Raible Designs

Happy Birthday Abbie!

Today marks the 4th birthday of Julie and I's daughter, Abigail Grace Raible. It's been a great day of reflecting on what Abbie did to our lives and how it's been so much better with kids involved. Granted, it's no picnic, but it's certainly worth it and we wouldn't change a thing. Abbie's birthday party consisted of a number of friends, a plethora of presents, and enough hard cider and beer to make everyone happy. I love my kids. In a perfect world, every day would be like today.

[CSS 2006] Day 3

This morning, I gave both my talks back-to-back and was done by noon. After lunch, I attended Scott Blum's Taming AJAX with GWT. It was a good talk with some impressive demos. I definitely need to dig into GWT more - it looks like very cool technology. I can't help but think it's the "widget framework" that JSF was supposed to be.

I was planning on heading back to Denver tonight, but it started snowing and Julie said they expect 10" in East Denver. Who knows if it'll actually snow that much (the weatherfolks are often wrong), but I don't want to be on the roads.[Read More]

Abbie and Jack - October 2006

Abbie and Jack had their picture taken at school this week. The picture turned out so cute, I couldn't help but post it. It's hard to believe that Abbie was born 4 years ago and Jack is just over two. They sure grow up fast!

On the Road Again

This week is a travel week for me. However, it should be a bit more enjoyable than most "business trips". I'm at Denver's airport right now, getting ready to jump on a plane to Philadelphia. Tomorrow I'll be speaking at Spring Forward 2006. Thomas Risberg and I will be presenting a Spring 2.0 Kickstart session, with Thomas covering Persistence and me covering MVC. It should be a fun show, especially with the current speaker lineup. We've put together some good slides, as well as a sample application. I'll make sure and post a demo, the code, and the presentation following our talk.

I'm going to stay with a friend in Philly on Tuesday night, then head to New York City on Thursday. I heard there's a bullet train that'll get you there in an hour - so I'm going to try to catch that. Wednesday night, I'm crashing on a friend's couch, and then heading up to Boston on Thursday. Hopefully I can catch a train and make it there in a few hours. Julie is flying into Boston on Friday. We'll be enjoying a kick-ass weekend at a friend's wedding before flying home on Sunday.

The beauty of this "train trip through New England" is my EVDO card. Thanks to it, and a 2nd laptop battery, I should be able to work while I'm traveling. On my todo list this week is working on Spring Live and AppFuse.

New Puppy

Abbie and Jack are two of the happiest kids in the world today. Grammy (Julie's mom) flew into town last night and brought a new puppy with her. Abbie has named her "Cookie" and she's a Cavalier King Charles Spaniel. She's 12 weeks old and already knows how to "go in the grass" and fetch things you throw for her. Thanks Grammy!

BTW, I did notice (and ignore) the following note on Flickr's homepage:

Remember! Flickr Terms of Service specify that if you post a Flickr photo on an external website, the photo must link back to its photo page.

WTF? I guess they don't like the lightbox thing, eh?

The neighborhood just keeps getting better

When Julie, Abbie and I first moved to our neighborhood, Julie was a little apprehensive. She liked living out in the burbs, and we were planning on living here for a few months while another house was being built in The Ranch. Meanwhile, I loved the neighborhood. I went to school at DU (a mere 8 blocks away) and considered the area my "old stomping grounds."

After a couple months, The Ranch house fell through (price went up 60K) and we decided to double the size of our house. We rented the house next door while ours was being built. Last year, that house was leveled and a nice 2-story, full basement house was put in. It sold a couple months ago for $750K. When we remodeled our house, we did it because we needed the space, not because we thought its value would skyrocket.

Today, I couldn't ask for a better location to live in. I was disappointed when the excellent Italian restaurant (literally 50 feet from our house) was replaced with Little India. However, I love Indian food and we've grown to love the new place. The wine tastings (Wednesdays and Fridays) at Little's Liquors are great, and the fact that I can take out the trash and pick up a bottle of wine in under a minute is phenomenal. The fact that Safeway is 1.5 blocks away is great, we walk there several times per week. Heck, even the first Chipotle ever built is only 6 blocks away. Not to mention Jerusalem's, the best Middle-Eastern food in town.

