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Stuff that doesn’t fit in any other category

How not to gain a customer

Last weekend, when I first noticed our hornet problem, I called a couple of national pest control chains on Sunday. Both chains answered (or had an answering service) and promised to get back to me "early next week." So on Monday, I waited until about noon. When I hadn't heard from either place by then, I got busy searching and found Pioneer Pest Control, who came out Tuesday and took care of the problem--and still, neither national chain had called me back.

On Thursday, the first chain called back, and I told their representative that they'd missed their opportunity. Tonight, fully nine days after I first called, the other chain called back. However, whatever small measure of credit I would have given them for at least returning the call was quickly lost, as this is what I heard when I picked up the phone:

[Obviously recorded voice] "Thank you for calling Orkin Pest Control. We're returning your call concerning a pest problem. Please stand by and an operator will be with you shortly." [Hold music commences]

Yes, that's right. They waited nine days to call me back to put me on hold! Needless to say, I didn't wait around for a human being to grace me with their presence. Now, it may be that Orkin is a great pest control service, and had I called a local office, perhaps I would have received a quicker call back. But as it was, the local offices were closed on Sunday, so I used the national number. Apparently the connection between that number and the local offices is quite poor--perhaps they're still using the Pony Express?

If you want my business, you're going to have to respond a little quicker than nine days--and have a person, not a robot, make the return call!



Possible new rules for the 2008 Tour de France

The Tour has a drug problem. First it was Patrik Sinkewitz. Then Alexandre Vinokourov. And now, Christian Moreni. Not to mention all those who "retired" or were otherwise dealt with prior to the start of this year's Tour. At the start of this year's event, hopes were high that the doping scandals were behind us. Alas, that's turned out not to be the case. Given that it seems the doping is impossible to control, I have some proposed changes for next year's Tour--changes that will handle the doping issue, as well as make the race more exciting for fans everywhere.

Update: Holy cow, Rasmussen's gone too!

  1. No more drug tests: Clearly they're not working to dissuade anyone from cheating, so let's just open things up. Anything goes--whatever drug you think will help your performance, you're free to give it a shot. The Tour will save millions in expenses, and spare themselves any further embarrassment when yet another big name rider fails a drug test. The other upside is that the tour will go much quicker, as I expect the average pace of the drug-enhanced athletes will be notably quicker than that of previous tours. Lose the rest days, too, as there won't be any need.
  2. Allow physical contact during the race: Think of the best of wrestling, roller derby, NASCAR, and demolition derby combined into one action-packed multi-week event. "And there goes Smithson, over the edge of the Col d'Aubisque, courtesy of a great body check from Peltiere!" 'Yes, Todd, that really was a great check, and the 1,500' vertical drop will really slow Smithson's return to today's route!' Think of all the new fans this will bring to the sport.
  3. Umbrella girls: Hey, if it works for Moto GP, it can work for the Tour, too. After all, it can get toasty sitting there on the saddle, waiting for the race to start. Each day, anyone in the top 10 in the general classification will be protected from the sun (or the rain) by an umbrella girl.

OK, so the above is in jest. I do enjoy watching the Tour; it's simply an amazing display of endurance, strategy, and outright speed. However, if something isn't done about the doping and drug issues, the sport is in danger of losing what little reputation it has left. It's bad when you begin to doubt any result, not knowing whether you just saw a heroic performance or merely the results of chemistry at work (i.e. Landis and Vinokourov's "great" mountain stages in 2006 and 2007).

I don't have any good suggestions on just how to further clean up cycling, though--perhaps changing the current two-year ban into a lifetime ban? Bigger financial penalties? Disqualification of an entire team if anyone fails a drug test during a race? Whatever it is, it's clear that more changes are needed if the sport is to cleanse itself.



Hasta la vista, hornets!

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As you may know, we had a not-so-small hornet's nest in a tree in our backyard. On Sunday I called a couple of the national pest control chains, thinking they'd be best equipped to respond quickly. I left messages with both to call me, but as of Monday morning, none had done so. So I did a bit of searching, and found a local company, Pioneer Pest Management (based in Vancouver, Washington). I spoke to someone for about five minutes, and they called back an hour or so later and set up the removal for Tuesday. I never did hear back from one of the national chains, and the other actually called me back about 30 minutes ago. Too bad!

