Indian Summer

We are 'old' people now, and it's not all that often that we are invited to a party, but Friday we were though. Mark in my office was celebrating his birthday, throwing a party with a Halloween touch. We went there straight after work on Friday, and although I was kind of tired we still ended up staying there for almost three hours. Mark lives in university housing, on campus. I've never visited those student appartments before. They're fairly basic, but the location is pretty good. Mark is really into 'patisserie' and he baked some awesome cakes.

The last few days have been unusually warm, and Saturday there was no wind at all. We haven't been to the beach in a while, so we thought we needed to take advantage of the clement temperatures. C took his surfboard down to the beach, me my boogie board. We dressed up in wetsuits before we went into the water, but I'm not sure if it was necessary that day, the sea was quite warm. We were probably in the water for more than two hours, surprisingly. The waves weren't high, but there was some surf. After we got back on our bikes, we went into La Jolla for 'gelato' and walked the cove a little bit. This italian ice-cream is really worth the trip!

Today, Sunday, Jan invited us out sailing with him for a couple of hours. His sailing club is out on Shelter Island. We took out a small boat, a 21'' that actually didn't sail all that different from the Holder 14 I've been practising on. But, I've never been on a keelboat before since I started taking sailing classes. We went to the fish market on the way back and got some fish and chips. A seagull caught C's fish filets right in front of my nose. The owner of the restaurant saw it and took pity of us and gave us another serving. That seagull was quick! He knew what he was going for ...

What Pumpkins Are Good For ...

I carved my first pumpkin yesterday. We didn't do a pumpkin last year, but last week C grabbed us one of those big fat pumpkins at the market, and put me in charge of making something out of it. Actually, the agreement was that C would open it up and remove all the nasty stuff from it, then I would carve a figure into it. I must say that pumpkins are quite new to me. I didn't even know what it was we would find inside it. I've had pumpkin pie a couple of times, but never made one myself and was actually quite intrigued by this plant (or vegetable, or whatever).

So, C started cutting it open by carving out a lid on the top of the plant, and as it turns out, the inside is pretty hollow. There are seeds inside, held together by some gory stuff, sort of like inside a melon. Once you've scraped out the loose, wet, "gory" stuff, the inside of the pumpkin consists of the pumpkin meat. It's walls are thick, probably two inches, at least. I now took to carving the face, the best I could. There actually exist special tools for pumpkin carving, none of which we possess of course, but without them the carving is not completely obvious, because the walls are pretty thick and solid and one sort of has to saw through them. So, I opted for something simple, but I think the result was not all too bad ...

The pumpkin looks pretty neat by dark too as it stands the guard on our porch.

Now, once I had finished carving the pumpkin, feeling bad about throwing away the leftovers from the carvings, I cleaned the seeds up and put in a pan in the oven with a little salt sprinkled over them (they're great for snack), then gathered the meat that had fallen off and put in a pot. I had heard that good soup could be made from a pumpkin. I found this mean recipe on the internet for a Thai Pumpkin and Coconut Cream Soup, and swiftly cooked up one. It was actually not bad at all. Slightly tart with lemongrass, ginger and lime, but softened by the coconut milk.

Speak My Language

Yesterday I saw again the two girls from Elfland that I met on the boat a couple of weeks ago. I was working up on campus, they were visiting. The university had an "open house" day, or "UCSD rocks" they called it. They were looking at job and grad school prospects, besides just visiting our pretty - or so some people say - campus.

I had a little coffee with them, but then thought I'd invite them for dinner to chat some more. It's nice to be able to speak one's language with somebody, because I don't get that many occasions to do that now. And I haven't been back home in Elfland for quite a while now, or one and a half year.

My sweet husband made us dinner while the three of us chatted away. We even recited poetry! Oh, sweet language ...

Time went fast. It was late when they finally left. It's good to finally have some elfish contacts here.

Movie and Dinner in Hillcrest

We went to see a movie last night up in Hillcrest, a documentary called Jesus Camp.

Hillcrest is a great place for restaurants, so we decided to get some dinner there as well. We went to what has now become a favorite, the Arrivederci. Had Carpaccio with plenty of aragula, artichokes and parmesan for starters, then Ravioli: Pansotti cheese with aragula and cubed tomatoes in a white wine sauce for me, pumpkin filled ravioli with sage butter sauce for C. Both were delicious. For dessert, the waiter insisted on offering us an Italian Cheese Cake, because he had accidently spilled some of our wine on the floor when filling our glasses. We didn't say no! It came with raspberry and chocolate sauce and it was also delicissimo.

The movie was disturbing. But it does portray America today, I guess. God bless us ...

Rhythm of Saints and Sinners

Yesterday we got an invitation to go out on the boat of C's boss. He has a small yacht he sometimes takes out in the harbour in summertime when there's a concert going on at the Bayside venue. Last night, Paul Simon (from Simon and Garfunkel) was playing.

One can basically anchor the boat just across from the stage, no further than if one was sitting in some of the seats in the back. But most of all, this is a nice excuse to get together and have a little drink and hang out on the boat.

Anyway, it was a cool gathering. Paul Simon provided the background music and various people from C's lab, B's connections and the industry provided the company. I met two girls from Elfland and talked longly with one of them.

In and Out of the Bay

Another bike ride today. We decided to see if we could bike around Mission Bay. We knew there were good bike paths on part of the way, but the whole ride amounts to 14 miles. We took the clockwise direction, biked out of our house straight to Sail Bay, then biked along the bay bike path as far as we could, that is to the big part at the end of Crown Point. Actually, just before we even got to the park, we had to veer of the bike path because a whole trailer camp had been set up there to service the big speed boat race that's going on in San Diego right now. We stopped for a while to watch the races, they're pretty crazy, they go sooo fast and they're sooo loud!

