Lean!

This was on the return from Sausalito to SF; I really wish it hadn't been so hazy, but it came out fairly well anyway.

Stop and Go

Ship's Flag

Last April, we took BART to the City and took the ferry over to Sausalito. I took a lot of pictures, including several of somewhat random things, concentrating less on landscapes, animals, and flowers (which I photograph the most) and more on everything we saw. I have another picture that has this flag with the Golden Gate in the distance, but it isn't as good somehow.

beep beep beep

So, for a long time, we've used the chime feature on our alarm to let us know whenever a door or window is opened in our house. This is particularly useful with small children in the house. Although we have tried hard to make sure that Rachel knows when it is OK to open the door and when it isn't (primarily that we need to know she is going to, at least at the front door), the chime helps us know when it happens... so clues us in if she forgets to tell us.

Occasionally we turn it off if we're going in and out or opening and closing windows a lot, because it can get a little annoying. A few weeks ago when we turned it off, we didn't turn it on for a while, and somehow we decided that if the alarm doesn't beep we have to say beep beep beep for it.

When we were at my parents' place for Thanksgiving, I had to go out to the car to get something, and when I walked out the front door, I said (not very loudly)... "beep beep beep".

Kitchen Nightmares

Today when Rachel and I came back from dinner with my parents, I went to put the left-overs in the refrigerator. Our refrigerator is a bit of a disaster, so this required moving a couple of things around. As I'm moving things, I find the lid for a plastic store-bought food container.

At first, I was just going to leave it; my parents were still here and I didn't feel like dealing with it, and I didn't immediately see any lidless containers, but that's how the fridge gets the way it is (besides having food for 3 adults, a child, and a baby), so I decided to suck it up.

What's the lid from? Hummus, our favorite, specifically. Hmmm... that's a little strange. Where's the hummus? Searching... searching... hey, that's odd... why's the parmesan in there at a funny angle? Huh. Strange... it has hummus on it. Ahhh... there's the hummus... open, dried out, and with the parmesan sitting in it.

Our refrigerator isn't worthy of sort of scorn Chef Ramsey summons regularly on Kitchen Nightmares, but he certainly wouldn't approve! Dawn and Darryl thought the story was hysterical, though!

Get off the phone!

So, a very pretty woman comes marching up to the BART turnstile tonight, talking on the phone and paying no attention to the numerous people in line to go through. Marches right up between two lines, think there can't be a reason there's not one trying to go through that gate, such as that it might be closed. Finally realizes she can't get out there and tries to cut into the line to her right.

Did I mention she was on the phone and not paying much attention? I can pretty much guarantee, gives what she looked like, that a glance and a small smile would have gotten her in front of almost any man. But, she wasn't paying attention and tried to cut in front of the plainest woman insight who snapped at her.

Of course, once that happened, the line tightened up, as if by magic, and she got stuck looking foolish waiting until someone would let her in.

The Great Pumpkin Pie Saga

My father doesn't like pumpkin pie, so if he's responsible for dessert at Thanksgiving, there won't be any pumpkin pie. For some reason, I really like having pumpkin pie and, of course, I know my father's opinion of same.

Somehow, I managed to think that with so many people coming to Thanksgiving at my parents' place this year there would be someone else bringing dessert, and that odds were at least one of those desserts would be pumpkin pie.

Two people brought appetizers, Charles (who even more than my parents could be a gourmet chef if he wanted) brought the turkey (I think) and stuffing, and I brought the cranberry sauce. My parents made everything else. Which means no pumpkin pie.

After dinner, on the way home, I decided I had to see if I could come up with some pie. I knew, of course, the odds were pretty low, but there are 6 grocery stores within 2 miles of my house. I knew one of them hadn't been open at all on Thanksgiving, but figured at least the 24-hour Safeway would be open. No joy.

Friday, Dick and Darryl walked to a nearby pet store and before they left, I told Darryl it was necessary that they get some pumpkin pie on the way back. They could also get pecan pie if they wanted. Despite Dawn's claims, I did not say they would ot be allowed back into the house without it. It's hardly my fault if they chose to infer anything sinister!

I did, in fact, have a piece of the pie on Friday evening, and it was good. It came from Whole Paycheck and was both better AND cheaper than one of the other stores near us.

Cut to Saturday night. We had a nice simple dinner of some of our favorite ravioli, from The Pasta Shop. Dick's friend Linda arrived from Sacramento as we were finishing, and joined us for dessert.

But wait... Is that MOLD on the pumpkin pie??

Uh-Oh

A few minutes ago, Dawn attacked me as I sat innocently on the sofa with Rachel and Zachary. She started, completely without warning, to throw various stuffed toys at me. Despite the fact that not one of her first salvo scored a direct hit, I could let the assault go unanswered.

Several minutes of stuffed toy warfare ensued, with Dawn even hitting the children on occasion, until she surrendered (she called it a "truce") when I started tickling her.

At one point, as I started to throw one of Zachary's toys, it said....

Uh-oh!

How 'bout that?

I've long thought it strange that MUNI's automated announcements sounded more human than BART's. It seems BART may have upgraded their speech software... Both the voices (for some reason one direction is announced by a female voice and one by a male) seem to sound a lot better today. Still a little mechanical, especially on the word 'platform'.

Wanna Get Away?

I do, and I am. Work has been very hard for a while, and having a baby at home doesn't exactly reduce my average stress level (although it is often very nice to get to play with the kids when I get home). So I'm headed to So Cal to spend the weekend with Dan.

Theoretically, we're going camping in Joshua Tree, but since all the other people we invited have bailed at this point, we are going to play it by ear and do whatever the two of us feel like. No wrangling multiple cars or keeping everyone happy.

I'm sitting at gate 30 in the Oakland airport. My flight leaves for Burbank at 7:45. I haven't been flying as much lately. Haven't been on the road for work since February, or on a plane at all (as far as I can remember at the moment) since 7 months ago today, when we came home from Florida. Zachary was 6 days old and Dawn flew across the country with him by herself, while I brought Rachel home later in the day.

The security line is almost invariably shorter at terminal 1 (14 gates) then terminal 2 (18, all Southwest), so I had Dawn drop me there. There's NO ONE HERE. I walked right up to security where there were TWO people ahead of me. I'm not sure I've ever gone through security so fast.

Although a lot of the major changes to the airport we finished the last time I was here, it remains almost unrecognizable by comparison to what I'm used to. There are 32 gates now, instead of 25, and most of the airport is in pretty good shape, neither drab not run down.

There are at least 4 Starbucks and a Peet's where there used to be mostly nameless unknowns. And now they have not only the one decent place (360 Buritto) but also Fenton's, Max's, CPK, and a Pyramid! If I had more time and weren't figuring we'll get something to eat in So Cal, I'd probably try Pyramid.

I'm flying Southwest, which occupies the majority of the airport and all of terminal 2. Owing to poor timing, I was at the gate by 6;20, in time to contemplate the idea of hopping one of TWO earlier flights. I am on a very early fare, and would have to upgrade for $80 to take either one. Now, I understand that those are the terms of the ticket, but I'm surprised at Southwest. Each of the earlier flights left half full and it would have been an easy opportunity for Southwest to do something nice for me. Certainly, if I'd called ahead, even earlier this afternoon, it would make sense to charge me, not knowing how full the flight might get, but it would have cost them NOTHING to do it and would have pleased the customer. As it is, I am disappointed with them.