You may remember way back in October I was tricked into running a 5k and hurt my knee in “training” for it. Well, that knee injury lingered for a long time and right about when it was better, I started playing basketball once a week so did not resume running. I started feeling healthier than I had in years. Unfortunately our basketball season ended when Jason’s girlish calf muscle tore. I have been without exercise ever since, and now both my weight and blood glucose have gone up dramatically!

So today, I laced my fancy running shoes back up and ran 1 mile and walked another 1/2 mile. I am only telling the world (all 3 of you) this so I have extra motivation to do it again – daily or at least weekly. Of course later tonight I ate two pieces of delicious apple cheesecake, so today is a wash.

oh crap, I just realized I wrote basically this same exact post in November! I can explain – the knee really did start flaring up again – that’s my story and I am sticking to it. And yes, this time I mean it – I am running again. (eventually)

Filed under: Sports, Whatever | 3 Comments »

Filed under: Whatever | Comments Off on Just one more click…

It is hard to believe it has been 10 years since Sept. 11th. Back in 2001, Erin and I were both working at the Chronicle-Tribune and were part of a small, but extremely talented team of journalists. On that day, Erin and I had worked the previous night shift until 1am and I am sure I stayed up several hours afterward, so we were both fast asleep when the tragic events started unfolding in NYC. In fact, we were so zonked that we did not hear the phone ringing off the hook as the newspaper tried to get a hold of us. They then sent photographer over to wake us up and we didn’t hear him knocking on the door either. So he decided to climb through the window, which scared Erin out of her slippers. Interestingly, one-year later to the date, we were flying home from his wedding in KC.

Anyways, we spent the next week at the newspaper working hard to produce great coverage and special sections on the historic event. Erin designed some great front pages which we still have saved in the garage. My biggest contribution was a interactive CD I made that saved all the newspaper’s issues on the event as well as a photo gallery of the week and a list of victims put to music. The newspaper placed these CDs titled ”Day that Changed America” around town and sold them – donating the $6,500 profits raised.

Our work as journalists defined our experiences of 9/11. I read every bit of coverage that was pouring across the wires. I was extremely moved by all the amazing stories of heroism and survival, but they were far removed from my life. I did not think the next attack was coming in Marion, or fear much for how this was going to change the world. As a journalist, I thought of it more analytically, in that our government had failed to recognize that the terrorism that was already plaguing the world for decades would eventually come to US shores. That we had not done enough to put Osama down sooner, after the 1993 attack on the World Trade Center and the 2000 bombing of the USS Cole. The ensuing wars had a closer impact as I began to know friends and acquaintances that were going off to war.

But now, 10 years later, so much has changed in our personal lives. The biggest of course is the arrival of our girls. So if 9/11 were to happen today, it would be a much different experience. Even when Obama announced a mysterious late-night speech (which we later found out was for Osama’s death) – I was in Atlanta and the wild speculation of what the president was going to announce was frightening. All I could think of was that I was far away from my family – way too far away if this turned out to be a serious tragedy unfolding. So, now the anniversary coverage stories that impact me most emotionally are those of the 7,000 children that lost a parent that day. And those that lost their children, such as Allison Crowther whose 23-year-old son, Welles, worked as an equities trader on 104th floor of the South Tower. It was not until years later that she discovered that her son was the mysterious “man in the red bandanna” that had saved over a dozen lives as he bravely reentered the building at least three times to rescue people, before the tower collapsed on him and the firefighters he had joined up with for another trip up to rescue more people pinned by debris.

September 11th may not be the biggest US tragedy in terms of deathtoll, but it certainly has made a seismic shift in our culture and the way we see the world. Luckily, it is in hard times that heroism like the man in the red bandanna and the strength of character like that of the surviving families that perseveres.

Filed under: News | 1 Comment »

"A superior quality potato vodka with a savory bacon flavor." – www.bakonvodka.com

Filed under: Food, Whatever | 1 Comment »

(CREDIT: NASA/JPL-Caltech)

Earth (on the left) and the moon (on the right) photographed by NASA’s Juno spacecraft on Aug. 26, 2011, when the spacecraft was about 6 million miles away. The photo was taken by the spacecraft on its journey to Jupiter – it will arrive in August 2016.

Aboard the above-mentioned Juno spacecraft are three Lego passengers: Jupiter, Juno and Galileo, each costing $5,000 to craft out of aluminum.

Filed under: Technology, Whatever | Comments Off on Juno takes unique photo of Earth and Moon

Since we returned from our trip Erin and I have been asked often “What did you do in NY?” and we have had a hard time answering, since we packed so many things into a couple days. So I decided to list it all out, to try and remember it all if nothing else, so here it is. (Of course, Erin has recently beaten me to the punch with some great posts with pics here and here.)

