causeway, with water from the Great Salt Lake on both sides, and looking east towards Salt Lake City.
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This is a view from the causeway looking south.  The Great Salt Lake’s water is very shallow here but makes for a giant ‘earth’ mirror.
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This is on Antelope Island .. that brown speck in the middle of the picture on the right is a bison!  I couldn’t get much closer, and the cell phone has a wide-angle lens which makes it appear to be far away. There is about 500 bison on the island ..
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.. and the antelope that the Park is named after is a pronghorn antelope.  There is a female antelope on the left of the picture, looking at me. She was waiting for me to drive on, and then she scampered across the road to join her mate on the other side.  The island has some 200 of these antelope, about 500 mule deer, and 120 California Big Horn sheep.
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Tuesday/ Antelope Island State Park

Our Marriott Courtyard hotel is in Layton, between Salt Lake City and Ogden.  It’s on Antelope Drive.  We leave the hotel too early to get breakfast or even coffee in the morning, so we checked out the Starbuckses closest to the hotel.  The two green balloons at the top right is where we are, on Antelope Avenue.  That’s when I noticed there is an Antelope Island in the Salt Lake; turns out the whole island is a State Park.  So now I have to find time to drive out there on the water with that ‘Syracuse’ road to go and check it out. Google Maps is always there to provide a preview, of course (and spoil the fun of discovering it for real a little bit. We live in the information age and nothing seems to be completely hidden away anymore!).

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Our hotel is by the two green balloons at the top right. No Starbuckses on Antelope Island (I would HOPE not : the whole island is a State Park).
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The scenery on Utah’s Antelope Island State Park (courtesy of Google Maps and Google Streetview) reminds me of the arid Karoo region in South Africa.
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Monday/ that ever-temporary ‘elite’ airline status

It is 6 am on Monday IMG_7780 smmorning at Sea-Tac airport and I am in the ‘Sky Priority’ lane to try to get in ahead of my fellow passengers.

How did I get to be a Delta ‘Sky Priority’ Platinum member, since I have flown mostly on United the prior year?  Well, you apply for a ‘status match’ with your new airline. Your new ‘preferred’ airline grants you a temporary elite status* match for three months to see if you are actually bringing them enough flying to justify your temporary status.  (If you don’t, your elite status disappears and you have to earn it the hard way with a full year of flying enough miles). So while my new Delta Platinum status did not get me upgraded to the luxe first class seats this Monday, it did help me get out of the middle seat in the back of the airplane to a seat further up to the front on the aisle, and with more legroom.

*Please don’t be too jealous of my ‘elite’ flying status.  All it means is that I fly a lot, and that I sometimes Iuck out and sit in front of the plane !

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Sunday/ packing up for the ‘Salt’ mine

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Let me decode this Capitol Hill bar chalkboard for non-local and non-bar fly readers! That’s Montana at the top, ‘happy hour’ means the drinks are cheaper (it makes the clientele happy/ get happy quicker); Rainier is a mountain and a cheap beer*; a well drink means you don’t specify the brand of liquor for your cocktail, so it’s also the cheapest stuff they have (so don’t order a well drink!); and a pickleback is a shot of whiskey thrown back in one’s throat followed by a pickle (supposedly the salt neutralizes the taste of the whiskey and the burn of the alcohol. Oh boy). *[From Wikipedia] In 2004, a black bear received substantial media attention for having consumed 36 cans of Rainier beer in Baker Lake. Washington.
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I squeezed it all in : clothes on the right, and two pairs of shoes and a toiletry bag on the left. It helps that I don’t have to pack fancy clothes (no suit and tie and not even a sports jacket). And there’s Willem’s New Baggage Rule : NO FOOD allowed in the suitcase, and absolutely NO CHOCOLATE.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I took a walk late Sunday afternoon and then had to pack since I’m heading out to the ‘salt mine’ in Salt Lake City again in the morning.  I am pressing a new suitcase into service that I have actually had for a long time, bought it at a sale. Part of the reason for the new suitcase is that I had a melt-down in my suitcase last Thursday while the rental car was parked in the sun all day with our luggage.  I tucked a whole slab of chocolate into the side of the suitcase – and of course it was no match for the inferno in the car’s trunk.  It liquefied and stained several items of clothing.  (I got most of the stains out to my surprise. I used club soda to rinse it, scrubbed it as best I could, and then used Tide detergent and my washing machine’s ‘extra hot’ sanitary cycle).

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Here is another picture I took of the Montana bar on Capitol Hill; the pink neon sign in the window that is Montana.

Monday/ Correction re: chalkboard : it’s Montana.  I said Washington State. Thanks to Bryan for pointing that out.  I was not paying attention! There is no jagged Puget Sound coastline in this outline.

