Labels: Extreme Home Makeover, Food, Volunteerism

Well, another week in Berkeley means afternoons free. Kirk works the 4AM to noon shift. Today, we decided to have lunch and see a movie. There's a fantastic little...food court, I guess it would be...over by Borders (near the Theatres). It has lots and lots of food options - quite the multinational smorgasboard. It is, by far, one of my favorite places to go for "fast food" here. Today I had "Gung Bo" - a chinese dish made from chicken and vegetables with lots of spices, served over rice. Kirk tried a shish-kabob from the Afghan place. It was tasty but way too much food.

Afterwards, we went to see Invincible, the new Disney movie. It received a 70% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, so we decided to give it a try. It was actually quite enjoyable - it was an inspiring story, told with humour and grit, with a good dose of reality thrown in.

Labels: Food, Movies, Travel

Well, I've recently become involved in blogging in two locations in addition to this one. (And you may have noticed that I've started blogging here a lot more). As part of my bzflag-playing, my ducati team, Bz-Incorporated, has a blog where it posts match reports and other things. Recently, I started another blog with a few other people (we are still open to additional contributors, so let me know if you are interested) called "The Healthy Cook". I won't be cross posting all the recipes I try to my cooking page, so feel free to go check out what we are up to on The Healthy Cook.

Labels: Bzflag, Food, Websites

Well, birthdays are supposed to be fun, right? I mean, I realize many people get to a certain age and simply just dread turning another year. But birthdays should be a celebration! Well, this year, mine was.

First of all, my wonderful husband was home. For the first time in five years, my birthday managed to fall on a day when he wasn't traveling or otherwise unescapably commited. Last year, he flew to Australia. The two years before were the men's retreat. The first year we were married, he was a groomsman in our best man's wedding and the bachelor party was that night. This year? This year, he was scheduled to fly to Maui the day before my birthday. When told of the impending schedule, he told them that if he wasn't home on my birthday this year, he'd have no home to return to. (He was, of course, kidding; however, the gesture and his determination to be here was greatly appreciated!)

I received a couple of birthday greetings a day or two early. On the night before my birthday, I was playing bzflag with some friends of mine. One is in Germany (Bernie) and one in Utah (Sol). Well, it was certainly my birthdate in Germany - and Bernie was sure to let me know! He not only wished me happy birthday repeatedly, he wouldn't let me sign off until it was my birthday HERE so he could "officially" wish me a happy birthday! Finally, a while after midnight, I said goodnight to Sol & Bernie and got some sleep.

In the morning, Kirk surprised me by setting up a special playlist on iTunes - all containing songs with "birthday", "happy" and "I love you" themes, like "Birthday" (The Beatles), "A Happy Ending" (The Princess Bride Soundtrack), "Donna" (Los Lobos), "The Girl I Love" (Tony Bennett) and "So Happy Together" (The Turtles). It was incredibly sweet and fun! We chatted for a while and finally he had to head off to work. I listened to that playlist all day.

On irc, we have our own channel - it's a small little place (##essy) that a number of bzflaggers and a few other friends visit. Well, Kirk had changed the topic on the channel to let everyone know it was my birthday. Consequently, people were cheerful and fun and we had a sort of virtual party there during the day. One of my GU teammates, romfis, had spammed most of the irc channels along with each team I'm on with a link to the GU Forums, where NTH had posted a birthday topic for me. Kierra did the same on the ducati forums. I was surprised to see a greeting from one of my teammates who, just a few months ago, complained about the posting of "birthday topics". So many people went out of their way to wish me a good day - it was almost a bit overwhelming (but completely and totally appreciated)! I even discovered a voicemail (gah, I picked the wrong day to forget to turn on the ringer for my phone!) from the "Baron clan", in which they, along with my friend Val, sang me a rather muddled, off-key and completely wonderful rendition of "Happy Birthday".

In late morning, Kirk pinged me to say that my birthday present had been delivered. It was shipped to my work address, so he suggested I go pick it up. I was pretty sure I knew what it was. Last week, when we were in Berkeley, tokimi had pinged me to say that Apple had just announced an 80 gb ipod. Now, I've been complaining for months that 40 gb simply isn't big enough. I was hoping for a 150 gb the size of a nano. Yes, yes, I know - it's a bit of a pipe dream, but 80 gb is almost enough to fit about 70% of our current music library (yes, I've been collecting CDs since I was in college - Kirk was happy to marry into so much music). So, when I heard an 80 gb was available, I immediately sent the link to Kirk and said "wow! check this out!" He said "cool! I guess it's a good thing I hadn't bought your birthday present yet, huhn?" So...I was pretty sure I knew what I'd be getting. And I did!

Of course, I immediately took it home, opened it up and started loading music on it. It takes a while to load 80 gb! With the OS and software loaded on the ipod, I had 74.37 gb of usable space. I'm using every little bit and byte. Funnily, it's actually slightly smaller in size than my 40 gb, and the screen is bigger. AND in colour! Now I need a new case, as my old one doesn't fit it properly. Since my old ipod is going to Kirk (his old one died), he will inherit my case too, once I get a new case.

While waiting for my 74.37 gb to transfer over, I played some bzflag. Pimpinella had put up a banner on the dub servers wishing me a happy birthday. (It's interesting how I was turning everything from 16 to 90-something, depending upon who was wishing me a good day! In fact, the answer to my age IS the answer.)

In the early afternoon, my doorbell rang. Now, for the last two and a half weeks (it seems longer!), we have had our lives and apartments turned upside down while they repipe the whole building. They are replacing all of our copper piping. There isn't a single room in our small apartment this isn't affected. We've been waiting for several days for them to finish our apartment (they're done with the repipe, but havne't closed up all the walls), so I presumed that the door was just one of the wallboarding guys coming back to finish up. I was shocked to see a man standing at my door with a huge bouquet of beautiful red roses! I happily accepted the delivery and discovered my wonderful husband had sent them to me!

I knew that Kirk was planning something for that evening - presumably including dinner, so I didn't have to cook. He actually arrived home a full hour earlier than I expected, but then said he had to go run an errand and left. He was home about 40 minutes later. He had a cake and a beautiful card for me! But of course, we were going to have dinner first.

Just as I was almost ready to walk out the door, the doorbell rang (again). What now? It was a delivery for me. I opened the huge box to find ANOTHER flower arrangement...I looked at Kirk quizzically and he shook his head. There was a note - my friends Dianne & Jeff had send the flowers! Cool! Kirk put the flowers in water and we headed out.

I love surprises. It's really hard for Kirk to surprise me - I'm very curious and he's a horrible liar (which is a very good thing, but not conducive to being surprised often). But in this case, I had studiously attempted not to ask him anything about what we were doing, and he had done his part by not bringing it up. I knew it couldn't be too far - we could get there within 15 minutes according to him. We drove down to Hermosa Beach, toward my old house. In fact, a block and a half from my old house! There's a beautiful, well-known little Italian restaurant (called The Bottle Inn) down there that, despite having lived right by it for 18 months and still very close for another another 4 years, I had never been. The menu was divine! It was extremely hard to make a decision, but I finally selected the Risotto Al Filetto and Kirk selected the Conchilioni. We had an appetizer of Calamari - possibly the best I've ever had. It was served in a giant martini glass. The atmosphere was both romantic and conducive to good conversation. We were at a table that was suitably secluded and in a quiet enough location to have conversation without straining our voices or our ears.

I thought we would manage to sneak out the door without any "birthday" hoopla, but (when asked if we wanted to order dessert) Kirk mentioned we were heading home to get some birthday cake and of course, they were back moments later with a small dish of chocolate mousse and loud voices.

After dinner, we took a nice walk along the strand in Hermosa Beach. It has been so long since we've done that, and despite my completely unsuitable (and clacky) shoes, we had a very nice time! All-in-all, it was a fantastic day - certainly the best birthday I can remember ever having! Thanks to everyone who made it so special!

