April 2014 – Page 2 – Bus Driver Jim

Cohke

TIL (today I learned) that the Coke company has grabbed all of the Ahh domain names out to some stupid number, example www.ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.com and beyond. It made me wonder if they missed the obvious.

So, I explored the mystical DNS (domain name system) in the cloud, searching for a Coke name in keeping with my phonetic h series of domain names, and guess what I found?

They missed the obvious. I’m now the proud owner of cohke.com.

All of their efforts to capture Ahhhhhh nonsense and they missed this simple five letter domain name. I’m going to have some fun with this one…

Moving Day

It was moving day yesterday for the Teton County Sheriff’s Department. I spotted the van early in the morning just sitting there in front of the old courthouse and around noon I grabbed these shots as the workers were loading the truck up. A computer outfit was waiting in the wings to gather up the hardware.

I’ve watched their new building come alive from the ground up and these are the first photos I’ve taken of it. The brick work is impressive and the woodwork is even more so. They’ve been waiting for the new antenna to become functional before making the move and it looks like it is. I’m sure there will be an open house and I plan on being there.

The Sheriff’s office has been confined to our old courthouse for quite some time now. The place was built in 1924 and vacated in 2010 when the new courthouse was built. I think the building has County Library written all over it.

At the end of the day I drove in from the backside with my last ride onboard and the building was alive! Parking lot full, sheriff’s vehicles all over the place and lot’s of smiling cops.

SlideShow

Easter Bags

I’m really fond of the kids I transport but occasionally one warms my heart. There’s a little six year old that rides from the Community school and she’s got to be an old soul. Smart, soft spoken and genuinely kind when the others around her are not.

She asked me about the box of Easter treats when she got on the bus yesterday, and I just smiled. She knew the drill. As we approached Driggs I got on the intercom and told the kids to grab their Easter bag on the way out the door.

Sitting directly behind me she said to the girl next to her “You know what? I love my bus driver.”

Heart, melted…

NCIS

Watching NCIS Los Angeles tonight on CBS and they’re interrogating an asian guy who’s an undercover agent for them but they think he went bad. He proceeds to say that he grew up at the base of the Grand Tetons in Driggs, Idaho.

Are you kidding me! How did our little town make it into the narrative of a popular show like this? Wait a minute, now it’s determined he wasn’t born in Idaho, it was a lie. The show is still going on and this is your live update.

Driggs, Idaho. Really… I knew it was a lie because I can count my asian neighbors on one hand, and they all moved here :-)

Lone Tree

I know Bates Road pretty well by now having driven it through all the seasons of many years but today I noticed something new. It caught my eye so hard I came to a stop in the middle of the road and backed up to it.

The people behind me were furious as they all had to follow suite to avoid getting run over. Oh, wait a minute, this is one car every five minutes Bates Road! :-)

What I noticed was one lone tree standing in the middle of a huge crop field. I’m not sure what they’re growing there this year, barley or potatoes probably, but why would they leave one tree standing? Maybe it’s where those two eagles live…

CardboardS 2014

While I was snapping Cardboard Derby shots yesterday with my new Canon, Steph was grabbing her own angle on the event with her camera, my old Canon. I cherry-picked a bunch, presented here, and I guess you could play the Spot BusDriverJim game…

Click the photo below to show all of the photos or run the SlideShow.

Cardboard 2014

My nephew Brian drove Steph and I up to the mountain this morning for the great Grand Targhee Cardboard Derby. This is the event that signals the end of ski season around here and I know a lot of these folks.

I took over 400 photos today, some using a mode that captures a bunch of sequential frames rapidly, and I’ve narrowed them down to 173 shots. The sports mode was used on the downhill runs and worked great for isolating expressions.

Click the photo below to show all of the photos or run the SlideShow.

If you’re wondering what this lead-in photo refers to, click here.

Update: Brian had to bail early and we missed the last morning shuttle heading down the hill so we hitch-hiked out of Grand Targhee. Got a great ride from a young guy who has an ocean fishing guide business in Alaska where he works 110 days in the summer and then comes back to his home here in the valley to ski in the winter. He dropped us off in our driveway. Stephs first hitch-hiking adventure was a success!

