Gung Hay Fat Choy!

Today is the first day of the Lunar New Year! It's the year of the Rat - the first animal in the 12 year cycle.

We have a lot of rats in my family - both my Mom and Dad, my cousin, Cheri, and my niece, (my cousin's daughter) Evelyn!


3 generations of Rats - Evelyn, Barb, and Cheri

The Sign of the Rat

Being born under this sign determines many talents, as well as other characteristics that may not be so commendable. Rats are very lively and need a lot of mental and physical stimulation. They can be calm and perceptive, but sometimes their brains can cause a mental restlessness, tempting them to take on too much, only to discover they are unable to meet their commitments. Rats are blessed with one of the best intellects going. Add to their intelligence a curiosity and a bright imagination, and they seem as sharp as a needle.

My family got together for our annual Chinese New Year celebration this past Sunday. For the first time in the last few years, we held it in Stockton at my Grandparent's house. It was really nice having it back there again.

I got a refresher course on Mahjong - it's been several years since I've played, and I really wanted to pick it up again. Now, if we could only find the Mahjong set that everyone *claims* belongs to me! :)


Mahjong!

Grandma had been preparing for the Chinese New Year feast for several days - cooking for 20 people! We all did what we could to help, but really, Grandma had it all under control. Unfortunately, poor Auntie Lani was sick this year, and couldn't join us, so we were down to 19.


A whole lotta Chow
(photo courtesy of my cuz, Bruce. Thanks, Boo!)

It was a really nice day, and, for whatever reason, one of my favorite "Chinese New Year" celebrations in memory.

Gung Hay Fat Choy!

Slow Down!

I just witnessed the aftermath of a pretty bad bicycle accident on our block. I was in my office, which is in the front of the house, and heard that unmistakable sound of a car slamming on it's brakes.

I quickly went to look out my window and saw a car making a quick u-turn, then stopping just up the street from my house. When I looked out the side window of the bay window in our front room, I saw that someone was lying in the middle of the street.

I put my shoes on, grabbed my cell phone, and ran out to see if there was anything I could do to help. There were already 2 good samaritans there: one was his phone with 911, the other was trying to convince the fallen bicyclist to remain lying down.

I found out from of the of drivers (the one who did the quick u-turn) that he was driving down our street, and that the bicyclist was speeding behind him (probably 3-35 MPH). He saw through his rear view mirror that the bicycle's front wheel began to wobble, and that the bicyclist had lost control, and flipped up off his bike, and landed hard on the street.

The poor guy. You could just tell that he was really shaken up, and probably in shock. We tried to keep him down on the ground, but he was adamant about wanted to stand up. Eventually, we got him to sit down on the stairs of a nearby stoop until the paramedics came. The fire fighters, ambulance, and police came within a couple of short minutes, and took him away to the hospital.

Dick and I have always commented on how quickly people drive up and down our street. We're a bit of a thorough way between 17th Street and Noe Valley, and sometimes, people just tear down the street. I think they forget that they are in a residential area.

A neighbor and I talked at the accident scene, and he was thinking about calling the City to see if we could put up speed bumps or caution signs. Not sure if that's possible or not, but it would certainly be helpful.

Luckily, there weren't any cars involved in the bicycle accident today. According to the driver who was in front of the bicyclist, the bicyclist ran through the stop sign at the top of the street, and was tearing down the hill when he lost control.

Slow down, people.

I voted

Please make sure that you do, too!

Chinese New Year Dinner

Table for 19! That's a lot of Chow.

Dick & Grandma cook Chinese New Year Dinner

Mah Jong!!

New Hat!

Dick was very sad when he accidentally left his hat on CalTrain a
couple of weeks ago. I've left messages with Caltrain's lost and
found, but so far, no luck.

This morning, we drove down to Fillmore Street to Mrs. Dewson's Hats
. My sister had worked with Mrs Dewson a few years ago when she
worked on the show, "Crowns".

Mrs Dewson has had her shop on Fillmore for over 35 years. It is THE
place to find a hat in San Francisco.

After searching for a while, Mrs Dewson was able to help Dick find the
perfect hat. :)

Happy (Belated) MINIversary!

BAD MINI Owner! BAD, Bad, bad....

Oh no! I forgot that yesterday was my MINI's 4th MINIversary!

Happy MINIversary!

I can't believe I've had her, "MINI Driver", for four years already.
Seems like just yesterday that we picked her up from the dealership!

I think this also means that my extended warranty has expired! Hmmmm. I should look into that!

I suppose one of these years, I'll stop talking about my MINI so much, but it probably won't be this year. :)

A Handy-Dandy Costco Tip

A few years ago, I signed up for a Costco American Express Cash Rebate Card. As you may know, Costco does not take Visa or Mastercard, but it does accept AmEx, Discover and Bank Debit cards.

For years, I used my ATM/Debit card, which was fine, but I would have much preferred to just charge everything to a credit card and pay the lump sum in full at the end of the month.

Enter the Costco AmEx Card. This card, with no annual fee, not only allowed me to charge my Costco purchases, but also gave me 1-3% back in a Costco Rebate check each year. Handy dandy. The breakdown for how much percentage you'll get in a rebate is: 3% for dining out, 2% on travel expenses, and 1% for purchases everywhere else, including Costco (but not including gasoline, alcohol, or cigarettes) . Usually, I only qualify for the 1% tier, since I only use my AmEx card at Costco.

Well, apparently, they introduced a new card last year called the "TrueEarnings Card" from American Express and Costco. The rebate schematic is the same as before, except now, starting in February, you can also receive 3% back on gas purchases! Not bad.

Here's the thing: if you had a AmEx/Costco Platinum Card (like I do) you have to call the number on the back of the card, and have them actually switch you over to the new card.

No reason not to do it (which I just confirmed with the sales rep who helped me out). It's the same rebate structure, with the addition to the 3% rebate for gasoline. Still, no fees, etc.,

...and that's your handy-dandy Costco tip of the day! :)

Happy Birthday, Tiffie!

Happy Birthday to my sister, Tiffini!



Just look at how young my parents were!

Today's walk down Castro Street

This afternoon, I took another stroll down Castro Street and caught more production action of the filming of "Milk".

It's such a surreal experience every time I take this walk during the production of the movie. There's something new to see each day, and even more storefronts have been transformed back to the 70s. Over the last couple of days, the street has been filled with actors and extras dressed in 70s garb, and cars from the era are the only ones parked along the street.

I was stopped, along with several other passer-bys, as the production crew was filming another scene in front of Harvey's Camera Store across the street. We waited for a few minutes as they wrapped it up before letting us continue. There are several campaign posters up on the windows of the camera store now, bearing Harvey Milk's name, but Sean Penn's photo. Surreal.


Harvey Milk's Camera Store and Campaign Headquarters transformed back in time.

As I walked down to Market Street I saw several more storefronts that had undergone the transformation. My favorite cookie store (Hot Cookie) now bears the Double Rainbow Sign. (that wouldn't be bad to have around, either!)

The Quickly Store (that makes bubble tea)is masquerading as a real estate office with several flyers taped to the windows showing the housing prices of the era: $40,000-$50,000!

Toad Hall, one of the most popular bars in the Castro during the 70s was resurrected. Dick and I watched the filming of a scene in front of this building this evening.

The Bank of America building, which is now a Diesel Store, has a sign bearing it's the bank's name on it again. (although they put it on the side of the building on Castro Street, where the Sprint Store resides, rather than the actual corner of Market and Castro.)

The Castro Theater has been restored to it's former glory. The colors are magnificent - I haven't ever seen it look so beautiful. I heard from a friend that the theater's marquis hadn't fully functioned since the 80s. My favorite part of walking past it today was what I read on the marquis: "The Poseidon Adventure"! (not actually showing!)