Labels: Acquisitions, Bzflag, Events, Family, Food, IRC, Local Outings, Music, Technology

Who said you only get fruits and nuts in California?! Today, in addition to our staple of delicious fresh fruit, we were also treated to an enormous macadamia nut pancake. Again, 1/2 was as much as we could finish.

Labels: Food

After a short bit of indecision, Kirk and I decided to have dinner at the Canton Chef in Kihei. It was actually just across the parking lot from Cafe O'Lei, where we had had lunch yesterday. As we walked in the door, we spotted a typed sheet of paper on several of the doors leading to the entrance. It stated that the restaurant was closing on Monday, August 28th after 19 years in business. Wow, that's tomorrow. We wondered a bit why they were closing.

Clearly they were severely short-staffed now. In fact, the waiter even suggested ordering sodas rather than any of the fancy fruit drinks one could normally order from their bar. Well, he more than "suggested". Looking at the menu, the food was incredibly reasonably priced and the place was packed with locals. Again, why close?

I discovered this review of the restaurant on the web, which I found quite accurate: "We have been to Maui every year for the last 6 years. We always make at least 1 trip to this chinese restaurant. First, they easily accomodate large groups. The prices are soooo! reasonable. The food is really good. It appears to be family owned and the waiter recommendations were the best. I also think the drinks are really unique, flashy and not wallet breaking. Usually don't need reservations."

The dishes we ordered, Kung Pao Chicken and Pork in Hot Garlic Sauce, were both delicious and reasonably priced. The bill came to $20 (2 dishes, steamed rice and a coke for Kirk).

On a side note, Kirk's back seems to be feeling a bit better. He made it through most of today on a single vicodin.

Labels: Food, Travel

In addition to the normal staple of fresh, delicious fruit that we have been served for breakfast since arriving here, this morning, we were also given a magnificent caramel apple pancake! It was gigantic. I am not a huge fan of pancakes (or sweet things) for breakfast, but this was just too tasty not to eat. Neither of of us managed to finish more than 1/2 though.

Labels: Food

Today, it was time to move from the B&B in Kula, down to one by the beach in Kihei. We had a nice slow, relaxing start this morning. Breakfast at 8 (again, delicious pastries and fruit). Then, we both did some packing. Kirk had just taken his vicodin and was feeling dizzy again, so we took a break. He played WoW - I tried bz for a bit, but was too laggy. So I watched another movie (last night, we watched Capote - very good), Walk the Line, about Johnny Cash. It was pretty good, albeit longer than I anticipated. As a result, we didn't make the noon check out, but Michael was fine with it.

Eventually, we loaded our car - we had to put the top down to fit everything in it, said good bye to Michael and Gabby (Gabby is Michael's adorable, hyper yellow lab) and then headed down the hill towards Kihei. Technically, we weren't supposed to check into our new B&B until 4, but we were hoping that at the least, we'd be able to drop off some luggage and go have lunch.

When I made reservations for our upcoming accomodation, I spent a lot of time trying to find someplace that was both affordable, near the beach AND available. With it being the weekend before Labor Day, many places seemed to be booked up. We narrowed it down to two places, and settled on (don't laugh at the name - I certainly didn't choose it) "Maui What A Wonderful World B&B". I had booked their cheapest room, the Master Suite. We found the place using the map from the website (it was easy to find, actually), and then were able to check in 2 hours earlier than we were expected. To our surprise, she upgraded us to the Garden Suite, because it was available. It's much bigger than we expected (but doesn't have the double shower heads that I was expecting - oh well).

Once we had unloaded our poor car, we headed off to find some lunch. Both Michael and Eva (who owns the current B&B) recommended the same place - Cafe O'Lei. We figured we'd try it out. The atmosphere was nice. We sat at a table by the window that had sheer curtains hanging between it and the tables on either side of it - providing a semblance of privacy that would otherwise not be there. The menu was varied, and very reasonably priced, to our surprise. We each had lunch for under $10 - including entree, rice and salad. For Maui - that is a VERY good price!

Afterwards, we dropped in to the local general store and poked around a bit, then back to the B&B where Kirk resumed his WoW game. Tomorrow, we are thinking about a trip to Hana, depending on how his back feels.

Labels: Food, Movies, Travel

After resting most of yesterday, Kirk felt like he was ready to get out and take in some sights. So, we decided to take the loop around the West end of the island. I had done this loop once before - the year we got married, Kirk came out here 2 months after our wedding for a work trip. No WAY he was going to Hawaii without his new wife! So, while he slaved away, working 16 hour days at the top of Haleakala, I played - scuba diving, snorkeling, whale watching, and, of course, long drives with fantastic scenery. I knew what was coming.

The West side of the island includes a very hairy 40-some-odd-mile stretch of "road" containing hairpin turns (enough to put Julia Robert's hair, in Pretty Woman, up and KEEP it up through 5 straight hours of high-impact aerobics), one-lane roads with long unpaved stretches, lots of roadside stands selling pineapple, banana bread, coconut candy, cold drinks and even shaved ice. In addition to it being a really fun drive, especially in a mustang convertible, it has some truly spectacular scenery.

So, we gathered our things and headed down the mountain from Kula, where we have been staying. It's about a 3500 foot drop in altitude, complete with a change in temperature to go with it. It was significantly warmer at sea level. On the way down the mountain, I had a really good laugh. For those of you who don't know, I have been playing an opensource online multiplayer game called Bzflag for a while now. It occurred to me today, that despite the fact that I'm "all grown up" now, I still have a rather vivid imagination. I saw this sign at the side of the road.
Immediately, I had visions of cars being damaged by lasers (a weapon on bzflag) - tires slashed, cut in half, engines burned...whatever it took to slow the thing down to the permissible speed. Kirk couldn't stop laughing at my silliness - and of course, one of the first things he said was "you play wayyyy too much bzflag!"

After a brief stop in Kahilui for lunch (and Kirk took his pain pill), we were on our way. Getting through Kahilui to the start of the road is quite a job for the navigator - lots of turns only 1-2 blocks apart. But Kirk is an excellent navigator and we made it without a single U-turn (I can't say the same for when I did the same trip almost 5 years ago now).

Now, I told you we rented a mustang. On the whole, it's a nice little car. Certainly more convenient putting the top up and down than on Kirk's Spitfire at home (I'll let HIM explain how that works - I can't even follow the process). However, there is one little detail that really bugs me. For whatever reason, the accelerator in the mustang is not very responsive. You really have to mash it down to get any reaction out of the car, something I am not at all used to. Most sports cars have a much more sensitive accelerator. It would probably be more fun if it were a stick, but oh well.

The scenery going from the windward to the leeward side of the island is really spectacular. Additionally, it varies from lush and green to more dry, deserty conditions (similar to California). We spent a lot of time driving up and down some rather amazing cliffs, even having to squeeze incredibly close to the edge of one so a large cement truck could get by us. He missed hitting our rear bumper by only about 4 inches. We were so close to the edge of the cliff, that Kirk had me back up before turning back onto the road to continue on.

There are certainly houses and farms and such along this narrow road. In fact, one of Kirk's colleagues lives in an estate development up here (for the low low price of 1.5 hour drive to work each day). We did pass a small (very cute) village about 1/2 way around the 41-mile section of road. It was colorful and quaint. There was a simply beautiful little church in the village. It was the first thing, really, that caught our attention.

Now, one of the odd things I particularly remembered about driving this section of the road was the coconut candy. First off, I love coconut. One of my FAVORITE ice creams (probably one of the top two, though it's hard to say which is the very very best), is Freddo's Coconut Ice Cream. There's only one problem with this being one of my favorites. Freddo's is in Buenos Aires, Argentina. I don't get to have it very often. (My other favorite is zitron ice cream, from Germany - yet another I get almost never). Rather early on, we passed a large stand (almost a small outdoor bar) that sold all sorts of things - tshirts, hats, etc. Sadly, they were out of coconut candy. But that was ok. It wasn't the place I remembered. That place had been on the inside curve of a hairpin turn, a good bit further along if I remembered rightly.

