Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!!! 2015 was a very good year for me and my 2 dogs. I celebrated the beginning of 2015 in Europe while traveling with a former Phoenix friend who was stationed in Germany. We were in Berlin for Christmas, Amsterdam for a few days, Frankfurt area for a few days and then to Hamburg for New Years Eve. I was also able to visit Ann-Katrin, who we hosted as an exchange student years ago…
Last Monday I flew out to San Francisco for the Atlassian Summit 2015. It’s a gathering of nerds who love and use Atlassian’s products. If you work in software development you’ve likely heard of it…if not, you likely have not. It is a fantastic family of products! http://atlassian.com The conference featured keynotes and learning sessions as well as a really fun party at the Exploratorium along the Embarcadero area along the bay. On Friday we moved to an AirBnB for…
Spent a weekend in the Portland, OR area for a Hash House Harrier event in early September and had such a great time exploring with my friends who live across the river in Vancouver, WA. I stayed with them in Vancouver and found that I liked their area more than I liked Portland proper. Portland is just too much for more than a day or two. The homeless population is ridiculously high, but still not as high as San Francisco…
My dreams have come true. Expedia has reimbursed me for the double booking issue!!!! August 26, 2015 Darin Klein Re: Itinerary #xxxxxxxxxx Dear Mr. Klein, Thank you for contacting Expedia via Facebook and giving us an opportunity to address your concerns regarding a refund request for itinerary xxxxxxxxxx. We regret the difficulty you experienced during your attempt to purchase one night at Howard Johnson Hotel Golden for check-in August 7, 2015. Our research indicates you were unable to see a…
Thank you John Oliver for shining a HUGE LIGHT on these HORRIBLE people. Yes, a sucker is born every minute, but there has to be a way to keep these “religious” shysters from stealing so much money for their own greedy purposes. Perhaps this can be fixed, then we can move on to corporations.
The final page is pretty much done. I’m likely going to add some more pictures as I go through them as well as re-reading and fixing spelling and grammar mistakes. View it here: link
I had been thinking of getting a new mattress for about a year and began investigating the new-comers and highly rated mattress options currently available. I have had a Tempurpedic for over 10 years and liked it, but wanted to replace it. In the past six months I had narrowed my search down to the “Tuft & Needle” and the “Casper” mattress based on reviews and material/construction methods. Having one friend who has a girlfriend with a “T&F” who said he liked it, and another…
I rode to Rapid City, SD to visit family and ride with my brother who brought his motorcycle out from Indiana. I took the same route as three years ago through Moab and Denver to get home. It was about 1,230 miles one way and my total mileage after arriving home was around 2,900 miles. The first day I rode from Phoenix, AZ to Rifle, CO which took about 13.5 hours with gas/food stops. I stopped for dinner in Moab,…
Back in March I began the fun of tearing out carpet & linoleum to put down tile throughout the house. There was tile already installed in the family room and kitchen so I bought tile to match, hired some people, and got to work. (Tile Work Link) Well… that tile work was done in April. I finished the guest bathroom and have been using it as my primary until the master bath was complete. A few months later and it’s…
Last Friday I went in for an oil change and came out with a newer car. My 2007 Prius (package 6) had 130,000+ miles on it and was running well except for an annoying sound every 10 seconds that I think was the hydraulic pump associated with the braking/re-gen system. It’s a big repair and I figured I’d take a look and see what was available before I would have to seriously think of getting it fixed. Well, they had…