Off to Arizona

Heading to Arizona for Christmas.

Seattle Public Library

Holy cow, they have a lot of locations throughout the city.

Never been here (the Central Library) before. OMG this place is awesome.  It's won a crapload of awards, and I can totally see why.

My daughter and I visited one lazy Saturday afternoon to kill some time while waiting on filmmaker mom to do her filmmaker thing elsewhere.  Turns out the kiddo is afraid of heights, even though she was riding on my hip and glued to me, but that's the "open space" impact of this place.

They also have a really awesome "map room" with a 3-ft diameter topological globe (I think that's the term) - and kiddo had fun spinning it, running her fingers over up and down the mountain ranges and into the oceans.  She also had fun pulling open the drawers to look at the different kinds of maps inside - all kinds of maps. I had no idea there were so many ways to draw the British Isles and bring out details, etc.

Kiddo had fun in the kids section, pulling DVDs off the shelf as a "shopping list" and was really bummed when I explained we don't have an SPL membership.  Maybe since there's a branch near my day job office, I should look into it.

(Note the pages I found these images at seem to be broken - Google found me the image, but "visit this page" results in a broken link; go figure.)

WA State Fair

At The Fair again. Watched Cowgirl Karen. Definitely a dying American art form.  Which is too bad, since it does take a lot Of skill and can be fun to watch.

Kiddo is on the bungee power jump again. Kid would grow wings and soar if she could. I dread the day she learns about base jumping.

Some day she'll be old enough to join me in this demon slingshot thing. Wife says I'm not allowed on it until kiddo is old enough to go with me.

Tracking my activity for health and creepiness

On the one hand, it annoys me the GPS couldn't figure out I walked in a straight line along 4th, as opposed to weaving through the buildings using my mutant powers.

On the other hand, it kind of freaks me out that this device was able to pinpoint and record my exact location to within a few hundred feet.

And I voluntarily carry this thing around in my pocket.

Seattle Clouds are the Best Clouds

Of all the many places I have lived and travelled, I think the Seattle area has the best clouds, hands down. They have so much variation, but they always have character and seem so relaxed and casual.

They strike the perfect balance of form, color and pattern.

While I really do miss that thunderstorms we had back in Michigan, and I'd trade Wellington for just about anywhere (maybe I'd take Prague; Prague was pretty amazing), I love Seattle clouds the best.

Do the Puyallup 2016

The Washington State Fair will be known by "Do The Puyallup" for years to come.

First stop on the 2016 visit? Same as last two years: The Giant Slide.

Microsoft Volume Licensing - reflections on managing the VAMT

Like everyone who has ever tried to read a software license agreement, let alone figure out how to pay for it, I have a love-hate relationship with Microsoft, and especially their Volume Activation Management Tool.

Volume licensing can be a real time saver, especially in organizations where machines are rebuilt frequently.  However, it's also finicky and a royal pain in the ass.

Well, turns out J. Decker agreed, and she has written a VAMT Technical Reference.  I'm not sure how "VAMT" might be pronounced, but every rendering in my head sounds exactly like a swear word.

(Image poached from)

Also potentially useful is the Microsoft Licensing Review (old, but still useful to grasping some of the basic nonsense concepts).

An article discussing Microsoft licensing in the Amazon cloud hosting service.  This is specifically for AWS, but the general concepts of "software in the cloud," are still potentially useful.

Chambers Creek Park, Tacoma

Chambers Creek Park, in University Place (aka Tacoma). Used to be a gravel mine, so has some really fascinating concrete structures. Beautiful park with huge open spaces.

Kite Festival was tons of fun. Took my little one on a play date with her friend. We got bits of wind here and there, so not much kite flying, but it was a wonderful day. They had bounce houses and food trucks.

Food truck with news article saying cash strapped public schools try inviting food trucks.  They had "spiral cut potatoes" on a stick - basically a different kind of French fry, and it was good.  The idea that schools are so cash strapped we can't afford to feed kids who can't afford food in the first place, is depressing and a bad sign for our society.  The food trucks are a bad solution to a problem that shouldn't exist in the first place.

Pig Iron BBQ - Seattle local dining

Great local BBQ place in Seattle. You know a mom & pop restaurant is going to be good when 70% of the space is kitchen. And it was good, too. Fun staff, good food, and they have their own store cola, too.

My coworker and I were running client site visits, when he got a flat tire. We located the nearest Les Schwab, left the car, and asked for a local recommendation.  They suggested Pig Iron BBQ, and it was worth it.

I had the BBQ chicken sandwich, and my coworker had some kind of monster healthy-looking green salad with pulled pork piled on top.  He's this skinny thing, but somehow couldn't stop himself from shoveling it down, and repeating the mantra "THIS IS SO GOOD!"

Pierce County Fair - Frontier Park, Graham, WA

Hanging out at the Pierce County Fair at Frontier Park in Graham, WA, tonight.

It's a nice park, with lots of walking trails. Also well equipped with animal barns for those of who grew up around farms.

The Little One loves the rides.  Hoo-boy, do they get you coming and going through.  It seems like all the fairs around here contract Funtastic to run the rides. They do a great job now of selling you a paper card with a barcode, which is then linked to the database.  Each ride operator scans your card, once for each person who is going to ride, and the scanner wirelessly registers the change in value of the card you have, and the operator can tell you how many tickets you have left.

Note that one "ticket" has a value of about 50 cents.  So, those rides that are 7 or 10 "tickets" per rider?  Yeah, you see where I'm going with that one.  Thank goodness I only have one kid!  (Of course, some day, she'll bring her friends along...)

