Week 1 - New Vlog, Mount Bonnell, Bald Eagles
Channel: Stephen Torrence
Date: 2014-01-06

That New Car Smell, a mountain in Austin, and more Bald Eagles than you can shake your talons at. I have coffee! Let's talk about this week in my life. 

# Show Notes

No. 4 St. James
http://www.fourstjames.com


### 1. THIS! My new Vlog channel


### 2. Ride to Mount Bonnell

Fairdale Weekender
http://fairdalebikes.com/catalog/weekender-og/

Google Plus Panoramic
https://plus.google.com/u/0/photos?pid=5965171675364485746&oid=104981014505089511100


### 3. Raspberry Pi

http://www.raspberrypi.org/


### 4. That New Car(2Go) Smell

CapMetro
http://www.capmetro.org

Car2Go
https://www.car2go.com/en/austin/


### 5. Bald Eagles in Dutch Harbor

What Happens When You Leave A Box Of Fish In The Back Of Your Truck in Dutch Harbor!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nSQf66rTZvY


# Transcript

Coming up, that new car smell, a mountain in Austin, and more Bald Eagles than you can shake your talons at. I have coffee. Let's talk about this week in my life. 

It's not quite Spring in Austin, but the trees think it is. (Sneeze) I'm Stephen Torrence, and I'm coming at you from Austin, Texas. This is my office, the office of No. 4 St. James, where I work. Here's a book that we made, about Texas products. It's kinda cool.

Number One. This. This thing. This. This.

This year one of my resolutions is to vlog, weekly. So, this is the first week of that... thing. I'll bring you about five things every week in sort of a round-up. Cool stuff that happened in my life, cool things I found on the Internet... stuff. Y'know. Stuff. And I promise to be caffeinated every single time. 

Number Two.

So we have one mountain in Austin. It's called Mount Bonnell, and it is gorgeous! And probably wouldn't qualify as a mountain anywhere other than Texas. BUT it's our mountain, and so we love it. So this weekend it was in the 60's in January... because Texas. So I decided to take my Fairdale Weekend out on a long ride up to our singular mountain. I took this snazzy panorama. Full version in the show notes. If you ever visit the city make that one of the things on your list, absolute best views of downtown, of the hill country, and pretty good hiking too. It's, y'know, it's got some rocks, and some trees, and some pathways and stuff. Mount Bonnell. Check it out.

Number Three... point one four one five nine two

I bought a Raspberry Pi! I mean, I plan to actually do interesting things with it. The first thing my roommates and I came up with is like a security camera that you text and it sends you the latest photo of whatever's outside of our house... among other things. It's geeky! It's gonna fun. It's gonna be fun...

Ehhhhhh need more coffee.

Number Four.

So about three years I sold my car and I have not owned a vehicle for that entire time. I do a combination of a few things. I ride a bicycle, my Fairdale Weekender. I use public transportation, which is... okay in Austin. Could be better. I drive the Car2Go's around town. 

So I had a fun little moment this week. Most of the fleet is about two years old or so, so I'm used to buttons that don't work as well, and suspension that isn't quite as absorbent. But this past week I badged into a vehicle, got inside and... it had that New Car Smell! And that was kinda neat because, y'know, I haven't bought a car in a while and I don't get to experience that New Car Smell thing.

So thanks Car2Go for upgrading your fleet and giving me a pleasant surprise this week.

Last but not least: Eagles!

So a friend of mine and I had a conversation the other night. She is from Dutch Harbor, which you might know from Deadliest Catch. Apparently, in Dutch Harbor, bald eagles are as common as seagulls or buzzards and do pretty much the same things. So eagles will tear apart fish that are around or spend a lot of time at landfills picking apart things that could possibly be edible.

And they will also apparently hold you groceries hostage by sitting on your vehicle until the police come and shoo them away nonviolently because you can't do anything to Bald Eagles because they're endangered apparently even though there are a bunch of them.

There's probably a political allegory somewhere in there but I just thought it was interesting. Bald Eagles. Really common apparently. In some places.

Alright, that's it for this week. I'll see you next Sunday. A transcript and some links from today's show are in the show notes below. You can follow me on Google+, on Twitter, on Facebook... bunch of other Internet things. And THIS BROOM IS AWESOME. You should subscribe!

I'm Stephen Torrence, I love you, thanks for watching and I'll see you next week.