Sunday

• Get girls off with grandparents for breakfast at Cracker Barrel. This will be our first multi-night trip without the girls, ever.
• Catch our flights and talk strangers into letting us sit by each other.
• Wait in LaGuardia Airport’s taxi line and catch a ride into Manhattan.
• Arrive at Cooper Square Hotel – the doorman takes our luggage from cab and seats us in lobby. Hostess brings us wine and checks us in while we drink! Loving NY already!
• We check out our room and make plans to meet our friends Ryan and Hyun-jue, who will drive into the city from their home in NJ.
• Walk though SoHo and Greenwich Village. Erin grabbed a Gyro from a street car. We popped into many chic shoe/clothing stores like Steve Madden, Jonathon Adler and Anthropologie. Also a great art gallery with more than a dozen Salvador Dalis.
• We hit a great chocolate shop called Voges Haut Chocolat which is probably best known for their Mo’s Milk Chocolate Bacon Bar. We instead tried Blood Orange Caramel Exotic Candy Bar – we would have ordered more but figured they would melt on our walk. We also bought t-shirts from a Russian artist selling on the street.
• Walk to Washington Square Park and rest our feet on a park bench until our friends arrive.
• After visiting for a bit, we watched a bizarre high-jumping expedition by a guy that claimed to have a 53-inch vertical, he did do some high jumps, but it was mostly his humor that made it entertaining.
• Walked to Mario Batali’s restaurant Babbo, where we planned to have dinner, but it was dark and stuffy. While we were sure the food would be good, there wasn’t room at the bar to visit while we wait 20 minutes for our table, so we decide to walk and find another place to eat instead.
• We ended up at a great little Cuban restaurant called Favela Cubana where we enjoyed tasty Mojitos and Caipi-Frutas. We ate several dishes as well, including:
  • Salmon Ceviche — pineapple, cilantro, orange segments, sweet paprika
  • Boquerones — white anchovies, roasted red pepper, baby arugula, cracked black pepper, crostini
  • Cuban Mussels — P.E.I. mussels, chorizo, garlic, thyme, white wine, tomato, grilled ciabatta
• Walk back to hotel passing several places of note: McSorely’s Old Ale House, Burp Castle: Temple of Beer Worship and Little Lebowskis, a store solely dedicated to selling items associated with the movie.
• After a glass of wine in the hotel lobby, we all walked to a European Tapas restaurant called The Barrel, named so because the interior mimics a wine barrel.  The four of us proceed to order 9 dishes of food and a pitcher of white sangria. Our feast included:
  • Ginger Tuna Sliders with wasabi mayo and lemon onion relish
  • Tropical Calamari mango & pinapple tossed calamari with citrus
  • Salmon Graviax with onion, capers, arugula and mustard sauce
  • Steak Frites – steak and potato trio
  • Duck Leg Confit with pear compot, and beet wine sauce
  • Rosemary Sausage sauteed with chili, fresh herbs, and fingerling potatoes
  • Avocado Island of plum tomato carpaccio, lavered avocado and cucumber, lemonette
  • Ratatouille of zucchini, onion, tomato, celery, peppers and black olives
  • Roasted Portabella with stuffed with caramelized shallots and roasted red pepper
• After much food and drink with good friends, we walk back to hotel to crash so we can start early the next day.

