Blog Master G

I left last Thursday afternoon for a mini-vacation to Southern California. It was a great, albeit short trip to visit my mom and bro. I packed a lot into only a few days — Thursday night through Monday morning — and managed to watch among Lakers fans at a Mexican joint as their team lost in the playoffs; enjoy a delicious lunch with some coworkers in the area; help my mom clean up and rearrange her house; go to a Padres-Cubs game (Saturday night) and cheer for the Cubs, even though I have no allegiance to either team, as the Padres won with a homer in the bottom of the 11th; go to a karaoke bar just before closing time; party into the night with Pete and his friends; hit a few after-hours golf balls on the 15th hole; hang out at the beach in Encinitas; enjoy delicious Mexican food at a restaurant overlooking the ocean; finish reading Freakonomics; and spend quality time with my family. Not bad for a weekend trip, eh?

View all LA Trip 2006 photos

Lots of excitement around the A_nderson house this morning — the painters have arrived and begun scraping down the outside of the house, much to Stella’s surprise and concern (we just had a barking incident in the kitchen when a painter appeared just outside the low window).

And city crews are around the corner preparing to dig up the road, presumedly to do some gas line work and/or repave the street. I suspected as much yesterday when I saw random and colorful lines of paint sprayed along the street with references to “NGRID B.1.8.7” (or something similar); I figured it meant Nationial Grid (our power company) had something to do with it.

Spring is a time of change, renewal, and getting things in order.

The Pacheco Valle Posse, circa 1986 (Marin County, California):

Are my jelly bracelets hot or what? And that’s my bro Pete on the right, ready for soccer.

It was around this time last year that I was fighting a weeklong cold. Luckily, I haven’t had the same cold fall on me this year, but have been feeling a bit run down and out of sorts the past week or so. Not so much in a funk — that’s too strong a word — but not sleeping well (hot, cold, sweating, seeing strange visions in the night), and otherwise just not able to focus too clearly. Maybe I need more exercise or more sleep. I don’t know. It’s certainly not for a lack of boredom; we always have plenty of stuff going on.

I worked Friday night, so nothing of public interest to report from that night. Saturday we trucked it down to Colonie to meet up with Alex and Cati — out cruising on their bikes (not the pedaling kind) on that beautifuly, sunshiny day — for a delicious and authentic Indian buffet at Karavali (spelling and exact location are a mystery to most). But for the record (mine and the public’s), here’s their address & phone number: 98 Johnson Road / 518.785.7600.

We spent the afternoon soaking up the sun in Justin’s backyard; he and I enjoyed some drinks while Jen did some contract work (and smooched Isaac). We then headed back to our house for a bit — Seed of Chucky happened to be on cable, so we enjoyed some laughs at that most ridculous of films — before playing some ponies at the Racino and capping the evening with an awesome dinner and margaritas at Leon’s, the best Mexican restaurant in the Northeast (to my knowledge). Our pal Filiberto Leon and his restaurant happen to be profiled on the front page of today’s Saratogian Life section: Leon living a lifelong dream.

Random fact: I have 458 uploads in my Sprint PCS photo account. Maybe I do need to get more serious about the possibility of upgrading my camera phone to something like the Samsung MM-A800, which I mentioned a couple months ago. The 2.0 MP camera phone would come in especially handy when Jen and I go on separate trips and both need cameras for our adventures.

Last night we went to a lecture at Skidmore featuring The Nation writer Bill Greider. The title of his talk was “The Conservative Crack-Up,” in which he explored some pretty excellent, though radical ideas about eliminating the national deficit (put a freeze on global imports), establishing a national pension program (required contribution for all Americans, similar to TIAA-CREF), and worker-owned companies (giving the power back to the producers of goods). The last talk we saw at Skidmore was in July last year when Joyce Carol Oates came to town. It’s fun to live in a cultural mecca.

Photo by Niki Rossi, April 12, 2006:

April is not the cruelest month. It is my favorite one. Having been born on April 2, I’ve always had a fondness for the month and felt a special connection with it — after all, it’s when I came into this crazy world. And now that I’ve been living in the great Northeast for nearly two-and-a-half years, I appreciate April all the more.

Here are some of the reasons why I love April:

• The days are getting warm — not too hot, not too cold
• No humidity
• Renewed growth of the Earth and of one’s priorities in life — a fresh start of things; setting new goals; starting new projects
• After six months of cold and snow, I appreciate the sun even more
• I can start wearing shorts again (as I am today)
• I can wear sandals once more (as I did today to go grocery shopping)
• The ceremonial shutting off of the heater until late October or November (just moments ago)
• Sun, sun, sun
• There’s an entire summer of warmth and travel and excitement to look forward to (kind of like why Friday is my favorite day of the week)
• Porch sitting happy hour with martinis and white cheddar Cheez-Its
• Daylight Savings Time
• The grass is green and I get to start mowing it again (as I did today for the first time since last year)
• The chirping birds, the scurrying squirrels, the blooming flowers
• The smell of BBQs in the air (and grilling fish ourselves, as we are the cajun salmon tonight)

Cheers to April! Till next year, my friend.

