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Had a blast surfing today. Natalie and Mom came out and watched, took pics. I'll try to get the pics up tomorrow, but not likely to get them up till we get back in town. Nat and I are both roasted, hopefully we don't peel too bad! More on all we've been doing...
I finally got the 293 opening day photos posted! Here are a few of the "good" ones, though I didn't go through them all.   Me walking into Cheers Me and Auntie Carol after the...
Coming back from Lexington Kentucky yesterday we stopped just into Indiana for some lunch. We got back on Highway 64 and immediately stopped in a traffic jam. We were sitting there for about an hour. When we finally made it through the traffic causing accident we saw a single Ford Explorer, I saw the passenger window broken, I assumed from rolling over. Apparently it was from gunfire! Check out the story...
I've been here in Lexington, Kentucky for the past 4 days. I was fortunate enough to meet two of the brightest minds in the industry! Also, I can't forget Chad Hobson (checkout that killer site, what mad skillz). Anyways, back to the brightest minds. I got to meet Shaun Walker, founder of DotNetNuke, and Scott Willhite, one of the Board members for DotNetNuke. I of course got them to sign my DotNetNuke book while they were...
So, even though I've never really been to the city of Chicago before, I'm stuck here right now. Was flying to Lexington KY, via Chicago and the flight out of STL was late, so here I am, sitting here for another 2 hours waiting for the next flight to Lexington. Finally got myself online, at a rate of 6.95/day, but at least I've got something to kill time with...
So you're wondering how to get yourself an Xbox360 before Christmas? Here's a few tips. Take 1: On November 21st, head to your local Best Buy, Wal Mart or Circuit City, Target, Kmart. Take warm clothes, some food, and a comfortable folding chair, you're going to be there a while. Wait, wait, wait, until 8am on November 22nd. Go in the store and buy one! If you're lucky enough to be one of the few in line that will get one. Take 2. Bid on one on Ebay. Take 3. Try finding one on Black Friday. (yeah good luck with that.) Take 4. Wait till after Christmas!   Any of your own tips on how to find a 360 before Christmas? Post them...
So now that most folks know Natalie and I got engaged last weekend, it's time to tell the story of how it happened. A little bit of info on this past weekend, Natalie's mother's birthday was on the 7th of October, so we were all headed out to So Cal for the occasion. Her parents live about 17 miles from mine, but by California's roads that's about a 45 minute drive. We, Me, Natalie, her sister, brother-in-law and neice all went out to California for the weekend, to visit with her family and mine. We planned on everyone going to my parent's house on Saturday at 6:30pm, kind of a family gathering, have both sets of parents meet, and just have dinner and hang out all evening. I however had other plans and had Mom scope out locations on the beach for me a few weeks back. The requirements were a good view of the Ocean at Sunset, easy accessibility, and somewhere that 18 people could watch, without Natalie seeing those 18 people until after I asked her to marry me. Dog Beach down in Huntington beach was the perfect location, with two seperate parking areas so that Natalie and I could park, and walk ~1/4 mile to the sand below the cliffs at the second parking area. So the plan actually was for everyone to show up at my parents house at 5pm, and head down to the beach. Natalie and I got to the house around 4:30 and picked up the Triumph so we could drive down PCH with top down, sight seeing a little was the cover I used with Natalie. I had to double check on the location mom picked out, as dad early Saturday morning said the two parking locations where too far apart, after seeing they were nice and close to each other I let mom know via a cryptic phonecall we would be in the same location as planned. Natalie and I drove around Huntington Beach a bit, stopping to watchi a few kite surfers (probably the wrong term) and then headed back up to the first Dog beach parking lot. I took her down for a stroll along the beach, all along looking ahead to see if I could see anyone at the rendevous point yet. We ended up at the point I had planned probably 5-10 minutes before everyone else showed up. Not exactly on time as I had planned, but I think that worked out best as no one was around when we were walking towards where they would all be standing, I was hoping she wouldn't see anyone before I asked her. This whole time Natalie was freezing, the weather the day before had been 83 and sunny, but the weather saturday was getting overcast and windy, probably somewhere near 55-60 with a 15-20mph wind from the ocean. Though, even with the clouds and wind, we had a pretty good view of the sunset, which I had planned everything around, a 6:19pm sunset. We stood there for what seemed like an eternity, finally the family showed up, I had to wave at them behind my back to get them down to the area near the life guard stand (stand 22) that would give them the best view. Natalie actually asked me if I was waving at someone, I said no, I was just cold and shaking out my hands. :) Once everyone was in position I suggested she put her shoes down, she'd been carrying them since we got to the sand. After a few moments, and her wiping her runny nose from the cold wind on my shirt, I got down on one knee and asked her to marry me. She teared up, not saying a word, in shock. I had to ask her, "well, will you?" to get her to knod yes! I rose and gave her a hug and a kiss and then the crowd cheered, she turned and saw 18 people standing up on the bluff cheering for us. It took her a bit to realize it was all of our families up there watching :). Everything turned out great, Greg (my brother) and Dad had my still camera and video camera snapping and shooting away the whole time. We walked up to the bluff and took lots of photos together, with all the family in various arrangements. Afterwards we all headed to Mom and Dad's house in Long Beach for a few hours of socializing. It was a great evening, and special thanks to Mom for getting everything together...