On Tuesday afternoon, Don from Pioneer arrived to deal with the hornet's nest. I cowered behind our patio door, opening it just enough to take some pictures of the process. I put them together in a small album that shows each step in the nest's removal--just click the first image and then use the slideshow controls to step through the rest. The captions on the larger image explain what's happening at each step.

He was here for about 40 minutes overall, and it cost $99--a bargain in my book when I saw everything he did to remove the nest. They also include a 30 day warranty, so if we have another nest crop up in that immediate area (meaning they somehow didn't get the queen), they'll come back and remove it for free. Sure, I probably could've done this myself...but there are some jobs I'm quite happy to leave to the experts!



Things you’d rather not see in the backyard

wasp image

We were out in the yard about four days ago, and if this thing was there, I sure didn't see it--and it's hard to miss, hanging out in the open about 10' from our kids' play structure. And no, I have no dreams of YouTube infamy, so I won't be attempting any creative destruction methods tonight. Instead, I'll call the experts tomorrow and let them take care of it. The nest is at least a foot across, if not closer to two.

I'm really not sure what they are, though I think they're members of the wasp family. If anyone wants to hazard a guess, here's a closeup of the critters.

Ugh. Bees and wasps. Two of my least favorite things, at least in mass concentrations in my own backyard!



More bad pictures

It was my birthday last Sunday, and my wife gave me a free pass to go out and about for a good chunk of the day while she watched the girls. So I packed up my new camera, and headed out to the Columbia River Gorge via the back roads. I drove a really big loop--about 250 miles total--up the Washington side of the Gorge on highway 14, then up highway 141 to Trout Lake. I followed 141 until the pavement turned into gravel, then turned around--my little MR2 is quite fun to drive, but "good ground clearance" is not on its list of attributes. Along the way, I stopped occasionally to snap some landscape photos.

Route 141 ends pretty much directly across from Hood River, and just down the road a touch is one of the more popular launching spots for Gorge windsurfers--as you can see by the number of vehicles in this Google Maps overhead view. So I took my camera and went and sat near the water's edge for a while, taking pictures of the action with the 300mm zoom. The Gorge is one of the most popular windsurfing spots in the country, and the wind was howling on Sunday morning--there must've been close to 100 windsurfers out on the water. I was hoping to see more freestyle wave jumpers, but alas, I only caught one shot of anyone in the air.

As you can tell by the images, I'm still pretty bad at this DSLR stuff. I'm having fun learning, but I just haven't had enough time to get out and shoot pictures while experimenting with the many modes the camera offers. At least we have some wonderful scenery around here that prevents the pictures from being completely terrible. (And next time, I'll remember to set the camera in RAW mode, so I can do more post-shot image correction when I get home!)



Free time at San Francisco International

747 approachingMy Friday flight home from WWDC (San Francisco [SFO] to Portland [PDX]) wasn't set to depart until 9:15pm, probably putting me in the door around midnight. In an effort to get home somewhat sooner, I headed to the airport around 5pm, as there was a 6:15ish flight to PDX, and I thought maybe I could get on that one instead.

However, when I reached their gate, the departure board indicated "delayed," and the estimated new departure time was 9:40pm--well after my booked flight's departure. With no pressing requirements for the next four hours, I made my way to the end of the C concourse, where I had a good view of the planes taxiing by--as well as a view, though quite far away, of landings on runways 28L and 28R.

Thinking simply "I wonder if someone will come question me about this," I got out the Nikon, attached the 70/300mm zoom, and started snapping pix. Amazingly, over the course of an hour's worth of picture taking, I was completely ignored by Homeland Security. (The first few images were snapped from a café near the international terminal, outside the concourse proper.)

The pictures may only be of interest if you're a true aviation nut; most aren't even that good. I do like, however, the nose-on shot of the China Airlines 747, which was snapped as it maneuvered on the taxiways just outside the concourse. It makes a most impressive desktop image when cropped to fit 1920x1200! (As always, if you ever want a full-size version of any image, just ask.)



Overheard on the street…

It seems that everyone walking around here in San Francisco is connected to something--if it's not an iPod, it's a cell phone (with or without headset). As I was walking back to the hotel last night, a sharply-dressed woman was walking towards me, talking quite loudly to someone via her cell phone's Bluetooth headset.

