Geodog

Geodog has temporarily retired to Costa Rica

Writing is addictive, but sometimes I need to break the habit. After Bush's War on Iraq started, and after I started SARS Watch Org, about the SARS epidemic, I stopped my Geodog political and technology writing, and worked furiously and full time on SARS Watch Org for about 3 months, stopping as the epidemic wound down. When I stopped working on it, I found I needed a break from writing. I was (and remain) discouraged about the political situation, and I decided to spend more time enjoying my family and the beautiful summer we were having, so I haven't updated Geodog's MT Weblog in a while.

Recently I have been concentrating more on coding and photography than on writing. I used the tools and skills I learned about with SARSWatch to update the TheBishop.Net's News page to actually do something useful, by having it display headlines and excerpts of articles from publications like the Washington Post, the New York Times, and the BBC. The page is updated hourly, making it a useful place to check out the news. I have put up a ton of family pictures in the photo gallery, and actually put up some public pictures, like the ones from the O'Reilly Emerging Technology Conference. And while I took a break this summer from my "Geodog" political writing, I did continue to maintain my linklog. To keep my technology muscles limber, I also started a Costa Rica Travel Wiki to play with the technology and to store information about my upcoming trip to Costa Rica.

Now I am heading down to Costa Rica for a month, to try and gage what it would be like to live down there. When I last visited Costa Rica for a month in 1994, it was a great place to travel, but I wasn't looking at it from the perspective of living there. This time we are going to check out housing costs, schools, employment opportunities, health care, and so on, as well as working on our Spanish and just having a great time. As the situation in the United States continues to deteriorate, it seems only practical to take a look at some alternatives, and Costa Rica sounds appealing from afar. We will see what it looks like close up. I expect that all my surfing in Costa Rica will be waves instead of the net, although I might check my mail once a week or so. Feel free to send me email at my travel address, costaricatim at thebishop.net.

I expect that I will take up writing as Geodog again in the fall, after school starts up. Until then, hasta luego y vaya con dios.