O the Places I've been!

I just found a cool new site where you can map where you've been, and since I have a pretty impressive track record within the US, I thought I'd show you. If anyone knows anyone in North Dakota, I'd love to have an excuse to get out there. The rest somehow seem manageable on my own.



visited states for you

Less Impressively, my country count (7):


visited countries for you

Great Plains?

My most recent experience proves otherwise. Iowa was certainly Great, but definitely not Plain. There were rolling dips, valleys, and hobbit-like hillsides. Plus it was incredibly green. Granted, the last time I was in Iowa, I was praying that I would find gas before having to stop in a cornfield over night and couldn't get out fast enough since it was so muggy, buggy and gross, but this time was different.... and windy. I even managed to have a slight wardrobe malfunction with my dress due to the wind. Luckily, my dad, the alleged mobster that he is, brought a big black raincoat, so I covered up.

This particular scene is from a cattle round up that we accidentally delayed--being the city slickers with cameras that we are. Needless to say, Amy was embarassed.

Family

Wouldn't it be nice to discover after about 10 years that you have an awesome family? Well that happened to me this weekend. True, I knew they existed, and I knew they were pretty cool, but man, I win. Last weekend I went to Iowa to visit my family and celebrate the life of my great grandfather Harold, who passed away in February. Thanks to him, I had a great weekend meeting my relatives as an adult, witnessing my very first auction, learning why you don't sell your cows, and how to find asparagus growing on the fence line.

There are tons of pictures from me and my dad if you want to take a look.

Mohonk Preserve

And this is why we love it... at least one of the reasons.

Dance with the Rock

Marching II
Originally uploaded by MotleyPrincess.

This weekend Jeff took me to New York and taught me how to climb rocks. I climbed a 5.4+! Sort of... I had a little help but made a couple of sweet moves on my own.

We also took a couple of lovely walks through the Mohonk Preserve and the adjecent state park. There were some crazy web-like nests which we discovered were some sort of cocoon for caterpillars. In this one, the big caterpillars were coming out and trying to find a way out of the tree. These guys were taking the scenic route and we caught them on film.... um, RAM?

Wake Up Call

This morning I woke up to about 14oz. of cold water spilled directly onto my flesh. Too bad it was only about 2am.

I managed to fall asleep with an open bottle of refrigerated water in my hand.

Nothing quite like wetting the bed at 24.

How to Talk to a Programmer

In my world, I spend a lot of time translating between normal human speak and programmer speak. And by programmer speak, I don't necessarily mean C# or visual basic. I mean programmer speak: the language used by programmers to communicate project goals, time lines, possibilities, solutions, etc. You don't have to know all the codes for colors in HTML, and you certainly don't have to know what HAL's favorite color was. You do however have to keep the following in mind:

1. Pretend like you think they are smarter than you. They think they are, so you might as well appease if you want the job done.
2. Be as specific as possible. They can smell a far fetched idea 18.2 miles away.
3. They think your "big ideas" are bogus. Remember that. Be discrete.
4. They probably are pretty bright in more ways than knowing how to concatenate two fields, so don't act like they're robots either.
5. If you want to "put pressure" on them to finish something, don't copy them on the email where you told your co-worker you were going to do it. (Ok, this goes for just about anyone).
6. Be realistic but firm about deadlines. Too quick and you'll get hostile response. Too lackadaisical and it will never get done.
7. It helps to have some basic knowledge of the soft/hardware you are working in to make this communication smoother. Consider taking a course in the "back end" of whatever it is you're working on.
8. Use sentences.
9. Hire me.

The funny thing is, I hate hate hate the phrase How-to. It is colloquial and stupid sounding. Use "process document" or "instructions" or "manual" or "guide" ... but How-To? It's like some awful bastardization of German syntax. Please.