Here’s a cool composite video that just might give you a feel for the event:

Ice Cave

What is this? Here’s some clues: Fall River, murder, hot water and anti-freeze…

Pigsty

I deal with a lot of animals on the road and I haven’t hit one with my bus yet although I did have a deer take out the side mirrors on my truck recently.

Yesterday I saw an animal on Bates Road about a quarter mile away so I started slowing down. I came to a complete stop as a pig crossed in front of me heading back to his roadside sty and his pig buddies.

There was no traffic so I rolled the window down and hung out with them for a bit. I find it interesting that the ranchers don’t care if they wander into the road.

SlideShow

Old And New

Everytime I drive Bates Road out by the foothills of the Big Hole mountains I’m struck by this old Mormon place next to the big new house.

I’m assuming the farmland has been passed down through generations and the current owners live in the big house. Mormons don’t take down their historic buildings so that must be the old family house. Pretty cool!

Here’s a closer view:

Morning Mush

The formula for my morning heart healing artery cleansing fruit smoothie has evolved into a throat burning gut wrenching cup of energy boosting pleasure.

Banana
Strawberries
Cayenne Pepper
Garlic
Lecithin
Turmeric
Almond Milk

Everything is fresh, the herbs and spices are the best, and I drink it in one shot. The effect on my body throughout the day is amazing and I’m feeling good!

What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger!

Teton Tip

The sun was coming up behind the Grand just as I was pulling into base this morning. From this angle the foothills block all of the mountain but the tip so I set my camera on the roof of my truck and zoomed in full…

Websites

I grabbed another domain name today so in honor of the new addition I’ve created a new category called Websites and put them all there. The new domain is in keeping with my phonetic h concept and is again a sweet little five letter name, called nuhts.

All of the 20 domain names below are .com addresses:

bdjimRedirects to busdriverjim.

bdjurlCustom short url generator.

buhlshitWorld news feed processor.

busdriverjimThis wordpress blog.

cohkeA spreadsheet for my travels.

crahpCurrent Flickr uploads.

fahckHTML5 design experiment using jCanvas.

fkscanThe original Flickr new photo scanner.

jessicabangertMy daughter-in-laws blog.

juhnkGoogle maps directions ruler.

nuhtsThe BusDriverJim blog custom search.

pehpsiUnder development…

rahtonCurrent movie information.

rileybangertMy sons website placeholder.

sehxeNPR article presentation.

shihtHTML5 dropdown menu experiment.

suhckThe best photos from Flickr.

symegryNew Flickr photos using jCanvas.

tetonstephStephs website.

wishpyMy Flickr photos presented randomly.

The Grid

This is awful, between my sweet computer rig and now tons of high-def digital content to stream from the cloud, I may never leave my office again. Not good, I need to work to pay for all these toys.

The Amazon Fire TV has integrated well with my over-the-air antenna and the amount of programming available is stunning for someone who is off the grid. The picture quality is amazing and everything happens really fast due to the quad-core processor in the Amazon box (left).

Another thing I like is that it goes to screensaver mode for a bit and then powers itself down automatically. I used to have to unplug my Roku’s because they got too hot.

There are a few videos embedded in the players help section and one of them is pretty cute. I’m sure Amazon will release it to the wild shortly but until they do here’s a screen capture I grabbed of it this morning:

Update: Steph just asked me if we could watch the new Hunger Games film Catching Fire. I grabbed the remote, spoke the request, clicked yes to the $4.99 charge to my net worth and we are now hunkering down to a great movie from the comfort of my warm office with no driving and no obnoxious people. I love technology!

Fire TV

I’m sorry, but I can’t write a post tonight. Yesterday morning Amazon announced their new Fire TV streaming device and for some strange reason one showed up at my door this afternoon. I suppose my Prime account and one day shipping had something to do with it. It’s now streaming hi-definition goodness to the Samsung LCD TV off to my left and quite frankly I’m just too distracted for any of this post nonsense.

Update: Ok, some sharing here, I love it! The video quality is stunning and my game controler is on it’s way.