Natebot
"It's not a big truck. It's a series of tubes!"

Well now we are month into 2005. While things are going well for me here in the Great Northwest, seems things are going downright craptastic for others. Ah, February! How do we love thee? Let me count the ways: My flat mate lost his job and had his car break down. Amanda is having knee surgery next week. And so is her housemates dog. Exact same surgery. No relation. Nothing quite like getting fudge-punched by good ol' fate is there?

Last week I went to Vancouver CA for my first time. It is a much bigger city than Seattle in population. I did some shopping, but didn't see much. It was raining all day and we didn't have time to hit the highlights. I met Rachel and John for dinner and proceeded to wander the Chinatown streets at night. Overall pretty anti-climatic. I'll have to go back when its nice and i can do thing proper. The only thing that struck me was the high density of Japanese in the city, more so than Seattle.

Today I walked the miles to Golden Gardens wind-swept beach. It was mostly empty except the kit-flyers, mallards, and I. Yesterday I hit Easy Street Records, easily the best record store I have found yet. Don't judge 'em by their website (or me by mine :) ) and the rest is work.

I'm spending a lot of time thinking about branding as part of my move from just IT stuff to marketing. Exciting huh? well all work and no play makes natebot a dull 'bot. So let me see what fun adventures i can plan to better tell you stories of....

Well suprise suprise we made it four years into the new millinium (which started in 2001, you crafty bean-counter.) No seraphim with burning swords falling from blighted skies , no armageddon (just the trailer with commercial breaks) and no goddamn flying cars.

As one blogger puts it:

"One of the things I find fascinating is the way that the idea of what the future will be like keeps changing. Nowadays it's all nanotech and terraforming Mars. In the 1990's it was alien invasions and terraforming Mars. In the 1980's it was depressing cyberpunk societies and terraforming Mars."

So if I end up driving on the ground when I visit Mars I will be pissed. You'll know future humanity is in a woeful spot if they watch Back to the Future 2 with wistfulness. Hell, I'd settle for Michael J. Fox's levitating skateboard. Though I admit flying on Mars is not without its difficulties, can't we at least have them here on good ol' Mother Earth? It's not like we don't know how they would work.

Resolutions? I have never made them. I've got enough cherished illusion that I don't need to delute myself in hopeful delusion of self-improvement. Smug self-assuredness being one of those cherished illusion. And a bleakly dry sense of humor.

What else? Oh yes, I did pull of quite a caper over the holidays! what what? Yes indeed, I flew back to Hoosier-land for the holidays to visit Amanda and give a frightful scare to my parents by paying them a suprise visit. Longest week of my life. I mean that in a good way. ;) Then new year's eve was spent at Jerry and Jeremy's bash. Sorry if I missed any of you. Where will he be next? Only the Shadow knows!

oh and I hope you weren't waiting for much details on my trip to LA. It is such a depressing place I am just happy to forget about it. It's places like that which makes you realize civilization has collapse long long ago in cloud of dollars and smog; and we are seeing a ghost of its presence like light from a distant star long expired.

Do I sound depressing? Chin up, HBO has some good programming these days.