Horray! I’m going to China in December for 3 weeks! Hope to gave a great time, I’ll try to post plenty of photos and some of what I did after I return. Until then….check out Mao.

Well, we are back from our honeymoon to Alaska, and rather than trying to explain everything we did (possibly boring you to death), I’ll just give you guys a link to some of the photos: Click Here.

Highlights of the trip were:

• Hiking Flattop Peak Trail.
• Taking a cruise within the Kenia Fjords National Park:
  • Seeing killer whales, a humpback whale, sea otters, puffins, porpoise, sea lions.
  • Aialik glacier and other glaciers.
• Hiking to Exit Glacier.
• Biking the Tony Knowles Coastal Trail by bicycle and taking a self-guided walking tour of Anchorage.
• Seeing the beautiful town of Seward and Homer.
• Taking a tour from the Alaskan Center for Coastal Studies:
  • Went tide-pooling and saw a bunch of cool creatures like: star fish, clams, octapus, sea cucumbers, sea urchins, etc.
• Driving from Anchorage to Seward along the Cook Inlet (one of the most beautiful drives in all the world).

That’s right, I’m getting married! This Sunday (July 22nd) is the day. After being romantically involved with my now fiance since Febuary of 2004, we will be tying the knot. It will be a very intimate and small wedding at a friends house, which will include only close friends and family.

Of course, there have been hard times in our relationship, however, the fact that we have made it through them has in fact made me more optimistic and less scared of married life.

I will post pictures on Flickr and here of the actual wedding soon after the event. We plan on having some more semi-professional photos taken sometime after the wedding as well (which I will share). We are going to Alaska for our honeymoon, and are looking forward to seeing a part of the U.S. we have never seen before.

UPDATE: Click here to see some pictures from the ceremony:

That’s all for now….stay tuned.

I love you very much Siqing!

Too often leaders sound their fiddles of fear, in an attempt to make their decisions seem more righteous.

OK, let me tell you it is extremely frustrating to spend 30 mins. drawing an awesome diagram with Word 2007’s new drawing canvas tools, saving the file, closing the file, re-opening the file, and finding all your drawings are gone–being replaced by blank picture elements! This has happened two or three times now, and I’m about to give up trying to draw with Word 2007.

Anyone had this same thing happen? All my searching Google turns up nothing…

Siqing (my fiance) and I just returned from another trip to the Puerto Rician islands. We were there for 5 days–one night on the big island and four on the island of Vieques. While on the big island we just walked a lot around Old San Juan (pic 1, pic 2, pic 3) and around Fort San Felipe del Morro (pic), and toured another fort we didn’t see the last time we were there–Fort San Cristóbal.

To get to the island of Vieques we chartered a small propeller plane from Vieques Air Link. Once there we stayed at the Casa de Amistad hotel in the town of Isabel Segunda, which is one or only two “major” towns in Vieques (located on the Northern shore). Almost eveyday we went snorkeling at one of the many secluded beaches (at least when we were there). Several of the beaches are named after colors (i.e. Green Beach, Blue Beach, etc…). To get to the beaches and around the island, we rented a scooter from Extreme Scooters. The highlight of our trip was at Green Beach while snorkeling, we saw a ray of some sort (I like to think it was a Manta Ray), which scared the bejesus out of me since it was so big and came from behind us, a huge puffer fish, and beautiful huge gardens of sea fans that swayed in the current.

Another note worthy thing we did on Vieques, would include the attending the opening of an art exhibit at El Fortin Conde de Mirasol (pic) (one of the last Spanish forts built in the New World), of works done by the two Puerto Rician political prisoners: Oscar Lopez Rivera & Carlos Alberto Torres. In attendance was the governor of Vieques (pic), what appeared to be wives and/or relatives of Oscar and Carlos, and ex-political prisoners.

For all the pics click here!

I’ve recently re-discovered the awsome awsome site to get t-shirts Threadless.com. You can buy t-shirts that people in the Threadless community have designed themselves! Meaning not many people have them, they are unique, and most importantly not advertisments for large retail shops!

This brings up something I’ve had on my mind for a while now, and I wanted to just express it if you guys don’t mind indulging me. Has anyone noticed how many people are wearing shirts with the retailers name on it? Not a day goes by that I don’t see 3-4 people wearing shirts that say “Holister” or “Abercrombie and Fitch”. I used to not pay any mind to it, but I recently realized why exactly people wear this stuff. The only reason I can come up with, at least when it comes to clothing that came from a semi-expensive store, is that they want everyone to know they can afford to buy from that store.

Actually I never knew, up until a few weeks ago, what exactly “Holister” sold. If you ever go in to their store, you will see exactly what they sell. When I went in, it was hard to find an item of clothing which didn’t have “Holister” written across it. It seems people are willing to pay the store back for its advertising.

Sorry about the rant, I promise I’ll have some ASP .Net and/or SQL Server 2005 stuff soon. Most likely on the subject of encryption, so stay tuned….

I was traveling north on a somewhat hilly and rural north-bound highway in Arkansas. It was the edge of an autumn morning, when there is still a hint of coolness in the air and the dew barely clings to the slightly overgrown grass. Deep in anxious thought of what the day might bring, I came around a bend in the road.

It was the first dog that caught my eye first, the one lying in the grass on the opposite side of the road. Still. Lifeless. The dog seemed to be a medium-sized and dark colored breed, no doubt the victim of a fast moving vehicle. Seeing such things are rare but yet are just frequent enough that on seeing them, one tends to feel a sense of sadness, but soon the moment has past and not another thought is given to it. It was the second image that I saw that mid-morning day, that has been permanently fixed into my mind. It was a second dog. This one approximately the same size as his departed friend. It had a red colored coat, which was dull and worn, just what you expect to see on a road-weary wondering dog. It sat on its side next to his friend. Its eyes were alert and its neck was erect, with a look of sheer confusion written on its face.

This is the image that has been permanently fixed into my mind. An innocent minded friend, wondering why his playful companion won’t wake up.

Here are some “…strongly opinionated but very smart people giving advice” to NASA, that were asked to resign their positions under pressure:

Click Listen to hear the whole story.

More evidence for my Temple Secret article…

Thanks for all of you who came out to the show! I had the time of my life…