Power of Perception

Dear Dove: We thought the Campaign for Real Beauty and the Dove Self-Esteem Fund was worth sharing too. Onslaught: Evolution:

That's what I do...I make glass tubes.

So, Rosa left out a very important fact from our walk in the city (our city walk, if you will). One of the points on the tour was the site of Philo Farnsworth's lab when he was developing all his patents for the first television. This is the best Sportsnight reference I have ever seen in real life. Seriously, I was REALLY excited. Probably inappropriately so.



Rosa left Thursday evening, which was really sad because we won't see her for the next YEAR while she's off traveling the world. Who does that?!?! Oh right, Rosa. Too bad everyone else will soon quit their job and start traveling, learning languages and working on organic farms in Australia, because you know if Ro does it, it MUST be cool.

After we finished being sad that Ro left, on Saturday Dan and I went back to Napa because...we wanted to and we like wine and stuff. We went to four wineries we'd never been to before, and ate some yummy lunch and came home with some yummy wine. The owner of the first place we went, Turnbull Cellars, has the largest privately owned collection of Ansel Adams work in the world and a lot of it was on display. There were signed prints from the 1920s, it was really nice.


The second place we went, Grgich Hills (pronounced grrr-gich...we had to ask) was founded by Mike Grgich who is kind of a big deal. In 1976, he entered a California wine in a blind taste test in France (you know, where they're all snooty like) and his wine won, and was declared best in the world. But the French were completely outraged that this upstart kid from Napa won, and didn't want word to get out about it. That didn't work out. So, he basically put Napa Valley on the map, and he's in his 80s and is still the winemaker for his own winery. Pretty sweet deal. While we were there, Dan got to stomp grapes. He got into it.




I'm kind of blanking on a fun fact about the third place we went, except that it was called Clos Pegasse, and it has a lot of modern art. And it had some wine too.



And the last place is called Merryvale, and is famous for it's cask room, where they hold private events. I mean, and their wine and stuff. But the room is super dramatic, lined with huge casks and barrels that hold thousands of gallons of wine with candles and dramaticness. See photo. We didn't get to Merryvale until about 6 PM - and it's one of the wineries that is open late (6 PM is late in Napa) and so, clearly, there are a lot of people there at that time trying to squeeze in one last tasting, kind of like Dan and I were doing. Except, we weren't sloshed like the middle aged people next to us chanting "chug chug chug!" or the people on the other side of us who totally skipped out on their bill while our wine server man had temporarily walked away. Who lets these people out in public?? Sigh.


But, the day wrapped up by going out to a new favorite restaurant that serves Burmese - yummmmm. And then coming home to watch the Tech/Clemson game that we had recorded. NICE. I was proud. Even though we didn't really have any offense. And even though Clemson got a safety. I love a good safety, don't get me wrong, but only when my team scores them.

What else to report? The kitties are getting bigger, almost by the day and I'm sad about that, but what can you do. Kids these days. Thursday, Dan and I are going to see a touring production of Sweeney Todd with a bunch of the other RDs, and then this weekend is homecoming for Cal, and since they're ranked SECOND in the COUNTRY, it should be a pretty crazy weekend. Next week, Dan's parents are coming to visit and then the next weekend we're going to Vegas to celebrate my birthday. Huzzah.

Oh, and HAPPY BIRTHDAY BEN!!!

Guest Blogger: Ro!

Greetings world!
Since KK and Dan are horrible at updating their blog in a timely manner, I flew here all the way from Reston to regulate.

I arrived in Berkeley Tuesday night and was taken to Yoghurt Park, a fat-free frozen yoghurt place that is “REEEEEEEALLY GOOD.” It was late and the line was still out the door. It did not disappoint. However, the winner of the highlight of the night goes to Mrs. Jean Jiao-Alexander, who somehow split her pants at the apartment and then proceeded to walk around Berkeley with her hand on her right butt cheek. Strong.

On Wednesday we had lunch at Thai Basil, a cheap Thai place located in the Asian Ghetto. We took the BART into the city to do a city walk. KK gave me the option of walks 1, 2 or 4 and after looking at the maps for each walk, I chose walk 1, which also happens to be the longest walk in the whole book. She was obviously thrilled at my decision. I was named the walk nazi, Dan was time keeper and puddle jumper (see photo below) and KK was official book reader. The book informed us that this walk had a lot of plaques. It was not kidding. Good times.

Dan and KK are pumped for the walk!

Group photo at Transamerica Redwood Park. We are so cute!

The title of the sculpture is “Puddle Jumpers.” The title of the photo is “We Can’t Have Nice Things or Go Nice Places Because Dan Embarrasses Us in Public.”

We walked by the Church of Scientology and KK was scared for her life. The girls standing outside invited us to go inside for an open house. Dan was the only one brave enough to step in.

Many years ago, some guy made friends with a parrot and then the parrots multiplied and they still hang out at the same spot. We happened to make it to that point in the walk exactly at dinner time for the parrots. Coolest thing EVER. They sure eat a lot.

Then randomly, the parrots would get spooked and fly away. But they usually weren't away for too long.

3.18 miles later, we finally finished the walk! Since I was the walk nazi, I made us walk back to the plaque that marked the start of the walk, so we could stand on it again and take another photo.

For dinner we ate at House of Curry, a great spot for cheap good Indian food. For our midnight snack, we had donuts at King Pin Donut. If you haven’t noticed yet, food was an integral part of this visit.

