RUSH - Beyond the Lighted Stage

© RUSH

For the RUSH fans out there, I’m getting Beyond the Lighted Stage on Blu-Ray via Netflix tomorrow. We’re hosting a movie night for those interested. Here are the details:

• Location: Our House
• Date: August 23rd, 2010 (Monday)
• Time: 7:30pm (curtains close and lights dim - don’t be late)
• Capacity - First five to notify me are in.

Drinks and popcorn provided. Hope you can make it. Oh, and it will be loud!

Breakfast at 10,000

Overview

10,000 feet that is (well, ok, 9,954 to be exact but close enough) . This Saturday, Kate and I are riding out to Fairplay, CO to have breakfast and get a little early morning riding on the motorcycle through some beautiful country. If lucky, we might even get to see some hot air balloons in the sky just past Wilkerson’s Pass.

Map

Details

• Date: 2010-08-21 (Saturday)
• Time: 6:30am (departure time). For the grumbling sleepy heads - just think of the quiet roads and golden morning light you’ll be riding in. Best time to out riding.
• Location: We’ll depart from our house but if there is a central location that works for everyone involved then that works too.

If interested, drop a line. Hope to see you on the road!

End of Summer Celebration

Overview

Craig and Heather are throwing an End of Summer Celebration this September. In other words, just a good excuse to play in the woods with good food, drink, and friends. Festivities include:

• Drinking (bring whatever you like)
• Eating (bring food, BBQ equipment, whatever you can dream up)
• Jam Sessions (if you can play, bring your instrument).
• Water Sports (bring whatever you like including your swim suit, kayak, boats, water skis, etc.)
• Stargazing (bring telescopes or any other equipment that might help).

Kate and I are planning pack the bike up with camp gear and other goodies in order set up camp that Friday night. We might even host some riding events for those who want to get in some scenic riding in the surrounding area.

Details

If you are interested in joining in on the fun, here are the details:

• When: September 10-12, 2010 (Friday, Saturday, and Sunday).
• Where: Meadow Ridge camp ground near Rampart Reservoir.
• Lodging: Bring a tent or just show up for any of the days (but you’re lame if you don’t camp out ;-).

Registration

If you are interested in joining in on the fun please R.S.V.P. by this Friday (8-13). You have until midnight. I apologize for the short notice but the camp ground needs to be reserved a.s.a.p.

Returning to Torrey

(click to view)

Overview

I recently tweeted about heading back to Torrey, Utah to ride for three days with fellow BMW riders this September. It has been five years since I last rode in Torrey with a great group of experienced and well-traveled riders. I’ll be looking to meet up with Brant - an old friend and fellow rider (arriving from the south). Actually, its due to Brant’s influence that I got into riding and if I didn’t have to code as much as I do, I would spend all my days traveling every scenic road this world has to offer (paved or not)!

Details

Anyway, if you are interested in joining in on the fun, here are the details:

• When: September 24-26, 2010 (Friday, Saturday, and Sunday). Departure is at 8am at either my place or some central location that works for everyone involved.
• Where: Torrey, Utah
• Lodging: The options are many. I prefer to camp, so will be looking to book a camp site at the Wonderland Resort RV Park (435-425-3775, Junction of Highways 12 & 24). I’ve stayed there several times. Great place. They have shower facilities if you need them.

Route

The whole point of Torrey (as with any trip) is not the destination but the routes to get there and back. Here is a rough idea what I’m thinking about taking to get there. I’ve traveled many of these roads, so if you haven’t experienced these roads yet, you’re in for a real treat:

(click to view)

Registration

If you are interested in joining and are based in the Front Range area (Boulder, Denver, Colorado Springs, etc) let me know and I’d be happy have you along. The more the merrier! It does help if you are on a BMW bike but any type of rider is welcome as long as you are comfortable traveling 500+ mile days.

Resources

More news can be found on the discussion boards.