Monday

• Up and at ’em early, grabbed some coffee in lobby
• Walk to Balthazars for an amazing (and crazy expensive) breakfast, Erin had Sour Cream Hazelnut Waffles with warm berries and I had perhaps the best Eggs Benedict ever, and I try it everywhere I go. (Side note: Why would any bathroom need an attendant? I can grab my own paper towels, thanks.)
• Head a couple blocks to jump on the Subway. It was fun, clean and crowded. I don’t think I would enjoy riding it every day as a commute, but then again my current commute is zero, so I’m spoiled.
• Subway pulls directly into Rockefeller Center and an underground mall with tons of shops and restaurants. But we mostly skip by those and head right to Top of the Rock, the outdoor viewing balconies on the 67-70th floors.
• We walked to Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) and our New York Passes let us skip right to the front of a line that stretched down the block!
• We explore the great art collection, including a number of really famous, historically significant pieces that I never thought I would see in person. The two I was most excited to see were not disappointing at all: Salvador Dali’s The Persistence of Memory and Vincent Van Gogh’s The Starry Night.
• We grabbed a quick snack in the MoMA cafe – Erin gets a rootbeer float that is wonderful and I get the best dessert of the trip, a chocolate cake to die for, and wash it down with a small pitcher of lemonade.
• With about an hour before the NBC Studio tour starts we hustled over to Central Park, knowing that 45 minutes is not a lot of time to walk around such a massive place, I negotiate a deal with a pedal cab to give us a quick tour – it was fantastic. Very refreshing to sit and feel the outdoor air as he pedaled us through the park and pointed out the various landmarks. We got out and walked in a couple places, like near the Boathouse and in Strawberry Fields.
• Our pedaler then raced up through busy NY streets back to Rockefeller center so we could catch our tour. The NBC tour highlight was Saturday Night Live set – I have been a lifelong fan and it was interesting to see how the stage looks in real life and hear the stories of what you don’t see on tv. One fact I remember is that each skit costs around $250k dollars! Erin came off like a SNL savant when she rightly answered the tour guides trivia, “who was the youngest SNL host?”
• After the tour, we jump in a cab to Pier 17, we grab our sailboat tickets and have a little time to spare, so we hit a sushi shop – not that great, but did the trick. Then we shopped Schermerhorn Row, got Eva a pair of Crocs and grabbed a few drinks at a pub happy hour.
• We then set sail on the Clipper City Tall Ship and cruised for about 90 minutes through the harbor and out near the Statue of Liberty. The weather was great and we had some drinks from the ship bar. Lady Liberty actually looked small after all the skyscrapers we had been viewing all day.
• After the cruise, Erin pigged out on some Häagen-Dazs ice cream, while I took pictures of pigeons (I was a lil’ tipsy so it was more fun than it sounds.)
• We returned to the East Village and actually walked right into my coworkers who were leaving dinner and heading for drinks. Erin and I were very excited to find out they were
  headed to McSorley’s Old Ale House. This place opened in 1854 and pretty much looks the same. It boasts being the oldest saloon, and that “Everyone from Abe Lincoln to John Lennon have passed thru Mcsorley’s swinging doors. Woody Guthrie inspired the union movement from a table in the front – guitar in hand, while civil rights attorney’s Faith Seidenberg and Karen DeCrow had to take their case to the Supreme Court to gain access.” They brew their own beer, so the only words that better come out of your mouth when ordering from the bar is “light” or “dark”. I actually found out that I can get this beer here in town too.
• At about, 10:30 pm, we realized we better hurry if we are going to get to Momufukus Noodle Bar before it closes. This place was soooo delicious and fun. I would be a regular if it were local. We each got a noodle dish, I think Erin got Ginger Scallion Noodles and I got Momofuku Ramen. We also ordered Pig Tails which were just that pig tails cooked in Hoisin, because I just can not resist but try exotic dishes. Yum!
• Completely stuffed, we walked home to the hotel, only stopping to grab some drinks from an great little open air grocery store market that was still open and busy at midnight.

Tuesday

• I am off to meetings at Clark-McDowell until 4pm, while Erin shops ’til she drops.
• I think the shopping highlight was Anthropologie where she got a few dresses, before it began to rain and she hit the hotel for a well-deserved nap.
• After my meetings got out, I caught a cab in pouring rain and joined Erin for a cat nap.
• Waking up refreshed, we noticed the rain had stopped, so we went for a walk through China town.
• We stopped at a shop to get some bubble tea – Erin and I were introduced to this by our friend James in LA, its a tea drink mixed with fruits and/or creams, and then there are tapioca pearls in the bottom that you suck up through a fat straw while drinking. So its a drink and a snack, very odd and tasty!
• We then saw a stuffed doggie in a shop window, and that was on our souvenir list for little Eva since she is absolutely obsessed with dogs. Erin picked one where the dog is actually holding a baby dog in its mouth, I think Eva gets a kick out of the baby doggie.
• We then hit a place called, Bok Lei Po Trading which was mostly martial arts weapons and outfits, but we found Ella a silk purse and some cool cases like Erin had gotten her at the San Fran Chinatown. I scored another t-shirt.
• We then walk into Little Italy, Erin bought a scarf and purse from some street vendors, then we walked past some great looking (and smelling) Italian restaurants, we would have stopped for a bite, but had reservation to get to already. We even contemplated canceling, but instead said we would eat in Little Italy when we come back to NYC!
• Dinner was at Mesa Grill, famous TV chef Bobby Flay’s place. This was by far our priciest and fanciest meal. It was fun too, the Margaritas were delicious and we even sort of talked with the couples on either side of us and they too enjoyed the place.
  • I had the:
  • Crispy Quail with Hot Mustard, Ancho Chile, and Seitz Family Farm Honey
  • Cascabel CHile Crusted Rabbit with Toasted Cous Cous, Fava Beans, Smoked Red Pepper Sauce,a nd Queso Blanco
  • Erin had the:
  • Mashed Potatoes with Green Chile Queso Sauce
  • Cornmeal Crusted Chile Relleno filled with Roasted Eggplant, Manchego Cheese
    with Sweet Red Pepper Sauce, and Balsamic Vinegar
• Times Square – we were both a little surprised by how this is arranged as a walking plaza area, and also how crowded it was for a Tuesday night, my guess its always packed.
• We do a loop around Times Square fighting off comedy show ticket hawkers, and decide to go to The View, it is a rotating restaurant/bar at the top of the Marriott on the square – my friend Josh recommended it to us. We drink a few drinks and get a full circle in of the view, including a bit of a shadow peep show from a room window at the W Hotel across the way.
• We stood at the backdoor to the Addams Family theater for a while hoping to see Brooke Shields come out and sign autographs like the other cast members had. Of course after a long wait,  she came out like 2 minutes after we walked away.
• We decide to hit a comedy show, and go to Ha! Comedy Club into a dark basement with comics rotating from room to room performing. It was ok, a couple guys were funny, but it was nice to just sit down in AC for a while and sip Mimosas.
• Back to the hotel exhausted and feeling like we saw it all!