And finally, as I turned the corner of Castro at Market, I noticed that even the Chevron Station had gotten into the act: it's prices were turned back to the 70s as well!



I really love watching all of this transformation and action happening in the neighborhood. Everyone that I've talked to seems to be excited about it as well - we're all so happy to see that the producers of the movie seem to be paying to much attention to the detail of our great neighborhood.

Stay tuned. I think there will be another week or so of production before they wrap up.

update:
Here's a great article about the movie and the filming in the Castro in today's sfgate.com.

Happy (early) Birthday, Sis!

Tomorrow (January 30th) is my sister's birthday! Happy Birthday, Sis!

Mondays are her days off from the theater, so we went out for a celebratory dinner last night. We went to one of our favorite restaurants (and a usual birthday dinner spot for our family): Roys. (Mmmmm... Butterfish!)

Sunset Idea House

Today I went with my Mom and Dad to the 2007 Sunset Idea House, which (conveniently for me) was located this year in the Mission District of San Francisco.

It was pretty interesting. It's the first one that I've been to, although my parents have been to many.

The theme of this particular house was "green" - it featured many eco-friendly features: Hot water is provided by rooftop tubes that collect solar energy, electricity will come from SunPower solar panels and a wind turbine installed in the backyard.

The design was too industrial-modern for my taste, but that's probably because I'm a little biased to Victorian and Edwardian architecture in San Francisco. The atmosphere of the interior was very cold to me, because all of the cement walls, floors, counters, etc., Although, I have to admit that I walked around with my shoes on (as all visitors did) so I wasn't able to enjoy the water-based radiant heated floors throughout.

I took a few photos. One is of the main level, as you walk through the front door. It shows the indoor lap pool, with a steam/sauna room adjacent to it. Another is the backyard, taken from the 3rd level of the house. I focused on the "rain chain" - an idea I had seen in a photo before, and really liked.



If you're interested in seeing the Sunset Idea House in San Francisco, better go soon! Tomorrow is the last day. Here's more info.

Oh, and if you're interested in buying the 1,200 sq ft apartment in the building (the actual house is not on the market) for just under $1 million, (price recently drastically reduced!) in San Francisco Mission District ($1,000,000 for a condo, without parking, in the Mission) here's more info: 1303alabama.com.

Milk

The Castro is going back in time! 30 years to be exact.

Production of the film, "Milk" has begun. Harvey Milk was was the first openly gay city supervisor of San Francisco, California, and therefore, according to Time magazine, "the first openly gay man elected to any substantial political office in the history of the planet".

He is considered by some to the be Martin Luther King of the Gay Community.

(from Wikipedia):

In 1972, Milk moved to San Francisco. He settled with his partner Scott Smith and opened a camera store, Castro Camera, in the Castro gay village. He emerged as a community leader, founding the Castro Valley Association of local merchants, and represented the neighborhood businesses in dealing with the city government.

Milk ran for the San Francisco Board of Supervisors unsuccessfully twice, in 1973 and 1975. He emerged as a figurehead for San Francisco's large gay community, and was known as the "Mayor of Castro Street", a title which he himself coined. With each campaign, he garnered a larger number of supporters.

Milk's opponent in the 1975 race was Art Agnos, who would win the assembly seat by 3,600 votes out of 33,000 ballots cast.

After San Francisco switched from at-large to district elections, Milk was elected to the Board of Supervisors on his third attempt in 1977, the first openly gay elected official of any large city in the United States, and only the third openly gay elected official in all of the US, after Kathy Kozachenko and Elaine Noble. Milk represented District 5, which included the Castro.

In his eleven months as a Supervisor, he sponsored a gay rights bill for the City as well as – famously – a pooper-scooper ordinance. He was also instrumental in defeating Proposition 6, The Briggs Initiative, backed by State Senator Briggs, which would have allowed openly gay men and lesbians who were teachers to be fired based on their sexuality. In November 1978, Proposition 6 was soundly voted down by Californians.

Harvey Milk was assassinated, along with then-Mayor, George Moscone on November 27, 1978. They were killed at City Hall by Dan White, a former San Francisco City Supervisor. In a controversial verdict, which led to the coining of the legal slang "the Twinkie defense," White was convicted of manslaughter rather than murder.

This year marks the 30th anniversary of the assassinations. The movie is being filmed now, and is set to be released towards the end of the year. Director Gus Van Sant is directing the film, which stars Sean Penn as Milk.

They are doing some of the filming on Castro Street, and have transformed part of the street to the way it looked 30 years ago. Harvey Milk's Camera store was on Castro, between 18th and 19th Street. He lived in an apartment upstairs, and used the back of the store as his campaign headquarters. The same building which he had lived/worked in has recently been transformed, as well as some of the businesses around it.

I took a walk down Castro Street yesterday, and snapped some photos. I didn't realize until I was taking the photos they were actually in production. You can see a scaffolding set up in the middle of the street (where the orange cones are) in one of the photos, filming a scene in front of the camera store. You can also see how some storefronts have been transformed, although the businesses inside are still open for business! Our favorite Thai restaurant, Thai House Express is temporarily sporting the facade of "China Court", which is what it was for years, until only about 3 years ago. You can also see "Aquarius Records" next store to it, which has also been long gone. (Thanks to Andrew for the photo of the Aquarius Records sign being put up.)



Since I took these shots during production, you'll see that all of the cars in them are all period to the late 70s. They even went so far in detail that I noticed them painting all of the sidewalk trash cans beige, over the dark green that they usually are.

I also took a photo of our beloved Castro Theater, which is also getting a face lift. I'm not positive, but I assume that the timing of it's new look is coinciding with the filming of "Milk".

Lastly, I'm including a couple of photos that I took from Harvey Milk Plaza, which is on the corner of Market and Castro, down by the entrance to the MUNI Station. There are a series of photos down here depicting the life of Harvey Milk, showing the impact that he had on our community.



I recently heard about the "Milk March" which will be held late in the evening of February 8th. The movie is looking for volunteers to appear as unpaid extras. They will be recreating the famous Candlelight march through the Castro the night after Milk and Mayor Moscone were assassinated in 1978.

I signed up for this evening, as well as two others (which don't seem to be mentioned on the web site anymore). I think this will be a fascinating opportunity to be a part of something important. For me, it's not about "being an extra in a movie". It's more about having the experience of participating in something that is so historically significant to my neighborhood, and my community.

Let me know if you'll be there on any of the nights - would love to hook up with some friends!

Update
Here's a really good article about the movie production that I just found on the B.A.R.

Tonight's Dinner

My new favorite recipe: Vegetable Chili. Good, and good for you! :)

Baby, it's cold outside...

...and inside, too!

Handy iPhone App

Thanks to Mike for sending this to me:

http://sf.munitime.com/

This handy little app checks SF MUNI arrival times for you via your iPhones.

Mr. Owl....

How many licks does it take to get to the Tootsie Roll center of a
Tootsie Pop?

A Whole New World - a Follow-up

Oh, my. This just keeps getting better.

Someone was clever enough to put Nick Pitera's recording over the scene from the movie:



If you haven't seen the video of Nick Pitera singing this (which I put up on my blog yesterday), be sure to watch that, too!

Jury Duty

Here I am, sitting in the Jury Assembly Room of the Civic Center Courthouse.

I received my summons for jury duty a few weeks ago, checked the website Friday afternoon, and found that I did indeed need to report in today.

I served on a jury about 3 years ago, and actually found the process rather fascinating. I'm wondering how far along in the system I'll go this time around.

