Old Ramblings - March through May 2006

Just got home with a stack load of new photos so a great incentive to do my bi-annual web update. I also had another update in the pipeline, but like a failed branch prediction it got stalled. (Sorry, that really was a bad computer joke). The reason why I have a sack load of sensor images, is because I am returning from Las Vegas where Microsoft were holding their Mobile and Embedded Developers Conference (or MEDC2006 for short). Work thought that this was a good chance to catch up on the latest and greatest developments and to do a bit of networking. I just thought this was a great opportunity to take photos.

We didn't go directly to Vegas, but instead detoured through San Francisco and parts of Oregon, so of course there are photos for those locations as well.

The trip was interesting to say the least. In Oregon, the (flash) hotel we stayed at turned out to be about a block away from some kind of mulching company which resulted in an oderous experience for us in Eugene. Luckily we didn't spend much time near the hotel so it wasn't really a problem, but one of our US colleges who worked in another near-by town had previously jokingly referred to the town as 'Smelly Eugene'. It's just weird how some things like that turn out to be true when you least expect it. I should put in a disclaimer that not all of Eugene was smelly of course. Eugene is a lovely town - we just got unlucky that day! :)

As it turned out, Eugene wasn't the only smelly experience on this excursion. We had the misfortune of missing a 45 minute cut-off for check-in to our flight to LV. This causes all sorts of complications as we begged the officials to let us on the flight anyway. In the end they let us on the flight we wanted - but our luggage ended up doing a bit of a detour. As a result, none of us were too 'fresh' until the bags finally turned up late the next day.

But, I'll forgive Vegas for all the trouble it has caused me, but only because it put on a free show for me. And it just proves once again that it's the city where everything happens at night.

A scary thing happened yesterday. My brother became a father. Even scarier, well for me at least, is that I'm now officially old. I'm an Uncle! So a big congrats goes out to him and a standing ovation to Kiri who did all the hard work and gave birth to little Rohan, 8lb 8oz, around 7.30pm last night.

Unfortunately for Rohan, he was born into a family of computer geeks, so even before he saw the sun for the first time the next morning, he had his own website.

 Not wanting to rain on Kiri and Steffan's parade, but I too have been responsible for bringing so life into this world in the last couple of months. And without wanting to brag, in my time I was responsible for in excess of twenty hungry mouths to feed. I can't be sure of the exact count due to running out of fingers and toes to enumerate with, but I do know there were a lot. Oh - and did I mention they were Monarchs?

For Christmas, Mum and Dad got me a garden voucher because they knew I was wanting to do something with the garden during the holiday season. While in the store trying to make good on my ill-gotten booty I noticed some Swan plants for sale. Their main sales drive was based on the fact that these are the only plants Monarch butterflies feed on and it is important part of maintaining the habitat for these creatures. So I decided to do my patriotic duty and picked up a plant. Ironically, I found out later that the Monarch butterfly is actually an introduced species in New Zealand and only survive _because_ people had the swan plants in their gardens - also introduced. I wonder if MAF know about this.

Anywho... I got home. Planted the Swan plant the next day and then promptly forgot all about it.

Two weeks later I happen to be doing a bit of weeding in the vicinity and I noticed a scrawny looking stalk. Only I didn't recall planting any stalks in this part of the garden. I looked closer and noticed that this stalk was actually the Swan plant planted a fortnight ago. For once, something in my garden was dying and it wasn't my fault. When I zoomed in for a closer inspection I noticed that the stalk was being <I>consumed</I>. All that remained was this spindly thing with nubs where leaves once proudly hung. It was covered with Monarch caterpillars.

So I did what any idiot would do - bought a terrarium, populated it with as many milk weeds as I could cram in, and then raised them in captivity. All in all, it was about two weeks before the last of the caterpillars became a chrysalis and then another three weeks after that until they had all flown the coop.

Now of course, I used this as a perfect excuse to buy a new lens (a macro this time), so I have a nice stash of photos for y'all to leer at. And some photos that are perhaps not that nice either.