There’s always been a bit of envy when I hear about people who commute to work every day with the luxury of taking public transportation. Of course, those of you reading this who take a train/bus/metro every day are probably scoffing at my use of the word “luxury”, but for those of us who don’t commute, it does have a certain allure. Taking a daily train to work conveys to me a sense of peace and calm. Something about letting someone else drive, while you focus on something else seems rather rewarding to me. So seeing that my schedule was such that I had the opportunity to experience a daily commute into Downtown Nashville, I was excited. The thought suddenly popped into my head that I could finally scratch the itch and see if it’s all that it’s cracked up to be.

Unfortunately, Nashville doesn’t have a subway. It does have one train, but it only goes East-West and I live in South Nashville. The only method of public transportation is the bus, but thankfully we have a pretty kick butt Nashville Metropolitan Transit Authority, so taking the bus is an excellent option. I looked into all the routes to see which lines would work for me and how I could give this new method of transport a test drive.

One of the other projects that I have going on is in a suburb of Nashville called Cool Springs. Ideally I was thinking that I could take an express bus into downtown and then after 10am, I could hop a series of busses and make my way South. Unfortunately, the MTA only covers Davidson County. Cool Springs/Franklin is in Williamson County. “Oh, no problem”, I naively thought, “I’ll just take the Williamson bus south to Cool Springs.” There’s only one problem, there is no MTA for Williamson county.

For those of you reading this that aren’t familiar with Nashville, Williamson County is THE county to live in. They have the best schools and the average income is pretty high. It’s the premier county in Greater Nashville and given the high incomes it takes to live in towns like Brentwood and Franklin, you’d think that they would also have a public transit system to support the nannys, housekeepers, maids, what-have-you, that cater to that kind of lifestyle. Well, even the housekeepers must have their own luxury autos, because there is NO bus service in Brentwood.

There is a Regional Transporation Authority, but they only provide a series of open air busses that are designed to represent trollies in the Franklin area. I could get to Brentwood via bus, but I can’t get from Brentwood to Franklin unless I walk or bike. Seems ludicrous to me, but that’s the way it is here. You pretty much have to have a car to get where you want to go. There’s been talk of a light rail program, but nothing’s been started yet, so it’s the bus or nothing.

I knew that getting to Cool Springs was going to be a stretch. My original intention was to just get downtown. From there I can take Holly’s car (she works Downtown) and drive to Cool Springs. Just my morning commute in by bus will save us the cost of driving two cars and at least one trip into Downtown, so it’s still something that I want to try out.

So my plan is to take the 33X express bus into downtown every morning this week. I’ll let you know how it goes.

Normally we take our vacation around our anniversary, but with the way the conference, as well as the date of our anniversary, fell this year it just didn’t work out. So we figured we’d delay it a few days and combine it with the DevCon.

I have to admit, Holly’s being a real sport about it because I don’t think a developer’s conference is all that romantic. Her allowing me to enjoy the conference in the middle of our “vacation” shows just what a great sport she is. I’ll try and include her in everything I can, but there’s just so much geek talk one person can take.

For me, it’s the one time of the year where I’m completely surrounded by people who share the same passion about Palm OS as I do. It’s fantastic! I learn so much every year and this year’s conference is looking to be really good schedule wise. I’ll be involved with the Palm OS User Council, but I’ll also be busy with the Computer Outlook Radio Show, we’ll be broadcasting live every day from the conference floor and recording other shows as well.

As if that’s not enough, I’m going to try my hand at doing a little blogging as well, although not so much here. I have another weblog at the Nashville PUG site that I’m going to post to called the Director’s Log. That’s where I’ll be posting information about the DevCon and my travels getting to and for. To be honest, I don’t know exactly what I’ll be posting, but it should be fun.

So, if you’re looking for content here for the next 10-days you probably won’t be finding much. However, be sure to check out the Director’s Log in the meantime.

Dinner In Knoxville
Around Knoxville we started discussing dinner options. No one was really hungry for any style of food in particular, so that left just about any option open. Holly and I were in Knoxville for her birthday last December and we started discussing all the restaurants we either saw, or dinned at in the Greater Knoxville area. There were two restaurants in particular that we remembered wanting to try that were located fairly close to one another in downtown Knoxville. So I exited the Interstate and drove around downtown for a mini tour.

