Andrew Ferrier » gel http://www.andrewferrier.com/blog Economics; Travel; Film; and Technology. Tue, 06 Sep 2011 09:40:25 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 Gel 2008 and NYC http://www.andrewferrier.com/blog/2008/04/29/gel-2008-and-nyc/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=gel-2008-and-nyc http://www.andrewferrier.com/blog/2008/04/29/gel-2008-and-nyc/#comments Tue, 29 Apr 2008 18:06:01 +0000 andrewferrier http://www.andrewferrier.com/blog/?p=442 I returned from New York City at the weekend after having spent a week there, partly on holiday and partly attending Gel 2008. Highlights of Gel for me were:

  • Attending the Sphereplay workshop – I learnt a new physical skill in about 3 hours, a concept quite novel for me! I will definitely be ordering a sphere (it’s not a ball, it’s not a ball) to keep this skill going.
  • The presentations by Clay Shirky and Garrett Oliver.
  • The performances of Rhett and Link – the knowingly geeky Facebook Song is pretty cool.

I’ve stuck up a few of my better photos from the conference on Flickr. I didn’t find this Gel quite as fulfilling as euroGel was, and this combined with the steep price (I pay for it myself) means I probably won’t be returning next year. It was still good fun, though.

The rest of my time in NYC was mainly spent chilling (photos to come); and doing a little shopping. I availed myself of the favourable exchange rate and willing-to-negotiate shopkeepers to buy a Canon 50mm EF lens that I’ve been hunkering after (the pictures linked to above are all taken with it). It produces nice sharp pictures and is great for portraiture.

I also managed to see both November (yet another David Mamet play; I’m addicted to his work at the moment) and Avenue Q on Broadway. The latter is wonderfully offensive and funny.

I’m back to the US in a week to attend in IBM conference in Vegas – somewhere I’ve never been. I’m looking forward to it.

]]> http://www.andrewferrier.com/blog/2008/04/29/gel-2008-and-nyc/feed/ 0 On the way to NYC http://www.andrewferrier.com/blog/2008/04/21/on-the-way-to-nyc/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=on-the-way-to-nyc http://www.andrewferrier.com/blog/2008/04/21/on-the-way-to-nyc/#comments Mon, 21 Apr 2008 05:36:58 +0000 andrewferrier http://www.andrewferrier.com/blog/?p=439 It’s a lot of palaver to travel these days – I started my journey to NYC yesterday, and as I write, I’ve still only reached the American lounge at T3 in Heathrow (although to be fair that’s mostly down to a combination of me being cheap – no chauffered transfer on my own money – and wanting to maximise my time today in the city). Still, in about 10 hours, I’ll be in Manhattan, and I can’t wait – my first trip abroad this year without work to do (unless you count Gel, which I don’t).

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