flying video

Scott (of the flying birthday party) put the video up on YouTube, in case anyone cares. Music and titles are courtesy of Scott. Fwiw, I appear around 02:08 in Part 2 and 07:49 in Part 3. (And yes, that's me -- the facial hair is seasonal.)

• Part 1: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v-2MldaaIqs


• Part 2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vii7WBW69is&feature=user


• Part 3: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=djrG1XbRw_g&feature=user


• Part 4: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nlpxU4B7wmI&feature=user

Plans had been to return to Tahoe this weekend, but things didn't end up turning out quite so exciting. I spent most of the weekend at home involved in house projects. The huge storms earlier this month exposed some weaknesses in our basement waterproofing efforts from a couple of years back, and I wanted to address those before the rains returned (which happened today). So far things seem to be mostly successful. Which is good, because a weekend full caulk, hydraulic cement, and masonry sealer isn't as much fun as it might sound.

Now that snow has returned, hopefully we'll be back in Tahoe soon.

snow, wings, and stuff

New Year's Eve was kind of mellow. We headed into the city, over to the Penthouse, the apartment where I lived before moving back to Berkeley. It was a fairly small get together, and we watched the midnight fireworks from the roof.

As you may have heard, last weekend we had some pretty big storms here. Lorien and I drove to Tahoe for some snowboarding. Feet and feet of dry, fluffy powder. Which was pretty amazing, except for the few times that I was making fresh tracks and the terrain wasn't quite steep enough and eventually leveled out enough so that I sunk. It's pretty tiring and time consuming digging your way out of chest high snow. I wish I could have just spent the whole week there, but that wasn't very doable. The cold and the snow temperatures continued for pretty much an entire week, but unfortunately last weekend was back to typical Tahoe temperatures, where it gets above freezing during the day and below freezing at night, so I'm sure the spectacular conditions have passed.

The drive to and from Tahoe was a bit of an ordeal, which was all the more reason to not go again this past weekend. We had a beer and wings cocktail hour on Friday night. I think it was our most attended cocktail hour ever -- maybe 20 or 25 people? Which seems to indicate that maybe it's not about us at all, and it's just about the wings... A friend from Cornell (Jim) who I hadn't seen in like 16 or 17 years tracked me down recently, and he lives in North Oakland, and he's from Buffalo, so he showed up with a deep fat fryer for the event. Which was much appreciated, and cooks wings faster than in a wok, and has now convinced us that we need yet another kitchen appliance.

Saturday I went down to the South Bay for two birthday parties. One for Jon's son Simon (who I can't get over is 13 already), and the other for a friend Scott (who probably hasn't been 13 for numerous decades). Scott's gathering was at a vertical wind tunnel that features a simulated sky diving experience. I have to say, it was pretty damn incredible. I think Scott will eventually be posting a video of us somewhere, but in the meantime there's the marketing stuff (complete with annoying soundtrack) at http://www.iflysfbay.com

And yesterday we saw Juno. Which was good. I highly recommend it.

That's the semi-random assorted rundown of what's been going on for the past few weeks. Sorry, no pictures.

Time to stop posting and eat some yummy gingerbread that Lorien made.