Tuesday, June 21st, 2005

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Bay Area Weekend Getaway

This past weekend Penelope and I drove up to the Bay Area to visit Merrilee and Keith. We attended a traditional wedding in Old Town Orange on Friday before we hit the road. The service was beautiful and the church (St. John's Lutheran) was lovely. We had to leave early in order to make it to Oakland at a semi-reasonable hour (2am).

Penelope and I woke early and went for a strenuous jog in the Oakland hills, man those are steep! After the jog, Keith and I surveyed the area in the back of the house where a stairway is to be built. We measured once and cut twice... oh wait did we get that bassackwards? Well anyway we planted stakes where we planned to drill holes for the load bearing members of the stairway. When we were done surveying it was time to pick up Merrilee who had just ridden 62 miles in training for the Death Ride. We prettied ourselves up and headed to the Pagan Re-Wedding of our caving friends Bill and Peri Franzt and Ethan and Courtney Frantz

I have never been to a Pagan Wedding or Re-Wedding and I didn't know what to expect, but the ceremony was really quite beautiful. There were about a hundred people in attendance and after drinking a variety of home made brews we all joined hands in a circle and started singing a short chant which I now forget the words to. The circle doubled back on its self and everybody kissed everybody on the cheek. The ceremony the involved the 7 couples who were remarrying drinking some wine and eating some bread and then spinning a wheel of life which we all also had the chance to spin.

edible flowers and baby greens The next day Penelope and I went for our hilly run again, then we all went to the Montclair Farmers Market where I scored some cheese and organic baby greens that had edible flowers mixed in. The edible flowers were really tasty and a bit spicy almost like horseradish. Merrilee and Keith picked up some fresh non-farmed salmon for dinner wich they later BBQ'd after soaking in a delicious Pernod marinade.

Penelope, Merrilee and Josh headed to Berkeley to visit the Sake Factory and buy Jim a father's day present and Keith and I headed to the lumber yard (Not Home Despot!) to pick up some tubular cement forms for the staircase. With the forms in tow we proceeded to the rental company and rented an auger with a 12" bit.

Neither Keith nor I had ever used an auger before, but we weren't too worried and as it turns out, using an auger is pretty straight forward. The only problem we ran in to was spilling a little bit of gas when we improperly laid the auger down on the ground, but no harm no foul. It took us a little over an hour to drill 6 holes and we even had a chance to take a break and have some water before we returned the auger.

seagull by the golden gate bridge After we were all done and the auger was returned I suggested to Josh, who is a photographer, that we head down to San Francisco to take some photos of the Golden Gate Bridge. We drove in to the city and made way to the Persidio where we parked near Fort Point and took some Bridge photos. I also photographed some sea gulls who were mugging it up for me.

palace of fine art We headed over to the Palace of Fine Arts where the Exploratorium is located and shot that famous landmark. Finally we stopped at Treasure Island to shoot the city from afar and while I shot a few pics, Josh sketched the San Francisco skyline.

When Josh and I pulled up to the house the coals were getting hot and the drinks were flowing. We ate, drank and were merry and in the morning it was hard to get up and leave, but we had to get back to LA. Penelope and I both had a great trip, albeit too short, and we look forward to the next time we make it out to the Bay.

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Saturday, June 18th, 2005

Friday, June 17th, 2005

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Thursday, June 16th, 2005

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Tuesday, June 14th, 2005

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Monday, June 13th, 2005

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Public Restrooms (BYOP)

Public Restroom (BYOP)In Downtown LA there are not many places to relieve yourself if you are not a paying customer. If you are homeless and roaming 6th Street and suddenly hear nature calling, you can't just use the public restrooms provided by the city, as there are none. There is no reason you can't just squat down and take a crap on the sidewalk, well no reason other than human decency and/or self-respect.

Just in case you didn't realize that you could use the street as your own personal toilet, local artist Richard McDowell[via blogdowntown] has made wonderful signs that let you know you can. Don't forget to Bring Your Own Paper. According to the rumors on blogdowntown, the signs are part of a film that the artist is making. There are also drugrelated signs in case you have trouble finding a drug dealer in Downtown.

