Manic Oppressive

It’s snowing again right now. I see this as a good thing, because earlier it was freezing rain, which would’ve meant that I had to crawl to work. Snow means I can walk it.

Ahh, and I have a demo tomorrow. In front of customers. Early. This will be interesting.

When I first moved to seattle, and I noticed some of the insanely steep hills, and I wondered what happens when there’s ice.

Now I know. All hell breaks loose.

This is the view outside my apartment window, tilted strangly so I could brace the camera. The angle of this hill isn’t too bad, maybe 7 degrees. Some of the hills are twice that. I imagine a cat would slip just looking up one of those.

Anyway, some of those cars are in control, most of them are stuck. After taking this picture, I went outside and helped get some people unstuck. (First gear, folks.) Then I went inside and fell asleep to the sound of cars trying to make it up the grade.

Also, Seattle Snow makes the best snowballs. Just so you know.

As a member of the ACM, I have more than passive interest in the use of technology for elections. Personally, I see it as a huge risk, but no one asked me.

So anyway, I’m on the sidelines, watching the election and I saw this gem:

Poll workers used hand lotion to prevent the machines from spitting out the cards.*

My first thought was, “Don’t worry, it’s only weird the first time.”

Seriously. What was wrong with paper?

* From this article on Forbes.com.

I was watching a weather forecast, and the weather man was forecasting flooding for today. “Gee”, I think, “Flooding, Why did I move here again?” They’re expecting 2-6″ of rain tonight.

I guess that this isn’t really normal; the expectation is that there will be more rain tonight then there is normally in November. So I feel a little bit better.

Oh, and Mom: Thanks for the umbrella. I actually was able to use it today.

Since I moved up to this pretty little corner of the world, I’ve driven about 1800 miles. That includes a brief jaunt up to Vancouver, B.C., so that’s about 200 miles a month.

That number is higher then it should be. There is a reason for this. Occasionally, I get in my car and just sort of drive. The idea is to learn my way around the city, and cause a sudden increase in blood pressure.

A few nights ago, I decided that I needed to go to Bed Bat and Beeeeeeeeeyond! to pick up a larger-then-life trash can so I can store my recycleables. So after spending 30 minutes trying to park and 5 minutes “shopping”, I decided to learn me some more of that Seattle Stuff.

Now, the deal is that if you don’t know where you are, you will invariably end up on a highway, which doesn’t solve any problems at all for you. And this is what happened to me that night; I ended up on a highway.

Then, about 20 minutes later, I was able to get off the highway. Then I drove for about a month and found my way home, a learned man.