The XPRT Women Code-a-thon finished today

and was a great success.  I'm very happy and proud to have been able to be involved.  Women gathered, came up with strong ideas, did a ton of good work in a very short time, formed friend and mentor relationships, and helped provide ideas and sample code for possible workloads for the BenchmarkXPRT performance-measurement tools.

For dinner our hardy band of travelers, minus one off visiting friends, enjoyed sushi at Momiji.  I'd definitely go back there if I were in the area again.

We walked a few blocks to Molly Moon's for delicious ice cream dessert.  I'd like to believe that bit of walking burned off our cups of ice cream, but, alas, I know better.

Tomorrow, I fly again to a different city--but not home.

I hate losing an hour of sleep

to "springing forward," but tonight is the night I (and everyone else in the U.S.) must endure that cruelty, so I'm crashing early.

The XPRT Women Code-a-thon began today, and it was exciting to be there.  Folks are doing a lot of interesting work, and I'm psyched to see the results.

Dinner took us to Chavez for some truly excellent Mexican dishes, including possibly the best queso fundido I've ever tasted.  I definitely recommend this restaurant.

Tomorrow requires another early start, alas, so the lost hour of sleep is doubly annoying.

To sleep I go.

Seattle sunshine

graced us for a few hours today, but then the weather turned rainy and chilly.  We enjoyed the clear skies while they lasted.

For a snack we enjoyed some tasty ice cream from the Kurt Farm Shop.

Click an image to see a larger version.

It's definitely worth a visit if you live here.

Dinner took us to Wild Ginger, which serves a variety of Asian-inspired dishes.  All the ones we tasted were good.

Walking there and back, we had this side-on view of a ferris wheel.

Lovely.

For dessert, we stopped at Gelatiamo for some very good gelato.

Tomorrow, the XPRT Women Code-a-thon starts early!

Exactly why they canceled my first flight

is not clear--the most consistent mumbling involved "equipment" (read: airplane) issues--but I got up this morning to learn that my day was not going to be what I expected.

When you travel as much as I do, this sort of annoying change happens from time to time, but it's still no fun.

I stayed up and worked from home while Gina worked her magic and booked our whole team on a new set of flights.

From that point on, the day has gone pretty much as it should.  I even enjoyed a Red Mango parfait in the Charlotte airport.

I'm writing this post from a plane, though, because by the time we land, collect our bags, acquire our rental van, drive to the hotel, check in, and finally make it to our rooms, it's going to be very late, and I'm going to crash.

Tomorrow, we begin the set-up work for our event, and we also will shoot some b-roll for the video we will eventually create about the event.

I'm heading to Seattle

because this weekend PT is one of the sponsors of this exciting event:

You can read more about it and register for it on the code-a-thon's EventBrite page.

I'm quite excited to see what the participants come up with and to hear what Kristin Toth Smith, the keynote speaker, has to say.

If you're in Seattle and like to code, come on down and join the fun!

On the road again: Seattle, day 3 / Portland, day 1

Today was a very long day indeed.  It began early with work email and then client meetings in the Seattle area.  All the meetings were interesting and fun, but when they finished, the second work day began.  We drove south to Portland in heavy traffic and moderate rain, a tiring drive that left me wanting to sleep. 

Instead, after checking into one of my favorite hotels, I worked and then grabbed dinner at one of my favorite restaurants, Little Bird.  Co-owner Andy Fortgang greeted me by name on sight--I had no reservation--and in no time I was enjoying a great selection of cheeses and charcuterie.  If you live in Portland or visit here, you need to eat at Little Bird (and at its sister restaurant and one of my all-time favorites, Le Pigeon; I'll be there Thursday night).  Something about simply sitting in Little Bird makes me happy. 

After dinner, I worked for several hours.  Now, though, I get to crash, which is a treat indeed. 

I have to say that though I like Seattle, I love Portland.  I don't ever intend to move away from Raleigh, but if I were to consider it, Portland would top my list.

On the road again: Seattle, day 2

I know this is a lovely area, but, wow, today was a dreary, drizzly, damp day.  Driving was stressful all the time, visibility was never good, and it never stopped raining. 

That said, the rest of the day was fine.  I enjoyed our client meetings--which, of course, I cannot discuss--and enjoyed many happy tech-geek moments. 

