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Old Journal Entries

• 07/28/00
  Well, at least I know that my kittys are relatively healthy, they both got their shots, and checkup, as well as full blood tests. The vet thinks that Fila has hay fever, which is why she is all weepy eyed. His blood tests came back negative, with just a few red blood cells so he's getting some anti-inflammatories (just like me ;) to see if things (like the hesitation peeing) clear up. Cameo's blood was showing a bit of change, and she was down in weight too, so now I have to weigh her weekly and then take her back for another set of tests in a few weeks.

  I've been playing a bit of vball and bball but my thumb is starting to act up again so I'm now going to start icing nightly again. At least I can still play with it wrapped until its completely well.

  It's going to be a busy weekend, Karen is moving to SF, and I'm picking her up at the airport, then its off to dinner in the city followed by Brown's birthday party. Somewhere this weekend I'm supposed to help Candice go car shopping, now that she's moving south for work she's going to need transportation. It'll be interesting to see where she's gonna park when she's at her place in the city.

  Tech News: if you tried to access my site around 10pm pacific, it was out of service while I changed all my powerplugs to a single power bar (courtesy of work) all those transformers were taking up too many plug slots (they cover 2 when plugged in) Also I'm starting to setup Rod's website www.AhiBros.com stay tuned, he's making me dinner next week while we go over the expected content.

• 07/25/00
  What a long weekend, it started out poorly, and got worse before it got better. First my plane was 2 hours late, if I'd have known that I could've attended my work "move in" party beer-bust. Then when I got there, my car battery was dead, so I borrowed my sisters car to go to the vball gang's poker party at Cindy & Scott's. While there I accidentally dropped my digital camera, now it doesn't work, and makes this grinding sound while it tries to start up, bummer, I'll have to send it back for work now.

  Saturday, I had wake up early just to make sure that my car started, otherwise I'd have to borrow my sisters car for the day -- sure enough it started, so I let my sister leave, only to have it refuse to start the second time. I managed to get it started using the battery charger, and then I had to wander down to Sears (one of the few places open at 7am) to get a new battery. Odd, it was almost 5 years to the month from when I had replaced it before, nothing like accurate planned obsolesence.

  Next up was a haircut and dim sum with Carey & Jo, we caught up, and they had some interesting suggestions about the motorcycle I "should buy", but that will have to wait till I get a garage. I ran a few errands, and then wandered down to Federal Way with Angel to meet Moxie who runs a ski shop (Moxie's Powder House) to chat about what ski I should buy. Sturtevants almost had me convinced away from my Solomon X-Scream Series, into the K2 Mod-X, but talking with Moxie set me straight. Unfortunately he doesn't carry either the X-Scream or Mod-X but he had some pretty comparible Head, and Atomic BetaRide 9.22S for me to look at. Since he's a really good friend of Angel (and partially sponsors her racing) he cut me a really good "off season" deal. I ended up buying a pair of 180 Atomic BetaRide 9.22S, with Tyrolia bindings, now all I have to do is bring my old skis (to see what the cant shim setting is) and boots up the next time I visit so everything can be mounted and set correctly.

  That night it was dinner at Maya's in Rainier Beach, and Saltimbanco over at the Renton Boeing parking lot with Angel, Cheryl & Kent. Dinner was very entertaining, Angel had drugged up to ensure that her hip (still recovering from surgery) would let her sit through the whole show. She fell asleep (and snored !!) at dinner, and was pretty "punchy" till the show started -- she even claims not to remember some of the dinner conversations. The show was awesome as always, lots of cool stuff, and some really scary trapeze work -- highly recommended.

  Ended the night with snacks and desserts at Red Robins, while we waited for everyone else to catch up -- someone wrecked their oil pan driving off a curb so others were running shuttle service before we all managed to eat.

