Tuesday, March 27, 2007

uh oh

Best Buy, a company that I hate, has bought Speakeasy, the ISP that I use and love. This can't be good.

Monday, March 26, 2007

junk food weekend

Went to a birthday party on Saturday night, at Triple Rock in Berkeley. I'd had a really light lunch, so I managed to polish off an entire half pound Mesa burger (bacon, pepper jack cheese, chipotle mayo). Yum.

The next day, I had brunch with friends at Stacks in Menlo Park, and had my usual scrumptious strawberry waffle. Double yum.

Friday, March 23, 2007

the magic glove

I played softball my last two years in high school. We were a completely new team; most of us had never played softball before except in gym class, and when we first got out on the field, the coach was literally showing us how to wear the batting helmets properly. Most of us didn't own gloves (I'd borrowed mine from my brother; it was his Little League outfield glove), so the coach had brought a bunch of her old ones.

The oldest one was so beat up that it was completely flat, and had turned a brownish-grey color, but we soon discovered that it was the best of the bunch, and dubbed it the "magic glove". It was so soft that when a ball hit it anywhere near the middle, the sides would automatically collapse on it. I think it may have also been a little stickier from having been used so much. Anyway, we used to fight over the magic glove, because we were all convinced it made us better fielders (I swear it did, at least for me).

I suddenly remembered all of this today, when a friend was raving about her new softball glove.

Thursday, March 22, 2007

here today, gone tomorrow

So much for going back to Bay Meadows next year. It appears they'll be closing down in November, after 73 years of racing.

Wednesday, March 21, 2007

AMT suckage

Yesterday I got my tax return back from my CPA, and had a bit of a nasty surprise when I realized that I owed a couple of hundred dollars, instead of being owed a few thousand.

It only took me a few minutes to figure out what had gone wrong. The AMT figure was significantly higher than the ordinary tax number. I had sold some stock in 2005, had paid lots of state and federal taxes on the gain in 2006, and now was being punished for having paid those same state taxes. It feels like I'm being taxed twice!

I do love living in California, and I'm already resigned to the real estate prices, but when faced with the reality of also paying thousands of dollars a year to the federal government for the privilege, well, I start to entertain vague notions of moving to Seattle.

I've known about AMT for many years (my dad being a retired CPA), and it's even affected my taxes a bit for the last two years, but this is the first year that it's impacted my tax burden significantly, and let me just reiterate that it sucks very much. It's much worse in practice than in theory.

I'll say right now, that if a presidential candidate that I'm otherwise undecided about (not anti-choice, not anti-gay, not anti-Taiwan, not crazy) pledges to fix this broken system, I'll vote for him/her in November.

Tuesday, March 20, 2007

Obama-mania

A friend invited me to the Barack Obama rally last weekend in Oakland. I was already booked that day, so I declined.

In retrospect, I'm really glad I didn't go. That's no reflection on Obama himself; I'm still undecided about him, since there's been so little data about his stances on my key issues. I'm just sure I wouldn't have been thrilled standing around for hours in a crowd of ten thousand people. I guess I didn't realize that the Bay Area was caught up in Obama-mania already.

Sunday, March 18, 2007

yet more wedding-related activities

Yesterday, after spending the morning at an organizational brunch for one wedding, I went to a bridal shower / bachelorette party for another bride-to-be.

This one was pretty well done; the hostess put together a really nice lunch (most of which I didn't eat because I'd just had brunch), with pretty decorations and homemade dessert, and we did the standard spa thing, this time at Burke Williams Santana Row, and then headed up to the city for dinner, drinks, etc.

We had 7pm reservations at supperclub san francisco. Unfortunately, none of us had ever been there before. Even more unfortunately, we hadn't eaten since about noon. Apparently, the deal at supperclub is that there is one seating, at 7:30pm, and for the next 4-5 hours they slowly feed you courses of food, while you lounge around on beds drinking cocktails and/or dancing on the ground floor.

Here are a few photos:

dinner in bedopen kitchen
 
tough love from the "hostess"live entertainment


By the time we were served the first course, which was a small smoked salmon salad, it was past 8pm. Over the next two hours we were served a glass of onion soup and a fish (or tofu) appetizer, but at 10:30pm, we still hadn't had the main course yet. We left at 11:30pm after finishing our porkchops, without having had dessert.

It was really too bad; if we had had a snack or something beforehand, I think we could have had a much better time. Even as it was, the first two hours were fun from an "interesting experience" and "cool concept" perspective. But, hungry people are generally cranky people, and we were definitely hungry for most of the night. Afterwards, I went home, and the rest of the girls stopped for porridge in Chinatown before hitting the bar scene.