Well, I was right. It was still on the inside of the hairpin curve, but it was quite a bit bigger than I remembered from before. AND painted. Last time I was there (4 1/2 years ago), there was room enough for the proprietor inside, but all customers just walked up to the counter on the outside. It is substantially bigger now. We tasted the coconut candy (yum!) and the banana bread. Then we left with a single small pouch of coconut candy. This is about 1/2 of what they used to sell for almost double the price. As we walked away, the proprietor said "If you want to make it last, keep it out of reach. Aloha!"

A bit further on, we saw a lot of cars pulled over and figured we'd check out to see what they were all looking at. It turned out to be a nice little hike downward and then we were at an overlook, where we could see tidepools in two directions. One was completely deserted, and the other had some people wading around in it. We debated walking all the way down, but Kirk's back was already feeling some twinges and we had a long way to go yet.

Maui is certainly a place with a lot of honeymooners though. I can't help myself from wondering whenever we pass a seemingly happy-looking couple, "Are they on their honeymoon?" This road is no exception. We had spotted a blow hole from the road and as we wended our way closer, we came upon yet another large group of vehicles, parked this way and that, squeezing into whatever off-road space was available. We slipped the 'stang into a spot near some mud puddles and hopped out to see if we could get a closer view of the blowhole. Along the path, we found an area covered with rocks, that had been arranged into any variety of messages and hearts that you could imagine - sure evidence that honeymooners, whoever they may be, had been there.

The blowhole reminded me of a quest Kirk and I once did in New Zealand. We must have hiked an hour or more to find a blowhole in the middle of some guy's field, seemingly far from the ocean. Unfortunately for us, at the time we were there, the tide was low and we saw almost nothing. This time, we had a very nice view of the blowhole, snapping first, a photo as the water was pushed up through the hole, and another as it descended and drenched the folks who were standing way too close (or were they..? It WAS pretty hot).

Now, about now, I've begun to realize something is wrong...dreadfully wrong. We seemed to have covered a rather large distance, but we hadn't yet reached the unpaved section of the road. I remembered that section being quite long, so to not have reached it...we must not be nearly as far around as I thought. I mentioned this to Kirk and he replied - oh, they paved the whole thing a couple of years ago - there is no unpaved section anymore. What?! No WONDER we had seen so many cars coming around it today. When it was unpaved, all the rental car agency agreements basically said you weren't allowed to go on that road without voiding your agreement with them. I guess that no longer holds true.

Kirk's back was starting to hurt him quite a bit by now. It had been only 2 hours since he last took his medicine - it would be four hours before he could take it again. Our original plan was to head into Lahaina and have dinner there, then go home. The only problem was, our trip along this newly paved road took a scant 2-2.5 hours to complete. We arrived in Lahaina HOURS before dinner time. And frankly, it was hot, we were both getting a bit tired, and I knew he really needed to get home and rest his back. We settled for a nice little walk around Lahaina, some Lappert's Ice Cream, some more walking and window shopping, and a cold beverage for the ride home. I drained about 3/4 of my bottle of water before we even made it back to the car.

We hopped in and started on the homeward stretch - most of which was on the ever-popular, ever-busy Lahaina Highway. The road takes you by some really nice (locals only) surf breaks, which were hopping. A hurricane bypassed the island a couple of days before, but the swell it generated was providing some really surfable waves. We took one view point stop along with way. What looks like a separate island in the background behind Kirk is actually the southern portion of Maui - you are looking at Haleakala, the volcano on which reside the telescope and instruments Kirk has been working with.

Despite some traffic getting out of Lahaina, we made it back to the B&B with little other delay. Kirk promptly went out to the jacuzzi for a while to try and relax his back, as he still had another hour before he could take his medicine. We decided to relax a bit around the room, order in food and just take it easy. La Provence, about 2-3 miles down the road, made us a pizza which I went and picked up. Just before I left, I snapped a photo from the deck at the B&B - looking to the North, where we had spent our day.

Labels: Bzflag, Food, Health, Transportation, Travel

We decided to drive down to Makawao for dinner. There's a nice little steak house down there that Kirk likes and it sounded like a good plan. It's about a 20 minute drive. Kirk was already starting to have pain before we left the hotel, but he wasn't supposed to take any vicodin without food, so we took one with us for him to take with dinner.

Have I ever told you about Kirk's "parking karma"? I'm not really a believer in karma, but it's a funny way to say - he ALWAYS gets the very best possible parking place. There could be 100 cars circling in a parking lot, and the second we drive up, someone pulls out of a front place spot right in front of us. Voila! Parking karma! Well, tonight was no exception. There was a spot (parallel parking on the street) right in front of the restaurant. He pulled right in.

In Makawao, the streets are quite narrow. Cars parallel parking are quite close to the driving lane. It's an older looking town, quaint, even. Very upcountry feel to it. As he was getting out of the car, another car came by rather fast (the speed limit there is 20 mph). Kirk looked at me, rather surprised. I never even realized what happened until he told me..."That car just clipped us with its mirror." Really?! He checked and saw no damage on our car. The other car continued on, so we went into the restaurant.

Kirk had a hard time getting out of the car. He was moving very slow and clearly in a lot of pain. Walking seemed to be painful even. We were seated and he told me in a low voice, "Let's try and get some bread right away" (so he could take his pain medicine). As soon as the waitress came by and took our drink order, she said she'd bring some bread. And she did - warm sourdough. It was quite delicious. We placed our order. Then, Kirk took his medicine, took two bites and then got an extremely odd look on his face. He was in so much pain he couldn't sit there. After several attempts to get comfortable, he got up and said he'd be right back, he was going to the car. He looked like he was near tears, he was in so much pain.

I watched for a few minutes, thinking. He hadn't come back and I talked to the waitress to see if it was possible to get our food to go. She said of course, after I had explained the situation. I walked outside to speak to Kirk, offered to take our food to go, which he agreed to, and went back inside. I was looking for our waitress to let her know and out comes a lady with two big cushy pillows. She introduced herself as Diane, the General Manager of the restaurant. She was extremely nice and helpful (all of the staff were). She gave us a referral to two other MDs in the event Kirk needed to see someone again. She offered to send us home with dessert (which, it turns out, she didn't charge us for). I was completely impressed with the service we received.

As I waited for the food to be packed up and to finish paying, I noticed Kirk had called me. I tried to call him back, but had no signal, so I tried sending him a text message (which often goes through even if a phone call won't). A couple of minutes later, I was on my way out the door with the food. I got to the door and Kirk was standing in front of the car. I put the food in the car and was ready to get him inside so I could drive us back to the hotel (no way he was driving after taking a Vicodin). Kirk stopped me and said, "We have another problem." He pointed to a car parked in the shadows about 4 car lengths behind us. There were 4 kids standing on the street next to the car. Apparently, this was the car that had driven by us and hit our car when we were about to head into the restaurant. The kids were apparently claiming that the undercarriage of their car had somehow been damaged when Kirk opened his car door. Now this, of course, is quite impossible. Not only because there's no way the undercarriage could have been damaged, but even if they were claiming damage to the lower portion of the car, the shape of the door on the Mustang makes that simply impossible.

Diane, the restaurant manager, happened to come out to be sure we were ok, and I explained what was going on. She went inside to get a flashlight, I gave her our telephone number and names (we were talking about leaving to go back to the hotel), then she and I walked over to the kids' car. They started claiming that Kirk had kicked the car (again, impossible - he could barely move) and that he had damaged the car - first, when he opened the door and they clipped us, and secondly, when he "kicked" it. We looked at every inch of the passenger side and there was not a single mark on it - anywhere. They then claimed that the damage was underneath.