We biked on some side streets around Campland camp site, up to Grand Avenue, over Rose Creek and then down on a semi bike path that led us onto the path around East Mission Bay. From there there's a perfect path along the bay through one recreational park after the other. I had just not realized there were so many parks in San Diego. But if you wanta have a picnic or a barbecue or just let your kid run around or play, I would say you have quite a choice!

At the end of the East Mission Bay Drive, we crossed the creek that comes out from Mission Valley, came around Fiesta Island and then onto Sea World Drive, along which there is a street bike path but also a wide empty sidewalk. A path goes all around Sea World onto Ingraham, where we crossed the highway before the bridge. We then biked around the marina up to the Mission Bay bridge, where instead of crossing right away we checked out the Fish Market. They vow to have the best Fish and Chips in town and we shared one of those, with a lemonade, to verify their claims. It's one of those ancient, no-frills places that is kinda fun to visit.

Biking over the bridge on West Mission Bay you get a real nice view of the channel (that I by the way sailed out on my last sailing lesson), so we hung out there for a little while, then biked down to the Bahia Hotel and again around the bay back to our starting point. All in all the bike ride probably took about three hours, out of which we probably stopped for one. There was still time to go sailing, so we went quick back to the house to get my Rec Card for the boat rental.

We ran into Jan as he was coming in, but we didn't wanta loose any time as the boat rental now shuts an hour earlier than in summer. Today I was gonna have C sail me around. The wind was nothing like yesterday, it was very mellow. We sailed out of the cove and just cruised gently back and forth. It was so gentle that I could just lean back and put my legs out on the bow. It was heavenly. So heavenly that just before we started sailing back in, the wind completely died on us. Well, we struggled (or C did, to be exact) for an hour tacking into the cove without ever getting that much closer. We realized we were gonna need a few more hours still to make it all the way, when Jenny, the dockmaster, finally came out to us in a motorboat and most thankfully pulled us in. Sort of shameful, I guess. And no. At least we didn't break anything today!

Drifting away (or What Do You Do With a Broken Rudder ...)

We have now picked up again our weekly bike-down-to-the-farmer's-market saturday routine. At the market we usually get avocados (because we found a stand there we can really trust), eggs (from a sweet old lady that also recycles our egg cartons for us) and fresh orange juice (from this grumpy guy whom we still can't bypass 'cause his pricy orange juice is still just SO good). Otherwise we usually just pick out some seasonal stuff that we seem to need or that looks tasty, sweet corn, tomatoes, grape fruits, oranges, zuccinis, strawberries ... The market's not all that great really, but it does complement the super market nicely sometimes.

After breakfast and stuff we went sailing because it was really to windy to go to the beach. Well, it was almost too windy to sail our little boat too. We realized that while we were rigging the boat already. The wind pulled on the sails alot and it was hard just to hold the boom in place. To top it, after we had put the boat in the water we noticed that our main sheet was too short to let the sail out all the way and that we were gonna have to sail with a tight sail even downwind. This is not ideal if you wanta be able to depower the boat when necessary.

As we took off, I was glad that I have been getting some exposure lately, because sailing the boat was not terribly relaxing. I managed ok though and we did some fun sailing for a while and got plenty of speed. We would get gusts though that would really make our boat lean and make it try to go into the wind, so I would have to hang on to the tiller extra hard to keep the course. We had sailed for a couple of hours already and were just going back and forth on little Sail Bay, across from the Catamarin hotel, when we got one of those gusts. Once we had righted the boat again I suddenly saw this white thing floating in the water. I moved the tiller and got no response! Holy cow, that was our rudder floating out there!

How do you sail without a rudder?? Fortunately, C had some notion of exactly that! He took control of both the sails now, and pulling and letting the sheets he managed to beach us. We then walked the boat around the beach over to the aquatic center. I probably would have been pissed if our rental hours hadn't almost been out anyway. At least we managed to get back and weren't stuck somewhere out in the bay for who-knows-how-long. In a way, this was something of an adventure!

When we got back to the house, I started preparing dinner big-time! I took out the frozen spring roll wraps and to further make use of all the good stuff we got at the vietnamese market last weekend, I decided to make three different dishes: spring rolls, samosas and a kofta recipe. This involved three different meat blends and a hell of a lot of cutting, chopping and shredding, aside from rolling and folding the spring rolls and samosas. Then, the meat ball dough had to sit for an hour before being cooked, the vermicelli had to be soaked and the samosas baked in the oven. All in all, the cooking took a whole two hours. But it was worth it, we thought we had a nice, exotic meal there ...

The Asian Market

Last weekend I talked C into exploring one of the asian food markets here in San Diego, because I have been on the lookout for some products that might not be available except at one of those markets, such as rice paper, galangal root, tamarind and lime kaffir leaves. We found one in Linda Vista, the wonderful Vien Dong, which to be exact is not an Asian market but Vietnamese. We stuffed our cart with interesting foods (yet found no kaffir lime leaves this time), then headed home to try out new recipes. Since the weekend then, we have had Fried Mini Spring Rolls, Spicy Stir Fry Chicken, Grilled Thai Trout and Fragrant Curry Chicken. All have been pretty yum, yum, but none is a favorite as of yet. But there's a whole list of recipes that we are getting ready to try still.

