Andrei Zmievski

Yesterday I got an unpleasant surprise when I got home after work. The management of my apartment complex has left a note in my door saying that my lease is expiring in two months and that the rent is being increased $300 (about 30% from the current level). Now I know that the economy is recovering, but this seems like it’s the height of the boom again. So, I have to seriously think about looking for another place unless they agree to a more reasonable increase.
I’d like to find something fairly close to work (not more than 15-20 minutes away by car) and probably an apartment complex rather than a townhouse or a condo. Fairly close to 237/101 would be nice and a proximity to some semblance of social life even better. Any suggestions for a good place? Palo Alto is another option I guess, but may be more expensive.. Anyways, let the search start.

Well, the cat is out of the bag. This article talks about a study that determined that immigrants in the U.S. live about 3 years longer on average than their U.S. born counterparts. I’ve long suspected this, since from my experiences people in Europe and other parts of the world are generally more physically fit and less reliant on drive-everywhere-and-through-everything mentality that plagues this nation.

In yet another illustration for Jeremy’s PageRank Is Dead article, consider this: a search on Google for sailing lessons brings up a page of results with #2 spot being occupied by my previous post about sailing! This is completely nuts. As much as it strokes my ego to know that I’m now an instant authority on this topic and that my page will be getting even more referrals from Google :), I cannot say that this is a good situation. The famed Google quality seems to be rapidly deteriorating, and in all honesty I think Yahoo! results are getting much better, as evidenced by the fact that the same search does not put me at the top of the pack. Conclusions? Draw your own, please.

So I’ve been getting into sailing more and more lately. The last outing was on a 33 foot Moorings Beneteau boat. Myself, Anil, Fergus, and 3 other people chartered it on Sunday and went to have fun around the SF bay. Pictures are here.
And I have also signed up for sailing lessons. I’ve already gone on the introductory sail one, but Basic Keelboat Sailing starts tomorrow. 2 hours of theory + 4 hours on the water every Saturday and Sunday for two weeks. Then it’s Basic Coastal Cruising, with the same schedule. So when I’m done I’m supposed to know all the strange and wonderful nautical terms such as clew, luff, shroud, forestay, leeward, jib, halyard, and beam reach. When I first opened the sailing instruction book I realized what the non-computer people must feel like when faced with a text from the Computer section of the bookstore.
Where will this lead? Who knows.. Maybe sailing around the world, maybe just puttering around the bay on the weekend. And to give you a taste of what it’s like, here’s a tongue-in-cheek quote:

Someone once said that to experience the thrill of sailing one only needs to go in the shower fully clothed, turn the cold water on, and start tearing $20 bills.
— Luigi Semenzato

More sailing humor and sailing wisdom.