Here are the happy parents!

Nice work Erin!

(with Mr. Sykes, the drama coach)

Then on Thursday, Erin walked for her promotion ceremony:

There was pretty music:

which caused a lot of hugging:

and smiles:

and posing:

D

Mark, the man with the meat:

Leah “I hardly KNOW her”:

Jason Hoos:

Mark demonstrates his child care technique:

Chirs Tromboski (I knew I’d spell it wrong, so why not be absurd?):

Dorothy Moe, wasted:

Elizabeth Badrov, hitting on me, as usual:

Super cutie Kate Badrov with Kera in the background:

Some guy:

Liz and Heather do what they do every day, plan to take over the world:

More pictures here:

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One of my best buds is Greg, my brother in law. We sneak off and play Trivia, drink beer, and eat chicken wings. Usually before or after 2 or 3 movies. Sweet…

A highlight of a visit to Elaine’s sister Beth is when they start drinking and get caught in a darkly descending spiral of hysterical laughing. It usually ends in someone peeing. This was a bonus year because their other sister, Jean, made the trip up to Chicago. This adds an unstoppable critical mass to the spiral. Enjoy:

Beth has lost it. Now it’s Elaine’s turn:

Jean tips over:

Finally, Beth’s head asplodes:

They hate me now, but someday they will appreciate that I had my camera shipped 2000 miles to capture this. Like I care…

I got some more time to play with my Lensbaby and got some nice shots. Here’s Rebecca:

And Rachael:

Jean’s daughter Candice (not Kelly. Don’t ask.):

Jean’s son Ryan:

A bunch of cousins:

More attitude than I can handle:

Just to be fair:

We had a great time in yet another palatial basement. I wish we could have basements out in California. The lack of humidity, bugs, and lots of heat help… a little.

More pictures:

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Elaine and I lived in Shampoo-Banana for nearly 15 years, first as undergrads, then as professionals. I worked at UIUC the whole time, while Elaine went from printing to computer support to airline pilot. The kids were born there, and Nathan still keeps in touch with his daycare buddies. Here are Sam, Nathan, and Hannah:

And their mom, Ellen on the right:

Erin, in the middle, had about hit her limit of being gracious about meeting people she didn’t know as you can see by her thrilled expression. Declan vs a 13 year old girl. Guess who will win…

We had lunch at Papa Del’s with Leslie (I failed to get a picture, we were talking so much), Daver, and b.:

I had a couple deep dish slices because they were fast, but Elaine held out for her favorite:

Papa Del’s thin crust piled with all kinds of good stuff. Fun fact: She LOST half a pound on this trip, whereas I had to buy a whole row of seats to get home. Grumble…

I went walking around campus and surprised Lynnell Lacy:

and shot some buildings. With my camera… Here’s where we got married:

St. Johns church.

This is the main Library:

Geek that I am, I couldn’t resist meeting up with new UIUC buddies Matt Cordial and Tim Donahue from the UIUC libraries. No picture tho, it was too friggin hot!

Here’s the Undergrad Library, which was build underground so as not to cast a shadow over the Morrow Plots, the first something or other AG something.

Obligatory Quad, Alma Mater, and Altgeld Hall shots:

Ok, that’s done. So now we can go drinking and play Bingo with the Wolfs – Megan, Greg (the kids), Penny, and Bob (the old ones):

Yep, that’s Greg in a Marilyn Monroe wig, singing “Happy Birthday” to someone. We were at a bar in downtown Champaign called Boltinis. The owner is a buddy of Greg’s and was having trouble getting much business on a Tuesday night. He asked Greg if he had any ideas, and Bingo night was born. Greg’s a performer (“ham”) and plays lounge lizard “Marv” perfectly.

We had a great time and won a lot of shots.

Which we fed to Elaine. Erin was NOT amused:

Every Wednesday, since I was a pup, there is a crew that meets for BREW (Beer Refreshment Every Wednesday) at Joe’s Brewery (used to meet at Coslows – I’m that old…) in Champaign. Luckily, our trip spanned a Weds, so I dropped in and saw some old friends. Here’s Warner:

And Charley:

And Debbie with kid!

I also ran into an old business partner, Mike Smeltzer:

Elaine’s friend Kim came out to join us:

Megan and Brian were there too. Not sure if they were meeting us, or if they are just at every bar all the time…

We then had to eat, so we hit Monical’s (Jerry, eat yer heart out!):

Then capped the night off with a Black and White from Jarlings:

On the way out of town on Thursday, I had lunch with my old friend Robin:

More pictures:

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There was a reception at a restaurant in Bloomington, and here’s where I saw some brothers and sisters I hadn’t seen since 2001.

Here’s Nuala – we’d actually seen her in Belleville, but I didn’t have my real camera yet, just the iPhone’s camera:

Brendan’s sporting the Hell’s Angels look now:

Diardra and Doug were there too:

Some of these pictures are from after mass the next day.

