Below are the 20 most recent journal entries recorded in neil's LiveJournal:

[ << Previous 20 ]

Sunday, April 22nd, 2012
2:59 pm	Restoration Originally published at Starry Wisdom. You can comment here or there. For whatever reason, my blog got somewhat pwned recently. Probably because I sucked at upgrading WP, but there was some stupidity in the layout of the directories which probably also contributed to the hacking. Either way, I cleaned it up last week, but I messed up some wordpress source files, so I decided to do a fresh installation. and just hookup the old database. I think things are good now (they appear to be, but if anyone happens to notice something odd, let me know1 (Comment on this)
Wednesday, March 21st, 2012
11:47 pm	Wasteland (aka the best computer game ever) Originally published at Starry Wisdom. You can comment here or there. It’s been a while (over a month!) since my last post. I obviously failed completely to do a post a day, but no matter. It’s time for a new post! Let’s go back in time to the late 1980s, 1988 to be precise. Imagine you are a 13 year old boy who likes computer games and you come across a poster advertising this: You find the game, perhaps a week later, and turn to the back of the box: If you’re anything like I was 24 years ago, you’d do anything you can, including spending a couple of weeks allowance, to buy the game. Which I did. The game itself was similar to some other games at the time – most particularly the Bard’s Tale games from the same studio, Interplay, but it had some notable differences, not the least of which was that it was set in a post-apocalyptic world, instead of a fantasy world. But the story, about a group of survivors from a nuclear war at the end of the 20th century was far more gripping than any story of magical heroes in a made up land could ever be. Your young team of Desert Rangers is sent off into the great desert to investigate some disturbances, and this leads to ever more adventures throughout the American Southwest. Demented farmers, giant bunnies, and deadly robots are some of the fiends you will face as you carry out your mission, which grows to epic proportions as you learn more about the state of the world. The game, of course, is not perfect – at least on the Apple II version that I played, healing was very slow – you basically had to hit escape and ‘wait’ over and over to recover health- and hope that no random encounters came up while you were still weakened. I ended up sticking my joystick on the escape key to simulate it being hit over and over, while I would read for five minutes or so. Anyway, I doubt I can sell this game to anyone who hasn’t played it, and I don’t think it’s quite help up so well, mostly because of the graphics. The game is also rather hard at some points – remember this was before the days of the world wide web and gamefaqs.com, so most of the secrets had to be discovered by one’s self. I remember spending days trying to get through the sewers of Las Vegas, because I couldn’t find the one item I needed to open some door and let me out. But the joy of actually finishing the sewers, and coming out with enough firepower in laser weapons to beat the dread Scorpitron filled me with much joy. I enjoyed the game so much that I ended up playing through it several times through during my high school and early college years. The real point of this post, and why I am so excited about something from the 1980s, is that Brian Fargo, the founder of Interplay, has started a kickstarter to fund a sequel to Wasteland, almost a quarter century after the original’s release. It made it’s funding goal of $900,000 within the first day, and it is currently at almost $1,500,000 at the time of this posting. The more money donated, the better the game will be and at the $1.5 million mark, there will be a Linux and OS X version of the game released, in addition to the Windows version. Hopefully the kickstarter will hit that amount – I’m very excited to play the sequel (I pledged a fair amount of money), and I can’t wait until it’s released. There’s still time if you are interested in pledging! (1 Comment |Comment on this)
9:51 pm	WordPress!!! Originally published at Starry Wisdom. You can comment here or there. I wanted to post about something awesome but – well, my admin page seems to be sans CSS right now, so I am posting this stupid thing from my phone. Maybe tomorrow I can fix the install tomorrow and do the post I meant to make. (Comment on this)
Sunday, February 19th, 2012
