February 2006 Archives

The nice nurse from Hesperia was running late this morning, so I had to sit in the waiting area for 40 minutes. I didn't feel all that well - tired, just blah - and I think she thought I was mad at her for making me wait, even though I told her it was no problem. She did her best to rush me through, and I did a double batch in about 48 minutes.

I watched the first half of Partner(s), whose Netflix review was better than it's IMDB review. It wasn't bad; Julie Bowen plays a conniving lawyer, which was fun. Overall, though, I can't recommend it.

An update to the family grocery list.

Download file, in Word.

Jeremy started working at Border's in the Santa Anita mall in Arcadia a few days ago. He had been the assistant manager at the local fourplex in Temple City, but it closed after the lease was terminated by the owners, who want to develop a mixed-use retail-residential project. He really loves the movies, but books and music are a close second, and he was excited to be back on the work force (as was his girl friend).

He stopped by the house after work to grab a quick bite to eat before heading down to Disneyland with Sarah on one of those last-minute, we-have-season-passes jaunts, but before he left he told me a story about his work day.

A man walked up to him at the register, and Jeremy asked him if he had found everything he was looking for. The man said not yet - he had called in a special order. Jeremy asked the man his name, and he said "I'm Wil Wheaton".

At this point in the story Jeremy tells me he's thinking of that line by Syndrom in The Incredibles...

I'm still geeking out about it!

Jeremy also reports that Wil signed up for a Borders Reward card.

From 1981 through 1985, I worked at a small appraisal research company named Marshall & Swift, in a building on Beverly Blvd. At the time I worked there, the third-generation Marshall was taking over, and running the place into the ground, despite the best efforts of Frank Swift, who's misfortune was to be an honorable man.

I left in September of 1985 to go to my current job, which has played out nicely.

This afternoon, I had a Girls Soccer Playoff game at Belmont High School, across the street from the old Marshall & Swift building. Here's a current picture - the building has been divided into what looks to be four or five smaller businesses.

Marshall & Swift moved in the early 90's to a downtown high-rise on Wilshire.

Mandy and Carole were heading to Palm Springs for the holiday, and invited me to join them there for dinner. I almost always ride either west (towards Santa Ynez) or north (to Palmdale), and was looking for new roads, so I gladly accepted.

I left at 10:45am, and stopped in Redlands for gas and food at a crummy Del Taco. A three-car accident in a construction zone tied up traffic once I got back on the freeway, but once that cleared I made good time to SR-62. 62 loops north and east through Morongo Valley, Yucca Valley, and Joshua Tree, where you cut south into the Joshua Tree National Park, where I gladly paid my $5 motorcycle entrance fee (I thought it would be $10).

The road through the park is sedate, and I spent some time behind some slower cars which let me enjoy the fantastic scenery. A few miles south of the entrance most of the traffic had found something else to do, and the last half of the drive I was mostly by myself. The views were amazing, and I really enjoyed the twisties on El Dorado Mine Rd. There's no ranger station on the south entrance.

Once you cross I-10, the road changes to Box Canyon Rd., and it proved to be interesting. A few twisties, some wide sweepers, and a 120mph+ straightaway made it pretty fun. It dumps out onto 66th Avenue in the city of Mecca, with views of Salton Sea to the south.

A few jogs took me SR-111 north, then SR-86 north to I-10. The first exit is Golf Center Pkwy, which joins up with SR-111. 111 starts out westbound in Indio, but soon hits prime time in Indian Wells. I got to the Elephant Bar in Palm Desert at 3:45pm, and called Carole to check on our 4:00pm meeting time. They were running late - too much shopping at the outlet mall in Cabazon - and asked me to get them a newspaper with movie times while I waited. They arrived at 4:35pm, and the restaurant was already quite busy - a lot of retirees enjoying an early dinner - but we didn't have to wait for a table.

Mandy had an oriental chicken soup that looked great. Carole had a beef dip with cheddar, and I had shrimp. The cole slaw was perfect - not too spicy, not too bland, nice and crunchy. The lemonade was also just about right - not too sweet, not too tangy. We split a lava cake for dessert.

On the way back, traffic on I-10 was bad from San Gorgonio Pass through to Cabazon. I knew the 10 would be rough with holiday traffic, so I grabbed SR-60 in Beaumont. It had some slowness around I-215, and again at I-15, but the carpool lanes helped a lot. In spite of a sweatshirt, a fleece pullover, and my motorcycle jacket, I was really cold once I got home.

My dad turned 80 on February 20th. The original plan was to have a family get-together on Sunday the 19th, with a more special dinner at the Ateneum at Caltech on Wednesday the 22nd. (The Ath is closed on weekends and holidays, and President's Day fell on the 20th this year.)

We met at Carol's for chicken cacciatore, and had a great time. Gabriella came down on the train, and we stayed late to talk.

Unfortunately, back on the previous Thursday my dad had taken a fall while he was out on his daily morning walk. He was still the worse for it, with a big swollen right knew, bruises on his right wrist, and a nice shiner on his right eye. He went home a little early due to some understandable discomfort. We decided to postpone dinner at the Ath until he was feeling better.

I saw a 5T California license plate this morning, on a Chevy Uplander mini-van going westbound on the Foothill Fwy at Lake Avenue.