UPDATE:

I didn't mention it, but there are actually portapotties a few blocks to the southeast on 6th.

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Sunday, June 12th, 2005

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Saturday, June 11th, 2005

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Loft View

I am really loving the view from our loft. I can see almost all of my favorite buildings... all except One Wilshire... oh well. I took this photo on Thursday night after Respect with my Canon EOS 20D. I think it was about a 20 second exposure.

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Friday, June 10th, 2005

Thursday, June 9th, 2005

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Wednesday, June 8th, 2005

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Monday, June 6th, 2005

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Sunday, June 5th, 2005

Thursday, June 2nd, 2005

Wednesday, June 1st, 2005

Tuesday, May 31st, 2005

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Loving Downtown LA

Penelope and I are all unpacked and yesterday we hit IKEA and scored a dining room table, chairs, some shelves and other assorted items. I have been walking down to Grand Central Market every day to buy produce and meat and cooking dinner every night. I love cooking and I really love our new kitchen. It is very open and well designed with brand new appliances and granite counter tops.

The city is full of energy and life during the day and the streets are bustling with activity. Broadway is a great place to buy cheap clothing and electronics as there are hundreds of discount shops in the Historic Core.

Today Penelope and I walked the two blocks to the LA Flower Market and picked up some star gazers and some other purple flowers for the loft and we also bought a bouquet of assorted flowers and lei for my mom. Her birthday is today and we are meeting her in Little Tokyo for lunch in an hour.

Once things are more organized I will take some photos of the loft and our wonderful view. I also plan on taking photos of the flower mart and other places around our loft.

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Friday, May 27th, 2005

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What a day!

Yesterday my superstar, amazing, wonderful fiance and I moved. We woke up at 6AM and drove to my storage unit in Redlands where we rented a truck and emptied my storage unit. Then we went to Penelope's house and loaded up her boxes and furniture and then to my house where we did the same. The 14' U-haul was totally filled up. We then drove to our new loft and moved in. Just the two of us! What a trooper Penelope is! I really love her. Boy am I tired.

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Wednesday, May 25th, 2005

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Moving tomorrow and Tiger on a Dual G5

Tomorrow we move in to our new loft on Gallery Row in Downtown Los Angeles. I am almost all done packing, probably 2 more boxes to pack. In the morning we are picking up a rental truck near my storage unit, which contains my dishes, assorted cookware and utensils. Then on to Penelope's house to pick up her stuff, then on to my house to pick up my stuff, then on to my office to pick up some boxes of books and my speakers then to Downtown.

Today I got a new system at work... Dualy 1.8Ghz G5 with 2gb ram and 80gb + 250gb drives. Finally Tiger actually works well. On my laptop which is a 1Gz powerbook (2nd or 3rd gen I think... it is Titanium) Tiger crawls and tends to keep the processor fan running. I think there may be a problem with the Laptop apart from the burnt out screen that luckily is still covered by the Extended Apple Care Warranty. Spotlight is much more responsive as are all my applications.

I transfered over my existing setup from my laptop and everything worked flawlessly including all my apps and all my settings... what a time saver. I wish Apple would come out with a G5 powerbook so I could carry my Tiger around with me.

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Tuesday, May 24th, 2005

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Swap Meet @ Betalevel

Betalevel, the electronic cock fight ringleaders, will be host to a data swapmeet that focuses on sneaker-netting and socializing through first person peer-to-peer networking. It should be a fun time and a good source of new music for my collection. The event takes place at the Betalevel underground lair in Chinatown this Friday evening. Bring your karaoke voice.

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Sunday, May 22nd, 2005

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Saturday, May 21st, 2005

Friday, May 20th, 2005

Wednesday, May 18th, 2005

Tuesday, May 17th, 2005

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Thursday, May 12th, 2005

Wednesday, May 11th, 2005

Tuesday, May 10th, 2005

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Monday, May 9th, 2005

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Drudge reaffirms his idiocy

drudgeOnce again, to nobody's surprise, Matt Drudge has proven that he is unable to read a story that he links to from his home page. Drudgereport links to this NY Times story about a break in that happened A YEAR AGO. Way to go moron!

