I spent the day with a scuba and travel buddy at the Songkran festival held at Wat Thai in the San Fernando Valley. Songkran is the Thai new year (currently 2547) and is a enthusiastic celebration. In Thailand the Songkran festivals are known for their water play. The Songkran period is a traditionally thought of …
I was reading The Economist recently and they had the story of Abdi Jimale Osman, Somalia’s minister of tourism. Unfortunately, or fortunately depending on how you look at it, Somalia hasn’t had a tourist in 14 years. One of the few hotels in Mogadishu recommends that visitors hire at least 10 armed guards to escort …
I had to go to LAX today to pick up a ticket and I may have almost given one of the security guys a heart attack. First off, I haven’t flown recently but I have flown several times over the last couple of years and I don’t remember security being this tight. There’s the checkpoint …
Instant Messaging used to be a great tool. Unfortunately, like email, once it became popular it went from useful tool to annoyance. I don’t think it was anything about the technology itself but I think the longer that it was around the more people projected their own social flaws onto it. What follows is an …
One of my clients is Axion Racing, a team that entered the DARPA Grand Challenge. The Grand Challenge is a government sponsored competition with a $1 million prize going to the team who can successfully get an unmanned, fully-autonomous vehicle from Barstow to Las Vegas over rough terrain. Yes, a fully-autonomous vehicle. No driver. No …