This last week, I ended up on an impromptu work trip to New York. While on the trip, I had the opportunity (and plenty of time with flights and layovers) to read a few books. I'll be updating the blog shortly with some reviews on those books.

Some notes on NYC though...

This was my second trip, although this time I was on my own in the evenings. I did go to Times Square a lot, since it was nearby, and there is always something going on there. My hotel was right by Madame Tussaud's and Ripley's Believe It or Not, but I didn't go in. What was the point? When I went out there, no camera. That did change. As per a blog review from Scott Hanselman, I picked up the the Flip Video Ultra. It is a nice little camera - takes some good video, but no stills. However, you can get a still out of the video with the desktop software. The downside was: it kept throwing errors on Server 2008, and after some extra settings in Windows I finally got it working. The videos are exported as AVI files and are decent quality. I unfortunately was unable to get the staff at one of the Chipotle's restaurants to record a message to D'Arcy Lussier, what with his insane fascination with the restaurant chain that is unavailable in Canada... Maybe if he had Papa John's pizza instead he could focus on bringing them to Winnipeg (they are in Canada, but far and few between...)

Times Square was amaazing. The Reese and M&M's store... the HUGE Virgin Megastore... The Toys 'R Us with the ferris wheel inside it... as well as posters for all the broadway plays including Spamelot, Lion King, Young Frankenstein... Yes, Young Frankenstein on Broadway... Right across from my hotel... I wished I had the time to make it there.

I also attended the New York .NET User Group meeting, which was their Speaker's Idol. Was a great presentation. Was invited out for drinks afterwards, but I had a few things I had to pick up before I headed back to Winnipeg the next day. It was a great time, but humid as hell. I was not prepared for that.

Anyways, book reviews to come in the next few days!