Internet at Sea

Several years ago I had the chance to help bring a 37-foot sailboat back to Los Angeles from Honolulu. As we neared the coast of California, a giant cruise ship passed us in the middle of the night. We had been eating our own cooking for about 2 weeks and not really had the chance to shower. Even though the ship never got closer than a few miles away, it was lit up like a Christmas tree and we could smell the wonderful food on board. Since then I have wanted to do a cruise but worried about all the weight I would gain from a multi-day eat-a-thon.

This year I decided that my wife and I should try to do a cruise. We looked for the shortest and easiest one available just in case we didn't like it. On Friday we flew to Los Angeles and caught an Uber to the Long Beach terminal where we easily boarded the cruise ship: Carnival Radiance. In doing my research I learned that you should make the upgrade to a balcony room if you can afford it, so we did. Then we toured our weekend home waiting for the ship to leave port.

Having never been on a cruise, I didn't know what to expect. No matter how much research I did, I still had questions and so I just waited to get on board to see what the experience would be like. One big question I had revolved around Internet connectivity. We would be sailing over the weekend and being disconnected didn't bother me. Up to 2 days before boarding the ship I had the option of purchasing a discounted Internet package but I didn't think I would need it. Instead I would rely on my mobile phone. It worked well while in port and I could take care of any late-Friday e-mails.

Carnival Cruise line has an app for your phone that they recommended be installed before boarding the ship and so we did. When we got to our room, we connected to the ship's WiFi and let the app know we boarded. It then became our go-to source for information about our cruise. As we left port, I put my phone into airplane mode but kept the WiFi connected as instructed. It didn't take long to realize I could still receive text messages. That allowed me to keep up with family comments even outside the sight of land. In reality that is the only connection I needed during the weekend trip.

On Saturday I sat down next to the pool and saw a couple watching a large smartphone. Naturally I asked about it. They purchased a day-use Internet package so they could watch their favorite college football team play. Carnival has 3 levels of Internet speed you can purchase: Basic, Mid-Level, and Fast-Enough-for-Video-Calls. I'm not sure which package this couple got but it was not fast enough to stream a live football game. I'm glad I didn't need to try and work while on vacation as I am not sure the Internet speeds would have been fast enough for me.

On Sunday we arrived in Ensenada, Mexico and I just took my phone out of airplane mode. T-Mobile immediately sent me a text welcoming me to a new country and telling me that I had free 5GB of data per month along with unlimited calling and texting while in Mexico or Canada. I used my phone to navigate the city and catch up with my kids and their families via FaceTime and phone calls. Once the ship left port, my phone went back into airplane mode.

The Internet connection allowing me to send and receive text messages worked sufficiently well that it is all I needed on my weekend cruise. I think if I had gone for a longer time, I might have purchased a basic package to read my e-mail and stay abreast of important work events. For this vacation, it would have been overkill.

Bicycle Insights

This morning I had a bunch of early meetings and then headed out on my daily bike ride of 16 miles. I didn't mind waiting a bit as the morning started cold and I prefer to ride when the temperature is at least 68 degrees Fahrenheit. While out on my ride I remembered the story of my dad at the beginning of his cycling obsession.

For some reason my dad thought it would be good to take a bunch of boys from Sandy, Utah all the way down to Lake Powell. Naturally he came up with the idea during winter and began training on an indoor bike in his basement. Every day he would watch a little television and pedal at a leisurely pace. When the snow finally melted and he headed out on his first outdoor ride, he went 7 miles. He put two large water bottles on his bike and drank both of them on his short ride. He didn't know how he could ride more than a few miles without carrying gallons of water. Only then did he realize that his indoor training did not have the intensity required to build up conditioning for a 300 to 400-mile bike ride over several days. To make a long story short, he increased his training and made it all the way to Lake Powell with a group of Scouts and their leaders.

Yesterday I had a lazy day and opted to ride indoors instead of outside. Fortunately I usually ride outside and know the level of intensity required to benefit my training goals. Without real-world experience it is difficult to know the right level of training required.

