What is On Jeffs' Mind

Over the weekend, I was at the annual Edmonton Indycar race,  and had a great time. The weather this year was pretty decent, maybe a little to sunny for my liking, since I sunburn easy, but the temperatures were pretty manageable. In the past, some of the weekends have been very hot, with temperatures in the mid to high 30′s, but this year, saturday was the hot day in the high 20′s, and the other two days were mid 20′s.

They had changed the grandstand layout this year. Due to the promoter Northlands cutting back on expenses, they did away with our turn one grandstand, and replaced it with additional RV parking. I will say, I was disappointed, as I really liked watching the race from that area. Our new grandstand was behind the pits, and we had a good view of the middle of the track, but I would prefer to be on a corner where some action happens. Some new promoters will be taking over the race next year, so not sure what they will do in regards to grandstand configuration, but hopefully maybe we get a chance to move to one in a corner. The RV parking bugs me as well, since that area of the track is blocked off to everyone except the RV owners. That is the section of the road course, and in the past we would go down and watch the cars in the practices, now we cant do that. I think it is short sited, and can see it is only a business decision. I could see where people who buy a general admission ticket, would not see the value in continuing, since there seems to be so few places to watch the race without a gransdtand seat.

I have never really cared for how Northlands have run this event, as each year, the off track entertainment seems to get less and less each year. I am hoping with the new promoters, that the party atmosphere comes back. I suspect Northlands figures since this runs the same time as CapitolEx, that is people want a fun atmosphere, they will go there, but since I don’t plan to, I miss out on what we had in the past. The food selection in thin as well, with not much to really choose from. You have your Hotdogs,  Hamburgers and Pizza, but not much else. A few specialized booths, but for the most part, the food selection is limited. As expected, the food prices are expensive, which I would be fine with, if there was more selection. But I can see, where bringing a family to this, would be a major outlay of money. As a simple hotdog and drink is going to cost around 10 dollars, so not family/budget friendly pricing.

I have always been and will be a big Champcar fan, so it has been hard to accept this new Indycar series, as the cars are inferior to the Champcar. One more year of the current configuration of car, and then they will go back to a Turbocharged car, and a chassis that is more suited to a variety of tracks, and not just Ovals. I am not really digging the proposed chassis, but hoping that the car will be more racy on tracks like Edmonton. I guess when I actually see one, I will have a better idea on how I feel. The current form of Indycar does nothing for me, we go through the paddocks, which is cool, but the cars are ugly to my eye, and underwhelming since they are 3 seconds slower on this track then the Champcar. But I was happy to see, with the new Indycar branding, and the IRL branding going out the door, that all the garish IRL tradmarks and branding are gone from around the track. I guess being a Champcar fan, I found the branding to be more appealing, and this new Indycar branding seems to be a step in that direction.

The race was alright, some controversy at the end, with Helio Castroneves being black flagged at the end of the race, and a surprise winner in Scott Dixon. Will Power had been pretty dominate in the race, but had lost the lead to Helio Castroneves a little earlier, and was blocked by Castroneves when attempting to pass. At the end of the race, Castroneves stormed the flag stand in anger, and provided some post race fireworks. Paul Tracy had a good run for the day, finishing in 6th, after starting so deep in the field. But watching this race, it really showed how much faster the Penske and Ganassi cars were over the rest of the field. Hopefully with the new Chassis, it will level the playing field out a bit more in the future. Simona Di Silvestro had a good qualifying, but unfortunately got bumped, and then problems with the car later on, but she looked very quick, and if not for the problems, would have had a good finish.

The Indy Lites race was alright, a bit of a parade at times, and only a handful of cars. We skipped the Canadian Tire race, as it seems like the same old same old each year, and without Andrew Ranger in the field,  we were not interested. I guess from that standpoint, we are casual fans, as we only seem to watch if certain people are in the race. The day before they had the Northern Alberta sports car race, it was fun to watch, and saw some good drives by a few.