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Saturday/ the Capitol Hill Block Party

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Pabst Blue Ribbon beer has been around in the USA for a long, long time : since around 1844. The blue ribbons around the beer bottles were done away with in 1912 already, but the beer is still around (the brand is now owned by SABMiller company).
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I say keep it simple with your band’s name. So if it were ME, and I was to choose a name, I would go for the ‘Rabbits’ or the ‘Doldrums’. (Doldrums : 1. a state or period of inactivity, stagnation, or slump | 2. a part of the ocean near the equator abounding in calms, squalls, and light shifting winds. Source: Mirriam-Webster dictionary).

On Saturday Gary got me out of the house to go to the Elysian Brewery Co. for a quick bite. After that we walked down two blocks to check out the Capitol Hill Block Party.  The ‘party’ consists of a few Capitol Hill city blocks that are fenced in, with four stages of live music, and beer and food that’s available.   I don’t drink enough beer (had my one at the Elysian already!), and I don’t really listen to live music so : not for me.   It was still early, and that may be why the crowds appeared to be a little thin. There was also the ‘Seafair Torchlight’ Parade going on in downtown Seattle (which admittedly is more of a family affair than the Block Party).

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Friday/ back in Seattle

It was a beautiful warm, sunny day here in Seattle (85°F/ 29°C). The pictures are from Fifth Ave in downtown, near the Convention Center.

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Artist Ginny Ruffner’s ‘Urban Garden (2011)’ was commissioned by the Sheraton Hotel on Fifth Ave in downtown Seattle. The watering can tilts forward from time to time and a stream of water cascades down the green leaf.
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Here’s the Emerald City ‘Trolley’. (We’re cheating a little bit. It’s not a real trolley like the one in San Francisco, since it’s not running on a track. We do have ‘street cars’. One track is in South Lake Union, with ones in Capitol Hill and in First Hill scheduled to open in the next year or so).
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Thursday/ checking out

The Marriott Courtyard hotel where we will come to and stay in for the next several weeks from Monday to Thursday is comfortable.  I finally got used to the noise of the air-conditioner in the room as well.   I set it at 74°F (23 °C), but even then it turns on and runs frequently.  The day temperatures have come down from Monday’s extreme highs to the low 90s (33 °C).

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It’s 5.59 am in the lobby of the Marriott Courtyard hotel.  I have checked out, and I am checking out the interactive ‘Go Board’ before my colleague and I drive out to the ‘salt mine’ (the factory where we do our project) for one more day on the site. We get to go home on Thursday nights.
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Wednesday/ earth, wind and beer

Uinta Brewing is named after an east-west mountain range located in northeastern Utah. I spotted their beers in the local grocery store.  ‘Earth, Wind and Beer’, says the 12 packs of Cutthroat Pale Ale and Golden Spike Heffeweisen.  The wind refers to their claim that Uinta Brewing has been 100% wind-powered since 2001 (according to their web-site).  I didn’t buy any; hopefully we will go out to eat some time, and then I will ask for one.

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The Cutthroat is a pale ale..
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.. and the Golden Spike is a heffeweisen.
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Tuesday/ it’s hot hot hot

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Starbuck’s Utah issue coffee mug. That’s The Arch from Arches National Park on the left, and the Utah state capitol in the middle.
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I had just stepped into the terminal at Salt Lake City airport on Monday. The Delta birds’ dark blue and red tails really stand out against the sky and the tarmac of Salt Lake City airport.

Monday saw 107°F (42°C) where we work out in the deserty area by the Great Salt Lake, reported my colleagues when I met them at the hotel on Monday night.  A very far cry from the opposite extreme of -8°F (-22°C) when I was here in the dead of winter! Today (Tuesday) was a little less scorching, but the mountains were still shimmering in the heat, not high enough to carry any snow at all at this time of year.

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Monday/ to Salt Lake City

SLC weatherIt is mid-morning on Monday and I am sitting in the South Terminal of Seattle airport, with very clean teeth. (Fresh from the dentist at 7.30 am this morning to get my chompers cleaned).  I see it’s going to hit 97°F (36°C) in Salt Lake City today.  I hope I don’t melt or get toasted too badly out there – the weather in Seattle has not been anywhere near that, for the most part this summer.  It starts out most mornings at 55°F (13°C), with a high of 75°F (24°C).

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A Delta jet sitting at the gate here at South Terminal. I think this is a Boeing 757-300, same as the one that will take us to Salt Lake City.

