Catching up

Thursday and Friday were a ton of fun. Thursday was the day of the mystery social event, and it turned out it was a trip to the US Naval Academy, a two hour boat tour of the Chesapeake Bay and Severn River, then dinner at Phillips. We had our choice of entrees, and I decided to have the crabcake and shrimp, always a classic around here. It was good, but that's what I would expect from a place like Phillips. There was also free beer, so no complaints from me!

Friday was the last day of the conference. As per my usual routine, yes, I wore my Baltimore Ravens jersey since it is Purple Friday after all. The last presentations went well, and I took away a lot of information that I can use. I talked with one of my bosses during the afternoon and we discussed where to take things next in the department. Next May we will finally put into production the survey I have been working on since day one of my career, and that means that we will have finally moved all of our surveys from DOS to Windows, or from PAPI only to CAPI (or CATI). Since we should not have to devote so much energy into making sure these surveys work (unless a sponsor wants a major revision done), we can start looking into building some tools to help automate our programming and testing processes. I saw some amazing tools that the University of Michigan has come up with, and if the powers that be let them, I'm going to obtain the source for one of them to see if we can modify it for our own purposes. It was a good talk with my boss, and I'm thinking it means some opportunities down the line for me.

So for the final big event, a number of us went out sailing on the Chesapeake bay. I have some amazing pictures from it, and once I get them uploaded from Flickr, I'll be sharing them here. It was fun, and I wonder now what it would take to learn to sail, there was something comfortable about being out on the water. I'll have to look into it.

We got back to shore and had dinner at Pusser's Caribbean Grille. The food was good, and on par for what you would get for seafood. I had the Tilapia Chesapeake for dinner, so basically it was a fillet of Tilapia wrapped around a mixture of crabmeat. I drove home from there, planning to head out to DC and the nightlife, but on my way home I started to feel a bit sleepy, so I decided to bag it and head in.

Saturday morning was my fun run with the DC Front Runners. I did much better than last week because I was able to run over 2.5 miles before I had to slow down, and that was only because my ankles stiffened up and finally screamed ¡No Mas! I did have an odd thing happen though, my left foot went numb towards the end of the run. I have never had that happen before in all my years of running. After I pulled off my shoe and sock I was fine. The next time I go I had better make sure to check and see how tight my laces are, because I suspect those were the culprit. Went to Starbucks as usual, then it was off to Best Cellars where I picked up a merlot from Chile to try. It was only $8 and I'll be curious to see how good it turns out to be. I grabbed lunch at Zorba's Cafe. I had never been there before, though I had always passed by it. I'm glad I went in there, they have excellent Gyros, and it's the kind of place where they take the meat off of a big chunk of it roasting on a spit. It was also a great price, so I'll have to keep it in mind the next time I'm down at Dupont Circle and I don't have much cash. I went home, then went on a walk with Kris, came back, went back into DC for drinks with some people from the morning run, then home for bed.

Sunday started out as the usual kind of Sunday, went to church, came home, did the weekly deep cleaning of the house. Then it was off to Blobs Park for beer, food, and dancing. While Blobs Park looks like it can use an update, they do serve good and authentic German food, and they have great beer. There was also a honey liqueur that I tried with the other folks, and it was like drinking pure honey with a little kick. I must find a bottle for the house, I bet it would make a great flavoring. So I would recommend going there since admission is only $5, and you can get a pretty good meal for only $7-$8. The only complaint I have was service was a bit slow, but considering there were only two waitresses for a rather large hall, I can understand why. The woman who served us was helpful when she did get to us, so we did give her a good tip.

Monday was just a usual Monday, today was more of the usual stuff at work. Tonight I went over and worked out to an exercise tape at church, so that's another thing I can consider making routine.

The rest of this week is shaping up to be busy. Tomorrow night I am going to go listen to the Bishop of the Diocese of Washington talk about the recent House of Bishops Statement that came out. I'll tell you folks that the media does have it all wrong with the way they're reporting the statement. Nothing has really changed from the current position, and that's not a bad thing because the church could have given in to the demands of a few voices of folks who have no power who are trying to dictate what the entire church should do, but instead they decided to stand against it. I have already heard my rector's comments on the statement, I'll be curious to see what the Bishop has to say.

Thursday night I have a date down in DC, we'll see where that goes. Beyond that, nothing necessarily planned for the rest of this week. That's not a bad thing at all.