With family and friends regularly visiting Facebook, Susi and I have also begun posting there. Click for Susi or Dave. We regularly post photos and stories about our travels and other adventures. See you there!

About a year ago I upgraded to a “smart” phone; last month I crunched it in a bicycle crash; and all throughout I have become increasingly concerned about how easily it could be lost or stolen. This vulnerability, amplified by the recent Target credit card snafu, drove me to tighten up security for my online identity. I’m feeling more relaxed as a result, and I encourage you to read on and learn how you can do the same.

As explained in this Zonealarm article, access to your email—a likely by-product of cell phone loss—could enable a thief to use the “Forgot password” procedures to gain access to many important websites. So, Read on →

A friend recently passed along an informative video that taught me a lot about the third amendment to the US Constitution, which, I admit, I’ve not thought about in a very long time. Unfortunately, it did little to address other more important questions. The main premise is that we citizens need to be ready and able to defend ourselves from harm that our government might potentially inflict upon us. I would suggest, however, that most people feel far more threat from other directions. Read on →

I’m thankful to my brother-in-law Tom for passing along an interesting article about stagnant income growth titled Wage Woes. It took me a while to work through it all, and I’m glad I did. I too have been worried about the growing income and wealth gap, and it’s good to see some solid analysis. I generally agree with the thrust of this article, and I learned plenty from it as well. I especially agree with the idea that longer-term structural issues are what really matter versus business cycle variation.

As an aside, it is, always good to see someone else rail about the negative effect of the uncertainty caused by our Congress of the past few years, and to even put some data around that!

The one thing in the paper that I question is the correlation between income growth and transfer payments. The next few paragraphs outline my response. Read on →

Plan B after the weather killed our trip from Homer to Katmai (see Susi’s posts Gone… and Grounded…) was a drive north to Talkeetna where we could fly toward Denali and land on Ruth Glacier. Who was to know there are clouds in this part of Alaska too?

After Wednesday morning’s flights were cancelled, Susi and Ben drove 60 miles to see if they might get a glimpse of Mt. McKinley only to be met by even less visibility and a bit of rain. We spent the afternoon doing computer work until the sun popped out and I enjoyed a lovely bike ride along the railroad tracks. Ben and I tried to drown our sorrows at the Denali Brewing Company, but even that didn’t work as neither of us really felt like drinking more than the samples of their beers—many of which were excellent!

Déjà vu Thursday morning, with lots of waiting around and admiring flowers until the flight service could determine whether they were flying or not. Everything was a bit more complicated and slower because a citywide power outage knocked out the computers.

We finally got word about 9:30 that Denali was socked-in once again, our third miss in as many swings. Though we seemed to be striking out at flying on this trip, one option still remained, and even gave Ben the chance to be pilot!

We enjoyed a gloriously warm, sunny Sunday in Victoria, where the wharf was jammed with locals and tourists on this first warm weekend of spring. Sidewalk vendors offered the usual array of trinkets and caricatures, and street performers grabbed our attention with sleight of hand, juggling and comedy. The surprising finale had Dave riding a trike while wearing a flaming helmet! Check out Terry’s photos and see Dave defy danger by riding between the juggler’s legs. What fun!

As Susi notes in her blog post, Scenic envy, the views around Victoria were stupendous. Butchart Gardens were in glorious bloom with tulips, and Parry Bay made a fantastic frame for the Olympia mountains to the south. Check out the 05-05 Victoria album to get a taste of the beauty.

Speaking of south, Seattle was also fun, and you can see a few pictures from there in the 04-28 Seattle album.

Speed bumps? On a walking path? Really?

Well, maybe not. But that sure is what they look like!

These shots were taken on the Larch Mountain Trail at Multnomah Falls Recreation Area along the Columbia River between Oregon and Washington. Of course, the yellow lines really mark spots in the trail that have been uplifted by tree roots. But a cynic like me can’t help but see those unruly little feet and immediately comment on our government’s tendency to be way to helpful at times!

I haven’t posted in a while, so I’ll point out a number of recent photo albums:

04-12 Monterey

04-13
Asilomar

04-14
Ocean Cove

04-18 Redwoods

04-19 Redwoods

04-22 Tillamook

04-24 Multnomah

04-25 Portland

I guess we hit Joshua Tree National Park at a pretty special moment, as the trees are at a blooming peak. NPR station KPPC in Los Angeles used five of my photos to illustrate their story Joshua trees in the Southern California desert are in ‘once-in-a-lifetime’ bloom. You can see the rest of my shots from that day in the 04-06 Joshua Tree album.

This climate also seems to nurture plein air painters, as we found out when Susi and I visited Point Lobos State Reserve just south of Monterey. With the 2nd annual Plein Air Convention opening tomorrow, the park was crawling with them. You can see some, along with a few pretty ocean vistas and huge cypress trees in my 04-09 Point Lobos album.