Mark L. Van Name's Blog, page 143

Sarah Prime

23 years ago, just past the turn of midnight, Sarah entered the world and my life.  She was, always has been, and remains one of the most amazing, wonderful people I've ever had the privilege of knowing.

18 years ago, she and Scott would run laps around my office, singing along with these tunes (and others) and screaming and swerving to avoid my lunges, lunges that never quite seemed to reach them, and I smiled and sang along and felt my heart could explode at any second from the sheer mass of love in it. 






I am the luckiest father in the world to have this particular brown-eyed girl--now, woman--as my daughter.

Happy birthday, Sarah.

I love you.

Do I believe Apple is going to buy Tesla?

And leave me driving an iCar?

In a word, no.

In two words, no way.

Though I'm not at all sure it would be a bad idea for Apple to diversify in this way, I just can't see Tim Cook making that bold a move.  Plus, Tesla's stock price is so high right now that Apple would be paying a huge premium for the company relative to its income (as all Tesla shareholders are).

Having said all that, I wouldn't be surprised if Tesla and Apple were to partner on battery production and/or technology efforts. 

Just don't expect them to become one company.


Disclosure:  I own both Apple and Tesla stock, and I own some Apple products and a Tesla Model S P85+.  I have zero insider information about either company. 

Lovely song

Check out this cover of The National's song, "I need my girl."



I may be biased, because I know these folks, and the lead singer, Ben, is a friend and colleague, but they did a terrific job with this song.

For comparison purposes, here's The National's video for the original.



Enjoy.

A month from now

I'll be heading to TEDActive, the simulcast gathering of TED that I've attended for most of the last several years.  (I missed the one right after my mother died.)  The program for this year's event is now available; check it out. 

I go to this conference because in past years it has helped me think differently and in unusual directions; it's stretched my brain a bit.  I'm hoping this year's version does the same.

I'm honestly not thrilled about the venue change from Palm Springs (warm in the winter) to Whistler (ski resort), because I don't ski or have any particular interest in winter sports.  Still, I've never been to British Columbia and look forward to seeing at least a bit of it.

As always, I'll report back from the conference with comments on at least some of the talks.

Let's stop the flood of disaster movies before it starts

Pompeii is coming.  Noah is due not long after it.  Does anyone really want to see disaster movies of real (or believed by many to be real, in the case of Noah) events that the filmmakers fill with made-up and almost certainly silly sub-plots?

I know I don't.  I worry, in fact, that supporting these movies may lead to a run of disaster films, because if there's anything Hollywood loves to do, it's jump on a bandwagon. 

If we absolutely must have more disaster films, I'd like them to at least be creative and, ideally, involve technological menaces.  Why can't we have

Toasters! 

in which toasters all over America rise up as one and begin snapping their metal jaws (yeah, I know, but work with me) at their owners?  Or

Washers!

in which the world's washing machines go rogue and with supercharged spin cycles and sharpened agitators (yeah, I know, but I'm on a roll) suck people into their circular maws and spit out chunks of bloody flesh?

Yeah, I'd go to those movies. 

On the road again: Portland, day 4 (and Zombeavers)

I'm home safely.  For a while, the weather cast doubt on whether I would be able to reach home today, but Raleigh warmed up enough that American was flying on time, and driving between my house and the airport was not a problem.  I'm grateful for that.

As I've written in various forms many times before, I'm never going to love a travel day that begins with me getting up in the early fives, as today did.  Still, aside from being flagged for random extra scanning at PDX, today's flights went as smoothly as one could reasonably hope. 

While in Portland, I, along with about a million and a half other folks, ran across this trailer for the subtly named movie, Zombeavers.



Not very long ago, I would have figured this for a film-school prank.  For all I know, that's how it started.  With this many YouTube hits, however, if it wasn't real before the trailer, you can bet somebody stepped up to finance it after the trailer.  After all, this trailer has inspired many people online to wonder, "Is this the next Sharknado?" 

The mere existence of that question speaks volumes about our culture.

