friday funday

First thing in the morning yesterday EvilBetty and I tried to ride Toy Story Mania before starting work. We were almost at the front of the line when it was announced that the ride was down and everyone was funneled out. I spent the day working on rewiring and programming e ink displays with a raspberry pi, took a lunch break to go eat pizza at Flippers with our team, and then went back to nudging small electronic text around. Then EvilBetty, Yzma, and I got to go poke around at Fantasmic and see the control booth and watch the crew getting ready to put on the show. Went back to the office, started running a 15-hour print on the 3d printer, and then ended the work day by leaving for the Food and Wine Festival at Epcot.

There I rode Mission: Space for the first time, which is a notoriously intense ride that is a centrifugal motion simulator thrill ride simulation of a trip to Mars. "The attraction exposes riders to forces up to 2.5G, more than twice the force of gravity at the Earth's surface (effectively multiplying a rider's weight by 2.5). A few months after the ride's opening, motion sickness bags were added within easy reach of riders." The ride blasts you with g-force that really does start to take your cheeks off your face and compresses your chest until you think you might pop a little, and all the while you are in trapped under a chest harness in a very very small face (less than a foot of space between you and the wall of your enclosure). I started to panic during the ride because I feared that I would die and had to start doing slow breathing to keep my wits about me. And now I know why most people don't like Mission: Space.

After that we wandered around in a sea of tourists, heard the 80s band Jefferson Starship, the night's live performance, play 'Nothing's Gonna Stop Us Now,' and occasionally snacked and drank expensive things. I had my usual blood orange margarita from the Mexico Pavilion's tequila bar. We rode Maelstrom, my absolute favorite ride at Epcot, which is tragically closing at the end of this weekend to make way for a new Frozen ride. At the end of the night Francus and I had delicious tequila flights by Mexico, I tried the sweet corn cheesecake and it was amazing, and we all watched the weird Epcot fireworks show, IllumiNations, before going home.      

my desktop

this week i acquired some high-end electronic candles to try out and, thanks to the raspberry pi, i also got yet another screen this week and now my cube is really running amok