Almost Forgot

My flights between Oakland and Seattle on Thursday-Sunday for Norwescon are timed in such a way that it's possible (assuming the flights and trains are on time) for me to take the Capitol from Fremont instead of either driving to the airport and paying a lot to park or driving to BART and paying $5/day to park. I can of course walk to the Fremont/Centerville station, and while the Amtrak fare is more expensive than BART, it's still less than the combination of BART + BART parking.

Fortunately for me, I remembered that I hadn't yet bought my Amtrak tickets for this trip this morning, and today was the last day I could buy them using the 3-day-advance-purchase National Association of Railroad Passengers 10% discount. It's not much money on such a small ticket, but there's no sense in throwing money away, and besides, the small discounts add up to the point where they sometimes end up being more than my annual NARP dues.

The connection coming back is tight, and there's a reasonable chance I'll miss it, in which case it will cost me the one-way BART ticket and a $12 cab ride from the station to my apartment, but the return ticket on Amtrak is good for a year and I can use it the next time I do this train-to-airport thing, because the conductors don't seem fussed about me using an "upside-down" (opposite direction than denominated) ticket.

I Figured I Must Be Losing My Hearing

Thanks to nitroace I now have some proof that my hearing is deteriorating.

You're not a hoopy frood

You thought you were really with it and in with your younger colleagues but they just laugh at you because you can't hear beyond this! The highest pitched ultrasonic mosquito ringtone that I can hear is 14.1kHz

Find out which ultrasonic ringtones you can hear!

It could be worse, I reckon.