Radixhound

... or Burnaby

I love martial arts, and if I’m going to do something for exercise, nothing works as well to get me motivated to go and exercise. I just need to feel like I’m learning and growing and not just strengthening muscle group x and y. The thing about martial arts training is that it’s always offered in the evenings around dinner time or just after dinner. I don’t know how people with families can train at those times.

Wait. I bet they don’t.

... why not in the mornings?

I just don’t get this, really. It seems like a no-brainer that there would be some people interested in training in the morning before they start their day. Here’s what you do: you get up, go to your dojo or whatever, get the oxygen pumping, and start your day. This works for fitness classes. Why can I not find a single martial arts club in my area that has morning classes?

... are you up for it?

There can’t be that many people in the world that love their pillows so much that they are unwilling to get out of bed to start their day off with a bang. What do you think? If you had the opportunity, would you go for some early morning training?

I want to find a group of interested people and approach an instructor about starting some morning training. If you happen to be interested too and live in the Vancouver / Burnaby area… drop me a line! radixhound by way of gmail.com

Are you interested in Jewish History? You are! I have news for you then—there is a new museum that just opened in Vancouver.

I’m sure you are wondering why I’m plugging Jewish history. It’s because they have a cool new website that I implemented using Mephisto. If you are not in the Vancouver area, it might be difficult to pop on over to check out the museum, but you can still check out the website. Eventually they hope to have some of their archives online, but for now they just have an awesome publishing system that is clean and easy to use.

I’m particularly proud of the typography on this site. You may not notice right away, but the second column lines up very nicely with the first column. This can be a bit tricky when you include various sizes of text like the different sizes of headers. I just had to make sure the headers restored the vertical rhythm to normal by using appropriate top and bottom margins. I also created a little image with horizontal lines spaced 15px apart. This gave me a kind of ‘lined paper’ to work with so that I could conceptualize what was going on.

So, even if you aren’t interested in Jewish history, check out the cool site: Jewish Museum

I’m going to blast of a flurry of blogging starting with Ruby on Rails news in Vancouver. Last week I attended a mini workshop on getting started on Rails.

I was amazed to see a room full of people in Vancouver listening to a presentation about Ruby on Rails. It makes sense, since Vacouver was the host of the first ever Rails Conference. There’s just a huge difference in going from being a Rails fanboy gazing through your LCD looking glass at this marvelous world and being actually in and among people who are into Rails.

I didn’t manage to meet any of the people there except for Nathaniel Brown , the presenter, because I had to navigate the maze that was UBC and get back home to my family. Still I hope to meet more of the Vancouver Ruby community and get out there and spread the excitement about Rails.

I haven’t posted on my blog here for a while, but yesterday I got a kick in the pants from Robert Sanzalone. He is a technology evangelist from the Vancouver area. That’s where I live if you are wondering.

I’m taking a course called Successful Contracting and Consulting. Robert delivered a dynamic seminar on technology for a consulting business. He did an excellent job selling everyone on the value of having a website that is a blog. I think everyone drank his killer koolaid right to the dregs on that one.

I thought it was great because I have been a quiet observer of the Internet trends in the past few years and had come to my own conclusion that a blog was really the only way to go. Some might call me slow on the uptake. Thank you for not being one of them. Robert really validated what I had concluded on my own and educated me more deeply on the ‘blogosphere” oh boy what a ride!

What’s my point? I won’t get you to read on… The point is Kudos to Robert. Thanks!