Pigs on Bear Lake!

On our way back from a lovely boat ride on the lake we were surprised to find four pigs wandering around the yard.  A few calls later and the Boy Scout camp sent some guys over to wrangle them home.  But it was a fun little diversion.  All I could think of was the high price of ham and how delicious they looked...

After You - Pepin Messabout

Another fun filled day, with lots of boating and talking about boating and even some kite flying.  You wish you were here.  Although the afternoon produced the Lake Pepin that I had imagined, with whitecaps and waves over the transom.  Need an electric pump.. :)

https://picasaweb.google.com/robert.craig/AfterYouPepinMessabout?feat=directlink

After You - Pepin!

Early to rise, headed downriver in a grind that would involve 12 hours, multiple rainstorms, waves to crash over her bow, two lock passages, and a few hours of beautiful scenery and river.  Met up with the wonderful folks of the messabout and had a great evening sitting around the fire telling lies, er, stories about many things.

https://picasaweb.google.com/robert.craig/AfterYouPepinBound?feat=directlink

After You - Downriver

Well, that was exciting!  Hidden falls has a boat ramp but today it had a boat parking lot.  It was a bit flooded.  No matter, Jill and the kids helped me launch quite nicely.    Left around five thirty and made good time for a bit.  Have to admit the first hundred yards took some getting used to, as the wind and currents were tossing me around.  By the time I got to downtown Saint Paul, I wanted to top off my gas tank.  Good call, though only half empty, I would end up needing every last drop in the next section.

I took a few minutes at the pier by Navy Island to tape some trash bags over the skylight and then put on the skylight cover. The clouds were graying up a bit and I wanted to be completely sure I kept the cabin dry.  It has not yet rained but I am glad I did it for my overnight, just in case.

Ok, I head into an alley of barges and industrial docks and soon after the wind picks up.  I am heading right into it and spend a couple miles reenacting various scenes from The Deadliest Catch.  Whitecaps, three foot waves, spray coming over the bow completely drenching me, and not a safe harbor in sight.  I soldiered on and eventually decided to stop at the landing at my evening halfway point, which was sure to be nearer the end of the evening rather than half way.  That was the 694 bridge, and the landing ended up being further underwater than Hidden Falls was.  So I skirted behind some islands where the water was calmer and refilled the tank.  It was almost empty, so good timing on that one. 

Took a backwater behind some more islands and noticed there was a protected channel running up through the island.  This is where I dropped anchor for the night as it was twenty minutes to sunset.

Dropped some Pigs Eye Pilsner (felt only appropriate) in the net and dropped it in the river to cool them off.  Had a nice cold sandwich and a juice box and here I sit, having a brew on the river in my gently rocking boat.  The cabin is small but super cozy now that it is organized, and I am rocking my Android tablet writing this post.  Obviously it is easy to type on, as evidenced by the long post.

After the sun set it is quite cool and no bugs to be found.  Awesome.

Now to read some pirate adventures by Michael Crichton as darkness falls and the birds in the trees coo me to sleep.  It is going to be an early morning to make up for lost time.

More photos in my Picasa Albums
https://picasaweb.google.com/robert.craig/AfterYouDownriver?feat=directlink

After You - Up North

The whole family went out to Mantrap lake and had a wonderful cruise. Even got to see some Pelicans and Terns! The kids spent most of the time reading, but Jill and I had a nice time sightseeing. It was chilly and cloudy, but a lovely trip.

We also tested out the new underwater camera. At full speed it's no fun, but at low trolling speeds it's quite interesting. Next step: hook up something that will record the video..
After a long day of off and on rain I got to take her out for a later evening cruise. Bliss.

First outing of the year on the After You

The "gear locker" with new hanging straps -- possibly the most useful additions to the boat.

I also got a new battery box. Exciting, huh?

We went to Calhoun, Isles, and Cedar lake. Didn't quite make Brownie, as I wasn't confident the battery would get us there and back. It had a long year last year.
The first mate checks the camera. It's temporary henna tattoos on her arms -- we're not horrible parents. :)

Amon Tobin

Listened to "Out from out where" by Amon Tobin on my walk home today and was constantly struck by how comfortable I am with his combination of noises. A couple times

I was thinking about how discordant and chaotic his music is, but it felt really right. I've

only seem him live once, but it was a really great show. It's fun to find an electronic

artist who can recreate and improve on their music live. He definitely can.