  Sunday was extremly busy too, I went to the Fremont market hoping to replace the kitty dish that I'd broken, found one, not quite the same but pretty good. Then it was off to Greenlake for Chris' going away vball gathering. He's moving to Chicago to go to school (PT/OT ??) and it was nice to see everyone there. I got about 4 games in but my body really wasn't up to it -- I was sucking wind badly, and playing even worse.

  Later that afternoon I went for an early dinner with Patty at the Bite of Seattle, and as always, scarfed down a lemonade and strawberry shortcake rather quickly *yum*. After that I swung by the Obon festival where Angel was dancing. I got to dog sit Tango, and boy does he attract attention -- in fact there was another 9 month old Shiba Inu there too and everyone was interested. Saw a few old friends, and surprised a few who didn't know I was in town.

  Monday it was off to the orthodontist, and good news, I only have to wear my retainer in the evenings now. I had lunch with Linda at her new job (they have 2 NetApp 760's !!) an heard all about George's latest exploits (socks on a boat ?!) Then it was off to Tira & Matt's for a bbq with Barri & William. It's always fun catching up with them, and I got some pretty good advice about buying suits from Matt, I may have to pick one up the next time I'm up there. After the bbq I stopped by to visit with Elaine (she lives right by Tira) and found out that she won't be coming down for Cheryl's wedding after all, thats too bad it would've been fun.

  Tech News: I managed to get the scanner installed on my dads system, so everyone should be expecting pictures in their emails soon. I also managed to track down the problem with the machine that my sisters bought at a garage sale. They paid $15 for a Pentium machine with cdrom drive only it wouldn't boot. I tracked it down to either a bad simm slot or mismatched sims (there was 1 16Mb simm with 3 4Mb simms) in any case its up and running with 24Mb in 3 slots.

• 07/20/00
  Ok gotta make a last update before I head out to Seattle. Finally got my car back, but it looks like they marked one of my quarter panels so I still have to take it back for them to buff it out. The new shocks are pretty good (bilstein sports) strange though that the ride is both stiffer and smoother than before -- I guess those old ones were pretty shot -- hardly any front end dive and definitely no scraping the (new) air duct shield. I may have them rotate my tires back as I had the old tires on the rear cuz I'm trying to wear them out faster so I can get another matching pair. With the newer tires in the rear the front end seems to push a bit at speed, probably due to the difference in grippines.

  Tonight I had dinner in the city with Caroline, James, Rod, Candice and Jay. We ate at Le Vie (Geary and 23rd) over by Caroline and Rod's place. Food was pretty good, but the best was that we all finally got to meet Candice's new beau, from New Jersey no less. The pictures from their Tahoe hike were pretty good, especially Candice's "back to nature" shot.

  Afterwards it was back to Rod and Carolines, for dessert, Rod cooked of course, fried bananas with corn flakes, chopped mangos and coconut ice cream, excellent as always.

  It turns out that Candice took a new job in Santa Clara and won't be moving east for the near future. I only mention this because that means that at the end of August I'll be having a new roommate, at least during the week, so Kat's weekend housing is still intact. Candice is going to keep her apartment in the city for the weekends. I think this will work out ok, hopefully I can find a bigger condo (3 bdrm) so guests can stay mid-week if necessary. Candice is a bit hesitant about the whole "move as soon as I buy something" but I'd warned her about it before, besides I have way more to move than she does. It is possible that she'll get her own place eventually but the occupancy rate down here is miniscule (4 openings out of 1300 apartments) its so bad that it rated a full section in yesterday's Mercury News. Folks are getting hit with 40% rent increases, good thing I signed a lease through March, the place is looking like a good deal now.

  Caroline bought a new car, kinda spiffy, an SUV, all she needs now is the cowboy hat cuz she already has the boots ;)

• 07/19/00
  Been busy, no updates, well actually I've been updating my imood when I get a chance.

  So this past weekend I went on a mini buying spree, new battery for my cell Li-Ion should go a week between charging now, new network hub (the home network is expanding) and a passle of dvds.

