My Coffee with Steve Wozniak

On my way back to Portland from Salt Lake City, I ran into Steve Wozniak, co-founder of Apple Computer. For those hardcore Apple fans out there, this is a big deal. We chatted for awhile because I invited him to coffee. We went to Starbucks, and talked technology for about an hour. It was the [...]

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Mr. Miyagi’s Geography Lesson

When I first saw The Karate Kid when I was 15 years old, I learned two valuable lessons. The first is that after only a few karate lessons under the guise of slavework, I, too, could take down the meanest, toughest, and blondest karate champ of the city; I only have to believe in myself [...]

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Questioning a Woman’s Place

Here’s a lesson plan I created for a technology conference in December. It is one of my better efforts, I think. This Power Point will take students through examining roles of women in the media and around the world. The “Onslaught” commercial alone is worth a viewing.

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Oh Boyle!

We met my Uncle Tommy and his wife Carol on Friday night. We went to a pub, and it was exactly how I’d imagine it: regular customers, drunk men, barflies making playful comments with the bartender, and everyone knew Tommy. He was the Boyle Norm. Everybody knew his name. One man, Mickey, came to the [...]

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Kristie and the Bloodthirsty Crowd

This is when we had enough of the event. Notice the guy to Kristie’s right. I think Hemingway was there, cigar and all. My 10th grade teacher was right about Hemmy watching bullfights in Madrid.

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Mr. T, Madrid, and Me

I began the morning watching an episode of The A-Team dubbed in Spanish. Either my Spanish is better than I thought or the storylines for this show are thread-bare, but I understood the show. The voice dubbing Mr. T sounded like a monster from Clash of the Titans. Perhaps the Spaniards need some help with [...]

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Skateboarding to Alsace

We’re in Strasbourg again after our Dublin trip was canceled. I’m waiting for Kristie outside the statue tunnel watching skateboarders. They certainly are tenacious with their practice. Falling after each attempt, thy try again. When they make that triple ollie (I don’t even know what this is), they work hard to hide that smile of [...]

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Amsterdam’s Coffee Shop

We went to a coffee shop in Amsterdam with some friends from Korea. I was curious to see how those drug houses work, and it was much different than I imagined it would be. We ordered at the bar (I had water, Kristie had cappucinno, just in case you wondered), and ther six of us [...]

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Caught Shoplifting at the Wal-Mart

Of all the places to practice my sleight-of-hand movements, Wal-Mart would not be on the top of my list. I’ve resisted the temptation at the Apple Store, Toys-R-Us, and Old Navy. Don’t misunderstand me: I’m good enough to steal if I really wanted to. Card tricks and larceny are close cousins because they both involve [...]

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Lon’s Pointy Hat

Lan is our next tour guide on the boat itself. We paid $45, and it seems like he purchased a guide for each strip of land in the Mekong Delta. She has one of those pointed bamboo hats that we always see in the explosion scenes in Good Morning, Vietnam-type movies worn by crouching rice [...]

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