Pat & Walter

Ipod sock

Pat got me this way cool Apple Ipod for Christmas. 40GB sucker. But searching around the web I could not find the perfect case to protect the Ipod and also allow me to control it at the same time. Then I happened upon the Ipod sock. Pat agreed to make me one of my own design and here is the finished product. The wool fits snuggly around the Ipod, but I can still press the buttons on the front to fast forward, skip songs, etc. It's version 2 actually... the first one was a bit too loose.

I'd call it more of an Ipod mitten than a sock.

Place your orders!

-Walter

Orlando December 2004

I had a business trip to Orlando, Florida near the beginning of December 2004. This was the replacement of the trip to Hawaii that was cancelled. Orlando doesn't really compare to Hawaii, but it's warmer than Toronto in December, so Pat spent some of her airmiles and we took a few days of vacation.

The hotel was fairly close to nowhere, but had a nice swimming pool (heated) with a lazy river and waterslide. Quite relaxing actually. We only planned on doing two major things in Florida: the first was to visit the Kennedy Space Center at Cape Canaveral; and the other was to visit the new Animal Kingdon at Walt Disney World.

The Kennedy Space Center is on the east coast and about an hour and a half from the hotel. I had rented a convertible, and the weather was warm (80F), so it was a very pleasant drive. The Space Center was definitely worth the visit. The "Rocket Garden" had old rockets on display outside, and some of them were huge. Life sized displays of the Shuttle and it's main fuel tank were also on display. The admission also included a tour by the "Vehicle Assembly Building" (which showed some damage from the recent hurricanes), and a visit to the Apollo/Saturn center where they have a scale Saturn5 rocket inside. It was too big to fit in one photo. All very cool place including a presentation where a life size Moon lander makes a simulated Moon landing (and take-off!). Again, definately worth the visit. Unfortunately I had left my large CF card at home, so we could not take very many pictures.

The trip to Disney's Animal Kingdom was not as spectacular. First we had to wait over 45 minutes in line to get our tickets. I guess this was partly our fault since we did not buy them ahead of time. Second, the park was really just a zoo, with a few rides thrown in. We did see a very cool live show about birds. They had trained the birds to swoop very low over the audience, and the birds would catch grapes in mid-air. Otherwise, I think the Toronto Zoo has a better display of animals. Maybe we're just spoiled.

More pictures below.

-Walter

Kennedy Space Center:

View of one of the Shuttle launch pads (there are 2).

The Vehicle Assembly Building. The different colour panels where they repaired it after the hurricanes are visible.

Pat in the Rocket Garden.

Shuttle and external fuel tanks.

Disney's Animal Kingdom:

One of the bird handlers with an American Bald Eagle.

Flock of Flamingos on our "African Safari".

Future "Everest" attraction. Will have a roller coaster inside ala Space Mountain.