Got home late last night after Evelyn’s farewell party, and as I pulled into the apartment complex I was met by four raccoons. They quickly scurried up a nearby tree, but were still there when I came back from parking the car with my camera ready. One was just about low enough in the tree to take some photos with my little digital. Only just though, as a result the photos are somewhat grainy.

As always, click on the thumbnail for a larger version of the photo.

I have completely given up on Yahoo’s real estate service. Here in the bay area they use ZipRealty as a provider for the service, but since I signed up (you need to register to even browse the listings) I have had my account repeatedly deactivated preventing me from searching. Since my time for searching is usually very late at night, the number they provide to re-activate the account is not useful and there’s no online way to re-activate the account.

So, I have switched to a service that provides all the same access to the listings, and does so without the need for registration: Realtor.com. If you do register (free of charge, of course, but you’ll need to give them an email address etc), then you can save properties that you are interested in and even the search terms (useful if you go to town on the all the options).

All in all, I have been very impressed by their service, at least as good, if not better, than the ZipRealty service, and without the annoying spam email from an agent who wanted to pressure me into buying and then de-activates my account because I haven’t found a place I want to look at that is also in my price range. Not a good way to get sales if you ask me…

Even more pictures of Jinx, at eight weeks old, for your enjoyment:

Well, the puppy, Jinx, has arrived at my mother’s home and is managing to wear out three adults every day running around and playing continually. My brother was kind enough to send another photo of her on the sofa next to an Eeyore toy:

Finally got fed up with all my calls being dropped by AT&T as I drive around the bay area (they are getting worse by the month here at the moment in terms of the number of places that have full signal strength but still drop you as you drive by). And that is on their old TDMA network; the GSM service in the bay area is supposed to be even worse at the moment (they are transitioning from one to the other at the moment).

So, we signed up for a family plan on T-Mobile. Seems that we can only transfer one number to the family plan (because our original plans were in different names, and the family plan is in just one name). Apart from that though, the plan was better than AT&T and they were willing to give us new phones that were not just the cheapest (AT&T’s best offer was a no-name phone or a $30 credit to the account – less than one month’s service).

Then we discovered that AT&T’s contract end dates are not 12 months from the date they show the contract starting on their web page – they back-date the start date when you call to change plans, but make the contract term then somewhere between 12 & 13 months.

Overall though, the change has been good so far. The only complaint I really have, and this affects all the GSM providers (as well as some of the non-GSM ones), coverage here in Alameda is nowhere near as good as their map would suggest. In my apartment it is impossible for me to get any signal at all, and it doesn’t get much better until I am almost back at the Oakland side of the island. With AT&T’s TDMA service I could at least get a couple of bars of signal, and usually make & receive calls successfully.

A trip to my old university city of Canterbury, in Kent, today to see a new cocker spaniel puppy that my mother will be bringing home early next year. She won’t be home until after I’m back in the U.S. We did snap a photo though (as always, click the image for a larger version):

Saturday December 20, 2003 found me in Horsham, West Sussex for the wedding of long time friend David to Lucy. The wedding ceremony was held in the main hall at Christ’s Hospital School which was freezing cold since the heating on the campus had failed a few weeks earlier and was still not fixed.

The reception was held at another school in the area, Tandridge School. The bride and groom then headed for a hotel for the night, and a flight the next day to St. Lucia in the Caribbean for a Christmas honeymoon.

Driving home last night all the lights dimmed. Not the ones outside, the ones on the dash. The little gauge that measures the charging level dipped well into its red zone and it was looking touch and go for a while on the getting home front.

This morning I dropped by the car dealer, Good Chevrolet here in Alameda, and they checked it out and concluded that the alternator needs to be replaced. So, I am here in Starbucks online and working. Thank goodness for wireless technology, eh?

While I’m writing, check out the old postcards of Alameda. And, no, the car dealer doesn’t look quite the same now as it did in that old postcard.

Was hoping for a wet night so that I could get some nice shots of the Christmas lights in my neighbourhood. Unfortunately, the rain and my schedule did not coincide so the photos were taken on a cool dry night, with crystal clear skies – tonight.

Here’s four of the best in the area:

If I find any more (or it happens to be a nice wet night and I have the camera with me), I’ll add some additional shots.