11:01 am	More on POPOS Originally published at Starry Wisdom. You can comment here or there. Some of you might remember I wrote a bit about POPOS earlier this month. Today on the SF Chronicle website there is an article by John King on this very subject. The thesis of his article is that it easy for developers to hide the existence of these required open spaces with signs that are all-but-hidden within plain sight. We have the list of these places on the door of our office at work, and while I haven’t yet managed to check out any of the several within easy walking distance, I intend to do so in the next few weeks, and I will report back on my experience when I do. Also, quick note: we passed the building inspection on Tuesday and have our Certificate of Final Completion and Occupancy, so we are free to move forward with the condo conversion. Which yes, I still owe a real post on, but that’s a post for another day. (Comment on this)
Monday, February 13th, 2012
7:53 pm	Call of Cthulhu: The Wasted Land review Originally published at Starry Wisdom. You can comment here or there. Last year someone pointed out a Call of Cthulhu Advent calendar app to me. I, of course, downloaded it and ended up scoring 100% on the daily quizzes, but that is neither here nor there. The calendar was put out by Red Wasp Design. and late last month they released an IOS strategy RPG/Horror game – Call of Cthulhu:The Wasted Land. The original release was a bit buggy, as these things can be, but the patch that came out about a week later fixed the major problems and in the end it’s a very playable game. The basic game play is turn based strategy with role-playing game elements. Your team of 4-6 ‘investigators’ are involved in a mission to save the Allies and the World from … well, unknowable horrors. In fact, that horrors are so unknowable that every time your characters interact with unnatural foes their sanity slowly ekes away. If sanity hits zero, the character will go insane, which sometimes causes them to freeze in panic, and other times allows them to go berserk. Either way, sanity can be restored, both before and after insanity, with a properly equipped character with the Psychology skill. See below for a picture of the intrepid investigators fighting various horrors: This is a great game, compatible with both iPhones and iPads (in HD) for the low price of $4.99. Per the developers an Android version is in the works. I highly recommend this game! (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Saturday, February 11th, 2012
9:57 am	Inspections Originally published at Starry Wisdom. You can comment here or there. I should post a real post about this sometime, with some specific information, since there isn’t a lot of information about this stuff around, but I’m currently in the midst of converting my place to condominium. I purchased the top floor of an Edwardian two-story in 2010, along with another person. We are currently co-owners (Tenants in Common – TIC) of the house with “exclusive” use of various parts of the property. San Francisco has some peculiar laws around converting this shared-deed property to a multiple-deed condominium – basically there is a lottery in which TICs of up to 6 units can enter when they meet certain owner-occupancy thresholds, and a small number of units win every year. There are two other ways to convert to condo. The first is so big companies can do it whenever they want, which is 50% or more improvement (which includes, of course, new construction). The second is a, lucky for me, exception for two unit TICs with a clean (eviction-free) rental history. After one year of both units being owner occupied, the TIC is eligible to begin the condo-conversion process. Anyway, that’s the background, and like I said, sometime in the next couple of months I will write more about this and my particular experience, but one of the big steps towards conversion is to get a ‘code and safety’ inspection by the City. This inspection costs something like $2500 for a two unit building (it scales up, but the biggest per-owner burden is at two units). Building, electrical and plumbing inspectors come out and point out all the violations which then must be corrected within the next six months, whether or not the condo-conversion goes forward. A signed job-card verifying the completion of this work is needed to continue on with the process. We had our inspection November, and we got our report back at the end of 2011, and it really didn’t seem too bad. Only one ‘building’ issue was called out, a fairly minor issue with one of the back patio stairs, and there were a few small electrical issues, and a few more plumbing and mechanical issues. I don’t have the final bill for the contractor work on this, but it’s going to be around $5000 