It's Steve (now in blog form)

I’ve been in Sundance for the last couple of days with the good folks from HP (they were nice enough to invite me along to one of their events).  It’s a really pretty place if you can get over the whole snow thing.  I’m not entirely comfortable with the idea of matter changing states when you get right down to it (sublimation is obviously an exception as it is very cool).  Check out the views from the hotel:

Those of you that have been following my blog for a while can probably imagine why I was excited to get up here…REVERSE PAPARRAZI!  The exciting game of asking famous people to take photos of you (full details here).  I figured I’d be bound to bump into a few famous folks at a boondoggle like this.  Last night it all worked out.

My hosts organized a lovely dinner in town and brought their new spokespeople Michael Phelps and Dara Torres.  Jonny Moseley was also at dinner as there was a ski activity he was involved in the next day.  Oh yeah, three gold medalists on paid to be in attendance.  Time to force them to pretend to be happy to talk to me.

Phelps shot this pic of me and Dara Torres.  Awesome.  Can’t believe that (a) she’s 41 (b) she’s so much freakin’ taller than I am .  Damn it.

Moseley took this one of Chris and me.  He’s a cool dude.  Gave his number to Chris’ wife so she could text him and they could meet up on the mountain for ski tips.  

 

It’s also worth noting that Moseley apparently took ballet for a while.  I don’t think he’d had as much to drink as I’d had, but here he is working through his exercises.

It feels really good to have found a whole new class of celebrity to harass and impose upon.

Update: Just to handle all you naysayers, here’s a pic of Michael Phelps taking my pic.

Yesterday, Kim and I went to check out a new house to rent. Today we got it. Woo hoo! No more duplex for us.  It sits directly on Rancho Park (that’s where my archery range is), and has a real backyard for Ben to be crazy in.  Very exciting.  I think we’re going to actually do the move around Thanksgiving. I probably need to pack up my junk.

On an unrelated note, I’m in SF this week for Web 2.0.  Nothing major to report at this point.  I did manage to Reverse Paparazzi Michael Arrington.  My techie friends will know who that is.  For the rest of you, he is one of the big tech bloggers.  To put it in an analogy format:
bloggers are to journalists as I am to a responsible adult.

Here’s the pic.

I feel like such a failure.  Yesterday morning I had at breakfast at Kings Road Cafe on Beverly.  As I was enjoying my pancake, I looked up and saw Jane Lynch (the lanky blonde from all of the Christopher Guest movies).  Here’s the sad part.  I had my camera and didn’t ask her to take my picture.

It turns out that Reverse Paparazzi (learn all about my new game here) is easier to execute when:
A. The celebrity is not really occupied with something/someone
B. You can run away after you get the photo
C. You’ve had a cocktail or two

This met none of the above criteria.  So sad.  On a positive note, the waiter said she’s there for breakfast pretty regularly.  I wonder if that joint serves mimosas…..

I’m finally back from several weeks of travel and thought I’d drop a quick post.  I’ll get around to a more complete post mortem of my vacation in a few days.  The most important thing to bear in mind from the last several weeks is that I’ve gotten Kevin Spacey and MC Hammer to take my picture.

It seems that if you run up to famous people and ask them to take your photo, they tend to be fairly compliant in their confusion (note: it helps if you’ve had a couple of cocktails and talk really fast).  Reverse Paparazzi is my new favorite game.

Kevin Spacey shot this one of Bjorn, Fran, and me.

MC Hammer shot Jim and me on the Big Island.