So here are a few of his tunes that really strike me.

Verbal - There are times in my life when I have what I call a "mental virus" -- it's like

being sick with a simple virus, but it's mental. I know, hard to explain, but this video

sounds like it feels on the more manic side:

The videos are quite good, as well. Enjoy this, and welcome to my brain:

Finally, if ever there was a soundtrack to my life, I think this would be a good example of how well Amon Tobin matches:

Charizard Pokemon Pillow

This pillow is for Eli.  Finally got it stuffed!

Dusting off the After You

This weekend I'm bringing the boat home. After a long winter in a garage in Saint Paul, it's time to work on some fitting out of the cabin and yearly spring maintenance. Excited to see how well she held out over the winter. I've stopped by a couple times to check on her but it's different getting into the actual sunlight..

Bring out your boats!

Navigation season opens on Upper Mississippi

Nintendo 3DS Gamebang

I got a Nintendo 3DS portable gaming system this week, and it's really cool. I'm not going to say too much about what it does, but I have an idea about one of it's cooler features.

It's called Streetpass, and it's a genius marketing move. When you come near another person with a 3DS and they have Streetpass enabled, the two consoles exchange a bit of information. At it's most basic level you "get" the person's Mii, or avatar in your collection. Collecting more Mii's allows you more points/abilities in some of the built in games, and that's kinda neat.

But what's even cooler? Some 3DS titles have Streetpass content. So if you have Nintendogs and walk past someone else who does (and it's based on the save file, not the actual game being in the machine, or even running) you find out about their pet. The next time you take your dog for a walk (regardless of whether that person is around anymore) you may see their dog. It can also unlock features and additional abilities in games.

In short (too late!), the more save games you have on your system, the more additional content you can get. And even if you don't have the game anymore, it'll be available if you do get the game in the future. See where I'm going? The more different games save files you have, the more you get. Not to mention the fact that anyone else you interact with gets something out of the deal down the road. My friend has Street Fighter, but I don't. If we meet, he doesn't get anything. If I have a save file for Street Fighter (and don't own the game, don't even want to) and we meet, he can get bonus stuff.

So it's in the best interest of all 3DS owners to have the biggest collection. So that's where the 3DS gamebang comes in. Plan an event, invite all your 3DS having friends, and get together for an hour or so. Everyone brings their games and shares them around. You all end up with save files, you all share your Mii's for the Mii Plaza, and everyone leaves happy.

Who's up for it?

Blades of March Skating Competition

Lily's first skating competition -- it went really well!

Skiing!

Kids these days, I tell ya. Eli comes home one day and announces that they have a field trip coming up. Skiing. Someone decided it was a good idea to take these tiny little children skiing? Ski they did. And from what I hear it was a roaring success. Eli came home with a new sport.

We signed him up for lessons at Hyland. I took him the first week and wanted to get him all set up properly so I didn't plan on skiing. Spent the whole time wishing I had the right gear so I could get on the slopes.

Hyland is considerably larger than Como (where we grew up on Ski slopes) with more than one slope and more than just one rope tow. For Minnesota, it's a great city ski spot and lots of fun. Eli has had three lessons now and was signed off on the basic course and if he wants more lessons it'll be at a (basic) advanced level. The instructor and supervisor were both really impressed that he did so well, especially since he's only been skiing five times! I just explain that by saying he's a Craig. :) And it's thrilling to find something Eli likes to do this much. Again, a Craig.

I'm excited about this new chapter in the Craig Skiing Scrapbook.

It's been so long since I'd been skiing. There were a few things that strike me:

• When did skis stop being pointy?
• I don't have a problem with snowboarders, but why do they all sit down in the middle of the slopes?
• WOW there are a lot of opportunities for people to ski now. I don't think there's a handicap anymore that would prevent someone from getting on the slopes. The blind skiiers were a bit of a surprise, but they really do quite well!
• Dad. I keep saying things to Eli that came straight out of my Dad's mouth. So many points that I totally "get" now. (Yes, ropes are better because they keep you warmer, lifts just make you cold. Bring your own sandwiches. Sweat is the enemy. Don't just go straight down the hill. Use poles. Colder means less people on the slopes.)
• Why doesn't anyone use poles anymore? Seriously!
• Lacking moguls, all hills are the bunny hill. Some are just steeper than others.