Dinner was with a client friend at Firenze Ristorante in Bellevue.  The company and conversation were great, and the food was quite good.  I tried a penne al gorgonzola that was perfect. 

Back to work for me.

On the road again: Seattle, day 1

Travel days inevitably peg the weirdness meter at least a little, because the act of packing yourself into big metal tubes for multi-hundred-mile-per-hour rides through the upper atmosphere is inherently a bit odd.  That's what I spent most of today doing, with an early morning wake-up in Raleigh and a late-night crashing in the Seattle area.  In between the two was my usual few hours in DFW, always a bit of strangeness. 

Beyond the normal people-watching, DFW did bring two fun interludes of its own:  this bit of Texas health-food lunch

and a stop at Red Mango for a small vanilla bean frozen yogurt with strawberries.  It was even better than the brisket sandwich; sorry for forgetting to snap its portrait.

I spent most of the first flight dozing and almost all of the second working, so I have very little to report.  I'm here safely, I had a pleasant dinner in the hotel restaurant, and I'm happy to be striding the terra firma sans big metal tube.  It's hard to ask much more from a day of business travel. 

On the road again: Seattle, day 3 / Portland, day 1

Another day in a work trip, another day of which I can say little.

We spent the morning and lunch in the Seattle area, and then we drove to Portland.  The three-or-so-hour trip is lovely, though the traffic is almost always what would pass for rush hour back home.

Knowing that dinner would be quite late, and indulging me, we dropped by Salt & Straw, a Portland ice cream shop that has been making a lot of noise.

Boy, am I glad we did.

Salt & Straw may be my new favorite ice cream shop.  It is certainly among my top five anywhere.  Set in a corner of a corner building in a funky Portland residential-and-commercial area, it greeted us with open walls along most of one side and most of the front.  One of the breed of locally sourced ice cream makers, it proclaimed its mission loudly.

As always, click on an image to see a larger version.

Intentions are all well and good, of course, but for any type of food, the proof is in the taste.  The range of ice creams available certainly suggested both a familiarity with modern classics and a quirky eye for new flavors.

If you blow up this image and look carefully at the admittedly blurry (sorry second line after the flavor list, you'll see that the shop offers a tasting flight of four ice creams.

Yes, I did it for you, dear readers:  I ordered a flight so that I could report with some authority on the ice creams here.

In my defense, I didn't eat it all--but I must confess to having eaten most of it.  From left to right, we have here sea salt with caramel ribbons, strawberry honey balsamic with black pepper, pear with blue cheese, and chocolate with gooey brownies.  All the flavors were delicious.  The weakest, somewhat to my surprise, was the chocolate.  The sea salt with caramel flavor blended those tastes perfectly, as did the strawberry, in which the balsamic and the pepper and the citrus all merged into a whole that was vastly better than any of its parts.  The best of the bunch, though, was the pear with blue cheese.  I was skeptical, but it was amazing, managing to somehow remove all of the rough edge of the cheese and merge it perfectly with the pear.

Fortunately for me, because we were visiting Little Bird, a Portland favorite, dinner was many hours later.

That meal was as delicious as every other dinner I've eaten there.  Though my Portland favorite restaurant remains Gabriel Rucker's original place, Le Pigeon (where I will be Thursday night), Little Bird is a fine sibling and stands well on its own right.  Tonight's tasty treats included a creamy potato soup with a clam and bacon relish, and my first experience with the Le Pigeon burger.  Damn, that was a fine hamburger.

Now, work summons once again, so I will return to it.

On the road again: Seattle, day 2

As most of you know, I can't talk about my meetings on PT trips, so the only part of my twenty-hour day that I can discuss is the dinner. 

Fortunately, it was a good one at a lovely Seattle restaurant, Canlis.  Canlis was a Beard nominee for Best Restaurant, and its chef, Jason Franey, was a nominee for Best Chef, Northwest.  With that level of recognition, I had to give it a try. 

When you enter, you can't help but notice the water (Union Lake, I believe) that is visible through the mostly glass wall that runs along the rear of the restaurant.  The lovely setting upped its beauty a few notches as the fading sun changed the light washing the water from yellow to blue and then gradually to the darkness of night. 

All the dishes I tried were quite good.  A poached hen's egg in mushroom foam with Australian black truffles floating on it and bits of veggies hidden below was delightful, warm and rich and happy.  The cold foie preparation was a well-executed standard.  The small Wagyu steak was the weakest part of the meal, a good piece of beef but nothing to compare to the top-grade Wagyu at, say, Craftsteak in Las Vegas.

