Category: Personal

Day-to-day life and other ramblings

Ringing Out The Old

I’d hoped to close out the year with a round-up of 2009, but instead I’ve been hammered by this cold, mainly making me dog-tired. Not the best way to end the year, although I’m trying not to complain too much since Debbi’s been struggling with this thing for almost two weeks (her doctor thinks she may have caught a second cold on top of her first one). It’d be better if I were just congested rather than so tired.

So we’ve had a quiet day at home, with an outing to take care of my friend Andrew’s cat, and to pick up pizza for dinner. I napped for a couple of hours, and I set up our Wii for Internet use, and Debbi was playing Mario Kart with her family back east when I woke up. We also watched Monsters vs. Aliens, which was okay, with a few good bits, but the plot and script were a bit too contrived and cliche (even allowing for the fact that it was playing with cliches). Still, a decent enough light movie.

I’m hoping to make it to midnight for the new year (which is the year 57 in trinary, in case you were wondering). We’ll see, though.

Kind of a blah way to end the year.

Holiday Break: The First Half

We’re a little more than halfway through our holiday break, so here’s what we’ve been up to:

The break has unfortunately been marred by Debbi’s illness, which she’s had for over a week, and which has progressed through the usual cold symptoms, but has taken forever to progress. After hearing her chest coughs yesterday, we finally decided that she should go see a doctor about it today. (I even hauled out our humidifier to see if damper air would help her cough less.) The doctor diagnosed it as just a cold, so there’s not a lot she can do except take it easy and take some cough medicine – and try not to overmedicate.

On the bright side, our friend Karen came down for the Christmas weekend. She usually heads east to visit her family over the holidays, but the price of air fare persuaded her otherwise, so instead we invited her down here. She flew in on Christmas Eve, which I had off but Debbi didn’t, so I picked her up from the airport and we went to Whole Foods to pick up the fixings for Christmas dinner, and lay in food for Karen while she was here. We went to Cascal for dinner, and then drove around the area looking at Christmas lights as there are some impressive displays around.

Christmas morning we sat around the tree (our artificial tree that we bought last year, because real trees have gotten astonishingly expensive around here) and opened gifts. My big gift to Debbi and myself was to replace our aging comforter with a nice new one. It’s even larger, so it fits in the comforter cover whereas the old one was a bit small for it. I also bought her the third season of Corner Gas on DVD. I received a goodly haul of books, CDs and DVDs from various people.

Karen has been training for a long race, so she needed to get some training walks in during her visit, thus in the afternoon we went out to the Stevens Creek Trail so she could do her walk, while Debbi and I took a ore leisurely one. We went directly to have lunch downtown at a Thai restaurant, and then vegged for a while at home, before finally cooking dinner in the evening. I made meatloaf, Debbi made mashed potatoes and steamed carrots, and Karen baked a blueberry pie.

Saturday Karen headed out for a long walk, and Debbi and I went over to Bill’s for his annual Boxing Day party, where we played some Fluxx, one game of which was epically long and I won in a particularly improbable way (involving randomly switched followed by randomly chosen cards). We picked up Karen (just before the first of the week’s rains came in that evening), and went to dinner at Sundance the Steakhouse, which has to be one of our better recent restaurant finds in the area.

Sunday we drove to the coast and had the champagne brunch at the Moss Beach Distillery, then stopped off for an outing at the beach the beach near Pillar Point. Monday, Debbi’s cold was starting to get her down, so we had a quiet day mostly at home and went to dinner at Amber India, before taking Karen to the airport, where she caught her flight home only a little late.

Tuesday, as I recounted yesterday, I went to play poker at a local card room, coming home as Debbi went out for dinner with some friends. I spent the evening puttering around in the study, and afterwards we watched some Corner Gas until we went to bed.

Today I went to the comic book store for the one comic that came out this week (Blackest Night #6). Due to the holidays, shipping companies couldn’t guarantee that books would arrive on Wednesday, so most companies decided to skip this week, as it was the fifth Wednesday of the month anyway (often called a “skip week” in the industry). DC decided to ship one book last week instructing stores not to put it out until this week, on pain of whatever tortures DC has at its disposal, I suppose. You can sometimes tell how ethical a store is by whether they abode by these requirements or not. My store, of course, held the book until this week like they’re supposed to, and held a sale besides – the store, surprisingly, was quite busy when I arrived!