Then, one of the young ladies (not the driver) said to Diane, well even if we weren't damaged, what if someone else had driven by and it was damaged? Basically, it sounded like she was trying to claim that even though we didn't damage that car, they were trying to punish us in the event another car drove by and clipped us some other time. Crazy. Besides the fact, that they were in the moving vehicle - I find it hard to believe that we would be found at fault at all in this situation if there HAD been any damage. Finally, the young man (the driver) told us he had called the police. The girl threatened us saying she had our license plate number. Frankly, it was an empty threat, given that there wasn't a single indication of damage on their car anywhere.

Well, with the police called, we really didn't feel free to leave. Even though we had left our contact information with Diane. Diane said to us that the kids were being completely unreasonable and it seemed as if there was a bit of localism going on. 'A bit', I thought, the surf breaks almost look tame compared to this. Finally, I decided to call the police myself. So, I did - the non-emergency number. Intially, the guy didn't even have a record of the call, but it turns out it hadn't been called in as a vehicular incident originally. I gave the policeman all of our information - the make of our car, our names, telephone numbers, local address, etc. The dispatcher, Bill, was very nice and offered to call an ambulance for Kirk. I explained that we didn't need an ambulance - we had already been to the hospital once today. I just needed to get him back to the hotel so he could take the rest of his medication. The dispatcher released us to go.

I didn't even speak to the kids - there seemed no point. I hung up, got Kirk settled in the passenger seat and then drove us home. We passed a police car on our way home - it could have been the one called to respond to the situation. But if anything comes of it, I am sure we'll get a phone call tomorrow.

One final note, despite the localistic tendencies of these kids, we have not found this to be indicative of the locals at all. Most everyone has been very nice, friendly, even inviting. Diane was fantastic, and even though the restaurant was a bit more on the high end of the price range, I'd go back there anytime - if nothing else, because they treated us with such care.

And thus ends my first full day in Maui.

Labels: Food, Health, Reflections, Travel

Well, my flight landed and my fantastic husband was waiting for me at the airport. He had finished work on Tuesday morning and is now free for the entire week! Hooray! But he turned in his car, and waited for me to arrive so we could pick up the new one. I spotted him as I arrived near baggage claim. He was standing there with a lei of real flowers for me! Very cool! I felt special!

We quickly got our bags and headed to the rental agency. I had gotten a rather good deal. I flew on American and for the same price as the flight cost me, I also go a rental car - for free. All we had to do was show up and pick it up. Once inside, it turns out they had a 2006 Mustang Convertible for rent - we had to pay a few extra dollars for the whole week and it was ours! We're on vacation! Why not? She asked what color we wanted - black, silver or red? RED!! And red it is.

Heading back to our lodging (the Upcountry B&B in Kula, which is very nice), we, of course, rode the entire way with the top down...AND the heat on, especially as we gained altitude. Kirk had mentioned earlier that he was having some pain in his back and side, but he wasn't sure what was causing it. He took some more ibuprophen and we went to sleep.

I woke up this morning, first at 3:30 (6:30AM at home) and then finally at 6 (9AM at home). I simply couldn't sleep any longer. Kirk got up but was in a lot of pain. When he started to describe him symptoms, I was afraid he might have broken or separated a rib and we decided to make a trip to see a doctor. After a fabulous breakfast of fresh fruit (pineapple, strawberries, kiwi, mango, melon and blueberries) and fresh, homemade mango and raspberry scones, we called the insurance company to find out where we could go to a doctor locally. They gave us two numbers, one of which was in Kula!

Now, Kula is a very small town. VERY small. Some wouldn't even consider a town, really. So to discover they had their own hospital...well, I was expecting a little 3-4 room building and a long waiting line. But off we went. As we pulled up to the hospital, we were shocked to see one of the biggest buildings I've seen in the upcountry. It was about 5-6 stories high and quite old. It turns out, it was built in the 1930s, originally as a sanitorium for tuberculosis patients that needed a place to recover in a reasonable climate.

We went into the 'emergency' room, to discover no waiting room. We were in an actual treatment room. With a nurse and a doctor, and no one else to wait behind. We filled out some quick paperwork, Kirk was wheeled (in a wheelchair!) off for some x-rays and then we were back in the ER. The x-rays revealed no break or problems. So it's most likely muscular. He got lots of drugs (anaproxin, vicodin and a muscle relaxant) and we were on our way back. At this point, we won't be surfing, scuba diving, running any marathons, biking down Haleakala. But, we will be relaxing, spending time together and enjoying whatever Hawaii has to offer those in need of rest, relaxation and recuperation.

Labels: Food, Health, Transportation, Travel

Airline travel these days is nothing like it was even 5 years ago. Sure, they still have pilots, flight attendants, cushy seats in first, narrow & uncomfortable seats in coach, loud obnoxious passengers & bad movies. The food used to be bad, but free. Now it's bad AND you have to pay for it. But now, you can't take water onto the plane. No spritzer. No coke. No gatorade, fingernail file. No scissors, so if you are planning to crochet or knit or sew, forget it. At least we haven't gone as far as the flights out of the UK, where NO carry ons are allowed on the plane - not even a purse! Airport security now has long lines to go through, and virtually no one on the far side. If you even THINK of pulling out a camera and snapping a photo anywhere near security, you'll have 10 agents surrounding you, demanding the film, camera and wanting to search you and your luggage.

All this said, my day started out quite fine. My friend Dina graciously drove me to the airport - albeit a bit early, as she had an appointment, but it was fine for me. After a slight glitch at check in (I went through the automated check in process, but the silly machine couldn't find my reservation), I breezed through security. During checkin, I heard a young lady next to me who apparently, though she was checking in 45 minutes prior to her departure (on an international flight), missed the deadline and was to be waitlisted on a flight leaving 7 hours later. I passed her on the way to security, trying to find coins for a pay phone. I remembered all the times during our travels we had to sort out making phone calls and just let her use my cell instead. A nice gal from Melbourne, just trying to get home. Apparently, check in in Melbourne for international flights is only 30 minutes. Hopefully she made it home.

From my past as a frequent traveler, I have a lifetime membership in the Admiral's Club. It's a nice little perk for when I'm traveling on American Airlines, which I was. I spent the next 2+ hours hanging out in the AC, drinking as much water and juice as I could consume and snacking on whatever they had laying around - fruit, cheese & crackers, trail mix. I watched one guy who managed to fill a plastic cup with trail mix, then, trying to balance it on his laptop, while carrying the laptop and a beverage of some sort, managed to dump the entire cup of trailmix all over the floor. He started to walk away, thought better of it, and then started to sweep up the pieces with his shoe, which, of course, merely crushed the pieces into smaller pieces and burrow them into the carpet. Eventually, he knelt down and scooped them up with his hands, leaving the remaining pieces for the attendant to sweep up a bit later. I passed the time chatting with a couple of people on IRC (for those of you who don't know, come to the freenode network, channel ##essy) and trying to do some testing at the same time.

Finally, it was time to board by plane. Another perk of the Admiral's Club (and arriving 3 hours early) was that I was able to change my seat to my favorite - the bulkhead aisle seat, right behind 1st class. Of course, 1st class would be nice, but I don't travel enough anymore to earn the upgrades. I got to the gate, expecting a giant crowd, only to find that they had already boarded most everyone. I breezed onto the plane, stowed my backpack and settled in.

There was a teenage girl in the seat next to me, traveling alone. By the way, not only did I score the bulkhead aisle seat, but it was exit row too! She offered me a stick of gum, which I gladly accepted, after having had an ear ache for the last week. Then she proceeded to talk. A lot.

Do you remember those people when you were younger? They were very nice, but seemingly not very self-confident. They often talked about themselves, and dropped comments or hints of things that were supposed to impress you? I think this is something that happens most with teenagers, and this young lady was no exception. She was very sweet though. Eventually, I managed to get engrossed in my book for a while and she turned her attention to the inflight entertainment.

