Weekend Activities

* Biked 10.5 miles
* Great Adventure Princess event at Indian Hills

New Car

I ventured onto a new car lot for the first time in over 13 years to get me one of those fancy new horseless carriages.

More Personal MBA

I knocked out a few more PMBA books.

• The 4-Hour Workweek - the seminal book for the "New Rich". I bought this one and have been reading and re-reading it. Have even put some of it into action (more on this to come).


• The Bootstrapper's Bible - great tips for startups and you can't beat the price.


• Finance for Non-Financial Managers - pretty much what the title suggests. A litte too basic for me.


• Law 101 - a good intro to the American legal system, warts and tall. I skimmed the sections on tort and Constitutional law and concentrated on contracts and property. This would be a good reference to have on the shelf.


• Getting Started in Consulting - got this for my wife and didn't read it myself.

Roomba Cleaning Tips

One drawback to the Roomba is that you have to clean it much more than a regular vacuum. I usually have to a complete cleaning after doing the whole house. With practice, I can do this in less than 15 minutes (assuming I don't break anything). Here are some tips:

• The center wheel gets hair and other debris wrapped around its axle fairly easily. This makes the wheel harder to turn and greatly reduces battery life. I tried removing the wheel and seemed to have broken something inside wheel assembly so I don't recommend this approach (look for a repair entry soon). The best way I have found to clean it is with a good utility knife. Scrape the blade along the axle and up the wheel. This motion will get a lot of the debris out and you can use small needle-nose pliers to further extract it. With a few strokes, I can get the axle completely clean.


• The beater brush also gets hair wrapped around it. Simply remove the center screw and you can remove it for easy cleaning.


• iRobot offers a cleaning tool for $5.99. I bought it (along with some spare parts) but it doesn't really do much. The blade is good for cleaning the brush, but you can just use a letter opener or utility knife for that.

Memorial Day Weekend Activities

* Zoo - haven't been in a while. Noticed the new giraffe home and saw the construction for the new Elephant Mesa. The slow loris was a no-show.
* Finished the front yard patio
* Dinner with family and friends on Orange County
* Started the back yard rehab
* Did a nice 7.4 mile ride from my house to the 101 and back.

Weekend Activities

* Laid down the patio pavers.
* The pool was finally warm enough to go in.

Weekend Activities

* More work on garage and front yard.
* Mother's Day BBQ with one grandmother out sick and one wife with a jaw wired shut.

Isreali-Syrian Air Strike Update

It seems that the evidence is mounting that the target was indeed a nuclear facility.

Weekend Activities

* Indian Guides trip to Vail Lake
* Got sick at Vail Lake
* Spent Sunday in bed

Weekend Activities

* Dorado cocktail party (stayed verrry late)
* Sick on Sunday (not from party...I think)

Isreali-Syrian Air Strike Update

An update from my favorite amateur IMINT analysis blog.

Old News

All the national news outlets should impose a moratorium on the following topics:
* Gas prices going up - everyone knows what gas prices are doing
* Fire danger in Southern California - everyone knows that fires are a problem in a desert-like climate with lots of brush
* Anything about the economy - the government can't predict the economy, economists can't predict the economy, you can't predict the economy. That is part of the gig when you have a free-market system; sometimes it goes up, sometimes it goes down. If you want stable, move to Cuba where it never goes up.

On a different note, has there been an inordinate amount of deaths on the North County railroad tracks lately? The UT has yet another one.

Isreali-Syrian Air Strike Update

It seems that it was a nuke plant after all, according to some.

Personal MBA

On my journey to explore new directions with my career, I cam across a cool biz book site, The Personal MBA. The site author has a list of what he considers to be the best business books on various topics. Since none of us have the time to spend reading every book that comes along, this is great service; especially since other services that you find in airline catalogs can cost hundreds of dollars.
My M.O. is to get the book from the library (they carry some, but not all the books in the list) and then buy it if I really like it and will go back to it. I have read several of the books so far:

• 10 Days To Faster Reading - great for increasing your reading speed and comprehension; be sure to do the exercises for each chapter.


• The Effective Executive - good if you are looking to be working for big companies.


• How To Win Friends and Influence People - common sense tips that few seem to follow.


• The Art of the Start - good, but thin.


• Crucial Conversations - ok, didn't get much out of it.

Weekend Activities

* Jyoti's jaw surgery.
* Kid's at the grandparents: ate ice cream, watched E.T., went to Disney's California Adventure.

Al Qaeda Led By Pointy-Haired Bosses

This is too funny, it almost seems like an April Fool's joke.

Tax Thoughts from Glenn Beck

I have been reading Glenn Beck's columns on CNN for a few months now and like his ideas. Unfortunately his tax agenda, though sensible and probably supported by most everyone, will never see the light of day.

Weekend Activities

* Spent most of Friday at Disneyland on the kid's new annual passes. Lines weren't too long and it wasn't that hot.
* Waited out the heat in our nice cool house (sans a/c).
* Grilled up a fabulous pork tenderloin with my rotisserie grill attachment. Haven't used it in ages, but it cooked up the roast beautifully.

Weekend Activities

* Adventure Guides event at Hurkey Creek near Idyllwild. Great times with laser tag, hikes and nice creek to get muddy in.




* Starting planting out the garden and getting rid of the big mound of grass I ripped up

Weekend Activities

* Jaya's 10th birthday party at Pelly's Minigolf
* Dog time at George's beach