Sailing Again on my Own

To catch up, we rented a boat two times this weekend, and sailed around the bay. If I may say so myself, I think I'm getting better at it. The wind was moderate, and it wasn't terribly crowded on the bay although there was a fair number of sailboats out. I met both Oskar and José, from my sailing class. They were each taking a Hobie Cat out. José said they were so much more fun than the Holder's. I don't know, the catamarins look kinda scary to me, they go so fast and they heel so much. But J said they were actually easier to sail, more stable but more responsive. I guess I might try to take a Hobie Cat class later this fall, if I manage to do more sailing in the meantime.

I'm getting much better at using the extension to control the tiller. (That's kind of fundamental for sailing the catamarins, because you have to lean out of them so much ...) I had one accidental jibe on Sunday, when sailing wing-on-wing. I think it was due to a gust, but I was actually quite confused about what happened. I must learn to be better prepared for this type of situation and better control the boat at all times. I also almost ran into a boat twice (and it was the same boat each time, but in completely different parts of the bay!). In both cases I had the right of way; the first time the other skipper visibly didn't see me, the second time I didn't see him because he appeared suddenly from behind us. But right-of-way is not the most important, but to be able to avoid collisions! So, it's good experience to do some sailing on the bay when it is fairly crowded with boats.

Labor Day Weekend

It was the lazy life this weekend. I had been apprehending the crowds and the traffic one would expect on a big holiday such as Labor Day, even if not as infernal as the Fourth of July, but it was finally kind of quiet around our neighbourhood. Sure, there were people down on the beach, there were big sun shades with tables and drinks, and there were people doing barbicues, but there were no mobs.

The big disappointment was that the Aquatic Center was closed, so there were no boat rentals possible. We had sort of planned to go sailing at least once or twice over the weekend. Well, we were down to the beach, did some boogie boarding (mostly me), and we made that bike ride. We also took advantage of a Labor Day sale to buy a DVD player to hook up to our TV. Sofar we've been watching movies on my computer screen, but this is much nicer. We got an OK deal on the DVD player, although apparently the labor day sale really ended on saturday, that is two days before the actual LD. That is something to know for next time ...

Bikeride to La Jolla

Ever since I got my cruiser bike (the one we saw at a garage sale for $15), we've never been biking all that far really. What we do is bike down to the bay, along the bay, to the boardwalk and along the boardwalk, and to the Farmer's Market on Saturdays. And that is it! Apparently though, San Diego is a real Bicyclist's Paradise.

Today, I asked C how long he thought it would take to bike into downtown La Jolla. About an hour, he thought. There even was a bike path half the way or so. I decided this bikeride would be our activity for the afternoon. To make it even more appealing, I decided that the gelato store on Prospect Street would be our endpoint.

The minute we were out on our bikes, I started regretting a little bit. The sun was strong and relentless and the ride out of PB was all uphill, although only slightly, most of the time. But, it wasn't too bad. Once we reached Tourmaline, there was a bike path following side streets and hidden trails. It steered us to a quiet wide street with a bike lane, just above the La Jolla Boulevard. We took this street through the old, beautiful residential neighbourhoods of La Jolla Birdrock, then turned more into the hillside, where we continued on a bike path again. It had a steep part as we went over the edge of Mount Soledad, then went downhill again to land us on Nautilus Street. Once we had crossed Nautilus, we were on a nice quiet road again, with bike lane, that took us past La Jolla Highschool, over Pearl Street all the way into downtown. The whole ride took us just under 50 minutes.

We locked up our bikes in a side street, and walk down to the cove. I was actually too worked out to have an ice cream right away, so we just sat down on a bench overlooking the beach cliffs and did some people watching for a good while. The park was packed with picknickers and people that had visibly come to spend the day on the lawn, listening to some bands playing. Lots of families were bathing on the beach. Many looked dressed up for the occasion (Labor Day). It was actually fun to be there and watch the scene.

We hung out for almost an hour, then walked back up to Prospect and our Gelateria Frizzante. And my-oh-my was it good! We both got sherberts, C got blood orange and mango, I got lemon and green apple, then we shared. They were all great, but the blood orange probably came out on top. The milk gelatos looked pretty tasty too. That's for next time.

We biked back in about 40-45 minutes. The ride back was more downhill. Maybe not tomorrow, but we'll certainly have to do that again ...

Friends from Seattle

Friends of C are in town. They are staying at the Catamaran hotel just up the street from us. C's been wanting to visit them for a while, even this summer. But hey, they just came down here. So, C's been trying to spend some time with his friend John, for the last few days, that is, when the friends are not doing Disneyland or Legoland or Sea World or the Zoo ...

Last night we went out on a cruise with them on the Bahia Belle paddle boat, sort of a Mississippi-style sternwheeler. One of those things we've been talking about doing for a long time, well, we finally did ...

Cold Sore

I'm in a really bad mood. Thanks to all the outdoors I've been doing probably, the sailing and the surfing, I got a cold sore. I wouldn't have thought it was that big of a deal, but it is very distracting. My mouth is burning and I can't enjoy meals at all. And last but not least, it totally ruined my margarita and chips treat ...

They're going on a cruise

P and R slept over last night, because they had a really early plane to catch from San Diego Airport which is only ten minutes from our house. At 5:30 in the morning, C drove them to the airport where they were taking off on their 10 day cruise of the Caribbean, starting from Puerto Rico.

We scanned through their travel brochure and their trip sure looked tempting. Hmm, maybe for our 20th anniversary ... !

The Skipper

Having finished the Advanced Sailing class, I can now rent small boats from the aquatic center, like the Holder 14 we learned to sail on. For $50 I can rent a boat six times for sessions of two and a half hour each time. So, I took C sailing on the bay today.