The flight attendants seemed a bit harried. Apparently, even though it was a full flight, they were running with a minimum crew. There was a bit of confusion and one of the flight attendants was having to man the drink cart, which weights about 150 pounds all loaded, by herself. That doesn't sound so bad, except when you consider that the plane was still gaining altitude, so it was a bit heavier. Then they came around with the "meal" ($5 for a turkey sandwich) and "snack box" ($4 for a box containing small amounts of goldfish crackers, mixed nuts, raisins, a sausage stick, cheese and crackers and a cookie). I spent $4.

Now, here's where I get to rant a little. There were three flight attendants handling all of coach, which was full. One of them, I barely saw - I think she was working the back section most of the time. One, Kate, was mostly helping us and was extremely nice. The third was... a bit rough around the edges. She basically was quite impatient and rather curt. That's fine - everyone has bad days. But...

On the second drink pass, Ms. Curt and Kate were sorting something out on one of the carts. Kate had gone back to get something and suddenly, I felt my arm get extremely wet. I looked down and saw my sleeve was soaked and orange juice was dripping down my arm. I looked up and saw Ms. Curt. She didn't even notice. I said, "Excuse me?" and she noticed I was a bit wet and handed me a teeny napkin (the drink-sized square kind) and said, "Oh, don't worry, it's only water." and she walked off. ARGH!! I was also penned in by the cart, so I couldn't get up to go to the bathroom and try to wash my arm off. A few minutes later, Kate came back and graciously handed me a can of club soda and two thick towelsized napkin thingies to try and get the orange juice out of my sleeve (so it wouldn't stain). Now, with a thoroughly wet sleeve, that air they always have going on the plane started to feel a bit chilly. I wrapped up tighter in the blanket.

After a trip to the toilet, I came back and wrapped up in the blanket again, only to discover that I had turned it around and the part I had wrapped around my arms previously had been on the floor and was also soaked in orange juice. Sigh. I flipped it around again. About 2 hours later, I'm starting to dry out sufficiently (it's a 5 hour flight) and I made another trip to the toilet (remember, I spent 2 hours in the Admiral's Club downing all I could drink). When in there, I noticed that a 5 inch section of the back of my shirt, near the hem, had managed to take on a douse of OJ and I was just noticing it. It was mostly dry, but had orange juice stains all over it... So, I got ANOTHER can of club soda and ANOTHER one of those cool towelettes (from Kate of course) and I did my best to get the stain out. Another hour or two to go of being wet and uncomfortable.

Do you remember when you were a child, and you used to chew gum? I do. Vividly. My father used to get terrificly angry if I chewed it with my mouth open. Or if I made snapping or popping sounds with my gum. I always thought he was over-reacting and being silly, but he was my dad. And I prefered not to be spanked - especially in my teenage years. So, I learned the fine art of stealth gum chewing. Well. Dad. I now "get" it. In the last hour or so of the flight, I chose to listen to my ipod and relax a bit. Despite the fact that I was wearing headphones and the music was sufficiently loud, I could hear, as if I had nothing in my ears, the gal next to me making the most obnoxious sounds with her gum. I sat there dreaming of ways to politely (or

Labels: Food, Health, IRC, Travel

Tonight, we had dinner at a fabulous little Ethiopian restaurant (named, appropriately, "Ethiopia Restauraunt") with our long, lost friend, Michael aka hoon. We had a great time catching up with him (as we haven't seen him in a year or so). Thanks for the great dinner & company, hoon!

The food was fantastic and served with rolled flat bread, called injera. It is the only "utensil" provided. It's a bit odd looking, sort of spongy, but is quite delicious! We had a vegetable combo and meat combo. It was served family style on a large platter (see photo above). The Butecha (fava beans) was wonderful! I highly recommend this restaurant.

Labels: Food, Friends, Travel

What a treat to have your food cravings explained! Next time I think I want chocolate, I know what I should REALLY eat. I just added the "Stumble Upon" extension to my Firefox and it takes me to all sorts of fun, random sites. This was actually one of them.

Labels: Food, Websites

We just had a wonderful afternoon I Orange County visiting Kirk's parents. After spending some time with his dad in his elder care facility, we had a nice dinner with his mom at El Torito Grill. Then, I got to hear some great stories from when Kirk was a child.

Oh, and by the way, I am making this post from my new Treo 650!

Labels: Family, Food, Technology

We drove up to Berkeley today. Kirk has some work up here this week. We had a wonderful dinner at a little restaurant we hadn't tried before, the Albany Bistro. I give it 2 thumbs up! I had a wonderful special fish plate they had for Valentine's Day and Kirk had ostrich! They were both excellent!

Labels: Food, Holidays, Travel

Some of you know (or would know if you've read any of our blogs before) that Kirk and I play on online game called bzflag. We've met a number of people that we play against in person over the last few months. Well, it turns out there's a fairly large contingent of bzflaggers in Arizona. On our way to Tucson, we had agreed to meet a whole family of them outside of Phoenix. So, we stopped for lunch and met up with High Karate Kitty, Dodge_This, Chinchilla and Puppy Power. The whole family plays (although not all at once - that would require a LOT of computer power AND a really fast connection. They were very very nice! It's always so fun to put faces to names. After lunch and a lot of chatting, we headed out. We got all the way down to Tempe (where we stopped for some more Costco gas) when we realized Kirk's ATM card was missing out of his wallet. After much searching, we called the restaurant and they had it. We drove all the way back.

Needless to say, we arrived in Tucson a bit later than we originally planned. But it was no problem. We went straight to my grandfather's house. We hadn't seen my grandfather since before we left for our RTW. An awful lot has happened since then! We hung out and chatted and caught up and then...oh yeah, we went to dinner at Los Margaritas, a great little Mexican restaurant. It was really good to have some time to hang out with him.

On Thursday, we hung with him around the house for part of the day. He took us out to Mission San Javier del Bac (also known as the "White Dove of the Desert"). I had been there once before with a friend of mine from Dallas; at that time, the interior was closed, as it was being renovated. This time, the interior was open, but portions of the exterior were being renovated. The interior was quite pretty. It was interesting to see a Spanish mission with such influence from Mexican and Native American culture.

On the way back home, we drove by the airplane graveyard. My uncle had taken me there once before, and I figured with the interest Kirk has in airplanes, he might find it interesting. Hundreds (thousands?) of airplanes dating back to WWII to present have been retired in Tucson, and are resting there in a variety of forms of disrepair. For dinner, we went to Chad's, which is a favorite of my grandparents. After Chad's, I talked my grandfather into driving through Winterhaven. Winterhaven is an entire neighborhood where they put up crowd-stopping Christmas lights! It was technically a little "early" in the season to be driving through there (which was probably better - often it's so crowded, they block the streets off to all but foot traffic), but there were plenty of displays up!

On Friday, Kirk and I went over to see Trev & Kristi, his cousins. We got to meet their new addition, little Hannahmarie. She was really sweet! It's so fun to meet a happy baby! After a yummy lunch that Kristi made for us, and a good deal of catching up, we decided to go out for a drive. We all piled into our jeep and we headed over the mountain near their house. Hannahmarie fell right to sleep as we started driving. When we hit the off-road stuff (not REALLY offroad - just a dirt/gravel road, really), she woke up. We stopped on the way back over the mountain at an overlook. It was beautiful, but very windy and cold!

After a quick stop, we all headed down to meet my grandfather at yet another Mexican restaurant. At this one, they made your salsa fresh at your table - made to order! The food was delicious! I was quite glad my grandfather came out to meet us! I felt bad not hanging out with him the whole time we were there. After dinner, we drove Trev & Kristi back to their house. Shortly after we arrived, some Christmas carolers came by! They sounded great and were collecting canned goods for disadvantaged families.

When we got back to my grandfather's, we had a comical series of telephone calls. I wanted for us to stay at my cousin, Marty's, on Saturday night if possible. My great-aunt (my grandfather's sister) was flying down on Sunday and Marty was going to have to drive up to Phoenix, pick her up and then drive her down to Tucson to my grandfather's. I really wanted my grandfather to come to Marty's with us and stay the night. But he didn't seem to want to. I must have talked to Marty and my grandfather 3 times each. Finally, Marty called my grandfather, and voila! He was going to drive up to Arizona City in the afternoon and spend the night with us.

