I made it! After nearly 18 hours of flying, I finally landed in Koh Samui a few days ago. My friends Scott and Samantha had an airport shuttle booked for me, so I simply got in the shuttle after landing and headed down to my new apartment here. The place I'm renting is about a 10 minute walk from the beach, but it's in a new complex with a pool, internet, maid service (for $5 a pop), and air conditioning. Normally these units run for about 21,000 Baht/mo (around $700 CAD), but because we were renting two units for two months each, Scott managed to negotiate down to 18,000 Baht/mo ($600/mo), which ...

I wrote a post recently about my travel metrics from the last six months. One of the observations I made was that I had spent roughly $500 a month on average for airfare. Given that I gave my apartment up in British Columbia prior to leaving, airfare is one of my only extra expenses I have when I travel. Taken together with a $90 a month storage locker and roughly $50 a month in travel insurance, that's a rough cost of $650 a month that is in excess of what I would normally spend back in North America. If you do the math, a person will realize that they can actually make money traveling the world, ...

I've been toying with this rather amazing idea for the last few years. I'm going to toss this out there, because I'm rather fond of it. The Vancouver technology scene is rather impressive. Almost every week there's a really awesome event taking place that brings together some great minds. I can't tell you how much I've learned from my peers in the last few years. Given that we all take time out to get together and discuss technology, I always thought it would be fun to all go somewhere all together. Sort of like a less formal SxSW, but with more of an unconference component. So here's what I imagine. ...

In about 30 minutes, the beach photowalk near my place is going to begin. It turned out to be a rather nice day with some ideal light, so hopefully there will be a pile of great shots taken. The challenge always for me is figuring out what lens to bring and what exactly I want to shoot. I haven't shot film in quite a while, so I loaded some 160VC portrait film in my one camera and put my wide angle on it, and will bring my 70-200mm f/2.8L for doing some portraits near the water. I'm just making some coffee and making sure my cameras are good to go, then heading downstairs to meet people. I'll ...

I have attended a few photowalks in the last year, most of which have been in or around the Gastown area. These events have typically brought together anywhere from 5 to 50 people, and have usually involved people walking around and snapping shots for an hour or two. They are a lot of fun, and always a great chance for people to improve their skills or just get out and stretch their wings a bit. I'm organizing one down in my neck of the woods for this Sunday. It will be mostly along the beach, eventually ending up near English Bay and the famous Inukshuk. Hopefully we'll even manage to catch a ...

2007 is officially in the past now, and today was basically the start of a whole new year, at least in terms of my routine again. I spent the day at work today getting back into the groove again. Tomorrow I will most likely dive head-first into a fairly large new project, which should be pretty exciting. I still have some unpacking to do from my trip, and will most likely take the tree and decorations down this coming weekend. At that point, the holidays will be completely behind me. I think tomorrow Dustin and I are going to get together and hang out for a bit, and this weekend there will probably ...

I've been stuck on the computer all day, so I figured I would go out and get some fresh air. Of course, like most walks I go on, I brought along my trusty camera. This is a shot of the sun setting over False Creek. ...

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[ ](http://www.flickr.com/photos/duanestorey/499059903/) I know I said I wouldn't post again until after my surgery, but I took a few shots tonight, and liked this one the most. So enjoy. The countdown is officially on -- I had that exciting call with the nurse today, and got the green light from Houston to go ahead with the launch. I find out tomorrow afternoon the exact time of my surgery, and will spend part of the day cleaning up and getting ready for it. Take care of the internet for me for a few days while I'm gone. Talk to you soon guys. ...