I must admit that I was a little nervous, as I had never rigged the boat all by myself before and it had been a couple of weeks since my last lesson. But the rigging was finally easier than I remembered it and it barely took us five minutes. As for the sailing, well, the winds were pretty strong today, probably stronger than they ever were during my advanced classes, so I found it pretty challenging to balance the boat. Actually, another thing that may have felt different was the fact that we were now only two in the boat, whereas previously we always had three people, whereof two always sitting up front in the boat, one on each side, to balance it. Today I had C sitting up front, and he would shift sides each time we tacked or jibed, just like me, so we were having a lot more weight shifting than usual.

In the end it was fine, I got somewhat used to it. We sailed pretty fast, with that wind, so there was more heeling. There were also much bigger waves on the water, more unrest, more ups and downs. With all that heeling and C hanging on to the jib sheet, the bolt into which you cleated the jib came loose, after which the jib had to be held on the left side all the time. Somewhat more action than I remembered from my sailing class. It was fun though. We sailed for a couple of hours, then beached the boat smoothly, and derigged without any problems.

We will probably be renting a boat to go out every so often now, for me to practice my sailing ...

Beach Day in Oceanside

Friends of C through Jake, Mike and Jody, live up in Orange County. He is an avid surfer, and C and him had been talking about going surfing together. We met them this weekend halfway between us, that is on the beach of Oceanside. Originally, the plan was to lay out our beach chairs and bamboo mats in San Onofre, but that didn't happen because of a surfing tournament that was taking place there. We met instead in Oceanside.

We spent the day on the beach, chilling out, reading, tanning, snacking and boogie boarding. C and Mike went out on their surfboards for an hour or so. We stayed later than we had intended, or until five o'clock, so we were both a little bit toasted after the day.

Secret Sushi Place Full

Coming back from work we realized we hadn't anything ready to make dinner from. "In the mood for sushi?", C asked me. We'd been recommended this little place, Sushi Ota on Mission Bay Drive just off from where we get off the I-5, and we figured we would try it. Well, wrong! There were lines coming out of it.

It's a very nondistinct place, doesn't look like anything special, hidden behind a laundromat and a 7/11, but the crowds are there, so it must be good. We didn't want to wait 40 minutes for a table, so we sat down at Lanna Thai next doors, where C got a Pad Thai and I got a yummy Green Curry. The meal, together with three Kirin's and a big appetizer platter, cost 32 bucks. I was unaware you could eat that cheap in San Diego ...

Herb Garden

I haven't given any updates on my garden, but it's actually been doing quite well since we moved. Much better than the last place where the little herbs I planted, basil, mint, rosemary, chives, were a miserable sight at the end of the summer. Even though we got help from our neighbours with watering while we went on our road trip. Our tomato plant gave one fruit, then died, and the fruit had turned bad before we even picked it ...

It turns out that the plants seem to rather like our front porch. And we have now kept alive for the summer several herbs and vegetable plants:
. Tomato plant - It has struggled a little bit, the first couple of months it only bore one fruit, then did nothing until we finally feeded it the plant food it was visibly starving for. It almost immediately started producing fruit, and we soon thereafter got a batch of fat beef steak tomatoes, most of which we ended up baking in the oven as part of our mozzarella-tomato bread. At that point we thought the tree was done, as it started to wilt and the branches came down. I gave it a last shot though, pumped it with food again, pruned the branches and the tomatoes started appearing again. Before long it was packed with them, so much that the main branch broke from the weight. I carefully tied the branches up again, and it doesn't seem to be doing so badly anymore. We are now waiting for some 24 tomatoes to ripen.
. Cherry tomato plant - This one has been very generous. We have recolted somewhere between 100 - 150 tomatoes from it already. The tomatoes ripen pretty fast and the plant has been furnishing us constantly with ripe fruit all summer and there is plenty more still to go. The problem here is that we are competing with the Scrub Jays for the fruit, because I have estimated them to steal probably about one third of our recolt so far. They are tempted by the red tomatoes but they have also, whether it is accidentally or not, broken unripe tomatoes off the tree. Since early this summer when I started noticing fruit disappearing, I have been suspecting the birds, but I have now caught them at the act several times. Actually, they won't even leave if you shout at them to leave the plant alone ...
. Bell pepper plant - It has grown very slowly, and we only recolted two yellow peppers yet (aside from a couple that went bad), but it has a number of fruits on it now, so I still carry hope ...
. Chilli pepper plant - We got several red chilli peppers from it earlier this summer (a total of eight), but then it stopped growing. It has a couple of fruits now but it doesn't look great.
. Basil plant - Actually, we are on our second one now. The first one we got was fabulous, it grew so fast, and so thick and so green. Then it got attacked by caterpillars, who feasted on it so bad, while also laying larvae under the leaves, that I finally gave up and got rid of the whole plant. I got a new plant, it's a different variety (as you can well see by comparing the pictures) that I don't like quite as much, but now I am prepared to deal with pests with a bio pesticide we bought for a little fortune. I've cut it down pretty agressively (and we twice made pesto) but it seems to be doing alright ...
. Rosemary bush - Actually, left overs of our Xmas tree! We just meant to finish it, before we threw it away, but I took pity of it, changed the soil, and now it's thriving.
. Chives - Same thing, we still had it from the old place and it looked pathetic. I changed the soil and since then it has multiplied.

Next year I mean to start up the tomato plants a little earlier. They don't take that much maintenance but standing in the sun all day they do need a lot of water. So does the basil plant, and we have to cut the flowers off pretty regularly. Otherwise, they're pretty easy. We're thinking about getting some mint too, and maybe oragano or marjoram. What we use the most are by far the basil, cilantro and rosemary. Problem is, I really haven't gotten any cilantro to thrive yet. Open to suggestions ...