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Saturday, May 7th, 2005

Thursday, May 5th, 2005

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Wednesday, May 4th, 2005

Tuesday, May 3rd, 2005

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Monday, May 2nd, 2005

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Saturday, April 30th, 2005

Friday, April 29th, 2005

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Desktop nuclear fusion

A scientist at State University of New York in Binghamton has achieved table top nuclear fusion in by heating a dueterium gas soaked lithium tantalate crystal. They are only heating it to 7ºC. It only produces a very small amount of neutrons, but you have to start small.

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Thursday, April 28th, 2005

Wednesday, April 27th, 2005

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Tuesday, April 26th, 2005

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Monday, April 25th, 2005

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LayerOne 2005

This weekend I attended a security and technology conference called LayerOne. LayerOne is in its second year running and this year was even better than last year. It is really nice to have a security conference in the LA area (toorcon is pretty close being in San Diego).

I only live about half an hour from Pasadena, but I decided to book a hotel room for both Friday and Saturday. I showed up on Friday in the early afternoon because I still had to do some work on my presentation. Just for the record I want to state that Keynote is a far superior program in comparison to Power Point.

I worked on my presentation for a few hours and then decided to walk over to Afloat Sushi, which is one of my favorite restaurants in Pasadena. After eating about 10 plates of sushi I walked back to my hotel room and took a nap. A call to my cellphone from Kelvin awoke me and I rolled out of bed, realizing I still had an hour left of work to do on my Snarl presentation. Luckily Kelvin is easily amused, so I put on Fox News and finished up my work.

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Sunday, April 24th, 2005

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Saturday, April 23rd, 2005

Friday, April 22nd, 2005

Thursday, April 21st, 2005

Wednesday, April 20th, 2005

Monday, April 18th, 2005

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Thursday, April 14th, 2005

Photos

Wednesday, April 13th, 2005

Monday, April 11th, 2005

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A Busy Search and Rescue Weekend

This weekend our SAR team had a two part training scheduled. The first part was Helitac training in which we were to learn about how to deal with helicopters in the search. We got about half an hour in to it when our team leader received a call from the Volunteer Forces coordinator. There was a need for alpine trained rescuers on Mt. Baldy for a patient evac. Being that 90% of our team is trained for Alpine rescue we responded and drove to the command post at the Mt. Baldy trailhead where we readied our gear. We were about to head up the trail when we heard on the radio that LA's rescue 5 chopper had successfully evac'ed the patient.

We decided to do the second part of our training, Cauhilla Creek Cave, which is near Temecula. This was a fun talus cave that is about a mile hike from the road. We had a reporter and a cameraman with us and I think they enjoyed themselves. It will be interesting to read the article.

At the end of the day we received verification on the possibility that we would be needed for a search for a missing woman in Indio. The call entailed us showing up at the command post in indio at 0630 which required us to leave the Sheriff's Office in San Bernardino at 0500. This meant that I would have to wake up a 0345... joy! So after about 4 short hours of sleep I jumped out of bed and into my car and drove to San Bernardino.

We showed up on time at the CP in Indio and feasted on some egg mcmuffins, yum. After the briefing we were assigned an area to search and we drove out and started searching. We searched for about 4 hours when we were called back to the CP where they said they needed Alpine certified rescuers to find some lost Boy Scouts on San Jacinto. Once our gear was ready and we were about to leave we were notified that the scouts were found and were being pulled of the mountain.

We then ate lunch and continued our search for the missing woman. After a few more hours of looking for her in the hot sun and not finding her we were called back. It was a long weekend and I was tired. I fell asleep as soon as me head hit the pillow.

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cloudy
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table
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grass
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fun
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coat
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chair
chair
bracelet
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monitor
monitor
musician
musician
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floor
floor
party
party
arts
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speaker
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performing
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flare
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baby
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cup
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pub
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path
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pet
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food
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wheel
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spotlight
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jeans
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weekend
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design
design
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area
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pc
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happy
happy
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phone
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equipment
equipment
cityscape
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desk
desk
singer
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wear
wear
formal
formal
sea
sea
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guitar
smile
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