Friday, March 16, 2007

night at the racetrack

A friend invited a bunch of us to go to Bay Meadows with her tonight, because there was a special: $1 admission, $1 beer, $1 hot dogs, and $1 minimum bets. Plus, Tainted Love, one of my favorite 80's cover bands, was playing between races.

In the end, I spent $7, ate a hot dog, was entertained for three hours, and learned a lot about betting on horses. Now I know what it means to "win, place, or show", what a "quinella" is versus an "exacta", and how the odds are read off of the scoreboard.

Here are a few somewhat blurry photos (horses are fast!):


Thursday, March 15, 2007

lucky

Last weekend, I threw a birthday party on a yacht, followed by dinner in the city.

I'd obsessively planned out all the details, including figuring out transportation logistics, printing maps and directions for all the carpools, pre-ordering cake and ice cream, bringing plates, forks, and serving utensils, buying decorations and balloons, drawing up a (40+ person!) guest and payment checklist, and arranging a preset dinner menu.

But in the end, the most important factor in making the party a success was that the weather was absolutely gorgeous. When we set sail at 4pm, it was 75 degrees, with not a cloud in the sky. Over the next three hours, it cooled off bit by bit, until it was probably in the mid-60s by sunset, which is actually my kind of weather. I'd rather be lucky, indeed.

Thursday, March 08, 2007

so worth it

Yesterday, I went to watch the Warriors' pre-game warmups. The doors open at 6pm for a 7:30pm game, so I left work at 4pm to meet up with everyone at Oracle at 4:30pm. We got to the BART station around 5:30pm, and were waiting at the North Gate by 5:40-ish. As soon as the doors opened, we walked directly to the tunnel leading to the home locker room, and draped ourselves over the railing. Over the next hour, I was able to get an autograph from every Warrior who practiced, for a total of ten (10!) autographs.

Here are some photos:


left to right: Monta Ellis, Patrick O'Bryant, Matt Barnes





top left: Al Harrington, bottom left: Steven Jackson, right: O'Bryant and Ellis (see above)





top row: Adonal Foyle, Josh Powell, Jason Richardson, bottom row: Kelenna Azubuike, Andris Biedrins

Baron Davis and Mickael Pietrus didn't come out for warmups, so we had no chance at them. Still, I was super-excited to get as many autographs as I did.

Some funny tidbits from the hour-long autograph hunting experience:
- My friend said "Welcome to the team!" to Josh Powell, who was the first player to come off the floor. He looked a little surprised, and said "Thanks" back.
- The security guards on the visitors' side were really strict about not hanging on the railing. Not so on the home side; although, at one point, I was bracing my feet on the bottom of the glass and got a semi-stern look from one security guy. I gave him a pleading look and he smiled back, so I stayed where I was.
- Some people were really, really pushy. One mother kept trying to get her young son to squeeze into the non-existent space between me and my friend, even though he obviously didn't want to go there. Another guy was pushing me in the back, until I asked him if he really wanted me to fall over the railing.
- One guy was pretty far up on the railing and wasn't having much success reaching the players, so he rigged up a harness out of a piece of rope, and managed to get the basketball low enough to get autographs from Richardson, Barnes, and a couple of others. Creative ingenuity, indeed.
- Al Harrington was wearing humongous diamond earrings during practice, but I guess he had to take them off for the game, because he wasn't wearing them later. It's kind of funny that he would take the time to wear them just for warmups.
- All of the players took a fair amount of time to sign autographs. I wonder if they're required to, for PR purposes, or whether they're all just that nice?

All in all, it was a really fun experience, and definitely worth the extra hour and a half of waiting time.

Oh yeah, and there was a game, too. Iverson lived up to his billing with a fantastic first half (24 points) and finished the game with 35 total. The Warriors spread the ball around a lot, did a pretty good job of running their new speedy offense, and ended up with a 110-96 win, which meant free Big Mac coupons for everyone.

Wednesday, March 07, 2007

no Carmelo for me

As soon as Iverson got traded to the Nuggets, I checked the Warriors' schedule to see if the Nuggets would be in town again this season. When I discovered they would be playing in Oakland on March 7th, I quickly arranged to get tickets while they were still being sold at face value. How could I pass up an opportunity to see two of the most prolific scorers in the league, playing on the same team?

I even went out and bought some new basketballs and got ahold of some silver Sharpies, and planned out my work schedule so that I could leave super-early, to get to the Arena in time to try and snag some autographs. Then, yesterday night, I'm watching SportsCenter, and what do I hear? Carmelo's fiancee is giving birth to their son, so Carmelo won't be making the trip to California. Much disappointment. Iverson better be awesome tonight.

Tuesday, March 06, 2007

192 countries

I object to this country quiz on principle, because it uses the UN list of countries and so doesn't list Taiwan, but I tried it anyway. Apparently I'm not great with countries; here's my result (with my comments in parentheses).

