Queue Jeopardy theme music.

This morning I was cleaning up my unread RSS feeds and came across an announcement that the next Indiana Jones movie started filming this week. The exciting news that there will definitely be another Indiana Jones film, was overshadowed by the memory of the best movie ever made - Raiders of the Lost Ark. Maybe the release of Raiders was just perfectly timed with my youth, or maybe Indiana Jones was the best character ever, or maybe frantic run that Harrison Ford makes when being chased by a ten foot boulder made for the best opening scene ever, or maybe if aliens visited Earth and could only take one thing back to their home world, it would be a copy of the Raiders of the Lost Ark DVD.

I know this has been done ad nauseam, but give me your best shot - what movie is better than Raiders of the Lost Ark?

I have never found documentation to be an enjoyable part of software development, but rather a nuisance and hassle. Why? Two reasons.

First - my experience with larger organizations is that documentation requirements often bury great ideas by sucking up resources that should be spent prototyping, and always being a step behind the latest ideas and solutions flowing between the minds of the people involved in a project.

Second - Word, Power Point and Visio, the most commonly used tools for software documentation, are not agile tools. I’m not saying they aren’t good tools, I’m saying they are not suitable for an agile, collaborative software development process.

Enter startup mode. Purchasing applications for an office of less than 10, on a startup budget, led me to put the company on Google Apps earlier in the year - despite the beta status (and the beta bugs). It was free, and it gave us email, calendar, storage, docs and spreadsheets all for free (it’s now $50 per user per year as of last month - still a bargain).

Little did I realize at the time, but the decision to move to Google Apps would start a change in my perspective on documentation. What used to be a chore that chased the development process; started to transition to a task that lead the development process. But Google did not do it alone. The ability to collaborate on docs and spreadsheets in real time from multiple locations - with fellow employees and contractors - was awesome, but it is still difficult to communicate software architecture using just docs and spreadsheets.

That changed sometime in May when I was making some changes to my basement remodel diagram on Gliffy, and noticed that they added the ability to collaborate. Fast forward to today - at one point half the ScribeStorm employees (plus one contractor) were online, working on a number of documents together, in real time, between five different locations. And the beauty is, it not only works, but everyone involved is excited it works and doing what we all wished we had done on dozens of projects in the past - quickly gather everyone’s ideas and build clarity and focus on the project, early.

daughter: Daddy, how old are you?

me: 38.

daughter: How old is mommy?

me: 40.

daughter: Wow, you’re a lot older than mommy. I want to count to how old you are.

me: Ok.

daughter: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 15 . . . how old are you?

me: 38

daughter: Ok, count with me and tell me when we get there.

both of us: 1 2 3 … 20 21 22

daughter: Is this the age that you are in?

me: No.

both of us: 23 24 25 … 30 31 32

daughter: Did we pass it yet?

me: No, we’re close though.

both of us: 33 34 35 36 37 *THIRTY-EIGHT*

daughter: (big smile)

Yes I know - I am obsessed with over-sized vehicles. I hate them almost as much as mosquitos. But here I go again . . .

I think back to just 5 years ago when friends (people who know how to push my buttons) would send me fake photos of semi trucks made into SUVs. Before I realized they weren’t real, I sit there in shock, wondering what this world is coming to. Now I receive the same photos and they are real. Like this set I received the other day:

What is this world coming to? I’m going to have to ride my bike to work several times this month to cleanse myself of this pornography.

There’s a story circulating around the town, being told mainly during play dates and gatherings of moms who have recently lost their free time due to the summer “vacation”. It goes like this:

A group of moms are at Water Works park. Some of the babies and toddlers are naked.

Ok so nothing shocking here. It’s hot, there’s sand and water, there’s babies and toddlers. It should be unnecessary to point out that there’s nudity as well.

At some point the fuzz shows up and tells the mothers to get their children dressed.

And that is all I know . . .

What I don’t know is - did the cop(s) take action due to a complaint from someone else at the park (a cell phone call placed to 911 - “naked babies loose in the park, come quick!”) or did a cop patrolling the park take action on his own initiative.

Either way, I cannot help but draw the stereotype of a bored small town police officer with nothing better to do than bust toddlers in the nude.

I cannot imagine anyone being offended by a nude baby or toddler. These must be the same people that are offended by - gasp - breast feeding in public!

I’m in the mood for some sort of performance art themed protest in response to this story. For instance, I’m thinking of organizing a play date with the moms in our circle of friends. Have it on a weekend afternoon at Water Works - at peak crowd. Sit back and wait for one of the kids to strip naked. This should take about 10 seconds.

