The FreeBSD Diary

As I write this, it is Tuesday, 20 January 2004, and I'm sitting in George's apartment in Brooklyn, watching Godfather Part II. This morning I was in Ottawa. I drove down via Syracuse today. It's been a long day which started at 6:20am, when I got out of bed...

After getting things ready, I left town at about 9am. I stopped along the way to buy some travel insurance, and then it was across the border at Hill Island. No problems there. Very smooth. From there until Watertown NY, there was very little traffic. By the time I neared Syracuse, the weather and started blowing snow. The locals just couldn't handle it. I saw one truck off to the left, buried hood deep in snow. Later, the fire department was tending to one vehicle off to the right. 400 meters down the road, a Jeep had rolled and looked like it had been totally destroyed. Another hour or so down the road, we detoured around another accident.

This was all with just a very little of blowing snow. The roads were not much worse off than anything I'd seen this winter in Ottawa. Perhaps these folks don't use snow tires or don't know slippery roads. I hope those involved in the accidents heal quickly.

For the most part, the drive went well. I had some doubts about being on the right Interstate, and when driving alone, it is difficult to check a map. Mapquest is good, but it is hard, not to mention dangerous, to read and drive concurrently.

When meeting Dana, I had to call her to figure out where the restaurant was relative to where I was. It turned out I was in the Target parking lot on US 46, and the place I wanted was literally just across the road. But of course, I had to drive a mile or so down the road to get to the other side...

The next problem was getting from NJ3 to the Holland Tunnel. Just when I thought to myself "I'm in the wrong place", there was a sign telling me I wasn't.

The other problem I had was getting from the Holland Tunnel to the Manhattan Bridge. I finally got onto Canal Street and knew I was headed east, but I called George just to make sure. From there is was pretty fast to get to his place.

For what it's worth, it cost me US$27.60 to get here, and CAD$2.00 to cross the bridge at Hill Island, and then US$6.00 for the Holland tunnel. The gas stops were:

location	odometer (km)	price per US gallon (US$)	cost
Ottawa	56346	-	0
Pulaski	56579	-	$12.00
North Milford	56809	-	$8.00
Fairfield	57033	$1.49	$7.60

I am sure there is someone who will calculate the price per km for me...

I have the gas receipts in the car, so I'll add into the missing values later.

I saw Dana, met her daughter, and met Dana's dad. We had dinner at a Mexican place. This was good. I'm glad we got together.

On Wednesday morning, we're headed straight to LWE and plan to arrive there just after 9am. That should give me enough time to get my registration completed and make it to my first talk. We're headed over there via subway and then it's just a 15 minute walk there. I am quite sure I should win the "best dressed for the weather" award. I know I won't be cold.