Her voice was loud enough that there was absolutely no way I couldn't hear what she was saying, in a most animated fashion. To the best of my memory, this is exactly what she said:

Listen Danny ... I said listen! ... they don't know about any of that, really! They can't. There's no way!
pause while Danny is obviously saying something
Oh Danny! Give it a break! You watch way too much CSI! They simply can't know...

And then she was passed and on her way, leaving me wondering just exactly what they had been discussing--a friend suggests she may have been rehearsing lines for a play or TV show. I'm going to go with that thought, as she clearly wasn't too concerned about anyone overhearing her conversation!



Play ball!

Last night, a few Macworld staffers took in the Giants-Blue Jays game at AT&T Park. Our seats were well out in left field, so the picture taking wasn't the greatest. However, the 300mm zoom did a decent job of bringing the action a bit closer, as you can see in this brief album.

The Giants won 3-2, with all scoring completed by the end of the 3rd inning--late arrivals to the ball park missed most of the excitement (though there was one spectacular home-run-preventing catch later on).



WWDC 2007 Keynote images

I took a bunch of pictures of the keynote yesterday--our press seats weren't the greates, as we were about 50 or 60 rows back and well off to the left. The room was quite dark, and I was shooting from our seats without a tripod. I used my new Nikon D40X with a 70/300mm zoom, with the camera (mostly) left in automatic mode (but with the flash disabled). Despite the long zoom and dark room, some of the shots actually came out halfway decent--a testament to the vibration reduction technology in the lens!

Here's the gallery, and these are definitely unedited pictures--the only requirement for inclusion was "not too blurry to understand." Feel free to borrow for your own uses if you wish--just ask me if you want a non-watermarked version.

Today I've been working on other stuff most of the day and haven't actually made it to any sessions yet, but that changes in 30 minutes or so as I sit through something that's probably way over my head! :)



A different kind of paging…

It's Sunday morning as I sit here in this San Francisco airport café, having just arrived on my flight from Portland for this week's WWDC. The flight itself was fine--the air was smooth, the plane was lightly loaded, and I had an entire row to myself. Without being in first class, it just doesn't get much better than that!

However, just before we pushed back from the gate in Portland, I heard this on the plane's PA system: "Rob Griffiths, please press your flight attendant call button." Uh oh. Talk about a quick way to elevate one's heart rate--nothing like an on-board page to accomplish that! A sampling of thoughts that ran through my head: "Uh oh, what happened to one of our kids!?" ... "I bet I left something at home, like my luggage, and my wife is calling to let me know" ... "They figured out that their online check-in tool shouldn't have let me move from the cheap seats up into Economy Plus?" [I was able to jump from row 22 to row 8 without any trouble] ... "Was there something in my carry-ons that they've just now discovered to be dangerous?" ... "Someone saw me taking pictures of the airplanes from the concourse windows and called security" ... "I always wondered what happens when someone is asked to press their flight attendant call button; looks like I get to find out!"

After all that (and more) had run through my head for a couple of minutes, the flight attendant showed up and simply said: "Ah, thank you--we just wanted to make sure you were on the plane. Didn't want to leave without you!" Whew, no emergency, no trouble. But then I began to wonder...how come they didn't already know I was on the plane? After all, I had handed them my boarding pass at the top of the jetway, they had scanned it through their boarding system, and I heard the thing go "beep."

The only thing I can think of is that by jumping from steerage into Economy Plus (or whatever my airline calls it), I somehow confused their system. Perhaps the gate agent did something special to let me claim my 'upgraded' seat--the flight was quite empty after all--and that somehow 'lost' me in the system? Whatever the reason, it was just a bit disconcerting to find myself 'lost' in an airplane despite having had my boarding pass scanned prior to boarding!

In any event, I'm here now, and have a free day to explore the city and its surroundings and take some pictures with the new camera. Tomorrow things get busy, with the (public) keynote talk in the morning and then a number of "state of the union" presentations in the afternoon, and a reception in the evening. I'm hoping that there are at least one or two real 'wow' secret features revealed in Leopard, as I'm not overly impressed at the moment (based on the features shown on Apple's OS X pages). We'll know one way or the other in about 24 hours!