I am currently working on a project with some new software and services. Unfortunately I don't have any of that real-world experience and all I can do is look at documentation and simple examples. I think I have things figured out but I know I need to put my knowledge into practice and test it with real-world scenarios. To do so, I reached out to my technical team and will start working with them to configure the software for our projected use cases. Only then will I know if my book knowledge is enough.

It is Good to be Home

I just got back from 2 weeks of extensive travel and it is good to be home. At the end of August I headed to Los Angeles for work and while the distance is not that far from Salt Lake, I had full-day meetings which can take a lot out of you. Then I flew up to Alaska to spend the Labor Day weekend with my youngest daughter who is an ocean-kayak guide. She had to show us her fitness and ripped our arms off to beat us with them. Then I had to take a red-eye flight back to California for another set of all-day meetings. Once home I didn't have the luxury of sleeping in my own bed as I loaded up my truck and headed to Scott's Peak, which is right above Brighton Ski Area. I spent the night staying up and helping runners participating in the Wasatch 100 Ultramarathon. Needless to say, my internal body clock is just now getting back to normal.

One thing I miss while traveling is access to a second computer monitor. It is always helpful to have a primary working monitor coupled with a second one to put look-up information. For instance I may use my primary monitor for a video meeting and use the second monitor to display information I need during the meeting.

Another thing I miss while on the road is my second computer. While at home I make sure to do work on my Sony-provided laptop and personal things on my desktop computer. Not having that second computer means I am trying to do everything on my work computer. I mostly just read personal e-mail but that means I can't edit videos or write narrations for my YouTube videos. I have one that I am working on right now and wish I could have made progress on it while traveling.

Then there are all the comforts of home that I miss while away. Things like sleeping in my own bed, having access to my full wardrobe, or being able to watch movies in my theater room. Yes it is fun to travel to interesting places but it also feels good to be back home.

My Robot Vacuum is Like a Bad Pet

Every morning I wake up at around 7am and run through my morning routine. That always includes going down to breakfast and doing some light reading. At 8am our robot vacuums wake up and start their 90-minute cleaning cycles. Without fail, if I am reading in the dining room while I finish up my oatmeal, a vacuum will leave the living room and try to clean under my feet. If I try to read in the living room, the beast will stay in that room and annoy me until I go somewhere else. Does that sound familiar to those of you with pets?

Sometimes I will escape to my office which requires going down into the basement. Fortunately robot vacuums can't negotiate stairs and so the one from the main level will stay on there and not try to follow me. That doesn't keep it from annoying me though. Sometimes it will get stuck and call out with an R2D2-like beep asking for rescue. Other times it will get suck up a lamp cord going forward and backward like a small dog trying to dominate its favorite stuffed toy. I didn't think robots could be capable of such lewd behavior.

Today my wife moved the vacuum from the kids'-bedroom level and put it on the master-bedroom level. You wouldn't think there could be much trouble our bad pet could get into. There is. Not long after the robot started doing its thing, it discovered my acoustic-guitar stand. It pushed the stand over, guitar included, which made a slight racket as the guitar neck hit the wall. The vacuum got tangled in the stand and tried to free itself by moving forward and backwards. Once again, it looked like it was humping something while my guitar cried out like it was being molested. I used my foot to nudge the robot off the guitar stand only to have it head back in that direction. I didn't know if I should squirt it with water or just move it to another part of the room. I decided on the latter only to have it head right back to my guitar. I had to move it several times before it got the hint to get back to work.

logically I know the robot vacuums are not sentient beings. That doesn't exempt them from seemingly nefarious behavior though. It makes me wonder if there are behavior classes I can sign my vacuums up for.

Smartphone Magic Tricks

My oldest grandson and I have a great relationship. He is only 6 years old and hasn't yet learned to hate adults yet. Of course it helps that I am one of those grandparents that takes him to Hawaii, Disneyland, and skiing. I talked with my son earlier today and he mentioned his wife is still mad I took my grandson skiing for the first time without her.

I keep a large bag of chocolate chips in my pantry that I will occasionally snack from. This comes from never being able to snack on chocolate chips as a child. All of the chips had to go into the cookie dough. Now that I am older, I don't have that rule and make sure to share generous piles of chocolate chips with all of my grandkids whenever they visit. They like this as do I.

