Jay Walking

There's a church by our house.  It's not quite a mega church, but it's much larger than your typical mom and pops church.  There are so many people that attend, that they park in other areas of the business park.  I'm ok with this.  Except for one thing.  When church is over, they jay walk.  There is a sign (set out by the church) that specifically states "Cross at the crosswalk."  There are multiple signs.  I've seen them.

And to be honest, I'm ok with jay walking.  I once got in trouble for it while walking back to my dorm in college.  It is actually a relatively decent time saving measure - when done appropriately.  But I'm not ok with slow jay walkers.  If you are going to jay walk, hustle your buns.  Don't cause cars to slow down.  If you can't hustle, don't jay walk.  

FYI - when I got in trouble for jay walking in college, I crossed a crosswalk inappropriately (i.e. the little crosswalk man was red....not green).   There were no cars coming, so no big deal.  I'm halfway down the block when a cop asks me if I know the fine for jaywalking.  Nope.  Turns out he saw me 3 blocks back.  Seriously, 3 blocks?  Honestly, go bust some kids for underage drinking.  

Harry Potter vs. Twilight

I've read both books and have enjoyed them both - couldn't put either of them down.  But let's be honest.  There is no comparison.  Harry Potter kicks Twilight out of the water.

JK Rowling is a much better writer than Stephanie Meyer.  Just pick a page from either book and read it.  There's a lot of fluff in Twilight. 

Hermione>>Bella

JK Rowling laid out the entire plan for HP on a train.  She knew the story before she started writing.  I think the sequels to Twilight were kind of an after thought.

Harry Potter movies > Twilight (the sequels may improve, and HP does lose some points for postponing the 6th movie for so long.....but Daniel Radcliffe is a much better actor than Robert Pattison).

I could go on, but there's really no point.  I love both series' of books, but HP will always have a special place in my heart.  Let's be honest, I'm still waiting for my admissions letter to Hogwarts.

What was I thinking

I signed up for the Nike women's marathon (the half version).  It was a raffle.  You gave them your info and your credit card and then IF you are randomly selected, you GET to run.  I kind of figured it would be fate...and it looks like I'm running this biatch in October.  Oh geez. 

Phoenix 2009

Friday morning (EARLY) we headed to Phoenix for some spring training.  Let me start at by recalling our morning.  Flight leaves at 7AM, we leave at 5:20AM.  Around Hayward...or 5:40AM, we realize we forgot the tickets.  So we turn around and get the tickets.  Leave the house at 6AM and RACE to the airport.  We park and spring for the shuttle and literally walk onto the plane just as they begin boarding the B group.  Amazing race style.....Nick Loper likes to cut it close.

We arrived in Phoenix and headed to Goodyear to hang out with Kellie and watch Chris tear it up with the Indians. 

Here he is after pinch running.  Notice his body position at 2nd base and again at 3rd. We have the right hand on the hip with the left foot on the base.  Very casual.  I like it.

On Saturday we hit up the M's in Peoria.  Since Ichiro and Felix were both at the WBC, we caught Griffey instead.  What a great kid.  Classic Griffey.  He flubbed it a few times in left, but it's cool.  He's getting a little old and we don't need him to get injured.  Man, I'd love to be at Safeco on opening day.  

After a little baseball we headed to a bar to watch the Huskies play Purdue.  At one point the bar shut off the game and 10 of us crowded around an iPhone.  It was great....and then we lost.  I'd be winning my bracket right now if the huskies could have pulled a W.

We spent Sunday with Kellie at the Phoenix zoo.  The highlight was the giraffe.  We wanted this leaf really bad but just couldn't reach.  He stuck his tongue out and even stood on his tip toes.  It was so cute.

We had dinner at Chino Bandido - Chinese Mexican fusion.  It was actually pretty good.....but I got sick later that night.....so no more Chino Bandido for me.

Skiing

We went skiing with Kellie on Saturday.  We woke up before the sun and drove to north lake Tahoe for some awesome spring skiing!  The sun was out and the snow was actually very nice. Much softer than I anticipated.  

Here we are at the top of one of the lifts.  Nick took this picture and it didn't cost us a penny.  Now, there was this guy named Kevin taking posed pictures of people in front of the lake.  I told him up front that I didn't want to buy his photos, but he guaranteed I'd love them.  Let's be honest, he was setting himself up for failure.  So we agreed to let him pose us.  I was a complete brat the entire time.  He made Nick take off his skis and made all of us remove our goggles - it was really sunny and we were all squinty for the photo.  If you are at all interested in his masterful photography, go to the website and scroll to the bottom.  It was actually quite hilarious and you sort of feel for the guy....but let's be honest, no one is going to buy one of your $20 photos (Well, clearly people do, otherwise they wouldn't be in business).

Here is Nick posing on the top of the mountain.  We aren't ever going back to Seattle :-)

While skiing, we spotted the Ford raceway.  It's actually a race course open to the public.  For $1 you can race down and get your time.  We opted to take a picture and continue on our merry way.

While driving home we saw something quite interesting.  A guy riding his motorcycle spread eagle.  The picture is bad because I took it in the car and tried to super zoom.  But you get the picture.  It looks really awkward and probably the exact opposite of badass.

We picked up Moch and Pico at doggy daycare and I snapped this random shot of him linking his eyeball.  I sure hope he doesn't grow into that tongue.

San Antonio

I've been in San Antonio for the past week taking a class.

We did the obligatory tourist stuff: Alamo, River Walk and Market Square.

Alamo

So the walls are really short.  I'm actually surprised they held up for as long as they did.  Also, the guard at the Alamo is very strict.  Ask me about it sometime if you are interested.

River Walk

It's kind of feels like being on Pirates of the Caribbean.  The river is all of 4' deep, they color it green for St. Patrick's day and you could easily fall in if you lost your balance.  It's very touristy, but you know what they say...when in Rome.

Market Square

It's like most markets, but with a southern flare.  They have turquise, cowboy hats, sombreros.

I wish this was a better post.  But let's me honest.  I prefer California.

Keys

While in San Antonio for work, the rental car keys flew out of a backpack and down the tiny sliver of room between the elevator and the floor.  The odds?  Close to 1 in a 1000.  

I thought it would be easy to retrieve - it happened all the time in the dorms.  It took multiple trips to the front desk but eventually we got the keys back.

Sidenote - Avis gives you both keys on the same key ring when you rent a car.  As a result, there aren't any spares.  They have to cut new ones.  Doesn't really make sense to me.

Poor Design

As a design engineer (who is often guilty of poor designs, hopefully the good ones outweigh the bad), I often look at other designs and evaluate them.  Usually I think, "Man, I wish I had thought of that."  But recently, I looked at 2 different things and thought, "Man, that really could have been done better."  

1.  Restroom doors that always look occupied

So this happens to me at the movie theater all the time.  All the restroom doors are shut because they all swing closed and they APPEAR occupied.  Unfortunately, patrons don't look under the doors - for fear of looking foolish - and everyone is forced to stand in line waiting for the 2 occupied stalls.  I get it.  If the lock breaks, the door can still stay shut.  But I don't know if it's worth it.  At the very least, put one of those red/green things on the lock so people can tell.  

2.  Apple Laptop wall adapter

OMG this is absolutely awful design.  It hangs off the wall like a diving board.  Cantilever anyone?  

Mochi ran into mine awhile back and bent one of the prongs.  Clearly these were not dog tested. If it were me, I would have put the prongs on the large, square surface.  I'm sure Apple has a logical reason for the design....and someday I would like one of their engineers to explain it to me.  Apparently the previous generation would spark and cause fires, so I guess I should be thankful for the one I have.