February 2006 Archives

What does the birth of a democracy look like? What happens when a society - that has lived under despotic rule for as long as most can remember - attempts to transform, to evolve itself, to a higher form?

Shiites Told: Leave Home Or Be Killed (registration required)

The Iraqis are working out their future, slowly. Some times they degenerate to the only behavior they know in sorting out the transition and distribution of power. It will get worse before it gets better but I think it at least has the potential for getting better. It was mentioned in the article that religious leaders are making efforts deal with the tensions peacefully. Even giving the Shiites two days to vacate is a step up from simply killing them in place.

It is the popular thing to use each and every news article out of Iraq to bash the current administration anew. I think that's cheap and easy. Few people really understand the complexities of Iraq. Many people seem to think they do. "It's all just so obvious, isn't it?"

Some time ago I listened to an NPR show Fresh Air when they had L. Paul Bremer III on the show. He was on to promote his book "My Year in Iraq: The Struggle to Build a Future of Hope". It was interesting to hear his telling of events in that first year after the fall of Saddam. He talked about things that never made it into the press. Everything is so clean, easy and unambiguous to us, here in the comfort of our homes.

William F. Buckley, Jr. believes, like many, that It Didn’t Work. That's definitely the easy view. There will be plenty to cheer and support him. I'm not so sure. In the follow on article, Next Step, Buckley attempts to draw a comparison between Japan and Germany of World War II and Iraq but the comparison is disingenuous. Buckley is comparing apples to oranges and he knows it.

Iraq has no history of democracy that anyone can remember. Iraq has no history of respect for human rights that anyone can remember. What is being attempted in Iraq today is to craft something for which there is no plan and no one knows what it will look like when it is done. The US knows what democracy looks like in Western society but it is foolhardy to think that democracy in Arabic society will look the same. The Iraqis really have no idea what it will look like. They've never seen an Arabic democracy before. Not one that works. However, if this article from the Economist is to be believed, democracy is coming to the middle east. They will figure it out, sooner or later.

At this point, the Iraqis have head start. I hope we stay the course as they continue to work out what an Arab democracy looks like. They have some big problems to resolve. Problems that have existed in that society long enough to have hair and teeth. Those problems will not be solved simply.

aloha

[posted with ecto]

Technorati Tags: commentary, iraq, military, sociology

We will not should not will try not to negotiate with terrorists. Negotiations appear to be in full swing.

Aloha

[posted with ecto]

Technorati Tags: commentary, political, religion

I did my Navy thing this weekend. I am a member of the United States Navy Reserves. One weekend a month and two weeks a year. That thing. Only one weekend a month and two weeks a year doesn't really cover it. In order to truly make a successful military career in the reserves it requires more like four to six weeks a year and in most cases you will need to do at least a couple of six to twelve month deployments in the course of a career. I like the military. I would probably go active duty if I could. I've written about this before in this blog but it has been a while and it is on my mind a lot right now.

There is a significant difference between active duty military and reserve military. Two very different cultures. Two very different mind sets. Active duty personnel live in a military culture. Individuals living within that culture may not like it but they still live within it. They still adhere to its basic mores and principles. They complain about them but they adhere to them. Military personnel participate in civilian culture but they never really leave behind the military culture that has become, at least a temporary part of them.

Reserve personnel live in a civilian culture. At regular intervals Reserve personnel visit the military world. Much like the military personnel visit the civilian world, Reserve personnel never really manage to leave their civilian self and put the military culture. For every reservist there is some aspect or aspects of the military that just never seem to fit right. Whether it's the uniform, the rank structure, the flow of responsibility and discipline, something just doesn't sit right with every Reservist. So, the inverse of their active duty counterparts, Reservists are typically civilians who participate in military culture without ever really adopting the military culture.

For many, the Reserves is like a club, country club, or fraternal organization. A social entity. They go and spend the weekend hanging out with the other members, feeling a part of the group, a member. They belong to something. They do military things. They study and train for military activities. They talk about military activities going on around the world. They share their stories of actual military participation. Until recently these stories were usually events that happened years ago. In some of the more strenuous groups they even take military hardware out on to military reserves and hold military exercises. Ostensibly training for the day when the military will call upon them to actually be involved in some real world military operation.