The first restaurant was located in Old Town, but we couldn’t remember the name of it (and as of this writing, I still cant ), so we headed down Gay street and eventually down into Old Town proper. There was an average amount of activity, but as we rounded the corner, I suggested that we go take a look at the other restaurant I had in mind – the Riverside Tavern. Turning back onto Gay street, we went back the way we came and then headed down by the river’s edge and pulled into the parking lot of the Riverside Tavern. One look at the location and the design of the restaurant and the decision was made – this is where we would eat dinner.

The Riverside Tavern is located right next to the Tennessee river and has a spectacular view of the waterview, the bridge and the buildings on the other bank. As we sat down at our table located on the covered deck, we could easily see the JFG neon sign quietly blinking in the distance. It was the perfect view for dinner in Knoxville. As we reviewed the menu, we could see the fog rolling in off the water and giving the boats docked on the side of the river a misty white backdrop. An old steam boat, probably some sort of tourist attraction, reminded us that we were still in the South and gave us a sublime atmosphere as we enjoyed our dinner.

We started with the Crab cake appetizer. It was served with toasted sesame noodles. There was a hint of spice on the noodles, yet the dish wasn’t hot. The spice simply opened up the palette and when combined with the crab cake made everyone’s eyes roll back into their heads. If the rest of the meal lived up to the appetizer, we knew that we were in for a real dining treat. Luckily, the rest of the meal was of the same caliber. I enjoyed the Prime Rib sandwich and I have to say that the prime rib almost as good as Houston’s and that’s quite a complement. Served on a buttered and toasted poppy seed and onion hoagie roll, the meat quite literally burst from the sides of the bread. It was as if it was too good to be contained by bread. I felt like I was using each half of the hoagie as oven mits trying to maneuver the prime rib into the au jus, horseradish sauce and finally into my mouth where it melted. It’s one of the best sandwiches I’ve ever had and it was a perfect match to my glass of New Castle Brown Ale.

Ending The Day
With full bellies, we headed out from Knoxville and back onto I-40. It was a little after 10pm CST, but we were now in the Eastern time zone, so it was after 11pm and the group decided it was time to bed down for the night. Unfortunately there was something going on in town and all the hotels that we tried were full, or unwilling to be hospitable by discounting a smoking room. I suggested that we continue on and make the change to I-81 before we looked for another room and that’s what we did. Sure enough, a few miles down the road on I-81 and we found a Days Inn at a very good rate and called it a night.

Just before heading to bed, I called Dan to catch up on things. It was 1pm his time and 12am my time, but he told me all about his recent adventure and we both had a good laugh. It sucks that there’s such a huge gap between us, both in time and distance, but it was nice that we’re still able to stay in touch.

Breaking The Diet And My Coolness
The next morning we woke up around 7am, packed up and got back on the road. At the next exit, we spied a Cracker Barrel and with nary a word said, pulled in for a hearty breakfast. Knowing that the rest of the weekend would entail nothing but food that we shouldn’t have, I tried to choose a South Beach friendly breakfast, but my will power simply wasn’t strong enough and I chose the Uncle Hershel breakfast. I’m a sucker for Cracker Barrel’s pork chops, what can I say?

Back on the road, we continued making our way to Roan Mountain. Just as we entered the town of Elizabethton, my phone rang and it was my good buddy Ken Duffy. He was on his way to New Orleans to visit his Grandfather and as he often does, he calls me to catch up and pass the time. The start of our conversation went a little something like this:

Ken: Hey dude. What’s up?
Me : Oh hey Ken! Umm, we’re actually on our way up to Roan Mountain up in the northeast corner of the state.
Ken: Sounds cool. What made you decide to go up there?
Me : There’s the Rhododendron Festival up there this weekend.

At this point Ken burst into uncontrollable gales of laughter. I could just see the tears running down his face as he tried to wipe them while still driving and talking on the phone. I didn’t realize how that sounded until after I heard the words come out of my mouth and I too had to laugh. This may not be as funny to you, maybe you had to be there, but I think Ken summed it up nicely:

Ken: Dude, you sound SO married.