Kevin had also driven up with Brendan:

I was having a little fun with my Lensbaby. His hair doesn’t really look like that.

The “OOO,” Una was also there:

The only sibling missing was Aidan. He and Renia had just given birth to a new boy, so they couldn’t travel. Welcome Jacek Michael Fleming!!!

Here are the bunch of us, with Rich and Judy on the ends:

The Hardys are always gracious hosts and put us up in their palatial basement for 2 days:

Tim Flynn, a buddy from UIUC, joined us at Avantis (mmm, Avanti’s bread…):

And I got to see my grade/high school buddy Jim Taylor:

I hadn’t seen him in 20 years! After lunch, we got to go see his mom, Phyllis. She was one of my mom’s best friends:

Here’s the public housing I grew up in:

Imagine 9 people living in half of that building. Fun times…

This is getting long, so tons more pictures from Bloomington here:

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Ok, to be honest, we flew in to St. Louis and my first stop was White Castle:

MMMM!!! 4 Doubles with Cheese!

Ok, on to family. My brother Kevin, and his son Kevin, live in Belleville, the next town over. Randy and Nuala were also in town, so we all hooked up at Denny’s for lunch. Here’s little Kevin:

Here are the little and big Kevins wishing us a fond farewell, later:

I met Randy, Nuala (my youngest sister’s husband):

We mostly hung out at Elaine’s mom’s (Donna) house with Elaine’s brother Matt and his kids:

Here are all the decent pictures from that leg of the trip. I’ve got a bunch more, but I thought I’d show some restraint for once:

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I tried to blog on the fly using the new iPhone, and got some pictures and a little text posted using the Wordpress for iPhone app. It did a good job. I’m still not used to the iPhone keyboard (this is short hand for “it sucks”), so I didn’t include much text. I think people like to look at pictures more any way!

The trip started in a very exciting manner. As I’ve blogged earlier, the Stupid Dog has a skunk fetish. After the second run in and subsequent spraying, we hired a skunk trapper. The traps were set up in the backyard for about a week with no real action, so we kind of ignored them. Robert, our house sitter and driver, came over on Weds to take us to the airport. He took Stupid Dog out to the backyard to let him take a pee before we left, and guess what?!? There was a skunk in a trap that we didn’t notice. Stupid Dog noticed…

The trapper had wrapped the traps in garbage bags to contain any spraying, so Stupid Dog ripped through that and got sprayed full in the face. At this point, we’re thinking about finding his embedded chip, cutting it out, and setting him free. Ok, maybe that was just me. Elaine quickly changes clothes and does the dance – peroxide (oh, we’re out – Nathan RUN to the store), vinegar, baking soda (where IS it now?!?) – finally getting the dog into some state of smell that we can lock him up in the house and Robert can still breath over the smell.

This whole time we’re watching the clock because we have a flight to St. Louis at 12:05…

We made the flight, but in the rush to get out the door, I forgot my camera, and we forgot car and house keys – things that we’ll need to actually get back to the house after the trip. Nothing like a little extra stress added to a long trip…

Long story short, Robert shipped my camera with a ton of insurance, and later shipped keys once we got those logistics figured out. Robert kicks ass.

There are already a lot of highlight photos below. I’ll put in a view of all the pictures here, then some specific collections.

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Our newest arrival is an iPhone 3g that I got for work. It is even cooler than the Touch because it has a camera. I’ll have a lot of lower quality photos now, but it’s super convenient.

A couple complaints about the phone, that I’m sure I’ll get the whine about on the MacVeritas podcast soon:

Battery life – with 3g, wifi, and heavy use, don’t expect this thing to last more than 5 hours.

Charging change – this just kills me. The device won’t charge in my car now. Lots of discussion on the forums that Apple decided to drop the pins where most car systems charge the phone. I’m hoping there can be a firmware fix. If not, maybe my car device has a switch, or I can build a little wire switching dongle. Either way, shame on Apple for messing with this with no real warning.

Exchange email set up was a snap – but I think I’m missing some emails… It’s being a little flaky with the ActiveSync. More experience with the device is needed.

Calendar confusion – some recurring events that have canceled exceptions are showing up as valid meetings. I know this is complicated programming from the WirelessKnowledge days. Apple needs to get ahead of this or people will lose confidence in their data.

Apps crash a lot – and have to be reinstalled. AIM, Twinkle, and others just try to start, then go back to the home dock. I’ll even get an occasional reboot.

Other than that, the device is nice! It’s sleek, so it slips in and out of pockets nicely. So far it is way more resistant to scratches than my 60G iPod.

Now that I have the phone, I don’t know if I need the Touch. The girl wants it, but I might sell it and the cool Surefire flashlights I won and buy a proper lens for the camera.

For the record, peroxide, baking soda, and vinegar take out about 80% of the stink. For the record, 20% skunk stink is still almost unbearable.

Stupid dog.

