Design . Build . Learn . Repeat

It developed a couple of days ago and now everyone’s talking about Hurricane Gustav! The storm is still in the Caribbean, where it has killed at least 22 people, but if it continues on its current course it could land pretty directly on New Orleans and/or the Mississippi Gulf Coast as a Category 3 or higher storm.

We should know by Saturday or Sunday whether we need to leave. Hands On has a fairly well-developed evacuation plan and if they evacuate I’ll go with them to a shelter near Jackson. Since Tropical Storm Fay barely affected us, this would be the first evacuation since I’ve been here, so we’ll see how it develops.

In other news, our team won Trivia Night last night at the Grocery! It was my first time playing and I don’t mind saying we did very well. Among the questions we got right:

• Who was the first man to appear on the cover of Playboy?
• What are rats unable to do, making them especially vulnerable to poison?
• Which US state has the world’s largest naval base?

Answers: Peter Sellers, vomit, and of course, Virginia!

Now that you are about to have read this, you will have been knowing what has or has not been going on!

The Olympics are great! As a long-time swimmer, in heart if not always in fact (I started swimming at around 6, did varsity in high school, and took a break in the first few years at UVA before getting into club swimming for about a year and a half), that’s the event that I’m mainly following. I don’t follow swimming much outside of the Olympics, except of course for that of my two younger brothers (at RIT and George Mason), but the Olympics always get me pumped up. And Michael Phelps and the rest of the American team are delivering an amazing performance.

Olympic Judo is also cool; it’s not televised, but NBC is doing a great thing by putting full videos of the competitions for most sports up on its website at www.nbcolympics.com. If your local cable company doesn’t have a deal with NBC, you might have to fudge your zip code and cable company.

Speaking of judo, my judo buddy and all-around good friend Will, who has been working with Hands On for the past couple of years, made the surprise announcement that he has accepted a job with the Coordination Center and will be staying in Biloxi for another half-year or so, rather than moving back home this weekend to Boston as planned. Great news! It’ll definitely keep me motivated for judo. Not only that, but Will will be moving into our house to replace my roommate Phil, who’s left for Oregon. The future of bad movie night and Scrabble is therefore assured.

While Will is staying, there are a number of people in the volunteer circle here who have left recently or will be leaving — Phil, Ian, Doug, Andy, Katharine, Chris, and more. I expect that the beginning of fall will bring a new wave of folks moving in, but for now it’s a little quiet around here.

Work is going well, although that’s another post. And the evenings and weekends always seem to produce some interesting events. I’d like to take some road trips, but money’s pretty tight, so that’s on hold until I get my long-lost-uncle-or-aunt-inheritance. I need to start swimming and lifting more — the Olympics are certainly motivating me for that.

Well, that’s more or less it. How’s everyone else’s summer going?

–World Record 3:08.24

–Nearly 4 seconds faster than the previous record

–Eight one-hundredths of a second faster than the French

–World record of 47.24 in the leadoff leg (by Eamon Sullivan of Australia)

–Amazing comeback by anchor Jason Lezak

–Maintains Michael Phelps’ chances for 8 golds

WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!