Sparrowman’s Perch

Well, it’s Employees’ Appreciation Week at work. We celebrate this with hikes, golf, walks and feasts. One of these was yesterday’s annual hike up to the Coopers Rock Overlook from Mont Chateau/Cheat Lake. A couple of folks drive up to the top with a van for those who wish to ride back and not hike. I decided and wanted to walk the return trip. The whole trip is estimated to be about 6 or 7 miles.

Here’s a photo of me with most of the hardy return-trip gang. The next photo is of “Haystack Rock” which some of our geologists term a “LFR”—which is a very technical classification that means “Large Frickin’ Rock” or something similar to that. Haystack Rock is actually moving and park officials don’t want anyone climbing on the thing or going around the backside of it. One can still get to it like we did by going on a little trail off to the side of the Overlook.

From there we went to “Rock City” to Rattlesnake Trail (we didn’t see any rattlesnakes but they are there) and eventually to Mont Chateau Trail.

It is a bloody shame that I live so close to this wonderful place and I only go to it probably once a year. I may try to go back in the near future and actually do some camping before it gets too cold.

Links:

Coopers Rock State Forest
Coopers Rock Foundation

Today we had our 5K walk/race during lunch. Just like my previous (July) 5K, I was pathetic. If I were a member of some herd animal group, I would be the weak one that lingered in the back and would eventually get attacked and eaten by a lion, a cheetah or a large carnivorous turtle. Again, for me, the blues song says it best, “I’m built for comfort, not for speed”.  Nevertheless, it was good to get out and do these things. Some here are trying to talk me into an official 5K at Cheat Lake for this weekend. They say it will be a “morale builder”. Yeah, right.

We had good weather for the week in San Diego.

The Convention Center:

There were about 15,000 people in attendance!

We had some unique entertainment just for us.

We got to meet some ESRI people doing GIS stuff… Wow, ArcSDE is different out there!

We had many previews for the new ArcGIS 9.2.  Some sessions were dedicated to installation issues.  Here is a UNIVAC (1540 and a 1532).  You have complete control with this machine.   You can set the memory addresses! Just picture the kind of spatial analysis you can do!

Most of us got to stay in some of the quality hotels in the area…

ESRI featured speakers, like Dr. Zauis, got a chance to rest between sessions and contemplate users’ questions and comments concerning the new ArcWeb services.

Seriously, I did enjoy the opportunity to learn of the innovations to ESRI products and to interact with fellow GIS folks.  I thoroughly enjoyed my time there and I hope to return for the next convention.  

Many of the above photos were taken on board the USS Midway (now a museum) and one was from the famous San Diego Zoo. 

(I need to post more stuff here but I thought I’d at least get this up now.  I’ll be back dating a few entries, however.)

Conference Sessions:

ArcGIS Extensions:  3D Analyst - An Introduction

Here are some photos from my touristic jaunt today. Some are from downtown and most are from a two hour tour of the bay.

Shiny happy buildings

US Naval Base

"Old School" ship and boat.

USS Ronald Regan and the USS Nimitz.  The Ronald Regan is nuclear powered and doesn’t need "refueled" for another 33 years!  I think she has a crew of over 6,000.

Seals!  Actually, they are sea lions.

More sea lions.

The USS Midway, now decommissioned.  It was commissioned in 1945 and it served the navy until the early 1990’s.  It is now a museum of which I hope to board tomorrow!

The "Star of India" - an iron clad ship built in 1863 and served until 1920 something.  Now a floating museum.