So far, this experience is already a lot better than last time. This time, I'm at the Courthouse in Civic Center, by City Hall. It's a much nicer building than the one I had to report to last time on Folsom Street. Also, last time, there wasn't any good public transportation options, so I had to drive, and park at a pricey lot. This time, it's MUNI to Civic Center! Much better.

The jury assembly room is also much nicer. Lots of large, wooden tables, with plenty of outlets for all of us and our laptops. I opted to pay the $5.95/day for wireless internet access. Since we're on the basement level, my iPhone doesn't have a signal, and I just couldn't sit around for who knows how long without checking email, surfing the web, and updating my Facebook status! Plus, you know, the beauty of laptops: there's always work to do. :)

So, here I am. I got here around 8:15 (15 minutes early) and was able to snag a nice, large table in the room. I've got my bottle of water, my dried fruit to snack on, and my laptop to work on, and to keep me company.

We'll see how it goes.
Stay tuned.

update
12:00 Noon

Well, that was fairly uneventful. They pulled us into the court room at 10:00, then proceeded to tell us how long the trial was scheduled to go for. 6 weeks! I wouldn't have minded serving on a jury, not even for that long, but I decided to submit a hardship form since that would've been too long for me to go without work/pay. I was sent back to the jury assembly room to see if there are any other, shorter trials that I could be considered for, but when I got down there, I was dismissed for at least another year.

So, I'm out about $9 from the experience: $5.95 for wireless internet (which I used for about 1.5 hours) and $3 for round trip MUNI fare. Not bad.

A Whole New World

My cousin, Cheri, sent me this link last week. She and I are both Disney Animation Fans.

My initial thought: this guy has an amazing voice! He actually sounds like the voice who sang the voice in the movie! (which is saying a lot!) Which reminds me, the character of Aladdin was my first and only cartoon crush. I mean, come on, the guy was dreamy. ;)

Anyhow, watch the video. Turn on the sound on your computer, and make sure to watch it in its entirety. This guy really does have an amazing voice, so much so, that it may surprise you.

MacWorld 2008

My Mom, my sister and I have a long standing tradition of going to Mac World San Francisco together. My Mom pulled my sister and I out of high school for a day in 1985 so we could attend the first one!

We also have a routine: we meet for an early lunch/breakfast at Mel's Diner at 5th and Mission, then head over to the Exhibit Hall. For the last couple of years, we've attended on a Friday, which is the last day, because it coincides with one of my Mom's days off.

So, we met all this morning at 11:00. My sister's boyfriend, Graham, also joined us. After lunch/breakfast, we headed over to the registration area. The registration was actually held in the new section of Moscone center this year (Moscone West).

It was a good year. It seems like it was larger this year that it has been for the past couple of years. There were two exhibit areas - the main one, and another large and busy one in Moscone West.

All the same stuff: lots of accessories for your iPod/iPhone/Mac, etc.,

We breezed through everything, including the Apple area. I was mildly interested in actually picking up (physically) the new Mac Book Air, just to test the weight. It really is remarkably light. The touch pad was also pretty cool - works like the screen on the iPhone. I still don't have any desire to buy one, though. At this point, it seems like a really great travel laptop, or presentation laptop, but not a serious full-time computer.

I didn't buy anything today. There simply wasn't anything that I "needed". If I had needed a cover or new carrying case for my iPhone, or my laptop, it would certainly have been the perfect place. Alas, I'm very happy with what I already have, and don't have any need for replacements. :)

Actually, there was something that I would have bought today, if given the option. I found these super cute little iPod/AM/FM clock radios. I've been looking for something compact that I can put on the shelf of the new bathroom. These really fit the bill. They are about the size of a square Kleenex box. Unfortunately, they weren't selling them at the show, and even more unfortunate, they won't have a web site for another month or so (or something like that. I couldn't quite figure it out). They did mention that I could find them on ebay, which I did tonight, but have discovered that it's only available right now in the UK. I think I'll just wait another month or so...



Here are a few fun pictures that I took today.

Moose Head Magnets!

(from my sister, from Canada)

Andy & Dick putting at the driving range

Out and enjoying the first sunny day we've had all week.

Morning Buns

This morning, I drove Dick to the train station about an hour earlier than we have been for the past couple of weeks. I've mentioned earlier that San Francisco is a sleepy City - it seems that everyone (including us) goes to bed early, and wakes up late. I noticed immediately how much quieter the streets are at 7:30 (which, really, isn't very early at all!) compared to 8:30.

As we drove by Tartine Bakery at the corner of 18th and Guererro, I noticed that the line, which is usually out the door, was much shorter than it usually is when we drive by. There also seemed to be a few parking spaces out in front. I made a mental note to come by on my way home to see if I could park and grab a treat for breakfast on my way home.

I got back to the bakery around 8:00, and found a 10 minute parking-zone spot right in front! I waited in line behind 3 people, and happily ordered myself a "Morning Bun" to go.

If you haven't been to this bakery, you really must check it out. Their pastries are simply some of the best I've ever had. Don't get scared off from the lines (usually out the door, and down the sidewalk). They move quickly enough, and really, it's worth the wait.

I''m going to go downstairs now and eat my Morning Bun with a mug of peppermint tea. What a nice way to start the day!

Honey, I'm home!

This is a look that Dick has been sporting for the past month or so.

I call it his "Honey, I'm Home!" look.

I love it. It's got a 50s, Ward Cleaver thing going for it.

It's really all about the hat. Love the hat. Apparently, he's had the hat for several years, but hadn't worn it in a long time.

Inaugural Celebration

This evening, Dick and I were invited (along with several hundred other people) to attend the inaugural celebration of SF Mayor, Gavin Newsom's second term. The event was at The DeYoung Museum in Golden Gate Park.

Geeky McGeekster

When Geeky Worlds Collide...

Dick and I just bought a new toy. It's a Garmin NUVI 760 GPS device. It's pretty cool. We honestly don't drive outside of SF very often, so we haven't had a chance to really use it yet, but we've had fun taking it around the town, and testing out what it can do.

The Garmin web site has a few 3D vehicles that you can download to show up as your vehicle on the screen. I was really hoping to find a MINI Cooper, but no luck.

Last night, I was surfing around some MINI forums to get some opinions on a GPS mounting option for my car, and I came across some MINI icons for the Garmin! Imagine my excitement!

This morning, as I was riding with Dick to the CalTrain station, I decided to take a picture of the GPS screen with my little MINI Cooper, tootling along the Streets of San Francisco. Pretty cute, huh?

Unfortunately, it only has the option for a checkered roof and bonnet strips, but it's still a Chili Red MINI Cooper, none-the-less. I may play with it a bit to see if I can make some digital modifications. :)

BTW: here's the mounting system I'm thinking about getting for my MINI (the second option down). Has anyone used the Kuda products before? Thoughts?

Another reason why I love Pete

not that I needed another...

Today I received an email from iTunes saying that I'd received a gift from a friend. Turns out that Pete had bought me a copy of the "Star Wars Theme / Cantina Band (12" Disco Mix) off of "The Best of Meco" Album.

OMG! I remember when this song first came out (obviously soon after the movie) and I LOVED it! It's got it all: the main theme, R2D2 beeps, the cantina music (all disco-ed up) and jawas, all rolled up into 3 minutes, 48 seconds of disco goodness.

I'm a happy geek. :)

Trina Chow: Soccer Mom?

Our friends, Abbe and Eve, have recently moved into the neighborhood! :) Their new (gorgeous) home is only about 3 blocks from us.