of work, shared between the two of us. Actually when I went in to the Department of Building Inspection to get the permit for the work, the inspector who looked over my report and my permit application said “wow, this really is not very much work, usually it’s a lot more”. Well, thats a lucky break for us – it’s probably a good thing that the former owners of this place replaced most of the electrical and redid the bathrooms and the downstairs kitchen, ALL WITH PERMIT in the past five years. Ok, now to get to the point of this. We aren’t done with inspections yet, the building inspector has to come out Friday and look at the stairs and close the job cards, but the electrical and plumbing inspectors came out yesterday and both passed us. So hopefully when the building inspector comes out Tuesday he’ll just sign off on the small back staircase, and we will be free to proceed to the next steps. (Comment on this)
Thursday, February 9th, 2012
9:21 am	Cold Shower Originally published at Starry Wisdom. You can comment here or there. I thought I was going to have to take a cold shower today, because the water was ice cold even after running for a minute or two. Contractors were over yesterday to do the minor code work that needs to be done for the condo conversion – more about this in a later post, I think – and one of the things they did is replace the first bit of pipe coming off my gas meter, before it splits out to upstairs and the basement (water heater and furnace). Well, I was worried they busted something for a moment, then I decided to see if they had just turned the water heater off. And they had. Thankfully it’s a tankless heater, so a very short time later I was able to take a shower. (Comment on this)
Monday, February 6th, 2012
1:41 pm	TV Originally published at Starry Wisdom. You can comment here or there. Television isn’t glamorous, but most of us spend at least some time watching it. Recently (around the new year) I got a promotion from Comcast/Xfinity or whatever they are called, which came with some free Showtime and HBO, for a limit time (6 months/1 year respectively, I believe). With the addition of Showtime, we’ve started watching the show Homeland, which they are replaying. We’re 4 or so episodes in now, and I don’t really see how the show can keep going, but I hear that things change and it continues to be good, and that Angela ChaseClaire Danes really deserved that award or whatever she got for it. The other thing I’ve been watching is a lot of Holmes on Homes and Holmes Inspections on HGTV and DIY. This is a Canadian show where Mike Holmes, a general contractor in Toronto, rips people’s homes apart to fix various problems. He probably goes overboard sometimes, but it’s interesting to see how a lot of the things are done, and to compare how careful they are about running pipes on the ‘warm side’ of walls up there, whereas half of my pipes our OUTSIDE OF MY HOUSE! What else should I be watching? (Comment on this)
Sunday, February 5th, 2012
10:20 am	Bagels Originally published at Starry Wisdom. You can comment here or there. Some of my friends know that I am somewhat particular about bagels. Unless they meat a certain threshold, they are just round bread. Mass produced bagels you find at the grocery stores here in San Francisco certainly fall into that latter category. Yeah, House of Bagels sometimes has worthy bagels, but just sometimes. A bagel must be toothsome, without that it’s not a bagel. Anyway, for the past couple of years, we”ve been able to enjoy, on occasion, bagels imported from St. Viateur in Montreal via my pal Shiu. The Montreal-style bagel is pretty minimalistic – small and dense, but seems to be always seeded. Also, they have giant holes. I’ve not had them fresh, but day old and/or taken out of the freezer at a later date, and toasted, they make for the basis of a delightful breakfast. Recently, my friend Yanny visited New York, and I asked her to bring us back some bagels for me. I have had some fresh New York bagels in the past, and so I knew that these were bigger and airier than their Canadian brethren. She gave me bagels from Ees a Bagel. These are a bit bigger than the bagels I remember eating, but they have the same consistency and ‘suggestion of a hole’ (which makes them easier to spread with cream cheese). I kind of want to have a ‘fresh is best’ taste off between the two now – seeded bagels from both, head to head in a battle royale. A blind test would be improbable due to the form factor differences, but still, it would be fun. But currently, I think the St. Viateur are winning in my mind – the sweeter, smaller bagels, which fit easily in the toaster when cut in half, are possibly my new bagel ideal! (Comment on this)
