October 19, 2006
Two weeks ago, we were lucky enough to have time to drive up to Traverse City. I’ve wanted to see the fall color display for the past couple years and this year, I was so inspired by the Pure Michigan radio ads that I couldn’t resist.
260 miles and 3.5 hours later, we got to our condo rental. It happened to be the only place available since the city was filled with people like us trying to catch the trees’ last hurrah.
What an amazing weekend.
Click below for a few more or here for the full gallery: Michigan Ablaze
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October 1, 2006
So I was pleasantly impressed by the Canadian border officer’s breadth of knowledge. Maybe it’s just because I’m in Michigan and not many people know much about computers, but this guy did.
During our brief interrogation at the Canadian border, the dude asked me what I did for a living. Hmm, a perfectly valid question from him to try to make me crack, I thought. “I’m in medical school,” I said. “At wayne.” Then he comes right out from left field and asks if anyone does computer programming. What the? I go, “Uh, oh yeah, I used to do that,” wondering how he came up with that one. “Is that why your license plate says that?” he said seeing the expression of wonderment on my face. And it all became clear. I told him how impressed I was because he was the first person in Michigan to know what it was. :happy:
September 18, 2006
So I’m on my way home from Ann Arbor and stop by the local BP gas pump to fuel up. So I was just minding my own business and doing the fill up routine: swipe card, open gas cap, choose octane, glance at price, glance at price again, confused and tilt head to side. . .wait, that’s not part of the routine.
HUH?? Weird. So now I’m no longer minding my own business but trying to keep under the radar and make sure no one notices the error. I press 93. In the meantime, I’m trying to peek at their sign at the street to check the prices. Darn a car is blocking my line of sight. So I look at the pump to see if it’s really charging me what I thought. I look again at the prices and notice the decimal moved one spot to the left making it a tidy $.2359/gal Couldn’t get a good shot of it but this is what I got when I looked up.
I blinked a few times before the guy came out and said it was an error and made me stop filling. I started daydreaming about selling this stuff when they shut off the pumps to fix the problem. . .
But wait, it gets even better. I ended up getting 9 gallons for zero dollars. 
July 24, 2006
About a week ago, I wondered if Verizon ever came out with a solution for the location capabilities of all the phones they sell. Well, they did. And it’s NICE.
It runs in BREW so it only runs on Geline’s RAZR but I believe other carriers have Java versions of their own navigation programs. It searches for you and allows you to call but best of all it’s a complete navigation system.
I jacked these images from the VCast site.In our first test, it located us to our apt almost right on the money. Then we programmed a restaurant and it gave us a route. Then to my surprise, it started talking! If you press the arrows it shows you the next step or maybe even a little map with your location on it. When we starting moving, the dot moved too! Amazing. And if you close the flip, it shows the directions from the outer screen and it still gives voice prompts.
You get to try it for 30 days, but too bad it’s $9.99/mo. otherwise.
June 7, 2006
When I first moved here the closest IKEA was 220 miles away, in Canada. Someone told me that this new store has the largest sq. footage of all retail stores in Michigan. It seems to be big news for Michiganders because all they had on the radio this morning was coverage of people supposedly camping out 3 days for the store to open. But I suppose it’s good news because now I can spend my IKEA gift card on some yummy swedish meatballs.
>> Crowds flock to IKEA – Canton, MI
May 14, 2006
That’s it? $1 extra dollar? Two please.
The Palladium in Birmingham was showing M:I3 in their special “Screening Room” for only a dollar extra. At first, I was skeptical. But after my butt felt the soft, supple leather, wide memory-foam cushions, and lack of bratty Birmingham teenagers, I was a believer.
Gonna be lots of good movies coming out this summer. Hope they play them on this screen.
May 11, 2006
March 27, 2006
Way back when, I blogged about the OQO model 01. Today, I saw the OQO model 01+ in action. My pediatric attending whipped it out on rounds to look at labs. I was like…:shock2: I was surprised, because so far, I haven’t met any real gadget freak attendings yet. But this guy’s also an MBA so maybe that’s where he gets it from.
It weighs a couple ounces short of a pound but it runs Windows XP Tablet Edition and the screen looks pretty nice. The case felt like a magnesium alloy and was nice and sturdy. The screen slid very smoothly. When I looked at my Treo I was sort of saddened but the Treo is so much more useful to me. If only I could get the Citrix client to work on it, I would be as cool as he. :yeah:
March 10, 2006
Wow, I forgot how demanding being on call can be. I chose to do pediatric intensive care this week…what was I thinking? Actually, it was a good experience taking call on Tuesday. And then taking call again on Thursday! The second call was my choice, but it’s exciting in the ICU. But we’ll get down to what this post is really about which is actually the sequel to the previous post.
My new toy; it’s designed to keep me connected while I’m in clinical prison. It combines my Dell Axim X30 and my RAZR into a single device. But best of all features unlimited EVDO internet. Mmm, full speed broadband internet from the little plastic knob antenna… :jittery:
End of nerd post.
November 11, 2005
Surgery is pretty busy and it’s even worse when you aren’t quite sure what you want to do.
But I still found the time to change the hands and date ring on my new watch in time for the time change. Phew, that’s actually more time than I thought.
I chose these hands to look more like the IWC Mark XV pilot’s watch that I like. The quality of the hands are not as high as I’d want, but they are still pretty good.
