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Today, ThinkGeek attended the Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology’s robotics competition. Imagine about 450 students, each having built and programmed their own little wheeled robots designed to navigate a simple obstacle course. They whittled it down to 7 freshmen before the “big event.”

They revealed a new course where the robots had to maneuver into a nook, pop into a balloon, and scoot to the other side. With a two minute introduction to the course, the students took their robots to a bank of laptops and attempted to program them in ten minutes.
One by one, they stood, placed their robots on the mark, and hit the “go” button.

Out of seven kids, guess how many actually were able to successfully maneuver the course? C’mon, guess!

No, I’m serious, guess.

None.

They were given another five minutes to reprogram the robots and try again. With another try, the success rate was phenomenal.

None.

There was improvement, though! Two of the seven were able to pop their balloons, and one maneuvered out of the little nook before spinning out of control, and rolling over the wall. Technically nobody won, but the girl whose robot made it out of the nook won first prize.

ThinkGeek supplied several prizes and gift certificates. I was hoping they would send all 450 robots into a giant free-for-all, which would have made an awesome video. Alas, it was not to be.

Neither Heather nor I relished the idea of driving back from Williamsburg in the deluge the weather forecasters were expecting. We were pretty confident we could handle the driving ourselves, but experience has shown us many times that it’s almost always the other guy that you have to worry about. We had a hotel lined up, but it’s supposed to get even worse on Sunday, so why bother?

We, instead, decided to do a little history exploration right here in Old Town Leesburg. We learned about Leesburg’s role in the Confederacy,  how old some of the local houses were, and what some of the original uses for some of the buildings were – some were taverns,  one was an old Dodge dealership from the turn of the century.

We had dinner in a great place that was once an old Mill called Tuscarora Mill, or “Tuskies.” It looked like a very nice place to have a civilized sit-down lunch. When I looked at their drinks menu, I was shocked by the beer selection – they even offered my all-time favorite beer, Fullers London Pride on draught! Unfortunately, the bartender said that it wasn’t pouring correctly, and wasn’t willing to serve it. I ended up with a Duvel instead (my second-favorite beer!). I’ll have to go back at some point.

I had a nice bowl of seafood chowder while Heather enjoyed a chicken and penne dish, that was actually better than mine.

I took a lot of pictures, but only a few were worth anything. I’m still having to teach myself to really shoot everything. Heather took twice as many pictures as mine, but came away with a whole lot more good pictures than me. See? It’s not the camera, it’s the photographer. Anyway, go check some of mine out here. I experimented with some black-and-white stuff. Let me know what you think.

Our weekend vacation might be marred by weather. A classic “Noreaster” storm is slowly forming over the Tennessee valley, and is expected to park itself in the Atlantic just east of Georgia. That coupled with a high-pressure system over the great lakes acts as a pump that drives cold weather from the north directly into the path of moisture from the ocean. That drives winds and rain directly into the coast. Saturday is expected to be alright, but Sunday through Monday is expected to be, in a word, shit.

In Williamsburg, they’re expecting cold weather and thunderstorms. As the storm moves north, the DC area is expecting the same. Now, the temperature Sunday night is expected to drop giving us a chance of – wait for it – a little bit of snow!

Actually, we had snow last week, but Leesburg got flurries while Alexandria actually got an inch or so. I didn’t bother to blog about it because, well, that’s all I seem to blog about now. At least now, I’m relating it to vacation.

Still, we get an almost full day in Williamsburg, enjoying the sights and history. Plus, we like to drive. I’ll try to shoot some pictures.

I’ve been bad. I haven’t written a single post since I got back from Germany. The double-whammy of catching up on all my back-work, and the fact that the trip being so busy that getting back seemed so mundane, that nothing interesting enough for me to mention going on. After some reflection, though, I suppose there are a few things to report.

Number one, and deliciously geeky – Heather and I have booked tickets to go to not one but TWO sci-fi conventions in July. The first one is Shore Leave 29, which is a nice general-sci-fi con that’s close to home. The second is the hard-core Star Trek convention in Cherry Hill, NJ. The original series (surviving) triumvirate of Kirk/Spock/Sulu are going to be there. Nerdgasm!

The second thing is, I went out to the local arts and craft store and picked up some unfinished shelves – the kind that look like pedestal tops with no visible mounting that attach directly to the wall. I bought stain, brushes, sandpaper, poly, and mineral spirits and, over several nights, finished off one of the shelves.

We’re taking Friday and Monday off, giving us a four day weekend. We’re going to go down to Williamsburg, walk up and down Duke of Gloucester Street, eat caramel apples, take pictures and soak up some history. Virginia is busy celebrating its 400 year anniversary, so I expect some crowds, but that’s okay. I don’t mind.