The expectation of the military as a whole is that these reserve units will be able to, when called upon, integrate with active duty operations and deliver the services advertised in a real world environment. And therein lies the major problem with the current arrangement. Reserve units are often incapable of delivering fully their services in a real world environment. Typically, Reserve units require extensive training in preparation for deployment and then often require additional training once in theatre in order to be brought up to operational qualifications.

In Operations Desert Shield and Desert Storm, the reserve components of our military were called upon to deliver the services they had been advertising for so long. Insofar as we know, Reservists were largely successful in the delivery of those services in that conflict. However, we saw a lot of complaining about being called to active duty. Complaints of lives interrupted, educations put on hold, and negative impact on careers and businesses. Reserve forces have comprised as much as 40% of deployed forces in the Global War on Terror. If our military is to retain a Reserve component, it is reasonable to expect that component to provide value to the military. As the Reserve component is expected to participate more regularly with active duty military, the two cultures will need to be more closely aligned.

aloha

[posted with ecto]

Technorati Tags: commentary, military

Writers Block Live is calling for a complete boycott of all high definition video (HD) that uses any kind of DRM such as AACS. The core issue is the desire of major corporate content publishers to incorporate control over how and when copies are made. Digital Rights Management (DRM) is the term that has come to cover this hot topic. The hottest part of this controversy at the moment is the perception that RIAA/MPAA is trying to remove or redefine Fair Use.

Fair Use is the clause in the copyright law that allows people to make copies of copyrighted material at all. Fair Use says that you can make copies of copyrighted material under certain conditions and in accordance with certain practices. Fair Use is what makes legal the copying of a song from the CD on which it was purchased to an iPod.

However, it seems to me that this is only a continuation of a misuse of copyright laws that began a long time ago. In the early 1900s businessmen bought the rights to music written and performed by those now recognized as the greats of Jazz. I'm sure this was not limited to Jazz either. Many of the architects of modern Jazz saw very little if any of the massive amounts of money their artistic endeavors brought in.

The Constitution is very clear on the purpose of copyright.

The Constitutional Provision Respecting Copyright
The Congress shall have Power... To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries. (U.S. Constitution Article I, Section 8)

Indeed, copyright in the case of musicians has been turned on its head. Artists beg music publishing companies for a chance to sign a contract the very heart of which is the conveyance of the artist's right to control the music they create. Without a contract with a major record label it is significantly more difficult to make a living as a musician. So, in the case of music, copyright has become a tool for the stifling creativity rather than promoting it. Major record labels aren't looking for creativity, they are looking for marketability. The very antithesis of creativity by some accounts.

It is interesting to note that in another industry the course of patent (a concept similar to copyright in its intent) has gone very different. For drug companies, their patent on new drugs is very limited. When the patent runs out, the formula becomes available as a generic. Conversely, copyright on a song can be extended, seemly forever. If I understand correctly the current law allows for 70 years after the originating artist dies.

I am all in support of artists being able to earn a living in the purveyance of their art. However, in the current model it is not the artists who are making a living on their art. It is the major record labels. The artists do not own their music in most cases. Yes, the biggest names do but, as I understand it, the majority of musicians signed with major labels have signed over the rights to the music they record.

At the end of the day it seems to me that the RIAA's squawking about piracy and illegal copying is more about their fear that their world is crashing in. The tools are already out there for musicians to publish their music without the major labels. CDBaby makes it possible for musicians to self-publish their own CDs. Those willing to jump through the hoops can publish their music on iTunes Music Store, no CDs required. ProTools, Logic Pro and similar software make home recording far more feasible and realistic. Even GarageBand is enough for some musicians to get their start.

I suspect that DRM and the rest of it is really the death throes of a suffering dinosaur. Major corporations use to living on major incomes are watching their livelihoods get eaten away by technology. This industry was built on records and airtime. The day the tape recorder started to become ubiquitous was the harbinger of major change for this industry. They have steadfastly resisted change at every turn. Continuing to do so may well render them irrelevant as others such as CDBaby and iTunes Music Store grab the opportunity presented by their resistance.

The business model used to move music, movies and similar content from the artist to the aficionado will change or rather will continue to change. The sooner the likes of RIAA and MPAA die, the better by my lights.

Aloha

Technorati Tags: commentary, copyright, DMCA, DRM, political, technology

I have this friend who buys a lot of really cool toys. Bicycles, motorcycles, table saws, band saws. Expensive stuff. I mean, he buys the expensive ones within each class. However, he never has time to go out and play with his toys. Moreover, he also does not have time to maintain the physical condition required to truly enjoy the toys he buys. My friend is wrestling with this issue.