This is too funny: My representative in Congress (NY-20) hard at work, representing his constituents in a district that’s not even his own. I love the quote from Rep. John Sweeney’s spokeswoman, Melissa Carlson:

“As a committed representative of the people throughout the area where he lives and works, he enjoyed the discussion he shared with the students from Union College. (Sweeney) was impressed with the energy and enthusiasm displayed by the students – particularly on a Friday evening.”

Looks like he’s having a great discussion:

Can we say wasted?

Read more and see more photos on the Capitol Confidential blog.

Times Union / U.S. Rep. John Sweeney: Grand Old Partier

Yesterday I was walking the dogs past a local church and saw a sign that the Red Cross was there doing a blood drive. Since I’d been meaning to give blood for quite some time now, I figured there was no time like the present. So I dropped the dogs off at home and returned to donate a pint of my A positive goodness. It had been nearly 3 years since the last time (#10). Around the ninth time donating, I was on a streak, donating once every few months (you can donate a maximum of once every 56 days). I joined the 1-gallon club in August 2002 and am now only five pints away from hitting the 2-gallon mark, my new goal.

I want to make more of an effort to donate regularly. I normally feel fine during and after donating. Yesterday I felt only slightly light-headed and a bit queasy, but I suspect it’s because the nurse helping me told me to roll the squeezing thing instead of squeeze the squeezing thing, so my blood took longer than usual to drain. Another nurse stopped by and told me to mix in a squeeze with my rolls. Then it was over before long and I was on my way to recovery.

Donating blood is a feel-good, easy, and very important way to give back to those in need in our communities — and to help save lives.

I’ve marked my calendar for June 20, when I’ll next be eligible to donate again.

Imagine this: You’ve come home from a hot date and all you want to do is get your groove on. You park your car and you just can’t help yourself: You begin your makeout session in the car. If you’re the lady who was riding passenger in the situation, you’ve climbed across the center divide into your man’s lap. The windows haven’t quite steamed up and life is good. Next thing you know, there’s a giant dog face staring at you through the driver’s side window. You jump and you gasp.

Leave it to Stella Brie to ruin the moment for a couple in our neighborhood last night. The Mallamute just knew something was going on in the parked car as we returned home from our walk. She’s walked past parked cars hundreds of times, so, not thinking anything of it, we strolled past the car, then suddenly Stella was standing on her hind legs checking out the action inside the car. What can I say? She’s one curious dog.

Friday Justin and I ran into Jami, Alexis, and company for what turned out to be the start of an 8-hour happy hour that spanned all around downtown — the Circus Cafe, Thirteen, roof of City Tavern, then back to Circus. Fortunately, Jen tracked us down on the roof of City Tavern for the majority of the evening.

Saturday was an action-packed game night at Hugh and Jami’s place — friends, Taboo (why do the girls always win?? I think girls can read each other’s minds), Balderdash, strawberry rhubarb pie, two cats, and four dogs. What else do you need for a great evening?

Two years ago today I posted this entry on Craftsman Homes around the time we had found our house and were getting ready to buy it. The philosophy behind the Craftsman home is awesome and really worth exploring (my blog post is a good place to begin). As I quote Stickley in the post, this rings true for me in the way I live my life: “those who demand honesty in all expression from friends, and who give in return sincerity and unselfishness, those who are fearless of sorrow, yet demand joy; those who rank work and rest as equal means of progress. … All we really need is a change in our point of view toward life and a keener perception regarding the things that count and the things which merely burden us.”

In 2001 or 2002 when Jen and I were still living in San Francisco, we were driving with Shannon under the freeway near that intersection of 9th St. and Division when we witnessed a head-on collision right in front of us. We pulled aside and immediately called 911 to report the accident since it looked really bad. A drunk man came stumbling out of one of the two trucks involved in the collision. I left my car to see if everyone was OK. I could smell the alcohol on the guy’s breath. The other couple remained calmly inside their truck, with the windows rolled up and refusing to talk to anyone until the police arrived. Fortunately, they looked OK. But we had still called 911, and thus expected to hear sirens blaring and lights blazing any moment. Here we go. OK. Still waiting. More than 30 minutes later, a single cop car slowly approached the scene to take reports from everyone. And that was that. Such is life in a big city.

Though it’s not completely fair to compare the public works infrastructure of a city with a population of nearly a million with the small city of Saratoga Springs (population less than 30,000), it is fair to say that the quality of life in Saratoga Springs is superior — quite simply, you get more for your money (and don’t me wrong, I do love SF and often miss living there).

This morning after flushing the toilet, the bowl was taking a really long time to refill — and the water pressure in the sink was noticeably weaker than usual. After some time, the toilet water started to refill — with brown water. I flushed again and more brown water. We checked the downstairs toilet and same deal. I then looked out the front window to see the street partially flooded with standing water. I immediately called the public works department just before 8am to report the problem. I was told that the fire hydrants were being flushed around town, so that was probably it. I told the nice lady that no, I had seen some water, albeit much less, backed up the other day, too, and that the drain was definitely clogged.

I put on my shoes and got ready to walk the dogs. As we walked out the front door, we saw a public works truck pulling around the corner — a mere 5 to 10 minutes after I made the call. We returned from our walk, and the problem was solved — no more standing water and no more dirty toilet water.

The Saratoga Springs Department of Public Works is to be commended for its rapid response. Now that’s tax dollars in action.