I got tagged on this by Betsy Thiede. Hm. Five things I haven't already blabbered...? How about...

• I've had too many cars. Well, not too many by my reckoning but by the standards of those a bit more, shall we say, conservative on the subject of vehicle ownership, possibly so.
  
  Not including spousal or child vehicles of which there have probably been ten or more, there are at least 23 I can think of off the top of my head. 9 Porsches, 3 Mercedes(es?), 2 BMWs, 2 Fiats, 2 Datsuns (one for just a day!), a Lotus, a Saab, an Audi, a Chevy pickup and a Ford van (both of which vehicles were used to pull other vehicles).
  
  Oh, and a Ralt Formula Atlantic, if you can count pure racing cars, so make that 24. Might be missing one or two but I've never bought one new (OK, yes, for my wife I have) and, other than the trucks, no American cars (except for my wife's cars again).



• I used to be pretty good Saxophone player. Not great, but decent. At one point (this was High School) I owned four Saxophones (Soprano, Alto, Tenor and Baritone), a Flute, a Clarinet and could play pretty much any woodwind (Bassoon, anyone?).
  
  I started to take it up again a few years ago and was making good progress until I just stopped finding the time to practice. On the other hand, twice now I've sold off all my horns to pay for racing expenses so I guess that says where my real interests lie.



• I am too poorly-travelled. Not in the US. I've been all over the US but at almost 50 I'm a bit embarrassed to say, other than Canada, I've never been outside the US. We're going to Europe this fall to start solving that particular problem, so there's still some hope.



• The Olympics make me cry. There's something about watching these kids who have pretty much given up any semblance of a normal life in the unwavering pursuit of a mostly useless goal that, well, gets to me when they actually achieve it.



• I have a bit of an artist's eye. I have a love for beautiful things that goes beyond what I think of as the traditional "beautiful things." I love, for instance, a beautiful form. That's "form" as in "piece of paper" or, more in my line of work, "paper-like representation on a computer screen." Yes, I know (GEEK!) but that's how it is. I can't stand working on ugly applications and obsess over things like exactly how much padding each of the cells of a table needs to make it look right (5 pixels, in most cases).
  
  Case in point: After finishing (and posting) this blog entry I have gone back and tweaked it at least half-a-dozen more times to get things to lay out and read the way I want them to.

1. Chris Whisonant01/24/2007 02:26:56 PM
Homepage: http://cwhisonant.blogspot.com

If you hadn't had so many nice foreign cars you could probably have visited some of the countries...

Perhaps you could focus your European vacation around visiting the places your cars were manufactured. My dad has a 97 boxster that I snag from him once in a while. It's not the quickest, but it's fun! Especially since I'm the only one in the family who can chirp the tires shifting to 2nd on a straight dry road!

Did you mean the Special Olympics make you cry?

2. Charles Robinson01/24/2007 11:13:38 PM
Homepage: http://cubert-codepoet.blogspot.com

I have the opposite problem with travel. I've been all over the world but seen very little of the US.

And I, too, obsess over good design. It literally has kept me awake at night and I've gotten out of bed to go fix something that I never should have left "ugly". I like to think that because I spend so much time on it, they find it immediately intuitive and don't have to stop and consider it. A good UI doesn't stand out or interfere, it just helps people work better.

3. Scott Good01/27/2007 12:48:41 PM
Homepage: http://www.scottgood.com

@Chris: Actually, I think you're probably right about the cars keeping me from travelling. I'm turning 50 in March and had kinda hoped to surprise myself with a trip to pick up a new car at the Porsche factory and then go drive it on the Autobahn, but that's out of my price range. Maybe when I turn 60!

@Charles: I have had the same thing happen (middle of the night "I can't stand it!" issues). A curse and a blessing, I suppose.

4. Joel M. Phelan02/09/2007 10:37:12 AM
Homepage: http://www.steinmart.com

Not great, but decent. At one point (this was High School) I owned four Saxophones (Soprano, Alto, Tenor and Baritone), a Flute, a Clarinet and could play pretty much any woodwind (Bassoon, anyone?).

The reference to it that always sticks in my mind is from the beginning of the movie "Sniper", when Billy Zane tells that kid that that is what's in his bag, and that he's with the Marine Corps band.. even though he's not wearing a Marine uniform. I digress. Now, perhaps, I can finally think of a bassoom without reverting.. but probably not.

I looked.. those things are huge.. I can finally understand how that comment made sense. Another mystery solved.

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