I stole Jenny’s “looking up” technique and got some pretty pictures:

Here’s a panorama of one of the flower fields with a mountain in the background. Click the image to see the full original image. Warning, it is very large!

Here are all of the pictures:

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The we joined some buddies and had some Dim Sum!

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Mom got up and made apple pancakes. Dad got out the camera.

They scraped the left rear side bumper, twisted the rear axle, and left a large part of their car behind on the road. They left skirting, tire guards, and some type of blower from the engine in addition to lots of plastic and glass on the road just behind and ahead of the Honda. There was no one in or near the Honda at the time of the accident, so, thankfully, there were no injuries to anyone we are aware of.

A white Mazda hatchback was seen in the immediate area soon after the hit and run was discovered. The Mazda was weaving across lanes and dividers along Carmel Mtn. Road, and passed the group looking at the Honda’s damage on Sparren, narrowly missing the bystanders. That group heard the flap of a flat tire as it passed. No license plate was taken, but a good samaritan had been following the car at a distance when he noticed the driver’s erratic behavior and stopped to give the make and model information to police in case that was the car that had caused the damage to the Honda.

Even if this Mazda did not cause the damage to our Honda, the driver was obviously impaired and needs to be questioned.

PLEASE call the San Diego Police Department’s non emergency number, 858-484-3154, if you have any information about a white Mazda hatchback (or any car) with fresh damage and missing parts on the front passenger side, or information about the hit and run on Saturday night. Please also feel free to distribute this to anyone else who may have information.

Thank you!!!!

Elaine, Declan, and Nathan Fleming

Click here for more pictures of the car.

We started with a Lentil Soup, which was tasty.  Next came a dish of appetizers, including hummus, babaghanooj, cashk bedamjoon, musto khiyar, filafel, and dolma (Man, the spell checker HATES those words!).  These were all fantastic, especially the babaghanooj.  I really don’t like eggplant, so I wasn’t expecting to like it.  It was smoky, garlicky, and full of subtle flavors.  The dollop of olive oil on top didn’t hurt either.  The other spreads were great, as was the yogurt based dip in the middle.  The dolmas and filafels were nothing to blog about (did you catch that subtle modernization of “to write home about?”  Clever, eh?), but the high quality of the rest of the plate does more than forgive that.

The main dish was a selection of Shrimp Kabob, Chicken Kabob, and Beef/Lamb Shawerma.  Again, we loved all of them.  The shrimp was a little salty for Elaine, but I liked the way the flavor permeated the whole shrimp.  And anything that slows Elaine down around shrimp is a blessing.  I think I got 2.  That’s a record.  Yep, she likes shrimp.

The chicken was soft, moist and had a great lemony flavor.  The beef/lamb (I bet that’s a funny looking animal) was very nice.  I’m a big lamb fan, and I asked if they had just a lamb version, but no.  Anyway, it was still good and had a nice lamby flavor.

On the plate was a lump of white stuff.  We asked what it was – whipped garlic with lemon and olive oil.  Really neat mix of flavors and texture.  It went well with a fork full of their nice basmati rice.

We finished the meal with a nice baklava.  Not too sweet and garnished with pistachios.

I love it when I find a new place with good food, especially unique dishes.  I really recommend the place and hope it gets enough traffic to keep it around.

Their web site sucks, but shows the address:

13185-3 Black Mountain Road
San Diego, CA  92129

This is the Vons shopping center in Rancho Penasquitos.

Anyway, somewhere near the beginning of December, I normally log on to Amazon, check the wife’s wish list, add a few things, and, bada bing, I’m done. All I need to do is collect boxes as they come in and decide which things I’ll give the wife for her birthday and which I’ll save for Christmas. There’s a whole other story about brow beating Erin (the daughter) into doing the wrapping for me, but I’ll save that, or get her to blog it.

So, I fire off my order on December 3rd, and within a week three big boxes show up addresses to me from Amazon. Now, we’re a Midwest family who transplaned to San Diego. At this time of year, there are boxes coming in every day. Since I outsource the mundane business of mail to the wife, I just had the boxes piled up under my desk, planning to select her birthday booty the evening before the 16th. The wife is a crossword freak and had added:

“Excalibur The NY Times Deluxe Touch Screen Crossword Puzzle”
Excalibur Electronics; Video Game

to her Wish List. I ordered that, and, since I wanted to look like I put SOME effort into the process, I added:

“Wordplay”
Chris Astoyan; DVD

a (very entertaining! who knew?!?) movie about crossword freaks. I imagined her delight upon opening TWO birthday presents, ONE of them a non-Wish List SURPRISE, and ANOTHER that’s also on-theme! (And not just a Starbucks card. “Here, you LIKE coffee. Right?”)