Abbe started a new job yesterday in Palo Alto. When we had dinner together last week, she asked Dick about his experience with CalTrain. Dick has been taking Caltrain to work for several years now, and highly recommends it, so she decided to give it a try.

We told her that Dick usually rides his scooter to the station, unless it's very cold or raining out. If that's the case, then I drive him back and forth.

Abbe and Eve decided to start out by having Eve drive Abbe to the station since they don't quite know the parking situation yet.

Yesterday, Dick and Abbe saw each other while they were on the same train home. Dick rode his scooter home, and Eve picked up Abbe. After Dick told me about their encounter last night, I suggested that he call Abbe to offer her a ride today, since we were expecting rain for the next few days.

Abbe went in earlier than Dick today, so Eve dropped her off again, but I'm all set to pick them both up from the station this afternoon.

Eve called me about an hour ago, confirming my plans to pick both Dick and Abbe up. She also offered to drive Dick tomorrow morning, if he wanted to go on the same train as Abbe.

I started laughing because we sounded like a couple of mothers trying to arrange a car pool for our kids. I told her that this must be what it feels like to be a soccer mom. :)

New Year's Day Dinner

the Chinese girl from California is learning...

In the Southern tradition, we made Greens (Collard) and Black Eyed Peas (in the form of Hoppin' John) for dinner.

The black eyed peas represent good luck and the greens signify prosperity.

We do this meal almost ever year on New Year's Day. We used a new recipe (for us) for the Hoppin' John - gotta love the Mama Dip's Cookbook. It was both of our favorite version by far. Mmmmm.

Which brings me to to the question: who is John, and why is he hoppin'?

Happy New Year!!

Taken from P&R's house. Watching the fireworks from the Embarcadero.

House of Nanking

Hanging with the tourists in a line 20 people deep at 2:15 pm! (but we
found a parking spot 1 block away, and put 10 quarters into the meter
(for 1 hour!) and I refuse to leave!!)

update

Since I've had so many people ask, I should explain why we were at the House of Nanking.

It's a great, whole-in-the-wall Chinese Restaurant on Kearny Street - on the edge of Chinatown and Little Italy. It's a different kind of Chinese Food - not as traditional (to me) as my other favorite Chinese Restaurant, U-Lee.

Dick introduced me to this place years ago. We both love it, but we don't go very often. It's pretty far away, and in an area that's fairly difficult to park. It has also become very popular amongst the tourists, as it's featured in many guide books. Because of this popularity, there's usually a line wrapping outside. (and that's even AFTER the remodel that they did a few years back that more than doubled their space!)

If you go, I highly recommend the House of Nanking Chicken (served with yams), and the Baby Pea Shoots. (something that wasn't on actually on the menu until we went this time - when I'd been before, it was what the owner recommended to us). I'm sure everything on the menu is very good, but honestly, these two dishes are SO good, that it's the only things we've tried!

The elves have been busy!!

Buying don tot in Chinatown

Andy & Dick wait in line at Golden Gate Bakery

Mousie Cookies!!!

Noe's new favorite spot

Underneath the sink, on top of the heated floor, in the new bathroom.

It's Official: I'm having one of "those" days.

..and the only thing that's helping me keep my cool right now is that I have to get ready to go out for a client meeting in 10 minutes.

In a nutshell (and because I have to leave):

sometime this morning: some ass let his big dog poop right in front of our stairs, so I had to spray it down so people wouldn't track it into our house by accident (getting grumpy)

1:00: find out Mykail isn't coming home for Christmas. :( (sad)

1:45: painter comes to finish touch ups (yay!)
He asks if I want him to bring the cans of paint back into the basement. I offer to do it instead.

While I'm down there, I drop two containers of paint (that I was using for quick touch ups). Both containers break, and spread paint all over the basement floor, and on my clothes. (over-the-top grumpy!)

This is not the end of the world by any means, but really, I want to scream.

Update:
I've made it to my meeting in time but realized while I was on MUNI that I didn't get all the paint off my hands, and my black sweater has cat hair all over it. OY.

Update to my update:
Client meeting went really well. Nice people, and we hit it off.
I stopped at "Hot Cookie" on Castro Street and got a chocolate cookie on the way home. :) I'm fairly convinced that a chocolate chip cookie can make almost any day a little better.

D'oh!

Oh man, I hate it when I do things like this.

Like most people, when it starts to get cold each winter, Dick and I will turn on the heaters on both floors (2 condos, 2 furnaces). Both furnaces are pretty old, but the one for upstairs is really old. For the last couple of years, when I tried to turn on the upstairs heat, it wouldn't work, and we'd have to go down to the basement to light the pilot light, and that would get it up and running. While we're down there, we also remember to change filters. :)

About 3 weeks ago, it started to get really cold, so we turned on the heat, but nothing happened. We went to the basement, lit the pilot light, tried to turn it on again, but still... nada.

When we moved the switch on the thermostat, we could hear the little "click" that you hear when you know it's turning on, but nothing was happening. We fiddled with it for quite some time, then figured that a) the thermostat was broken and needed to be replaced, b) the furnace was kerbusted and needed to be replaced, or c) all of the above.

I asked my contractor for a recommendation for a heating company, and got an immediate referral. (always nice) When I called the company, they were booked solid (because it's the beginning of winter, and everyone is calling them now!) and I had to wait more than a week for an appointment. Which is fine.

So, the repair guy came out this morning. I told him the situation. He came upstairs to check out the thermostat first. He turned it up all the way. (I had tested it by turning it up to 75 or 80 degrees, but not all the way up to 90)

Before we headed down to the basement, he asked to use our bathroom. While he was in there, I started to smell that familiar smell that the heater makes when it's blowing warm air up the ducts for the first time in a year....

What, really?

So yeah. The heat was working again. And all he did was turn up the thermostat.
...and we've been freezing our tushes off for the past 3 weeks.

Duh.

He was super nice. Since he really didn't do anything, he offered not to charge me, even though I knew that the company had a minimum 1 hour charge. He also offered to take a peek at our furnace to check it out. He said it was at least 30 years old, and that we should plan to replace it soon.

Anyhow, it was a funny story, and I really appreciate that he was so nice and didn't charge us. You know they'll get our business when we decide to replace the furnace!

Cozy Kitty

This is where I found Noe yesterday as I was heading out: on the bed,
between the pillows, and underneath the comforter. It's a good life.

More than meets the eye...

robots in disguise

Last night, Dick and I watched the movie Transformers

I had heard it was a pretty good movie, but we were both surprised how much we both really loved it! Okay, not the best movie ever made, but some good entertainment!

I remember hearing about the movie before it came out thinking, "Seriously? A movie about a toy line from the '80s?".

Actually, what really cracked me up was realizing that I although I never had the toys, and never watched the cartoon, I learned enough from watching TV ads for the toys in the 80s to remember that Megatron was the leader of the Decepticons. That's some pretty serious toy commercial brainwashing!

Anyhow, GREAT special effects, a fun action-fill story, a decent cast, and some surprisingly funny dialog. What a fun film!

taking a break

After a busy last several weeks, I decided to take a mental health day today. (one of the big perks of working from home!)

Here I am, sitting in an empty theater, with popcorn and a coke in hand. I'm waiting to see The Golden Compass, which I've been looking forward to seeking for awhile.

I've never been to see a movie by myself before! No real reason, except that I don't often go out to see movies in theaters. It's pretty cool, though - I'm really glad I'm doing this. What a nice treat.

Bonus: before I left the house, I remembered that I had an AMC giftcard! Woo Hoo! ;)

You swooped me? I'll swoop you right back!

Some of you may know that I'm a fan of ebay. According to my ebay stats, I've been a member since January 14. 1998. Wow - that's a long time. Being a collector of a few different things, I often follow auctions to see what things are going for, and I will occasionally participate in one as either a buyer or a seller.