Once more to Saska's

Got a short visit from P & R yesterday, as R was making his monthly delivery to his distributor in San Diego. Not to break the rule, we made a visit to Saska's. P and I had our favorite, the Ruby Rare Ahi, and the guys had steak.

After dinner we walked down to the Mission Beach Belmont Park where the guys took a ride in the (frightenly old) Giant Dipper rollercoaster. We also visited the Wave House, where we watched surfers on their man made waves for a while. The guys seemed to be fascinated.

Capsizing (or wet, wet, wet ...)

Today we practised capsizing our boat. I can't say I was looking forward to it. We were to intentionally capsize the boat on the water while sailing, to then learn how to right it again.

My crew mate, Erica, was dreading going in the water even more than I was, which strangely calmed me more than a bit. We sailed out of the cove and raced into the next cove where the yacht club is. First boat in would be the first to perform the capsizin exercise, and we got that role. To capsize, we sailed on a beam reach, then all three of us in the boat gathered on the leeward size and leaned overboard. The boat gradually laid down on the water. I was surprised how slowly it happened, but it happened finally and we were in the water. The water wasn't all that cold but rather refreshing. We split tasks, Oscar held the mast up, I uncleeted the jib and the main sheet and threw them over the boat, Erica climbed onto the centerboard and as she hissed the boat up with her weight I got scooped into it by hanging onto the hiking straps. After that I could easily help them on board.

All this didn't take long, probably two, three minutes, and once we were righted we just sheeted in the sails and continued our course. We also practiced "man overboard" protocol, with a pad we threw out of the boat, then picked up. Once all the boats had capsized, we got to go again and this time I righted the boat by climbing over it, then standing on the centerboard. And it was actually fun.

A couple of our class mates broke the boom of their boat during the manoeuvering. They had to beach the boat and be towed to dock once the class was over. We were lucky that didn't happen to us and we could sail the shit out of our boat ...

French Gourmet and Scoop

On C's initiative we went and tried that small french restaurant on Turquoise in Pacific Beach. We've driven past it so many times. At first I thought it was just a bakery. And there is a bakery with all these nice frenchy pastries, fruit tarts, éclairs, mille-feuilles, but also quiches, croissants and pains-au-chocolat. But there is also a small cozy restaurant which carries this wonderfully traditional french menu. So we went to try it out and it was totally up to expectations. We had a platter of delicious patés and cornichons for starters, then chose each our dish of lamb.

After dinner we went and saw Woodie Allen's new movie, Scoop. It was laughable at times, especially Allen's monologues, but the plot wasn't all that exciting, and it hardly measured up to his previous movie, Match Point, which in my opinion was just brilliant.

More Sailing

I enrolled in in an advanced sailing class now. The setup is the same as for the first class: we will sail four mornings during two consecutive weekends, before class we have a little theoretical introduction, then we go out on the boats for a couple of hours.

This time we are sailing the Holder 14, slightly bigger boats that take two persons to sail, they are 14 foot long and can carry four people. The rigging is a little more complicated now, and these boats have a main sail and a jib, so we have one more sail to rig. So, rigging was sort of the most complicated part of the first class. Otherwise, the same basic sailing skills apply, we control the jib much in the same way as the main sail most of the time, except that the boats sit much more comfortably and one doesn't need to fear the boom all the time, the boats are slightly more responsive and faster, and the tiller comes with an extension that allows you to sit more up front in the boat although it is kind of awkward to handle.

We sailed three in the boat, and I was designated skipper when we took off, which meant that I steered the boat out of the cove and was the one to push it ashore and last person to jump in. Then we took turns while out there, and again I was at the tiller when we beached the boat at the end of the class.

For my second class on Sunday I was late (we had not slept half the night because of our neighbour's dog barking every couple of minutes) and missed the rigging, but got there in time to jump on the boat with a couple of other people. We had more or less the same tasks to accomplish as in the first class, that is to tack and jibe around three flags that formed a triangle, one side which we had to tack up on a beat. After I finished skippering our first triangle, my crew mates decided this was no fun, and that the fun thing to do would be to ignore all these flags and the crowd of our class mates boats and sail further out and just go back and forth on a beam reach where you could sort of more feel the wind. That was actually fun for a while too, our instructor even gave up on us after a while and completely left us alone doing our thing, but in the long run I got a bit bored. Sailing back and forth is not very challenging. Now, while one of my crew mates was mostly interested in heeling the boat, my other crew mate wanted to lie down and tan while we steered. I wanted to practice sailing. But I will get the chance too some day ...

Basic Sailing Completed

... and Sunday I finished my Small Boat Basic Sailing class. That went well. We spent the whole morning sailing, and went as far as under the bridge by Sea World. On the way back we raced, and I managed to come in second. I had already derigged my boat once the rest of them started coming in, so I could help them dock. Quite a few of them had to be pulled in, because the couldn't beat into the wind faster than they drifted back, so they got stuck out on the bay. With respect to wind this was probably the best day out of the four days so far.

There was a little barbecue by the aquatic center at the end of the class. C brought a couple of skewers to grill for us. Afterwards, we had coffee in a little bakery by the boardwalk.