  This past Sunday was the Children's Health Council Summer Symphony, its a big "to do" posh fundraiser. We (NetApp) got to volunteer and handle the donor reception it was more wine icing and pouring. This was all outdoors at the Frost Ampetheater on the Stanford campus. Pretty fun, we had more than enough people so I ended up wandering through the crowd serving appetizers. The food was by Left Bank, and they had quite the spread. We must've impressed though, since the coordinater was swearing that NetApp is doing everything again next year -- I guess she liked that we didn't need much instruction. It was attended by lots of old money, and large rings, and not surprisingly they all seemed to know each other.

  The concert itself was pretty good, the San Jose Symphony was playing, and then they backed up Nancy Griffith and her Blue Moon Orchestra. Pretty good, outdoor setting was nice. It wrapped up early so later I went to see Chicken Run, it was hilarious I'm going to have to get the dvd when it comes out.

  Spent alot of time preping for my options exercise, it was going to be the first one, and I hoped to generate enough cash for any down payment I might need. Luckily our stock has been on a tear recently and I managed to cash out at a pretty good price (102 1/4) now all I have to do is find a place to buy, and probably check with a tax person to see what I should exercise and hold to make up for the income I've generated for this year. (that darn AMT calculation !!)

  Took my car in today for its checkup, it needed it, turns out that I broke a bracket on air duct beneath the car, as well as shredded the duct itself, that and I still needed to do the shocks so its going to be a rather expensive service this time. They'll need to keep the car till tomorrow, good thing they're close to my apartment.

  Tech News: installed yet another hub (I now have 3) so I can connect multiple machines to my work via the vpn -- boy do I have lots of wires running around. I finally got around to reformatting my old drives so I could use the enclosure. Now after a few reboots (sorry if folks lost connectivity around 8pm or so) and retries I've got 2 9Gb disks available, I dedicated one to the web server, and I'm holding the other for various administrative things (backup, archive storage etc) This means I can now put a whole load of stuff online, as well as store all of my digital camera pics online.

• 07/15/00
  Ok, the thumb is better, still a bit sore, but I managed to play a couple of rev-coed doubles with Tammy at Questa on Thursday -- we got spanked by a couple of open women, and then lost in the dark to some of her friends. Couldn't set with my thumb wrapped so I played without it taped, it held up pretty good.

  Friday was basketball, definitely had my wind back, we've been playing 4 on 4, with no subs so theres a lot of running. Did tape my thumb to protect it but it makes it really hard to shoot, and it starts loosening up with all my sweat.

  Almost forgot, went condo shopping on wed, just to take a quick look, strangest thing was that one of them was right across from Joy & Alan's old place, only for about twice what they sold for 2 years ago, they were a bit bummed when I told them, but they have such a nice house now it shouldn't matter much. It appears that I can qualify for just about anything I want to buy, now I just have to arrange for my down payment (1st option exercise !!) and then make sure I find a place worth buying.

  Today I'm mostly vegging out, everyone seems out of town, and tomorrow I'm doing some volunteer work so It should be a pretty restful weekend, for once. Although it is Bon Odori season, so I may just have to go check out the Mountain View version of it tonight.

  Also note that I've joined imood.com (see the little graphic at the top?) interesting concept. Although I did put a spam email address when I registered, so if you accidentally email me there, well, I'll probably see it eventually.

  Tech News: still need to wipe my old drives so I can expand my server, I think I'll sell my old Mac IIsi on ebay when I'm done.

• 07/11/00
  Basketball switched to Friday nights, so I'm guarenteed at least one night out on the weekend now ;) Unfortunatly I rammed my thumb into someones knee and its been sore ever since. Its getting better slowly, but I'll probably need to continue icing and wrapping when I play.

  Saturday I spent most of the day watching Caroline & Stacy play in a coed dual 6's tourny (both regular and reverse) that was pretty fun, but they were knocked out of the tourny by Sam & Karen. Didn't stay to see the end, but during pool Brown's team went 2-0 against Sam -- lots of bragging rights now. With my thumb wrapped I wasn't even tempted to play.

