I spent the past 14 days in Thailand (with a 5 hour stint in Narita, Japan). My New Year was spent on the beach at the Full Moon Party on Koh Phangan, and then I spent some time in the Krabi area, including Krabi Town, Koh Phi Phi and Ao Nang. So needless to say it will take me a few days to get back to reality. If I can get my ass in gear, over the next few weeks I will try to post some photos and some of my journal entries from the trip.

Hope all is well with all of you, and that you had a holiday as good as I did!


Looking down to Koh Phi Phi from viewpoint

Labels: adventure, Thailand, time off, travel, vacation

Beautiful Colorado Rocky Mountains

Memories from Colorado trip earlier this year...

After descending over the Rocky Mountains on one of the more bumpy flights I've ever had, we arrived in Denver on Friday morning. The plan was to check out the major cities of Colorado over the next four and a half days, and while we were at to sample a lot of the great breweries and pubs in the area as well. It turned out to be a sort of impromtu beer tour, but that worked just fine because it gave us direction and motivation to keep moving along. So to get started, we picked up the rental car and then headed straight to Boulder, which was the place I was looking most forward to seeing. I had only driven through Colorado, without ever having spent any time there, so this was all new to me.

I had written down a few potential places to stay, but we decided on the Quality Inn, as it was the only one I knew of that was walking distance to Pearl Street. It turned out to be a great choice, and I can say without a doubt that it is probalby one of the nicest Quality Inns I've ever stayed at. Without going into all the details of what we did, I will say that we loved Boulder, and decided on staying a second night, which gave us more time to explore. (This was partly due to the snow storm in the mountains which we opted not to drive though heading to our next destination.) The downsides of Boulder for us were that it was such a college town, and also that we found out the cost of living was pretty steep. Which makes it a great place to visit but probably not a place to ever move to. The accessibility of everything was definitely nice; bike lanes everywhere, and even a paved walking/biking trail that led from the center of town right up into the mountains. A definite plus coming from California where everything requires driving.

Some of the boulder highlights were the Mediterranean Restaurant, Mountain Sun Brewery, Avery Brewing, and the Boulder Draft House. A couple places that were great but I think maybe a bit overrated were Walnut Brewery and Jax Fish House (overpriced).

While in Boulder, someone clued us in on the Frozen Dead Guy Days Festival that was going on in Nederland, so Sunday morning we checked out and headed up into the mountains. We didn't actually see any of the festival, but we did get a pretty good idea of what it was like based on the general level of debauchery going on in town. We had a few beers and some ribs at Wild Mountain Brewery, and then went north to Estes Park. Estes Park was gorgeous, but the brewery there was definiately not worth the drive. But the scenery and the wildlife sightings near the entrance of Rocky Mountain Natinal Park made it worthwhile.


Downtown Denver at Night From Estes Park our next stop was Lyons, where we hit Oskar Blues Brewery. We loved that place and it was everything we expected. So after a late lunch and a couple beers, we hit the road again for Fort Collins. We knew nothing about Fort Collins, but after driving around for a couple of minutes, we quickly found our bearing and got a nice room at the Armstrong Hotel. I would have loved to spend more time in this small city, but due to our impending departure from Denver the following day, we wanted to get down to Denver and have a little fun there before flying out. One of the reasons we wanted to go to Fort Collins was to check out the New Belguim Brewery, as I have heard many good things about the way they run their business, especially from an environmental standpoint. But as it turned out, we planned our trip there on Monday, which was the day they were closed to the public. But we did get to check out CooperSmith's Brewery, Fort Collins Brewery (which we were pleasantly surprised by due to how small they are), and Odells Brewing. But alas, we couldn't linger because Denver was calling.

Denver was a little stressful to arrive in after spending the last few days in smaller cities and on the open roads, but after only a little bit of confusion, we found ourselves at the the Jet Hotel downtown. It was nicer than we were looking for, but with night closing in we were getting frustrated and as it turns out the rate was better than expected and the location was great.