When I'm serious about trying to "win" an auction, I do my best to "swoop" in during the last minute or few seconds of the auction. You know the drill: you wait until the last few minutes, constantly refresh the browser, watching the minutes/seconds count down, then, during the final 60 seconds or so, you put in your bid, hoping that once you've completed all of the steps, you will have come out victorious! It's all very exciting - just as they intend it to be. :)

Last weekend, I was trying to swoop on a particular item. My theory: bid as high as your comfortable paying, and if you get it great, but if you don't, you can't feel bad, because you already decided what your limitations are. So anyway, here I was, swooping at the last second with my high bid, my bid is accepted, and I'm the high bidder. But wait: there are a few mere seconds left. Refresh one more time, and damn, someone named "iluvebay" swoops in and wins the auction. (okay, that wasn't really their ebay name, but you get the idea.) And then you curse out loud: "Damn you, (insert ebay name here)".

This happens more often than not, which is okay, because I still follow my rule of knowing how high I'm willing to bid, and not to be to upset that it goes higher.

So there were two more auctions that I was following ending this afternoon. These were both similar items to the item that I "lost" last weekend. (I always try to remember that these things do have a habit of coming back up for auction if you're patient, and wait it out.) I did the swoop again, with about 45 seconds to go. Again, i was the high bidder with a few scant seconds left, then...... "Sorry, you've been outbid".... by the same person as last weekend! "Damn you, (insert ebay name here)".

8 minutes later, the second auction was ending. "Okay, (insert ebay name here)I'm on to you now!" This time, I waited even longer - perhaps 25 seconds before the end. Hit my submission, and....."Congratulations, YOU are the high bidder." Refresh once more, and it is verified that I had WON, and yes, the bidder-who-shall-not-be-named tried to swoop me once again, but I managed to be one up on them this time.

And now you know the crazy antics that I will go through to win an auction on ebay. It's quite hilarious, actually. Dick has watched me in the process a few times, and he gets all into it, too.

Just another day-in-the-life.

Thanks, I needed that!

With Dick up in Seattle for the night, and Richard down in Milpitas for his new job, Pete and I decided to get together tonight to hang out and relax.

The plan: Pizza (Chicago-style, even!) and "Elf".

First things first: the pizza was outstanding! One of the best I've had. It was indeed Chicago-style, but without as much cheese as I've had before. The sauce was really well seasoned, and it was chalk-full of goodies!

Secondly: "Elf". Pete has been telling me about this movie for years now - well, at least 4 years, since it only came out in 2004. I just never got around to seeing it.

I really enjoyed the movie - I think it was exactly what I needed. It was hilarious - I laughed so often! Plus, I didn't know it was directed b Jon Favreau. I love that guy.

If you haven't seen it yet, I recommend it. It's a very charming and funny holiday movie. Plus, Pete found it at Best Buy for only $10! You can't beat that!

Thanks, Pete! It was a great evening.

Giving Thanks, Moving Forward, and Finding Humor

First of all, I want to thank all of you who have sent emails, comments, and cards to me and my family in regards to my Grandpa's passing. I can't express how much your notes of love and support have meant to us.

In my 37 years, this is the first time that I've lost a close family member. That fact still amazes me, and I do not take it for granted. With this in mind, I've always been one of the people writing cards of sympathy to friends, offering them my condolences, wanting to do whatever I could to help in any small way. It never felt like enough.

Now I know that these emails and cards that I've received, phone calls, and hugs that I've received are SO much. I want you all to know how much strength and support you've given to me. I've always known how fortunate I am to have so many wonderful friends and family members: the best support system I could imagine.

I haven't had a chance yet to respond to any of your emails - I hope to start doing that tomorrow. Please know that I've received them, and loved reading every single one of them. They warm my heart.

Yesterday, my Mom, my Grandma and I went shopping for an urn in which to keep my Grandpa's ashes. None of us had ever been through this before, so we didn't really know what to expect. My sister had called my Mom earlier that day to remind her that Costco.com sells funeral items: coffins, urns, etc., (I'm sure I've blogged about that before!) So my Mom and I checked out Costco.com, printed out the urn selection, and brought it with us for comparison.

We went to a place in Downtown San Jose which (apparently) has a large selection of urns in stock. This gave us a chance to get a feel for what's available, what the sizes are, shapes, colors, etc.,

To make a long story short, we all agreed to go with one of the urns on costco.com. Now I realize that this may sound odd, but really, it's perfect.

My Grandpa would have gotten a kick out of knowing that we could buy this from Costco. I can hear him chuckling now. :)

In Loving Memory of Choo Chan

January 22, 1917 - December 7, 2007

I realized fairly early on that blogging was a therapeutic resource for me. There were times when it really helped me to be able to put my thoughts "out there" to share with others (whom ever that may be). I'm counting on this to be one of those times.

My Grandfather, Choo Chan, passed away this morning.

Although I am extraordinarily sad about this, I'm finding great comfort in thinking about all of the great memories I have of him.

Simply put, he was one of the best people I've ever known: he was kind, generous, loving and had a great sense of humor. He had an even temper, and always had a smile on his face.

He lived for over 90 years. He was married to his wife for 60 years. He loved his wife, he loved his daughter, and he loved his family.

He loved hot dogs and custard donuts.
He made the world's best Egg Foo Young.

He owned and operated his own Shoe Repair Shop in Downtown Stockton. He ran it for 50 years.

He was kind and generous: he would give money to the local "hobos", but only after he had figured out a way that they could work it off somehow so that they could retain their dignity. These same hobos referred to my Mom as "the shoe repairman's Daughter" and would watch after her as she walked to and from elementary school.

My Grandpa had a great sense of humor. He was always laughing, and always teasing. When I was young, he used to tease me by saying he was going to take some of my Raggedy Ann dolls. I believed him, and bought him a Raggedy Andy of his very own.

He used to call me "Chili Bean"
He used to carve the turkey for Thanksgiving, and would always sneak a few pieces to me.
He would give my sister and me $1 for every "A" that we showed him on our report cards.

He used to pick up these little plastic banks from McDonalds that were shaped like garbage cans (a McDonaldland character, at the time). He would save all of the pennies that he could save from his store, and he would present these banks to us, full of pennies when he saw us.

He loved animals, and all things small and cute.
He and my Grandma have a small brown teddy bear named "Half Pint". Grandpa would bring him to sit on their bedside table every night when they went to bed.
He would call anyone or anything small "Big Shot".

He used to walk me to the 7-11 by his house to buy me a Slurpee.

He couldn't pass up a deal. If he found a really good sale, not only would be buy one or two - he would usually buy something like 10!

He enjoyed shopping at Costco.

He liked gadgets.

One of my most recent favorite memories was when I showed him my iPhone. He was very impressed with everything it could do. He asked me how much it cost. I was embarrassed to tell him, because he was so frugal, and I was afraid he would think that I spent too much money. After I told him it was $600, he turned to my Mom and said, "That's not bad. I thought it would be $1,000! Barbara! You should get one, too!"

My Grandpa was one of the best men I've ever known. Everyone who knew him loved him.

I can't express how lucky I feel to have had 37 years with him.
He had a great life, and he knew how to be happy.

Goodbye, Grandpa. I will miss you, always.

Everyone looks great in this jacket!

I just got an email from my friend Barry, who had just finished reading my blog post from yesterday.

It turns out that Barry has a Chinese jacket very similar to the one that Dick wore to the Holiday Party Saturday night. Barry's was custom made for him in Beijing! (just a little further away than San Francisco Chinatown, where Dick bought his jacket.)