This article from the Reuter's news service (I haven't seen it picked up by the media at large) states that Americans work more but 'seem to accomplish' less. This article on Wikipedia indicates that Americans work more than their European and Australian counterparts. Lastly, the issue of balancing life with work came up in an instant message conversation with a good friend of mine.

This issue of balance of life and work was one of the primary issues that my wife and I were struggling with when we decided to leave the corporate world. We understood that starting a small business might well require more work than corporate America but at least we'd be doing it together and closer to home. At least we'd be making our own choices as compared to having our choices dictated to us by corporate leadership.

For most of my life cross-cultural communication and inter-cultural exchange has been a core part of my work. I've lived in Japan and I've worked closely with Japanese and Europeans. It always made me smile when American managers discovered that they could not make foreign staff work on a weekend, through a holiday, or cut short a vacation in order to meet some business deadline. On one occasion I had a co-worker ask me if it was really true that Japanese workers would be locked out of their building over the New Year's holiday. New Year's in Japan is generally a three to four day holiday with some companies closing down for a week. Americans are often completely nonplussed at the notion that they cannot simply demand more hours from their salaried employees. Likewise, European employees are often viewed by their American counterparts as not dedicated, not a team player, not hard workers.

In the eighties and nineties American society almost prided itself on its thorough materialistic values. The American Dream was no longer to own a house with a picket fence. The American Dream was to have all the latest and best of everything. It seems that American society has taken the next logical step. If life is about having stuff then life must be about making money. If life is about making money then life must be earning a salary.

Is the value of life really determined by some bottom line? Is life really about how much we make? Or is it really about the title? Probably not. It seems we've finally figured out that titles are really meaningless, in and of themselves. Maybe life is about the products that we've worked on. What is the value of life? What is it that we live for and how long do we have to wait to get it? Is retirement what life is all about? Do I really have to wait until I'm 60 or 65 to start enjoying life?

[posted with ecto]

Technorati Tags: commentary, political, cross-culture, sociology, technology

Whew! What a pain in the butt. I finally got my weblog nailed back together. This time with no plug-ins installed. I can't honestly say that the plug-ins were to blame. It does seem that the problem stemmed either from the plug-ins or the fact that I'm not technically savvy enough to properly handle plug-ins. In either case, plug-ins are out. I was handcrafting the html code to make the little boxes around the pictures of books and what not anyway. ecto does a great job of allowing me to tap into my Amazon Associates account so that when you buy a book or something through a link on my page, I get 3 or 5 cents. So, Smittie's Ramblings is back.

Yeah, and I already got one person telling me my new design is bad. Colors are bad. You know what? I like the colors. I will probably refine it a bit over time but for the most part but I like it.

Aloha

[posted with ecto]

Technorati Tags: movabletype, technology

[posted with ecto]

• 4 miles in 40:52
• Pulse one minute after finish: 140
• Pulse five minutes after finish: 128

Technorati Tags: technology

My political compass

• Economic Left/Right: 1.25
• Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -2.62

I want less government because I don't believe that the government is the best way to get most things done. There are few things that absolutely need to be the responsibility of the government.

Although I am a registered Republican I feel that all politicians are not to be trusted. My observation is that politicians work first and foremost to get themselves re-elected. What is best for their constituents, their community, their State and their country is secondary.

I believe in a free market but also acknowledge that some times regulation is necessary. When regulation is needed, I think economic incentives work better than governmental regulations. I would like to see consumers putting more thought into how and where they spend their money, thereby exploiting free market principles rather than expecting the government to protect us from ourselves. To wit, make an effort to spend your money at businesses that support the that which you believe in and avoid those that are not.

I'm more interested in economics than politics but I can't honestly say that I'm strongly interested in either. American Politics strikes me as a run away train. At the end of the day, I have little real influence over the political process. I fall in the center of the political spectrum, which is not to say that I am, necessarily, a Centrist. At least not in the sense that the term is used by many of the Conservative Right. I live in an area that is renowned for its liberal political views while my father is a fan of Conservative Talk Radio. Generally speaking, I usually manage to keep my friend and my father angry at me with my political outlook.

