Too few hours in the day //Jafoca.com

My good friend Neil Chan recently participated in a dive photo ’shoot out’ contest in Byron Bay.

He just told me that he had some of his photos posted on his blog over at
www.neilchan.com – the photos are AMAZING!

Some background – Neil is my dive buddy from Australia.  He is a marine biologist by day, dive instructor by night, and fits in some time for photography in between.  He actually recently won a pretty sweet prize for being one of the top fundraisers for the Life On The Edge Challenge – which was really cool.

Anyway, when I was in Australia nearly 3 years ago Neil was just getting into underwater photography, with me prodding him along the way. Since then he has taken the plunge into the deep end (haha) and gotten pretty serious about it, so I offered to set up the photo-blog site for him. So now all of us in the northern climes can live vicariously thru Neil and his adventures in Australia.

Neil tells me that Byron Bay is one of the top reviewed dive sites in all of Australia, and the photos prove his point. Neil captured some great photos of somewhat rare creatures including peacock mantis shrimp, cuttlefish, anglerfish, and several nudibranch – go check out these oddities at his byron bay page.

So as I mentioned before, my car has been having some problems.  It all started with a “Check Engine” light about 1500 miles before my warranty went out.

After going in and out of the shop 4 times for the problem, and subsequently leaking petrol all over the garage at my house, I was assured that “the problem was taken care of”.

Thankfully too, the Audi service manager, Mike at Delta Imports, said that they would stand behind my Audi even after the warranty is up, since it is admittedly buggy (lemon perhaps?).  I am very greatful for this, but I feel that this is what should be expected when buying a high end car from the beginning.

I was just hoping not to put his word to the test so soon.

This is my 2005.5 (b7 platform) audi a4.

It is a 2.0t (great engine), and has quattro, XM sat radio, an automatic transmission (boo…), and the performance package.

I love it. I will say this again and again, this is the ultimate car for driving in snow. Its 200 HP from a 4 cyl engine is ample, and more than many 6 cyl cars manage. The interior is a study in quality materials. The car feels slow – that is to say… it is so stable, quiet, and confident at speed that I can be doing 85mph and feel like I am only going 65. I have never experienced that in another car, even my previous b5 A4.

It is also, unfortunately, an early model in the b7 product line, and all the kinks were not worked out when it was assembled in December 2004.

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This is for Neil and Joni !!!

I finally found one of the GOOD beers from australia in a retailer here in the USA!  James Boag’s, brewed (and sampled by me) in Tasmania, was either my 2nd or 3rd choice beer while studying abroad in Australia.  Now if I can only find some Cascade Premium!

The beer was found, cold no less, at a local grocery store / market called Kingma’s Market.  Until now I had only seen Tooie’s New (swill), and Fosters (crap) here in the States.

Sorry for the crap picture.  The Iphone is not the greatest in low light!

 Oh, and Joni – my friend Nick and I downed the 6 pack while watching the Battlestar Galactica series finale.