On Sunday, I fly to San Francisco to spend a couple days at the Adobe mothership before heading to Salt Lake City for the Omniture Summit. With each trip to the west coast, I try to learn from the experience, so the next time is smoother. For example, I will never again fly with a suit bag. Of course, “pack light” is a given, but there are other things, like essential pocket occupants, that are a necessity (see travel tissues, Burt’s Beeswax, black Bic pen).

Wherever I fly, I make sure to bring my camera. And, depending on the location, I have a number of decisions to make—which lenses to bring, whether or not I’ll need a tripod, etc. The first time to San Francisco, I brought my tripod—an 11 ft Gitzo with carbon fiber legs. It was obvious afterwords that this was a big mistake, so the next time I packed my Gorillapod. With a height of about a foot, this was pretty limiting, so I rarely used it.

This time, I’m prepared. On Monday, I placed an order on B&H for a Gitzo carbon fiber monopod. It weighs less than a pound and supports 26.4 lbs!—making it the perfect travel companion. It arrived today and I noticed something I wasn’t expecting. Instead of using the ballhead from my tripod and nullifying the lightweight aspect of the monopod, I thought I’d use the quick release system from my DIY steadycam. Unfortunately, the lock on the quick release interferes with the monopod’s base.

To correct this issue, I ordered a swivel/tilt head. It provides one-axis movement to quickly switch between landscape and portrait—perfect for monopods. It’s expected to arrive on Friday, just in time for the trip. I’m excited to see how it performs, so look forward to a follow-up post after the trip.

About a month ago, I wrote an article for Adobe Developer Connection regarding framerate throttling in AIR. Then last week, I was told I am this week’s featured blogger! I’m ecstatic about the good news of late and there is much more to share.

This past Friday, I sat in on InsideRIA’s RIA Radio podcast with Garth Braithwaite, Leif Wells, and Zach Stepek. I tend to ramble, so the show ended up a half-hour longer than it usually does—and I still have more to talk about! It will be posted sometime this week and I’ll be sure to make an announcement when it goes live.

Lastly, this morning I woke up to a fantastic email from Robert Hall, inviting me to Flash Camp Philly on Saturday. It will give me another chance to sit in on some great sessions before the year is out and stay with the sister in center city.

I arrived at the LA Convention Center this afternoon to get my MAX badge and everything looks amazing. I spent the day hanging in the community plaza, where all the booths are set up. This place is massive and everyone is so very busy. I’m getting tons of swag and my badge even says MAX Staff—unreal. The action starts tomorrow, so expect a ton of #adobemax tagged tweets.

Note: If you use DestroyTwitter and can’t stand people who tweet from events, add this regex to your exclude keywords: #adobemax[A-Za-z0-9]*

I leave for Adobe MAX within the hour, making a pit stop in San Francisco to join up with the Adobe XD crew, then to Los Angeles for MAX. The past two months have been spent on an Adobe AIR app for the conference. I’ll be sure to post about it when it goes live—a day I’ve been longing for. Since this year’s MAX is Star Wars/Trek themed with Mark Hammil, aka Luke Skywalker, co-hosting with LeVar Burton, I decided to bring my Diesel stormtrooper shoes. To all Destroy Today readers attending MAX, I’ll see you there!

I walked home from work at about 5:30 and found myself sitting in my room with nothing to do. I’ll be hanging out with some friends at 7:30, but that leaves me with a good 2 hours of alone time. I’ve been in front of the screen all day, so sitting in front of the computer wasn’t high on my list. I thought, I have a camera and I have a bed. With remote trigger in hand, I spent the next 15 minutes jumping onto my bed at just the right moment. I would’ve kept going, but soon realized there’s people staying below me. Nevertheless, I had a fun time. It reminded me of the time I lived alone for four months with no friends around—now that was interesting (see schizophrenia).

If there’s one thing I love about San Francisco, it’s the views—seems like everywhere I look is filled gorgeous architecture, beautiful scenery, or just something unique. This photo is from my hotel room, where the Apple store glows bright next to Virgin records.

There’s always so much activity, but it’s not over-the-top or stressful. Though I did have the chance of walking through some shady neighborhoods, they’re nothing compared to those of Baltimore—it’s actually a bit refreshing, bringing a bit of familiarity to the west.

I think Robert Hodgin, of the Barbarian Group, said it best in his speech at the 2006 Flash in the Can, “If you’re constantly staring at an environment that doesn’t inspire you…I’d highly recommend you find the energy to pick up and move.” Oddly enough, he was referring to his move to San Francisco as well.

I completed my first day at Adobe yesterday where I became oriented with everything. The majority of the time was spent installing software on my computer, which is always a refreshing experience—starting anew. Today, I begin working and I’m very excited to do so. Above is my temporary workspace while I’m here. Don’t ask why I have two keyboards…

I just arrived at the Hotel Palomar in San Francisco and I’m exhausted. I stepped into my room and declared it my home for the next two weeks. To my surprise, I see a plate with strawberries and chocolate sitting on the table. My immediate reaction is wow!—how thoughtful! But then I take a closer look… Alas, these strawberries and chocolate are not intended for me. It’s a shame they’re digesting as we speak! To quote the great Dax Flame, “It’s so good, it’s so good.”

I’m writing this post from 36,000 feet in the air, on my way to San Francisco. I’ll be there for the next two weeks, going through orientation at Adobe and starting my first project. I’m flying Virgin America for the first time and ecstatic that it has in-flight internet. It comes at $12 fee, but anyone who has been on 5+ hour flights knows it’s well worth it.

The Virgin America plane has this club feeling to it, with purple plexi separating first class from coach and pink lights running down the sides of the ceiling. When I arrived at ticketing, there was no line and the ticketers were dancing to Beyoncé—they even asked me to dance! At takeoff, my laptop needed to be stowed above the seats, so one of the attendants took it from me, but handed it back to me as soon as we were level.

This is also the first time I’m using the Flight Tracker widget. It reminds me of Continental International’s tracker in the headset—that thing is addicting! I just love technologies like this—they continue to amaze me. I’ll be getting my iPhone this week where I’ll be sure to use those wild augmented reality apps.

Jen’s sister, Heather, volunteered to have her boyfriend and pro skater, Pat Bryan, ollie over her. He’s quite talented and one of the nicest guys you’ll come across. Check out the trailer of his latest skate video and an HD video of the stunt below.