Political Compass is another of the online tests that I love. Political Compass first expands the paradigm used to discuss political position. The Right vs Left paradigm links economic and social view. Yet, these view are not necessarily linked. I don't think Political Compass is by any means perfect or in any way authoritative. It does provide a standard, or measure by which to compare.

Aloha

[posted with ecto]

• 4 miles in 42:46
• Pulse one minute after finish: 144
• Pulse five minutes after finish: 112

Technorati Tags: commentary, political

   INTP.

I - Introversion

N - Intuition

T - Thinking

P - Perception

	Weak Moderate Strong

I like online tests that tell us something about ourselves. In many cases, I learn something new about myself through these tests. Today's case in point, the Myers-Briggs personality model (Google Search, Wikipedia) and the tests based on this model. The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) is based on the psychological research of Carl Jung. At one point, I spent a weekend trying the various online tests.

The test that seemed the best to me was TypeFocus. This test is free, takes about 5 minutes to complete and provides the most detailed results. I took the test several times. First, I focused on learning what the 'questions' were asking. Then I focused on determining the true answers for me. That is, separating what I wanted the answer to be from what the answer was. Separating who I wish I was from who I am. This was an interesting exercise. I asked my wife to answer some of the questions for me. I learned a lot about myself just in this phase alone. Finally, I repeated the test several times answering questions that I was largely ambivalent about with different answers to see how that affected the outcome of the test.

The result of all of this was the determination that I am an INTP. Discovering this bit of information was the beginning of a new road of self-discovery. I began searching the net for information on INTP. Wow! I found quite a lot of information but the most significant was this site, intp.org.

intp.org has an article that describes and explains the INTP. The first time I read The INTP Profile I stopped about a third of the way through the article. It was just too frightening. I was used to hearing and reading descriptions of me as viewed by others. This was my first time to read an article that describe what it was like inside my head. What I was reading was so accurate it scared me. I've gone back since then. I read the article every now and then because it is really useful to be reminded of why I do some of the things I do. Understanding the INTP mindset helps me relate to others better because I better understand other people's reaction to me.

aloha

[posted with ecto]

--------------------
Today's run stats:

• 4 miles in 43:46
• Pulse one minute after finish: 132
• Pulse five minutes after finish: 124

Technorati Tags: commentary, psychology , sociology

So, I've managed to get my fat, old butt out and run every morning this week so far. One more day and I've finished a full week. Very cool. Not as hard as I thought it would be. Monday I was really slow. Almost 50 minutes to run 4 miles. 12 minutes to go one mile.

So, I'm going to keep a record here of my times, my finishing pulse and my pulse five minutes after finishing. Hopefully, what we'll see is a drop in the time and finishing pulse and a great difference between the finish pulse and the five minute pulse. As my physical condition improves my recovery time should improve. At any rate, here's the data for today:

• 4 miles in 43:48
• Pulse one minute after finish: 144
• Pulse five minutes after finish: 132

aloha

[posted with ecto]

Technorati Tags: family, middle-age

Zillow.com is pretty cool. Not at all cool that it doesn't support (read: actively prohibits) Safari. So, you have to install Firefox to check it out. Zillow.com proposes to tell you the current market value of your house. They've incorporated the now required satellite maps which is kind of cool. You can see the values of houses in your neighborhood, or more to the point, you can find out what your neighbor paid for her place. So, it's pretty cool.

More interesting to me is the rhetoric that Zillow.com has started in the realtor community. This article from BusinessWeek provides an overview. Google something like zillow realtor marketing and you'll get a sampling. The upshot is that realtors are pointing out that the data is inaccurate and that the valuations cannot be trusted because they do not come from a human realtor. I ran my house. Zillow.com knew the correct date that I bought the house

I was glad to see the day come when I no longer had to use a travel agent. It was always tedious to have to work through them. Especially when I knew that what I was asking was possible but the travel agent made more money by telling me it wasn't. I don't necessarily want to see real estate agents go the way of travel agents. More, I would rather see real estate agents bring some game to the party. Many of them don't.

aloha

[posted with ecto]

Technorati Tags: commentary, review, technology

I finished "R Is For Ricochet (Kinsey Millhone Mysteries)", "S is for Silence (Kinsey Millhone Mysteries)" and "Eleven on Top (A Stephanie Plum Novel)" haven't been released in paperback yet. So, I'm hard up for stuff to read. I resorted to reading stuff that's good for me. I mean like, books where I'm going to actually learn something! Yew!

