July 25, 2005
Muir Woods
We spent the day hiking in Muir Woods in Marin County yesterday, just north of the Golden Gate Bridge. We hiked amongst the thousand year old redwood trees and under the beltering hot sun in the open plains.
We hiked a trail that was descibed as "Moderate to Hard Difficulty", but I thought it was OK. We hiked for more than 6 miles, almost 7, maybe even 8, because I missed a turnoff in the trail. Ok, I admit it was my fault... =P
We survived, though. Enough to get back to the little town of Mill Valley where we had an early evening dinner along the water front at Piatti's.
July 24, 2005
Warren's Birthday
It's Warren's Birthday, by-the-way!
The guy is never in town when he needs to be, but I'll understand if the wife needs him at home!
Happy Birthday, Buddy!
July 23, 2005
SF Giants vs. Florida Marlins
Field level, 17th row, Seats 11 and 12. It was great! Sabrina got us tickets to the Giants and Marlins game at SBC park. Though the game fell into a downhill slide, we kept our hopes up cheering on our beloved SF Giants all the way to the bitter end. We filled up on hot dogs and soda, and an order of garlic fries. It eventually turned into just plain garlic, but eh, who cares.
I love going to the ballpark. I think it's hilarious watching people in the stands yell at the ball players. People get all riled up, and even the most tamest-looking of people turn into something more expressive. It's the chance to let your inner-self release, and make new friends at the ball park.
The Giants lost 16-4..... =(
July 20, 2005
Diana's Birthday
Yes, yes, I know, Diana's Birthday was last week, but she's such a difficult person to nail down these days, she's been celebrating her birthday for the past two weeks. We treated her out to dinner at Paragon Restuarant in San Jose. I really like this retuarant. It's located in historic Hotel Montgomery in Downtown San Jose. The story goes, the hotel was scheduled to be demolished in a city redevelopment plan, but at the last minute, it was saved and moved to a new location. It was literally picked up, replanted on a new plot of land. I remember, years ago in the news, how movers put the hotel on jacks, placed wheels under it, and carted it down the street to it's current location now!
Anyways, the restuarant and hotel have been immaculately modernly redesigned, now, and dinner was absolutely great. I'll refrain from mentioning Diana's age, though she likes to be reminded she's now 21, of course. Happy Birthday, Diana!
July 18, 2005
End of a trip
Well, the close of the weekend falls on a Monday this time around. I had spent the afternoon having a nice relaxing lunch with a few friends, Lucy and ANSEN at Yankee Doodle's, an outdoor sports bar on Santa Monica's Third Street Promenade. Lucy Just just moved back to California, having spent the last four years in Maryland in Pharmacy school. In all ethics, she did not pass me any drugs.
But I was having so much fun, I missed my flight home! By 2 minutes! Even the lady at the check-in counter suggested that I could try to make a run for it, seeing as how the plane had not left, yet. But it was not meant to be. It was a security-heightened day at the airport, she and I realized, so she promptly put me on the next flight back to San Jose.
I'm on a tight schedule, as I'm meeting up with some friends tonight, to watch Wedding Crashers back in San Jose.
July 17, 2005
Minh and Glenn's Wedding
Minh and I used to work together in at the UCLA Community Service Organization as directors in one of the projects. There were five of us, and though we're all sprinkled all through out the United States now, it's really an occaision when one of us achieves a milestone in our lives.
It was a very quaint wedding in Sherman Oaks, where I found old friends, like Serena, who lives in San Francisco, now, and whom I just saw just a little while ago. We chatted throughout the entire wedding. Heather, whom I have not seen since UCLA, was also there! They were all roomates with Minh, so it was just nice to catch up with everyone.
We all went back to Heather's house in Monterey Park, afterwards, where we hung out until the the dinner reception at 6 o'clock. Heather's husband, Jimmy, also joined us, and we arrived at the reception, right on time, at about 7:30. =)
The reception itself was not without incident, in a good way, I think. This was one of the first weddings I've been to, where everyone was drunk. Between the four of us at our table, we finished off 3 1/2 bottles of a dessert wine, which is not bad in comparison to the table next to us, where they finished off two bottles of cognac. The bestman, the groom's brother, who was also obviously inebriated, did a little dirty dance with his girlfriend, to which mom even suggested they "go get a room". She was not happy. haha.