I have some to the conclusion during the weekend, that at some point it would be nice to be a person who can go into restricted areas around the track. At times, it felt, like me the race ticket buying fan, that I help pay for this event, but a lot of times I am spending time looking at more privileged people from behind a fence. A race event is really a dichotomy of a class system, as there are areas for VIP’s that the rest can only watch from afar. Companies the sponsor cars or the series, seem to have people who get some pretty nice access to different areas of the track. I was watching the Pit lane from behind a fence, and noticed a bunch of people strolling up and down the lane. But for the common fan, you can buy a pit access pass, but it really in not pit access, as you are behind a fence, really on a few feet in front of the rest of the general public. To me, that access is a sham to sell, as they sell it as pit access, but it is not, but there are still non race team people strolling up and down the real pit lane. Maybe someday I can go to a race, and be able to walk into theses fenced off areas. But sadly to me, I notice more and more each year all the places that is restricted to me, and some of those places offer a good view of the track, and their is less for the person who actually buys a ticket.

Fun weekend, looking forward to next year, hopefully it will be better

Tags: Champ car, Edmonton Honda Indy, IndyCar

It has been a real long time since I have made a post. Life the last few months has been a bit unexpected at times, but I think it is starting to get more predictable, or at least I am getting better at how I handle it. I am going to be on the lookout for some cool things to blog about. Also, I will be putting in some more effort on my Collecting Podcast very soon, my basement is nearly completed, and I have a few days off coming up soon, so I can set things up a bit more in my basement to facilitate it.

From looking at the control Panel, looks like their is an update for the wordpress software I am using, so I guess I should update that, looks like a bit of a release as jumping up a number, so I guess there might be some changes coming soon on the layout. Not sure what they are, but I guess I will find out after the update.

The Annual Edmonton Indy Car race is coming up soon, so I will probably have something to say about that. Will lie if I say I am pumped for it, as I still find the racing package to be underwhelming, and from all reports, still have a nother season to go until their is any updates. But I will put a post in about the weekend.

A few weeks back, had a busy music weekend. On Saturday, went to see Iron Maiden, and they were great. This time around, they played songs mostly off of their last few CD’s, so it was cool to hear songs I had never heard live. They were touring in support of their latest CD called The Final Frontier, even though it is not released yet. On Sunday I went to see Star Wars in Concert. A great experience, and I really enjoyed it, cool experience, I recommend it to anyone who is a fan of Star Wars.

Tags: IndyCar, Iron Maiden, Star Wars in Concert

I have really been enjoying Hockey lately. Last Friday I went to the Edmonton Oilers game with my brother, they lost to the Dallas Star, but the game was entertaining enough. Actually the Oilers have yet to win in 2010 and the worst team in the league. I am not sure what it is but I am enjoying the games quite a bit. Maybe it is the race for last place in the league is thrilling, or watching all the new ways the team can lose, or maybe since the season is done, just doesn’t matter and can just watch the game for what it is, and not be concerned about wins. My wife doesn’t really under stand, and gets upset at me if I turn an Oilers game on, she was giving me strange looks as I was watching the Oilers get run over by the Chicago Black Hawks. On Thursday I was watching the Oilers play the St. Louis Blues, I was enjoying the game, but had to step away to do some work, and alas the Oilers Lost. Saturday will be a big game, the Calgary Flames are in town, lately they have been as woeful as the Oilers have, so it will be interesting to see who comes out with the win. The battle of Alberta takes on a bit of a new meaning.

Formula 1 teams are starting to launch their cars for 2010. So far it looks like there have been Launches for Ferrari and McLaren and a livery reveal for Mercedes. Both Mercedes and McLaren are going with a silver paint scheme, and of course Ferrari has its traditional red. I must say the McLaren looks very stylish, the Shark Fin on the back of the car gives it a different look then the Ferrari which does not. I always think it is interesting the production the teams put into these launches. Way different then in Indycar, where the only news lately is that Tony George is finally gone after all the irreparable damage he has caused, and who is not going to be showing up this season instead of who will. Check out the launch pictures here

Also, here is a cool Video from Redbull

Tags: Edmonton Oilers, Formula 1, IndyCar

Yay

Today we got an extra hour do to Day Light Savings Time. So I spent it not being overly productive. There is a few more things I can do in the backyard, but I will save that for some other day. Well, unless it snows, then Cest la vie. I need to start priming the basement walls for painting, but I think that will be a project for next weekend. There are a few boxes of books and CD’s that I should unpack, so I might work on that. It might be alright as well as I can flip through them a bit and look at them, since they are mostly Star Wars and Star Trek books. I also like Organizing my CD’s, call me OCD, but I like to put them in Order of release and Artist.