The Hiker in Kilt

I had my third sailing lesson on the bay today. This time, there was a drizzle as I woke up. I even got wet, just biking out to the aquatic center. The wind was so low that even sailing downwind was challenging. So, it was a good experience. We sailed a lot on the beat and I got a good feeling for how to do that. Today we were practicing beaching. Guess what, once everyone was out in the cove, we practiced beaching - softly - on the beach half of us stranded on on the first day of our class after which we basically spent all morning there. Hey, this time we managed to launch again without problem. Knowing how to go about helped. But even if I had known that during my first class I doubt that would have been enough. The wind was just too strong that time, it was a lost situation.

We then sailed around the little peninsula that houses the yacht club and beached again on the facing beach. Launched again, sailed across the bay on a beam range, into the cove again and docked the boats. I was successful on my third attempt only. There was no wind in the harbor and on the first try I just lost speed completely, about ten yards from the dock. The second time, somebody barred the way for me and I had to turn, go back and tack yet again.

It was very mellow today. Nobody tipped the boat. In fact, it was sort of relaxing, although sometimes I was not quite sure whether I was actually sailing or just drifting. Sometimes, even with a really tight sail I could feel no real traction, but slowly the boat moved in the right direction.

After class, I had to go to the post office to put a letter in registered mail that they wouldn't take on campus. We had brunch at the Café 976, after which we went to Play it Again Sports, the second hand sports equipment store on Garnet. We wanted to look at rollerblades, I found a nice pair, but they didn't have the right size for me. We ended up buying a boogie board though. In the store we met this guy. He has been walking in the memory of his aunt for two years, to raise money for cancer research, or something.

This was all very vague, when we were talking to him and I didn't understand half of what he said. But what I understood was that he had just arrived in California and was going to continue with his walking. First he walked the Appalachian Trail on the East Coast, now he was going to do the Pacific Crest Trail. He did look like a junkie to me at first, especially as he came across as abnormally excited or aroused. He also has a very stout, muscled body, one that tells you you don't wanta mess with this guy. In any case he told us that he liked to tell everybody what he was doing, to spread the word around, because people would call the cops on him all the time, thinking he was dangerous. "Hah, no kidding!", I thought. He also told us, for some reason, that kids used to pick on him when he was young. He told us he had been in the Special Forces and that he had been a firefighter, and he told us he'd served some time in jail. He told us he was divorced, that he had loved his aunt very much and he told us he was gonna go spear-fishing for white sea bass in the afternoon. He didn't tell us about the woman who sent him cookies on the trail, though. But, all this in only five minutes. Americans are very open people ...

Just as we got one block away from the store, after buying our bodyboard, we came across Carlos again. Two policeman in a police car had stopped him at an intersection!

We found out there's a running store in PB, called "Movin' Shoes" and we quickly drove out there to get me a sports top, for once I finally start running again ...

Ben's Farewell

Another party at Pavel's tonight. Pavel is "the other professor" in our bioinformatics group (after my advisor). He has a really nice house on the other side of campus, with wide marble floor salons and high ceilings, large kitchen and nice terrace with pool. In other words, perfect for parties, and tradition is that he throw a party each time a member leaves our group, with lots of wine and catered food. Tonight, Ben was leaving, for Brown University. Ben's a mighty smart guy from MIT who's been doing a post doc with us. He got job offers from virtually everywhere, and he decided to go to Rhode Island, with his wife and brand new tiny little daughter.

The food was excellent, just like we expected. The thing though, when you are invited to a party at your advisor's house, is that people tend to be a little tame and restricted. So, no scandals. And the party had an early end, before eight everyone was rushing to get out before everybody else would ...

Which Wonders of the World?

I remembered this page last night and thought I'd ask C which of these 100 Wonders of the World he covered. He toured the world for almost a year a long time ago, so I figured he would probably have seen the sites I would want to visit in my lifetime.

Here's the sites C has visited:

6. Grand Canyon, U.S.A. (with me last fall!)
9. Bali, Indonesia
34. Borobudur, Indonesia
40. Canals of Venice, Italy (with me)
44. Kathmandu Valley, Nepal
46. Mount Everest, Nepal (didn't climb it of course, but did the Annapurna circle up to first base camp)
52. Prague Old Town, Czech Republic
68. Kremlin, Russia
81. Santorini, Greece
92. Yosemite National Park, U.S.A. (almost lived there for a while)
94. Hermitage Museum, Russia
99. San Fransisco, U.S.A. (many times)

Here are the sites I visited:

6. Grand Canyon, U.S.A. (north rim, last fall)
25. Chichen Itza, Mexico (last summer when in Yucatan)
30. Colosseum of Rome, Italy (Easter trip to Italy, when I was living in France)
32. St. Peter's Basilica, Italy (same Easter trip, we were staying at a guest house in the Vatican)
36. Hong Kong Harbor/Cityscapes, Hong Kong (China) (visit to my brother, October 2002)
37. Sistine Chapel, Italy (again, the Vatican, with my brother)
39. Louvre Museum, France (a few times, I mean, I only lived a few blocks away ...)
40. Canals of Venice, Italy (First time with friends, second time on my Honeymoon!)
41. Versailles, France (visited palace twice, gardens and village a couple more times)
45. Metropolitan Museum, New York, U.S.A. (summer 2001)
52. Prague Old Town, Czech Republic (summer 1997)
56. Chartres Cathedral, France (went down there for a day with my boyfriend, not sure how that came about ...)
60. Uffizi Gallery, Florence, Italy (only covered half of it before they closed, will have to visit again!)
62. Golden Pavilion, Japan (during my week in Kyoto, 2003)
66. St. Mark's Basilica & Campanile, Venice, Italy (in my first trip there)
67. Florence Cityscape, Italy (still the same Easter trip, best views from Piazzale Michelangelo after visiting Pitti Palace)
73. Leaning Tower of Pisa, Italy (same trip, shot load of photos not knowing the camera didn't work ...)
75. Mont St. Michel, Brittany, France (a camping trip)
84. New York Skyline, U.S.A. (I adore NY and I must say I gasped when I first saw the skyline with my own eyes)
86. Eiffel Tower, France (several times, but one of the world's 100 wonders?)
89. British Museum, United Kingdom (try to visit each time I'm through London)
92. Yosemite National Park, U.S.A. (with my hubby, last fall)
95. Chambord Chateau, France (a couple of times; it's big!)

