Snowboarding

Today I went snowboarding with my brother and his g/f (poopoo).
We left L.A. for Big Bear at 8am, drove for an hour and then they stopped for breakfast, a sit down breakfast, I ate before they picked me up. It was kinda weird, I figured that we'd leave like at 6:30 get there early before it got crowded and all.

We drive for what seems like forever and finally get there around 11:30, get our lift tickets and go out to the snow. BTW Poopoo does not know how to snowboard, my brother and I spend some time trying to teach her how to turn and not catch an edge. I feel we are doing fine my brother seems to be in a hurry to get her on the lift and up the hill. I thought I had little patience, one thing I've learned from being married is that if someone is not getting what you are telling them it is best not to push 'em or they will balk. Anyways we practice some more on the bottom of the hill and before long its we have to get you up the hill before you will be able to learn anything. Poopoo gives in and goes up on the lift and does a great job getting on and off the lift for the first time ( she can ski), we strap her to her board and get her going down the hill, she falls many times, but makes it down the hill. On her next run she sees that my brother and aren't having the times of our lives watching her fall down the hill and sends us off reluctantly. We finish one run and are on the lift back up to catch up with her and we see her form the lift she falls forward trying to avoid the lift tower then she gets back up and tries again and falls again, what a trooper, this time she is holding her wrist. I say uh oh its over its at least got to be sprained.

After searching for her we find her in the ski patrol with a broken wrist. Off to the doctors for x-rays turns out that it is broken in two places. At least the doctors at emergency care were quick and mostly friendly.

Oh yea I got in two runs!
cest'la vies

Giftmas Survey

1. Egg nog or hot chocolate?
*Hot Chocolate. Nog reminds me of... lets just say its too thick!

2. Does Santa wrap presents or just sit them under the tree?
*Wraps em.

3. Colored lights on tree/house or white?
*Old school colored big lights.

4. Do you hang mistletoe?
*No. Mistletoe is a parasite

5. When do you put your decorations up?
*Some time after Thanksgiving.

6. What is your favorite holiday dish (excluding dessert)?
*Mac and Cheese, not out of the blue box.

7. Favorite holiday memory as a child?
Sleeping under the tree on Christmas eve.

8. When and how did you learn the truth about Santa?
*never had santa my dad let us pick a toy from the toy store.

9. Do you open a gift on Christmas Eve?
*No

10. How do you decorate your Christmas tree?
*Whimsically.

11. Snow! Love it or dread it?
*Snow is fine. I go to it when I'm done I leave it.

12. Can you ice skate?
*Yes, it is not like roller blading.

13. Do you remember your favorite gift?
* Yellow Tonka truck


14. What's the most important thing about the holidays for you?
*The tree silly

15. What is your favorite holiday dessert?
*Sweet tater pie

16. What is your favorite holiday tradition?
Don't have one

17. What tops your tree?
Star from Grandma Frieda

18. Which do you prefer, giving or receiving?
*both are fun

19. What is your favorite Christmas song?
*Baby It's Cold Outside

20. Candy canes?
*The curve is the best part

21. Favorite Christmas movie?
* Charlie Brown, cuz of the cool dancing.

Christmas

We had Maddy's parents over today for dinner.

Maddy made a pot roast for the first time. Not only was it the first time making pot roast but the first making beef with such a large piece of meat. I was afraid that it would not come out, or else that it would come out dry. She got the recipe from her grandma who lives in the mid west where they know such things as pot roast making. Maddy is not from the mid west and obviously not a big meat eater.

As the meat cooked I noticed that it got smaller. Whew! I didn't want to have to eat leftover pot roast for a week, as Maddy is not into eating leftovers so much. We still have mack and cheese form last week.

Surprisingly it was just the right amount for the four of us, and it was not dry or anything! we had the meat with noodles.

Yay! for our first C-mas in the new house.

MOCA opening

MOCA openings are the best!
We (MLE myself and Patric) got there early to avoid the wait in line to see the art. It was amazing to see the correlation between fashion and architecture.
We met up with Alia, Devin and Lisa whom arrived later and went upstairs and started dancing as they had a DJ and a bar. Drinks were provides by MLE who works there. Yay!
One of the most interesting things is to people watch. The crowed is one of the most eclectic ever! There is no way that these people would ever come together in nature, they are young, old, hip, street, mod, skater and what ever else. Its great.

Thanksgiving Observed

Yesterday (11/19) Maddy and I went to her parents house for Thanksgiving. Maddy will be in Vegas for a concert the and her sister will be in San Ramon visiting her boyfriends sisters on turkey day. We all had a great time at eating, drinking and playing games. I made an apple pie that was huge. It looked like a mountain, it must have stood about 4.5 in above the pie plate. It was quite yummy if I do say so myself. The turkey turned out wonderfully Mr. S did a great job by evidence of the S sisters eating the skin. E's garlic mashed potatoes were great as usual, and Mrs. S gravy was some of the best I've ever had.

After dinner we took a walk around the neighborhood where they grew up. They closed the old fort and are closing the bridge that they used to cross on the way to elementary school. It was sad to see the fenced off fort it looked like it would be a dream to play in. J and I were thinking of jumping the fence to get inside, but the fence was too high.