The next morning, Saturday, we had brunch plans up in Phoenix. We packed everything up and headed up there. It's not a bad drive. We met some more bz-friends up in Phoenix at "The Good Egg". This time, we met up with Justin (who is not a bz player), Scipio, Nidhoggr & Theropod. Nidhoggr owns the server that we play the most often on (and assist by admining on). Brunch was delicious. The conversation was wildly diverse and entertaining! In addition to the great conversation and brunch, Nidhoggr gave me a wonderful homemade (by him) collection of soaps and hand creams.

After a great brunch (and another trip to get Costco gas), we headed back south to Arizona City. I had only been to my cousin's house once, but it wasn't hard to find. Marty & Robin have an amazing house. As a California convert, I have no hope of ever having anything so roomy or nice. But it was great to visit with them too. They have several children (the youngest is now in High School) and the place is always bustling with activity. Marty & Robin were actually going out that night to Robin's company Christmas party, but, once my grandfather arrived, they served us a wonderful late lunch (thank goodness) of lasagna and the fixin's. We chatted for a long while until they had to start getting ready to go out.

After they left, we sat around and played games with their kids - like Word Thief and Upwords and speed Scrabble. We had a great time until it was sufficiently late that we really HAD to go to sleep. We were leaving first thing in the morning!

To be continued...

Labels: Bzflag, Family, Food, Friends, Holidays, Travel

Monday morning, we tagged our luggage and had our breakfast. We didn't even have to carry the luggage downstairs. Once we notified them we were "checking out", they knew to gather our luggage and put it aboard the train. It was pretty frigid since we were at altitude (1382 feet) and Kirk was glad I made him bring some cold-weather gear.

We took some time to walk around the gift shop a little to scout out what we might spend our gift certificates on. I saw a really nice fleece jacket we could get if we pooled our resources. We grabbed a Starbucks coffee (yes there is a little Starbucks right there in the depot) and headed over to watch the shoot-out. I met a couple from Thailand along the way and chatted with them. It sometimes amazes me how much I miss the variety of accents and cultures from our RTW. The show was pretty corny, but cute.


We boarded our train and headed out. The conductor (who also turned out to be our server - he served us sodas and such during the trip) was quite funny. About 30 minutes after we departed, a cowboy with a fiddle came to our car and entertained us for the rest of the trip. He was quite a good fiddler and interacted well with the audience.

Once we arrived at the Grand Canyon, we were picked up by a bus and driven over to the Maswik Lodge, where we had lunch in their cafeteria. Most of the folks on the trip were only in the Grand Canyon for a day - they were taking the afternoon train back. I had booked us to spend the night. Of course, when I booked the trip, I didn't expect I would have broken my ankle a couple of months before - I expected we'd do some hiking.

It was really cold outside and it was nice to get indoors and have some hot food and drink. Afterwards, we piled back onto our bus and they drove us to some of the major viewing points on the Canyon. It was pretty cool to hear some of the history in addition to getting all the wonderful views.

After our tour, we checked into our hotel and found our bags had been delivered straight to our room! We relaxed for a bit and then headed over to the El Tovar Hotel for dinner. The El Tovar is an historic landmark and quite beautiful, capturing the spirit of the by-gone days of the European-style hunting lodge. Made of stone, it's perched on the edge of the canyon and has spectacular views from the South Rim. It was built in 1905 by the Santa Fe Railroad and has been called, "the architectural crown jewel of the Grand Canyon." It is also also renowned for its world-class dining room, The El Tovar Dining Room (where we ate). "A memorable dining experience in the Arizona wilderness while enjoying breathtaking views of the Canyon." They have an extensive and expensive menu. The food was quite good, indeed, however, a bit over-priced, we thought. We did splurge and have dessert - it was pretty cute!

We made it an early night; Kirk wanted to be up quite early on Tuesday to catch sunrise over the canyon. I tried to wake up when he did, but was a bit late. I was out the door only about 5 minutes after him, but JUST missed the shuttle. Since we didn't have our car with us, we had to rely on the shuttle to get around. I caught the next one, and arrived at the canyon as fast as I could. At the point where I had to change shuttles, I had to walk (hobble/run?) a pretty good distance to catch the next bus; I was afraid I'd miss it, but I just got there in time.

Kirk had been taking photos for a while when I arrived, although the sun still had not cleared the edge of the rim. When it did clear, the view was spectacular! The canyon is beautiful at all times, but it has different hues at different times of the day (sort of like Uluru, which we visited in December of 2002 on our RTW).

After Kirk's fingers were too frozen to take any more photos, we grabbed the shuttle back and ate breakfast at the Maswik Lodge and checked out of our room (again, we didn't have to worry about our bags). Then we caught another shuttle to the visitor's center. We toured around that a bit, and then headed to the trail that runs along the canyon rim. We walked a good bit of that trail, stopping at a variety of places to take photos. (Do you remember I broke my ankle less than 2 months ago?). Eventually, I was limping so badly I couldn't really walk anymore. We managed to get me to a shuttle stop and we got back on. We went over to Bright Angel Lodge and had some lunch and relaxed a bit. Then we stole one more quick look at the canyon before boarding the train back to Williams.

On the way back to Williams, the train was "robbed". I was actually on my cell phone (my mom had called from Kansas) and said, "Oh, I've got to go...we're being robbed!" Luckily, she didn't think I was serious!

Back in Williams, we spend another night at the Grand Canyon Railroad Hotel. We also had another dinner at Max & Thelma's. The food was MUCH better this time! It turns out, they dumb down the food during the Polar Express because of all the children who are there.

On Wednesday, we had breakfast, bought the great fleece jacket we had spotted earlier (using our gift certificates) and headed back toward civilization.

To be continued...

Labels: Events, Family, Food, Transportation, Travel

December can be a truly exciting month, with all the Christmas decorations, parties, etc., or a truly stressful one. It's all in your attitude. But when your BIRTHDAY is in December on top of everything else, well, that's just fun!

No, my birthday is not in December, but my husband's is -- 6 days before Christmas. And this year, he had a MSD change (as he likes to put it). You know! MSD...most significant digit? Like changing from 20 to 30 or 30 to 40 or 40 to 50! So, last summer, I started plotting. I wanted to surprise him with something that would help him remember this MSD.

The plans started coming together and I had to figure a way to pay for everything without him figuring things out. With joint bank accounts and a husband who (thankfully) tracks every penny, that wouldn't be easy. So, I told him I wanted to surprise him with something - I wouldn't say where or when and was letting him know that I needed to spend the money. Whew. That worked. But THEN, I found out that if I put the charge on the credit card, the exact thing I had planned would show up on the statement - that's no good! So a friend from work let me put it on his credit card and I turned around and wrote HIM a check. Yay!

Next, I wanted to throw Kirk a surprise party. First, I had to locate a host. Well, generally, the only time we aren't together is when we are at work. That makes it hard to work up an invitation and start mailing them out. There is also the challenge of getting the names and addresses of friends of his - I wanted to invite his family, church friends, work friends AND friends he grew up with. Fortunately, I bumped into Rod (one of the guys he grew up with) a

Labels: Daily Life, Events, Family, Food, Holidays, Offroading, Travel

Hooray! It's December! One of my favorite times of year! A month or so ago, I asked Kirk to hold Sunday (December 5th) open for a "date". We haven't been doing much in the way of dating lately, so it seemed like a good idea.

Unbeknownst to him, a group of girls (we are married and all our husbands hang out together too) had decided to take our husbands to the Mission Inn to see their Festival of Lights. The Inn is pretty cool - it was initially built in 1876 (and no, it was NEVER a mission - only a boarding house). I'd never been there, so I was excited.