  Sunday I went shopping for skis, actually I know what I want to buy (Solomon X-Scream Series) but I still needed to check prices and think about bindings. I found a pair of 2000-1 models for $620, but I think I can do better, especially since there are still the preseason sales to come. Later that night I went to see The Patriot, it was pretty good, kinda gory in the violent parts though. I think the cannonball action was pretty realistic.

  Monday Candice came to stay for the night since she had a interview in Santa Clara early in the morning, it was fun catching up since she had spent the weekend at a bachelorette party in Vegas (such wild women ;)

  Tuesday was the wellness fair at work, lots of goodies, but not surprisingly I have high blood pressure, especially since I haven't had much sleep lately and I haven't played near as much as I should have, that plus I gained a little weight again -- guess its time to start working out again.

• 07/06/00
  Had a blast for the 4th, first I played at the Stanford Oval with Miki & Jack (and some of Miki's friends who are pretty good) that would be 2 days out of 4. Even switched to my new outdoor shoes instead, and was much quicker, I think those other shoes are too grippy for the thick oval grass. It was warm again (it had been cloudy and windy in SF over the weekend) and I got a bit of a sunburn, and was pretty exhausted after 3 games, I like to think its because those gals made me work way too hard.

  That night it was dinner with Candice, at a place called Rocco's on VanNess, it was pretty good. Caroline, Stacy, Omar, Omar Jr, Shiela and James all finally showed up and we went off to see the fireworks. We watched from the hill on Hyde street, pretty cool, they actually do 2 identical shows on the waterfront, one in front of Ghiradelli's and the other at pier 39, we could even see the Sausalito fireworks show too.

  Later that evening we all had dessert at a coffee house around the corner from Candice's place, pretty good, but there was still a crowd on the road a few hours later.

• 07/04/00
  Happy Independance Day !!!

  I actually got all of the pictures from Tiburon up, and decided to start a party page too, just so I have a place to put all of the pictures.

• 07/03/00
  Gee, almost a whole week to catch up on now....

  Thursday I had my meeting with the mortgage broker to try and prequal so I can go condo hunting. Things seem to go well, then he started explaining about "neg-am" loans (negative amoratization) interesting concept, might even keep my monthly payments reasonable.

  Friday I had dinner with Barri & William at some, umm, rather poor italian place on Murphy Street in Sunnyvale, won't be going there again anytime soon.

  Saturday it was volleyball at the marina with Caroline, her sister Carla and brother-in-law Matthew. It was very blustery, almost Seattle-like and kinda cold so we quit early. Caroline's parents were also in town and they made us lunch, with a yummy chicken based soup. That night James invited us over to Tiburon for a bbq where he is house/dog sitting. Lots of fun, the dogs (a chocolate and a yellow lab) were a blast. I actually have pictures of them playing tug-of-war with a tennis ball. In fact I'll probably try and put up the pictures that I took in a day or two.

  Sunday I went to watch Miki & Jack play at the Stanford Oval, didn't play since there weren't very many people and it was hellaciously windy -- also I was a bit sore (ankle & shoulder) from playing at the marina the day before. That night I headed up to the city to have dinner with Bar (at a pretty good chinese bbq place right by her parents) and then off to go see M:I2 again, since she hadn't seen it yet, and it was worth seeing again.

  Monday I finally got to sleep in, was checking my mail and noticed a copy of my credit report, with a ding from the credit union way back from 1997, had to put in a call about that, especially since its on my home equity line of credit which is auto withdrawn from one of my accounts at the same bank. Unfortunately they'll have to go to their archive records and are going to call me back on Wednesday. Also, suspiciously, there is another SSN attached to my name, it looks like a typo version of mine, and my mortgage guy said not to worry about it.

  Managed to go and put in a half a day of work, and then some shopping, but mostly just kicked around at home catching up on magazines.

Who are these people?

Old Journal Entries