And he was right, I didn’t say that there was tons of hiking, fishing and mountains to climb, I said what Holly had told me when I asked the very same question – there was a rhododendron festival. LOL After a little more catching up, we signed off and about 30 minutes later we were entering the Roan Mountain State Park

At The Mountain
I’ve become accustomed to seeing hills since moving to Nashville, but I’m still a little be awestruck when I see mountains. Roan is located in the Appalachian mountain range, just south of the Smokies and is the second highest mountain in the Appalachian range. Mt. Mitchell is 399 feet higher. Our first stop was at the conference/recreation center where we inquired about our cabin. While we were waiting for an answer, the lady behind the counter said to someone who had called on the phone, that during the summer, they only rent cabins by the week. I gave a look to my Mom, who explained that since she worked for Parks, this was one of the perks, we could rent a cabin for only one night. Nice. The cabin was still being cleaned and wouldn’t be ready until after lunch, so we left the car in the parking lot and walked down the hill to the festival.

To be continued…

At this point in my career, I’m currently a one man show. I don’t have any employees, so if it has to be done, I’m the one who has to do it. For online stuff, I do have backup via my buddy and sometimes partner in crime, Dan, but he just moved to Guam and he’s still on dial up. Not only that, but we’re still sorting out the whole time zone thing. On past trips, like the one last year to the Bahamas, I’ve brought my laptop so that I’m fully prepared to do whatever I can in case of an emergency. I was lucky enough to find an Internet Cafe and it definitely came in handy when I had to fix a problem or two when I was away.

This year is a little different though. For starters we’re going to be gone for 7 days, not 5, which is the longest vacation I’ve taken in YEARS. I haven’t been away this long since starting my business back in 1997. All of our trips have been extended weekends for the most part. It’s just so hard to leave your business behind. The other thing is that this is the farthest we’ve gone in a long while as well. The Bahamas was so close to Miami, it wasn’t too far removed from all the creature comforts I’m accustomed to technology wise. The electrical outlets were the same, there was high-speed Internet, etc. What will I find in the Yucatan jungle?

According to Sprint, my phone should work there, albeit at .70 cents per minute, but I doubt that I’ll have data access on it. I’m looking into dial up numbers via my AT&T Worldnet account, but I think my best bet will be to find an Internet cafe. I’m still doing research, so that I can be prepared as much as possible, so hopefully I’ll have some of these issues ironed out before we go. At this point, I don’t even know what type of electrical outlet I’ll find.

So what do I plan on bringing with me technology wise? The digital camera is a given, but I also plan on bringing my Dana Wireless, my Sony Ericsson T608 phone and probably a few handhelds. I’d like to bring my laptop to because it makes a good “home base” to charge my gadgets and store my photos, but I need to confirm the electrical stuff first. If I can’t plug it in, then it’ll be worthless. Heck, if electricity is a problem, then I’ll probably leave behind my handhelds too. I can use AA batteries in the Dana, so it’s definitely coming with me.

How The Trip Came About
Originally, I was hoping that I could take Holly to Greece, which is where we first went on our honeymoon ten years ago. However I didn’t have the money to do it and with the Olympic games getting underway, it is probably for the best. With those hopes dashed upon the rocks of reality, I set my sights on something closer to home. My next choice was Pfeiffer State Park, just outside of Carmel, California. It’s supposed to be gorgeous and very romantic and I figured that I could get us there on a shoe string budget pretty easily. However, I didn’t have all the frequent flyer miles that I thought I did, so that meant that I’d have to bump up to “full shoe” budget, but I still figured we could afford it.

Then my Mom showed me something in the paper about a package to Aruba that looked very affordable. I made the call, but I couldn’t get it to work with our schedule. I have an NPUG meeting with a very special guest on Saturday, so I wanted to leave on Sunday if at all possible. When Aruba didn’t work out, the travel agent and I looked into other locations and that’s when Riviera Maya came up. It was definitely more expensive than I had budgeted with the trip to California, but when I did the math, it didn’t seem so bad. Once you figure in the cost of hotel, airfare, food, etc.. this package tour seemed rather reasonable. It’s an all-inclusive package that covers everything, including tips, so when I compared the totals to what I would spend going to California, it didn’t seem that far off.

