New cars in camo!

So. Cal is a prime testing area for car makers, so it's not uncommon to see development vehicles running around with all sorts of body coverings, or nothing more than black tape over the emblem. A couple weeks ago on the way to San Diego, I spied a new Mercedes crossover wagon thingy.

Oh, there's often a caravan of cars with the test vehicle too. At least, that's how Toyota likes to roll. Saw some new Lexus crossover wagon thingy last week followed by a chase vehicle Camry. They all sport the Michigan Manufacters plate of course. I did see the Lexus IS-F about a year ago.... the guys driving it stopped off at Chiptole for lunch. As soon as they got out of the car, they had a full body cover that went all the way down to the ground to keep prying eyes (like mine) away.

Not to be mean... but...

I only had the use of 3/4 of my seat on the airplane because of the overly large woman in the seat next to me. We couldn't even put the armrest down. Considering that American Airlines is now charging $15 for the first checked baggage due to fuel costs, I think I should've gotten a discount for only using 3/4 of my seat. Plus, I weigh probably half of what the woman next to me weighed. So I’m saving the airline a lot in fuel costs! It should get passed on to me, me thinks…

Scary what's on YouTube!

So I was searching for a video clip of my favorite motorcycle racer, Nicky Hayden, doing a demonstration lap of a MotoGP motorcycle at Indianapolis. In the search results are videos of Hayden Panettiere (actress from Heros, various movies) signing autographs. Okay... how creepy is that! Can you imagine having video of something as uneventful as signing autographs, taken by some random person, posted up on the 'net?

Don't get that feeling anymore

So one of my roomies has a scale that sends a current through your body to measure body fat percentage. I remember the first time I used it, I could feel the current going through my feet. Now, I don't feel a thing. I find it a little odd, but oh well.

Cops in LA can't drive in the rain either!

So everyone jokes about how LA drivers absolutely suck driving in the rain. No joke, if it's even just a drizzle, it's best to stay off the road. People have no concept of rain = slick road; especially when it hasn't rained in months and there's oil all over the road. So everyone speeds like usual and when it comes time to get on the brakes hard (people like to speed up to red lights and slam on the brakes for some reason, even in a Prius), they can't stop and rear-end someone. Happened to two guys at work already and almost happened to me yesterday.

Back to the subject of the title. I'm on a road that goes up a hill and there's a cop in the next lane over a few cars ahead. It's wet out and we're accelerating from a stop, and the rear of the cop car is fishtailing all over the place! Uh... wet roads means you can't accelerate as hard either. Freakin idoit.

Changing of the wardrobe

I was cleaning out my closet to find stuff to donate to goodwill and it got me thinking about how the type of clothes I wear has changed. Back in college, it was nothing but shorts, jeans, and free t-shirts. And some slightly nice stuff to go out in.

Now it's work clothes, workout clothes (Nike drifit, underarmour i.e. NOT free t-shirts), and going-out clothes. I still wear my Adidas all the time though :)

I did feel a shake!

So this one was an earthquake for real! Felt a shake in the middle of the night, which my three roommates all slept through. But one of my buddies informed me the next day that it was a 3.0 a few miles away. I swear I felt one about a year ago... but it was never verified.

3rd Street Promenade in Santa Monica

It's an interesting place.... lots of shopping, places to eat, families walking around. It's also a place to pimp out your kid as a street performer apparently. And being Cali, there's some unique stuff like the Abercrombie model dude paid to just stand at the entrance of the store with his shirt off. It was amusing actually, a lot of tourists walking by and laughing.... kinda felt bad for the guy.

Then there were three ladies dressed up in these big white dresses promoting the movie, "27 Dresses"; the street kids performning had way more talent.

Huh... guess it makes sense

I went out with a couple guys to the Hermosa Pier area to play some pool and hit up a few bars. For some reason, I never noticed what a huge sausage fest it is around here. Makes complete sense though as everyone our age around here works for Raytheon, Northrup, or Boeing. I.E., a whole bunch of engineers around here.

Hey, whatever you want to eat...

So my company is an international company and we have offices in Europe, India and China. While I was working in France, we also had a group of guys from China working there, along with a bunch of Indian guys.

Those that know me know that I eat about everything. I LOVE Italian food, viet food (of course!), Japanese, some Korean BBQ, good ole midwest BBQ, Thai... Well, there's some selection of places to eat in the town we were staying in, but the guys from China would ONLY eat Chinese food.

I brought this up with some of the guys I work with, and when one of them was at a corporate meeting in Czech Republic, the guys from China would only eat Chinese food too. And when we had some guys from China in our office here in Cali, they only ate at the Chinese restaurants.

Just thought it was a bit odd…. The guys from India eat pretty much everything like I do. I haven’t made it to China yet, but I’m probably guessing outside of the metropolis areas, they probably don’t have much variety in food. Guess I need to go find out!

There is this one lady at work from the Midwest, and when she goes down to our plant in Mexico for any number of days, she brings her own stock of food (burgers, fries, sodas). Apparently she doesn’t like Mexican food and is perfectly content eating her ‘mid-west’ food.

Hey, whatever makes you happy to eat!

Redbull Air Races!

A couple of guys and I headed down to San Diego today to catch the races. All I can say is, badass!!! Before the races, they had some Naval demonstrations including some F18 fly-bys, Coast Guard Search and Resuce, and some other random things.




Oh, and the Coast Guard don't play around!


Yeah, back to the races, these guys are nuts! Pulling over 9Gs!


And here's a crappy vid due to Google's crappy video compression. They're going into that first turn at ~230mph and pulling 9Gs!.