So, the evening of the 15th comes and I go hide in my office and pop open the three big boxes, in search of the two crossword related items. Three boxes. Three items. WHAT? There were eleven items in total that I’d ordered for the two occasions. Oh man, I’m screwed… Thankfully, the crossword video game was one of the three, but my masterwork, the accompanying DVD, was not here. In fact, the only items that had shown up were the ones Amazon offered through third parties. All of the other stuff, DVDs and books, Amazon stock and trade, were missing. I quickly looked through my email for the Amazon Order confirmation and was stunned to finally notice this:

Shipping estimate for these items: January 5, 2007 – January 19, 2007
Delivery estimate: January 9, 2007 – January 24, 2007

[LIST OF ALL THE STUFF THAT WAS MISSING]

I was wrestling with a lot of emotions at this point. Shock over not seeing what I expected. Disappointment that I wouldn’t be able to give what I thought I would. (“Look, movie!” “Good boy!”) Shame over screwing up my ONE real gift buying event window of the year. Stupidity for not checking the boxes sooner or actually reading the Amazon mail. Then finally anger that I’d even have to consider that Amazon would take this long.

How was I going to deal with all this? Well, it’s the 2000s and I’m a Networking Professional, so I did what most of us do in this case. I wrote an email. Well, actually I filled out a form on Amazon’s site, but it’s pretty much the same thing:

Subject: Other Assistance
—————
12/16/06 08:16:00
Your Name:Declan Fleming

Comments:

Hi – I did all my shopping on December 3rd, using Amazon.com order number: XXX-XXXXXXX-XXXXXXX

More than half of my stuff won’t arrive until after Christmas!!! Is this a feature of Super Saver Shipping? I get everything done by the beginning of December, and Amazon – the ICON of effeciency – can’t ship for over a month on the items that are listed as stocked by you?!? I have received the 3 items from other vendors that I bought through you, it is just the stuff you stock that is being delayed.

I did not notice the ridiculous ship date until today when I thought to look. Who would think that Amazon would take so long? AND, there’s no way I can see to expedite my order. You’ve got me over a barrel with the timing of the shipment, and I can’t even dig my way out.

Wow, I’m so unhappy! Look how long I’ve been an Amazon customer. I’d NEVER dream that shipping books and DVDs ordered on December 3rd would take a month from you.

How are we going to fix this and save Christmas?
Declan Fleming
—————

SNAP! That’ll show them! Can you see my Customer Service background come out as I tear Amazon a new one? Through a feedback form. I bet this will be escalated all the way to Bezos! “A customer didn’t read his order confirmation mail and now he’s pissed! Let’s get ON this!” Man, I’m screwed.

The next morning the daughter and I get up early and head out to get the wife some flowers and coffee. In line at the Starbucks, the daughter hits me up for a $25 gift card so she has a present for her mom. (Where did she learn to put things off like this?!?) “She LIKES coffee. Right?”

We get home and give the wife her stuff and I brace her for a Christmas of printouts of gift orders rather than actual gifts. But it will make a very festive January, right? I hang my head in shame…

But wait! What’s this? Email from Amazon:

Thank you for writing to us at Amazon.com.

I’ve checked your order and can confirm that we are currently
preparing it for shipment.

It appears that we will be able to ship your package earlier than
the date estimated on our web site, and we expect your order will
arrive within 5-7 business days of the ship date.

We will send you an e-mail at the time of shipment.

You can also check the status of your order, including estimated
dates of shipment and delivery, by clicking the Your Account link at
the top of most pages of our store or by following this link:

http://www.amazon.com/your-account

Thank you for shopping at Amazon.com. We hope you enjoy your order.

Please let us know if this e-mail resolved your question:

If yes, click here:
If not, click here:

Please note: this e-mail was sent from an address that cannot accept
incoming e-mail.

To contact us about an unrelated issue, please visit the Help
section of our web site.

Best regards,

Ramji L.
Amazon.com Customer Service
Thank you for writing to us at Amazon.com.

—————-

This doesn’t exactly answer my questions, and it smells like an auto-responder, but there’s some positive language in there. “earlier than the date estimated on our web site” Hmm, vague… I want some more details. I hit their Help section and find a link that sets up a phone call. Let’s see if I get anywhere talking to them. I type in my phone number, click the button, and my phone rings immediately. (Remind me to write a rant about a house that has 7 wireless phone but not one in its base…)

“Hi, this is Juan from Amazon, how can I help?”

“Hi Juan, how are we gonna save Christmas?”

Juan was very good. He reviewed my account and agreed that the long ship date didn’t seem right. He said he’d dig into this and get back to me the next day:

From: Amazon
We are very sorry for the delay in completing your order. I have
reviewed your account and can see that this experience has been far
less than positive.

We strive for convenience and efficiency at Amazon.com, but in this
instance we have fallen short of our goal. I’m truly sorry that your
impression of doing business with Amazon.com has been so negative.

Unfortunately, your order is still being delayed and we are currently
unable to ship your order. We are doing everything possible to correct
this problem. However, we have no new information at this time
regarding the status of your order. You will be notified as soon as
there is an update.