We're having a lot of fun. I'm having a lot of fun. It's good to be back.

eBlots - cut rate internet therapy!

eBlots is back, kinda.

I'm working on porting the web site over to an app for Android, and thought it would be fun to put the site online for a bit in order to test it and gather some samples.

Fine, I'll explain. I suppose it was ten years ago. TEN YEARS. I don't know how that happened. Anyway.. I was working at Plural, and I had a Palm of some sort. Probably a Palm V, which was of course the best and coolest Palm *ever*. And whenever I had a moment of boredom I'd just draw a little doodle and save it. We'd been light on work (closed later that summer) and I'd been churning out ridiculous little web sites (guidsquirt, flarben, etc.) and coming up with some interesting ideas. eBlots was one of them. Just the idea of Rorschach charts and sharing opinions...

So I whip up eblots.. (no, I still don't know if it's eblots or eBlots) Dropped the link on a site or two but really just enjoyed doing it. Was fun coding, fun drawing the doodles, and most of all fun to put my comment in daily and see what other folks thought.

Yahoo sites of the week, mention on CNN news, many many many linkblogs, and lots of traffic. I'd promised never to put ads on it, and I'm still glad I did that. The couple hundred dollars I might have made wouldn't have been worth the thought that I kept it "pure" -- although I did open a cafepress store if folks wanted a t-shirt or something. :) I got to watch 1400 connections pour in at one moment and that was a lot of fun -- even handled the volume! Woo!

It was a lot of fun, and after a while it sort of petered out. After the year anniversary the images rolled over and somehow, as unbelievable as it sounds, a couple folks complained about the "reruns" -- what a memory! Eventually I retired it and stopped paying for the domain.

It's one of the few sites I'm really proud of because I enjoyed it and it was enjoyed by other folk.

So now I'm building a version for Android phones(*). Maybe I'll let someone write an iPhone version if I get a cut of the profits. Just kidding! eblots will always be free.

So if you want to hit the site you can play along and see a new image every day, comment on it, and see what other people thought...

The Lying Down Game

These pics are a couple months old, but we were at the cabin and I had mentioned the silly "lying down" game to the kids. They took the camera and dove right in...

The Lying Down Game

by the kids

(Before you ask, just remember -- we're Craigs.)

Marting Luther King Jr Dog Park

No, I'm not talking about the Minneapolis neighborhood kerfuffle. I'm not even a dog person. But I noticed something. There are three dog parks NAMED for Martin Luther King Jr. around the country:

• Martin Luther King Jr Park Dog Park in Corvallis OR
• Martin Luther King Field and Dog Park in Sausalito, CA
• Martin Luther King - West Oakland Dog Park in Oakland CA

And then there are more on streets named for the undeniably great man:

• Off Leash Dog area in Golden Gate Park on Martin Luther King Jr. Drive
• Sam Smith Park dog park on Martin Luther King Jr. Way in Seattle, WA
• Thomasville Dog Park on Martin Luther King Drive, in Thomasville GA

That search took a couple minutes, tops. There must be more. I can't help but wonder if their communities embraced or rejected these memorials.

GUIDSQUIRT

http://fnirt.com/guidsquirt

Long story. Many years ago I was working the web development world at a consulting company. It was a great group of folks, both technical and non-technical. Occasionally a bit of geekiness would show up in meetings and the business folk didn't always "get it." In one such meeting the idea of using GUIDs for something was brought up, and the concept of the GUID would have to be explained. Even after the explanation one of the business people made some comment about using GUIDs sparingly, lest we "run out" of them.

Being the wiseacre, I had to take that comment a couple steps (ok, miles) further. Thus GUIDSQUIRT was born. It's a site dedicated to wasting GUIDs. Flagrant misuse and disrespect for the remaining supply of GUIDs!

A site was cobbled together and given the timeframe of this idea (.com boom anyone?) we took out a domain name -- guidsquirt.com. There was even some talk of a store in which you could buy t-shirts, but I think the fact that each shirt couldn't have a dynamically generated GUID killed that idea. After a number of years I got tired of dropping $x for a goof-off domain and let it go.

But people keep asking about GUIDSQUIRT. So here it is.

(I'm building an Android app based on the concept now. So you can waste GUIDs in your pocket all day long.. Stay tuned for further developments)

P.S. Waste not, want not.:

Waste! Waste! Waste!