I would say my share of this list was a bit skewed compared to the traveling my husband has done. Granted that when I took him to Paris, I actually deprived him of a visit to two of the sites. A large number of sites are to be found in Italy (7), and in France (6), where I lived for years. Three of the common items on our lists my husband and I visited together. Two more sites on the list (21. Acropolis & its Parthenon and 63. Delphi) would have been on my itinerary two years ago had I taken a trip I was invited to do. I also should have done the Hermitage Museum years ago, it was as good as planned.

Sites I plan to visit very soon are: 7. Machu Pichu, 54. Amalfi Coast and San Fransisco

I also hope in my life time to be able to see: 1. Pyramids of Egypt,
2. Great Wall of China (or more generally to visit China and the Guangxi region) and 3. Taj Mahal. But when, I don't know.

Sailing For the First Time

I started my first sailing class this weekend. We were to learn how to manoeuver the small single-handed Sabot boats, little 8' dinghies with a single main sail. Being nothing of a dare-devil and having only mediocre balance, I was both apprehensive and excited about sailing at all. And the first class on saturday was hard.

First of all we learned to tie a couple of knots: The Figure-Eight knot, a simple stopping knot (and the first climbing knot!), and the Cleat Hitch, to tie our boats up to the dock. We then reviewed the terminology for the different parts of the boat: the hull, mast, main sail, boom, rudder, tiller, traveler, boom-vang, leeboard, main sheet and bow-line, so that we would know how to refer to them. And we learned the basics of the Wind Clock, such as the irons, the beam reach and the runs, and we were taught the principles of tacking.

We were then taken down to the dock where we were shown how to rig the boat, then given each our boat and told to launch off. After that we were basically on our own. The wind was blowing really hard from the dock that day, towards the beach on the other side of the cove. I was impressed at how fast I could sail out of the dock and I dutifully prepared myself for performing my first tack. Now, the first thing to do when tacking is to look and make sure you're not gonna get in somebody elses way! When I came to the flag however where we were supposed to tack, five boats were already clogged up there, blocking the way. I figured I would just sail around them, which I then did, allowing myself ample space before I would try my skills in the art of tacking. But then a motorboat got into my way, I waited for it to pass, but by the time it did, I had almost reached a group of surfers taking a wind surfing class. At this point I could only head back, so now I tacked, found my self upwind and my boat pretty much stopped.

"Now, what do you do?", I thought to myself. I figured that where I was now was probably these irons, they had talked about during our lessons. So far, so good. What they hadn't told us however, was how to get out of these irons once you got there. I looked around me now to see how my class mates were handling the situation. Well, two of them had cap sized close by and were now in the water, clinging to the hull of their boats, a bunch of people still seemed to be stuck by the tack flag, a couple of people seemed to be heading out of the cove, not willfully! And I now saw three boats stranded up on the beach. Which is exactly what was about to happen to me, I now started drifting backwards, I hung on to my main sheet and the tiller and tried to steer away from the beach but in vain, I had come to close to the beach and my leeboard was now up, making me drift whichever way the wind wanted. And now my rudder came off, as my boat hit the ground ...

Well, I got out of the boat, pushed it away from the beach, jumped back in, fixed the rudder ... but before I could put the leeboard down the boat had already drifted in again. I pulled my boat up to another boat that was stranded close by and she offered to push me out but refused to try to launch off herself, saying she had already given up on it. Alright, she now held the boat while I put both the rudder and the leeboard out, then gave me a good push, enough for me almost to take off, but not quite. Instead, I barely made it around a little curve, then stranded again.

About eight people or so were now stranded on the beach where I had landed the first time. Three more people had tipped their boats and were being rescued by our sailing instructors. The rest of my class mates were out of sight. Hey, maybe they just blew out of the cove, into the main bay? I tried once more to get afloat. The wind was really strong and it took all my forces to keep the boat still in the water. I figured the only way would be to point the boat in a direction perpendicular to the wind. I waded the water almost up to my waist and somehow managed to jump into the boat, before I got control of the sail and the tiller though, I had blown inward towards the main beach again, and had very little room for manoeuver this close to the beach. Of course I stranded again.

One of the instructors was now helping my class mates take the sails of their boats down, then tying them up to his motor bows to tow them back. I started doing the same with my boat, when a guy came running towards me, saying he was gonna help. I told him, no, that I was taking the sail down because it was too windy. "No, no, just get in the boat and I'll push you off and you'll catch wind", he said. I was a little suspicious. "Hey, I don't think so. It's way too windy, I'm just struggling to keep the sail from blowing off the boat." "Listen to me, I'm a sailing instructor. I do this for a living", he said, as he pulled the boom out of my hands. "Come on, are you scared?" "Well, yeah! But, as you like", I half heartedly said as I moved to the other side of the boat. As I reached for the rudder inside the boat, I got suddenly hit on my head by the boom. That hurt! That stupid imbecile of a "sailing instructor" had dropped the boom without so much as giving me a warning. I was angry now. "This is not gonna work", I said. "If you really wanta help, then help me take down that sail, now!" "Niah, niah, niah ... ", he mumbled, but he came over and reached for the boom with me. "What is this?", he then said, "this is all different, I don't know how to do this", as he reached for the boom-vang. "Well, get out of my way, then", I said, ready to drop all manners now. He quickly did. As he strided past me, I could suddenly smell the alcohol on his breath. Goodbye, mister know-it-all ...