Tags: Torrey

Greenhorn Acres Road Trip

We are planning a road trip to Greenhorn Acres farms (a local CSA). It will be a road trip meant for motorcycles. However, if you must insist in a vehicle with four wheels, then we won’t exclude you. Here are the details:

Date/Time

To be determined (but sooner rather than later).

Main Destination

5856 County Road HH.5
Fowler, CO 81039

Trip Map

It will be 200 mile round trip (roughly). No, its not mountainous, but it will be a good primer for a new season of riding. Feel free to leave a comment here or email me directly if you are interested. Hope to see you on the road!

Memorial Day Party

Another year has passed and once again we are throwing another Memorial Day party!

Details

• Date: May 29th (Saturday).
• Time: 3pm to whenever.
• Location: Our place.
• Food: We will be cooking up a culinary feast of some sort. If you follow Kate and I at Local Dish then you know we take food seriously.
• Drink: We will have an assortment of some of the best micro-brews including some tasty ales from Trinity Brewing Company, Bristol Brewery, and Tommyknocker to name a few.
• Festivities: There is the good company, great food, and drink, of course. If the weather cooperates, we should be able to make use of the balcony. As the evening rolls on we can always do a movie (as many know how much we love a good movie). Finally, there are plenty of good games to be played (digital and non-digital).
• Lodging: For out-of-towners (if any) we have space at our place to put you up. Otherwise, there are plenty of great accommodations nearby.

Registration

Kate and I need a head count of who can make it to the party so we have enough food and drink for everyone. Feel free to leave a comment to this post or email me if you can make it.

Thanks and we hope to see you at the party!

iPhone Home Screen

Its always fun to look over someone’s shoulder and see how certain technology is used so I thought I’d share my setup. In this case, I’m talking about the home screen of my iPhone since it where I keep the most trafficked applications.

Here is a break down of my home screen (left to right, top to bottom):

• OmniFocus - Inspired by the book “Getting Things Done” by David Allen, this is the best app to implement David’s teachings perfectly via software. This app is heavily used (hence being in the first position). Sync’s perfectly with the desktop and truly is my digital brain. Well done OmniGroup!
• Groundwork - At one point I tried to do accomplish all professional work within OmniFocus (and still do when I’m the solely responsible). The only problem is that OmniFocus is for single use and doesn’t work well in a team/collaborative setting. This is why it is handy to have Groundwork around to sync with your Basecamp setup. Perfect for checking status and not loosing ideas while on the go.
• Nezumi - Almost all my Ruby on Rails apps are running on Heroku. This is a handy app for managing your apps while from the road. It is limited in function but having log, reboot, and console access is a nice backup plan.
• Ego - Sounds bad but is actually quite useful when it comes to tracking Google Analytic, Feed Burner, and Twitter stats for various my Ruby on Rails applications.
• Messages - Default iPhone app, sometimes useful. I don’t really use SMS much but keep it around since others like to communicate that way. Personally, I think SMS should die much like email.
• Tweetie - Another app that makes managing multiple Twitter accounts easy. I use Tweetie on both the iPhone and desktop.
• Skype - My favorite instant chat client. I use no other. Obviously, very handy to have on the phone. Also, a great way to save on SMS text costs.
• Calendar - Default iPhone app. What can’t be done (or doesn’t make sense to do) in OmniFocus, is done here. Syncs perfectly with my desktop app. No complaints.
• Maps - Default iPhone app. Always handy and now on the 3GS version of the phone, it does a pretty good job of keeping track of where you are in real-time.
• 1Password - So passwords suck and just about every web site and application known to man does it their own special way. The only way to deal with the chaos is to use 1Password. I love having this on the iPhone because it syncs with my desktop client and allows me to easily cut and paste complicated 20-character or more passwords into my local iPhone app configurations or web pages. BTW, as you might have guessed, this didn’t truly become useful until Apple enabled cut and paste support.
• Dropbox - While some people might like Evernote, I still find files and folders extremely handy. This app does all the heavy lifting of keeping my files and folders synced between all machines. Plus they give you up to 3GB of space for free. Brilliant.
• Billings - When I was running my own consulting company (actually, I still do), this app was used a lot. I keep it around now because I like track my open source and personal project work. I’m mostly curious as to how much time I spend on things and like to know whether my speed is increasing over time.
• AccuWeather - So far the best weather app for my tastes. Since I live in the mountains and ride a metal steed, it is wise to know what is brewing. Especially in the dead of winter.
• Clock - It’s what gets me up in the morning. Also handy for when you are in the kitchen.
• Calculator - For those calculations that would take too much brain power to compute.
• Convertbot - For unit conversion calculations. Handy when cooking or in the garage. It’s also an elegantly designed application and worth looking into if nothing else to help inspire your own designs.
• Phone - While I don’t use the phone much, it does give me access to my contacts.
• Mail - Used often with Inbox Zero discipline. What can’t get processed immediately gets scheduled via OmniFocus.
• Safari - Used mostly for info lookup. Always handy in a pinch and for testing your own sites, of course.
• iPod - Besides, the OmniFocus app, this is probably the secondly most used app for constant learning. Audiobooks and educational podcasts are heavily consumed.

