Recently in Fabian's Stuff Category

I am heading off to Orlando and will be there until Friday at a firm training event.  The training will be held at the Caribe Royale Hotel just outside of Walt Disney World.  I am happy not to be in Walt Disney World, since I think some of the coolest things in Orlando are outside of the Magic Kingdom.

I returned from New York yesterday afternoon and had not a chance to post anything on the Nug until just now.  I am glad that I finally had the chance to get a bunch of photos out of my camera, including photos to the Toyota Grand Prix, our sightseeing tour of Los Angeles, and more photos of my trip to New York.

I am heading off to New York City until Wednesday.  I am part of my firm's National Hispanic Network Advisory Board and we are having a meeting at my firm's Park Avenue headquarters.  Hopefully I'll have a chance to do some touristy things around the city even though I will only be there a couple of days.

We are back from Long Beach but I haven't had any time to download all of the photos off the camera except for this one. Watching the American Le Mans Series race at the Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach on Saturday was a highlight for me because I got a chance to photograph my favorite car in action (pictured here).  It's funny that after playing Forza Motorsport 2 it totally felt like I had actually driven some of the Le Mans Series cars, but seeing (and hearing) them live made me realize that Forza is only a game.  I will post the rest of the photos later this week.

Melissa and I are heading to Long Beach to visit with family and friends and watch the Toyota Long Beach Grand Prix.  We're returning on Monday.  This race will be the last ChampCar race, since the open wheel racing leagues merged earlier this year.  Unfortunately it will be missing all of the top ChampCar drivers, since they all made their move to IRL.

Earlier today, upon returning from a walk to the Ferry Building (2.5 miles round trip), I noticed a strange bump on the top of my right foot.  The bump is pretty hard, about the size of a marble, and doesn't hurt at all.  Weird right!? I of course went on a Googling expedition to find out what the hell it is.  After some searches, I found out that it is likely a ganglion cyst that developed from injuring my foot while walking 12-14 miles in a couple of days last week while in Washington, DC.  Either that or it happened when I twisted my foot walking to work the other day after my return from DC.  Either way this thing on my foot looks really weird, I certainly hope it goes away on its own soon.

We returned from Washington, DC last night and really enjoyed the history of the city.  We were blessed to have pretty good weather while we were there so we got a chance to see the monuments without rain or snow, which would have sucked!  I just posted the photos taken during our trip onto Flickr.  I hope that I'll get a chance to add tags and captions to the photos soon.  Here's my favorite from the set, check them all out is you have some time.

I finally got around to getting photos from Fleet Week (October) and our visit to Hawaii (December) off my camera and posted them on Flickr last night.  We are still in the process of taking and sorting all of the photos we are taking in Washington, DC and I will be posting those later.

Melissa and I are heading off to Washington, DC this morning.  I have to be there for a privacy conference that starts on Wednesday, so we decided to head there early and be tourists in the District.  We didn't realize that we were heading there on Easter weekend, which may mean that a lot of things will be closed on Sunday, but oh well.  We'll see whatever we can, I guess.  I will post photos of our travels upon our return.

Melissa and I were walking past a couple of homeless guys today and they approached us excitedly and asked us to clarify a debate they were having.  Since this was a welcome change to being harassed for money, we both agreed.  They surprisingly had an American history question: Which country burned down the White House during the War of 1812?  One homeless guy debated that it was the British, the other that it was the French.

Melissa and I both didn't know the answer off the top of our heads, but we suspected it was the Britsh since the French were busy with the Napoleonic Wars in Europe, not in the U.S.  In order to settle the debate definitively, I busted out my BlackBerry to get the answer from the Internets.  Sure enough, a quick Google search found that it was the British that burned down many public buildings in Washington, DC, including the White House, near the end of the War of 1812.

The homeless exclaimed, "God bless the Internet!"  Indeed.  All in all, the interaction was quite refreshing and informative for all involved.  I really had no idea that the homeless were interested in these types of academic pursuits.  So I have to ask, do the homeless in other cities debate politics, science and quantum mechanics?  I wonder.

Last night, there was some serious weirdness going on with the Internets. Both me and a co-worker of mine couldn't get to The Daily Nugget, any of my websites, or GoDaddy. We both have Comcast as our ISP.  I of course assumed that this was all GoDaddy's fault, since it seemed like a DNS and/or routing issue.