All in all, I liked Canlis and can recommend it, but to my taste its food is still not up to such giants of the region as Portland's Le Pigeon, Castagna, and Beast--two of which I'll be eating at later this week. 

On the road again: Seattle, day 1

The plan looked good: Fly from RDU in the morning, but not the insanely early morning; arrive in Seattle right before evening; grab what promised to be an excellent dinner at Sitka & Spruce, a restaurant that's been making some noise; and head to the hotel with plenty of time remaining to finish the evening's work comfortably.

Unfortunately, the weather had an entirely different plan, so by the time we left RDU about 2:00 p.m., more than two hours late, I had downshifted my goals to a rather less ambitious set:  Arrive in Seattle late, hope our luggage had made it, and eat room-service dinner while working.

Matters then picked up.  I was lucky enough to receive an upgrade on the first leg, and that plane offered bandwidth, so I was able to work in relative comfort for the entire flight.  Our layover in DFW grew to almost two hours, so we enjoyed delicious Red Mango parfaits and then shifted to the Admiral's Club for more work.  (If Red Mango ever opens a franchise near my house or office, I am in so much trouble.)   The only open seats on the second flight were in first class, so it was upgrade city once again.  Dinner ended up being airplane food, but it was edible and bland, about as much as one can reasonably ask these days from a meal in the sky. 

At SEA, our luggage was actually in the first few bags off the conveyor. 

Yeah, we hit the hotel late, and, yeah, work had piled up a bit, but so it goes.  For a day with a huge travel delay, today went well.

And now, our IFAOTD (Ignorant Fucking Asshole Of The Day) award goes to GOP Senatorial candidate Todd Akin for one of the most offensive interview responses in recent memory: 

“If it’s a legitimate rape, the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down.”

Yeah, he apologized later, but, really?  No, you don't get off for that kind of comment. 

Let's hope that the good people of Missouri do not forget this sorry asshat's comments and send him packing back home on election day. 

On the road again: Seattle, day 3 and Portland, day 1

When you see a small shop named Haute Dog Girl in a little strip mall, what do you do?

Head right for it, of course!

That's what I did for lunch today in beautiful downtown Kirkland, Washingon. Once inside, I found a perky young woman who pointed me to this menu:

Click on any image to see a larger version.
The young woman looked remarkably like the woman on the menu, so much so that I wondered if I might be in the presence of the Haute Dog Girl herself. Some things are best left mysterious, however, so I did not ask her.

Instead, in the interest of science, I ordered two of the odder dogs.

The Seattle Style Dog.


Yes, that's cream cheese, and, yes, those are grilled onions.

The Pastrami Reuben Dog.


All beef hot dog meets classic sandwich; what's not to like?

Somewhat to my surprise, both hot dog concoctions were quite tasty.

If you're in the area and are a fan of the noble tube steak, you should definitely visit this little place.

Now, I'm nestled into my favorite Portland hotel and quite happy to be here. Tomorrow morning starts insanely early, however, so to work and then sleep I go.

On the road again: Seattle, day 2

Work filled most of today's hours, and I can't talk about that, so this one's going to be short.

Lunch was a surprise: very good Thai food at a mall restaurant, Thai Ginger in Redmond. I tasted a few dishes, and each was quite tasty. I'd definitely eat there again.

After lunch, I was lucky enough to catch a few minutes of blue sky--cloudy, yes, but blue. When the sun shines here, I find the whole Seattle area to be one of the prettiest places I visit.

One of the best things about working in the tech industry in general and my job in particular is the opportunity to talk and work with smart people who are passionate about what they do. Today's meetings, like most of those I have on these road trips, were all interesting and informative. I love the way the tech world is constantly evolving; nothing goes stale.

Tomorrow, more interesting meetings, and then an evening drive to Portland, one of my favorite cities.

On the road again: Seattle, day 1

I'm never going to be a big fan of a day that requires me to wake up before nine a.m., but so it goes; that's what I had to do today.

Most of the long day went to travel, with an extended layover in O'Hare. Lunch there was quite good, courtesy of Rick Bayless' Tortas Frontera, which served quite good (though in my opinion too salty) and very fresh dishes. I enjoyed a Cubano and tasted some guacamole they were making as I watched. Very nice.

