Cat and I spent a few days in Oregon for a wedding last weekend. Beautiful place, great weather, stellar seafood.

I’m in Närpes, Finland working from my grandmother’s house for 10 days. It’s a very rural area, and as kids this place seemed so remote that after spending 6 summer weeks here it felt like you were coming home to an entirely different world. Your friends had changed, a season full of events had passed and you were an outsider when you returned.

It’s been a completely opposite experience this time. My grandmother’s 200 year old farm house has a 10 megabit fiber connection – twice as fast as the top-of-the line DSL package in the New York metropolitan area – and voice over IP lets me join conference calls with better comfort and clarity than my cell phone.

All this coincides with observations about the world of business and communications in the book I’ve finally gotten around to reading, The World Is Flat, by Thomas Friedman. Unless I explicitly remind my friends and coworkers, they can’t really tell where I am.

I have some pictures posted, but will spend more time making them presentable when I return.

Update: I’ve returned and posted my pictures in a better thumbnail format.

I spent the last two weekends in Dallas and St. Louis, respectively.

My college frat brother Janet was married in Texas to my good friend Mike from high school. Unfortunately, I left my camera in my hotel room the day of the ceremony and reception, so my pics aren’t too hot. I wish Clive had done the same when karaoke broke out in the wee hours…

The trip to St. Louis involved a 19 hour, 1000 mile road trip on the way out from Connecticut, and a 16 hour return trip. I accumulated a bug collection the likes of which the Peabody would be proud. I prefer to forget all the time on the road, but Missouri itself was nice.

I’ve posted pictures from my six week trip to the Bay Area.

Some pictures of the new Frontier.

United for Peace in New York. My photos of the anti-war rally in NYC.

Snow in New York. It continued to snow for another 21 hours since these shots were taken.