I happened to stumble upon this, what I first thought was just an extensive shopping area, but later learned it is the site of the Asakusa Shinto Shrine and Tokyo's oldest Buddhist temple Senso-ji. It was an interesting area so I decided to spend a couple of more hours there on the morning of 21 Sep prior to my long awaited first trip on a Shinkansen train down to Kyoto later that day.... read more

We left the hotel around 7am for the relatively quite drive over to Pasadena from our nice digs nearly on the beach in Santa Monica. I think we got to the parking area at Brookside Golf Course on the North side of the stadium around 7:45am. We had plenty of time to tailgate, and ended up seeing a great game. Michigan State came out on top, 24 to 20 over Stanford.... read more

Just a few quick photos from this.... read more

On 3 Aug 2011, McKesson treated around 120 of its employees from its specialty health care unit to a day at the ball park. This was to recognize the work that the team had done to align with ARRA requirements, and since I had a hand in the e-prescribing related efforts for the iKnowMed application, was quite happy to attend and take in the day with my co-workers. It was a great weather day and we got to the park early at around 10:45am since we also had tickets to Triples Alley, a section of the warning track in right field where those with tickets can watch batting practice and such at field level. That was quite a treat to see a few players up close, as well as the complimentary food and drink afforded in ... read more

I had heard that you could tour an aircraft carrier on Alameda island just outside of Oakland, and that one of the more interesting aspects was riding the flight elevator between the hangar and flight decks. I had been meaning to take this tour, and after arrival realized that spending just half a day there was not going to be enough time. Very interesting indeed. Upon arrival, a docent gives you some high level information about what you can see on the ship, the island, the engine room (you must sign up for this as they can only take 15 people at a time down to the one viewable engine room, there are three others, but the engine room tour is done for no additional fee), the hangar and flight decks, the Apollo mission artifacts on ... read more