Bloggin'......

Blast from the past

I've been going through my pictures archives, trying to reconstruct some of my past entries, and thought, how about a little year in review of 2005! well, here goes nothing:

January of this year, I got off to a pretty good start. I was trying to get out more by trying a few new restuarants, out and about in the Bay Area, a little french and a little italian. Maybe I should take this up again! However no real travel this month.

February was the start of the Chinese New Year, but it was also the month of my annual Ski Trip! This year's destination: Utah! We spent five days skiing in those hills, but alas, I of all people had to cut my trip short because work was too heavy on my mind. Projects looming and deadlines pasing, I went home early so that I could at least try to stay on target. I did finish out the month going go-kart racing. =)

March was starting to ive way to spring-time. I got back out to nature by going biking, surprising the only time I went biking the whole year, and Hiking. I also started work on a new project bike, a powder purple bike. Very girly, but very nice to ride! Another slow travel month.

April was a very special month. I tried to get off my lazy butt by starting to play in a volleyball league at the Fremont City Beach gym. It was nice and I felt I could finally get some good excercise and play in a sport I liked. it was also the month in which one of my closest friends from college got married. It was also where I met someone special. =) Travel this month was Hong Kong, Shenzhen, and Dongguan, China.

May was a real heavy travel month, and also the start of the wedding season. Though Warren's was the first at the end of April, I saw the marriage of George (friend from IBM days) and Diana, and Nghia (friend from UCLA) and Sophia in May. I also wrecked my car in May. My acura TL went into a 180 +/- 90 degrees spin into the wall, at 70mph. I was OK, but the car was not. =( Travel this month was to Minnesota (via horrible delays in Chicago), Los Angeles, London, Belfast, and a BBQ in SJ. I also got to watch the European Soccer Championships while I was in N.Ireland, and it's just an utter difference from watching sports in the states. It was especially special when the hometown team (an English team from Liverpool) went on to win in sudden death overtime, where everyone in the pub got into an arm lock all around, praying and singing the songs of the team. Imagine being hugged by a man large enough to block the sun, with tears in his eyes. Do not make fun of soccer.

June calmed down a bit, but I still managed to fly to Japan this month. It's also the month where S. and I started going out. =) Especially after a full month of just mising each other! I'd be on travel on one week, and she'd be on travel the next! This went on for a full month, but we finally in the same hemisphere htis month in June! =)

Not much went on during the month of July, except everything else that goes on in a MONTH! I finally got to check in on the progress of repairing my Acura. It was coming along, but was still only back 75% of being back to a normal car. Since my insurance did not cover the cost of a rental car =( , the body shop had set me up with a loaner car, a white 1996 Honda civic, with doors that didn't lock! I missed my car! It was really memorable, because this was also the car I drove S. around in when we started going out. =P Mike had his annual beach BBQ in Rio Del Mar in Aptos, where we also got to watch the biggest firewaorks display I've ever seen, adn it was done by just random people on the beach, on a beach where fireworks were illegal. We will definitely go back again next year! Wedding count for the month of July: Minh (friend from UCLA) and Glenn, (1, 4th of the year). Also Happy birthday to Diana, Frank, and Warren this month.

August was another busy month! It started wih Eric's bachelor party, in which we all went whitewater rafting. I'm still not sure if it was our guide who really sucked, or if he was just purposely flipping our boat so that we'd be tossed into the class III rapids. I had to be fished out of the water twice, and during the last tumble, I landed on a giant rock! Eric and I had to compare who had the bigger bruise afterwards. He beat me, and went on to get married to Ivy (wedding count: 5 for the year). =) It was also the month where S and I went wine tasting in the wonderful Napa Valley. It's a perfect get-away that's still very close to the Bay Area. I rounded out August by going camping at Emerald Bay in Lake Tahoe, in the begining the month, and another trip to Hong Kong at the end of the month.

I started September continuing my East Asia trip by continuing to Singapore and on to wonderful Hanoi, Vietnam! I have to admit, I was expecting the worst, having traveled in China, and a lot of other not so advanced Asian countries, I was expecting poor poverty, pan handlers, crime, and generally very dirty streets. But it was the direct opposite. Depsite its very rural setting, Hanoi was a very clean city, with a vibrant commuity, and friendly people. I loved it. I closed out September watching the the Icer Air Big-Air snow/ski jump competition in San Francisco. The sponsors had trucked in a whole lot of ice to cover Fillmore street in the city, and had turned it into one of the first ski slopes to be located in the middle of an urban city, on the hottest day in September! That was cool.

