Microsoft is in, Cingular is out

I have been long remiss not blogging about this. A month ago, Benjamin became an official Microsoft employee! :-O He is now the Operations Engineer for Microsoft Game Studios. It is his job to design and ensure the smooth operation of the networks that run many of the Massively Multiplayer Online games (MMOs, or more commonly MMORPGs for MMO Role Playing Games) released by Microsoft in the future. In theory, this is Benjamin's dream job. For years he has wanted to work in the gaming industry and he loves network design. Reality rarely mirrors dreams, but so far things are going well. He's working hard and putting in lots of hours while trying to acclimatize to the Microsoft culture, a challenge in its own right.

Puppy porn

brokenbike.org / Percy being cute

Benjamin calls the dog photos that make everyone go "awww" puppy porn. Flickr has serious puppy porn going on. I discovered I can watch a nearly endless slideshow of pug photos - http://www.flickr.com/photos/tags/pug/show/ - and that there is a pug "pool" (photo group) - http://www.flickr.com/groups/pugs/pool/.

Nikon Rob / Fun with 85mm F1.4 D in the park

Rob took a great shot of Stephanie. He's turning into such the photo-speak-geek. I am jealous. Rob, want to photograph my brother's wedding with me?!?!?!?!?

Book: The Family Tree

Not bad, but the ending is a let down

I thought this book was alright. I liked the way that the story unfolded from a number of points in time so you only were able to put the puzzle together a piece at a time and not all in order. However, I didn’t feel like the plot really lead anywhere. It didn’t seem like the character particularly grew or learned from her experiences, neither did the plot take an interesting turn in the end. Given the disappointing ending I can’t recommend the book, but it was fairly well-written with some interesting themes and well-developed characters.

rbanks / Maddie in the flat

This is my friend and former MS design mentor's little one. I think this is an adorable picture.

Designing a wedding invitation

Corinne S. / Designing a wedding invitation

I've been working on the invitations for my brother's June wedding. Almost ready to print them. I discovered a new to die for paper store in Bellevue called Paper Source. The envelopes were spendy but overall I am extremely pleased with the paper, colors, and selection of products. I am also really glad to have some new choices since the Paper Zone hasn't made major inventory changes in a long time.

Book: The Second Summer of the Sisterhood

Similar to the first one This is a nice story, very similar to the first traveling pants book. Ann Brashares writes well, especially for a young adult fiction writer. These books are worthwhile if you like young adult fiction that isn’t very heavy. Kind of a nice break without dropping down to the level of a vapid romance novel. Also BTW, I haven't been writing blog entries for the books and movies I've been consuming, but I have been tracking them so you can take a peek if you want to - Star Girl (me) on All Consuming.

Corinne S. / Man's best friend

I just uploaded a bunch of new photos to Flickr, some stuff from Tempe and some other random stuff that's recent. Screw the 4 months of unposted photos. I am moving on. This is a beautiful and friendly dog I met on one of our research visits here in Tempe.

Corinne S. / Multiplicity of Jesus

I took this photo today. I am in Tempe, AZ for work, though we haven't had any appointments for the last two days so my co-worker and I have been bopping around the area.

I'm participating in the online beta of a photo recognition program called Riya. Overall it seems pretty good, though I am still playing around with it and of course it is still a beta. But I got an email today from the folks at Riya prompting me to do some recognition review. And this is one of the things that was recognized as a face. :-)

My friend Leanne recently had her 19.5 week ultrasound and they confirmed she is having a girl. I haven't seen Leanne in a while so it will be exciting to see her now that she really looks pregnant. It's very exciting to have a childhood friend of mine who is married and in a similar place in life as me be pregnant. It makes the whole baby-making thing seem more real. It's been getting more real over the last few years anyway with other friends having babies, but this one is having even more effect on me and Benjamin recently decided he's ready to start planning our kids. Wow! More later on all that...