"The Art of the Start : The Time-Tested, Battle-Hardened Guide for Anyone Starting Anything"
(Guy Kawasaki)

I started reading "The Art of the Start : The Time-Tested, Battle-Hardened Guide for Anyone Starting Anything" (Guy Kawasaki) about a week ago. Parts of this book are pretty hard to take since they point out a lot of the areas of starting a business in which I am very weak. Like, not knowing anything about business. Guy Kawasaki, for those who don't know, worked on the original Macintosh team and was one of the first to use 'Evangelist' as a business title. After working for Apple he went on to start several great, successful companies. One of those was Garage Technology Ventures where Guy still spends a lot of his time. I've followed Guy for quite a few years now. I enjoy his writing, his insight, and his wit. In The Art Of Start, Guy offers some straightforward, easy to understand, common sense advise about starting. Starting pretty much anything.

I'm only on chapter 3. I'll let you know how it goes.

"Jesus, Entrepreneur : Using Ancient Wisdom to Launch and Live Your Dreams"
(Laurie Beth Jones)

The other book I'm reading is "Jesus, Entrepreneur : Using Ancient Wisdom to Launch and Live Your Dreams" (Laurie Beth Jones). I'm ending up with a lot of really good ideas and advice from this book. I recommend it as well, albeit I'm only on chapter 5.

aloha

[posted with ecto]

Technorati Tags: book, christianity, reading, review

Last night my wife of 17 years and I went to a dinner celebrating Valentine's Day. At this dinner Steve Clifford and his wife were the guest speakers. They talked about marriage and how to keep the romance live. It was a great night. Steve Clifford is the senior pastor at Westgate Church. Steve and his wife, Dana talked about two things significant to not only marriage but relationships in general. First was the importance of understanding what motivates us and our mates. Second was a discussion of the five languages of love.

My wife and I learned that we are both motivated by approval of others. Making sure that others are satisfied with our performance is very important to both of us. This is rather interesting in my case because on most levels I really don't care what others think. I am very opinionated. I don't really care that others don't agree with my opinions. I am interested in the thoughts and opinions of others but am seldom willing to take anyone's word for anything. Thus, most people who know me think I am largely uninterested in the opinions of others. That is true except where my performance is concerned. I work best for managers who recognize and reward, how ever slightly, performance. Interestingly enough, few of my managers figured that out.

"The Five Love Languages: How to Express Heartfelt Commitment to Your Mate"
(Gary Chapman)

After dinner and listening to Steve and Dana, my wife and I went to Lulu Carpenters' for dessert, coffee and a conversation about what we'd learned. In May it'll be 18 years. I thought I loved my wife on the day we married. As I look back, the love we had then was nothing.

Aloha

[posted with ecto]

Technorati Tags: christianity, family, reading

I was, briefly, signed up with the webhost provider, Dreamhost. Since that time the email address that I gave them and only them has been a primary source of spam in my inbox. I'll let readers drawn their own conclusions.

In any case, I received the following text in a spam message sent to that DreamHost email account:

Everybody knows the great sexual scandal known as "Klinton-Levinsky". After the relations like this Klintons popularity raised a lot! It is a natural phenomenon, because Bill as a real man in order not to shame himself when he was with Monica regularly used Voagra. What happened you see. His political figure became more bright and more attractive. It is very important for a man to be respected as a man!

See how it works. Use viagra to improve your performance in your philandering activities and thereby gain greater respect as a man.

Aloha

[posted with ecto]

Technorati Tags: commentary, humor, political

Students' Drinking Reported in Blogs

Fifteen to 20 students at East Grand Rapids High School face possible disciplinary action by the school after parents reported seeing Internet photos of them drinking alcohol at parties.

OK, so, how stupid... never mind.

Aloha

[posted with ecto]

Technorati Tags: humor, commentary, sociology

Great news today. My son no longer needs to get bone marrow tests!

My son suffers a condition called Severe Chronic Neutropenia (SCN). He's had it from the time he was very little. If SCN is genetic then an increased risk of developing Leukemia is also present. As a result of this, until it can be established that the SCN is not genetic, the patient must undergo annual bone marrow testing so as to monitor for the early stages or even the pre-cursors to Leukemia. Bone marrow testing is a frightening and painful process.

