Baltimore - NCAA Lacrosse - Div III and II Championships

After walking nearly 2 miles in 90 degree weather (near 100% humidity) over to the stadium (M&T Bank Stadium where the Baltimore Ravens play) we got to find some nice seats in a bit of shade to watch the first lacrosse game. NCAA Division III - and I've since learned to be in the Division III the student can NOT have any form of scholarship for athlete players. Div II allows for some types of financial aid, but NOT scholarships, and Div I gets to spend the big $$ for student athletes.

Well of course before the start of the game there had to be a singer out there with her own rendition of the Star Spangled Banner. Good voice, country TWANG, and she just couldn't sing the regular notes and had to 'spice it up' - I like the good old-fashion song. I did especially enjoy the words and story behind the song. Being that we were within 2 miles or so of the actual Fort McHenry the song is about. The original poem by Francis Scott Key was initially entitled 'In Defense of Ft. McHenry'. So it had special meaning to me to be able to be here and remember those sacrifices for our country on this special Memorial Day weekend.

We did get to see this original flag that flew over Ft. McHenry
that fateful day back on September 20th, 1814 during the War of 1812
while on a family vacation to Washington DC a few years ago.

Then on to the games - the Div III teams played great Lacrosse, a real joy to watch and see what good teams and individuals can do. Salisbury defeated Cortland State, 15-9 We sat kind of high up in the stands and had a nice view to see how plays and slides moved across the field. Later we went down near the field for a closer look - it was much more like our High School games then.

The second game was a disappointing, boring defensive game nearly 50 shots on goal between both teams and a final score of 6 to 5. (the last score came as an accident when a pass missed it's intended target and sneaked into the goal with 1 second on the clock) Yes - I know that sounds exciting, but even that couldn't make that game better. Le Moyne, edging out Mercyhurst 6-5

Tomorrow will be the Division I title match between Duke and Johns Hopkins - it should be a great match.

I have photos to prove we were there - mine's a bit out of focus, but the sign behind me is in focus. Don't the boys look like they are having fun!!?

Lots of photographers down on the field - but this guy was right up behind me with a 6-shot- per-second camera - I turned around to look at who had the fast camera and this is what I saw...

Baltimore with Brent for NCAA Lacrosse Finals

After getting up at 4:30am to catch a 6:00am flight - I spent the day on planes and airports getting to Baltimore. After checking into the "Lord Baltimore Radisson" and getting a very small room behind the frieght eleveator... I was able to meet up the Brent, Michael Rife, Jake Ferrin and his parents for a nice dinner at the Cheesecake Factory on Baltimore's Inner Harbor. It was very crowded downtown Baltimore last night. The hotel was full of Lacrosse Fans.



Today we'll be heading over to the M&T Stadium where the Raven's play to watch some more Lacrosse (NCAA Division 2 and 3 Championship games) Then Tomorrow is the Division 1 championship game between Duke and Johns Hopkins. Last night the boys bought team logo'd lacrosse shirts and shorts.

It is in the 90s with near 100% humidity... I'm so looking forward to sitting in the sun all day! But the games should be good and I'll enjoy being with Brent and his friends.

Orange County - Class and Jazz

This week's visit was to Orange County - Southern California. I taught for 5 days a set of AirMagnet classes at the Hilton across the street from the John Wayne Airport in Irvine.



Yep - just week of work.

Then since I was flying out on Saturday to Baltimore to meet up with Brent and friends for the NCAA Lacrosse finals... I had an evening free. I went over to Barry & Donna's for dinner... great pork ribs (slathered in my special BBQ sauce - but since they are now 'out' I'm going to have to make another 2007 batch soon)



Then we went to a local Jazz club called 'Steamers' - though it was very hot, very crowded, and had a rude waitress... the Music was great! The lead singer was phenomenal, the supporting instrumentalist inspired and it was a great night out with friends. I think I'm going to have to pick up a CD from Jackie Ryan - I liked her style.



CD Pre-Release for "You and The Night and The Music"
A special evening with the incredible trio that played on the CD: Tamir Hendelman piano, Christoph Luty bass and Jeff Hamilton on drums. Plus special guest, Rickey Woodard on tenor sax.

First WLSAT Class in DC

After a mad rush to finish up the labs, print the student binders, and make all the student kits... we finally held our first new class. Called Wireless LAN Security Assessment Toolkit - WLSAT in Washington DC last week.

We had all four course developers there to teach the specific labs they had written, and so we could use this opportunity as a 'Train the Trainer' to get cross-trained on the items we personally didn't write.

I flew into Baltimore with Jeff and Mark on Sunday. We stopped at IHOP #551 - a terrible choice for a place to eat - the corn tasted of soap, the food was cold, the service atrocious, it was just terrible.

We had 14 students at this first session - all had a great time playing with and learning on their student kits. The Nokia N800 little tablet computers were a hit!

The course flowed much better than I could have anticipated. Yes, we have a bunch of little edits to make, and additional steps to put in different labs, but overall "two thumbs up"!

Not a Road Warrior Week

Ok... I wasn't a road warrior this week. Stayed at home all week working on the course development for our new Wireless LAN Security Assessment Toolkit class. We only have one more week before the first class and we still have LOTS to do.

The class has over 45 hands-on lab exercises and comes with over $13,000 worth of software and hardware. Ryan's been working on inventory and binder cover pages, Karrissa on editing all of our lab exercises, and me ordering up all the stuff for the first couple of classes as well as writing more lab exercises.

I did a new lab exercise on WarDriving... that is driving around with a GPS and a Wireless Card tracking where everyone's Wireless Access Points are located - then putting it on Google Earth... see below.

One more week at home working on this class, then I start a 7-week road trip (home for weekends mostly)