The day we picked turned out to be quite rainy! I was hoping the rain would quit by the time we went out there. It's about an hour drive from here. I herded Kirk out to the car, dressed in warm clothing. Then we drove across the street and picked up some friends (they were hiding in the Von's parking lot). Neither of our husbands knew where we were going. The other two couples drove out in a separate car. James & Gia (who rode with us) are hilarious! And it was really fun listening to James & Kirk spout off a steady stream of guesses as to where we were going!

When we arrived, it wasn't quite dark yet. When I said surprise, Kirk said "This is IT?!" Ha! we walked around the entire place and decided to stop into a coffee shop and have something to warm up (and wait for the other 2 couples to show). Kirk was definitely happier when the lights went on and Mike & Anita and Garret & Ambre showed up. The Inn was beautiful! There were lights everywhere on the city-block sized inn - even on the palm trees surrounding the it! Kirk loves photography and took pictures practically every where we went (if you're surprised, don't be - check out our RTW page and you'll see!) We could hear carollers, but they seemed to be somewhere else at the time. We stopped in a little gift shop that led through to the inner courtyard. Once in the courtyard, we actually got to see a boy propose to his girlfriend while we were in there! It was soooo sweet!

Eventually, we headed inside the hotel. Much of it was not open to the general public (apparently, it's quite a tourist attraction during the holidays. While inside, we finally caught up with the carollers. They sounded fabulous! It made me miss the days when such thing was rather common in neighborhoods.

Finally, we headed back outside. We had all decided to grab dinner together somewhere. We had not made reservations at the inn and it looked to be rather pricey anyway. We decided to head over to the Old Spaghetti Factory, which was just down the street. After a quick photo op at the Inn entrance, we headed over for dinner!

Dinner was wonderful and we even closed the place down! All in all, it was a great date (can I say that even though I got to plan it?).

Labels: Food, Friends, Holidays, Local Outings

Kirk and I had a great date last night! First, someone had given us free tickets to go see the Ten Commandments musical at the Kodak Theatre (the same theatre where the Academy Awards Ceremony is held). So, after arranging for some friends to come with, Kirk suggested we go out to dinner in Hollywood (near the theatre) before the show.

So, James & Gia and Kirk & I headed up to a little restaurant that our friend Steve had suggested (thanks, Steve! It was great), "Off Vine". The food was amazing! Kirk got the grilled pork chops (yummy!!) and Gia got the smoked mozarella & chicken ravioli. Both dishes were amazing! James and I each ordered linguine - I got chicken and he got seafood. They were good, too, but the flavors on the other dishes were really wonderful! The restaurant was in an old house, built in 1908. It was a wonderful setting for a date!

After dinner, we headed over to the Hollywood & Highland complex, which houses the Kodak Theatre. After parking in the handicapped section (there are definitely advantages to having a broken ankle), we wandered around for a few minutes before heading in and find our seats. It turned out that we were about 8 rows back from the stage in the orchestra level! The seats were great! As we got settled, one of the ushers came by and told us that after the show, the cast and crew were going to do a meet & greet, Q&A session if we wanted to stay! Cool!

The big draw for this show, of course, is Val Kilmer. It was a little hard to think of the guy made famous by "Real Genius" as Moses (even though he was the voice of Moses in Prince of Egypt). However, all the promotions for the show assure you that he CAN, indeed, sing.

When the show started, we discovered that he can sing, however, he had obviously strained his voice - he was quite raspy. There was another guy in the play - Adam Lambert, playing the part of the Joshua - who had a simply AMAZING voice! It was unreal, really! However, I found myself throughout the rest of the production watching and listening, hoping he'd have another solo. He didn't, but the one he HAD performed made the whole show worth watching (if it weren't already). On the whole, the performance was quite enjoyable. There was one scene in the second act (the Golden Calf) that was not appropriate for children (and possibly not for adults - it was quite lewd). Otherwise, despite the fact that Val Kilmer was the weakest vocal link, we had a great time.

After the show, we moved to seats even closer to the stage and get settled in, awaiting the cast. The theatre cleared out quite quickly. There were about 30 or 40 folks who stayed behind for the meet & greet. Val Kilmer and several other cast members (including the four young boys who were in the cast) came out to meet us and answer questions. Val was quite funny, really! He had a quip for practically every question that came up - and they were witty, seemingly spontaneous answers. One person in the audience asked what they did to keep their voices in condition. Val answered, "Not enough, apparently."

Labels: Food, Friends, Local Outings, Theatre

Kirk and I decided to take a little break and head to Death Valley for a few days, to meet up with our 4-wheel club. Friday, we spent the day packing and I prepped our food for the trip. Friday night, we went to my friend's (Rena) wedding. We left before the reception started, as we had a 4+ hour drive ahead, of us to Olanche.

We spent the night at a teeny little motel with a bed that should be used in a comedy act. When we arrived (around 11 PM or so), the manager was out working on the hot water heater - apparently it had stopped working. Saturday morning, we awoke fairly early (although later than many others, as we could hear them outside packing up already) and managed to get a hot shower. Then we all headed over to the Ranch House Cafe for breakfast, where we were meeting the rest of our group.

All total, we had 18 Jeeps on the trip (5 Wrangler/Rubicons, 2 XJs, 1 Comanche and 10 KJs). The drive out to Saline Valley, where we would spend our first night, was fabulous! We had excellent views of several valleys, hit several water holes and even had an amazing drive down Lippencott Mine Road (very steep and winding). Then we had a long drive across dusty washboard.

We camped at the springs - an oasis of sorts in one part of the valley. There was a hot springs, a warm springs and one additional springs in the area. We all pooled resources for a pot luck on Saturday night (I brought my new favorite soup, Southwest Chicken Soup).


On Sunday, we broke into a couple of different groups. We took 6 Jeeps (2 KJs, 2 XJs and 2 Rubicons) on a loop. We went up to see the Marble Bath (whoever decided to put a bathtub filled with blue marbles in the middle of the desert certainly created a popular stop along the way!), checked out a geo cache, saw the 700 foot tall sand dunes. Igor got a flat along the way coming back. Chuck's diffs kept locking, although we are on pavement and going, 45+ mph (when they had no business locking!). We ended up pulling the fuse to try and fix the problem. On the last few miles, we got behind a camper pulling a trailer and a Land Rover that wouldn't pull over and wouldn't let us pass. Finally, our trail guide went off road and around them, then slowed down and stopped so they would have to let us pass. They were going around 10-15 mph while we had been going about 25-30 before we had come upon them.

Sunday night, Mario (of Adventure Trailers) held a barbeque for everyone (he is the one who had arranged the trip). Afterwards, Shawna, Angela and I walked down to the hot springs. I had avoided it up to that point because it had been over run by people from a nudist colony. However, JJ had just returned from the pool nearby and said it was deserted except for folks from our club. We went down and hung out for a bit. It was quite dark, so you could barely see much of anything anyway. I decided to head back to camp after a while. The others were still soaking, so I dressed and headed back on my own.

As I walked up the hill to our camp site, I was thrilled with the beauty around me. And it was virtually deserted. I took a step with my left foot and suddenly it slid out from underneath me -- fast! I rolled my ankle hard, heard a loud "crackk!" and fell to the ground. I had done something really bad to my ankle. I thought of the time I had done something similar (and heard a similar awful sound) a few years ago (I rolled my right ankle and detached the ligament, pulling a small chip of the bone out in the process). Ugh! I tried calling for help and no one could hear me.

I tried putting some weight on my foot. No, that wouldn't work either. I hopped/crawled up the hill a bit further and called for help. No answer. I crawled closer. Still no answer. Eventually, I heard Clint call back "Are you okay?" "NO!" "Where are you?" "In the middle of the road." Less than a minute later, 3 guys came running up the road. Shortly behind them, John drove up in his jeep. they helped me into the Jeep and then John drove me back to camp. As he drove by the campfire, he leaned out the window and said "Don't you know an ambulance when you see one?"

Kirk helped me into the tent and we used our little remaining ice to try and bring down the swelling. I slept with it elevated (on top of my duffel bag).