I was originally going to make it a surprise, but since this was a big purchase, I let the cat out of the bag and asked Holly what she thought before I booked it. Holly was ecstatic! She too went through the same logic as I did and came to the same conclusion – although it wasn’t cheap, it was a more realistic figure than if we stayed in the states and paid as we went, thinking that we were spending less. If you’re going to end up spending the same amount of money, why NOT go to someplace exotic? Other than helping me make the decision to spend the money, the other reason I wanted to not leave this trip as a surprise is because Holly is such an excellent researcher. Springing the trip on her the day we leave wouldn’t give her enough time to discover all the wonderful things we can do once we get there.

Holly really excels at finding little known things to do whenever we travel. One year, when we did a driving tour of the New England and Maine area, she found Louis’ Lunch where the first hamburger was served and that Al’s French Fries was rated as the best fries in Vermont. Not all of her finds are food related, but you get the idea. Already she’s discovered that sea turtles will be nesting during the time that we’re there, so we might get to see this miracle of nature in action! Every night, she’s buried deep in a travel guide reading all about where we are going and who knows what goodies she’ll find before we leave.

As for me, I’ll be frantically trying to get all my projects to a good stopping point, and trying desperately to get my task list as clear as possible. I’m really looking forward to this trip, but this week is going to be a stressful one.

[QUE HERO MUSIC]
InMotion Pictures To The Rescue!

I had seen InMotion Pictures kiosks in several airports, but I’d never really investigated them, so with an hour to kill, I decided to take a peek and see what the deal was. The concept is pretty simple, you can rent DVD movies and DVD players from a kiosk, watch the movie on your plane and simply drop of the movie and/or player and your next destination. And the price is reasonable too. The basic player rents for $12 and includes one movie; additional movies are $4. If you have a DVD player, then movie rentals are $5.

Portable DVD players are nothing new, but I’ve never really seen a reason to own one. Yes they are nice, but I don’t often find myself with a lot of time on my hands and nothing to do. The only time that I consistently find myself with some time on my hands is when I fly, but I’m already carrying enough technology, I don’t need to contend with yet another device. However, by the time I’ve checked my baggage and I’m ready to board the plane, having one additional small bag is no big deal. Besides, InMotion is responsible for making sure that the batteries are charged (they give you two just in case), that the movie is playable, and that everything works. InMotion Pictures is a brilliant concept because all of the things that make bringing a device with me too much of a burden have been solved!

I rented T3 and Once Upon A Time In Mexico and the basic player and returned to my gate to wait. Putting on the headphones and firing up T3 I was whisked out of the dreary airport terminal and into a world of excitement and adventure. The time just flew by as I got about halfway through the film. Soon it was time to board and take off. 20 minutes later I was at cruising altitude and able to start the player again. Good thing too, because there were at least three crying babies on board; I’m not kidding; and the plane was near capacity, so this was NOT going to be a fun four hour flight.

Turning back on the movie, all the pain and suffering that the other passengers were experiencing was lost on me. I finished T3 ( 3 out of 5 stars) and popped in Once Upon A Time In Mexico ( 2 out of 5 stars). Even though the movie wasn’t all that good, it was certainly better than the alternative of not having a movie to watch. By the time the last movie was over, there was only 30 minutes left in the major leg of my flight. The babies had cried themselves to sleep and the rest of the passengers seemed fixed to their seats. They were like the slave rowers of a galley ship. Chained to their seats rowing for the long haul as the slave masters, ahem, I mean flight attendants, walked the galley. OK, maybe I spent too long watching movies.

When I arrived in Minneapolis, I spotted the kiosk on my way to the gate of my connecting flight. In 30 seconds they had me checked in and on my way. The total cost for the two movies and player rental set me back around $17 with tax. In my opinion, it was well worth it. As I boarded the last leg of my flight, I was relaxed and rested and was able to focus once again on work. Being able to lose my self in a movie was all that I needed to clear my head.

I can’t see renting a movie for a short flight, but for longer or cross-country flights, I can’t see traveling any other way. InMotion Pictures takes all the chore out of the experience of watching a DVD on a plane and leaves you with the simple enjoyment of sitting back and enjoying the show. If nothing else, it can be a life saver should you find yourself on a nightmare flight.

I’ve created a travelogue of this year’s trip and the first two days have already been posted. You can find it at this link. I number each day and each entry, and the entries are dated and time stamped so it’s easy to keep track of what’s going on. We head back to Nashville tomorrow, but I’ll continue to update the Travelogue as time allows. I hope you like it.

I also hooked up the web cam and took a quick snapshot. You can find it in the Webcam Section.