October was back to the basics, flying by airplane. I visited rainy/cold, which led to freezing-snowing, Denver and Longmont, Colorado. It wasn't so bad, because things were to change in the next few days. I flew into Denver on a Sunday night, worked Monday and Tuesday, flew back to Califronia Tuesday night, checked in the office Wednesday, and flew out on vacatoin to Hawaii on Thursday! How could it not get better, cold in Colorado, sunny in California, and then the tropical in Hawaii! =) Hawaii was special, and we had a wonderful time. That was where we attended S.'s friend Howard and Yukimi's wedding at the Kahala Mandarin Oriental Hotel in Waikiki (wedding count: 6). October was also my friend Frank and Carol's wedding in sunny Saratoga (wedding count: 7). =)

Novemeber was a month where I was starting to notice my camera was starting to show it's age. Exactly two years old, I had recieved it November 2003, it had been to over 10 countries and five US states and every environment possible from subfreezing snow to super humid tropics. It had also taken over a few thousand pictures (I don't post every picture I take), and created tons more of memories. I had traveled to Dublin, Ireland, Boston, Massachucetts, and Minneapolis, Minnesota, this month, and S. got to met me in Boston where we finished off the tastiest lobster I've had in recent memory. =)

I'd like to say December was a slow month, but it turned out to be the busiest of the year. With Christmas just looming around the coner, I flew out to Thailand for a a quick business trip, adn purchased two new flat panel monitors for my computer at home on the side early Christmas gift to myself, but that didn't ease my pain at all trying to shop for a Christmas gift for others after all my traveling and generally being busy around the office with year end projects! For Christmas, the family decided to have a Vegas style holiday, complete by actually being in Vegas on Christmas. We stayed four days in the city of sin, and I only came out of it 200 bucks out of luck! UCLA also came out on top, winning their Sun Bowl appearnace against Northwestern, 50-38! Yeah, Go Bruins!

Wow, what a year. There are definitely many things I'm thankful for this year, and none more meeting S. =) It's the end of 2005, but I wish everyone the best for 2006. I'm out for now, but I hope everyone has a safe and wonderful new year's, and we'll see what else will be new, next year! =)

Vegas Christmas - Day 4

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Vegas Christmas - Day 3

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Vegas Christmas - Day 2

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I'm Back!

It seems there's been more serious server troubles! The Ocliw server died recently, and a lot of my picture files were lost from that drive! =( The server's been replaced with a new service, I've been told, but the only remaining part of my blog is the text backups of my log. I get web space from Mike, and he's helped me get the blog back up, but the associated pictures may be questionable.

By my calculations, I think I've posted over 2000+ pictures over the past two years! Luckily I still have the originals, but even those will take me some time to repost to the new server...

Hopefully I'll be able to bring back the picture archives soon, I miss flipping through them from time to time!

Sierra Ski Resort

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Skiing In Heavenly

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Bangkok, Thailand

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Ayatthaya, Thailand

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On travel to Bangkok, Thailand

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Soundtrack for the day

Rise Against - Swing Life Away

Am I loud and clear or am I breaking up?
Am I still your charm or am I just bad luck?
Are we getting closer or we just getting more lost?
I'll show you mine if you show me yours first
Let's compare scars I'll tell you whose is worse
Let's unwrite these pages and replace them with our own words

Swing life away
swing life away
swing life away
swing life away

Feeling Greedy...

I'm kind of feeling a little guilty... I guess I didn't really need it... but it was there... and I made the plunge...

... so Warren messaged me the other day about a great deal Dell was offering on their 20" flat panel monitors, knowing that I had been shopping for a new monitor for a while. I'd always been joking that if the price ever fell below a certain amount, I'd buy two.

My old 21" Mitsubishi CRT has been like old faithful. I got it almost seven years ago, it was a factory refubished, with the new vertically flat screen. I never had any major problems with it in the seven years I've had it. Though the extreme left-hand corner of the screen seems to have acquired a green tint to it, and during the summer, the screen also started to have a tendency to flicker in the heat, or more accurately, *Zap*.

So, I stared at the deal for a little bit, and decided to take the plunge. I bought one Dell 20" flat panel monitor.

But it was so cheap. I went back to the Dell website and thought some more. It'd be so cool to have two!

So now, I sit here where they both arrived in the mail today! They're pretty.