 

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Sunday/ Trader Joe to the rescue

I ran out of my favorite oatmeal (McCann’s Irish Oatmeal), and had no luck finding it anymore.  The grocery stores in my neighborhood stopped carrying it.  So I was happy to find fresh supplies at the quirky grocery store called Trader Joe’s.  Yes, there are plenty of oatmeals to choose from.  Quaker (now owned by PepsiCo) makes a very nice oatmeal as well; just not the ones with maple syrup and apple and cinnamon and all that added.

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Trader Joe is looking out for me, using his telescope to find my favorite oatmeal (McCann’s Irish Oatmeal).
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Saturday/ Big Bertha is ready

Big Bertha the tunnel borer is ready to start her duties here in Seattle, and there was a dedication ceremony today that Bryan and I attended.  The borer is very big, the biggest in the world, and built in Osaka, Japan by Hitachi’s heavy construction division.  Check out the excellent write-up by gizmodo that also shows in an animation how the digging, earth removal and tunnel construction works.

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Bertha the big tunnel borer is ready to start with the boring of the 2-mile tunnel.
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The structure on the right is the Alaskan Way Viaduct, now deemed unsafe because of damage it suffered during the 2001 Nisqually earthquake. The Viaduct will be dismantled once the tunnel has been completed.
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There were several food trucks around for ‘noshing’.
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Governor Jay Inslee and Congressman Jim McDermott were in attendance at the Bertha dedication ceremony.
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Finally, we were allowed to step onto the platforms that overlooked the tunnel boring pit with the boring machine in place (that was not ‘boring’ but exciting). The front, cutting face of the machine is on the far end from me towards downtown Seattle.
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A first peek from the side ..
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.. and for this picture I had to stretch out my arm over the rail and let the camera take a look for me into the boring pit. Those stickers on the green surface of the boring face are nice for now, but will last about three minutes once the boring starts !
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Friday/ Capitol Hill train station : a long way to go

I walked by the Capitol Hill train station’s construction site. The tunnels to the station have been completed. Here is a Youtube clip of the tunnel breakthrough.  But there is still a long way to go to fill in all the construction that makes up the rest of the station !

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The Capitol Hill light rail station is progressing, but a lot of work is still to be done. The WSDOT website says the tunnel from Capitol Hill to Washington University is complete (100%), but that this station is only 11% complete. But then it is scheduled for opening only in 2016.
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The rain monster is part of new artwork on the walls around the Capitol Hill station’s construction site. There is not much rain this time of year in Seattle, though !
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The gutters catch the rain water, and irrigates the little greeneries that have been arranged in an old storage palette.
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Thursday/ that’s a polychoron

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A tesseract or hypercube is a well-known polychoron.  It has 8 cells : count them and see if you agree !
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No, it’s not a play park climbing structure, it’s .. geometry? art? both?  This one has a very large number of cells. 

There is an intriguing structure on display in downtown Seattle’s Westlake Center.  I walk by there on the way to my firm’s downtown office sometimes, and I finally took a picture.   So what is it?  Well, it’s a polychoron, but a very complicated one with 1-4-8-4-1 outside vertices (with the bottom vertex cut off to make it stand on its own!). Polychora are closed four-dimensional figures, with cells inside.   A tesseract has 8 cells, but the one at Westlake Center has too mind-bogglingly many too count.

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Wednesday/ the Oak is new

I was well enough on Wednesday to get out of the house (I had to get out of the house!) and go have a beer and a bite with my friends.   The Oak is a new-ish, unassuming neighborhood pub and grub place in Beacon Hill, and we went there to try it out.   We liked the food and the atmosphere.  It’s not quiet, but we didn’t have to shout across the table to make conversation.

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Here’s The Oak on Beacon Hill (see the big oak in the window?) – an unassuming neighborhood pub and grub place. We liked our food (chicken and pork sandwiches, fries) and our beers, and we will come back some time.
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Tuesday/ on Royal Baby watch

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The Royal Mint’s Facebook page invites soon-to-be parents in the UK to apply for a ‘lucky’ silver penny to celebrate the birth of their baby on the same day as Kate and Williams’.
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Here is the silver penny. I love coins; would have bought a full set of 2013 UK coins if I had the opportunity when we were just there with the cruise ship. I see I can still order them on-line from the Royal Mint, though.

So .. the due date for the birth of Prince William and Duchess Kate’s baby has come and gone.  When will it be? It’s got to be soon, right?  (I know nothing about babies).  The Royal Mint in the UK has announced that they will send a lucky 2013 sliver penny to parents whose babies are born on the same day as Kate and William’s.  The parents have to apply on the Royal Mint’s Facebook page.  There are only 2013 (the quantity) 2013 (the date) pennies available, which should suffice : on a typical day 2,000 babies are born in the UK.