All went well with my plans. Natalie and I are now engaged! Pics and video up later this...
Photos from Topeka are posted. Thanks to James Elterman for taking most of the 5th heat photos while I was...
Photos from the University City portion of the Gateway Cup are posted. http://chrishammond.com/photos/2005_gateway_cup/default.aspx I only took Cat 5, Masters, and Cat 4...
I had an adventure to make it to and from the game on 8/25 in KC, but managed to take a few hundred photos at the game. Please feel free to give me any comments. I'm by no means a photographer, just a guy with a camera, so any tips/suggestions appreciated.You can see the photos here http://chrishammond.com/photos/old/category1068.aspxHere's my story about the darn ride back to St. Louishttp://www.chrishammond.com/archive...08/27/1502.aspxAnd then, of course my 2004 Game 4 World Series...
So, ever since google earth came out I've been trying to find a satellite photo of one of my cars. Well, I found MSN's Virtual Earth this evening and I think I've found one! Here's a link to Swank, follow Walnut Place west of Jefferson, out in front of the second building (swank being on jefferson as building number 1) just out of the shadows there's a white car, with a black top. I believe that's my old Camaro Z-28.  I could be wrong, and this could be a really old picture, but looking on the eastern wall of that second building is a black area between the building and the parking lot, I believe that's the left over asphalt from the Swank wiring...
 1200 photos from the event this past weekend. http://www.solo2.org/gallery/albums/69.aspx Mostly heats 2 and 4, though a few Heat 3 photos in there as well. The new camera, Rebel XT,...
Andy and I made it to Denver and back. I went 1800.8 miles since I filled up with gas on Thursday night, we left Friday at 4am. The car did well, Andy was in the lead after the first day, but slipped to 2nd on the second day. I finished in 7th both days. Not a great showing for myself, though Andy picked up $200 from Kumho's contingency $$. I took ~800 photos, I'll link those later as there are some server problems right now. I also broke the Digital Rebel, so I'm headed to Best Buy this evening to see how they are going to handle the warranty on that...
We got to denver around 4pm, just under 12 hours. Andy drove most of the way, I got to sleep. I'm sure it'll be the opposite going home. The course is huge, gonna be a long...
I'm getting up in 4 hours to drive to Denver for the SCCA National Tour. I have to pick Andy up at 4am. Will post more info when I get to...
Saw the movie last night after getting back from the Midiv Divisional #4 in Kansas City Missouri. The movie was a blast, I laughed, cried, had a good time. Okay, I didn't cry, it's not a sad movie! The divisional went great. I beat Andy again, so we now both have 2 wins, with the 5th and final divisional coming up in Topeka in two weeks. The division championship is tallyed with your best 3 of 5 scores, so I have to finish in either First, or 2nd with Andy 3rd or lower. We're off to Denver next weekend for another National Tour. That'll make 4 National Tours and 5 divisionals this year, far more than I've travelled out of town for events than any other year, but we're doing well, so we need to keep it...
For some reason I haven't blogged about Krekeler Jewelers in a while! So here it is, a blog post! I visited Jeff a few weeks ago to get some of Natalie's jewelry repaired. I still need to head back down there and pick some of it...
On nightline tonight there was a story about a girl named Sarah Reinertson, she's 30, and only has one leg. She attempted the Ironman Triathlon in Hawaii last year, she made it to the transition after the bike ride, but was 15 minutes too late to go on the run. The show is still on, but I believe she's going to attempt the triathlon again this year. It really makes you think about life when you see what she does. She's got this challenge she has to live with every day, and she has the drive to be able to compete in this hardcore...
It was only so long before google expanded their mapping capabilities, from Earth to the Moon! Check out http://moon.google.com You'll be amazed at how far you can zoom...
Well, I was going to do this blog post as my entry in the “blog your way to the PDC” but after doing a bit of research, I actually don't want to go to PDC 05 in LA. Here's why. The PDC is being held September 13-16th 2005, which is exactly the time frame I will be in Topeka Kansas at the SCCA Solo Nationals. Andy and I have a good shot at performing well in the car there this year, so I would hate to miss a trophy (hopefully) at Nationals to go to a developers conference! So, I challenge Microsoft to move the PDC to the following week! Then I will re-enter myself in the “blog your way to the PDC“ with my original intention of using the PDC as an excuse to road trip from St. Louis to California in my 350Z, blogging and taking photo graphs along the way! ...
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Chris Hammond

Chris Hammond

is a father, husband, leader, developer, photographer and car guy. Chris has long specialized in ASP.NET and DotNetNuke (DNN) development, so you will find a variety of posts relating to those topics. For more information check out the about Chris Hammond page.

If you are looking for DotNetNuke consulting please visit Christoc.com Software Solutions

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