I even got to dance with one of the bridesmaids, who was also pretty inebriated. There seems to be an ongoing theme here.
Fun was had by all!
July 16, 2005
Yet, another LA Trip
Well, I'm in LA again this weekend for my friend Minh's Wedding. I planned a little get together for a few friends on the side , so we're going to play a little Poker tonight!
I flew into LA about late in the afternoon, and was kind of hungry. I didn't have lunch, or even breakfast this morning, so Ansen treated me... to a pop tart! It was much appreciated. I later went out to get pizza and chicken wings for the get together, and that made it all better!
Poker didn't start until almost 9. Ansen invited a few of his friends as well, who in turn took all our money. That'll be the last time I let him invite anyone. j/k. I only lasted about half an hour and I was broke after that. I took it all in stride, easy ome, easy go... all the way. It was just as well, as a few other friends decided to just drop by and visit. It was nice to just catch up with them, the type of weekend I had originally planned.
July 13, 2005
Yay!
This'll be a little smug, but I finally got my car back! It's been in the body shop for almost two months, but I finally got a call this morning telling me may car was finally ready! I snuck out of the office when no one was looking and finally got to pick up my car. It's been a little disconcerting lately, because I have been the equivalent of without a good car, save for borrowing my mom's car.
Who really wants to be known for driving their mom's car, but what can you say when it happens to be a very comfortable RED car. I can't really say that that was bad trade, but for everyday commuting, I had relegated myself to a woefully underpowered Honda Civic. To the people with 4 cylinder cars, I feel your pain...
I don't have pictures yet, but the car looks great. It also seems to drive ok, but I've only taken it on I-880 back to the office and the road isn't that great to use to tell if the car drives straight or not. I do have one problem, the Navigation system seems to be broken! The BIOS starts up, but it keeps errorring out for a hard drive error. HOW WILL I EVER BE ABLE TO GET AROUND!?!? Well, it seems I better make another claim.
July 12, 2005
Catching up from the weekend
Just catching up on some pictures from the weekend, but it seems the weekends are getting busier and busier. I went hiking at Castle Rock State Park in Saratoga on Saturday and then stopped by another barbeque on Sunday.
There has been a little too much good food going around, lately, and I'd hate to think what those consequences of living too well are! ...I have to start setting more time aside for mountain biking!
July 06, 2005
More July 4th pictures
This time around, the girls decided to re-enact an event from US History, the raising of the US flag over Iwo Jima. Then there was just a downward spiral, re-enacting high school cheerleaders, and then throwing me when I gave Cindy a strange look.
July 05, 2005
Mike's Beach Bonfire Bonanza
It was Mike's Beach Bonfire Bonanza at Rio Del Mar Beach in Aptos this past weekend. I got there a little late in the afternoon, but bringing some good tasting Korean BBQ ribs seemed to make up for it. There was so much good food there. I ate a pretty good share of it, too! I played a little volleyball and even took a short stroll over to the concrete ship over on the neighboring Seacliff State Beach to try to walk off some of the food. here's to being stuffed silly.
Most of us stayed well into the evening, when people on the beach started to launch their own fireworks! I thought fireworks were illegal on the beach.... I thought that was what all the police and sherriff's deputies were for! But, we watched people launch fireworks for almost 2 hours! It was by no means little bottle rockets and roman candles, either. People brought out full flame fireworks, explosives, and whatever else that could fly, blow up, make lots of starry colors! It was every bit as good, as big, and as colorful as the the big expensive productions large cities put on, too!
I'll have to remember to do this again next year.
July 02, 2005
Monterey Bay Aquarium
The last time we were in Monterey, my friend Sabrina and I spent a lot of time just walking up and down the streets, not realizing we also wanted to go to the Monterey Bay Aquarium. It closed on us that day, so we try, tried again today. This time it was open. We took our time and had a small lunch at the fish market, before going down to see their friends at the aquarium. We took a LOT of pictures.
July 01, 2005
My Car
I finally went down to the body shop to check up on the progress of my car. They are doing a really good job and have completed almost 80% of the body work. The last 20% will probably take the longest, as they are now waiting for the last of the parts to arrive and then make the car drivable.
For the time being, they were nice enough to give me a loaner car. My insurance does not cover a rental car, something we never thought we needed at our house, but on some days, it's just nice to have an extra car around. It's a 1996 Honda Civic, with a driver side door that doe not lock. Please do not steal it. I need to return it later.