Here's a photo of Barry looking dashing in his jacket. Note that Barry is holding a doll - that's Hitty. Hitty belongs to Andrew, Barry's partner. Hitty travels all around the world with Barry & Andew. In this photo, she's wearing a custom made Chinese Silk Dress! (Hitty's wardrobe would make Barbie jealous.) You can view all of Hitty's Travel Photos Here.

Holiday Party at the Asian Art Museum

Dick's company's Holiday Party was this past Saturday Night. It was held at the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco. What an amazing venue that is. It's the second time in the last 5 years that the party has been here, and both times, the parties were really top notch and amazing! Really great food, open bar, and live entertainment (acrobats and musicians). Plus, the building itself is just gorgeous. The museum exhibits were actually open to us during the party, but unfortunately, Dick and I ran out of time, and didn't have a chance to see any!

While Dick's family was in town over Thanksgiving week, we brought them to Chinatown for shopping, and dim sum. I took them to Dragon Seed, the store where I had my cheongsam made for our wedding a couple of years ago. It's a really neat store, with all kinds of beautiful fabrics and clothing.

While we were there, Dick eyed a really beautiful men's silk Chinese-Style jacket. He tried it on, and it was a perfect fit - so much so, that his family and I all agreed that he had to buy it! That's when we remembered that the company Holiday Party was going to be held at the Asian Art Museum this year, and it would be the perfect event to wear it to.



Dick's jacket was a hit - he had many people compliment him on it during the evening. I wore a little black dress, along with one my my Chinese-Style jackets that actually complimented Dick's jacket quite well. :)

Graham playing @ The Red Devil Lounge, SF

Dick and I went out tonight (on a Friday Night?? Shocking!) to see Graham play at The Red Devil Lounge on Polk Street. Graham is the Bass Player for Jonathan Douglas.

The band sounded great! We both really enjoyed it. Unfortunately, I forgot to bring my regular camera, which would have enabled me to take a quick little video to post. But luckily, I at least had my iPhone with me, which always comes in handy for a quick shot.

Congrats on the great performance, Graham! We're looking forward to seeing the next show!

The Boot Dance, circa 1992

About a month ago, I set up a private social networking site for all of the Alumni of the State Street Review - a color guard from Madison, WI which I was a member of in 1992-1993. (They were around from 1978-1989, then again from 1992-1993)

The site has been a tremendous success so far: we already have 100 members!

People have been posting photos and video footage from our shows, rehearsals, trips, and miscellaneous adventures.

Two of my friends posted this great clip from our 1992 show, which was Country Western themed. We referred to this part of the show as "The Boot Dance". It was a really fun part of the show. And yes, I'm in there somewhere. Just look for the girl with the big hair!


Find more videos like this on The State Street Review Alumni Site

We now return to our regular scheduled programming

I just returned from bringing my father-in-law, and one of my sister-in-laws to the airport.

This concludes the 3-week visit with my father-in-law, Richard. My two sister-in-laws also came last week (Meg from Thursday through Sunday, and Kathy from Friday 'til this morning) and our niece, Adrianne, who came from (last) Monday through Sunday.

It was certainly a busy few weeks. Richard and I really had a nice time doing day-to-day things together: finding new places for breakfast and lunch (usually soup & salad, running errands together (my personal favorite was the day we went to Costco!) and taking nice walks around the neighborhood.

The last three weeks were not without their fair share of unplanned surprises: both Kathy and Meg were sick before coming out and had to reschedule their flights out. The bathroom remodel still had some work to be completed (really, it's almost done now). We ended up getting a room for everyone at the Palace Hotel for a few nights to ease the congestion of the craziness over at our house.

Adrianne and Dick managed to get out to play a few rounds of golf at Golden Gate Park last week. Meg made it in just in time to join all of us, along with the whole Chow Clan for Thanksgiving at my parent's house. Kathy came in on Friday morning, and we all spent the day in Chinatown and Union Square, and I even had the chance to take them all to my favorite Chinese Restaurant, U-Lee!

There was a lot of walking around the City, great food, and lots of cocktails! (my new joke is that the bathroom remodel has driven me to drink!)

I really enjoyed the visit with Dick's (and now my!) family. We've been really fortunate to have had a chance to spend so much time with each of them this year.

As I write this, I realize that my house is very quiet, and it is one of the first times in the last 3 months that I've been in the house alone - no contractors, and no house guests. It's a bit surreal.

Taking a moment...

I'm winding down from a really amazing evening - one of those times in life that you stop, and take a moment to appreciate what just happened.

We had a couple of guests over to the house for cocktails tonight. One of them was someone from my father-in-law's past - a former student whom he had not seen in 50 years!

It's times like this that I'm reminded of how the universe works sometimes - how an event can occur that you never dreamed would have been possible, but you always secretly hope that it might.

Life is really pretty amazing, and I'm so happy to be a part of it.

3 Craddocks & The Golden Gate Bridge

Dinner @ House of Prime Rib!

Judy & Ken at U-Lee!!

Dim Sum Lunch in Chinatown!

Thanksgiving Dinner

A gorgeous day at The DeYoung Museum

Gotta Go, Gotta Go!

Poor Noe. The bathroom remodel continues to disrupt her little cat life.

This morning, the painters returned to finish up some final touch-ups and last-minute additions. They came at 8:00, which I'm now realizing is before Miss Noe woke up.

When there's activity in the house, Noe will usually stay in our bedroom where it's nice and safe. Throughout the morning, I kept noticing her coming out of the bedroom, and peeking down the hallway where the work was going on. As soon as she saw one of the painters, she would jolt back into the bedroom. This continued for a about an hour.

That's when it occurred to me: Noe hadn't been out and about before the painters came, and she probably really needed to use her little box!

The kitty litter boxes live in the upstairs kitchen, which is just past where the bathroom hub-bub is going on. I brought Noe's litter box into the bedroom, and she hopped in immediately.

Noe's day should be a lot easier now. :)

The iPhone doesn't lie.

never question the iPhone

Yesterday afternoon, as we were out and about, I was using my iPhone to check the weather for the week. I was surprised that it had forecasted rain for today (Monday). So Dick and I made plans for me to drive him to the CalTrain station this morning. (I always drives him when it rains, so he won't have to drive his scooter.)

We left the house this morning at 7:30. It was sunny, with clear, blue skies!

I told Dick that perhaps the iPhone had lied to us.

"liePhone", he said.

(editor's note: that's funny!)

Well, here it is, two hours later, and lo and behold: it's raining out.

The iPhone doesn't lie.

I owe my iPhone a public apology.

Listen to your iPhone.
The iPhone is your friend.

Follow up - we're fine, and thank you!

"Uh, everything's under control. Situation normal. Uh, we had a slight malfunction, but uh.... everything's perfectly all right now. We're fine. We're all fine here now, thank you. How are you?"

I just wanted to let everyone know that we're all okay here. I received numerous emails and phone calls today after my last post about our accident in the cab last night.

I realized that since I wrote it minutes after it happened, and I was still a bit shaken up, it probably came across more melodramatic that I had intended.

We're all fine. Richard had a slight scrape on his leg, which fixed right up with a band-aid. Dick is fine, and my head just has a bit of an indentation on it. Go figure.

But we're totally fine. We were more shaken up than anything.

Thanks for all the comments, emails and phone calls.
We really appreciate it.

car accidents and the importance of seat belts

First of all, we all seem to be fine.

With that said, Dick, his father and I were just in a minor car accident.

We went out to dinner at Zuni this evening to celebrate Richard's birthday (which happens to be today).

