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One of my headlights went out last week. I went to Kragen Auto Parts and got new bulbs. I paid a little extra and got Sylvania XtraVision headlamps. I had bought Silverstar headlamps but I found out that they only have an average life of 1 year in a car. $60 a year on automotive lighting… blah.

The XtraVision are marketed as having “up to 20% more illumination” (source). After pulling out my 8 year old bulbs and installing them, I came to realize that “up to 20%” includes “5%”. :-(

Oh well. At least I had fun figuring out how to change the headlamps in a 1998 Chrysler Sebring LX Convertible. The first one took half an hour of fiddling. The second took 3 minutes. :-)

I was unfortunately unable to change the direction they point. I found the controls but I think they had aged and wouldn’t move properly.

Does it bug anyone else that Sylvania is using shortened life span as a sort of “planned obsolescence” money maker? They can easily make them last 3,000 hours for almost no extra cost but they choose to make them last 850 hours. Halogens last that long as a matter of course; that’s what the halogen is for. I think they need some healthy competition in the marketplace. Anyone want to start an automotive lighting company?

A few weeks ago an acquaintance I met… I think her name is Ruth, while walking in Glen Canyon Park told me that I might find people flying RC airplanes at Fort Funston. Not only are there model airplanes but there is steady wind and a cliff, making for a perfect hang gliding spot. The sky was full of hang gliders. And littered around under bushes out of the wind were slope soaring planes. Once the hang gliders landed, two guys put their planes up, a gentle soarer and a tiny little hotliner that was more hot than tiny! It’s very hard to gauge how was it was…. 120MPH? Both planes had their charms, that’s for sure. When Brandon, Larry and myself got to talking about flying, they said how there were better places to fly just to the south. Brandon pointed toward Pacifica and mentioned at least 3 good places to fly: near the public dump, on top of the mountain (but you need to be able to land in about a 10′x10′ area!) and down near the water.

So after taking in the incredibly break taking views at Fort Funston, watching the hang gliding and and RC soaring, and playing a little football catch with the guys, I went down to Pacifica.

I went down near the dump and quickly found them. It’s funny, when you’re looking for soaring planes, you have to scan the horizon and look for flying objects. Once you’ve found one, you have to watch it closely to determine what it is. If it moves relative to the ground, it’s not a kite. Then it might be a plane or might be a bird. It often takes me several seconds to figure out which it is. I love that. I love that we are flying artificial birds. With motorized planes, it’s easy to tell because birds flap their wings while (of course) planes don’t. But with soaring… at a distance, it can be quite hard to tell the difference!

I found about 6 guys flying flying wings on an incredibly beautiful hill. The flowers at my feet, the crevices of the hill, the gentle but constant wind, the sound of the surf a few hundred feet below, the 180 degree panorama of the coast and of the town nestled just inland, the setting sun partially obscured by roughly defined clouds, the glistening of the light off the water… I could go on, really I could.

They were having some playful combat and doing some soaring. Sometimes two planes would collide and as they were falling out of the sky there’d be hooting and laughter. Sometimes the pilots would recover and sometimes they’d have to climb down the hill a ways to fetch their plane, only to briefly examine it and toss it silently into the air again.

A mere smiley face does not suffice!

And I should’a brought a camera.

Oops! I was supposed to get it in DVD! Wrong button!

But at least my anti-religion arsenal arrived safe and sound… Dennet’s “Breaking The Spell” and Henderson’s “The Gospel of the Flying Spaghetti Monster”. (I didn’t really realize I bought 2 anti-religion books at the same time until they arrived)

Now I’ve got to sell the VHS version and buy it on DVD. I’ve got to wait another week or two to see Adam say those imortal words…

I just wanted to wish everyone a happy Cheese Weasel Day. Did you get any cheese under your keyboard today?

Last night I went out to an Aaron Jae night club experience at Whisper, 535 Florida St. It was more fun than I thought it would be. Danced, drank, met some cool people including some Space Cowboys. I haven’t been to a show in a long time where the DJs were celebrated; I wasn’t expecting much but I was very impressed. They talented and made the dance floor a lot more fun.

Must chill now. Going to bed at 4am will do that.

Catalog your books by ISBN and discuss them on librarything.com

Reminds me of Bookcrossing

In life, read the back of your ticket.

For the first time in forever, I flew. The Zagi flew very roughly by my unpracticed hands, with new flimsy winglets (some tape will fix that), some exposed wiring and flapping skin, new coroplast elevons, and with high and gusty winds. But I flew :-)

I can drive to the park, fly 2 batteries and bop into 7-11 for some sandwiches in under an hour. :-)

I went to the Golden Gate Milonga with Vixen tonight… a real Argentine Tango milonga with dancing and everything. It was great fun. We’ll both be back to this milonga and others!

I really like my little studio apartment at 24th and Valencia in San Francisco. I commute to Cupertino 3 days a week and telecommute 2 days to Wavexpress.

I worked for Wavexpress back in 2000 and they hired me back this summer. We/they are still trying to make a video blog viewer that works a lot like television. I’m a little disappointed in the progress we’ve made, but I’ll keep plugging away at it because it pays the rent.

I have been doing my best to enjoy life… going to events like the Urban Iditarod, Kite Fight (although I have still never made it to a successful event, I have been trying now for two months… I am beginning to doubt that Rick really exists), Argentine tango classes, concerts, more concerts… I’m probably going to do Improv lessons at BATS soon.

For exercise, I’ve been running (occasionally). I feel good when I do it. I was thinking of going to Golden Gate State Park right after writing this…

For my commute to Cupertino, I have been carpooling with a coworker named Linden. Well, actually he works for Wave and I’m with Wavexpress (we’re just like Wave, only we don’t stop as much) We’ve been getting along splendidly. For the last month we have been listening to Malcolm Gladwell’s “Blink” on the way to and from work. It’s a fantastic book. Before that, we have been listening to podcasts that I have been downloading from the internet. over the last several weeks I have been watching the first three seasons of Penn and Teller’s “Bullshit”. I feel like they might turn me into an atheist yet. At the very least, they have reminded me of how important personal responsibility is.

I still haven’t put any art on my walls. I don’t know… I like the clean lines or something. I’ve got lots of art from friends and my own collection… I should just put a nail in the wall and see what happens…

A coworker (well, she’s with Wave…) showed me a model airplane field thats 10 minutes from my office last week. I’m getting my planes ready to fly!

I was introduced to a friend of Jeremy and Fiz.. Charlotte. She lives in Boston right now but she’s moving to SF this summer. I’ll give further news as it develops.

And I continue to find it to be near impossible task to keep up with all of my friends blogs. I do apologize. I’m not sure if it’s crazy that it often takes me a week to get back to people via email. The backlog just never ends.