For a list of the apps mentioned above and other iPhone related news, check out my iPhone page for more info.

Last Day

© Trinity Brewing Company

Today is the last day working for my current client. Its been an interesting experience and I plan to write more about the banking industry soon but, for now, I’m looking forward to moving on and getting back to doing what I really enjoy, which is working with the Ruby language.

So where am I headed? Well, I’ve been hired, full time, to work at Pactimo - a high-end bicycling apparel shop. All of their software is written in Ruby using the Rails web framework. Development will be on the MacOS and Linux systems. As for me, I’ve been bestowed the title of “Director of Software Development”. In essence, I AM the software team. Yeah, yeah, I know. Oooh, fancy title. No, not really. It means that I’m looking at some long days and sleepless nights for a while but…for those who know me…I wouldn’t have it any other way. Its an awesome opportunity and I’m honored to take the helm.

I’ll have more to say about Pactimo in the future, for sure. As for today, I just want to mention that some of the crew and I will be hanging out for happy hour (5pm) at the following location to celebrate. Swing by, if you are around:

Trinity Brewing Company
1466 Garden of the Gods
Colorado Springs, CO 80907

To new beginnings!

Zombie Party

Fall is probably my favorite season of the year. The change of colors, the piles of leaves, pulling the snowboard out of hibernation, etc. It’s also the celebration of several personal holidays as well as kicking off an entire end-of-year holiday season starting with Halloween.

This year Halloween falls on a Saturday and we are throwing a Zombie Party! Here are the details:

• Location: Our House (Kate and Brooke)
• Date: October 31st (Saturday)
• Time: 7pm to whenever
• Beverages: A special punch - drink at your own risk. Feel free to BYOB as well.
• Food: Various snacks that, while quite tasty, are sure to make your stomach churn while looking at them.
• Activities - We’ll have games, some prizes perhaps, and two movies playing in the background. We’re thinking “Shaun of the Dead” on the LoFi while “28 Days Later” plays in the HiFi theatre.

The only real requirement is that you arrive to the party as a zombie. The scarier the better. Kate has made sure to send out an evite to the event but this is reminder and a notice to some who might not have gotten the evite to come join us. Leave a comment here or email me directly.

It’s going to be one hell of a good time. Hope you can make it!

Eco Festival

Today is the Eco Festival which, for Kate and I at Local Dish, is the final culmination of the work we have been putting into Local Food Week. It has been a lot of effort with software development, marketing, news announcements, sponsorship, gathering of recipe ingredients, contestant judging, etc. All worth it, of course, now that we can announce the winners of the recipe contest.

So if you are in the city today and have time to swing by Rock Ledge Ranch (at the base of Garden of the Gods), please do. Kate and I will be on stage between 12pm-1pm announcing the recipe contest winners as well as cooking and providing free samples of the two top recipes (because the results were very close). Just look for us, wearing these shirts:

See you at the Eco Festival today!

Tags: Local Dish