Several months ago my son was tested to see if his SCN is genetic or idiopathic. Well, actually the test only determines whether or not the SCN is genetic. In my son's case, if it is not genetic then it must be idiopathic. The test results were negative meaning that his SCN is not genetic. He was scheduled to go in for bone marrow testing on Friday. At his appointment today the doctors told him that he doesn't need the tests anymore. That makes for a pretty happy day the Smittie house.

Pre-adult patients with Idiopathic SCN can grow out of it. That is, their body can, as it matures, begin producing appropriate levels of neutrophils. This is our hope and prayer for our son.

Aloha

[posted with ecto]

Technorati Tags: family, health

I am square into middle age, struggling with all the middle aged male stuff. The current struggle of focus is weight and exercise. Two years ago I was running five eight and half minute miles Monday through Friday. I could do three sets of fifty push-ups and I was making improvements in sit-ups. Pull-ups have always been my nemesis. I can do, like, three. A variety of events in the past two years have made it difficult or impossible to maintain the regimen. So, today I'm over weight, can't run a block, and the only time I do anything even remotely resembling a push-up, I have to sit down and rest for twenty minutes to recover.

Wednesday I went skiing and was sorely reminded of the sorry state of my physical condition. So, yesterday I got motivated to go out and start doing something about it. I have a course that I run that starts here at the house but it's a little too hilly for my sorry butt in its current state. So I drove over to West Cliff drive. Yesterday I ran three miles. Well, actually I ran about a half mile and walked, panting and weezing, two and a half miles. 33 minutes to do three miles. Three eleven minute miles? There are people who use walkers that can go faster than that! OK, but the important part is I was out there. Couple or three weeks and I'll be back up to five miles. Three or five weeks after that, I'll have it back down under nine minutes. All right, I can do this.

This morning I get up, grab my clothes and head down stairs to dress being mindful not to wake the sleeping wife. Now, we have a rather odd stair case in our house that wraps round in a half circle only it's a square. There are two landings that facilitate ninety degree turns in travel. Old man that I am, I managed the first two flights without serious strain or injury and then my luck ran out. Took the first step in the last flight of stairs, slipped and landed left butt cheek square on the last stair in the flight.

Initially more startled than anything I sat there taking inventory. The fall was pretty frightening but it didn't seem that I had seriously hurt anything. I got up and started doing the manly "walk it off" thing. My wife, whom I was trying so hard not to wake, comes down wondering what it is going on and then wondering if I'm OK. I decided I am too old for all this health and fitness crap. I went back to bed.

Aloha

[posted with ecto]

Technorati Tags: humor, middle-age

Monday and Tuesday of this week I attended BAVC's Shooting Techniques II class. It was a good class, learned a lot. Blah, blah, blah. So, the good part was, I have a new lust in my life. The Panasonic AJ-SDX900. Hum, yummie. It does all the formats and film look video. Very nice. And I'll go broke on the extras. Lenses, matte boxes, studio viewfinders, control boxes. Ooh yeah.

Tuesday night after class I drove back to Santa Cruz from San Francisco. We jumped in the mini-van and headed for Dodge Ridge. Spent the night in Sonora and then met a bunch of other home school families for a day of skiing at Dodge Ridge. I haven't skied more than once or twice in 15 years. It was a lot of fun. Dodge Ridge is a nice, friendly space, or at least it was on a Wednesday. It was drizzling when we arrived. Turned to snow fall later in the day, back to drizzle and rain in the early afternoon.

My son took a ski lesson in the morning. My daughter and I skied an easy slope for the first few runs. I taught her how to ride a chair lift so that she wouldn't be stuck on the tow rope all day. Once my son finished his lesson we all rode to the top of the mountain to ski down. It was probably a little more than the boy was really ready to handle after only two hours of skiing but he took it like a soldier. We got down the bottom and I took him over to the chair that my daughter and I had be riding in the morning. Skied with him for a few runs after which I was really wanting to go back to the top. The kid says, go ahead, Dad I'll be fine. He spent the rest of the day riding the chair lift by himself. He had a great day.

My daughter had been skiing before but never learned to ride a chair lift. So, she was relegated to the rope tow which is very short and boring. Having learned how to ride a chair lift she travelled all over the mountain.

My wonderfully devoted wife spent the day in the lodge studying Adobe Illustrator. It was great to have her holding down the base camp. It gave the kids a place to check in and get a confidence check and freed dad up to go out and have fun without worrying about the kids.

It was a lot of fun.

Aloha