You may be on to something. I think it will be a smash hit as long as it is inter-changeable and available in various colors.

Pretty sweet pic. That thing has taken a beating. I can only imgine how deep those craters are. Kinda looks like a barnacle or a hornets nest.

"It's good to be King!"

Ahh to have an opposable thumb and no responsibilities.

this is a good picture i am using it for my applied art and design course i am doing

"It's almost impossible to take shots with a point and shoot..."

Ok so now your too good to use a common man's digital camera?

You clipped off the sentence. With the darkness of a concert, it's almost impossible to get a crisp shot. I took over 100 and maybe 10% turned out. With the DSLR, I could adjust the shutter speed and sensitivity to pick up more light manually. Of course being closer to the stage would have helped too!

I got to see Pearl Jam last year up in Vancouver. My friend has been in the fan club forever so we were in row 10 center stage. It was my first time seeing them live and man was it awesome. I like their setup, just gear and them on stage with a packed stadium.

Yes, it's a very simple stage setup, which is really nice. I'm also in the fan club, but unfortunately waited many years to actually join it. So that's why I'm in the stands. It's really cool that Pearl Jam reserves the floor and side seats for fan club members. Not only do you get people who want to be there, in priority order, you also get to sit by people who are fans, and the band is closest to people who are most fanatical. Makes for a great show all around. Best thing is that with fan club tickets, you don't use Ticketmaster, and you also are allowed only 2 per person WITH ID at will call. This prevents all the good seats at the show from being bought by scalpers.

It was really unbelievably nice weather, that weekend. Thanks to Jon for the tour of Xbox HQ and the Mongolian stir fry...

Maybe it's my screen but what's up with the change in contrast on left most 25% of that last pic.

I bet they were taking the pictures our of their corner office and that corner window.

Indeed, it was the corner window. That, or a bad texture map.

Sorry about the weak shots - they're taken indoors, so the colors and glass reflection dulls the pictures.

I also find Google Earth strangely addictive. I’m going to resist your island challenge however as I’m afraid of the amount of time it will suck.

Yeah, I "drove" from San Francisco to Seattle by clicking and dragging (using the satellite images setting) and now my hand hurts.

You forgot to pull over at the rest stops. Serves you righ, you know you can't click through the whole trip in one shot.

Those rest stops are super dangerous! Have you seen the characters that hang out there? Definitely smart of Paul to just tough it out and go direct.

Now seriously... no one even guesses the first one?

Paris, Notre Dame

Correct - the first is Ile de la Cité in Paris. It actually connects via bridge to a more quaint and exclusive island Ile St Louis, home to Berthillon ice cream and other very nice restaurants.

Second island I reckon is Murano in Venice. Haven't got Google Earth, but I recognise it because I've been there - ha!
The reason I haven't got it is because I've just watched my collegues waste two hours straight on it...

Easy...Paris :-)

The guess of the second one is close but not quite...

Bugger, well - it's next to Murano then.

Buy your own island. Awesome.

Some nice shots.

That pile of dirt brings back bad memories. My house was built in a valley that was once fertile farm land, yet when I moved in I had to buy a dump truck full of top soil just to be able to grow a lawn. I'm pretty sure they just sold me back the dirt that was originally there in the first place.

What's with all the "flowers" and "outdoors"?

Anyone up for some Counter-Strike?

Nice. I see crazy stuff on the road all the time. I never seem to have a camera handy enough though. Probably for the best.

For anybody who might have been thinking it was dangerous for J to take pictures while driving on the freeway, think again. Anything that can distract J from the cars around him is actually better for everybody on the road. If he wasn't preoccupied with looking for a good photo op, he would have been laying on his horn weaving in and out of traffic like a madman and showing up at his destination in a bad mood because he just had to put up with all the horrible drivers on the road.

I don't weave. I'm just the most optimal driver there is. I just want people to pay attention and get out of my way. :-)

Luckyyy! Gosh.

That looks like an RV-4. I too knew a commercial pilot who had one of these. He also knew how to perform aerobatics. Man that was an awesome ride. We did just about every trick in the book. Then he let me take the stick and said, "Ok, try doing a roll." I did loops, rolls, the works. He had a g force meter and said during one of the loops we pulled 3-4g's, which wansn't too bad, but it was only for a few seconds.

You're right, it was sort of like cimson skies.

Droooools....

The first time I ever flew in a plane (1988), was in an ex-girlfriend's brother's cessna. There was this thing he did with the wing flaps that caused the plane to drop really quickly for a short distance. He called it "The Elevator". Quite accurate, and completely scared the crap out of me.

Wheelson - close, it's an RV-8. And looking at the specs, it can apparently easily do 200mph. Neither of us was about to have me try doing the tricks though!

Oh, you guys will like this. We're both wearing noise cancelling headsets, and after taking off and broadcasting our position, I hear this background music come on, like some 50's music. Turns out, the pilot has hooked his MP3 player into the system so when no one's talking you've got tunes!

When I was flying in Alaska the pilots would plug a tape into the system for the passengers to have a narration about the Juneau ice field as the pilot flew the plane.
When we flew cargo/passengers to cities around Alaska they would plug in a tape of music (not nearly as high tech as MP3) into the same system. The funny thing was, even with great headsets, you had to put ear plugs in, then the head sets and turn the music way up just to hear it in the old DeHavilland Otters (9 cylinder circular engine right in front of you).
Good Times...