Troutmaster

Raspberry Wheat

This raspberry wheat from the Moose's Tooth is for Timber. We had some pizza and beer for dinner and both were pretty good. Not sure what we'll do tomorrow.

Moose's Tooth

We are going to the Moose's Tooth tonight for dinner. I'm going to get a pint of the Raspberry Wheat and one other beer. If you ever come to Anchorage you should give it a try.

Finished Scheduling My Bowl Games

The College Football Bowl games are currently raging and I just finished scheduling the taping of the games that I would like to see. That's the great thing about being able to schedule show recordings over the internet. I just hope that Timber doesn't get mad that all the football is being recorded and erase it all before I get home.

Aces Lose 2-1

Well I guess the 10 day layoff between games caused the Alaska Aces to be a bit lethargic. They never really put things together and as a result fell 2-1 to the San Diego Gulls. Scotty Gomez was obviously one of the best players on the ice but I'm guessing he was slowing down a little bit to prevent injury. He always seemed to put passes on the tape and played smart. I forgot to bring my camera so I couldn't take any photos.

Alaska Aces

We are going to an Alaska Aces hockey game in a little bit. I'll try to take some good photos. Hometown NHL player Scotty Gomez is playing for the Aces due to the NHL lockout so I'm interested in seeing how he does in the beer drinking league.

Working Remotely

I'm doing my work from Alaska this week and I have to say that it is hard to go from being on vacation to being in work mode. I think I'm still able to get things done but I really don't feel like working. I wonder if this is what it would feel like to work remotely all the time?

Cool Vacation Ideas

Timber sent me a link to a cool vacation site. I could definitely see myself going on many of the trips listed on the website. Overall it has some good ideas for things we might want to do on our honeymoon.

Ice Fishing Shelter

My brother went and got an ice fishing shelter the other day. It is called the Eskimo Quick Flip II. It can hold between 2 and 3 people and is great on cold and windy days. I spent some time over the last few days helping him put it together. Later this week we'll either use it on another ice fishing adventure or we will go snowboarding at Alyeska instead. Either way it should be fun.

Christmas In Alaska

Merry Christmas everyone! Christmas in Anchorage this year was a little chilly (0 degress F) but fun overall. My parents brought breakfast to my brother's house this morning so we ate breakfast and then opened presents. As expectd Ava got tons of cool presents. I think Christmas with kids is the best. Later on in the day I went over to someone's house for dinner and to watch more kids open presents. All in all it was a fun Christmas.

Bowling, Shopping, and Snow

My brother had to stay out of the house all day yesterday so we ended up going to breakfast at Hogg Brothers (where they serve huge portions). I got two pancakes and two eggs and I didn't even come close to finishing my food. After that my brother had to take his friend Craig to the airport. After that we checked out probably the greatest store on earth, The Sportsman's Wharehouse. I'd say it is like REI but with guns, ammo, and fishing stuff. Between this place and REI I could spend about $10k a trip. After we were done drooling there we headed to my mom's place for a lunch of beer battered halibut and fries. Then we did some bowling and got smoked by my parents. Overall it was an action packed day but also quite relaxing at the same time. This morning I spent about two hours doing my Christmas shopping with my mom. So now I feel that I'm pretty much ready for Christmas.

Ice Fishing At Fire Lake

I finally got to go ice fishing and it was a blast. Here is an 18 inch rainbow that I was able to pull up through the ice. I'd guess the ice was about a foot thick. We went to Fire Lake in Eagle River. I think tomorrow we'll either go snowboarding or snowshoeing.

Ice Fishing Tomorrow

Tomorrow I will go ice fishing with my brother. I can't remember the last time I did that but I think it is going to be fun. I'll take photos of the fish that we catch.

I Survived The Trip To Alaska

I made it to Alaska after a long and arduous trip. When I get to the airport I always wonder why people bunch up near the gate even though they have assigned seats. My flight from San Jose to Seattle was late, so I got into Seattle just as my other flight was supposed to depart. Once I got off the plane I sprinted to the gate and at the time I thought I barely made the flight. But we ended up not taking off for nearly another hour. To further slow things down we hit a head wind that slowed the flight to a crawl. I feel bad for my mom and brother who either stayed up late or got up early to come get me because they both have to go to work in the morning.

My Vote For Worst Movie Ever

Timber's friend Jackie let us borrow "Booty Call" over the weekend and we watched it. I have to say that this is probably the worst movie I have ever seen. It is an attempt at a comedy but at even the best moments it is only mildly funny and that it with captions. The actors sometimes talk so fast and say things so unintelligably that I had to switch to captions to catch everything. Overall I would give this gift as a Christmas present to people that I don't like. So if I give this to you, you should be offended. :-)

Christmas In The Park

I went with Timber and her parents to have dinner at The House Of Siam in downtown San Jose and then check out "Christmas In The Park". The thai food was mediocre but Christmas in the park turned out to be pretty cool. The Christmas tree must have been about 60 feet tall and it had a choreographed light show. There were also tons of displays and smaller christmas trees throughout the park. We also checked out he ice skating rink that had palm tree. If you are in San Jose I would recommend going to check it out.

Collegue's Retirement

I attended a retirement party for a collegue yesterday. It was amazing to hear about all the things he had done throughout his career. He has been at IBM for 30 years and has had an impact on countless people. He helped me work out the kinks in my patent submission and has given me really good advice. I think he also sets a high standard for those of us coming after him to measure ourselves againt. Working with Wayne has inspired me to be better at everything I do.

Apple Employee Spouse Protests Long Work Hours

I'm not at all suprised that this would happen, but it is an interesting event. You can read about it here. I know for a fact that Apple works the crap out of their employees and that weekends and evenings are common times to keep their employees working. I don't think Apple knows much about work/life balance, at least that is from my own experience.