Saturday, February 4th, 2012
10:27 am	Can’t write Originally published at Starry Wisdom. You can comment here or there. I just can’t think of anything. I think I cursed myself by not actually following through with my entry in the NYC Midnight Short Story Challenge. I entered this challenge, which begins with one week to write a 2500 word short story, with a genre, subject and character specified at the start of the contest, late last year. It seemed like it would be a good idea at the time, even though I knew I was going to be in Las Vegas the first weekend. I figured I could use that weekend to brainstorm, and then Monday night I could begin writing. Yeah, that was a smart plan… or not. But the reality is, while I did brainstorm a decent story start, I couldn’t come up with an end, and we got stuck in Las Vegas for about 4 extra hours, so instead of having Monday night at home, I spent it traveling. And then one thing led to another, but there was really only one night that week when I was in any shape to write, Tuesday, and I just didn’t. So I failed. And now, now I am cursed! (Comment on this)
Friday, February 3rd, 2012
12:07 am	Now what I thought I was going to write about Originally published at Starry Wisdom. You can comment here or there. I had some ideas about what to write about today, and then, well, work got busy and I forgot. But then I had an idea to write about, one that is interesting but which I am not really completely familiar with yet… And that idea is POPOS – Privately Owned, Public Open Space. These are public spaces in downtown San Francisco that are privately owned. It turns out that there are a fair number of them within walking distance of my office on California between Montgomery and Sansome. I’ve chatted about them some with my coworkers in the past week, and we’re going to start checking them out on our lunch breaks. For more information: Spur has a good article about the POPOS, and a map of them. One of my favorite podcasts, 99% invisible, did a great story on them a couple of years ago, definitely worth a listen! Podcast Powered By Podbean (Comment on this)
Wednesday, February 1st, 2012
8:39 am	Again! Originally published at Starry Wisdom. You can comment here or there. Just like last year, I’m going to try to post once a day in February. This year it will be harder as there is that pesky 29th to contend with. (Comment on this)
Tuesday, January 10th, 2012
10:56 pm	Side Dishes (part 2) Originally published at Starry Wisdom. You can comment here or there. Finally, it is time for my second installment of Hanukkah side dishes – and this time I bring you the recipe for noodle kugel. Kugels are a very common Ashkenazic side dish, and they can range from sweet to savory, but in my family the sweet has always reigned supreme. This recipe is actually courtesy of my mom’s good friend, and our next door neighbor growing up, Joan Futterman. Joan is a fantastic cook, and her Kugel recipe is, well, also fantastic. Sweet Noodle Kugel Servers at least 10 16 ounce wide egg noodles 16 ounce container cottage small curd cottage cheese 16 container sour cream 8 ounce cream cheese, softened 1 stick butter, melted 6 eggs, beaten 1 tsp vanilla 1 tsp orange juice 1 tsp lemon juice (optional) ¾ cup sugar 1 cup golden raisins 3 chopped or thinly sliced peeled large apples ⅓ cup cinnamon sugar mixture ⅓ cup graham cracker crumbs 1 stick melted butter Preheat the oven to 350°F Cook the noodles until al dente, and drain Mix the rest of the ingredients together, except for the graham cracker crumbs and cinnamon sugar Fold mixed ingredients into noodles Put mixture into a greased 9×13 inch baking dish Sprinkle graham cracker crumbs and cinnamon suger on top Bake uncovered for 60 minutes. Check after 50 minutes to make sure it is not burning Let rest for 20 minutes before slicing. The kugel may be served hot,at room temperature, or even cold And yes, this is not a dessert, this is eaten with the main course! (Comment on this)
Friday, January 6th, 2012
