Yellowstone National Park

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We took a road trip recently to Yellowstone National Park.  Pretty good drive from Seattle, about 715 miles each way. We drove the MINI, out on its first road trip. Really amazing scenery on the way over, starting at Puget Sound, through the Cascade mountains, the desert of central Washington, and into the Rocky Mountains.

The way there was pretty uneventful. We stopped in a few times for gas, and had lunch in Spokane, WA (at Arby’s). I handled several work related phone calls, working on some last minute stuff for the Google+ launch.

We stayed in the Big Sky Resort, in Big Sky, MT. It turns out that if you want to stay in the national park, you have to book about a year in advance. Good to know for next time. We met up with Cortny Helmick‘s parents in Big Sky, that had just arrived that day form the midwest.

We spent the next day actually driving around Yellowstone. One should really spend more than a day there, but you can see a lot in the day. Highlights included a viewing of an eruption of Old Faithful and a visit to the Grand Prismatic Spring. Pictures:

Some thoughts about Yellowstone:

  • Old Faithful is simply amazing. You see steam rising out of the earth for a while, then a little bit of water bubbling up, and then within seconds water is shooting over a 100 feet into the air!
  • Bubbling mud! Didn’t even know this existed, but Yellowstone is home to some bubbling mud. Kind of unsettling standing on ground that is that thermally active.
  • The grand prismatic spring is really cool. At first it looks like the steam is causing a rainbow to form, but when you look closer it isn’t quite a complete spectrum. The colors come from colored bacteria that grow in a rainbow colored order – amazing. And on a sunny day, the colors reflect up through the steam (captured in my pictures).
  • The mammoth hot spring is neat, but kind of out of the way.
  • Animals – we saw lots of bison, a few elk, and a beaver (that was unexpected and cool). Didn’t see any bears or moose, but we also stuck close to the road.

After a day in the park, we spend 2 days driving back. We stopped for a night in the historic Davenport Hotel in Spokane, WA. The guest list and history of this hotel are both fascinating and impressive.

Last day of the trip, we drove from Spokane to Seattle, using the northern route. And WOW, amazing driving through Washington. We have a huge diversity of landscapes, and it is well worth the drive.  A quick stop for lunch at the Munchen Haus in Leavenworth, WA, and back home in Seattle.

MINI Countryman

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I’ve been doing a lot of looking around at cars for the past few months, and I decided to go with the new MINI Countryman. You may not have seen one on the road yet, because there aren’t many on the roads.  There also isn’t much stock of this model at the dealers yet. Seattle MINI only had a few, and it seemed like 2 were being used exclusively for test drives. There was even a line to take a test drive the way we went, it seems to be popular.

The main purpose of this page is to give a timeline of order to delivery, maybe you’ll find it helpful. When I ordered, I was told that the total time to deliver was running about 2 1/2 months (10 weeks) to Seattle. Delivery to the west coast is slower than to the east coast.

  • (0 days) Saturday 3/26 – Ordered
  • (2 days) Monday 3/28 – Made some changes. Decided to add the sunroof.  The dealer was really helpful on this, and processed the changes quickly.  I received my production number today, after the changes were processed.
  • (5 days) Thursday 3/31 – Color and model updated in the owner’s lounge (OL) on miniusa.com
  • (6 days) Friday 4/1 – Moved to “scheduled for production” status on the OL. VIN number assigned.
  • (12 days) Thursday 4/7 – Vehicle in paint shop
  • (13 days) Friday 4/8 – Vehicle complete, awaiting transport!
  • (14 days) Saturday 4/9 – Vehicle released to transport company
  • (19 days) Thursday 4/14 – Vehicle is at the exit port in Germany
  • (32 days) Wednesday 4/27 – First confirmation form MINI that my Countryman is in transit! (probably left on a ship a few days earlier)
  • (54 days) Thursday 5/19 – Unloaded at the BMW/MINI Vehicle Distribution Center at Port Hueneme (Near L.A.)
  • (59 days) Tuesday 5/24 – Arrived at Seattle MINI
  • (60 days) Wednesday 5/25 – Delivered! Drove the Countryman home.

 

 

The super out-dated blog post

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I’ve been neglecting my blog. Part laziness, part re-prioritization. I’m still maintaining a very busy lifestyle, but I’ve learned to stop and do nothing, or stop and read, or better yet, just stop and be. My new job finally doesn’t feel like a new job any longer. I’m all set on SIGCSE 2011 work, and I’ve gotten a huge jump on SIGCSE 2012. I’m actually working on CS research again. My yoga teaching is going really well. All in all, life out west is good.

One previous event to detail (among many that I should catch up on), is a photography class that I took last fall. The class was at the Photo Center Northwest, and I highly recommend the Digital SLR workshop if you have a SLR camera, but would like to learn what all of the menu items do, plus how to take some really good pictures.

Here are some of my pictures from the class. We took a field trip to pike place market after dar and practiced some fun techniques. We worked with long exposures, blurring a moving object, blurring the background, ghosting objects and people. I even got to make my first trip to the gum wall (something we will be adding to the tour itinerary for visitors).

Summer

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Summer is in full swing, and it almost passed my blog right on by. I kept meaning to post, and now I’m going it! The best intentions are not worth much without action.

When last we spoke, I was about to go to level 2 teacher training with Baron Baptiste. I went, and it was awesome. I’m back, and I’m continuing to work. Being a practitioner and teacher of yoga are both never ending. There is always something to learn, a new experience, and something bigger available at each moment.