I also went to an Apple store to buy a new keyboard, since the wireless keyboard I’ve been using since I got a stand for my laptop has been terribly unreliable, dropping connections every 10 seconds at times. Very disappointing, but web searches suggested that the keyboard has been problematic for a lot of people (apparently 2.4 GHz devices – wireless networks, cordless phones, etc. – can interfere with the keyboard’s bluetooth connection). Oddly, I’ve never had any such troubles with wireless mice.

And that brings us up-to-date. Now, to go read that comic book – and the few others I bought at the sale!

Christmas Rundown

Yes, we still come down in our bathrobes to open Christmas presents. Well, I did, anyway: Debbi wore sweats, and Karen had red Santa loungewear to wear. We came down mid-morning and Debbi baked scones, I brewed coffee, and then we opened gifts. My big present for me and Debbi was a new down comforter from Bed Bath and Beyond, which will be nice since our old comforter was not only old, but a little small for the cover it lived in. The new one is much larger.

I surprised Debbi with a couple of DVDs she wasn’t expecting, and we exchanged gifts with Karen (our houseguest for the weekend), too. My family and I always go a little overboard with the presents, which is always a little amusing since we’re also all pretty hard to buy for! Debbi finds that difficulty really frustrating, and was annoyed that she didn’t find anything for me that she was really happy with. She did, however, buy me a pound of marzipan (mmmmm), which makes me happy!

Karen is in training for a racewalking competition, and needs to get in some workouts while she’s visiting, so around noon we went out to the Stevens Creek Trail so she could walk for an hour. She took off and Debbi and I did our own – rather shorter – walk over the same span of time. Debbi unfortunately is still getting over a cold, which has settled into an annoying cough and making her sporadically miserable, so we took it easy on the walk. At least it was sunny and fairly warm.

We were hoping to go to the local kosher restaurant, The Kitchen Table for lunch, but they were closed. (A friend observed that maybe they were out for the traditional Jewish dinner on Christmas – Chinese food.) The local Thai restaurants are always open on Christmas, though, so that’s where we went. By this time it was 2:30 pm, so we went home to vegetate for the afternoon, expecting a late dinner.

I talked to both my mom and dad during the day, but not yet my sister. I should call her today.

Dinner took longer to cook than expected – it always seems to – but even though we ate at 8:30 pm, it was all still good: I baked bacon-wrapped, ketchup-glazed meatloaf, Debbi made mashed potatoes and steamed carrots, and Karen baked a blueberry pie. “Plenty of food” may be an understatement. Plenty of dishes to wash, too.

Today Karen’s doing a long walk as part of her training, so we’re hanging out at home for a bit, Debbi’s playing Mario Kart on the Wii, we ought to have lunch soon, and wemight stop by Bill’s for his annual Boxing Day party for a bit, then we’ll pick up Karen later in the afternoon when she’s done. And hopefully – if we can get a table – go to Sundance the Steakhouse for dinner. But other than Karen’s training, we have a fairly low-key weekend planned. Maybe a trip to the coast tomorrow.

I hope everyone else’s holiday was as fun!

Christmas Run-Up

Whew, what a week! But Christmas Eve is here, and I’m on vacation, and Debbi’s on vacation. Or, rather, our companies are shut down for the holidays, which is pretty much business as usual at each of them, but for us it’s the same thing.

I’ve been semi-frantically cleaning the house and especially the front room in preparation for our friend Karen visiting. I didn’t quite get it all done, but close enough. She flew in this morning, and everything went smoothly, right down to actually landing a little early before I was quite ready to arrive. Since none of us have gone back east to visit our families, we extended the invitation for her to come visit.

After she arrived, she and I went to Whole Foods to buy food for dinner tomorrow. We put off actually having lunch today a little too long, and I almost ran out of energy to be able to figure out what I wanted for lunch, but I ended up buying a surprisingly large sandwich which I wasn’t able to finish. (Debbi finished it for her lunch when we got home and met her – she had to work today.) Whole Foods was surprisingly civilized for Christmas Eve, and the lines were not long at all.

We have dinner plans for tonight, and we’ll probably go out and look at Christmas lights afterwards. I finished my Christmas shopping last night, finished wrapping today, and I think everything I ordered got where it’s supposed to go. The tree is up and decorated, the lights are up outside, and the cats are baffled that we have a houseguest. Situation normal. 🙂

As I always do, I have a long list of stuff I’d like to get done over the holiday break. And as always, I might get about half of it done. (Heck, I haven’t even finished reading the comics I bought last night!) It’s good to catch up on stuff over the break, but I also don’t want to stress out about it. I’ll be happy with whatever I can do.

I hope everyone reading has a happy holiday season and end-of-year. As you know, I’m not at all religious, nor really spiritual, but I always enjoy the proverbial spirit of the season.