Wednesday

• Pack up and come home. Back to Mac & Cheese dinners and dirty diapers. But I think we will visit again, next time in the Fall.

Filed under: Art, Food, Whatever | Comments Off on NYC Visit Journal

Here are some photos I took on our New York trip this week.

Filed under: Art | 3 Comments »

Erin and I are off to NYC this weekend and I am getting hungry just thinking about it. Because the first thing we did when we decided we were going, was to think about where we could go eat. I watch tons of cooking shows and can recognize way too many chefs by name or face. Here are the four very different chefs that we are hoping to eat at their restaurants, from left to right, Bobby Flay (Mesa Grill), Mario Batali (Babbo Ristorante), David Chang (Momofuku Noodle Bar), and Wylie Dufresne (WD-50).

And then there is art, we already have tickets to three of the premier modern art museums in the world, from left to right, The Metropolitain Museum of Art (MET), The Guggenheim, Museum of Modern Art (MoMa).

A few of the masterpieces I will be able to scratch off my must-see list are Salvador Dali’s The Persistence of Memory and Vincent Van Gogh’s The Starry Night, and Hokusai’s The Great Wave.

I am also excited to just see the sites and take some pics of my own. A couple places where I expect to get good photos are the top of the Empire State Building and also during our Clipper City Tall Ship Cruise that will give us a waterfront view of the city.

Filed under: Art, Food | 1 Comment »

Ella likes to spend time in my office and so I decided to buy a PS3 game we could play together. I wanted to find a game we would both enjoy, but be easy enough for her to play. What better than Lego Star Wars?

It has been great – we both love Star Wars and so she knows all the characters and enjoys recognizing storylines from the movies as we play. (She prefers being Luke or Leia, and I try to be Han as much as possible.) The game itself is pretty good, not too easy and not too hard. It also has some fun cut-scenes that have cracked us both up at times.

It has also been a bit of a trip exploring this new and interesting dynamic. Ella will sometimes forget that we are playing on the same team and she will start trash talking me. I actually really dislike it, and try to talk to her about how working together is more fun than competing. But its also funny at times when she comes up with a good burn, like letting me blow up and stealing all my coins so she can rub it in.

It’s also fun to hear her say “Thanks dad” when I help her out with something in the game. Or she snarkily says “If you say so” or “really, dad?” when we are arguing about which way to go. I’m embarrassed to say we have even gotten stuck a few times and had to really work to figure out how to finish the level. I love hearing her come up with a plan, and she says “wait, I got it – follow me dad.” It is really cool when she is the one to figure out the solution, of course even when its me that solves the puzzle, she always breaks out an “I knew it, the whole time.”

Also, if you are rolling your eyes about my parenting via video games – a study published in the Journal of Adolescent Health found that “girls who played age-appropriate video games with a parent felt more connected to their families, lowered internalizing (e.g., depression/anxiety) and fewer problems with aggressive behavior.”

Unfortunately, the big question is whether Star Wars is age-appropriate – it does involve a lot of Lego on Lego violence. To date I have only been able to find one game without violence – its called Flower and you fly around a field blooming flowers, it is surprisingly fun, but also surprisingly a little too hard for Ella. I guess we’ll stick with Star Wars for now – we already blew up the first Death Star and escaped Hoth, so we have a ways to go before we have to begrudgingly play through the prequels. (Although, I bet the Lego game version will be better than the movies were.)

Filed under: Fatherhood, Movies | 1 Comment »

I already admired Nintendo CEO Satoru Iwata for his impressive accomplishments, and for being true gamer and developer, rather than just a profit-driven businessman. “On my business card, I am a corporate president. In my mind, I am a game developer. But in my heart, I am a gamer.” (From speech at E³ 2005)

However yesterday, he became even cooler. After Nintendo announced the company’s first-ever quarterly loss, Iwata told shareholders that he takes the blame for disappointing 3DS sales and will cut his own salary in half. Other high-level executives will also see their paychecks slashed between 20 and 30 percent.

Now when is the last time you heard of a CEO take blame? How about one cutting their own salary?

Filed under: News, Whatever | Comments Off on Nintendo CEO is awesome