Santa Cruz visit - I haven't written in several days because I've been visiting our Santa Cruz office to learn about some of our software stacks. I flew into San Jose Sunday night ("do you know the way to San Jose...") and have been staying in Scotts Valley while driving into Santa Cruz every day. The office overlooks the nearby bay. Also nearby is a wharf with a lot of little shops and restaurants. It's also amusing to see and hear all the sea lions that hang out on the rafters below the wharf. Also nearby is a rather unusual park: a butterfly preserve. There are a bunch of trees growing in this ravine and every year thousands of butterflies gather there to hibernate for the winter.
Missing Halloween - I'm sad that I'll miss out on taking the kids trick or treating this year. This is the first year the twins will be tagging along. On a good note, Michelle and I plan to go out alone for dinner after she picks me up at the airport -- assuming the flights arrive on time.
Michelle's ring - Late last week I picked up Michelle's replacement wedding ring. We both feel happy with it because it's simple enough that she wears it all the time. It's much less likely to get lost or stolen this way. Meanwhile my ring was dropped off to get buffed and have an inscription carved on the inside.
It works with Windows - In another example of Microsoft induced laziness I found that the hotel I'm staying at has a major bug with their room internet service. When you initially negotiate a connection, the local server assigns you an address and a range of local addresses you can reach directly. For places outside that range (in other words -- the internet) your operating system is told the address of a local router which can relay the connection for you. According to proper internet protocol, that router is supposed to be within your range of local addresses. The server at the hotel gives you the address of a router outside your local range. My mac plugged in and effectively said (justifiably so) "there is no route to the internet" because there is no router he can reach within the local network. Microsoft Windows PCs ignore the problem and just hit the router anyway - in violation of the internet protocol. So, in effect, because Windows doesn't see a problem with it, the management doesn't fix the fundamental problem that they have in their setup. Luckily, there was a semi-techie guy behind the front desk who knew a surprising amount about networking who gave me an address for a local router that I could hardwire into my hotel setup - overriding the defaults that occur when you plug into the network. I haven't been traveling for business in quite some time. It's nice to have a good internet connection in your hotel room.