I'm in San Jose for the VON Conference - and I'll be here until Friday afternoon. I have to say that I wasn't particularly looking forward to San Jose. My one experience with San Jose basically involved driving down from Oakland and ending up in some business park campus thingie. As a co-worker of mine stated, San Jose is a lot like miles and miles of Dimond Blvd. Dimond is a road back home that is strewn with strip malls. Not very appealing.
However, downtown San Jose has been a very pleasant surprise. Very nicely done, without being cloying. A great riverwalk. Wide boulevards, great restaurants. An actual real treat. I would definitely come back.
Based on the published recommendation of Bruce Schneier, (god of all things security and cryptographic), I did dinner at Hally K' Ono Cafe - a Hawaiian-Philippine restaurant. Man - it was absolutely fabulous - and as cozy as could be. I also note that they're famous for their cinammon rolls. I think I'll be stopping by there for breakfast.
I spent most of today in a special day long session on SIP. Very good stuff and the presenters are considered to be the industry experts. Nothing like learning from the best.
I took a break to testify via teleconference on yet another Knik Arm Crossing Bill (a bridge to nowhere). I hate testifying via cell phone, but I could not find a land line - anywhere. Land lines seem to have gone the way of the Dodo.
Finally, how could I be in a new city without doing some geocaching on the side? I found four out of five caches today - not bad at all for a lunch break!
One of the great things about geocaching is that you see things that you would never normally run across. For example, via geocaching, I discovered San Jose's wonderful Guadalupe River Walk. I also became acquainted with the life story of Ernesto Galazara via a geocache puzzle at the inventive and wonderful Galazara memorial in downtown San Jose.
Loads of fun. I've got several more caches planned for tomorrow. Oh yeah - and the conference too!
9:30:24 PM 
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