Visit Paris from your computer in amazingly high resolution. You can browse around like Google Maps and zoom in to incredible distances.

“Look at this Richard. Just look at it.” A Virgin airlines passenger voices his complaints about the food and entertainment to Sir Richard Branson. I for one could barely stop laughing. The world’s best passenger complaint letter.

I love to see companies maintain a sense of humor, but Google is in a league of its own when it comes to corporate antics. They regularly do an involved April fools gag, and they have little quirks and tricks throughout their products that entertain people. They’ve struck a balance between providing useful services and […]

I spent the last few weeks searching for an inexpensive airfare to visit family for Christmas. I did an initial round of searches on every web site I could think of to get an idea of the current market price, then set up a daily e-mail notification on Kayak.com and checked flights almost every day. […]

Yahoo just announced the release of their trip planner. It allows you to plan a trip to see different sites and print out a list of all the things you’ve planned so you can actually do them when you get there. They integrate the use of Yahoo Maps and you can also see other people’s […]

As you’ve probably figured out, I love maps. I loved Topofusion when I first heard about it, I was ecstatic when Google released Google Maps, and then Keyhole which later became Google Earth. It’s just amazing to me that we can see almost anywhere in the US (and more and more areas around the world). […]

I’ve recently heard of three new services to find cheap airfare. The first is called Kayak (although as far as I can tell it has absolutely nothing to do with kayaking), the second is Yahoo’s Farechase and the third is Sidestep. I searched for the same roundtrip fare with all three of them and Kayak’s […]

Jan started it, and Renee soon followed, so it’s quite clear that I’m a follower, but it’s kind of cool. I’m not sure I got all of them correctly, but I included ones that I’ve driven through and didn’t include airport only visits. The ones in red are the states I’ve visited and here are […]

50 States is a collaborative effort to assemble pictures of scenic locations around the United States. In addition to submitting pictures, it’s fun to look at what’s already been posted. They may be a bit sparse given that it’s a new site, but it’s growing quickly.

I recently heard about a web site for finding last-minute weekend getaways. I rarely plan vacations in advance so this could be useful when I discover I have some time off. I didn’t spend a lot of time on the site but the prices I saw weren’t too bad. Mmmmm. The Bahamas…

Things to Do provides lists of activities and sites of interest for every state in the US. Going to Kentucky? Be sure to visit the Australian themed animal park.

I was in the Northeast for Christmas where we were given a generous helping of snow on Christmas day. Mother Nature had not given such a cold and bounteous Christmas gift since weather records were first kept in the late 1800’s. The roads cleared up the next day and by Saturday the runway in Manchester […]

Jason graciously gave me a ride to the aiport at the early hour of 4am, for which I am very grateful. I arrived in New Hampshire without incident, and already had a chance to get a $400 voucher and a first class flight to Manchester from Atlanta. I didn’t take it because I wanted to […]

Longer baggage checks for the holidays. “I’d advise passengers to wear comfortable shoes and bring along a good book, because you might have to stand in line a long time,” said Robert Poole, a transportation expert at the Reason Foundation, a Los Angeles public policy think tank. “I worry a lot about the potential for […]

Last December I was in the Logan airport waiting to board a plane to Salt Lake City. The desk attendants announced that the flight was overbooked and the asked for volunteers to be bumped to the next flight. I leapt to my feet, raced to the desk and apprised them of my willingness to be […]

The rental car is a red 2002 Convertible Mustang I was expecting speedy acceleration and lots of power, but it doesn’t feel any faster than my Maxima. It has a 3.8 liter V-6 with 190HP but I’m not too impressed. Having the top down is still fun and provides a great way to see the […]

I’m off to Chicago for work and will return on Halloween (assuming we can get everything done by then) so updates will be spotty at best. I will have internet access but I don’t envision having much time for blog entries. Travelling for work is often something I look forward to but this trip is […]

If only these demands were met by the airlines, we’d all be rich. Barring that, at least they might see how unfair and one-sided many of their policies are and make adjustments. After all, they are supposed to be providing a service.

The weak economy coupled with uneasy passengers have resulted in unusually low airfares for this fall. I still have a $750 voucher that I’d like to use to go to Spain. Last night I found a flight to Madrid for $800, which indicates that I may not have to subsidize my flight at all. Too […]

I went to San Francisco to see my uncle and then to San Luis Obisbo to see my roommate’s grandmother (who happens to be an excellent cook). We went to the beach and got some sun (meaning sunburn) but the trip was great and I got to catch up a lot with my uncle which […]

I just got back from a Verio Developer’s Conference in Florida. The conference was good, the weather was great and I even got to go to Disney’s Magic Kingdom the last day I was there (and I have a sunburn to prove it)

I am home in New Hampshire and will be here through New Year’s. It’s nice not being so busy. I kind of like it. I do have lots of things to do that I set aside to do when I’m not so busy doing other things, so I guess I’m kind of busy still. It’s […]

Back from the USENIX LISA conference in Seattle. It was quite a bit of fun. I’ll have to try to make it next year. Now I have to catch up on everything that I missed the past three days. I’m adding quite a bit to my CD collection, so please let me know if there’s […]