We made it out to dinner that night, and also to the Falling Rock Tap House. The following day we finished up our beer tour by hitting Great Divide and then Old Chicago for a late lunch before heading to the airport for our flight home. All in all it was a wonderful trip. It sounds like we drank too much, but we were mostly sampling, which is how we were able to fit so much in. And as for Colorado, I really liked how easy it was to move around between the cities and see so much in such a short time frame.

Click here to see more photos

Labels: colorado, time off, travel, vacation

A few hours south of the US/Mexico borderThe place we were to be going in Mexico was called Punto San Jacinto,and it's located on the Pacific coast, and if I recall it is somewhere around 150 miles south of the US/Mexico border, definitely a good several hour drive. Getting there is pretty easy, you just head south towards Tijuana, cross the border, and head to the toll road going south. Once you get out of Tijuana it's a straight shot on the winding highway. There was only one checkpoint, and the fact that my girlfriend is pretty fluent with Spanish made it easy.

At the time we took this trip, the Tijuana area was getting a pretty bad rap in the news because of murders and kidnappings, but we had no problems. We left after dark with the goal being a straight drive with no traffic. Everything went smoothly, all you really have to watch out for is the truckers who wind up and down the narrow highway, and the sharp turns. Not knowing where our destination actually was, we followed our friends and after a few turns from the main road, we were there. The property we were going to had no house, and it was quite desolate, with nothing around for miles with the exception of about 20 or thirty other lots, some of which had proper homes, some which just had campers or trailers. On our friends' lot they had constructed a shack with a water tank on top which was used as a makeshift bathroom, and a nice little windbreak made of corrugated tin which was quite good at doing its job, which of course is to block the wind and provide a bit of shelter The area is right on a point, and even as the temperatures inland are warming, the breeze off the Pacific down there is quite cool. We quickly set up the tent, did a couple obligatory shots of tequila, had a few beers, then went to sleep.

Read the rest and see photos here

Labels: adventure, mexico, photos, time off, travel

It's almost time for the long weekend, so I'll keep this post short and sweet. I've written this ahead of time but will schedule it to go out before everyone heads out for the their three day mini vacation.

I just want to wish everyone a safe and happy 4th of July weekend. Most likely I'll try to keep myself away from the computer, so we'll see how that goes. Or maybe I'll just spend some time getting ahead on some good posts for next week. In either case, keep an eye out. Also, in case you haven't noticed, I've been trying to be better about posting more regularly too, but no more than one or two posts per day, if that.

I'll be sticking around, staying in San Diego, but heading down to Ocean Beach for a party on Saturday afternoon.

Anyone have any big plans? Or are you staying home and doing the traditional bbq and party thing?

Labels: time off, United States, updates

I had seen this article about a 4 day workweek a while back and had intended to post about it then. I never got to it, so anyway here are my thoughts on it.

Personally I love the idea. From the point of view of someone who has worked in the tech corporate world for years, I think there is so much wasted time that could be avoided and minimized by a more flexible working schedule. The nature of tech jobs is such that sometimes you are on a roll and will work a longer day, sometimes not. Years ago at my old job there were days that I would literally go ask for work and was told to just "relax" for a bit, that nothing was coming up at the moment. To me this is absurd. In this situation why do I need to be in the office doing nothing? Well because from a "professional" point of view it would look bad to send me home because there was nothing to do.

I feel strongly that most office jobs are more about keeping up appearances than ensuring actual productivity. It is more important to keep people on the clock 9 to 5, five days a week (or longer) than it is to actually get things done. Now to get back to what I was mentioning earlier about the tech industry. The reality (at least for me) is that there are some days that I might hit a good stopping point with my work midday, and the rest of the day is sort of spent toiling between projects. And of course there are other days that come 5 or 6 I am in the middle of deep thought and being productive. I feel that allowing employees to be flexible could harness these work patterns and make for more productivity overall.

And when it comes to the 4 day workweek, I believe this flexibility could work very well with that. Time off and the need to recharge on weekends is another under estimated thing in the corporate world and especially by most management. For me it really increases productivity to have more time off. I know it sounds counter intuitive, but when you know you will have more personal time and less office time, you can better schedule the time that you do plan for work, and in those few, more flexible hours actually get more things done

Labels: 9to5, productivity, time off, work