When we got back to the house we played Boggle which E beat us handedly. I thought her sister was good, I was proven wrong! While playing Boggle we ate the two pies we had brought over along with vanilla ice cream.

Beer Update

It was a Smoked Urbock. My stomach feels ill. I'll admit I've had a few beers go BAD in that they would spray everywhere when opened like some product you would find in the world of Harry Potter, no one has ever complained of being sick.

I'm gonna go get some Pepto

g, night

New beer

Around the corner there is a great beer store where you can find beers from all over the world, I found a beer called Urbok. It tastes like smoked fish. I don't think I like it.

Cabo

We're (myself, Maddy, E & her boyfriend J) back from Cabo it was a great time.

It turns out the only way to get to the hotel from the airport is to take a taxi. To get a taxi you pretty much have to go earn it. Here is what happens you exit customs and are accosted by people trying to get you to go to their time share presentations. In exchange for going to the presentation you get "gifts" one being a ride to and from the airport. Other gifts we "earned" were a booze cruse, horseback riding and 1/2 hr message. Not bad right? Not so much, the presentation was billed as 90min. it took like 3 hours of valuable vacation time.

We get to our hotel and check in to our timeshare and are approached to go to a timeshare for our hotel we are tired and tell her we'd talk later. We go to our room and take off our watches and order a pitcher of margaritas. yummy.

Next day we go to our "90 min" timeshare pres. and go to do the booze curse. We get to the dock where the boat is and are shocked and frightened at how small the boat was.
It reminded me of a boat that a refugee would use.

We decided to go and have some dinner at a restaurant on the wharf. Where we found that salsa in Cabo to be lacking in hotness. The beer was fine.

We did other stuff too like drink and sit in the hot tub it was a great time. If you would like to learn more check out Zerodoll She has a great write up.

Vacation

I'm going to Cabo this weekend! Yay! except I'm sick.

Why is it that you cant get sick on work time or sit around the house time? Why do I have to get sick when I'm about to leave the country?

Hopefully Devin will be by to bottle his beer tomorrow, or he will have to wait till I get back next week. That means that the beer will be ready about Thanksgiving. It's been so long since I actually put it into a bottle, I usually put it into a keg and drink it.

I'll tell you about the trip next week.

Making Beer

Yesterday (10/10) Devin came over and we made beer. It took all day, he picked a recipe with 15 lbs. of grain which meant that to convert the sugar to starch and rinse it took about 10 g. of water, which meant that it took literally all day to boil out that extra 5 gallons of water. Eight hours later we finally added the yeast to the wort and we were done with exception of some minor cleanup.

It's odd that his recipe asked for so much grain then asked for brown sugar. Why not just add more brown sugar if you are going to be adding sugar not from the grain? The beer is now in the backyard being made into better things by the yeast. I'll let you know how it comes out in three weeks.

10/4/06 A Beautiful Day

Today was one of those days you love to live in Los Angeles! It was like 74 deg. Outside and a beautiful clear blue sky which I am not usually into, but today it was wonderful.
I tried to get some things done sense it was my day off. I went to the hardware store, got the numbers transferred from my broken phone to my new one and had lunch with Cute Baby.

For some reason when I got home form lunch I was extremely tired so I went to bed and didn't wake till like 4:3o. I got on the computer and checked the usual place then Maddy came home and we had TJ's frozen pizza ( not bad for frozen ).

Last Friday

My wife has been out of town sence Friday. After dropping her off at the airport poopoo calls me and asks if I wanna go rollerbladeing. I pick up Jamesey and head out to the valley to go skating which goes fine. No one falls not too many complaints about the heat from other than myself (I like to skate at night).

We headed back to Poopoos to make tuna sandwiches yummy! They came out well.

Later we went to Mimi's Cafe for soup and a salad. Lisa was gonna meet us but didnt make it.
she will meet us at poopoos to pick up a book.

It is now about 5pm and Melenie is asking us what are we going to tonight we say dunno. Melenie leaves and makes coppies comes back and says you are stilll sitting here is that what you are going to do tonight? Looks like it. We decide to get on the phone and have come people over to Poopoos. They resist Rita says no, Ryan is in the desert, Sofia moved to Wisconsin, Tim and Nicole are in Santa Cruz, Rj &Bj already have people over, Preston is in Seattle, Mike didnt answer (suprise), MLE she wants to go to Das Bunker (a club) and dance and is willing to come and get her kidnapped husband to do it, we fortunately we convience her to come overand bring marghretta fixins, Alia and Devin are "watching a movie" and will be over later, Seri says he'll "come."
So we're hanging out drinkin beers and conversating about life and what not and David finally comes home and brings wine (such a nice boy). Devin & Alia finally get there and we have a little party going. Agreat time was had by all.

It used to be that we would just call 3 or 4 people and the house would be full befoer you could count to ten. I guess we are getting old and moving apart, hell Deb is now in Irland.

First try

Today I went to the movies with my friend Lisa. We saw Jet Li's Fearless (one day I will learn html so i can link). Contrary to what it said in the paper it was an enjoyable movie. The special effects were not overdone nore was the hero "Hollywood Perfect."

Tonight is Kamakaze Karoke! Nope. Its been moved to the second. Maby I'll go play tennis instead.