And yet, as a man who's seen an unhealthy number of zombie movies, I had to ask myself the embarrassing question, "Would I watch this?"

Yeah, sadly, I probably would.

It may be time for me to put a zombie book in my queue and show people how to do zombies right.  Maybe I'd get a zombie movie all my own. 

But not one with beavers.  Beavers are already taken.

On the road again: Portland, day 3

Wow, did work eat today.  I exercised in the park behind the hotel in the early morning, and I had a lovely dinner at Le Pigeon, one of my all-time favorite restaurants, in the early evening.  The rest of the time, I worked.  The work was good, the client meetings excellent, but it did consume the day.

I'm cutting this short because I have to get up at 5:20 a.m. for a long day of travel.  With luck, I'll reach Raleigh, and with more luck, I'll be able to make it to my house once I've landed.  Here's hoping for warm weather back home tomorrow!

On the road again: Portland, day 2

I feel bad for my family and friends back in snowbound Raleigh, where the lucky ones spent the day at home and the unlucky ones invested big chunks of their days in making their way home.  At the same time, I'm glad I flew out here ahead of the bad weather, because I have no clue if I would have been able to leave town had I wanted for my morning flight today.

I don't normally think of Portland as a place to come to get warm, but that's what it's been so far here, with highs in the low 50s.  Sure, the sky is the usual gray, and yes, it's rained off and on all day, but it's a whole lot nicer than back home.

For lunch today I headed to Brunch Box, a place Sarah had recommended.  I opted for breakfast for lunch, and it was quite tasty.

In a break from my attempt to change my eating habits for the better, I headed to Salt & Straw in the late afternoon.  I had been ready to resist this ice cream palace's charms--until I learned that it was currently featuring five different new flavors highlighting local chocolatiers.  So, two of us shared a flight of them.  I enjoyed them all, but none was, to my taste, better than Salt & Straw's regular freckled Woodblock chocolate.

Dinner tonight was at one of my local favorites, Gabe Rucker's second restaurant, Little Bird.  Everything I tasted was very good, but the highlight, to my great surprise, was a roasted garlic and sweet potato soup that two of us split.  I am in no way a sweet potato fan, but I absolutely loved this dish.

Tomorrow, I hope for sunny skies for outdoor exercising before meetings. 

On the road again: Portland, day 1

Today has been a very long day.  I had to get up early to drive to the doctor's office for my completely useless appointment to pick up my allergy serum.  Fortunately, my former nemesis and I have reached a peace accord, so the transaction was quick, efficient, and cordial.

Next up was exercise, which left me rather tired.

Some work, including a fun lunch meeting with Bill, consumed the time until I had to rush to the airport.

The good news about today's flights is that I enjoyed first-class upgrades on both, so I flew across the country in comfort.  The bad news is that the elapsed time from when I left work for the airport to when I was in my hotel room was over 14 hours.

I spent a lot of that time in DFW, first enjoying a Salt Lick dinner and then working in the Admirals Club.

Despite its length, however, I can't complain about a travel day that left me at my destination more or less on time and that included first-class upgrades.

I do look forward to some sleep.

Weatherfail

Two days ago, my week seemed reasonable:  normal Monday, normal Tuesday, fly to Portland Wednesday, meetings Thursday, fly home Friday.  I wasn't in love with the two days of flying for one day of meetings, but the meetings merited the travel. 

Yesterday, my day looked far worse, thanks to the snow that's on tap to clobber the Triangle Wednesday morning--when I was due to fly.

Now, the snow appears all but definite, and I'm flying Tuesday afternoon to Portland.  This trip in turn compresses the rest of the day, so the morning is insane.

I'm quite done with this weather. 

It, alas, is not done with me.

I know, I know:  Compared to people in the Northeast, we've had it easy here in North Carolina.  Nonetheless, I am ready for a more standard February, with highs in the fifties and lots of clear skies.

Enough whining.  Time to pack.

My next post will be from lovely--as in, cold and damp--Portland, where the weather will be only marginally better than it is here, but I will be sure to make my Thursday commitments.