The things that make life worth livin'...

I spent the past week in Utah for a business trip. I lucked out because I was staying an hour away from where my oldest sister lives. I got to spend pretty much every evening with my sister, her husband, and their two daughters.

It always makes me feel special when I pull up to their house and see two little faces pressed against the window. Kids can be a lot of fun, and my nieces are no exception. I really enjoyed spending time with them.

I also enjoyed being able to get out of the house for some one-on-one time with my big sister. Thanks for the good times big sis and family!

Field Trip: The Cyclorama

This weekend I made my first fieldtrip to Atlanta. I decided to go see the Cyclorama in Grant Park. Apparently this was a bit of a fad after the Civil War -- large oil paintings put together in the shape of a cylinder. In the case of the Atlanta Cyclorama, it is a painting depicting the Battle of Atlanta from the Civil War. The painting is 42 ft. tall and 358 ft. in circumference. It used to be larger, but due to being transported around and such over 100 and some years, it's been worn down a bit. The painting is suspended with stadium seating setup on a platform inside the cylinder. The stadium seating is concentric to the painting and 30 ft. less in radius. The 30 ft. in between is filled with a diorama to give the painting more of a 3-Dimensional appearance. The stadium seating slowly rotates while different images from the painting are highlighted by a spotlight and explained by a narration. It was really pretty interesting. The building also contains the restored locomotive "Texas" which was involved in the "Great Locomotive Chase" of the Civil War. (I hadn't heard of it before, so don't feel bad if you haven't either.)

The Cyclorama Building from the front

The next picture shows the rear part of the building where the painting is housed. You can see the metal structure that supports that part of the building (the painting weighs 9000 pounds!). If you take a close look at that part of the building and the metal structure, they are covered with lightning rods (they didn't show up in any of my pictures). I guess it makes sense for a building housing 9000 lbs. of canvas and oil paint valued at $20 million. If it was mine I certainly wouldn't want it going up in smoke due to a lightning strike!

The part of the building that houses the painting

If you're interested in reading more about the Cyclorama try these two websites:

http://www.bcaatlanta.com/index.php?pid=81

http://roadsidegeorgia.com/site/cyclorama.html

The Pad

Okay, now that you've seen my ride, here's a quick virtual tour of my apartment. First, the building from outside:

Then up the stairs and to the right:

Come on in!

Take an immediate left after you enter the apartment, and there's me bedroom (bed complete with skirt and pillow shams):

Turn around and there's my computer (and the tower of boxes):

Connected to my bedroom is the study:

Back out to the common area, here's the living room:

The dining room:

Kitchen:

And finally, attached to the kitchen is the laundry room (out of respect of my roommates privacy, I didn't include any pictures of his bedroom):

My New Ride

All right y'all, here's the long-awaited update of how life is in Georgia. As you probably know, I flew down here last Saturday (Jan. 28) and have had a week or so to get settled in. I'm already getting ready to head off to Utah for a week for some business-related travel. Anyhoo, I wanted to provide somewhat of a photo journal of my travels through the remainder of my rotations. So,with no further ado here's my current (rental) ride:

My current ride: 2006 Chrysler PT Cruiser

The folks at Enterprise gave me a choice of an Impala, Taurus, Saturn, PT Cruiser, or HHR. I figured I'd give the PT Cruiser a try. It's nice having a little more cargo space than I'm used to, but I don't think this car was made for tall people. I'm 6'1" and even with the driver's seat down as far as it goes I often find myself hunching down so the roofline doesn't obstruct my line of sight (especially when I'm waiting at a stoplight).

Cargo space: More than my Civic - no big surprise there

I like the dash and gauges, though. And I really like having all of the little compartments in the center console to stash my stuff in (as in iPod, coin purse, sunglasses, etc.)

Dash and gauges

And of course, what everyone was waiting for, the massive poweplant that pushes this rig down the road. Quoting the Chrysler website:

"PT Cruiser's standard 2.4-liter 16-valve 4-cylinder DOHC power plant offers 150 horsepower at 5,100 rpm and 165 lb-ft of torque at 4,000 rpm. You'll appreciate those numbers when you step on the gas pedal to climb a hill or pass another vehicle."

Yeah, I guess I missed the memo on that one. I'd really appreciate having slightly larger numbers when I mash the pedal. I think they left out some of the fine print. So, I took the liberty of editing that last sentence:

"You'll appreciate those numbers when you step on the gas pedal to climb a hill or pass another vehicle (but only if you don't mind having a car with no cajones whatsoever)."

A different word initially came to mind, but I thought "cajones" might be more acceptable, especially since my mom will be reading this. Well, sorry to keep you waiting, here's the powerplant with those great numbers:

2.4 Liter 4-cylinder: Standard equipment for PT Cruiser

At least I think there's an engine in there somewhere under all of that plastic. At least there better be -- according to the in-dash mpg calculation I'm getting an average 21 miles per gallon. With a 4-cylinder!? The PT Cruiser is doing a good job of getting me from point A to point B, but it does have a few shortcomings (poor acceleration, poor gas mileage, poor visibility for people other than pygmies). I think that at the end of this month I may trade it in for something else, then I can bore you all with another car review. Oh well, as far as I'm concerned, the folks at DaimlerChrysler will redeem themselves of any wrongdoings ever done if they would just put the Challenger concept car into production:

My next rental (I wish): 2006 Dodge Challenger Concept Car