10:25 am	Year in Books 2011 Originally published at Starry Wisdom. You can comment here or there. Well, I owe you all another post about side dishes – I hope to be able to do that this week. But right now, I want to do a quick (I just wrote SQUID there, btw) rundown of the books I read in 2011. I read a total of 23 books in 2011, which is far short of the 30 books I resolved to read, according to the resolutions I put in the champagne bottle last year, which we cracked open on NYE. Anyway, some more info: Only 7 of the books were nonfiction, and two of those were memoirs. Maybe this is balanced out that one of the books was about deeds in California? I don’t know. That one was not one of my favorite books of the year. I read two books by David Foster Wallace in 2011, A Supposedly Fun Thing I’ll Never Do Again and The Pale King. The latter is his posthumously published ‘last’ novel, although it’s to complete, so I’m really not sure what to call it. Despite that fact, it ranks as one of my favorite thing read in 2011, without a doubt. It’s also one of the two books published in 2011 I read this year, the other being Tina Fey’s Bosspants which I did not like nearly as much! I read almost half (eleven) of the books electronically, via the Kindle reader on my iPad. Actually, wait, I read 12, so really just over half, of the books electronically; I read Bossypants on Mackenzie’s actually Kindle. It’s very convenient, and very comfortable to read this way in bed, but I do have some misgivings about the whole thing. The last physical book I read this year was a reread of At the Mountains of Madness by H. P. Lovecraft, back in September, which I own at least two copies of in various collections. At Home: A Short History of Private Life Bill Bryson How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe: A Novel Charles Yu The Art and Science of Communication: Tools for Effective Communication in the Workplace P.S. Perkins All Clear Connie Willis Dune Frank Herbert Deeds for California Real Estate Mary Randolf Children of Men P.D. James A Supposdely Fun Thing I’ll Never Do Again:Essays and Arguments David Foster Wallace On Stranger TIdes Tim Powers Cryoburn Lois McMaster Bujold Packing For Mars Mary Roach Light M. John Harrson A Canticle for Leibowitz Walter M Miller Jr. Game of Thrones George R.R. Martin Bonk Mary Roach Declare Tim Powers “I Know I Am But What Are You?” Cowboys and Aliens “Scott Mitchell Rosenberg Spellwright Blake Charleton Bossypants Tiny Fey At the Mountains of Madness H. P. Lovecraft The Neverending Story Michael Ende The Pale King David Foster Wallace (Comment on this)
Wednesday, December 21st, 2011
9:31 pm	Side Dishes Originally published at Starry Wisdom. You can comment here or there. Last night I had some friends over for Hanukkah dinner. I made a bunch of things, but the two things I want to talk about the most are the some of the side dishes. Tonight I’m going to talk about the relatively healthy one, Kasha Varnishkes – which are buckwheat groats and bowtie pasta. The buckwheat is a very nutty/earthy grain, which is a great complement to a hearty meat dish, such as the brisket I served. Kasha Varniskes From The Frugal Gourmet on Our Immigrant Ancestors by Jeff Smith. Serves at least 4, and up to 8. 1 Cup kasha (buckwheat groats) 1 egg, well beaten 2 tablespoons rendered chicken fat or vegetable oil (I had a plethora of fat from the chicken soup I made) 1 yellow onion, chopped 2 Cups chicken stock 1 Cup bowtie pasta Salt and Pepper to taste Start water boiling for pasta, but do not cook yet In a small bowl mix the kasha and the egg, make sure all the grains are coated with the egg. Put a medium nonstick fry-pan over medium high heat, and cook the kasha egg mixture, stirring and pushing down with a wooden spoon, until the egg dries and the grains are mostly seperated. Set aside. In a heavy 4 quart pan pan, heat the fat or oil and saute the onion until translucent, about 10 minutes. Add the chicken stock and bring to a boil. Add the kasha and salt and pepper to taste. Stir and cover. Reduce heat to low, and continue cooking, stirring occasionally, for about 10 minutes, until the kasha is tender, and the liquid is absorbed. Cook the bowties at the same time. Add drained, al dente cooked bowties to the buckwheat. Mix well and serve hot. Stay tuned for a MUCH less healthy side dish in the coming days! (Comment on this)
Wednesday, November 30th, 2011
9:27 am	I’ve Been Hiding Originally published at Starry Wisdom. You can comment here or there. But not not writing: (Comment on this)
Sunday, September 18th, 2011