The rest of the day went to travel, work, and a late dinner in the hotel restaurant. Ah, the glamorous life of the business traveler!

Today is the birthday of my late stepfather, Edmund D. Livingston. He passed away many years ago while on the family beach house vacation. He served in the Marines in WWII. While in the Corps he went ashore at Okinawa, was injured severely twice, spent time as one of the first of the occupation troops in Japan, and came away from the experience profoundly changed, as all are. He loved my mother fiercely, loved my brother and sister as if they were his own, raised them, and took care of them. He had a ready smile and a bad joke always at hand. He waved to strangers as he drove by. At his memorial, many people appeared whom my mom had never met, and it turned out that in his personal time he was out quietly doing charity work, bringing food to some, driving others, all without telling anyone. He was never my father, but I would have been proud had he been. I underestimated him when I met him, but as I grew older, I realized how foolish I had been.

I miss you, Eddie. Always will.

On the road again: Seattle, day 2 / Portland, day 1

The sky was never fully blue for the short time we were in Seattle, but the weather was generally lovely.

Work meetings filled the early part of the day, and then we drove to Portland. I was mostly either driving, which meant focusing on the rather considerable amount of traffic, or working, which kept me looking down, so I didn't get to pay much attention to the scenery. What I saw, though, was lush and, when we weren't in the land of strip malls, quite pretty.

Dinner in Portland was at Gabriel Rucker's second restaurant, Little Bird. We sampled several small plates, and all were very tasty. The potato, bacon, and fromage side dish is a favorite of mine, a small bowl of potato-y, bacony, cheesy comfort-food goodness, exactly the sort of thing you wish your mom had known how to make.

As I always note, if you live here or visit here, you should make time to eat at Little Bird.

On the road again: Seattle, day 1

A few notes to the rude and inconsiderate man ahead of me at the x-ray station in RDU this morning:

* The rule is two carry-on bags. That's two. Not your two large rolling bags and your briefcase. That would be three.

* No man should need nine--yes, nine--little three-ounce containers in his carry-on baggie of personal products. I know the number because I was waiting so long for you to move through the line that I had time to count them multiple times.

* It's okay to put shoes and belt in one bin. You personally consumed eight slots on the metal tables: five plastic bins, plus your three carry-ons. That's too many for one person. Hell, it's too many for two people. Learn the rules.

* Leaving your last carry-on in the aisle next to the luggage tables so it blocks everyone else is an asshole move. You are not alone in the world, and you're certainly not alone on the security line.

Can you tell that this idiot pissed me off?

Anyway, his rudeness started my travel morning, and a flight to Chicago in a non-exit-row seat with the jerk in front of me leaning all the way back so I could not work kept the good times flowing.

Happily, my fortune reversed in Chicago, where I was able to work in the Admiral's Club, get some lunch at a food court, and then sit in an exit row, buy bandwidth, and work on the flight. Upgrades were out of the question on this excessively crowded flying day--both flights were way, way oversold--but I have no right to complain when I have an exit-row aisle seat and bandwidth.

A wet gray blanket covered the Seattle area as we landed, and it's still here. The temperature, though, is lovely, and I do like having the humidity.

Dinner was good but not great in the hotel's restaurant; just too much work to do to be able to afford the time to go elsewhere.

Soon, I will fall over and go boom. I need some sleep.

On the road again: Seattle, day 5

Tip 1 for traveling to Seattle: Don’t rent from Dollar. I’d never heard this bit of advice, and to save money we routinely rent from Dollar, so that’s what we did this trip. Dollar, as it turns out, is the one major car rental company that doesn’t let you return cars to the SeaTac airport. (I think it may also be the only one that doesn’t let you pick them up there, but I’m less sure of this claim.) So, we followed the rental car return signs through the airport, to the garage, through the garage, and back out of the airport again. Fortunately, the guard at the exit gate took pity on us and told us how to find the Dollar return lot; I got the impression we’re not the only people to make this mistake.

Coming home from the West Coast is always an exercise in moving that consumes almost the entire day: get up early, shower, pack the dop kit, check out, drive to airport and rental car return, (today) drive again to real rental car return, ride shuttle to airport, walk to check-in, check in, walk to security, go through security, walk to gate, wait, get on plane, and so on and on and on. It’s hard to do much productive, which as you might imagine I find frustrating, but I work as much as the situation allows and read the rest of the time.

