Welcome Lori to the fold

Just as it's bad luck to have a ship without a name, I've found it useful and creepy to name my cars. My first car, a black 2000 Acura EL, was Chloe. My second car, a 2005 grey Acura TSX, was Rachel. Most recently, during her maiden voyage to Vancouver, we christened the third car, a 2007 bronze Acura (spot the trend here?) TL. The name is Lori, short for Lorraine, as in Marty McFly's mother from Back to the Future. And I must say that the maiden voyage was very much a success! The ride was smooth and quiet, and I was able to pwn all the souped-up Civics that challenged us along the way as well as in Richmond.

Without further ado, here are the pictures that I promised so long ago.

The controversial Type-S rims aren't bad with this color.

This is before I had to put on the front license plate.
Stupid state of Washington. :)

Lori in Vancouver, the day after her maiden voyage.

A lot of pros on this car.

• Drives great.
• Very comfortable and quiet.
  
• GPS works quite well.
• Computer is faster than the one in the TSX.
• Interior controls are a lot more logical as well. Sunroof controls next to the sunroof? Who'd have thunk it?
• Much improved sound system.
  

Some quirks so far include:

• Rattling noises from the driver's side door that only the driver seems to notice.
• The steering was quite stiff when I first got the car but it's loosened up quite a bit, though I still remember the TSX being more agile. Not a big deal on the road, but the feel of the car can be quite different in an enclosed parking lot.
  
• Lack of folding rear seats mean that the car is less useful for making Ikea runs.
  
• The audio system is top-notch, but DVD audio discs (DVD-A) are few, expensive, and far between. That's not a fault of the car but a fact that I still lament.
  
• I have no clue why they still include a tape deck in this day and age. They might as well include the address for the Prussian consulate in Siam.
• The MP3 disc support doesn't support Chinese or Japanese in ID3 tags.

Yes, yes, I know. I'll quit my bitching.

Out with the old...

A while ago I went to a job fair in Boston with a few people from Waterloo. During this time we shot some footage. It has been about a year and a half, but I have finally found the time and tenacity to piece together the snippets we shot into something remotely watchable.

If you're wondering about some of the weird edits, they were to remove shots of an ex-girlfriend. This was really too bad. All the best footage featured her.

May: the flowers bloom

So it's been a while. A long while. Well, I'm not going to split hairs, so let's just jump right in to why I haven't posted for so long: I forgot the URL of my own blog. Yes, even though it's run by the company I work for and it has my name in the address, I forgot it.

Here's an idea of what I've been up to.

• Gone up to Vancouver, twice. Which helped me break in the new car. Whee!
• Met some people from Microsoft, Amazon, Boeing, and many other places. Both new friends and old.
  
• Started going to church.
• Joined a self-defense class. Yellow belt test on Friday.
• After months of inactivity, started writing a new book.

This is just a summary of everything that has happened lately. I'll get into more detail in subsequent posts. But I thought I'd let everyone know that I'm still alive.

Cheers!