... now I'm just annoyed.

here's Elmo!

After changing the batteries on her son's Elmo doll, Elmo appears to be channeling Jack Nicholson.  The programmable doll is able to learn a child's name and repeat it as part of a variety of phrases.  A glitch, however, makes it sound like it's saying "Kill James".

Death-threat Elmo brightened my day a bit until I watched the CNN video.  What killed the buzz?  The mother is obviously angling for a cash settlement from Fisher-Price.  Fisher-Price offered to replace the toy and investigate, so why does the mother still have the toy which she states has her "distraught" and is causing her a "hassle"?  She clearly thinks she's holding a little red lottery ticket.

C'mon lady, take the replacement doll and laugh it off!  Worry less about how your kid is affected by the doll and more about what he learns from how you handle the situation.

I coworker sent these to me... they're too fun not to share:

There were a bunch more fun visual advertisements in the e-mail, I stuck a bunch in a cool advertising gallery on our picture site.  Enjoy!

... trying to absorb a whole new job is really taking it out of me.  Perhaps a little stop motion to get me going...

(thanks Jason for the vid)

I really liked the last Cadillac CTS-V and probably would have bought one if the interior didn't feel so cheep.  I also like the tweaks they've made to the styling of the new CTS.  I'm not sure, however, that I like the new CTS-V.

Sure, it's got all kinds of sexy under the hood and the interior looks much improved... but the outside looks like they made it a bit too bumpy/bulgy.  I'm sure they wanted to make it seem extra-tough... but it's looking like they may have gone past the look of a sleek athlete and ended up with something a little more cartoon superhero.

I'll reserve final judgement until I see it in person, but with 550HP & lbs/ft I suspect I'd never want to be looking at it from the outside.

via: autoblog

The stress of moving and changing jobs has kind of put me off blogging... so for updates I refer to you Paula's blog.  She has been much better than I about blogging as of late.

At any rate... after a much delayed flight from Dublin to Chicago we're relaxing in the American Airlines Admiral club.  I must say, AA is going down hill.  The aircraft here from Dublin was a total beater (our seats had no functioning lights and the channels on the AV system wouldn't change).  The Admiral's club is not much better, the seats all look like the upholstery hasn't been cleaned in a decade.

Yep, delaying my flight for several hours forcing me to have a 5 hour layover makes me grumpy.

Bah!

Paula and I are complete old fogies... we rang in 2008 from bed.  On the plus side... it's the first time in several years we've actually been awake at midnight.

Have a wonderful, safe and peaceful 2008!

One of the things Paula and I have found is the off season is really nice.  The weather may be cooler but the prices are lower and (my favorite part) the crowds are lighter.

There is, however, one more thing I was noticing today: the lighting is dramatic for most of the day.  If you're trying to take pictures during the summer, they really look best at sunset and sunrise.  During the winter, however, the sun is lower and the light is more dramatic.

Grenada has been a joy so far.  I was a bit stressed at the beginning since my grasp of Spanish is pretty much nil, but I've decided to relax and let Paula handle it all.   After spending most of the morning traveling yesterday we had an early dinner then walked around a bit near hotel.  We slept about 12 hours then spent today going up and down the hills that surround the Al Hambra palace.  Tomorrow we head up the hill to see the grand Moorish complex, we can't wait.

I've got a new job (soon)!  The beginning of next year I'll be joining the Sharepoint team in Redmond, Washington.  I'm super-excited about this new position.  I'll be moving into the greater Office organization and getting a chance once again, to work with friends from the past. 

While Paula and I are both really excited to be moving to Redmond we're still a little bit stressed and sad.  We're facing down our second international move in less than two years (can you say "gluttons for punishment"?) and are a little disappointed to be leaving Ireland. We love the Irish people, the country and especially the convenient travel.

We will, however, be over the hump soon and are working hard to distract ourselves (went to Waterford last weekend, going to Spain this weekend, going to western Ireland in early December and to New York for Christmas with my sister <phew>). 

January 14th is my first day... so I'm sure the time will fly.