Neal Stephenson, one of my favorite fiction writers, came by campus today as part of promoting his new book (released... today!). He did an interesting presentation that sort of gave background to the thinkings of one of his book characters. He's going back to the original hackers: 17th century style. Looks like some of the characters have the same surnames as the excellent Cryptonomicon, so there's a thread continuing there.

Elisa's Dad, Carl, is in town and on Sunday we did a day trip to Mt. Rainier / Paradise. Della the Seeing Eye dog came along, too.

It was the most wonderful, beautiful day I've ever been to Paradise. The air was absolutely clear, it was sunny, there was a nice breeze, and it just felt fine.

Of course, I didn't bring a single camera. But we had a great time.

2 and 1/2 weeks to Oysterfest! Back wrapped grilled o-y-s-t-e-r-s! To quote The Man at Dixie's: Yeah Baby!

Elisa, Beau, Bella, and myself took a couple of days off from the Puget Sound area to visit the Long Beach Penisula. We stayed at the Moby Dick Hotel (a place I'd been with Bella long ago when we first got her). Unfortunately, a neighbor had sprayed some herbicide recently so they weren't risking harvesting the oysters.

We managed to get some time in to...

• Walk around the Moby Dick and flush out a loud heron
• Drive up to the beach and see the Pacific (didn't drive on the beach this time)
• Have a great dinner
• Go for the short hike to the ocean from Leadbetter State Park
• Take a nap on the beach (all four of us!)
• Stop by a little seafood retailer near The Ark and get some fresh, fresh tuna (in season)
• Finally: fried oysters!

Senator John McCain came by campus this past Friday. He did a brief discussion of various topics of interest to him and then took questions from the audience. He was surprised when a bunch of us clapped in response to his opposition to recent tax cuts. I think Sen. McCain believes this group makes a lot more money than it does. We'd have to be floating out on Lake Washington in our private yacht before we thought those tax cuts were a good idea.

Todd Ogasawara's review of the Nokia 3650 - O'Reilly Network: The Nokia 3650 GSM/GPRS Phone with Camera, Bluetooth, and More. I'm still in love with it!

Well, the Wayback Machine keeps records of all sorts of old web pages. They don't have my earliest little web site at Teleport, but they do have the next to final version (before Teleport was bought out): The Richards Nexus

Day Trip! On Sunday Elisa and I headed off for a day trip to Roslyn Washington. Right off of Route 90, exit #80. This is where the TV show Northern Exposure was filmed.

We ended up being so lucky to be there during their Coal Miner celebration (missed the Manly Man festival!). So there was a party atmoshphere going on within the town's single main block.

The Roslyn Cafe was closed, but we did stick our head into The Brick and got to enjoy a crashing loud Scottish band (some things shouldn't be enjoyed within closed spaces).

Later we wandered about the large cemetary that is unique in the way it's divided into lodge and other social groups. There's also an area where 200 black coal miners are buried, along with a dedication to the 2001 Thirty Mile Fire firefighters who lost their lives defending NW forests.