Stephanie and I had the pleasure of going skiing in Whistler back in January. I posted pictures at the time but never got around to blogging about it. Whistler is a ski village in British Columbia north of Vancouver and previous site of the 2010 Winter Olympics. Every time we go skiing I make a mental note of our top ski destinations and the favorites of the past. Whistler now tops the list.  By its size alone it makes most other mountains seem like foothills.

To recount the fuzzy details of the trip six months later would belabor the point, so I will hit the highlights. The ski resort is actually two separate mountains. Blackcomb and Whistler. We stayed at the foot of the Blackcomb mountain in an excellent location with easy access to the slopes and easy access to a hot tub that awaited us at the end of each day.  We were able to stroll down the streets of Whistler at night and view the previous Olympic Park.

I highly recommend Whistler as a future vacation spot for anyone. Don’t let the distance or foreign country intimidate you. It’s much easier to get to than you would think. Keep an eye out for another post coming soon, much more exciting than a half year’s old news.

Of course, after I had been riding for a couple of months, I started getting a little too confident. I often enjoy riding along the Mississippi river from Mud Island down to the Memphis-Arkansas bridge.  Going approximately 20-25 mph downhill around a blind curve, there was a patch of unlevel concrete I hit while turning. The concrete grabbed my front tire, turning it completely perpendicular and catapulting me over the handlebars. Don’t worry the bike was okay and I was wearing a helmet. However, the brunt of the fall was absorbed on outstretched hands. I immediately knew I had done more damage than just a sprain.  It was a painful 2 mile return the house at a snails pace.

Fast-forward 7 weeks, four of which were spent in a thumb spica cast, and things are 90% back to normal and I’m back in the O.R. doing what I love. The ironic part is that approximately 6 hours prior to the accident, one of the attending surgeons gave a grand rounds on finances and talked about the importance of disability insurance. I still haven’t gotten back on the saddle yet, but probably will soon. The ‘ol Cannondale is hanging in the garage waiting to get back on the trails.

There’s a number of ways to do this.  You can buy an expensive dedicated macro lens like this one. The difference in this lens is the focal length, or the distance in which the light converges on to you cameras sensor. Or you can do what I do and use you existing zoom lens with a Macro filter set. These have different rings of varying power to  turn you lens into a macro lens very economically. For instance my canon lens can normally only focus on an object as close as 5 feet, however, when you slap one of these on there you’ll be able to focus on an object only a couple of feet away with a large amount of zoom. Note that both of these methods will shorten the depth of field and make focusing more critical. It also creates a nice blur effect on objects in foreground or background. You’ll likely want to switch to manual focus for this.

We started the week with classic tourist sites. We visited Baker beach with great sunset views of Golden Gate Bridge skirting the incoming tide for a quick photo-op.  We roamed about Chinatown for a few good deals and souvenirs ending with the fortune cookie factory to see how fortune cookies were made.  Of note, fortune cookies are much, much better warm off the press.

We then spent a peaceful morning roaming the Sequoias of Muir Woods amidst the early morning glow of fog and afternoon of fine seafood at Scoma’s in Sausalito before returning across the bay by ferry.

For our educational portion of the trip we toured Alcatraz Island and the famed Alcatraz prison which was probably my favorite part of the trip. It was interesting to see how the prison escape was actually executed and see the actual cells they escaped from. We also enjoyed to Cable Car Museum where you can still see the engines that drive the four remaining cable lines. And if you ever go to San Francisco, riding one of the cable cars is a must.

We ended our trip on a more relaxing note, enjoying some much need sleep and relaxing day of strolling and shopping. Of course, everything we ate in San Francisco was delicious, but notably Fish & Farm in the Mark Twain hotel probably took the prize of our best meal there.

More pics on the Pics page

If you don’t feel like making your own, there are easier pre-made options that our as easy as putting together Legos. You can pick them up online or at a local Lowe’s or Home Depot.

Along the lines of a recent green, thumb I have been experimenting with cement recently. It has all been part of a larger goal ever since I found this Book while perusing Barnes & Noble one rare lazy weekend. It inspired me to use cement to make countertops for bathrooms or outdoors, but I restrained myself to work stepwise in the medium of cement. So my first projects have been cement pots and containers. While the first several have cracked and led to nothing but a heavy garbage can come Monday, a few have worked out and have been functional. There are several online tutorials out there and the whole process isn’t really as hard as it would seem.

By the way, how cool is it that I did this post from my iPhone. Thanks WordPress.