Fringe Benefits

A couple of lively days at work this week – for reasons having nothing to do with actual, you know, work.

Yesterday our department had its annual holiday party. Breaking our recent tradition of going bowling – which actually was more fun than you might think (even though I suck at it) – we instead went to the nearby comedy club Rooster T. Feathers for lunch and a show by comedian Don McMillan, a former engineer turned funnyman. And he was in fact very funny, and I’d certainly pay to see him again.

Today there was a mini-concert in the cafeteria. A few weeks ago we had Corinne Bailey Rae, and today was a group named Lifehouse. I guess this is what happens when your company has passed Wal-Mart as the largest music retailer in the country. (Sheesh!) Both acts were pretty good, although not exactly my cup of tea; Rae’s singer-songwriter approach appealed to me more than Lifehouse’s modern-alt-rock style. (And of course I always think of Lifehouse as being an unfinished rock opera by The Who.)

You could tell it was a concert attended by geeks: Hardly anyone was dancing, and everyone was taking pictures and/or tweeting about the show. I realized this because I wondered if there’s any hope they might book a prog-rock band (Spock’s Beard, for instance), but of course prog isn’t really danceable – but if no one is dancing, then it doesn’t really matter, eh?

But even if it’s not exactly aimed at my tastes, it’s still a nice perk. I hope the musicians had a good time, too, playing to a bunch of geeks! 🙂

Chilly Weekend at the Magic Kingdom

We’re back from our annual Christmas trip to Disneyland, with various friends. We had nice weather for the first two days (Saturday night and Sunday), albeit a bit chilly, and then Monday the rains moved in and we spent the day bundled up under ponchos. The rain tapered off around 3 pm, and we managed to hit all our favorite rides at least twice over the trip, so it all worked out. We also had two nice meals, at the Blue Bayou restaurant in Disneyland, and at Steakhouse 55 at the Disneyland hotel, both a cut (or three) above the typical park fare.

They haven’t yet started the major renovations on the California Adventure park, which will change it from a general California theme park to one emphasizing early 20th century Los Angeles, when Walt Disney first moved to the state. (They’ll be tearing down the Golden Gate Bridge, for instance.) That will be a sad time.

The trip home was delayed a bit by the bad weather closing the Grapevine, the stretch of I-5 north of LA, for 17 hours overnight. We got to the foothills at the tail end of the shutdown and got stuck for 45 minutes, but that’s not bad, considering. We arrived home to unseasonably cold weather (apparently it didn’t break 50 today) and some kitties who were very happy to see us.

Jefferson seems to be just fine, 10 days after his dental surgery. He was scheduled for his follow-up appointment tomorrow morning, but the vet left a message that his doctor got summoned to jury duty, so I’ll have to reschedule.

That hiccup aside, tomorrow it’s back to the grind: Morning coffee, getting caught up on work after two days away, and comic books in the evening. And getting into the swing of the holidays, with putting up the tree and outside lights this weekend. Not much to complain about, really.

Thankful

Yesterday I was thankful for having a fun, low-key Thanksgiving at the house of our friends Chad & Camille, with Susan and Subrata also attending. Plus we had one toddler (S&S’s), two infants (C&C’s), and two dogs (also C&C’s), and the obligatory plenty of food, supplied by all of us. (Well, Debbi took care of our contributions.)

In the evening Debbi and I watched Up on DVD. I liked it quite a bit when I saw it in the theatre, and I liked it just as much this time. The more I think about it, the more I think it is Pixar’s best film. Its ridiculous premises are inventive and audacious, but more importantly they’re surprising; the film heads in unexpected directions and yet holds together. It works because it sticks to its emotional center, that of Carl finding meaning in his life after leaving everything he’s known behind him. It’s certainly the most emotionally resonant film in Pixar’s catalog.

Today I’m thankful for my cat Jefferson, who went to the vet for dental surgery, and who fortunately had ‘only’ an infected tooth that needed to be pulled, and nothing worse (like a tumor). He’s home now, a little groggy, has been wolfing down soft cat food and drinking lots of water, blinking at the bright lights, and slowly getting back to normal. The other cats were perplexed by his absence, and have been mostly leaving him alone since he returned.

But for a 15-year-old cat, he’s doing pretty good. He’ll be on soft food and taking antibiotics for a while, but hopefully a good night’s sleep will get his personality back to normal.

And then I’ll really be thankful.