And now it’s Thursday. After that intense walk around the city yesterday, we thought it would be good idea to go on another hike around the Berkeley hills. We walked up towards the football stadium and saw the tree people. There were some cops there that were searching through a car because last night a police car was set on fire and they were trying to find some evidence.

Dan led the way up the hills and off the beaten path to the big yellow C that is painted on the ground at the top of the hill. The view from the top was amazing and we had a good view of the city and the Golden Gate Bridge.

Now for everyone’s favorite fact game – I am quitting my current job at the end of the month to become a full-time bum. I leave on 10/28 for Hong Kong and will be traveling with a friend around the western part of China for 5 weeks. After that, I will be taking language classes at a University in Taiwan for 5 months. Then in June I am flying to Kuala Lumpur and taking a bus to Singapore to visit some friends. Then my sister will be meeting me in Melbourne, Australia and we plan on working on an organic farm somewhere in the country. After 2 months in Australia, we are going to Auckland, New Zealand for 10 days before coming back to the US in August. Hopefully by then I will have an idea of what I want to do with my life. If anyone has any suggestions as to what that should be, please let me know because right now I have no clue.

Ok, so maybe this post will get them rolling again and all their fans can enjoy more regular updates of adventures in the Bay Area. A big THANK YOU and HUGS for Dan and KK for letting me stay over and be guest blogger. Ciao!

Walk 5 & The cool gray city of love

The city plan of San Francisco was laid out with straight lines, much like Washington DC. However, the planner didn't change any of the straight lines to accomodate for the 42 hills that make up the city. So, San Francisco was built on hills too steep for roads or at least any horse & buggy back in the olden days of road building. Really some of the roads are too steep for cars today. We heard the tires of a Lexus SUV screech as it tried to push up a hill while it's front end left the pavement for a few seconds. Hundreds of staircases were built to access different areas where roads couldn't work. Neighborhoods were built among these footpaths, and now the only access is by climbing stairs. Smart. Anyway, we bought a book which has several walks/hikes/tours planned out for anyone interested that leads you around the city by these paths and stairs, where cars can't go. We started with walk 5, which led us around parts of the city we knew, but pointed out so much we had never observed before. The book said this was an architecture heavy walk - i.e. you're going to see a lot of houses you can't afford.

I had to lean against these nice people's Bentley to get a decent picture.

The cool gray city of love, so said George Sterling.

The guy had just gotten done waxing it. Seriously, he parks his antique Aston Martin on the street because he had something else under a cover in the garage. I'm guessing around 1959 Aston Martin... $125k at least?

Cal vs Tenn.

Yup, football! It was an interesting experience to go, but I was really looking forward to the game. Our seats are actually really good, around the 50th row, to the sides of the endzone. Cal has a lot of traditions and chants and...stuff that we just didn't know about, so we pretty much felt like outsiders the whole game (even though we had Cal gear.) We also oddly felt like we were cheating on Tech by going to another school's game. It was awkward...especially when they played "Enter Sandman" during the first quarter, during a random commerical break. We were confused and sad, for we missed the energy of a VT entrance. Also, the season ticket holding asshats that were sitting behind us are of the loud, vocal tribe who think that every single one of them is on the coaching staff, and should dictate the plays we run, the defensive strategy, and you know, everything else. We're more from the camp that just wants to observe the game, and cheer at appropriate times, so this was kind of upsetting. AND there was some Cal fan booing of their own team, which we could simply not get down with. Ugh. Hopefully, we will be less grumpy and more excited for the rest of the home games (and hopefully the people sitting behind us will be sick).

Highlights though, of the game, the Cal team is friggin good. DeSean Jackson is pretty amazing to watch, especially during his 77 yard punt return (which Dan totally missed!). Also, the student section is really really vocal, and during half time does card stunts, which are fun. (They were started here in 19-something a long time ago). AND the band is really awesome - their pregame show is fun. So, clearly, there will be things to watch.

Cal's masot - his name is Oski.

For all you band people.

Tightwad Hill for all the people too cheap to buy tickets. Yes they really call it that. It's a high point next to the stadium that you can see from (since the stadium was built into the ground...see first post)

Umm, apparently they rush the field whenever they win a game.

Spare the Air

During days that it gets too hot (by hot, I mean in the 90's - watch out for that heatwave) San Francisco frets about the air quality index, and on those days, encourages everyone to use public transportation instead of private vehicles to reduce the pollutants in the air. They do this by offering free rides on all types of public transportation (cable cars, busses, BART, ferries, etc.) So, Dan got to reap the benefits and ride the cable cars for hours because they were free! Normally they are $5 every time you hop on which is just ridiculous, but the tourists pay it. And you will too when you come visit. Because, as I've said before, I love a cable car ride. Here's some shots from that adventure.

The famous Lombard St.

Incoming fog meets the bridge

And the Cable Cars

Mmmmmk

I'm admonishing both of us because very bad bloggers we have been. We apologize for not being able to distract you from work for over a week. And after we watch the VT/LSU game that we taped, we will get in on this whole blogging thing. Lots of fun things have occurred. Including a four night long Lord of the Rings marathon. MAN we're cool. Other highlights include our first Cal game, a chocolate festival, more kitty pictures (if you can stand the cuteness!) and...some other stuff. Please stay tuned.