I still have a bit of TV recorded to catch up on, this morning I watched the final Formula 1 race from Abu Dhabi. Real cool looking track, some interesting racing near the end for second, but for the most part it was the locale that was interesting to me. Some of these F1 tracks look like something out of a Video game. The one things I really love about Formula 1 is the in car cameras, with my TV and HD, you really do get to see the excitement of being in one of those cars. I love it every time they cut to one of those cameras. I wish every car was mounted with one, and someday maybe have a channel or feed devoted strictly to those. Just really great stuff. After that I watched the last half of the Nascar race from Talledega, Typical plate racing, with a few big wrecks at the end. Looks like Jimmy Johnson pretty much has the championship wrapped up again. I don’t watch a lot of Nascar races, but things like Talledega get me watching. Maybe partly as waiting for the big wreck, but also reminds me of my online racing sim days, and all the laps I put in at Talledega in the Sierra/Papyrus Nascar Racing game. Those were some fun times, and not sure how many online races I did at Talledega, but it was by far the one I raced the most. I just got Forza 3 the other day for my X-Box 360, so over the winter months, looking forward to putting in some time with that. 3 Nascar races left, Texas is up next, but will skip that as don’t care for that track. Will watch Phoenix, as I like that track, and reminds me of my Online Sim days as I had a big Victory at Phoenix.

Days is moving away, so I should get to something else. I picked up reading again, and maing some good progress on the Star Trek book I am reading. I will have to go to the book store and get a few more books, and hopefully I can get back on pace to at least 1 book a month.

A quote from Calvin and Hobbes on Weekends, I pretty much believe this.

“Weekends don’t count unless you spend them doing something completely pointless.”

Tags: Calvin and Hobbes, Formula 1, Forza 3, Nascar, Star Trek, Star Wars, X-Box 360

It is nice to get out and see things, but it is always nice to come home.

Last week I was in Ottawa for some training for work. It was a nice trip, nothing eventful really happened, everything seemed to come off without a hitch. The training was interesting enough, as I took a course on Open SSO from Sun. I did not know anything about this software before I left, but have a much better idea of it now and how it fits in to the Enterprise workspace. I did reaffirm as well, that I dont think I ever want a job as a Unix Sysadmin, as the long command line commands really challenge my rather limited typing skills. I have limited knowledge of Unix, so at least it was nice to learn a bit more about it, but I think at the end of the day, I prefer working on Windows systems.

It had been a very long time since the last time I was in Ottawa, I had gone on a family vacation back in the early 80′s, so it was almost like going some place new for me. It was an interesting city, and since it is our Nations Capitol, it had a mix of really old buildings and more modern office towers. The downtown core where I stayed seemed very busy during the weekdays, the streets narrow at times, and lots of people going about their days. The evenings, in the part of downtown I was staying, it cleared out pretty fast. When I arrived on Sunday, I actually thought the town was shut down, as I walked the streets looking for a place to eat, and could not find anything. Later I learned, that just past the Parliament buildings, there was a market area with a lot of restaurants. I was able to make it over there later in the week, and it was interesting.

The first few days I found the weather a bit humid, and found myself gasping for air a few times. It probably was not all that humid, but coming from a dry place like Edmonton, I notice any little bit of humidity. The Hotel I stayed at was ok, though I am not sure if I would stay there again if I went back to Ottawa. Like most Hotels, the Lobby and reception area is very nice, but the rooms are not as nice. There were a few complaints I had about the room, as the window never really shut properly, the rooms were not very sound proof from what was outside of them, and the fan in my room never stopped running. The Internet access was really good, though probably too good as I ended up doing more work in the evenings then I had originally had planned.

I got home on Friday, and felt really nice to be home. On Saturday I went for Dim Sum with friends, and then after that Dave, Tao Tao and I went to see Surrogates. I thought the movie was ok, but nothing really overly special, the concept of the movie was interesting enough, and could see society possibly going that way. In the evening I played cards at Paul’s house. but in the end Jason won. Sunday was a nice relaxing day, I watched the F1 race from Singapore and then the last 100 laps of the Nascar race.