You forgot: Albania, Algeria, Andorra, Antigua and Barbuda, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bangladesh, Belarus, Belize, Benin, Bhutan, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Botswana, Brunei, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cameroon, Cape Verde, Central African Republic, Chad, Comoros, Democratic Republic of the Congo (I tried "Zaire" and "Congo" but neither counted), Djibouti, Dominica, Dominican Republic, East Timor, El Salvador, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Fiji, Gabon, Gambia, Georgia, Guatemala, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Guyana, Honduras, Kazakhstan, Kenya, Kiribati, Kyrgyzstan, Laos, Lebanon, Lesotho, Malawi, Mali, Malta, Marshall Islands, Mauritania, Mauritius, Micronesia, Moldova, Montenegro, Myanmar, Namibia, Nauru, Nicaragua, Niger, Nigeria, Palau, Papua New Guinea, Philippines (I swear I tried every combination of L's, P's, and N's except this one), Republic of the Congo, Rwanda, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Samoa, San Marino, Sao Tome and Principe, Senegal, Serbia, Sierra Leone, Slovenia, Solomon Islands, Suriname, Swaziland, Tajikistan, The Bahamas ("Bahamas" doesn't count?), Togo, Tonga, Trinidad and Tobago, Tunisia, Turkmenistan, Tuvalu, Uganda, United Kingdom (I tried "England", "Ireland", and "Great Britain". No dice.), Vanuatu, Venezuela, Zambia.

Monday, March 05, 2007

one day ski trip

There was a lot of snow in Tahoe early last week, plus the weather forecast for the weekend was clear, so I decided I wanted to go skiing. Since Friday and Saturday were already booked up, the only option was a one day trip on Sunday. I polled for interest and got four solid yesses (all girls this time, go figure), so it was a go.

I've done the day trip lots of times before, starting in my middle school ski bus days. The ideal schedule:
4:00am wake up
5:00am assemble at departure location
5:30am start driving to Tahoe
8:30am arrive at ski resort and gear up
9:00am hit the slopes
4:30pm meet up at lodge, snack & change
5:00pm start driving home
7:30pm grab dinner around Sacramento (depends on traffic)
10:30pm arrive back in Bay Area

Sounds perfectly reasonable, right? And, everything went off without a hitch. The snow was great (Northstar, mostly backside), we took our last run just as my legs were about to give out (sign of a good ski day), I ate a Euro Snack Belgian waffle for the first time (totally worth the four dollars), and we had a yummy dinner at Claim Jumper in Roseville. We got home somewhere between 10:30pm and 11:00pm, and I was in bed by midnight. The only downside is, in another sign of impending oldness, I'm really not all that awake today.

Friday, March 02, 2007

50 states

I've seen this name the 50 states link a couple of times in the last few days. Yesterday, I decided to try it. I managed to name 49 states in 3 minutes, but it took me another 2 minutes to figure out the last one. (It was Nevada. Ironic, since I was just there last month.)

It's really not fair for me to play these games; I had some very boring lecturers in college, and I distinctly remember trying to stay awake by doing useless things like writing down all of the teams in the NFL (by division), writing down all of the school teachers I'd ever had (chronologically starting from kindergarten), and writing down all of the states (with their capitals, both alphabetically and geographically in order). Yes, I'm really strange.

Thursday, March 01, 2007

relationships, seriously

I had dinner yesterday night with a friend who recently broke up with his girlfriend of over six months. Of course, we chatted a lot about the reasons that they broke up, and talked a bit about relationships in general.

At one point, we discussed an article that I'd read recently about the major issues that can become deal breakers in long term relationships. According to the article, those issues are: religion, money, politics, sex, family, children, division of labor, work-life balance, health and fitness, and social attitude.

The first six are pretty self-explanatory and are often discussed, but I thought that the last four were less obvious and more interesting.

For example, division of labor was probably not an issue a hundred years ago; it was assumed that women would stay home and do housework and raise children, and men would work outside the home and produce income. Nowadays, it's much more complicated, and couples have to figure out who cooks, who cleans, who plans, and who runs shuttle duty.

Work-life balance and social attitude are two related issues which can get overlooked. Some people are workaholics, others find fulfillment in spending time with friends and family. Some people like to hole up in their own homes, others like to go out regularly and explore new people and places. Of course, there will always be some discrepancy, but if one person is completely absorbed to his/her work and the other is constantly nagging him/her to come home, things can get ugly. Similarly, if one party is always having to drag a resisting significant other out of the house, that conflict can cause serious problems, as well.

The health and fitness issue is one that I hadn't really thought about until recently. It doesn't tend to come up in younger relationships, but as people start to figure out what their adult lives look like, they develop patterns of food consumption and exercise, and it can be hard to adapt these routines to accomodate another person who may have different habits. Often one or both will have to compromise. I guess that's what relationships are all about.

 

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