Holy crap!

Today is the day that cute was born.

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Some pictures

I spent the day taking pictures of a cluster down in Tukwila. Getting their seriously sucked, the directions failed when half the local roads were closed for construction and their were no detours. It took 15 to 20 minutes to find the damn facility becuase of all the construction! The roads don't make a nice grid down there, rather they are all going at different angles, some turn in to highways, some curve around, basically not the kind of roads that make it easy to make your own detour if you've never been to your destination before. I saw several other cars driving back and forth over that period too, so clearly I wasn't the only person lost. Once I process the pictures I'll post a few of them, but mostly they are for promotional material at work.

For making it past the jump, you get a special treat. By popular demand (okay, only 2 people asked, but since I only have 4 people reading my blog that is a huge request!) more Lucy.
Alas, I did not take these pictures on my own.

New Toy

My trusty 18v Craftsman drill had its final battery die on Tuesday. A trip to Sears revealed that they no longer sell the battery I need in the store, it is only available via the special parts department. That's no good, my 1st battery had died a year ago so I had no backup, and I needed to screw some stuff in 'now'.
The 18v "limited anniversary edition" (I think it got the special name because it was the first 18v kit they had) drill & light kit was actually pretty nice. Adjustable angle light, two batteries, a smart charger with multiple status lights, a dual speed variable speed drill (there is a 2 speed switch on the top for either high speed or high torque, and you can also change the speed within the range set by the switch by how far you hold the trigger) with 18 levels of ratcheting action, a keyless chuck, and two slots to hold driver bits.

Well, the untimely death of my backup battery and the lack of battery at Sears meant it was time to upgrade. It is really hard to find a nice cordless drill/driver! They are either low power, really heavy, or have some other weird reason that I didn't like them.

I finally found the DeWalt DC759 18v cordless 'heavy duty' drill/driver. It was smaller (lengthwise and weightwise) than the 18v Makita I was looking at, and seems like a great little kit. It is actually shorter (lengthwise) than the Craftsman, so that will help in some weird spots I've had to drill. I don't like that it only has one slot to hold a screwdriver bit though. It holds a reversible straight/Philips bit rather than separate ones. This is a problem because the separate ones my Craftsman could hold were the type that I could lock in to the quick-change adaptor I mount in the chuck (allows quick swapping between various bits without unlocking and aligning). I'll replace the dual-sided bit with a single Philips quick change bit and if I need to do straight slots I'll just have to hold it separately. It also didn't come with a wrist strap, though it has a slot for one so I'll need to add one. It is very handy to be able to let the drill dangle from your wrist while you are manipulating something on top of a ladder.

The 18v battery system is compatible with a number of different DeWalt cordless tools, so I'm not going to be stuck with dozens of different types of batteries - so that's good. I do have a small cordless screwdriver that uses a separate battery, but it is a very small unit, so there is no chance for something like that to share a battery with everything else anyway.

Kung Fu Panda

The title says it all... There is a movie about a panda that learns Kung Fu.

The panda is Jack Black.


I don't understand why you aren't already trying to pre-order this.

Jackie Chan is the Kung Fu master.


Why are you still reading this instead of searching the internet for it?

Angelina Jolie is the tiger.


I don't see this on your Amazon Wish List yet.

Lucy Liu is the snake.


Why are you still here?

Here is the plot description from the IMDb:
A CG-animated comedy about a lazy, irreverent slacker panda, Po (Voiced by Jack Black), who must somehow become a Kung Fu Master in order to save the Valley of Peace from a villainous snow leopard, Tai Lung. Set in the legendary world of ancient China, this is the story of Po, our unlikely hero, who enters the rigid world of Kung Fu and turning it upside down. Po ultimately becomes a Kung Fu hero by learning that if he believes in himself, he can do anything.