Then, I’ll stand up with my mouth wide open in shock, point to the naked child, and scream as loud as I can, in alarm, “OH MY GOD - A PENIS/VAGINA . . . SOMEONE DIAL 911 NOW!”

I’ve been a Flickr Pro member for roughly two years. Today while uploading photos I noticed I had hit the 1000 mark. That’s an average of about 2 photos per day. I think of the teenagers on Flickr, envious of the digital photo archive they’re building of their lives.

Or consider my daughter, and other kids of Flickr addicts; their childhoods being documented in quality that puts those faded Polaroids to shame.

I need to buy a scanner and make up for lost Flickr time.

This large yellow lego is living outside my office door lately. I’m tempted to put out a bowl of Lincoln Logs for it to eat. Every morning I find it in a different spot within five feet of my office front door. I think it is dying. Poor large yellow lego: people get these things when they’re small but don’t realize that it is a big responsibility to take care of a lego.

I’ve had many great things to say about the food in Fairfield. It’s one of the main reasons I moved to Fairfield - access to good food. Having said that, I am about to say something negative about my food experience in Fairfield. Here it comes . . .

The food at Vivo sucks.

Yes I know, it’s a small town and if I don’t have anything nice to say I should say it quietly over the fence to my neighbor.

And to my barber.

And to the cashier at Walmart.

Anyway . . .

Last weekend my child was at her grandmother’s house for the weekend and my wife and I were in search of a fine dining experience. Vivo seems to be the fine dining choice around here (the only choice I know of) and even though we have been there before and both had aweful meals, we made excuses for them and ended up there again, last Friday night.

We shared some bruschetta. I ordered the filet and a glass of Grigio. She ordered the Salmon and a water. The bruschetta was composed of dry and hard slices of bread (think large, flat stale crouton) with a container of diced tomatoes ON THE SIDE. I got the impression that the bread had not been toasted, but was actually from a package; a quick and easy way to serve crunchy bread.

[Update: “Jonathan”, the former Appetizer Chef who served the Bruschetta, commented (below) that he personally prepared my Bruschetta fresh. He notes that the cup of diced tomatoes is “a compilation of over 15 different ingredients” and that the “crustinis” are made fresh everyday from the table bread. Unfortunately for the diner, all this freshness has no positive effect on the taste.]

The filet was bizarre - while tender, it was completely absent of anything resembling juice. As in, you slice off a peice, and there was no juice to soak up. The meat was dry, but still tender and absent of taste. I spent about 10 minutes consuming the filet, morphing through various puzzled expressions and always eager to try another piece in order to solve the mystery of the dry but tender and tasteless filet. A mystery not at all worth $28.

In the time I ate my meat, my wife had taken one bite of her salmon. I found out why after trying a bite myself. It was way overcooked. Granted most people do not really know how to cook fish - fear of death from under-cooking has ruined many a good fish. But this piece of salmon was absolutely ruined. Not burnt, but again, dry - absent of juice.

Tip to future restaurant owners - juice equals fat equals flavor.

I know someone reading this is thinking I am being too critical, but $150 and two visits later, I beg to differ.

Good news though . . . Saturday evening I found a superior filet not far from town. I’ll post the details later.

Last month United Airlines sent me a letter notifying me that my air miles were going to expire if I did not use them. They were kind enough to point out that I did not have enough miles to fly anywhere, but I did have enough to trade for any number of magazine subscriptions.

I’m not sure why exactly, but I checked the boxes on a number of magazines and sent in the form.

Last night I received my first issue of Details magazine. I admit my ignorance up front about the whole magazine universe - I thought Details was a magazine about Movies and Music. It’s not. It’s basically a gay(er) version of GQ. Not that there is anything wrong with that.

I didn’t get a chance to read my new issue of Details magazine; my wife snagged it and plopped down on the couch, making fun of me with every flip of the page about how gay my new magazine was.

“Oh honey, here’s a great article you’ll enjoy about botox injections to make you look younger and give you that edge at work!”

“Will! Great news for you - pastels are back.”

She’s pretty funny this wife of mine. Anyway, despite making fun of me and my magazine, she was the one on the couch reading it for nearly an hour. Including an article titled “Inside The World Of Fat Sex”.

Now, I’m not the most masculine man to be damn sure, but what the hell is an article about Fat Sex doing in a men’s fashion magazine? It’s like one of those questions on an SAT:

Which of the following does not belong:

1. “Why Your Six-figure Salary Just Isn’t Good Enough”
2. “The Ultimate Gourmet Grilling Guide”
3. “Are You Ready For Botox?”
4. “Inside The World Of Fat Sex”
5. Photo of Orland Bloom