I'm big on politeness - it sometimes drives Carole and the kids crazy. I open doors for people of either gender; I walk ahead of ladies going down stairs, and behind them going up; I pass the salt and pepper together even if only the salt was requested; I would never knowingly cut into a line. Today, though, I had "an incident".

I stopped by Caltech to pick-up a SURF batch, and wound up talking to Carol for almost an hour. I stopped by Rick's to pick-up some tacos. When I reached the front, there were a bunch of guys standing in the back next to the newspaper racks, seemingly in no big hurry, but there was no one up ordering at the windows. This is normal - after you order, you move back by the racks for your pickup to be called. Assuming that everyone was waiting for an already-placed order, I made quick eye contact with a few, and proceeded to the window. I ordered four tacos — hot — and the woman wrote them down on the order bag, but before I could pay one of the guys from the back says "Hey, hey, hey", and walks up to the window. I apologized and moved to the back, and waited for the first guy plus two others to go up and order. When it seemed like everyone was done, I checked with everyone else, and once I'd been cleared, went up to pay for my tacos. I was going to tell the woman at the window that I didn't mean to cut, and that people who need to order should be up at the window, not hanging back at the racks - it's just the way things are done at Rick's. But, the first guy was standing right next to the window, and I didn't want to be needlessly provocative - plus I felt somewhat guilty for even the appearance of being a line cutter.

No more than 15 seconds passed after I paid for my order when the guy working the other window catches my eye and gives me the head nod that my order was ready. I shook my head to say it couldn't be for me, but he just said "four tacos". I took it to mean that the woman at the counter knew I wasn't trying to cut, and called back my order to the cooks early in the process. I grabbed my bag and headed back to my bike for the ride to work. I waited for the first guy to give me a look, so I could give that satisfying head nod thing as I walked away, but he didn't oblige. I'm not sure if I would have actually done the nod, but we'll never know.

Carole surprised me with a three-day trip to Cambria, mostly for Valentine's day, but also because I needed to use some vacation time at work, and she had a break in her work schedule.

On Tuesday, we made some joint tactical mistakes, and wound up driving 70 miles for a Carl's Jr. meal. We drove in to Paso Robles to eat at McLintock's, but got there right at 9:00pm - when they closed. Our fallback was to get Carl's and eat it while watching a movie, but the snotty teenage manager of the local theater wouldn't let us in with our "outside food", so we drove back to the hotel.

On Wednesday, we stopped in Santa Maria for lunch and a movie - the Roadhouse, where we ate way too much for a combined lunch and dinner, and Firewall, a so-so thriller with Harrison Ford. On the way out of the theater we both wondered why the previews had given away almost all of the plot.

Carole surprised me with a three-day trip to our favorite hotel in Cambria. We had a great time - well, except for a 70 mile drive for drive-through Carl's Jr.

I did a Boys double-header yesterday, Alhambra vs. Bell Gardens at Moor Field in Alhambra. We gave out a lot of yellows and two reds, but otherewise the games weren't memorable.

During a lull in the action in the second half of the varsity game, I reminisced about another day I spent at Moor Field. It was a windy Sunday - I think I was around 7 or 8 years old - and we were visiting my dad's mom, who lived in a great two-story Spanish-style house south of Valley in Alhambra. I persuaded my dad to take me to fly a kite. We went to the store to buy a kite - back then most kites were made of paper - and a long spool of string. When we got to Moor Field (which was only a few blocks from my grandma's house), my dad told me to stay in the car for a minute until the blustery winds died down a little, but in my youthful impatience I jumped the gun, and hopped out holding my kite - which promptly disintegrated when I held it away from the wind. My dad was patient, and we went to the store to get another kite, which I treated oh-so carefully. I remember having a great time flying the second kite - watching the hand-tied knots on the cloth tail dance in the wind while I pulled on the string.

Brian Binnie, pilot of the second flight of the Ansari X Prize-winning SpaceShipOne, wrote a Contrails article in the February 6th issue of Aviation Week about the flight. In his description of a particulary hairy moment, when the rocket power kicked in, he wrote:

The serious surge of power as that rocket motor kicked in, plus the rocket's roar and violence, drove me to the bottom of Maslow's hierarchy of needs.

Based on that quote, I just knew that Maslow's hierarchy had to be interesting. Wikipedia says Maslow was an American psychologist who presented his hierarchy of human needs as a pyramid, with basic survival needs on the bottom, progressing up to self-actualization (self-fulfillment, personal growth) at the top. Once the lowest needs have been secured, individuals can concentrate on the next higher level, and so on to the top.

A graphic of the Maslow pyramid follows the jump.

Super Sunday started with a nice ride up to Palmdale — Big Tujunga Canyon, Angeles Forest Hwy, a snack at Tom's in Palmdale, Bouquet Canyon, and Little Tujunga Canyon. I hit the driveway back home with 36 miles on reserve. S&T says it's 137 miles, and I was back in three hours and fifteen minutes.

I made enchilladas for dinner, and managed to clog up the kitchen sink in the process. It was one of those nasty ones, where you have to remove the trap to get the snake into the main pipe. No fun for me.

Seattle got no love from the referees, but could have won the game anyway if they'd avoided all the mistakes.