No biting the personnel

The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time, and still retain the ability to function.

F. Scott Fitzgerald in “The Crack-Up”

On our drive around the island, we stopped at a farm that raises Alpacas. I remembered it from a few years ago. They now have a lot more heads than before. They also had a llama. You can’t miss the farm. If you’re driving clockwise around the island, it’ll be a little while after the English camp. In any case, they have a store. They sell various items from Alpaca wool: beautiful sweaters, dresses and Teddy bears. The price tag says ~80 USD. The other tag says “Made in Peru”. Peru? Yeah, Peru. Peru as in “not made from the wool of the Alpacas on the farm”. Peru as in “imported from South-America Peru”. Hmmm… Ebay!!! Yup, great reminder that if it’s both imported and not custom, you too can probably find it. Average price for identical Alpaca Teddy bear? 20 USD.

I only retro-activated the last post on San Juan.

One of our New Year’s resolutions is to get out of town one weekend a month. This past weekend was our first attempt. We left Seattle ~1:30 PM on Saturday, reached the ferry terminal at Anacortes just in time to miss the 3:00 PM ferry – yeah we should have looked at the schedule – but caught the 4:20 PM one. Sadly, that one follows the long route through all the major San Juan islands; it stopped by Shaw, Lopez and Orcas before arriving at Friday Harbor at ~6:15 PM.

We stayed at a wonderful Bed & Breakfast. The Tucker House has probably been around for a few years now although new owners had just moved in that day. They also own the Harrison House Suites next door. It was a great experience. I’m always surprised, having traveled a bit in Europe, how different the B&B concept can be in North America. Their off-season rate is 140USD per weekend night. That’s more than many hotel rooms in small towns. Friday Harbor has many such B&Bs with charm, luxuriousness and great location in the village. Was it worth the price? The room was wonderful and breakfast… breaskfast… breakfast was, in order, fresh orange juice and coffee, granola with yogurt and honey, baked grapefruit with brown sugar, southern scramble wrap with beans and chocolate coffee cake with sour cream icing. They offered to serve it all to our room. We decided instead to eat in the kitchen of the Harrison Suites. We got to see a bit more of the property but forgot to take pictures. It’s gigantic and can sleep 48. If you fly in, they can pick you up at the local airport. They have spare bikes for client. They can arrange diving lessons. We’ll happily go back.

Friday Harbor however was dead. Most of the restaurants and stores were closed. As the owner of the B&B put it “the grocery store is the most happening place in town” this time of year. Tourism certainly plays a big role in this community. But I’ve been there in summer; it’s crazy. Going this time of year was quiet and relaxing. Bring a book, go to the lavender cafe (from the folks that own the Pelindaba Lavender farm), walk about the American or English camps, visit the lamas (1), camels (1) and alpacas (too many too count) and stop by Roche Harbor to realize just how much the island is changing.

We left with the 4 PM ferry on Sunday.

To most, Montréal winters means extreme colds that burst water pipes and snow storms that dump so much snow you can’t see your car the next day. We tend to forget that, even in the middle of winter, the temperature fluctuactes wildly. As a result, falling snow can easily turn into freezing rain. Cyberpresse.ca has impressive pictures of the ice storm that hit Montréal today. I especially liked these two:

Long week. I’m still dragging some tasks from the holidays. For example, I’ve started sorting our vacation pictures. Here is a really nice one of the dining set from Christmas Eve dinner.

I still can’t post by email though…

          I learned today that Amazon’s post holiday party is on Jan 28 and the theme is “Viva Las Vegas!”. In addition to fake gambling, dancing, and karaoke to keep the guests busy, Amazon is once again paving the way by providing “Amazon Wedding Chapel™” where couples may be wed Las Vegas style by an official who is registered to legally perform wedding ceremonies in Washington State. Being an equal opportunity employer, Amazon extends this benefit for both marriage ceremonies and domestic partnership. The winning couple will win airfare for two and hotel accommodations for three nights at the Bellagio Hotel in Las Vegas. Amazon is of course careful to avoid any fraud by requesting that domestic partners must supply proof of their existing domestic partnership using such documents as their certificate of Domestic Partnership registration; for marriage ceremonies, couples must supply a copy of their marriage license for which a legal ceremony has not yet been performed.

          The question now is how accurately people can predict how many couples will take the bait and get married Amazon style. I could use some statsticians to help me out. The results? We will find out on Jan 28.

At 5:35 this morning I boarded my AA flight to Vegas. With a few minutes to spare I started to play with my phone (5600). 1h 50 later we’re still on the ground. Something about paperwork for minor technical work being mis-filled. So what have I been up un in the mean time? I’ve been a geek. This post is coming live from the cell phone, by email, and I’ve been fine-tuning wordpress. That said, I still don’t have an easy way of posting pictures by email. Moreover, the lady now has authorship rights on the blog. I have to find out how to better identify the author of a post on the web page. Wouldn’t want people to take my food suggestions as her’s. P.S. Flight delayed until 9 AM.

I have to say I’m impressed. In ~1 hour I got a blog set up on fizzz.net. Getting wordpress and dreamhost to take new posts straight
from an email account was more difficult than it should have been though. Dreamhost’s knowledge base answered all my questions.
Kudos to them.

Now I need to understand how to configure it to post an HTML email as well as how to post images. Finally, adding comments wouldn’t
hurt. All in due time I guess.

Off to CES for now.