I was real busy last week, so I didn’t get a chance to tell about my trip I’m on now. I left Michigan on Monday morning to check out the South, especially North Carolina and Georgia. I’ve heard recently that there seems to be more promising jobs in the South, especially in NC. I have relatives in North Carolina and Georgia, so I thought I’d come visit them and check out the different areas.

Well, anyways, I got to my aunt and uncle’s place here in North Carolina on Monday night. Tuesday was just a day for resting after the long drive the day before. Then today, my uncle took off work and we went through Greensboro, Burlington, Chapel Hill, and Raleigh. While in Chapel Hill, we drove through the campus of UNC and while in Raleigh we went through NC State. That was pretty cool.

We also went through Research Triangle Park, which is between Raleigh, Durham, and Chapel Hill. It’s a large research park where over 100 businesses are located, including IT businesses like IBM, Nortel Networks, and Cisco Systems. I thought it was awesome there. It’s an attractive area for businesses because there are three large universities within a few minutes (Duke, UNC, and NC State). Everything is nice and spread out, and there’s lots of trees! I’d love to be able to get a job there!

Well tomorrow we’re going to Charlotte, so I’ll keep you posted when I get a chance!

Tonight Derek, Mike, and I started snow carving at Zehnder’s Snowfest in Frankenmuth. We’re sculpting a person sitting with his hands crossed on his knees (see the sketch). The weather forecast says it is going to be around 38° and sunny each of the next few days while we sculpt. That’s nice for people coming to look at the sculptures, but it’s a little warm to work on them… so we’ll probably do most of our work at night. Hopefully all goes well!! We get done Saturday morning, so I’ll post pictures sometime after that!

Update (2/5/05): We finished sculpting at 10:00 this morning, but we stayed up all night to finish it. We actually weren’t behind schedule, but because of the weather we wanted to work on it at night. Early this morning we slowly worked on different parts to make sure it was how we wanted it. So, since I’m really tired, I didn’t end up taking any pictures. I’m hoping to find someone who will have some nice pictures of the sculptures.

It was a memorable experience to be a part of the first Motown Winter Blast in Detroit. I was very impressed!! There was lots of things to see and do. The snow slide was a big hit, with lines as long as 1 to 2 hours. People also seemed to enjoy the sled dogs and the ice skating rink.

Snow sculpting went very well. We finished our sculpture without having to rush very much, but we didn’t place in the top 4 either. It’s still fun, but it would be nice to place in an event!! See my Motown Winter Blast 2005 gallery for all the pictures.

The festival was larger than they had planned. They expected 100,000 people to attend, but 275,000 people actually attended. Everything was planned out very well, so it didn’t seem too crowded. I talked to one of the people who was in charge of keeping everything organized, and he said that there were 800 volunteers for the festival this year! That was a lot of people, and you could tell, since just about everywhere you looked you could see a person wearing a Motown Winter Blast jacket. But next year during the Super Bowl, there will be 8,000 volunteers!! There definitely are lots of people trying to make a difference for Detroit!

So far, I think they’re doing a good job making a difference, too. My view of downtown Detroit has changed. Before, I would only go downtown for Lions or Tigers games, but now I wouldn’t mind going there more often. I have to say that I was a little skeptical—and I don’t think I was alone—when I heard about how they’re trying to change Detroit’s image. But I think they’ve really done a lot to help it, especially if they can continue the success of the festival even after the Super Bowl.

Starting Thursday, I’ll be working on a snow sculpture at the new winter festival in Detroit, called Motown Winter Blast. The festival is put on by the Detroit Super Bowl XL committee and is running this year to prepare for the Super Bowl in 2006. It seems like it’s going to be a real nice thing for the city of Detroit. They’re really trying to improve the city’s image for all the people who will be around for next year’s Super Bowl. I’m glad to be a part of the event. The closer it gets, the more excited I get about it, so I hope all goes well. If you’d like to find out more about the snow sculpting event, see their page for the General Motors Snow Spectacular & Ice Show.

Hardee’s decided to display this billboard for its Indianapolis billboard campaign. Supposedly, this ad was not in response to the Pistons-Pacers brawl, but was based on the Eastern Conference Finals earlier this year. Whatever.

Mozilla released its full version of Firefox 1.0 today. Many people have been using Firefox for awhile, but now Mozilla is ready to publicize it. This version comes with a new feature called Live Bookmarks, which allow you to add automatically updated RSS feeds to your bookmarks. If you don’t use Firefox now, it’s about time for you to CHECK IT OUT!!!

With all of the hurricane activity this season, how far would you go to prevent them from causing such damage? Some people have actually proposed nuking them or using other methods to break them apart!! It makes you wonder what people are thinking!!!

I previously mentioned that the U.S. should have a tryout for its men’s basketball team. It looks like USA Basketball is actually considering holding tryouts for players in the NBA, college, and other leagues. They even mentioned how it would show who has the heart to participate, just like what I said!

Remember a few years ago when people said that someday all of our appliances would be connected to the Internet? Digital homes could become a reality very soon. With a digital home, you could control the brightness of lights anywhere in the house, change the thermostat before coming home from work, and make sure that dinner will be finished as you walk in the door.