My motivation for writing this post is because a new Sushi place has moved into our neighborhood. Julie mentioned it last week, and I had a chance to check it out today. I was very impressed when I walked in and discovered it was a John Hollys. I've only eaten at one John Hollys (near Park Meadows Mall), but it was excellent. Needless today, lunch was scrumptious today and I'm looking forward to eating there again. The Sushi Den is pretty close by as well, but it's probably a mile away - unlike John Hollys at a 1/2 block.

A device-free weekend

This weekend, I did something I haven't done in a while (if ever). I left my laptop at work, and I promised myself to not touch a keyboard all weekend. When my phone's battery died on Saturday morning, and I realized I'd left my charger at work, I decided to go no-devices all the way. Of course, I still watched TV and enjoyed my car stereo, but being computer-free felt liberating. It was an awesome weekend, and I'm thinking about doing it from now on.

Saturday, Julie and I had a great time watching Superman, IMAX, in 3D. It was killer. The whole movie wasn't 3D, but the 4 scenes in 3D were incredible. I highly recommend it. On Sunday, we had kickass seats to The International thanks to Virtuas. We sat on the 18th hole and watched golf while getting free cocktails served to us for several hours. It didn't suck by any means.

Going off the grid

Today marks the beginning of Raible Road Trip #10, Leg #2. My parents and I, as well as Abbie and Jack, are leaving soon to drive to Spokane, Washington. We'll stop in Spokane tonight, where we'll meet up with my sister and Julie. Kalin arrives later tonight (hopefully with a case of cider from her cidery), Julie flies in tomorrow morning. From Spokane, it's about a 4-hour drive to the cabin.

Think we're the ones having all the fun? Nope, Julie is in Vegas right now with her sister. They flew in last night for 12 hours of good ol' Vegas fun.

The cabin, which you can read more about on my about page, is "off the grid" in Montana. There's no electricity, no running water, and 120 acres of lush Montana acreage. There's a sauna for bathing (good ol' Finnish roots) and a generator if we really need power. My mom prefers no generator, my dad likes power and bright lights. I suppose I could dial-up to the 'net if I wanted, but MacBook Pros don't have modems, which is how I prefer it. Vacation shouldn't involve a computer - so I'm pretty pumped that mine will be pretty much useless all week. Besides, we're pouring the foundation for the Cabin #2, and that sounds like a lot more fun than any of this computer stuff.

I'll be back in Denver a week from today, but I don't expect to have any desire to work/blog/etc. until Monday the 7th. And with that, I'm officially on vacation.

Julie's House

For the last 3 months, Julie has been doing the "flip this house" thing. Today, it went on the market. Click on the image below to see the listing and pictures. She thinks the pictures look best in the 2D mode.

Nice work darlin!

Update: Believe it or not, it's now under contract. Sold in under 8 hours!

Raible Road Trip #10

Raible Road Trip #9 was to the cabin last year for the 4th of July. This year, we're taking it a whole new level. Going to the cabin for the 4th is a good time, but the huckleberries aren't ripe yet. This year, we've decided to go the first week in August instead.

OSCON is at the end of July and visiting Portland in late July is awesome. My parents have agreed to watch the kids during OSCON, and July doesn't want to travel to Oregon (she's rather enjoy some "down time"). Because of all this, I've come up with quite the travel plan for Raible Road Trip #10.

On Saturday, July 22nd, James Goodwill and I leave from Denver and drive to Salem, Oregon - where my parents live.

According to Google Maps, this trip should take about 21 hours. We expect to arrive in Salem sometime Sunday night. We'll hang out in Oregon until Tuesday morning. Then I'm flying back to Denver to pick up the kids and return to Portland the same day. On Wednesday and Thursday, I'll hit up OSCON and its festivities. Thursday's Geronimo Live event followed by the Oregon Brewers Festival on Friday should be a lot of fun.

On Sunday, my parents, the kids and I will be heading to The Cabin.

Julie's flying into Spokane, WA that Sunday, so we'll pick her up on our way and hopefully arrive at the cabin sometime Sunday afternoon. From there, we'll all enjoy a week of relaxing, huckleberry picking and good family fun. We'll head back to Denver late that week, spending a night in Yellowstone Park along the way.

Julie thinks I'm nuts for all the driving I'll be doing on this trip. She calculated it up tonight and it's something like 46 hours. I'm pumped about the whole idea and can't wait for it to begin. I love road trips, especially when doing them with family and friends.

Update: As Sanjiv mentions in the comments, Yahoo Maps has a much better representation of this trip.

Total Distance: 2920.6 miles, Total Travel Time: 48 hours 8 mins