By the way, Wi-Fi at SeaTac, at least in the American Airlines end of the airport, sucks. I was able to connect to AT&T’s Wi-Fi service, the only option available, just long enough for AT&T to take my $7.99, and then the connection failed. I could never synchronize my email. Very frustrating.

After three lovely and formal dinners in Seattle, tonight’s repast was something a bit different: a Chicago dog from a strange little man with almost no English and a determination to pile everything possible onto the dog. Fortunately, I love hot dogs, so it was a fine meal.

Now, though, I’m back, and glad to be here. Any trip home that ends with me home safely is definitionally a successful one.

On the road again: Seattle, day 3

My name is Larry, so I think I'll call myself, Studly LaFontaine. It has kind of a French-Canadian ring to it, doncha think?

This, the line of the day, came from a barrista-in-training at the Panera Bread in Redmond where I was grabbing some free (okay, not free: I bought a bottle of water) bandwidth in a desperate attempt to catch up on email in a break between meetings. The folks at this particular Panera were so happy, so enthusiastic about their work, that just being around them made me smile and feel better.

You know I can't talk about the work stuff, so don't ask.

Dinner tonight was a very good meal at Pearl Bar and Dining, a place I can recommend. Our large and, as the evening wore on, somewhat loud group ate a decent variety of dishes, and no one had any complaints--always a good sign.

This is my 700th blog post, a fact that means nothing, really, but that somehow seems significant, like a glance from a stranger that lasts a beat too long before she fades into the crowd on the other side of the street.

On the road again: Seattle, day 2

This hotel room is generally great, but it has two strange and unpleasant elements.

The first is its desk, which is a triangular piece of wood attached to the wall with a fixed return at right angles to it. The triangular piece is too high for comfortable work and too narrow for my notebook PC to fit in front of the outlets except right next to the wall. The return is a bit lower than ideal but still a pretty good height for work--but it has fixed shelves, so if you try to sit close enough to use it, you bonk your knees. A simple, regular desk would have been so much better.

The second and far more annoying flaw is the world's worst bathroom sink. Oh, it looks lovely, seducing you until you turn on the water. When you do, out of a spout designed no doubt with ecological goodness in mind come falling slowly downward a sad little collection of eight (or so) miniature streams of water. You can fill a water glass from it, but don't be in a hurry. If you want hot water, bring a book, because the water resists heating as if afraid it will burn.

Fortunately, the shower is wonderful, with a rainfall head, quite good water pressure, and water that turns hot almost instantly. Too bad the people who chose the shower didn't talk to those who selected the sink.

Dinner tonight was at Lola, a place near Pike Place Market. We tried a great many Greek dishes, and each and every one was good. I definitely recommend Lola.

Scheduling oddities found us in downtown Seattle with a little over an hour free, so we checked out the Science Fiction Museum & Hall of Fame. The SF Museum was in many ways like the field itself: flashy on the outside, thanks to the wonderful Frank O. Gehry design, which was worth the trip on its own; an odd blend of movies and books; and a bit low-rent on the inside. Still, as a lifelong SF fan, I both loved the visit and felt a vague sense of vindication by this application of Paul Allen's money, as if the fact that we now had a museum somehow made things better. If you're in the area, definitely visit this place.

On the road again: Seattle, day 1

The trip took about 14 hours from door to door, but I made it, and I'm happy to be in a hotel with a bed awaiting me. A three-hour layover was quite pleasant thanks to the free wireless and free Diet Coke at the Admiral's Club in O'Hare, and I accomplished a great deal on the planes.

I hate doing work travel on weekends, but it does have one great consequence: a higher probability of airline seat upgrades. Today, American upgraded us on both legs, which made the flight a great deal better than I had feared.

Dinner included two of us sharing both pork belly and fried pig ear, the latter a first for me. The pork belly was a B+, with the perfect outside but the interior not quite succulent enough to earn an A. The pig ear, though, was underwhelming--a statement that a decade ago I would never have anticipated writing. The ear had very little taste of its own, and even its potentially odd texture was overwhelmed by the entirely too heavy fried batter. Still, on balance the meal was good.

Now, though, I plan to finish my work and crash for what I sincerely hope will be a good night's sleep. I hope yours is good, also.