Walking back from Taco Deli, I notice this huge spider’s nest. It looks like something straight out of Lord of the Rings. Perhaps a mini Shelob is eating a mini Chihuahua in there?

I checked my mail today at work. For the first in quite some time, apparently. There was a gift certificate from a drawing when I left my business card at my favorite lunch time sushi restaurant. But it was sent last December and expired in March. So sad. I will call them up and ask if I can still use it. You never know…

I went to Ventana’s for lunch today and walked by what is left of some of the IBM buildings. Which is basically a large pile of sand. But I could still see the putt putt course poking up through the weeds in a state of severe decay. It is amazing how much the grass and weeds take over what was once highly manicured lawns… So sad…

Wow. We actually did a team outing with some morale money at IBM and took a cruise on Lake Austin. The boat was docked next to the Tom Miller dam. And when we arrived, a couple of news camera crews were filming segments for the upcoming Memorial day holiday (where drunk people flock to the area lakes).

After they got some free footage of someone unloading their boat, they started filming a police boat. Remember folks, don’t drink and sail!

Jon tried teaching Tichu to some new people, others played Texas Hold-Em, and most of the people just sat around and talked.

The weather was not as perfect as it could have been. It was overcast with an occasional sprinkle. But I did manage to get a little sun burnt.

That is the phrase for tonight! ‘Nuff said.

What an interesting message left on my voice mail:

Hi Gary,

This is Liz from, ah, Sugars. Ah, I was just wondering if you were going to come by and visit me today or, um, some time this weekend. Ah, you can call me at Sugars at XXX-XXX-XXXX. Ah, I will be working the day, ah, shift Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. So, ah, stop by if you want to visit.

Bye!

Monte Copeland built a 17′ sailboat called a Catboat. Which is way cool, in my opinion. He detailed a lot of the process here. I finally got a chance to sail it today. It was a beautiful out. Not a cloud in the sky. Temperature in the 80s. Light winds out of the North. Very few motorized boats out.

We drove out 360, to 2222, to 620, to the marina here. Surprisingly, for being built on the water, there were an awful lot of spiders on the marina and the boats.

After we motored out of the marina, we pulled out the sail and took off. Monte started off but quickly handed the reins over to me. The boat is extremely responsive and pretty vocal in response to what you do. If you pull harder on the rope that brings the sail towards the center of the ship, the speed starts increasing. And the tension on that line really increases making it harder to pull it in more. There was probably 50 or more pounds of force on that line. As the sailboat speeds up, it leans in the water. You want the slope of the hull to run flat over the water. And the position of the other person really does makes a difference in the angle of the ship.

If you want to slow down, you just let out the rope. And you can even let go of the rope entirely if you want. As you turn the ship, you can tell what angle works best against the wind. If you turn too much into the wind, the sail starts to flutter as it looses the wind.

We sailed down wind for a while which is pretty easy. Then, we turned back to practice tacking upwind which is much harder. Or, shall I say, much slower. The winds were mostly consistent. There were some moments of no wind. But it is surprising just how little wind you need to go. Of course, that other boat out there was bigger than us and had two sails. So it was much faster and more efficient than us in the wind department. And it was interesting how the winds changed when we got close to the shoreline.

This boat also has a low draft. Like less than 3 feet of water. So, we are able to get quite close to the shore as we make the bend along the lake. Certainly inside of the warning buoys.

Because I was almost out of gas and went to the station on Parmer and IH-35, I stopped by Masala Wok for dinner. I like this place. They have a number of good Indian dishes.

It seems that they are out of regular gas. How convenient! Make people pay for the more expensive gas… Which is not an issue for me, being stuck using premium.

I walked over to the new Domain today for lunch. And passed the old rusty IBM building that has been thoroughly demolished and is now a large pile of sand. What is it with IBM selling off its properties and developers making way more money on the land?

I wouldn’t say that the route to the Domain is safe. Not with all of the temporary fencing around here. It makes quite the maze. I cut through the parking lot for the Texas Culinary Academy and was fortunate to find a gap in the fencing to make it towards the Domain. I can understand fencing that stops people from going to an active construction site. But why is there fencing on the right where there is just parking lots? Flawed! And, they create this road from Burnett to the Domain that is lined with fencing with no sidewalks for people to walk. Not very friendly for pedestrians.

I had lunch at a new restaurant called Jasper’s. It was a little odd when they asked for both my first and last name to seat me. In an empty restaurant. But I doubt that they spelled my last name correctly. So I don’t have to worry about Big Brother. The lunch was nice, if expensive. I tried out some Raspberry Quince tea from the Republic of Tea. It was nice and light. And also unsweetened, which is nice.

In a strange coincidence, I noticed that I had a dilemma in determining which shaker held salt and which held pepper. Last Sunday, I was talking with my aunt and cousin. And they told me that they had a bet as to which one had more holes than the other. The web replied that there was no standard and the authorities conflicted each other. Mine were quite similar. One was half an inch higher and had twice as many holes (with 2) as the other. So, since pepper has more letters in it than salt does would it use the two hole shaker? Or, because salt is essential to life, would it use the shaker with 100% more holes in it?

I stopped by the new Border’s afterwards to briefly look at the books. And was depressed to see that some of my favorite authors only had one of their books on the shelves. Both Mike Resnik and Jack Chalker are both prolific authors. So sad.

Besides tearing down old IBM buildings, they are doing other construction around here. From what I hear, it is infrastructure work. Sewer, water, electrical work… that kind of stuff. I guess that the rocky ground around here is making this work take forever.