Since then I have also changed jobs! I accepted a software engineering position at Google. Yes, the Google. I’m working at the Seattle office, which is about 2.5 miles from my house, making for an awesome 7 – 10 minute commute. I went down to Mountain View, CA for orientation. That was pretty fun. I spent one evening in San Francisco and got to meet up with some friends that I had met turing my teacher training in May.

And, I’m very excited to announce that beginning on August 28th, I will be teaching at 4:30pm on Saturday afternoons at Shakti Vinyasa Yoga (Seattle)! See you on the mat!

Intention

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I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the power of intention. Working with an intention is something that we do regularly in Yoga practice, and one of the items that I teach during our intro class. This week I had a big awakening in regards to intention.

Intention has to be present with you and intention must be something you are putting into action, right now. This is my point of growth.  I was thinking if I just got clear about what my intention is, that things will fall into place. And that just isn’t how it works. Intention requires work, intention requires action.

Setting a goal is different. Setting a goal can be having an expectation. I recently fell short on reaching a personal goal, and it was partly because my intention was in the wrong place. By setting an intention about where I thought I needed to be to reach my goal, I missed out on a great opportunity to be present with what was actually happening. Had my intention been in the right place, I might be further along.

The lesson for me is to get clarity on where things stand. To set intentions from where I am, and not from where I want to be, think I should be, or my goals. If the intention is clear and present, it can be put into action. Setting an intention that can’t be put into action, lead me to feel a bit unfulfilled.

40 Days to a Personal Revolution: Day 4

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Time flies when you are having fun! Today is day 4 of our 40 days to a personal revolution.  That means 36 days to go, and for me, 29 days until I leave for level 2 teacher training.

Since I stopped eating meat a few days early, I’m at 6 days without eating meat. I think I’m at 6 days without caffeine (maybe 5), and 4 days without (or very limited) sugar intake. I’ve found that 100% eliminating sugar is nearly impossible. Sugar, or some kind of syrup is in everything. Now, corn syrup and especially HFCS are right out, not having those at all. I’m trying to prefer things sweetened with honey first. I found some locally produced bread that is sweetened with honey. When that isn’t available, I have regular bread. For teacher training, I am going to have to switch to Ultima Replinisher (instead of Gatorade), but that isn’t a big deal. So, being truthful.  I can’t realistically eliminate 100% of my sugar intake, but I’m being very conscious about what I do intake.

I was thinking about why I’m doing this (the diet portion at least). And, to me, this isn’t about sacrificing things, it isn’t about sacrifice at all. This is about living a more balanced life. I’m not “giving up” meat during these 40 days, I’m adding a whole new list of healthy, vegetarian meals to my diet. I’m not sacrificing my free time for meditation and Yoga practice. I’m using those tools to achieve more balance in my life. The (twice) daily meditation practice is a little difficult. I’m still working on that routine. The daily Yoga practice is awesome! I’m at 5 days in a row right now.  6th day tonight, day off on Friday, and then 7 days straight before my next day of rest.

Day 1 (Again)

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If we are counting days, yesterday wasn’t really Day 1. It was the organizational meeting. Today is the real day 1 for our 40 days program.

So far, so good. I haven’t eaten meat since lunch on Friday. As a consequence, I’ve learned that I like Halibut. Well, I like Halibut when Ray’s Cafe cooks it.

Today, I went for the 6:15am Yoga class.  And, now I think it is time to go to bed!

Day 1

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Today is day 1 of going through the 40 Days to a Personal Revolution program. I started the day with some hot water with lemon and honey (part of the diet recommendations from Journey into Power) and Cheerios. We went to the 9:30 class this morning. I wanted get started with a practice day, rather than a rest day.

At the meeting today, we were given a choice of 4 categories, CATS. Caffeine, Alcohol, Tobacco, and Sugar. Of these 4, we were to choose one (or more) to give up for 40 days. Since I don’t smoke, giving up Tobacco wasn’t a sacrifice. I have cut back my caffeine intake quite a bit, and I only drink alcohol once a week. So, neither of those would be much of a sacrifice. This leaves me with sugar. I’m giving up all 4 of the items (well, 3 + tobacco).  On top of this, I am giving up meet on my own.

After the meeting, we went grocery shopping… and it is hard to find food that doesn’t contain sugar! I was looking at granola, and pretty much all of the granola contains sugar of some kind. Then bread, almost all of the bread contains sugar. I found a loaf of bread with honey instead of sugar.

That’s where I stand halfway through day 1. The yoga 6 days a week isn’t going to be a problem, but finding enough food without sugar is going to be a problem.

Day 0

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From my previous post, you know that our journey through 40 Days To a Personal Revolution begins tomorrow. I got some things in line today :)

I started the day with 8am Yoga. I admit it, I love practicing first thing on a Saturday morning. It is a great way to let go of the previous week and transition to the weekend. At 9:45, I assist the level 1.5 class. Today was the first day that I got to teach during this class. It was great! My opportunity in teaching is to “stop trying and start doing.” this has been a progression for me. At this point, I am ou. Of my own head enough that when I am teaching, things are just flowing. This is a recent development, but it is kind of awesome.

During the 40 days program, I have decided to eat vegetarian. Not necessarily giving up meat, but rather bringing in some more healthy choices into my diet. I started that today!

Tomorrow, things start off with a meeting at Shakti west. I’m going to practice before the meeting, knowing that I will be setting myself up for 8 consecutive days of practice.

I know there are going to be challenges along the way. Specifically, I am worried about 4 full days of flying that I’m doing in the next 40 days. We are going to Cincinnati and back, and I’m going to Mexico and back during the program. The Yoga and diet items will be taken care of during teacher training.  For Cincinnati and back, the Yoga schedule is going to be difficult. But no excuses. I’m committed to the program, I will make it work.