As this was not what you expected when you placed your order, we would
understand if you’d prefer to cancel it. You may cancel unshipped
items through the “Your Account” link at the top of our home page by
clicking the link that says “Cancel items or orders.” After signing
in with your e-mail address and password, you will be able to view
your order history and cancel your order for any item that has not yet
entered the shipping process.

Otherwise, when your order is shipped, we will send you an e-mail to
confirm the shipment.

Again, I would like to apologize for the inconvenience you have
experienced and express our gratitude for the patience you’ve
displayed thus far. I am going to apply a promotional gift certificate
for the amount of shipping which is $16.16.

Please be assured that this is not a typical Amazon experience and
in no way did we intend for this to happen. I hope that you will give
us another opportunity to prove the quality of our service to you.

Thank you for shopping at Amazon.com.

Please let us know if this e-mail resolved your question:

If yes, click here:
If not, click here:

Please note: this e-mail was sent from an address that cannot accept
incoming e-mail.

To contact us about an unrelated issue, please visit the Help section
of our web site.

Best regards,

Juan
Amazon.com Customer Service
———————-

Well, hmm… The letter STARTS nice. “We suck, we’re sorry.” That goes a long way towards making me feel good about Amazon. But their remedy is not satisfactory. Just cancel, take our $16, and the problem goes away… Well, no, I’ve got eight items for Christmas that I need, and I am NOT going to start my Christmas shopping on 12/18.

I did NOT want to cancel this order, and in fact, the Cancel option was not available because it was in the process of shipping. I decide to get a little pissy and open a small can of whoopass on the web form:

Date: Tue Dec 19 07:12:44 UTC 2006
Subject: Feedback to Amazon.com
To: “int-form-feedback__34erdf@amazon.com” int-form-feedback__34erdf@amazon.com
From: declan@declan.net

CUSTOMER: Declan Fleming
COMMENTS: I appreciate the note, but it in no way addresses the problem of getting me my stuff before Xmas.

“Unfortunately, your order is still being delayed and we are currently
unable to ship your order. We are doing everything possible to correct this problem. However, we have no new information at this time regarding the status of your order. You will be notified as soon as there is an update.”

This tells me nothing other than you don’t know what’s going on. Please figure out what is going on and ship my order now. I’ve already missed my wife’s birthday (12/16). Please don’t mess up Xmas too.

Declan
———————–

So there! I ALMOST left off “Please.” I’m a hardass. I wasn’t sure what would happen, but I tried to push all the Customer Service buttons I could think of to force a response. Here’s what I got:

Thank you for writing to us at Amazon.com.

First, please allow me to apologize for the inconvenience you have
faced. It is certainly not our intention to cause you any
frustration, and I am sorry that this has been the case.

We are very sorry for the delay in completing your order. I have
reviewed your account and found that your order item has entered the
shipping process on December 13, 2006 but not yet shipped till now
and can see that this experience has been far less than positive.

We strive for convenience and efficiency at Amazon.com, but in this
instance we have fallen short of our goal, and I am truly sorry.

Unfortunately, I can’t cancel your order items, because it’s already
in the shipping process.

In looking into this situation further, I see that the shipment of
your order is still being delayed by a system error. This same
error prevents us from being able to cancel the order.

We have been in contact with our technical specialists, and they are
currently doing everything in their power to correct this problem
and ship your order as soon as possible.

However, we have no new information at this time regarding the
status of your order; you will be notified as soon as there is an
update.

Due to the circumstances surrounding your order, I have made a one-
time exception to our standard policy.

You may place a new order for the same items with Two-Day shipping
and the write back to us using this link so that we will waive the
shipping cost :

http://www.amazon.com/gp/help/contact-us/general-questions.html

Please copy and paste the URL into your web browser to reach the
specific page.

You may refuse this shipment when it arrives from this order.
Refusing the shipment allows you to return it without having to pay
for return shipping. If the package is delivered by mail and you
are not present when it is delivered, you may write “Refused–return
to sender” on the box and leave it for your postal carrier to pick
up.

When we receive this refused and returned order, our return center
would create full refund for the shipment.

Again, I would like to apologize for the inconvenience you have
experienced and express our gratitude for the patience you’ve
displayed thus far.

Please be assured that this is not a typical Amazon.com experience
and in no way did we intend for this to happen. I hope that you
will give us another opportunity to prove the quality of our service
to you.

Thank you for shopping at Amazon.com.

Please let us know if this e-mail resolved your question:

If yes, click here:
If not, click here:

Please note: this e-mail was sent from an address that cannot accept
incoming e-mail.

To contact us about an unrelated issue, please visit the Help
section of our web site.

Best regards,

Vijay .E
Amazon.com Customer Service

http://www.amazon.com

—————

Wow! Let’s analyze this…

1) Sorry for sucking.

2) Sorry again for the suckiness.