Sunday in the City

Friday night I surprised Debbi by taking her to dinner at Sundance The Steakhouse, which we’d last (and first) visited for my birthday this year. It was as good as it was the first time!

Saturday we took the cats to the vet, Debbi taking hers in for a 2 pm appointment, then me taking mine in half an hour later. She was in-and-out and ran into me as I was arriving. It took longer for my guys to get their check-ups. Newton seems to be doing well enough given that he’s taking thyroid medication. Jefferson, however, has some really crummy teeth and his gums are looking pretty bad, including a spot that’s bleeding. He’s lost 3 pounds in the last year, and it could be because he’s having hyperthyroidism himself, or it could be because eating has been difficult because of his mouth. And the vet said there’s a chance that he could have a tumor which is bleeding. So both cats are getting blood tests, and we’ll see where to go from there. My bet is that Jefferson “just” needs some dental surgery.

Still, for 15-year-old cats, that’s not really too bad.

We had a more exciting day today, since I wanted to go up to the city for Borderlands Books‘ 12-year anniversary sale. We left early and got breakfast in San Carlos, but realized that we’d be getting to the bookstore well before their sale started, at noon. We tried going into Golden Gate Park to visit the botanical gardens, but there was no parking. However, we saw a sign on the way for the Disney Family Museum, which recently opened in the Presidio, and decided to go check that out.

Even with a $20 entry fee, I figured there was still some chance that it would be little more than a few trinkets that Diane DIsney Miller had inherited from her famous father, perhaps with some notes on his life. But in fact it was much more than that, and we spent more than two hours going through it (and could have spent more time than that).

There’s not much left inside that looks like an old Presidio building – they clearly spent plenty of money to make it a modern venue, with computerized displays in addition to the memorabilia, and even a theater in the basement. The reception area has hundreds of awards that Disney was given during his lifetime (including most of his Academy Awards) on display. Inside is an impressive collection of photos of Walt and his family, and many DIsney memorabilia, including a polo cup he won, one of the trains he built for his home, the fiddle his father played, and many of his early drawings (some the originals, most reproductions). The earliest known drawings of Mickey Mouse are among he collection.

The narrative is well-written, although the layout of the individual rooms makes it sometimes difficult to know where to start, so sometimes you experience things out-of-order. While it admirable grapples with a few of Disney’s less shining moments (such as the early 40s animators’ strike), it oddly glosses overt the construction of Disneyland, which occupied Walt for several years and was one of his greatest accomplishments.

While some have cautioned that the museum is more about Walt and less about Disney, anyone interested in either the man of his company ought to enjoy the museum. It’s a good companion experience to the biography of Disney I read a few months ago.

After the museum, we stopped for sundaes at Ghirardelli Square, and then headed to the bookstore, where I picked up a few things, and we got to see Borderlands’ two hairless cats, Ripley and Ash, the latter of whom I hadn’t met before.

The only blemish on the day was having trouble getting dinner cooked (stuffed pork chops from the supermarket that took about 25 minutes longer to bake than advertised), and watching the Patriots mysteriously hand the Sunday night football game to the Colts by not punting the ball on 4th-and-2 at their own 30, leading by 6 with 2:30 left in the game. WTF??? The Pats lost 35-34. Gah.

But that aside, it was a day of pleasant surprises, so I can’t really complain.

The Pernicious Cold

The cold that kept me out of work for two days last week has been sticking around. Friday it knocked Debbi out of work for a day. Saturday she felt better, but I was very congested and actually spent most of the day feeling rather dizzy. Other than a trip to the supermarket, we stayed home all day. Sunday I felt better but Debbi felt worse, and we stayed home and watched football most of the day, but I did feel good enough to go to my book discussion group in the afternoon.

We’re both slowly feeling better, and have returned to work this week. I’m still congested and have a bit of a post-nasal-drip cough, but otherwise feel fine. I plan to go to frisbee tonight, although I might not make it through the whole evening. Debbi seems to be getting better, but skipped her aerobics class last night and then didn’t sleep very well.

Friends of ours have told us that this cold is a stubborn one, and that it hangs around for a while. Other friends have theorized that we actually have the flu. I’ve known people with the swine flu and to a man it’s knocked them out for a week or more and sounded absolutely miserable. This is a particularly mild strain, if so. It might also be the garden-variety flu, for which we’ve both had shots, and perhaps the shots only offered partial protection. Who knows. The fact that it feels like a cold and I often get a cold in early November, combined with Occam’s Razor, makes me think it’s just a nastier-than-usual cold.

Assuming no resurgence of symptoms, though, I’m hopeful that we’ll be entirely well by the weekend.