11:12 am	Oysters! Originally published at Starry Wisdom. You can comment here or there. Yesterday, Mackenzie, I and about eight other friends drove up to Marshall, CA to eat oysters and clams at Hog Island Oyster Farm. This was a celebration for our friend Ali’s birthday this Monday. Unfortunately, Friday night was a night where I needed a drink or five (not the best end of the week at work – nothing terrible, just lots of last minute work of the sort I abhor), so we woke up in the morning a bit later than intended. We actually only left about 15 minutes late, but I was lax in looking at the direction on the map, so I blindly followed the GPS to go up 1 through Mill Valley, instead of going all the north and cutting across on Francis Drake. This is more or less meaningless to 99% of humanity, but the important thing of note here is that yesterday was the first part of a two-day National Multiple Sclerosis Society Waves to Wine bike ‘tour’. The first day started in SF and went through Stinson Beach going up 1. So basically, I had to navigate around hundred and hundreds of bicyclists, on a twisty, hilly road – which was harrowing. I was very glad when we finally made it to Tomales Bay, and only had to deal with the normal weekend cyclists, which are much easier to navigate around. Once we got to the Oyster Farm, we began to quickly consume/over consume shellfish. We (much of the we being myself) shucked dozens of oysters for eating raw, as well as grilling some up. We also grilled up 2lbs of manila clams. All of this was delicious, but even more delicious (maybe) were the oysters that we got up that were grilled by the Hog Island people with a delicious maple chipotle sauce. Actually, why bother comparing, it was all delicious, as were the accompaniments we brought up from home – cheese, charcuterie, bread and a lovely melon and feta salad that Mackenzie made. If any of you are anything like me, you will probably be saying “This Post is Useless WIthout PIctures”. Yep, I forgot to snag my camera as I left in the morning, and my 3+ year old iPhone is just too slow/cruddy for me to bother with much. I really need to consider getting a new phone one of these days… (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Sunday, September 11th, 2011
4:10 pm	Ten years ago today, and today. Originally published at Starry Wisdom. You can comment here or there. We all know what happened ten years ago today. For me it started with waking up to NPR, as normal, and hearing that the *second* World Trade Center tower had just crashed down. I felt like I was dreaming at first, but then I got out of bed and turned on the TV. And of course, yes, it was real. And that’s about all I am going to say on that subject. Now, for today: A little over a year ago I purchased the top flat in a approximately 100 year old two-storey Edwardian in San Francisco. One of the things you’re likely to get in a home that old is some old, painted-shut, double-hung windows. My flat as full of them, but over the past year I managed to get all but one of them open by cutting the paint on the inside of the sash. But one window in my living room would not relent to my assault, so I knew it was going to be the first window in my window repair plan – besides windows that were/are painted shut, there are some windows with cut sash cords, and other assorted problems. But the one in the living room was both painted shut and it was missing a sash cord, so it seemed to be a good place to start. I actually began the project yesterday afternoon by removing the stops (the vertical pieces of molding the hold the bottom sash into the frame). Actually, the project began a few months ago when I bought some books on the subject, and started to assemble a series of tools and supplies for the job, such as: sash cord, finishing nails, a respirator, and a small pry bar. Anyway, removing the stop involves cutting the paint between the molding and the frame, then prying it out with a combination of a hammer, a pry bar, and a stiff-blated putty knife. Once the stops are off, it’s fairly simple to wiggle the sash to free it from the dried paint, and then it can be removed. I ran out of time yesterday, so I replaced the stops (they are held in place by a combination of tension and nails – I just pressed them in place). This morning I took the stops back off, and then sanded off the excess paint on the edges, primed, and painted them. While waiting for the paint to dry, I replaced both sash cords on the window – even though one of them was already functional, the rope was in a sad state, so it was actually easier for me to remove and replace it. Here is a picture of the sash out of the window and one of the weights: Also, this is what it looks like in between the windows, where the weights normally are: Then it was a relatively process of replacing the stops, and repainting the trim – and that left me with a finished, operable window (sorry for how dark it is, but you probably get the idea): All said and done, it probably took about five hours to get the window fixed, which included a couple of hours of waiting for paint to dry. I could probably do more than one in that time, and three in an hour or two more. I’ll probably fix the next two at the end of the month! (Comment on this)