3) “Unfortunately, I can’t cancel your order items, because it’s already in the shipping process.” Um, yeah, you figured that out too, eh?

4) “In looking into this situation further, I see that the shipment of your order is still being delayed by a system error.” Translation: “Our IT has screwed you.” I run an IT group and I felt SUCH sympathy for this poor Customer Service guy at this point. I can’t tell you how many time I’ve had to tell my customers that we have a “system error.” Tough crap, I still want my stuff. (HEY! NO using this against me, customers! ) I swear to God, if there wasn’t so much context to this statement, I’d make it into a T shirt. System error… ha! Sorry, where was I?

5) “This same error prevents us from being able to cancel the order.” Translation: “Our IT group has screwed US.”

6) “We have been in contact with our technical specialists, and they are
currently doing everything in their power to correct this problem and ship your order as soon as possible. However, we have no new information at this time regarding the status of your order; you will be notified as soon as there is an update.” Translation: “IT are all in a meeting. And not answering their cell phones. Damn IT.”

7) “Due to the circumstances surrounding your order, I have made a one-time exception to our standard policy.” Translation: “Your whining is messing up our call completion stats.”

WHAT??? Let me get this straight… Yer telling me to ignore everything so far, REORDER all my stuff with refundable (thanks.) 2 day shipping, thereby doubling the charges on my credit card, then refusing reception on the original order when it actually arrives, sometime around Easter? Let me check with my Shipping Department… The wife says to go pound sand. Oooo! Now you made HER mad! You wouldn’t like her when she’s mad…

9) Again, we suck, we sorry. Thanks for being a buddy.

10) Oh yeah, we usually don’t suck. Can we borrow your van? We promise not to run it off a bridge.

I spend the rest of the day reeling and composing a blog post in my mind. I don’t actually WRITE the post because I believe in the magic of Christmas and that the stuff will actually show up. And I thought it would be way too long to put in a blog. I think I have proven that fact. Instead I tell all my friends and they laugh at me. Gotta love my friends.

Well, Santa showed all of my friends up. At 7pm of the same day I got the email above, this arrives:

Greetings from Amazon.com.

We thought you’d like to know that we shipped your items, and that this
completes your order.

[LIST OF ALL THE STUFF THAT WAS MISSING]
————–

Everything shows up a few days before Christmas, and there is much rejoicing.

So, what have we learned?

1) Amazon comes through, eventually.

2) Amazon has some pretty creative excuse writers.

3) Always blame IT. Damn IT. System error! It cracks me UP!

4) Always read order confirmation emails. Even from Amazon. A MONTH for DVDs and BOOKS? Who’da thunk it?

5) This is way too long a story to go into a blog.

6) The wife loves the crossword video game. I haven’t seen her since her birthday.

7) The daughter’s gonna kill me for telling everyone I bought the Starbucks card. Thankfully, she never reads my blog.

Gabe show his power move:

Looks like he’s boring Elaine to sleep…

TJ, between poses:

We even got a special appearance by Nathan!

Erin’s got a power move too:

Click here for more pictures.

Day 1

Day 2

Day 3


Here’s a link to Sue’s Hardy’s pictures.

Here’s a link to Matt Hardy’s pictures.

It was so nice seeing old faces and meeting new ones!

I’d like to get everyone’s pictures into one big collection online.  Please mail me at declan@declan.net and we’ll figure out the best way to get your stuff to me.  I can also make DVD or CD copies of the big originals for people if they’d like.

UPDATE

I’m slowly loading the full size, high quality images to Flickr.  Click here to see my sets of pictures.  Look for the ones with “HQ” in the title.  So, if you like one of the pictures and want to make a print for yourself, grab a high quality copy.

Ok, downloading a picture can be a bit convoluted, but it works.

For example, go to http://www.flickr.com/photos/bigdpix/sets/72157594150754780/ and click
on a picture.  At the top of the picture are some icons, pick the “All Sizes” one.  Then select “Original”.  This will show the biggest image.  There will be a link called “Download the Original size.”  Click that and you can save the image to your disk.

UPDATE to the UPDATE

Sue has pointed out a flaw in my directions!

None of the icons show up on top of the pictures, unless you have a Yahoo account (Yahoo owns Flickr).  I was automatically logged in, so it just worked for me.

So, if you want the instructions above to work so you can download the files, Sign up for a free account from the link on the picture page.  Sorry, it’s a bit of a pain to do this, but it then lets you get to more functions.

Check this out:

http://www.declan.net/wp-content/gpx_loader.html

This uses Google maps with an overlay of the route we took. The data comes from a rider’s GPS device, so it is very accurate.

All of the roads we took are marked and you can zoom and pan over the whole ride. Click on Satellite view or Hybrid to get a neat view of some of the terrain.

Here’s how today started:

And it went on like that for 15 miles, with a killer headwind, for 4 hours. Headwinds are just nasty. They kept our forward pace to 3-5 miles per hour and just wore us out. We kept hearing that the turn on to Route 78 would put the wind more at our backs, so that kept us going.