A few years ago, I spent some time talking to my oldest grandson on a video call. I asked him if he wanted some chocolate chips. He was smart enough to know that you can't pass physical objects back and forth through the phone. Fortunately his mom picked up on the trick I was about to perform. She snuck to their pantry and got a handful of chocolate chips and held it discretely under the phone. Then I dropped some chips in front of the camera so it looked like the phone was depositing them into her hand. My grandson was amazed.

I will eventually have to tell my grandson about how I pulled off that trick but he still tells his sister and cousins about how his Grandpa can send chocolate chips through phones.

Movie Review: Gran Turismo

Last night I went and saw an early showing of the new movie from Sony Pictures called Gran Turismo. Now before diving into the review it is only fair that I mention that I spent 11 years at Sony PlayStation which created the video game of the same name and forms the basis for the story of the movie. I currently work for Sony and work directly with Sony Pictures and Sony PlayStation. In other words, I am not an impartial reviewer. That being said, I did not enjoy the Uncharted movie and think most movies derived from video games don't meet expectations. Given that preface, here is my review.

Working for Sony has given me a lot of behind-the-scenes look at Gran Turismo. There have been several virtual meetings where the creators of the movie have shared the journey from the concept of the film through the entire movie-making process. This had me excited to see the finished product even though I have only played about 10 to 20 hours of various versions of the game. Let me correct that, it is not a game, it is a driving simulator.

Several years ago GT Academy was created to take the best drivers of Gran Turismo and see how they would do on a real race track in actual races. The movie is based on that story and how one of those drivers fared. Whenever the creators needed details for the movie, they went back to the true story and incorporated what really happened. This means there are a lot of very accurate details in the movie that are often sensationalized in other based-on-a-true-story films. At the end of the movie they even point out that Jann, the person the story is based on served as the stunt driver for the film.

I found the story interesting and compelling. My wife went to the movie simply to spend time with me yet at the end said that she really enjoyed it. It is always a win when your spouse enjoys the same movie you do. As we pulled into the driveway we both remarked that it had a similar feel to Ford vs. Ferrari. If you enjoyed that movie, you will enjoy Gran Turismo.

My wife and I are fans of David Harbour from his role in Stranger Things as well as Orlando Bloom from the original Pirates of the Caribbean. Both do an excellent job of playing less-than-perfect characters and add to the authenticity of the story. The race tracks throughout the world make excellent supporting cast members as well.

I wish I could say that Sony gave me free tickets to the film or that I could expense the cost. Nope, I paid full price and all of the associated service fees and spent $36 total for 2 people to see the film. I will probably go see it again in the theaters one more time before I add it to my personal film library.

Hopefully the review is somewhat helpful if you are thinking about seeing Gran Turismo. Watching the film made think about playing the game again. Perhaps that is what I will do tonight.

Hurricane Season 2023

Sailors are very aware of hurricane season as none of us want to be caught out in the ocean during one. I've personally been caught in two, both in the Pacific. They are not fun. Unfortunately I have a morbid fascination with hurricanes now and want to know how they are developing out in our oceans.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) or US weather service has a great site to watch as storms form and strengthen. There are 3 tabs on the page that show the Central Pacific, Eastern Pacific, and Atlantic. When a storm first begins to form it is marked with a yellow "X". Hovering your mouse over the X gives you important information about the storm such as intensity and probability of becoming more severe. As it grows in strength, the X goes from yellow to orange to red. Then it progresses through depression, storm, and hurricane icons.

The beginning of hurricane season is in June but is actually very boring and so I didn't start watching the site until July. Even then there is not much going on. The real action begins in August and so I have the site up all day. I watched as Dora went from a probable storm up through a hurricane. I took particular interest because it started where the sailor Donald Lawson got into trouble. The Mexican Coast Guard kept talking about how weather contributed to hampering the search for the missing sailor. Being able to watch the storms build really underscored the difficulty experienced.

Hurricane Katrina happened towards the end of August. Then hurricanes Fiona and Ian that happened last year formed in the middle and end of September. I hope we have a very boring hurricane season this year but now is the time to start watching.