Monday, August 1st, 2011
8:03 pm	SUMMERTIME ADVENTURES – JULY 2011 (PART 2) Originally published at Starry Wisdom. You can comment here or there. I finished the last post with me heading back to San Francisco, on July 11th. I had a four day workweek ahead of me before going on to my next weekend trip, but in the meanwhile, I went and saw the midnight showing of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2. The movie was pretty good, and I think I would give it about 7 out of 8 rabbit turds, on the rabbit turd scale. I think that as a whole, the two parter was quite well done and reflected the novel quite well. What was not great was coming home at a quarter to four and having to get into work by 9am the next day. Luckily for me, my next trip didn’t start until Saturday, because the next trip was vegas. Las Vegas July 16-18 This was a trip to Las Vegas for my friend Steve’s bachelor party. I won’t say much about this, but I will show a picture of my dinner that saturday. And then back to SF for another 4 day work week. It took me until Thursday to really recover from the weekend but the week did feature a trip to AT&T park to see the Giants beat the Dodgers, and to see Brandon Belt come back up to the big leagues with a Home Run. And then Friday it was on to the final trip of July. July 22-24 Lake Tahoe Camping We went up to DL Bliss State Park on the shores of Lake Tahoe for our yearly camping trip and river float. The latter, well – it wasn’t much of a float. It was more of a river fiasco, truth be told. There was still snow on the tops of the mountain, and as that might lead you to believe, there was lots of water in the river systems. However, the river float is at the start of the Truckee river, where it flows out of Lake Tahoe, and this flow is controlled by a large dam. The dam was completely closed, because there was lots of water downstream, about two and a half times more water than one would expect. Unfortunately this meant that there was about 1/3 as much water as expected in the float area. The float was slow, shallow, and tedious. We didn’t even make it half of the route before calling it a day in a little over two hours. Our less was learned – if the commercial river rafting company is closed, don’t bother with the float. We got back to camp a bit earlier than typical, and used the time to visit the beach at the camp site. This was fun, and we decided we wanted to come back again the next day before we left the area, which we did for a nice afternoon swim and lake float. This helped us avoid a lot of the traffic leaving the area, and as we were planning on stopping in Davis for dinner with Mackenzie’s sister’s family, it helped out our timing. We had a nice visit in Davis, but poor Orrin got stung in his foot by a bee. He took it well, was more annoyed than anything else at the problem. After dinner and some visiting, it was back home. I am now in the middle of 12 nights at home, before heading to Redding this weekend to hang out at Mackenzie’s parents’ house with some friends (her parents are out of town). Unfortunately Mackenzie was out of town herself last weekend, to go to LA for her friend Melissa’s birthday. I skipped the trip due to all the traveling you read about above and the previous post. However, on the bright side, my friend Joan was in town from Toronto for a tech confernce. I got to hang out with her Friday night and Saturday, and wander around my home, San Francisco. (Comment on this)
Sunday, July 31st, 2011
9:38 pm	Summertime Adventures – July 2011 (part 1) Originally published at Starry Wisdom. You can comment here or there. This July has been jam-packed with adventure. I was away from home every weekend this month, until this, the last weekend. As such, I didn’t have time to keep up with my bills (I managed to pay my cell bill on the last possible day), let alone my blog. But as I am home this weekend, I have had time to go through the photos I took, a pre-requisite to the blog post. So here we go on a recap of the month: July 4th Weekend – Donner Lake Our friends Tori and Steve invited us to their cabin on Donner Lake for the July 4th weekend. It was a great weekend, jam packed with fun and food (all the couples invited took charge of a meal to prepare for everyone. Mackenzie and I took Sunday dinner, for which we did a tacopalooza – carne asada, carnitas, and chicken tinga, served with all the trimmings -I should make a separate post on this. We spent most of the time during the days on or by the lake. Tori and Steve rented a speed boat on Sunday, which the group took turns using, and on Monday, July 4th, they rented a pontoon boat, which we