I don’t have many pictures from this leg of the race as I was too miserable to take any, my battery on the little camera had died, and Elaine was out wandering the desert taking pictures of flora and fauna:

That’s another ocotillo in bloom. Here’s a teddy bear cactus:

Here’s our team of riders on that day:

Erin’s apparently flashing some sort of gang sign. Make a note to look into elementary school gang activity… Hailley’s dad, Damon, joined us this day and we all stuck together for most of the rest of the ride. Here we cross the San Diego County Line:

Erin and I stop to soak up the view of the nuclear devestation the Carrizo Badlands:

By the time we got to lunch, Erin was still in good spirits:

And I was about done:

But there’s nothing like a dry, white sandwich to perk me back up:

I LOVE what that helmet does to my hair. I’d wear it everyday if it would fit into the headroom of the car.

Our next destination was Agua Caliente, which is Spanish for “Crowded Pool”:

We’d taken so long getting across the desert that the pool was just about to close when we arrived. Erin said, “Oh yeah, this is just about the best 5 minutes of my life.” I think she was being sarcastic, but she’s very subtle, like her dad, so it was hard to tell…

Then it was back on the bikes for a few more miles to Vallecito:

Which apparently has a stagecoach house museum thing, which Elaine thought to take pictures of and which I didn’t even notice because I was so tired I wanted to die:

Elaine got a neat shot of the sunset and an ocotillo:

I’m sure someone has a picture of Plaster City. This is my main memory of that day, riding in the blistering heat (95-100F) and avoiding the huge drywall trucks coming and going to the factory there.

For more pictures from Day 4, click here.

Video – http://video.fox6.com/launcher/160364

The Imperial Valley is flat and lush, lined with irrigation ditches. Most of the fields we passed by were for making hay:

Here is a chase team who cheered us on for the whole ride. They had the greatest energy!

We got to El Centro pretty quickly, and I got some pictures of its beauty:

Ok, there’s not much in El Centro… But, they do have a pool! Our Pit Boss, Gary, is a Navy Seal or something, and he broke us onto the El Centro Navy Air Facility to use the pool. It was tough cutting the barbed wire and drugging the dogs, and I’m sure the guards we subdued will all be just fine. Thankfully, once you penetrate the perimeter of the base, they let you take pictures:

This plane has its engine removed, or I would have taken it for a spin.

Here are Hailey, Divia, and Erin:

Erin has fun in the pool, and Divia gives me the stinkeye for yelling at her all the time:

CANNONBALL!

These poor people didn’t know what hit them. It was like Caddy Day at the pool in “Caddyshack.” Minus the Baby Ruth.

Here’s where the parents hung out, under the awning, or in the hot tub in the back of the picture. I spent some time there myself. When I told Erin that I met one of her friends’ Dads in the hot tub, her reply was, “That’s awkward. You met some guy in a hot tub.” If you know me at all, I never let anything go, so “awkward” was the watchword for the rest of the trip. Erin’s still not talking to me…

After a few hours at the pool, we had about 5 miles of easy riding to the next school to camp. Or to park my bike then get a ride to the El Centro Ramada. I believe I’ve made my feelings about camping known….

We did hang around the school for quite a while, because they have a merry-go-round. I remember we had these torture implementations on the play ground when I was a kid, but they have been banned for a long time. I guess country kids are just tougher, or more expendable. I went to take a picture of Erin on the ride, and she said, “I can’t look up or I’ll barf!!!” Good times!

We had dinner, settled the bikes in with the Blackmans, then walked to the campfire. As I passed through the dining area, I sniffed the distinctive odor of clay chips, and, sure enough, there was a Texas Holdem poker game about to start. I firmly lectured the group of men about to play about the immorality of cards, then noticed they had a spot open. While Elaine and Erin went to the campfire, I almost went bust, then fought back to about double my original chip stack. Elaine walked back from the campfire and said she’d wait in the car, so I kept going All In to bust out and get to a real bed at the Ramada. Sadly, I kept winning, so eventually I gave my chips to a guy who had already been busted out. It was almost the perfect poker game. I didn’t lose, and all night I had the hope that I won! I didn’t. John went all in on a straight, and lost to a flush. At least that’s the story I got from all the guys the next day…

Click here for more pictures from Day 3.

Here are the data files so you can play with them yourselves:

KMZ File – works with Google Earth
GPX File – GPS eXchange Format
GDB File – the base Garmin DataBase that came from the device

Day 1 – River to Gold Rock Ranch:

Day 2 – Gold Rock Ranch, across the Dunes, to Pine School:

Day 3 – Pine School to the El Centro pool, to Westside School:

Day 4 – Westside School, through Plaster City, to Vallecito Camp Ground:

Day 5 – Vallecito, up Banner Grade, to Julian and Spencer Valley School:

Day 6 – Spencer Valley School, through Black Canyon, to San Pasqual School:

Day 7 – San Pasqual, to yummy breakfast, to the coast!

