Thursday, December 14, 2006

Brazilian congressmen double their own salaries

In a country where the minimum wage was just raised to R$ 350,00 per month with fierce fight, the congressmen raise their salaries from R$12847,00 to R$24500,00.

This is INSANE! ABSURD! Brazilians, reunite and go on strike, start a revolution, stop everything you are doing, because this is absolutely insane!

More information, in portuguese, here:

http://www1.folha.uol.com.br/folha/brasil/ult96u87753.shtml

Wednesday, December 13, 2006

Rudy and Heather Wedding - Pictures

Pictures from Dinner with Rudy and Heather's families and friends.

Heather's mom (left) and Rudy's sister (right).













Rudy and his dad













Heather and her friends Olga (left) and Michelle (right)

Monday, December 11, 2006

Rudy and Heather's Wedding - Part 3 - "EXCITEMENT"

So it's Saturday morning and it's the real deal - they're getting married. After just a few hours of sleep, Heather takes off to the salon to have her hair done, while Rudy and his Dad pack up everything and check out of the hotel. We then packed the car with all their bags and waited for the hotel shuttle to pick us all up to drive to the pier.
Everybody is well dressed carrying tons of bags which made it somewhat interesting, but we all managed to get things done in time and board the boat OK.
I was not able to attend the ceremony at the boat due to immigration constraints, but I will post pictures as soon as they get back from their honeymoon (which happens to be a cruise!).
Congratulations both Rudy and Heather!

Rudy and Heather's Wedding - Part 2 - "STORIES"

So there was the famous dinner event before the wedding. Once all the guests have been accounted for and were in the hotel we got together at 7.45pm and went to the Columbia Restaurant in Ybor City, Tampa. Columbia is a Spanish restaurant and they had a live flamenco presentation for the patrons. The food was awesome, and so was the presentation.
Rudy and Heather's family was both there, as well as their closer friends.
The highlights of the night were their friends asking both of them in separate moments when and how was their first date, and checking to see if their answer was the same. The friends also told funny embarrassing stories about them, which just makes the dinner richer :-)
Pictures are coming soon.

Friday, December 08, 2006

Rudy and Heather's Wedding - Part 1 - "DRIVEN"

Rudy and Heather are getting married this weekend! The wedding is in Tampa, FL in a cruise ship on Saturday morning. I arrived this morning at 9.20 and Rudy and Heather picked me up in the airport. They had already started the day by driving arround to the courthouse to pick up the papers for the wedding.
After picking me up we came to the hotel and dropped our luggage. The hotel rooms were still not ready, so we left for more errands. We bought licquor and drove Heather and her mom to the salon so they could get their hair done. Then we drove to the airport for two pick ups.
The Tampa airport has a GREAT concept: a Cell Phone parking lot. We got there and there's a huge billboard with the arrival times for the flights, as well as free wireless internet. It's a great way to avoid traffic and allows guests to wait before heading into the arrival area to pick up guests.
We easily realized one of the flights was late, so we left for lunch. Back to the airport we met the two guests and drove them to the airport. After that, there were three more trips driving from the airport to the hotel. It's now 6pm and Rudy is picking up the last 4 guests in the airport and everybody has now been driven to the hotel.
So that was the day today - "Driven" through the freeways of Tampa.
More updates as the weekend progresses.

Sunday, December 03, 2006

AU 2006

I was in Vegas this week for Autodesk University. I taught a class about Lighting in AutoCAD 2007 and attended several others. I also showed Impression at the show floor for a couple hours.

Here's proof I was there: AU 2006 Pictures