Sachin Agarwal: August 2003

One of my co-workers, Jerry, left us this week. He moved down to LA to work at the Apple pro video office down there. It's really sad seeing him go. He was one of the people at Apple I hung out with the most.

The week he left was a huge party (because we were sad to see him go, not because he was leaving :) )

On Monday there was a surprise beer bash because the G5s started shipping. On Wednesday we took the day off and went to Great America. On Thursday night we went to Dave and Busters and got Jerry TRASHED on every horrible shooter they had. On Friday for lunch we went to an authentic Philly cheese steak place in Saratoga (did you know authentic cheese steak is made with cheese whiz? Nasty!). Then on Friday afternoon our group had another beer bash and we had tons of Italian desserts and cakes shipped in from New York! Wow they were good.

I'm hoping that eventually I can move down to LA where Jerry is working. I hated LA when I lived there, but after turning 21 and then going down there I love it! It's so much more fun than up north. It would be nice to go back down to LA for a year or two.

I really need to move to SF. I love my house and my housemates, but it's really really lame down here in the South Bay. After being here for 5 years I'm totally ready to get the hell out. On the weekdays there is NOTHING going on. And on the weekends I need to leave of the area to find anything to do.

My best friend from high school, Joe Kim, moved up to the city this summer. We've hung in the city the past couple of weeks. It was soooo much fun. Two weeks ago I was out until 5am. SF really is a great place to live. My cousin lived there and commuted to Apple for 4 years. I'm not sure if I can handle it.

he he, he he

I've always really, really loved going out to restaurants to eat and bars to drink. Partly it's for the atmosphere, and party for the good food and alcohol.

Last night we went to an Intel party that one of Chris' co-workers was throwing. The party was very cool but I didn't actually meet many new people. Most of the time I was talking to my friends. So I realized that I don't necessarily like to go out for the higher quality drinks, or to meet new people. I just like to go out for the change in setting.

Staying home and doing something can be a lot of fun, but it's also very routine and boring. You know what's going to happen. When you go out, random shit always happens and you always have stories to tell afterwards.

Last night stories? The main one was riding in Nathan's new Saab 93. On the short trip from Los Altos to Sunnyvale you wouldn't believe how many times he chirped his tires, downshifted aggressively, how many times his stability control/traction control kicked in, how many times he almost lost control of his rear end, or how many parked cars he almost mowed down.

Seriously though he's a really good driver and the drive was tons of fun :)

Also, shizzle.

Tonight I'm going to SF to hang out with one of my best friends from freshman and sophomore years in high school. I love San Francisco.

Here's a cool article by Robert X. Cringely. He wrote Accidental Empires and I think he was a Stanford professor.

This article has several interesting points:

1. Microsoft Windows viruses. Why doesn't Microshit fix security holes? Why don't IT departments apply updates once they are available? The update to fix this latest virus was out a month ago. And someone made suggestions to MS 12 YEARS AGO that would have prevented this virus, but they didn't listen.

2. He argues that Macs aren't popular in business because "Macs reduce IT head count while Linux probably increases IT head count, simple as that." If an IT department recommended Macs, they would be out of jobs. Mac OS X is as powerful as UNIX, but it's a breeze to setup and use.

3. Nerd ego. Nerds like to feel powerful, like they are badass because they can use a command line and setup a Unix machine. Well fuck that. I can setup an XServe in minutes and spend my time doing IMPORTANT THINGS. It's like people who code HTML by hand. I don't get it. It's a waste of time. I'd rather let a program make the HTML and I'll spend my time on CONTENT.

4. Macs cost more than PCs. But the Total Cost of Ownership is LESS. If you factor in all the additional goodies you get, the less support you will need, how long they last, and their rediculous resale value, you will spend less on a Mac than you would on a PC. I know I have

There are other interesting things as well. I recommend reading the article.

http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pulpit/pulpit20030814.html

My mom's Solid Gold MINI is still on order and hasn't begun production yet. I got an email from MINI USA that let me pick out a free CD that would be in the CD player when I pick up the car, choose which radio stations I want preprogrammed into the radio, and make other decisions to customize the car. I definitely have to custom order the next car I buy (cause you know programming those radio stations is a bitch! :) ).

This was one of the best weekends ever. Steph and Del got married on Saturday in St. Francis Winery in Kenwood, CA. Seiji, Tony, and Ryan were in town for the wedding.

The wedding started at around 5pm. It was a great ceremony. The winery was beautiful; the backdrop almost didn't look real. We were surrounded by grape vines, and off in the distance there were mountains. The weather was perfect.

After the wedding we had dinner and a reception. Lots of beer and wine were consumed :) At around 11pm all the young people took off to some bars in the area. We were out until around 3AM when we headed back to the hotel and crashed.

On Sunday we continued wine tasting with a mild hangover :). I wanted to stop at Ledson winery because it was a gorgeous castle like building. We drove in and they had a live band playing and lots of people were tasting wine. I joined their wine club so I get a couple bottles every other month, and I can go to club events. I'm hoping to go there a couple times a year.

We checked out some other parts of Sonoma and went Sake tasting. I got this great Raspberry dessert Sake.

Sonoma/Napa was amazing. Driving on the 12 near all the wineries was beautiful. Driving and wine, my two favorite things :)

Sunday night Seiji and I had dinner at BJs with Rob, the chef from Bob. He drove his pimp ass car and EVERYONE was checking it out.

Overall it was an amazing weekend. Congratulations to Stephanie and Del!

Check back for pictures.

Update: Here are some pictures. More coming later.

Last night Seiji, Eric, Anita, Josh, Chris, Geoff and I went to the Nuthouse to hang out and celebrate Eric's birthday (a little late).

This VP at Intel claims Apple made the wrong choice going with IBM for the G5. I admit the G4 pretty much sucked from start to finish, but the G5 is a different story.

Then he pulls out the Centrino marketing bullshit and claims they are doing great things making wireless laptops. Right. Apple has had integrated wireless for over FOUR YEARS now.

And the guy sounds like an idiot.

http://www.canada.com/technology/story.html?id=262551E7-13C4-47D2-8782-E933BC367BF6

I think it's really cool (and scary) that doctors can perform new, experimental procedures without any government approval. It makes sense because if you are in pain or are going to die, why not take the risk? It's your life anyway.

http://nytimes.com/2003/08/04/health/04SURG.html?hp

Pirates of the Caribbean is a great movie! I think it's my favorite movie this summer. Johnny Dep is all around awesome, and Keira Knightley is HOT.

Don't miss this movie. It's definitely worth seeing in the theatres.

After the movie I wa trying to find a picture of the Apple Cupertino campus back when they use to fly the pirate flag. I can't find one. :(