OPP, my favorite technical creation

This is a web application I wrote in November of 2001

(click ^that^ link to see it)

Technical Information: The application backend is Active Server Pages (something of a precursor to .Net) on a Windows server. Images were originally captured with a Bell + Howell BH10 mini digital camera. They were then processed by accessing a Photoshop DLL via ASP and applying filters 'charcoal' or 'cutout' -- the original goal was just to see if I could apply Photoshop actions to images dynamically via ASP. Turns out, I could! In the end it was pretty precarious and wouldn't be very efficient in a production environment, but for post-processing via an administration page, it worked quite well. You would import the latest images and the interface would present you with the the same image filtered in each of the filters. Click on the image that seems "right" and it gets added to the mix. The other filtered image is tossed. Think Rorschach Photo Editing.

Personal Information: Two months after 9/11 I was working in a job I didn't feel comfortable in -- at a company I couldn't stand. Because it was the only job available. I had just spent part of a summer job hunting having been laid off in a bad economy before 9/11 happened. I would take the bus to and from work, go through the motions and act like a grownup. There was no challenge, no technical peers, an petty corporate culture. I hated it.

Our son was almost two at this point and had been slowly focusing from "screaming toddler" to "communicating child" but that was new. I felt like I didn't know what I was doing and got mixed feedback from the boy. Endless hours spent at toddler playgrounds just sitting there waiting and watching. Don't get me wrong, I loved him (and still do) more than life itself. And my lovely wife is wonderful and supportive, but this was not the best time of my life. Lots of days mix together, some pretty good, some horribly bad. Almost a decade later and these pictures in this application are an exact image of my memories of the time. Some vague and colorful, some gray and dirty. But few very clear, many confusing and uncomfortable.

It's not one of my most advanced technical projects, but it's one that I come back to from time to time to revisit and feel some feelings and realize how things change, how things are good, how things are bad, and how things just .. are. So this is my most successful project on a personal level. Just thought I'd share it.

Classic: ASCII Flaming Plural Logo

This commercial came out when I was working at a "B2B Web Architecture and Content blah blah blah" consulting company. To it's credit, it was actually a pretty good one until the bottom fell out of the market.

It was also about the time I was really getting my ASP on. (Active Server Pages, web stuff.) We would joke about various things here and there and every once in a while a mini-project would spin off. This was one of them. The joke was that someone would want more than just a flaming logo, etc.

So the challenge was:

"Can you make a flaming logo but not use graphcs?"

The answer was:

Yes. Yes I can.

(p.s. No, it's not optimal, yes it's a crap hack job, no it doesn't matter.)

TNR 11/9/10 - Bridges!

Update: ampers did a really cool piece on the Bridges of Hennepin county! It's only 90 seconds, click on it!

Every bridge that crosses the Mississippi within the beltway! That's 18 if you didn't know already. Those are the "shore to short vehicle allowed, distinct" bridges. We have a pretty high standard. If you just counted the number of times you went over a land to land span it would have been 38. Not too shabby!

I was running two mapping applications and Tom was running a third. It was an interesting experiment to see the different options. These are all Android apps, BTW.

Instamapper (Application name: GPS Tracker)

Pros: Always on so it's easy to define start and end points, simple web interface,

Cons: Not highly configurable, not a lot of statistics available

GPS tracking powered by InstaMapper.com

EveryTrail (as reviewed by Tom)

Pros: Seems to be very robust in the current version, allows you to either see the map or see overall statistics as you're going, the display interface for afterward is pretty solid, it seems to prioritize the data collection such that whatever might be going on with the phone, it gets the data anyway

Cons: It can be slow to respond to input, can't see both the map and stats at the same time, display interface on their website uses flash, which I hate

9 Nov TNR

EveryTrail - Find the best Hiking near Minneapolis, Minnesota

Google MyTracks

Pros: Lots of display information, super easy upload to My Maps, quite accurate despite GPS quality

Cons: Hard to tell if you're recording, stats good but don't filter obvious GPS errors, have to remember to start and stop recording. :)

View TNR - Bridges! in a larger map

I think it all comes down to what your needs and personal opinions are. None of these are rubbish, and for certain needs some of them are stellar. But I don't think there is a consensus or best practices for what a navigation recorder needs to be. Someday...