Even though it was magnitude 3.6, and the epicenter was about 10 miles away, it just barely woke me, and I wasn’t really sure at the time if was a quake or if a particularly heavy freight train had just passed. After all, I live pretty close to the railroad tracks, and have learned to sleep through quite a bit of rumbling. Also, it’s not unusual for pictures on the wall to rattle a bit when a big train goes by.

Still, I had a vague sense that this was not just a train. Checking the USGS web site, I discovered that this had, in fact, been the largest earthquake in Maryland since the 3.1 Hancock, MD tremor in 1978.

There was no damage anywhere that I could see, and although Twitter traffic didn’t show anything, I soon found quite a few Facebook statuses mentioning the quake ( the majority seem to have slept through it).

No car alarms, no sirens, and a lot less shaking than in the San Francisco area quakes I’ve experienced.

Still, it’s something to talk about. Almost worthy of a blog post.

The USGS places the precise epicenter is at 39.167°N, 77.252°W:

View July 16, 2010 Earthquake in a larger map

Traces from the Maryland Geologic Survey

Posted from Rockville, Maryland, United States.

I quickly discovered that I wasn’t the only one who had been waiting for this opening. When I arrived at about 7PM, it was very crowded both upstairs and down (and extremely noisy downstairs), with quite a waiting list at the Hostess’ station.

I was expecting some friends to be there ahead of me, so I wandered around looking for them and got my first beer – a Cask Conditioned Oliver’s Ale (Baltimore, MD). Upon discovering that my friends weren’t going to be there, I inquired with the Hostess about the approximate wait time for a party of one, and was delighted to find that Meridian has a communal table, and there was one vacancy. Brilliant! Not only was I seated immediately, but I also got to meet several other diners and see more of the food.

My first neighbors were just finishing Half Smokes with Pork Chili and some French Fries with Rarebit Sauce (both of which they recommended). On the other side, another new friend was just receiving her Burger with Blue Cheese, Bacon, and Grilled Onions, which was also rated a winner.

I had been looking at the menu online since early May, and already knew what I would order: The Double Cut Brined Pork Chop with Rhubarb-Hard Cider Sauce. It was served with Roasted Sweet Potatoes and Braised Kale, which I paired with a Trade Winds Tripel, from The Bruery (Orange County, CA). My order arrived in a very reasonable time, as I chatted with my fellows at the communal table. The Pork Chop was tender and moist, a very generous serving, nicely set off by the sauce. I would highly recommend this to anyone with a good appetite.

As some folks moved on, I acquired new neighbors at the table, who ordered the Pork Quesadilla, Grilled Trout, and Braised Short Ribs. Once again, I heard no complaints.

As I was finishing my meal, Chef David Shewmaker dropped by and chatted for a few minutes. I introduced him to some of my new friends, and we all complimented and congratulated him.

I rounded out the evening with a pint of Old Rasputin Stout from North Coast Brewery (Fort Bragg, CA).

I’ve seen several restaurant openings, and they usually start out well enough, but crash and burn before the evening is done because they are simply not fully prepared. Not so at Meridian Pint – everything appeared to be running smoothly my entire time there, and the word from some of my new friends was that it continued to do so well into the night.

Congratulations to the team at Meridian Pint on an excellent opening night. I hope to be returning often and for many years to come.

Meridian Pint – http://meridianpint.com/ – 3400 11th Street, NW, Washington, DC 20010

Posted from Rockville, Maryland, United States.

In part, it was a social experiment. I had recently completed a contract which had me living with Navy SEALs for a few months, and had begun to see the differences in how others reacted to the guys with and without tattoos. It was long before tattoos had gone mainstream – in fact, tattoo parlors were still illegal in New York City, as well as many other places. Still, I felt a tattoo fitted who I was at the time, and decided to get one which could easily be covered by a short-sleeve shirt, and which could also be partially or fully exposed, if I so desired.

I commissioned the artwork from Dawn Wilson, a well-known Science Fiction illustrator, and was very pleased with the design she came up with. Then, I set out to find a tattoo parlor and learn more about what was involved. I ended up visiting every tattoo artist I could find from New York through Virginia, and met a lot of interesting characters. That story will have to wait for a much longer post (or series of posts).

Early in 1984, I settled on Great Southern Tattoo in College Park, MD. Charley And Sandy Parsons were (and are) talented artists, and they sterilized all of their needles in an autoclave. I felt safer there, and I liked them personally. This was, incidentally, just a few months before my daughter was born.

Having found the tattoo parlor, I sat for a 2 1/2 hour session, and then the social experiment started. The details of this will also have to wait, but I feel confident that I would not get similar reactions if I were to do it today. I have also never regretted having the tattoo. I’m still looking for old photos of the actual tattoo, but haven’t found any so far.

Original artwork for my tattoo

Fast forward 22 years. I was diagnosed with testicular cancer, and underwent surgery and radiation treatments. My Radiation Oncologist tattooed a grid of dots on my body to ensure that I was lined up exactly the same in the beam every day.

This gave my darling Goth Princess daughter the idea to have a tattoo done in my honor (by this time, she already had three). Over the course  of the next couple of years, Maeve had a friend design the tattoo, and worked in a number of features referring to me:

1. It’s a Mermaid
2. Her shirt is made from a torn-up Diver flag
3. She is holding a Chaos symbol
4. Hidden in her hair are my initials

Maeve had her tattoo done at Read Street Tattoo Parlor in Baltimore, MD. All in all, it took 3 sessions and a total of 4 1/2 hours. It was supposed to be a surprise, but when the time came for her first appointment, nobody else was available to sit with her, so she called me. With the cat out of the bag, I accompanied Maeve for all three sessions Here are photos taken at the end of each one.