In order to troubleshoot, I tunneled through my work's Internet connection and was able to access The Daily Nugget a few times with intermittent "503 service unavailable" errors.  WTF!?  This morning I was still getting intermittent 503 errors, but was able to access the GoDaddy.com host administration.  I proceeded to refresh my DNS settings by deleting and re-adding a CNAME entry.  Sure enough -- fixed within minutes.  Bastards!

A few minutes later as if almost on cue, I got an email from GoDaddy that says they have just changed the look and feel of their "My Account" area.  Apparently, this wreaked havoc with many shared hosting users, as evidenced by webmaster forum rants.  The good news is that it is all over and we can return to our regularly scheduled programming.

My apologies if you were unable to access the site and it caused you to lay down in a fetal position and cry uncontrollably while you checked the Internets every 5 minutes to see if it was back up and running.  I concede that may have been a little "inconvenient" and you may have lost some sleep last night.  Please read the site's terms of service before considering any litigation.

I updated the blog template to have a very simplified html markup and achieve all of the graphic elements using only cascading style sheets and the default movable type style sheet classes. What does this mean in English? The blog is more easily readable using a mobile devices. I got tired of the blog looking like crap on my BlackBerry and having to scroll through all of my tags. Ultimately, the change gives better accessibility for all of the Nug readers!

I caught what I can only describe as an evil stomach virus this weekend that had me within close proximity of a toilet bowl at all times. Everything that I ate on Sunday flew out of me one way or another (and I do mean everything). I was so weak and dehydrated by Sunday night that I passed out from exhaustion. Vomiting is violent, so much so that my diaphragm muscles are in pain like I got punched in the stomach. Today, a couple of people have told me that this "has been going around." Well, thanks for the warning!

I added the AdBrite ad service to my site yesterday and inadvertently turned on inline and full page ads. These obnoxious ads should be gone from the site by mid-day today. The only remaining ads should be the right side skyscraper on the front page and the top banner ads in the archive pages that have been there over the last two years. Sorry about that.

POSITION: Mom, Mama, Mommie, Mother and Dad, Daddy, Pops, Father

SUMMARY: Long term team players needed for challenging permanent work in an often chaotic environment providing leadership and mentorship opportunities to young workers. Candidates must possess excellent communication and organizational skills and be willing to work variable hours, which will include evenings and weekends and frequent 24 hour shifts on call. Some overnight travel required, including trips to primitive camping sites on rainy weekends and endless sports tournaments in far away cities. Travel expenses not reimbursed. Extensive courier service duties also required.

RESPONSIBILITIES: For the rest of your life. Must be willing to be hated, at least temporarily, until young workers receive $5. Must be willing to bite tongue repeatedly. Also, must possess the physical stamina of a pack mule and be able to go from 0 to 60 mph in three seconds flat in case, this time, the screams from the backyard are not young workers just crying wolf.

Must be willing to face stimulating technical challenges, such as small gadget repair, mysteriously sluggish toilets and stuck zippers. Must screen phone calls, maintain calendars and coordinate production of multiple homework projects.

Must have ability to plan and organize social gatherings for young workers and clients of all ages and mental outlooks. Must be willing to be indispensable every minute, from one embarrassment to the next. Must handle assembly and product safety testing of a half million cheap, plastic toys and battery operated devices. Must always hope for the best but be prepared for the worst. Must assume final, complete accountability for the quality of ALL produced work product.

Responsibilities also include floor maintenance and janitorial work throughout the living facility.

POSSIBILITY FOR ADVANCEMENT AND PROMOTION: None. You will remain in the same position for decades, without complaining, constantly retraining and updating your skills, so that those in your charge can ultimately surpass your own skills and earn more than you.

PREVIOUS EXPERIENCE: None required, unfortunately. On-the-job training is offered however on a continually exhausting basis.

WAGES AND COMPENSATION: No pay! This is a reverse-salary position in which you pay the young workers and offer them frequent raises and bonuses throughout your career. A balloon payment is due when they turn 18 because of the assumption that college will help young workers become financially independent. When you die, you give them all of your assets. The oddest thing about this reverse-salary scheme is that you actually enjoy it and wish you could only do more.

BENEFITS: No health insurance, dental insurance, pension, tuition reimbursement, paid holidays, or stock options are offered. However, this job supplies limitless opportunities for personal growth and free hugs for life if you play your cards right.

SPECIAL NOTE: You cannot decline this position, ever, and there is no retirement! Good luck!