Drooling In Meetings

I got to get a filling this morning at the Dentist's office and then come back to work with the right side of my face being numb. Unfortunately for me I went right to several meetings. While sitting in the meetings I noticed several instances where I was slightly drooling. And I noticed that people were looking at me a bit funny. I think it was partly because of the drool and partly because I wasn't speaking up as much as I normally do because I didn't want to sound like an idiot. But I did have to speak up and tell them I had gotten a filling and then I had proceed with what I was going to say, albeit slowly. :-)

10k ft. View Of Search

I found an interesting article that talks about how IBM is integrating it's search products here. I found it interesting because I've been so busy working on my project that I haven't had much of a chance to look at other pieces and how they fit together. It looks like we're doing some cool stuff in other areas too. I should poke my head out of my burrow sometime and see what the others are up to. :-)

Made It Back From Tahoe

We made it back from Tahoe a little while ago. Overall it was a fun trip. We ended up NOT snowboarding at Alpine Meadows because it didn't snow anymore this weekend and it was one more day in the freeze/thaw cycle (spring conditions) which makes for pretty crappy snow. When I talked to someone at Alpine Meadows today they told me that it had snowed 3 feet on Wednesday and then it promptly rained which ruined the snow. Since we did not snowboard today we left earlier than expected and got to hit ClaimJumper on the way home.

Sugar Bowl Today

We went to SugarBowl today and they were not joking when they said there were spring-like conditions. Most of the runs this morning were hard and crunchy and then after lunch there was a bit of slush. There was little powder to be found anywhere and I'm not sure if we are going to snowboard tomorrow. I had fun overall but I think I've been spoiled by all the powder I've snowboarded in over the past few years.

Going Snowboarding This Weekend

The time has finally come to go snowboarding! I thought I was going to get to go over a month ago but it never quite worked out. Not this time. We got ourselves a condo for the weekend and it looks like we are going to hit Alpine Meadows on Saturday and Sugarbowl on Sunday. I'm looking forward to feeling that burn in my knees again. :-)

More Spam Than A Hawaiian Could Handle

Saying that it is more Spam than a Hawaiian could handle is an understatement. Hawaii leads the US in spam consumption, they even have their own collector's edition of Spam. My point is that my gmail account is finally starting to see Spam and it can only be a result of posting it on my blog (it took them long enough but it was a pretty good experiment). And the comment spam is starting to get out of hand.

FedExKinkos Is Expensive

I have to give a speech this evening at my toastmasters club. As part of that speech I put together a power point presentation that I needed to get printed to color transparencies. I went to FedExKinkos last night before soccer but all of their color printers were down. Then I went this morning before work and after a long wait they printed out the transparencies for me. The total cost was a little over $30. That's pretty expensive for 14 color slides. But at least I can say that they turned out pretty good.

Frontier Village

I used to live over by the Hayes Mansion in San Jose and the park nearby had a moat in it. I've been wondering why it had a moat and Timber found out that Frontier Village used to be there. They have since torn it down and built a bunch of houses and condos there. I guess this site is just a little piece of San Jose history. Frontier Village seems a lot like Alaskaland which is in Fairbanks.

iPod Switch Complete

The iPod switch from Windows to Mac is complete. The steps for the process are as follows:
1. Dump the music onto a PC using iPod Music Liberator.
2. FTP the music from the PC over to the new iMac.
3. Reset the iPod.
4. Plug it into the iMac and download the music into the iPod.

Finished Intro To Mandarin

Today was my last class of the year for my Intro To Mandarin Class that I had been taking. I can now greet someone, ask their name, and tell someone what time it is. I'm going to keep practicing so that I can go to the Chinese restaurant and order in Mandarin. Hopefully I will get to keep taking more Chinese classes but I have to make sure that they don't interefere with snowboarding season.

Kick Ass Apple Pie Recipe

Timber and I just got finished baking a kick ass apple pie (took about 2 1/2 hours). Thanks to my mom for sending the recipe. We are going to bring it to dinner with friends tomorrow. I love this pie and I think when they try it tomorrow they will understand why. Here is the recipe:

Crust::
1 3/4 cups all purpose flour
1/4 cup sugar
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup plus 2 tablespoons ( 1 1/4 sticks of butter)
1/4 cup water or apple cider

Filling::
8 McIntosh apples, peeled, cored and sliced
1 2/3 cups sour cream
1 cup sugar
1/3 cup all purpose flour
1 egg
2 teaspoons vanilla
1/2 teaspoon salt

Topping::
1 cup chopped walnuts
1/2 cup all purpose flour
1/3 cup firmly packed brown sugar
1/3 cup granulated sugar
1 tablespoon cinammon
pinch salt
1/2 cup (1 stick) butter, room temperature

For crust: Combine flour, sugar, cinnamon and salt in medium bowl. Cut in butter using pastry blender or 2 knives until mixture resembles course meal. Add water and toss mixture gently with fork until evenly moistened. Gather gently into ball. Transfer to lightly floured board and roll into circle slightly larger than a deep 10 inch pie plate. Ease pastry into pan and flute high edge. Set aside.

For filling: Preheat oven to 450 degrees F. Combine all ingredients in large bowl and mix well. Spoon into crust. Bake 10 minutes. Reduce oven temperature to 350 degrees F and continue baking until filling is slightly puffed and golden brown, about 40 minutes. (If edged of crust begin to brown too quickly, cover with strips of aluminum foil.)

For topping: Meanwhile, combine walnuts, flour, sugars, cinnamon and salt in medium bowl and mix well. Blend in butter until mixture is crumbly. Spoon over pie and bake 15 minutes longer.