The drive home Monday was a blur. We all drove out together (as far as the Saline Valley Road turnoff). In the process, we had another flat tire (Igor again), a leaking radiator and another transmission overheat. Once on blacktop, Kirk and I rushed back as quickly as possible. I was trying to make it to my "Authentic Woman" bible study at church. It's only seven weeks long and I really didn't want to miss another class (I missed the one while we were in Berkeley recently). I did make it in time for class.

On Tuesday, I was at work (using my crutches) and my ankle was starting to hurt (even though I was staying off it as much as possible). With Kirk and Linda's encouragement, I went to have my ankle x-rayed. It was just a precaution, really. I was quite sure it was only sprained. Maybe a ligament detached again, but surely that was all.

NOT. It's broken. It's not a bad break, but I'm out of action for 6-8 weeks. Oh well. I'm just terribly thankful that it happened at the END of the trip AND that I had such great people around to help me!

Hopefully our next trip to Death Valley will be a vacation, but not a "break"! Check out our photos!

Labels: Food, Friends, Health, Offroading

What a great week this has been! Last night, Kirk and I got to meet a bunch of the developers/players from bzflag. Several were in town for SIGGRAPH, and the others flocked to the tiny town of Redondo Beach for a gathering of nine. JBdiGriz drove up from San Diego, DTRemenak and Bozo drove down from Sacramento, Patlabor221 came in from Ventura, cappy and scanline were here from Boulder (Colorado) and learner/brlcad was in from Maryland. We started with a little sushi at Ichiriki and then headed to a nearby hovel for some coffee and tea. It was really great to meet everyone and put faces to names. Admittedly, much of what was discussed was a bit over my non-technical head, but it was fun nonetheless. See who you can identify from the photo of our gathering!

Labels: Bzflag, Food, Friends

Well, for the third night in a row, we had the opportunity to meet someone out for dinner. Last night, it was our friend Michael (a/k/a hoon). Michael is one of our fellow admins on bzflag's secretplace server. We went to another great little restaurant in Elmwood, La Mediterranee. The food was fantastic!

Of course, the company was great as well! Michael had just bought a new house (closed on it today)! It was fun to finally put a face to the name.

As it turns out, a bunch of bzflaggers are going to be meeting up on Sunday for some sushi and Michael might be able to meet up with us (he'll be in SoCal over the weekend).

Labels: Bzflag, Food, Friends, Travel

Kirk has been coming up here for 17 years, but the last two nights, we have had a dinner in an area he's never frequented - Rockridge. Last night, we went to dinner with some college friends of mine at a little italian place called Oliveto. The food was quite fresh and good. It was really great to see our friends - we had last seen them when we went to dinner at Spenger's last February (the last time Kirk and I were up here together). They have been here for the last 8 months while Toby completes her fellowship. Now, they have fabulous news! They are moving back to Oregon in a couple of months to have their first child! It has been a real blessing for us to be able to hang with them up here - it's nice to have them so close (even just temporarily). When they move back, we'll have yet another excuse to head back up to Oregon!

Labels: Food, Friends, Travel

Well, we are back in Berkeley. It's the first time in about a month for Kirk, but first time since February for me! Last night, we had the great pleasure of having dinner with Chris. We had never met him before, but had heard much of him. Years ago (11 years to be exact), he invented a little game called BZFlag that we love to play (it's available for free). He had originally invented it as a demo to show off 3-D graphics, but it was so fun to play it became much more. In fact, although Chris no longer works on the development of BZFlag, there is an entire team of folks that do! We had dinner at the Soi4 Bangkok Eatery in Rockridge (some of the best Thai food we've had since we were in Thailand). I love meeting people and we had a nice time chatting with Chris, who now works for an animation studio.

Now we are back on the 4AM to noon working shift. Ugh. But it's amazing how much you can get done that early in the morning if you try!

Labels: Bzflag, Food, Friends, Travel

Sunday, after breakfast, Kirk and I headed to church. We went to a Vineyard Christian Church that was in walking distance from our hotel. It was a nice service. Then, Kirk and I headed over to the Taste of Chicago, an annual 10-day or so long event, in order to meet up with a few folks who had attended the wedding. Again, we hopped public transport into the city (but this time we took CTA, i.e., the "L", which is what we wanted). Kirk and I got there a good hour or more before everyone else, so we had time to scout the booths. There was a lot of restaurants represented, but a disproportional amount of fatty/greasy/fried food being served. We did eventually manage to find Hilary, Nick, Roman and several others. We stayed there for a few hours and then jumped back on the L to Evanston where we were meeting some family for dinner. We had a nice dinner with my aunt and uncles and Solomon.

Monday, Kirk and I took our time getting up. Then, we checked out of the hotel and headed in town (with luggage). We stored our bags at Union Station and then headed over to the Shedd Aquarium. Shedd Aquarium is one of the largest in the world. They have an entire section called the "Oceanarium" which specific focuses on such creatures as the Beluga Whale, White-sided Dolphins, Sea Otters and Penguins. It was possibly my favorite section. We didn't have a long time to look around and see everything, but we did quite a bit. There were some pretty neat frogs and the Caribbean Reef section was pretty cool.

We were blessed when we left. We stayed a tad bit longer than we should have, but then we managed to catch a trolley directly to Union Station without waiting more than about 2 minutes. Once we had retrieved our luggage, we realized the blue line (which we needed to take to O'Hare) had a stop only two block south of Union Station (instead of about 10 blocks east). Our trip home was uneventful.

Labels: Family, Food, Travel

Today, I started my second week of work. It was very busy, but enjoyable. Tonight, I had a great dinner at my friend Gia's future home! Essentially, she kicked her fiance out of the apartment for the night so we could come over and see it. Generally, there are five of us, but we had an intimate group of three for the evening. We had a wonderful time just chatting and catching up. Meanwhile, our husbands and fiance helped to move one of the girls in our home church group.

Gia made an excellent pasta dish, Anita made sinful brownies, and I made my favorite salmon dish, Salmon Bake with Pecan Crunch Coating. The food was awesome, as was the company. I even taught the girls how to play a game of speed scrabble.

Labels: Food, Friends

Many of my friends know of my obsession with sushi. I just plain love the stuff. I'd have it for breakfast, lunch and dinner if I could! In fact, one of my favorite past times is taunting my friend Sean with the fact that I'm having sushi that day (of course, it's absolutely devastating when he taunts me and I'm NOT having any).

But, noooooo, I'm not going to tell you I had sushi today. In fact, I was all set to have a bit of left over mexican food for lunch, when my hubby called me to invite me to join him and his work friends for lunch at the Big Wok.

The Big Wok is just that - a restaurant where all the food is cooked on what is essentially a giant wok. Technically, the food is "Mongolian Barbeque"; you go through what looks kind of like a salad bar, except that it proffers a bunch of raw meat and vegetables, with an interesting mix of "dressings". The dressings are, in fact, various cooking oils and sauces, which when mixed in with the rest of your selections, serve to give your plate a completely individual flavor.

We love the Big Wok. The food is really good (how could it not be - you've essentially designed the dish yourself) and reasonably priced. Some of our guy friends like that you can go back for seconds, thirds, fourths... I never have that much room. But it is rare to walk out of there without feeling completely stuffed! It's not sushi, but it's spicy (at least the way I make it) and that's the next best thing!

Work was fun today (will I say that every day? perhaps so!). Afterwards, Kirk and I grilled out again (of course! It IS summer after all) and made some lamb. It was great, and reminiscent of our time in Australia and New Zealand. After watching another movie, I sat down and read three chapters of a soon-to-be released book of one of my friends, Kerri. Kerri is a comedienne in Los Angeles and is hilarious. She also has the unique trait of being a CLEAN comedienne. No, I don't mean she washes on a regular basis (which she DOES, but that goes without saying) - rather that she does "clean comedy", a rarity it seems. If you ever have a chance to see her perform, she's great!

Labels: Food, Friends