We took a cab to and from the restaurant we wouldn't have to worry about parking or drinking.

We picked up a cab to the restaurant on Castro seat. I remember thinking that I should put on my seatbelt (because I always do) but that it was a little cramped in the backseat of the cab with the three of us, and the restaurant was only about 2 miles away.

With this in mind, we did the same thing on the way home. We caught a cab outside of the restaurant, and none of us (stupidly) put on our seat belts. Well, within a mile after leaving we were involved in a rear-end accident (our cab rear-ended the car in front of us). It took us all by surprise - none of us really knew what happened.

Luckily, we weren't going too fast (I'd guess around 25MPH) so it nearly as bad as it could have been. We all got a little banged up. Dick hit is head squarely on the passenger side headrest, Richard hit his knees and shins on the middle armrest, and I think I hit my head on the side of the headrest in front of me.

I'm developing a bit of a bump on my noggin' right now, and I'm feeling very stupid.

I always make a habit of wearing a seatbelt, and the fact that I thought about it tonight, chose not to wear one is going to bother me until the bump on my head goes away.

It strikes me at how bad car accidents can be - we weren't going very fast, and were on city streets, and the three of us were in the backseat. Had one of us been in the front seat without a seatbelt would've been much, much worse.

So, lesson learned. Always wear a seatbelt, matter how short the distance, and no matter what the inconvenience.

I'm going to go to bed now, and I hope I'll feel better in the morning.

I have friends?

I just noticed that I now have 50 friends on Facebook. I know that's not very many at all compared to a lot of people, but it surprises me.

I first joined Facebook in late July, I think. Dick had to pull my arm just a little bit. He kept telling me how much I'd like it. I resisted a little bit, figuring I wouldn't use it much, and that I wouldn't know many people using it anyway. Early on, I figured that the only "Friends" I would have on Facebook would be my cousins ("Hi" to my cousins!) and some of Dick's friends from work.

It didn't take me long to figure out that it was actually pretty cool. Since then, I've reconnected with some friends over-seas (including a long-lost friend from art school who I've been trying to find for years), some of my old color guard friends, and I even got a note from my favorite Science teacher from high school! Pretty cool!

So, now I have 50 friends on Facebook. And, I have to admit: I actually really like Facebook, and I'm on it more than I'd like to admit. (like I needed another internet addiction!)

Practically Done!

*whew*

The Great Bathroom Remodel of 2007 is (just about) Done!

Friday was a busy day here. The glass guys came in to install the mirror and shower doors. The electricians also came to install the sconces, the ceiling lights, and to connect all of the outlets, switches, and the thermostat for the floor heater.

By the time they left (around 3:00pm) the bathroom was functional and usable for the first time!

Woo Hoo!

We still have a few more things that need to be installed (glass shelves in the niches inside the shower, one long glass shelf under the mirror, and the mirror for the medicine cabinet) and a few adjustments and minor finishes to be done, but for all intents and purposes, the bathroom project is complete!

I cleaned it as best as I could on Friday afternoon, but had to wait until Sunday before I could really clean the shower for use. (had to let the epoxy on the shower door dry fully.) We used the shower for the first time yesterday, and let's just say: the experience was amazing! Best showering-experience ever!

here are the latest (and almost final) photos!
(it's kind of hard to capture a 5' x 10' bathroom with a camera.)

Dear Restoration Hardware, WTF?!

Okay, this one's a doozy.

Yesterday, we had the plumbers come in to install all of the fixtures into the bathroom: The new Toto Toilet, the sink and the shower fixtures.

Should be no problem, right? I mean, we had ordered all of these products months ago, and had specked out the the entire remodel based off of the dimensions for everything that we had ordered. The fixtures were all delivered and were sitting in the basement for several weeks before being installed.

You can see where this is going, right?

I *knew* that we'd hit a snaffu or two during the process of the remodel. I even figured we'd have *something* go wrong once we installed the fixtures. When we were putting in the electrical, the plumbing and the framing, we kept double-checking to make sure that our measurements were correct for all of the fixtures.

The toilet was installed with no issues - the center of the toilet was exactly 15" from the shower wall, and 15" from where the edge of the sink will be. Great. That's exactly the minimum amount of space that we must have to meet code.

Next: the sink. It's a porcelain sink with two chrome legs, which a towel bar between the legs. (Restoration Hardware stopped selling this product slightly after we bought it, so I can't link to it.) The sink dimensions, according to the website (which I had printed out when we placed our order) is:

Small Console Sink: 23-3/4"W x 17-3/4"D x 33-3/4"H

The sink was shipped in two boxes, but one shipment. One was the sink itself, from Restoration Hardware, the second was the chrome legs, with another companies name on it. Mildly curious, but okay.

So, the plumbers are working on putting everything together. Their building the legs, and installing the faucets, etc., I went into the room just as they were putting the sink on top of the legs, and immediately saw that it was too tall: the back of the sink was covering the electrical outlets that we had planned to be about 2 inches above the sink.

I asked them to stop immediately, told them it was too tall, and asked if the legs were adjustable. It should be noted here that the two plumbers who were here don't speak English, only Chinese. Unfortunately, much to my Grandparent's dismay, I still don't speak Chinese. (D'oh!) Dick was working from home yesterday, so he came in to check out the problem. It turns out that the legs aren't adjustable at all, and that they are full-on 4" too tall! I asked the plumbers who were here if we could call the head plumber, who has been working on the project throughout, and does speak English. We got a hold of him over the phone, I explained the problem to him, and he came right over.

He and Dick thought over the situation for a long time, trying to figure out a solution. The only thing they could come up with was cutting the bottom of each of the chrome legs by 4". This was risky because there was the cutting of the chrome, there was drilling of holes, and also creating a hole with thread so that a tiny screw could be properly screwed into the newly created hole.

Assuming that this all worked, we also had the issue of the sink legs being out of proportion now. There's a towel bar, which would now be 4" too low, which, I'm sorry, is fairly significant.

Anyhow, the cutting and drilling worked: our plumber was a complete rock star.
The sink looks good, the towel bar is low, but manageable.

This is all fine and good, but, come on! You order something based on it's dimensions, and it comes in 4" taller than it should be?! WebTrina was not going to let this one go.

So I called Restoration Hardware, explained my situation, and was immediately passed along to a Supervisor. She was very understanding of my frustration. It was late afternoon, and she and the vendor of the chrome legs were on East Coast time, so she promised to place some calls first thing Friday morning, and for me to call her when I woke up.

I got up and called her at 7:30.

The first thing she said was that she would refund us our $195 in shipping fees. Okay, that's very nice (really) but I still have a bogus sink. She said she hadn't gotten a hold of the vendor yet, but she was still working on it. cool.

Then, she said that she did talk with a Restoration Hardware Product Specialist, and that woman had said that the product legs could be cut 3" without any damage to the product. WTF? That's the solution? I was very careful to make sure that I didn't yell or get upset with the woman who was helping me, because frankly, she was doing a great job, and was only being the messenger at this point. But I did tell her that that sounded outrageous to me: "Yes, we know that the measurements of the product aren't the same as what we had advertised, but all you need to do is cut the legs by 3", and it will be fine." No, no, no!

My representative was very understanding that this was an unacceptable answer (I mean, really...) and promised to get a hold of the vendor to see what they could do.

10 minutes later, she called back. She'd gotten a hold of the vendor and they offered to ship us another set of legs - hopefully with the correct size. This part gets complicated, as it involves the shipping of new legs, old legs, checking to see if the new legs are the right size, and if they aren't sending them back with the corrected specifications, etc., After a lot of negotiating, I get to keep my (cut) legs on my sink, wait until the new legs arrive, see whether or not they are the right size, if they're not, send back the new legs with written specifications, and wait to get yet another set of new legs. If the new set that I get is right, then I just need to install them and send back my old legs. I expect this will be a little complicated, and go around in circles for a bit, but I'll do what I need to do to make this right.