Here is a link to all of my pictures on Flickr. 

ONE of us had a good night’s sleep:

Nathan got to sleep in the van, which was less susceptible to violent winds.

There was one working bathroom in the offices, so I thought I’d be clever and get up before Gary, the Pitt Boss, had revelry go off at 6am. Sadly, everyone else had this idea, so there was a line anyway. We all stumbled around, found bushes to water, then got in line for breakfast.

Here are the dead bathrooms, on the left:

The ocotillo is in full bloom, so I got a picture of one by our tent. My mother in law assumes all flower pictures I take are for her since she’s way into flowers and plants, and I’m happy letting her think that

Food was prepared for us at every stop. Breakfast was usually eggs and some bread substance.

This is Hailey, one of Erin’s classmates. Her Dad had to work until Thursday, so she hung out with me and Erin on the roads.

We were told over and over again that the kids were not to be riding alone, and it really mattered. The 153 riders could be spaced out over 10+ miles of distance, so a kid could possibly wander off the road and get lost. There were chase vehicles every 2 miles or so, offering water and great moral support. They did a pretty good job of grabbing orphaned children and hooking them up with adults. I do admit that one of the hardest parts of the ride for me was slowing my pace to stay with my daughter and her buddies, but I got it into my head that this was a ride, not a race. Staying together, despite the pain it causes and extra time it took, was more important than getting ahead.

Elaine and Nathan had to run back to San Diego, so we didn’t get a lot of pictures on this day. I’m hoping to collect pictures from the other families to fill in the gaps. The ride itself was very difficult. We had strong headwinds the first 15 miles which took us 4 hours to cover. Once we got to the 78, we had more of a tail wind and covered a lot of distance. One of the most striking features of the ride was crossing the Dunes on 78. It’s a comic book version of a desert, with long mounds of tan sand drifting across the distance. We saw a snow plow used to keep the drifts back from the highway.

After 54.22 miles, Erin made it to Pine School.

Erin was just awesome! She got her pace and just moseyed herself across the desert. I was keeping an eye on some stragglers, so Erin would often get ahead of us. This was a little scary for me, but the chase drivers were great about making sure everyone was ok. Erin did a lot of training with me for this ride, so she knew how to be safe and maintain a pace. I am so proud of her!

I arrived shortly after with Divia, one of Erin’s buddies:

This was a really hard day. It turns out it wasn’t the hardest.

Click here for more pictures from Day 2.

As you can see, I’m well carbed up for the ride. If you are mean, you are making bosoms jokes about my picture right now. I know I would be. It was the light. Or maybe 40 years of Oreos. Thankfully, we were equipped with BMD (Bosom Masking Devices) to spare people looking at pictures on the web:

There was one celebrity there to see us off, Starsky from TV’s “Starsky & Hutch:”

Here’s the obligatory colorful-riders-all-in-a-row picture. I photoshopped in an attack helicopter and Starsk’s departure to make it more interesting:

Actually, the helicopter was real. I guess it’s pretty boring out in the desert, so if you have a helicopter it’s fun to buzz 150 bike riders (kids and adults).

And we’re OFF!

Actually, that’s not me and Erin. I’ve got some quality control issues with our photographer, but I’ll take it out of her bonus.

What followed was about 25 miles of this:

The first 2.5 miles were on soft sand. I was very happy to be on my wide tires and not the road bike. There are a few riders with road bikes, but they had done the ride before and knew to just carry the bike on this stretch. Even with the wide tires, we had to work hard to get through, and were glad to see pavement. One highlight of this section was pushing the leader of the chase vehicles, Gary (in the vest):

and his cool Tacoma out of the sand. You can tell when people didn’t grow up getting cars out of snowdrifts…

Our support team went on ahead and set up camp:

Three hours later, we came to the turn off for Gold Rock Ranch, our first stop. Of course, it’s a mile off the road, on another stretch of sand. Just the thing to get us hungry for the spaghetti dinner at the other end. In Illinois, someone would have put down a layer of oil and made a proper surface with the road, but the desert is run by hippies who wouldn’t think that was cool. Of course, these hippies all have dune buggies and dirt bikes, so I think they have a hidden agenda.

After dinner I grabbed a shower for a dollar – had to have quarters… Thanks to the support team I was set. Luckily I took one early, because someone flushed a towel down a toilet and the whole plumbing system went nuts and they had to shut down the bathrooms. That left 200 people with one bathroom in the main office building. Camping is fun!

Next, there was a campfire where we burned the slowest child on the ride and his spirit was released to the heavens:

Seemed a little harsh to me, but hey, it’s the desert, man. Things are tough out here.

I had fun with the campfire light:

Then we raved til dawn. It’s pretty much the same as Burning Man.

Click here for more pictures from Day 1.