The folks at Read Street were interested in seeing my “old school” tattoo, and until I found myself having to explain what it was, I hadn’t realized just how much it had faded over 26 years. So, I went back to Great Southern (at their new location in Alexandria, VA), and had mine touched up. It took about 2 hours, and came out great. What’s more, they did it for free, explaining that their work is guaranteed, and that includes touch-ups. You can’t beat that for customer service.

Once I find an  old photo of my tattoo, I’ll add it here. Here is a before and after, though. The first was taken the day before my touch-up, the second as soon as it was done.

If you’re in the Baltimore-Washington area and looking to have a tattoo done, consider Read Street Tattoo Parlor and Great Southern Tattoo.

Posted from Alexandria, Virginia, United States.

IT jobs, and probably all jobs, were incredibly scarce in 2009. I’m beginning to see signs that the situation is improving. I’ve been getting more interviews in the past couple of months, but that doesn’t mean a lot until I can actually land a position somewhere.

While it is somewhat depressing, the experience hasn’t been all bad. I had the opportunity to get some up-to-date studio training and set up my Voice Over business, and have been doing some long-overdue work around the house.

Also, thanks to the very generous severance package from Sun, I’m still paying the bills, and I’m not desperate (yet).

Anybody need a slightly used Technology Evangelist?

I’ve been waiting for the iPhone version of Google Latitude for months. It’s a nifty way to find out where your friends are, or which ones are close by. It might seem like a loss of privacy, but if you’re already blogging, tweeting, and/or Facebooking your life away, this shouldn’t bother you too much. Also, it has some pretty nice privacy features to allow you to hide when you want, as well as to control the quality of position you show on a person-by-person basis.

The Latitude page has been saying that it’s coming soon for iPhone and iPod touch for quite some time. I’ve been using it on my laptop for several weeks, but if I want to keep my location updated, my phone is the obvious choice of device from which to do it.

If you have an iPhone, chances are you can get Latitude working, though it might take a few tries. On Mobile Safari, browse to m.google.com/latitude, and you will either get right in to Latitude, or you will get a “Coming Soon” page (which is what I got, at first).

Just keep reloading the page every once in a while (I had to do it 6 or 7 times), and you may eventually find yourself using latitude. Press the “+” on the bottom toolbar, and add a shortcut icon to your Home Screen, so you can get back to it.

I got my RIF notice on 31 March, but I’ve remained on payroll and benefits through yesterday.

This week, I can file the paperwork for my severance package, and start really looking for a new job.

The job market is pretty thin, at the moment. Over the past two months, I’ve only managed to get one interview (though I haven’t been trying very hard). Fortunately, I don’t have my heart set on doing the same job I’ve been doing. While I’ve really enjoyed being a technology guru, I’m ready to try something new, and if any of my dear readers have something in mind (or a job opening they would like to fill), I’m open to suggestions.

It’s been a week now since I was laid off, but so far, things haven’t changed much. I still get up at about the same time, and my day is pretty full. After all, I need to get my resumé up to snuff, start looking for prospects, and I’m also studying for a couple of new things (which I’ll tell you about later).

Before going to Sun, I was considered by most to be a heavy user of email. But, even back in 1992, email was the way things were done internally at Sun. We never sent around paper memos. As a result, I developed processes for dealing with the fact that, on a typical day, I would receive between 200 and 400 emails. And that was after all of the spam filters had done their work.

Now, I’m not asking to start receiving a flood of email. I’m simply pointing out that the biggest change I’ve noticed in the past week is that, with only a few dozen emails a day, my entire way of dealing with my on-line life is now very different from what from what it had been.

Thankfully, the practice of using an email address as a userid isn’t as common as it once was, but I’ve been active on the web since 1993, and have a lot of registrations scattered about.

As I feared, a number of these sites allow changing your email address, but only after sending a confirmation message to the original address, with no clear way of making changes should that address become unavailable. I’m sure I didn’t catch them all, but at least the ones I still use regularly seem to be done. Now, I’ll have to make a habit of checking the settings every time I log in to a site to be sure that they’re not sending stuff to the old address.

It feels a bit strange, but after almost 17 years of having the same primary email address, I suppose there is bound to be confusion and cruft left behind for quite some time.

Of course, I have seldom used my work address for non-work stuff in recent years, but not too long ago, it was uncommon to have more than one email address. Today, I have seven email accounts going to my iPhone, and there are several more on top of that which I only check on occasionally.

While I was trying to do all of that clean-up, I installed WordPress and got my first blog entry published, and packed up gear I had at home. After taking the gear back to the office, I met with a couple of ex-Sun friends for dinner and a few beers.

My RIF package just arrived via FedEx, so I’m going to spend some time figuring out what my benefits are. Looks like Sun is being very generous, so I should have some time to reflect on what I would like to do going forward.

I don’t need to rush around for anything today, so I think I’ll take in a movie (probably Watchmen) this afternoon.

My first ever, in fact, so bear with me while I flesh this out.

It seems like the right time to do this, since I was laid off today from Sun Microsystems, where I have been working for nearly 17 years. I’m still coming to terms with it, but I think this is not as bad as it might seem. I’m going to treat this as an an opportunity to try something new, hence the initial name of this blog.

And I have experience to help me. I was (very nearly) laid off in 2004, but was called back at the last moment. If you’re interested, you can find an email I sent out about that experience here.

The link in that message is very old and won’t work, but it referred to the announcement that Sun was going to develop the world’s first publicly-available Grid Computing Utility. I worked as Lead Engineer on the project, and we did it. It was kind of cool. Anybody could use our Compute Grid for $1 per CPU/hour.

So, it begins again. Thanks for taking this ride with me.

Curt Harpold

Posted from Rockville, Maryland, United States.