I am utterly impressed with my Restoration Hardware representative who is helping me out. She's really doing a fantastic job of follow-up and problem solving. Once this is all over, I'll be sure to write her a glowing letter. I'm really unimpressed and disappointed in Restoration Hardware that they would actually sell (or used to sell) a product with the incorrect dimension, and expect the customer to fix it on their end. (Cutting the legs could've easily gone wrong, and cost us more time and money.)

Anyhow, I just needed to vent. I knew something was probably going to be wrong with the fixture installation, but I just didn't think that the sink would come in 4" taller than advertised.

Time Machine Rocks

I've been using it to back up my system since Saturday. Today was the first time that I needed to restore a file.

it totally rocks.

this app was worth the price of admission alone.

Dick picking his Dad up at the airport

So Close!

Hey, remember that bathroom remodel? I haven't blogged about it for a while, but it's still going on, and nearly complete!

Here are a bunch of pictures and descriptions to get you up to date.



The painter (yes, singular, because the room is too small for two people at once) has been here since Monday. He's planning to finish today.

The plumber will come tomorrow morning to install the shower fixtures, the sink, and the toilet. The electrician comes in after him to install the sconces, and to hook up all of the outlets and switches, then the glass people come to install mirror and the shower door.

I've arranged for my cleaners to come tomorrow afternoon to help me clean the back of the house. It's all kinds of dusty back there!

This is all great timing. Dick's dad comes this evening to stay with us for 3 weeks. (yay!) We've decided to get a hotel room for him for the first couple of nights, so we'll have time to finish the project before he comes to stay.

Almost there!

One Foggy Morning

This morning we woke up around 7:00, and when I looked outside, saw that it is the foggiest morning that I can remember seeing in our neighborhood in a long time. I drove Dick to the CalTrain station, and we went in and out of fog banks along the way.

It's One Foggy Morning, all right.

which is not to be confused with One Froggy Evening!


"hello, my baby, hello, my darling....

Installing Leopard

that was easy...

I woke up this morning at 5:00 for no apparent reason, so I thought I'd get up and install the new Apple OS that I just picked up yesterday afternoon.

I backed up all of my important files to my external drive first (did that on Thursday, actually), just in case any problems occurred during the transition.

The installation took about an hour or so, and went very smoothly. Everything seems to be back up and running just fine.

One of the features that I was most interested in is Time Machine - a utility that will automatically back up your files. I had been using Retrospect for a while, but was very unsatisfied with it. I actually stopped using it all-together a few months ago, and have been looking for a better solution ever since.

Time Machine claims to keep:
-hourly backups for the past 24 hours
-daily backups for the past month
-weekly backups until your backup disk is full

cool. I started running it about 30 minutes ago, and it's chugging along now.

Another feature that I'm interested in is Boot Camp. This utility will allow me to run Windows on my Mac. This will come in very handy - I've had a separate PC set up for years so that I can test my web sites on dual platforms and browsers. I've also been running Quickbooks off of that, but I suppose I should upgrade to a Mac version of that,anyway.

Anyhow, so far, so good. I'm always happy when the upgrade to a new OS goes smoothly. It just seems like so many things could go wrong!

The Muppet Matrix

Pete just sent this to me, and I couldn't stop laughing.

This is all kinds of funny.

We have a parking spot in a garage!!!

After living in San Francisco for 12 years, I'm thrilled to report that I am able to park my car in a garage for the first time!

Dick and I have always not-so-secretly hoped that we would someday be able to find a garage in the neighborhood to rent. We've looked into adding a garage to our own house, but that would require physically raising and moving the house, building a new foundation, in addition to lots of time and a ton of money.

Parking on the street for our two cars has been surprisingly not too problematic: we can usually always park somewhere on the block, and even usually even in front of our house (because our two cars fit so perfectly in a spot that most people would use for one car). But nonetheless, we'd always thought it would be really nice to actually have a spot in a garage that we knew we could come home to when the neighborhood is busy, and let's not forget the recent time that both of our cars got keyed in the middle of the night.

We'd been checking craigslist on occasion to see if any spots were available. Honestly, I'd given up at least a couple of years ago. Over the last 6 months, we've received postcards in the mail from new neighbors who had recently moved into the neighborhood, looking for available parking spots. They literally made post cards, sent them out to the neighborhood, and basically said they were willing to pay almost anything. That's when the reality set in that we'd probably never find a spot. Unbeknownst to me, Dick continued to check in craigslist every once-in-a-while for the slight chance that something would open up.

Two weeks ago, it happened: Dick found a garage space that was available just down the block - about 5 houses down. How ideal, and amazing! We'd both left messages over the next couple of days, but figured it must have been taken already.

I received a voice mail message a few days later saying the spot was still available! They had several people who had come by who were interested, but that it's such a tight spot that no one was able to actually get their car in comfortably. (this is starting to sound like Cinderella now) The woman literally said that the spot is very small, and would be ideal for a car like a MINI Cooper!

Imagine her surprise when I called her back and told her that I actually DO have a MINI Cooper. She totally thought I was pulling her leg. Dick and I met with her that evening, and practiced driving my car in, and out, then also tried the same with his car. They both fit!

Now, I realize that this may sound ludicrous to those of you who have never lived in a city before. I've lived in San Francisco for 12 years, and I've never had a spot for my car, let alone a garage to keep it in. I'm thrilled knowing that we'll always have a spot, we can take our car out of busy weekends that we used to stay in for (Castro Street Fair, Gay Pride, Halloween) and our car(s) may even stay more clean now that they won't be exposed to the elements all of the time!

Yesterday was the first day (first of the month) that we started to officially rent the space. I was in Milpitas during the afternoon and evening visiting my Grandparents and my parents. When I came home late last night, I didn't have to worry about finding an open spot, or which side of the street I should park on (Friday morning street cleaning). I was able to drive right into to my newly-rented garage space! My little MINI practically danced a little jig as we drove in (and so did I).

Happy Halloween!

For only the second time in the past ten years, Dick and I decided not to throw a Halloween Party this year. We just had too much going on, plus we needed to be up in Seattle on the weekend that we would normally have the party.

So, no new Halloween pictures to show for this year. :(

Instead, I dug into the vast vault of Halloween Photos from years past, and I present to you my favorite "Dick and Trina Halloween Photo" to date: John Lennon and Yoko Ono. classic.


Dick and Trina as John and Yoko, circa 2001

Well, Shake it Up, Baby!

That was a pretty strong Earthquake!

According to this site, it was a 5.6, and centered in Alum Rock, which is only 7 miles from Milpitas, where my parents live. We're about 40 miles away, and it was still pretty strong.

My parents called us immediately after it happened. They had stuff falling off shelves, etc., It wasn't nearly as strong here in SF.

Hope everyone is okay!

update
After I spoke with my Mom on the phone, I checked out sfgate, and saw the article saying how close it was to Milpitas. I tried calling my parent's house for the next 20 minutes, but I kept getting that message that "All circuits are busy, please try again later." I was really happy that my Mom thought to call me as soon as she did, and that she was able to before the phone lines went down. (She did the same after the 1989 earthquake, when my sister and I were living in Ohio.) While I was still trying to get through to her tonight, I got a call from a mutual friend who had been trying to reach my Mom but was unsuccessful. She called me instead, so I was able to tell her that everyone was okay. That was very nice of her.

Happy. Birthday Martin!