Graham is old farm country, so every time there is an event here, the buildings fill up with cows, pigs, goats, chickens, dogs, cats, rabbits, etc., etc.  We always have fun walking through these.  There are some really weird looking chickens in the world.

Why we love Heroes Unlimited and Rifts

The game mechanics in all the Palladium Books games are a complete mess, but the character generation is so over-written that it's actually kind of a mindless pleasure to indulge in the wreckage and see what kind of character shakes out.

Fort Casey, Whidbey Island, WA

We were exploring Fort Casey today, and I couldn't help but try to imagine it as a dwarven fortress in a D&D world. Most of it is partially or completely underground and it's very hard to see from certain angles. Even the massive guns would be below sight line when in then"loading" position until raised to fire.

Swords & Stitchery - a gamwr blog

Was surfing and ran across this site. I don't have any horror stories of the peryton, but they are one of my memories of 1e DnD.

Swords & Stitchery - Old Time Sewing & Table Top Rpg Blog: The Peryton & The Other Monster Manual For Your Old School Campaigns

Finding a Help Desk Ticketing System

So, I'm tasked with pre-screening helpdesk ticketing systems, because my new employer is ready to make the jump to Something Better.  Here's what I've discovered.

SysAid - dedicated sales people, who appear to be in the US, and will talk to you on the phone, and be happy to customize a demo to your requirements, to help you decide if that's what you want.

ConnectWise - dedicated sales people, who appear to be in the US, and will talk to you on the phone, and be happy to customize a demo to your requirements, to help you decide if that's what you want.

Autotask - dedicated sales people, who appear to be in the US, and will talk to you on the phone, and be happy to customize a demo to your requirements, to help you decide if that's what you want.

JIRA - I could not figure out how the Hell to get to a person. I could demo the product, and a-la-carte order anything I wanted, or view demo video, after demo video to my heart's content, all through the website, but pre-sales human?  Yeah, this one dropped right off my list.

Manage Engine - Look, I know India has a lot of really brilliant people, and they will eventually compete with China as the two Superpowers (displacing the current UN Security Council entirely),  but outsourcing your pre-sales demo to India?  Come on.  I need a sales person who can tell me how the product will work for ME, and my "special needs," not walk me through one of the online videos, and choke if I try to go off-script.  The online demo is absolutely brilliant - I've shared it to show what a real "activity management" product should be.  But, that's about the limit of what I want from Manage Engine right now.

Request Tracker - just don't do it.

Spammers not even trying

Except for the part where this spam message appears to have actually originated from a Microsoft server (OOPS), these spammers aren't really even trying.

Tacoma Nature Center - break the daily routine

At the Tacoma Nature Center today. I've been to Cheney Staidum dozens of times, and somehow never knew the Nature Center was here, tucked right in the middle of Tacoma, preserving what must be a sliver of what the forest here looked like before modern civilization arrived. In hindsight, I've even driven past the Nature Center before, but didn't register it. It's amazing how much of our daily lives are dominated by routine, that discovery somehow slips to holidays and special occassions.

My extensions to the Rules for Dating My Daughter

So, I was reading a "rules for dating my daughter," recently, and I felt there was something missing.

So, here are my personal extensions to the "rules for dating my daughter":

New Rules for Dating My Daughter

Rule 1:  Once upon a time, I was a teenage boy. I know what you’re thinking;

Rule 2:  I’m older now – not only do I know what you’re thinking, I’ve had more thoughts than you can possibly imagine, and I know exactly how to tell if you’ve had them, and I already know what will happen to you if those thoughts ever leave your head;

Rule 3:  If you make her cry, I will make you cry;

Rule 4:  You should Google “Rules for Dating My Daughter” – it won’t help you escape, but you might realize how deep you’re already in it;

Rule 5:  When in doubt, remember Rule 1.

Polyglot Park

I love this area.  I'm in Orting at the park and it's interesting hearing the number of families that mash English with another language when talking to their kids. I've identified three different languages, although i couldn't tell you what they were.

Orting of all places ;)

--

Main City Park is a Community Park located in our downtown area, right off of the main street through town!  This park features two sections.  The first section located at 101 Train St SE has a play area with a big toy and swings, built by the volunteers, public restrooms, benches, picnic tables, trees, plantings, horse shoe pits, a memorial wall, a gravel parking area and a covered area that is available for reservations.  The second section located at 102 Train St SE is the area where the basketball court is, with trees, plantings, benches, our lovely tree carvings and the gazebo that is available for reservations.  This park is also a place where you can park and walk on the Foothills Trail.   Many events happen right in this park!

Sound Transit - I'm Commuting Now

I've always found watching the world through a train window to be a bit surreal. Like watching a toy set on the table of a toy train set.  It always has that slightly surreal dream-like quality to the visual.  Always.

Never really been a public transit commuter before.  Started a new job this week. Oh sure, I've used buses and trains, but that was when on vacation or for film fests. This isn't glamorous; this is daily grind.

Taking the Sounder (light rail) this mornkbg for the first time. Nice clean trains.

Of course, being able to write this while commuting means less of my life simply wasted by traffic. That's pretty cool.

Daffodil Festival In Orting

Orting, Washington, is this pretty little town that has had explosive population growth as the Seattle workforce moves farther and farther into the suburbs.

They participate in the Daffodil Festival and also have a great little park that my little one enjoys playing at


We have several great parks within about 5 minutes of our house.

Today, we're in Orting enjoying the sunshine and the small town feel.