It is nice to be home, looking forward to this upcoming week finishing up as then I will be on Vacation for 2 weeks. I am debating on maybe adding another week to my Vacation to make it 3 as I really feel I need a break. Want to get started on some renovations and put some work in some fun type projects.

Tags: Dave, Edmonton, F1, Jason, Nascar, Ottawa, Paul, Tao tao, Travel

Been awhile since my last post. Tao tao’s mom has made it back to China after her stay, and her trip was fairly smooth. Things are starting to get back to normal as summer winds down. Today was a nice day, in that I spent it doing yard work. It has been a few years since I have really did any yard work. The townhouse had a small yard, and the only work in that yard was pulling weeds. The yard in my new house is bigger with a lawn to maintain. The lawn is not in very good shape, so it is going to be a bit of a project to bring it to a better condition, and probably will take a few years. But it was nice to get out there and do some work today in the yard. After I sat on my deck for a little while, it was nice, even though stormy weather was rolling in.

My friend Dave dropped by on Friday, as he had something to show me. He had just bought himself a Motorcycle, and he was quite happy about it. The bike was in great shape and from the sounds of it got a good deal on it. About 7 years ago Dave had a horrible accident on his previous Motorcycle. Well driving over to my house in the city, he was cut off and ended up slamming into the back of the car. He was thrown from the bike and badly injured. He was taken to the hospital with a leg injury. After examination the Doctors never could figure out the problem with Daves leg, and they had to cut it open to relieve the swelling. Dave was in the hospital for quite some time, and then was off work for around 6 months as well.  Dave was fortunate that he did not lose his leg, since the doctor nearly sent him home originally thinking his leg was only swollen, not for his persistence at the time, things could have been much worse.

Motorcycles are not for me, but I admire Dave for getting another one. It had been 7 years since Dave had rode one, and he had talked about it off and on over the years. Finally he decided it was something he enjoyed and was missing it, so he got it again. I think it is great for him to get the bike, many would have never gone back after an accident like he had, but he did. I admire him for that.

This morning I woke up and watched the Formula 1 race from Valencia. It is the second year for this race, and I must say I really enjoy it. It is a street circuit which is my favorite, but also very picturesque, with the cars racing by the ocean and even over a bridge. Ruebens Barichello won the race, and it was a very popular win as it has been 5 years since his last Victory. Those 5 years were spent on some very bad Honda F1 teams. Barichello is the oldest driver in the F1 series, and even him having a drive this season was pretty much last minute. All the rumours at the end of last year was that he was out of F1, replaced by a younger driver. Then in the offseason, Honda, the team he raced for pulled out of F1. The team became Brawn GP, but there was still talk that he would not be back as maybe a younger driver with money might take the seat. But at the last minute he was given the ride for 2009. Brawn was dominant at the start of the season, but that was all Jensen Button. Barichello was the slower car on the team, and all the attention was given to Button. There were even a few races, where Barichello was ahead of his teammate, but due to team strategy, they were able to maneuver Button ahead of him, much to his displeasure. The past few Grand Prixs, the Brawn Team started to fade, but today, Barichello was really on it, out showed his team mate by a lot, and was very solid in the race. I am not his biggest fan, but I do appreciate the Victory, and the determination for Barichello to push to get back to the top spot on the podium. At points in the last few years and even this season, a win must have felt a million miles away.

So this weekend has got me to think about my resiliency lately. Things at work have been really tough lately, and it has gotten me down. I seem to have fallen into going with the current instead of trying to stear myself a bit better in the direction I would like to go. We all have hardships, and sometimes it takes quite a long time to bounce back, or reach what we want in life. I have to keep reminding myself, sometime you get pushed down, but if you hang in there, things work out. It might not be immediate, but it will come. I am hoping I can try and keep myself a bit more focused on work, and not allow myself to get swept away with apathy for the job and company. Those are both only temporary, and just one chapter in my life. I just need to tap into some resilient spirit that I know I have.

Tags: Brawn GP, Dave, Formula 1, Honda F1, Jensen Button, Ruebens Barichello, Tao tao, Yard Work