Le Grand Bleu

Le Grand Bleu was in New York today. 371' long (plus or minus a foot). Launched in 2000; owned by Roman Abramovich. Depending on the reference, it's somewhere around the 17th largest yacht in the world. According to yacht blogs it's been in New York since Tuesday (2 days ago). Quite impressive - check out the tiny boats in the 2nd picture.

Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island

Took the day off and went to New Jersey/ New York to see Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty.


Both are impressive in so many ways. High points: old photos at Ellis Island, especially the ones taken in the 1980's before any restoration work was done.




Wish we could walk around the whole island(s), even if we can't go inside the buildings.


An excellent trip back in time: hard to walk outside into the sunlight and 2009.

Rain ! Hail ! No riding !

Still not riding - it has rained every day, usually right after work, for the last two weeks. Yesterday we had hail for about 20 minutes - at 5:45pm, which is exactly when I would have been on the bike trail.

On the positive side, it appears that the police have some sort of patrols (motorcycle) in Norristown, which is good. I'm just trying to find a way to keep riding and be able to deal with the security situation, without having to always ride with someone else.

Getting Coordinated !

IceOpera is now my username on Facebook (http://www.facebook.com/iceopera.)
Working on moving my personal web site over to http://home.earthlink.net/~iceopera.
Then, I just have to move Flickr, and I'll be completely coordinated !

Backyard Audit - Audobon Society

Had a backyard audit by volunteers from the Audobon Society. Despite the weeds and the soil that doesn't drain, the back yard is not in bad shape. Only two invasive weed-type things that I need to pull up (and they're very small), and lots of options for shade-loving plants that can soak up the water. The toads made their appearance, and we can build them little toad houses to encourage them.
Lots of birds, as we knew, including owls and woodpeckers, and song birds. Many options for native plants that don't require lots of care, some ground cover options, etc. Plus, lots of places around here that specialize in truly native (i.e., local to this area) plants. So, lots of garden work, but we're going to start slowly, and examine the options.
I found two pictures of the yard: one is the day we had the house inspection in 2005 and the other is from last fall - with one of the water pools.

Tour de Brooklyn

A fun 20-mile (approxinately) tour of Brooklyn. Totally fun and scenic tour ! I've always wanted to ride through Brooklyn, so this was great. I picked up a biking in NY map from Transportation Alternatives (sponsor of the ride), so I can have a personal, leisurely tour on my own in the near future. Took the new VADO digital video...... here's a shot of the riders (pre-ride) from the KeySpan stadium - on Coney Island.

Another Day... Another Conference

Actually, another YEAR, another conference. Just finished the annual pilgrimage to the IBM/ Rational Software Developer's Conference in Orlando. Very good conference - some new products to look at, especially stuff moving over from Telelogic to IBM/ Rational. The IBM team is great, and the conference is well organized, well planned, and the facilities are great.
Some stuff on my wish list: black diamond sessions, especially for tools that have been around for a while; move the conference from Epcot. Maybe Las Vegas ? or Taos ? or Portalnd, OR ? Or Portland, ME ?