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I went to my first web development conference ever on Monday and Tuesday in downtown Boston. I was pretty surprised when one of the speakers surveyed the audience, and I found out that most people were in from out of town. I met designers and developers from Philly, Boulder, NYC, Portsmouth and the Netherlands – and a few locals scattered in there too. Day 1 of the conference sort of underwhelmed me – it was a lot of generic, broad information – like don’t take clients who seem like they’ll be a PITA. Day 2 really got into some good stuff, mostly CSS3 awesomeness with loads of code up on the giant screens. That is what I was looking for. I grabbed a few snapshots from the AEA Boston Flickr group, can you spot me in the two below? Read the rest of this entry »

We’ve had some really nice growing weather here in Boston recently. Sunny and in the 70s for a couple days, then one or two days of rain, then straight back to sunny. Needless to say, there has been much growing progress in my garden – weeds and veggies alike. (Clockwise from top left: sugar pumpkin, broccoli raab, tom thumb lettuce, chiogga and golden beets)

I am having some problems with flea beetles eating my arugula, and also trying out the lettuce and broccoli. I took over some hot pepper + soap spray today, so hopefully that helps deter them from snacking. I also did a second planting of my english peas (which need to be staked up), and replanted some cucumbers and sunflowers that got devoured by a squirrel or something. My parsnips, green onions, red onions and other lettuces are all doing well. I will be harvesting some arugula and broccoli raab sometime soon!

Wednesday morning we drove from our hotel in Luquillo to Fajardo and caught the 9:30 am passenger ferry to Vieques – a small island off the east coast of Puerto Rico. About an hour and a half later we landed on Vieques to lots of sunshine, crystal blue water and white sandy beaches. We grabbed a public car (taxi) to Esperanza on the other side of the island, and checked into our hotel. Not having any plans for the afternoon, we got into our swim suits and wandered down to the city for some lunch.

Esperanza seems kinda touristy to me. The city is basically comprised of a row of pretty cheesy restaurants/bars across from a malecon (“boardwalk”, but basically just an elevated sidewalk along the ocean). After lunch we walked down to the public swimming beach, which was so pretty.

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We spent last week in Puerto Rico on an impromptu vacation, booked two weeks prior. Puerto Rico is definitely my favorite spot I’ve visited in the Caribbean, but very different from Costa Rica (although it boasts some of the same natural features). I really enjoyed the trip – beautiful scenery, crazy bay (more details in the next post), local culture, clear water and wearing short shorts and my fedorable hat everywhere.

We arrived in San Juan on Monday around 3pm, grabbed our rental car and took the scenic route along the coast to Luquillo – a little beach town close to the rain forest. We checked into Luquillo Sunrise Inn, milled around a bit, checked out the beach across the street:

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