Combat Skiing
Combat Skiing is an evolution of the Biathlon, which combines cross-country skiing with target shooting. I’d replace the live ammunition with paint pellets and get rid of the targets altogether; competitors would be shooting at each other as they’re skiing. Think of it as live auditions for a James Bond movie.

As a frequent Disneyland visitor and semi-frequent Walt Disney World traveler, I am aware of vacation home rental. The idea is that for extended vacations to popular destinations like Anaheim or Central Florida you would rent an actual home instead of a hotel room. Instead of renting two or three expensive hotel rooms for a large traveling group, you’d all stay in one big rental home. With a kitchen, laundry facilities and entertainment options, you could actually save money and that’s definitely a plus. Have I used a vacation home rental myself? Well, no, mostly because the opportunity hasn’t really been there for me. But it’s something to strongly consider next time I travel with a group.

Disclaimer: This is a sponsored post for VacationRental.org via PayPerPost. Though the content and opinions expressed are mine, I am being paid to write it.

I grew up with PCs. My first PC was an actual, original IBM PC model 5150 (which still lives, dormant for decades now, in my garage). Along the way, I worked on Commodores (VIC-20 and C-64), an Osborne, a Sinclair ZX-80, and there must have been an Apple ][ in there somewhere. But the PC standard won out and by the late 80s that was all I used. I went through a series of ever-more-powerful PCs, mostly home-built but some mass-market branded, for a number of years. I got to the point where I knew Windows, up through XP, like the back of the proverbial hand.

Meanwhile, Apple was evolving the Mac OS and finally released OS X, a true Unix-class OS with no legacy baggage. I watched from afar but as the OS and machines got better and better, I thought that I might be interested in making a switch–especially when Apple moved to Intel processors and it became possible to easily run Windows on Macs. Finally, I decided that when my then-current PC (a Dell Inspiron laptop) died, I'd buy a Mac notebook to replace it. Perversely, the Dell hung on for a year or two past its expected lifetime, but finally gave up the ghost when I (accidentally, I swear!) spilled most of a bowl of soup into it while working at home one day.

So I bought a MacBook Pro. I acclimated myself to OS X very quickly and was able to keep my Windows applications and workflows mostly intact with VMWare, running Windows side-by-side on OS X. But then a strange thing happened: I found I really didn't need Windows on my Mac after all. I tried keeping VMWare turned off for a week, then for a month, and then I just didn't turn it back on again and finally uninstalled it. There isn't anything that I could do on my Dell on Windows XP Pro that I can't do on my Mac, but (in my experience, as always) OS X beats Windows in the usability and stability department by a mile. And it's trite and over-used, but the Mac does indeed "just work". Things I want to do are right where I subconsciously expect them to be and work the way I instinctively want them to. There's tons of power under the hood, since OS X is a true Unix, but I don't need to deal with it unless I have to, or want to.

So yes, after years and years of being a PC, I'm a Mac.

Here’s the route: on MapMyRun

"OmniMover" is the generic name for the ride vehicle system used in the Haunted Mansion and other Disney attractions. The word has always appealed to me so when I discovered "OMNIMVR" was available I had to get it for my first new car.