could all fit on. We spent a great afternoon out on the lake (which was freezing cold, no wonder, there was stills now on the mountains). As Tuesday was a work day, and in particular I had to be in by 9am, we had to leave before the firework show at the Lake. However, on our way back to San Francisco, we stopped at Mackenzie’s sister’s house in Davis, to visit her family and go see the fireworks. Her nephew, Orrin, who was about 16 months months old, had fun with Angry Birds on my phone, and watching the fireworks. This is the full gallery of photos posted from the trip. July 9th Weekend – Chicago I was home for only a few nights before heading to Chicago that Thursday afternoon for my nephew Milo’s second birthday weekend. Thanks to spending several days in Burbank for work earlier this year, I had a free flight on Southwest airlines, which I took advantage of for this trip. This meant, of course, that I flew into Midway, which is quite a bit farther from my parent’s house than O’Hare, but my parents graciously agreed to ferry me to and from the airport. The fast paced nature of the month makes the early part of the trip hazy, but I know that on Saturday my parents had Milo at their house, as they do almost every Saturday. We had a fun playing in his sandbox, drawing with chalk, and playing with toys. I thought Milo was his normal, light-hearted self, but my mom was a bit concerned as he had a bit of a bowel issue that day. We took him home to his parent’s, and then I went out to dinner with my parents. This brings us to Sunday, the day of Milo’s birthday party. The party was to be held at his house, and his dad, my brother, was going to cater it, as he did last year, and the main course was to be smoke brisket. The plan was that my parents and I would watch Milo again during the day, as Keith and Sarah prepared for the party, and then he would take him back for his party around 3pm. However, I woke up to the news that my brother was violently ill, had slept in the bathroom, and was not able to make the food. Sarah, while not a cook, is a great super-connector, and she enlisted one of their chef friends to help her with the brisket, and other friends to help set up for the party. Our morning with Milo was fun, although he did seem a bit off. He took a longer than usual nap, and we set out for him to be late to his own party. Things started to turn concerning right before we pulled up to the house, as Milo puked a bit in the car. Thankfully we were almost there, so we rushed him home, and his mom changed him, and as he seemed that he was OK, he was able to attend and enjoy his party. In hingsight, maybe he shouldn’t have been eating deviled eggs, as he threw up again an hour or so into the party. I helped Sarah get him cleaned up and changed, and all the poor kid wanted to do at that point was watch his favorite TV show, “Martha Speaks”. Keith, who was still pretty out of it, took him into his bedroom and they watched tv together. So not only was Milo’s dad unable to attend the party, but Milo got knocked out of it too. I carefully washed my hands after getting him cleaned up. At this point, I was roped into assembling my parents’ gift to Milo – a pretty awesome kitchen set. Despite the small size of this project, it was incredibly complex, and took over two hours to assemble. Milo came out, part way through, to supervise. Then Monday, the day I was to go back, I woke up at 7am to my mom telling me that both her and my father had gotten violently sick. Bleh, I thought, and went back to sleep, to be awoken by some thunder a bit later. It turned out that the thunderstorm knocked out power for my parents’ house along with a few hundred thousand other houses. This was the second time his summer my parents had no power for more than a few hours, and after the last storm my dad had gone out to buy a generator. I helped him (well did most of the work) to get it set up and running so that they could have power for the duration of the outage (which turned out to be about 24 hours more). However, I also got picked up by my brother to spend the day with him and in theory get a ride to the airport. But since Milo wouldn’t nap, and ended up running errands with the two of us, and Sarah was also Ill, I took a cab to the airport from their house, instead of subjecting Milo to another long car ride. Oh, while I was there that afternoon, we put together my present for him, a push bike, and I played ball with him in the house. This post has turned out to be quite long, and since I promised I would post something tonight, and need to watch true blood, I will leave this as TO BE CONTINUED. (Comment on this)