Thankfully, there was now an instructor in sight. I pulled my boat over to her and she took my sail, packed it up in her motorboat and brought me and my dinghy to dock. I was one of the last people to be towed in, but I learned that I probably got to spend more time in my boat than most of them. "One and a half minutes, is how long I spent in the boat today", one of the older women said. Well, at least I tried to launch the boat again, which was more than most of them did. The instructors said it had been a lost battle from the start, due to the weather conditions. "The worst we've had all summer", they said. They promised next time would be better.

Next time was yesterday, sunday, and it was much better. We learned more about the wind, how to get out of irons, the beat, the close reach, the beam reach and the broad reach. The wind was much calmer, yet ample, and we got some good sailing done. Tacked and jibed and sailed in a triangle, great fun! I even got comfortable sailing in such a tight crowd, but there were 19 of us on only a small patch of water, between the tree flags they had positioned for us. Everything went well, except for a couple of people that cap sized again and a guy who lost his rudder and drifted way out until the instructors realized and went to get him!

I was all excited about my sailing as I biked home to meet up with C. We biked together to the little Olive Café for brunch, then spent the afternoon on the beach. I finished up one more pocket book, Dearest Poona by Karin Fossum, or Calling Out For You, as it's called in english. I don't know if it's because I have been out of reading novels for such a long time, but I get really worked up about every book I read now, and this one was no exception. I felt so for the protagonist and his poor indian bride that I was close to tears many times.

10 minutes from Downtown

Sunday night we suddenly got the absurd idea to go downtown. We wanted to see a movie, there isn't a whole lot to see, I didn't feel like seeing the pirate movie and it was kinda too hot to rent a DVD and watch on the couch. The only option seemed to be the cinemas downtown.

After scooping up our lamb steaks and corn we drove downtown in a lightning. And it only took us ten minutes from when we left the house and until we walked up to the theatre after parking the truck. Downtown was buzzing with live: cars everywhere, tourists, restaurants, late night shops, taxis, bars, the sidewalks filled with scenery, people walking, action.

At the theatre we saw the devil wears Prada with a brilliant Meryl Streep. After movie we went for a drink at La Strada across the street. It suddenly dawned upon how "outlandish" the place felt, sitting there outside on the terrace having a prosecco on a hot summer night in a foreign city. Yet, it's only ten minutes from home and we go there so rarely that it almost feels like going abroad. Well, if it doesn't take more than that we should definitely go there more often.

Which we did again yesterday. Left work early. Went home. Hung out. Then drove downtown for dinner at the indian restaurant Monsoon. Which did in fact send us back home in our thoughts (to our favorite restaurant, the East India Company). In that sense, the meal didn't quite live up to it. But the food we tried was good, even if the servants were kind of frazzled. We ordered one lassi, we got two. We waited a while for our food. When it came, the naan didn't come with it. We started serving ourselves and when I tasted my sauce I was surprised to see that my Moler Murgh had big chunks of mango in it. Even more surprising was to find that C's lamb dish was made of tofu. When I cut up my chicken it came apart like fish. And it was indeed fish. After a while the waitress came with OUR food. What we had on our plates was what the couple sitting across from us had ordered. Only, they had already received their food. "We got it mixed up somehow", the waitress said. "We seem to have made a double order for them." So she took the fish dish and the vegetarian dish away from our table, then appeared again with our bread as she scooped away our plates. We thought our waitress was gonna bring us new plates, since she took away the ones we had already served ourselves on. She didn't though, and as the wait got longer we started nibbling on our bread and I used the naan to dip into my Moler Murgh to try the new sauce. We'd almost finished our naan when we finally got hold of the waitress to remind her about bringing us plates. By that time, I was somehow kind of full. I had of course been drinking the lassi I didn't order and eating my naan bread. The couple sitting next to us got impatient from waiting and they suddenly stood up and walked away. A couple of minutes later the waitress brought the drinks they had ordered and left them at their abandoned table without a clue. All in all the food we got was fine, except that it was cold when they finally brought us plates to eat it off. And I found the naan a bit lacking in flavor. The menu is very enticing. However, we'll probably check out some of the other indian restaurants of San Diego before we'll be back.

After dinner, we wandered into Borders where we spent a while paging through books. I mean, it's not that often we get out of the house to do stuff like that ...

Picnic on the Beach

We had yet another picnic on the beach last night. Went in the water a little bit first, and it was really warm. Then sat on our bamboo mats and snacked on olives, fresh bread with italian dry sausage, french cheese from sheep milk and grapes. Also, galia and cantaloupe melons, pineapple, blueberries, and mango for desert. With this, a cheap bottle of red, which we didn't even finish. Actually, it's strictly forbidden to bring glass on the beach, risking a 50 dollar fine. But, I could see no way around it. Anyway, we have this perfect, padded bag for all our picnic stuff, including the wine bottle. (Thanks, Gogga!) It packs plates, cutlery, wine glasses (plastic), bottle opener, salt and pepper shakers, napkins, cutting board and like I said, a special pocket for the bottle. Nice, uhh?

I like the beach by sunset. It's so peaceful sometimes. And most of the jerks will have left the beach by then too. My beach! Right?

Les Visiteurs ...

The visitors and us wrapped it up with a trip to Coronado Island and a day at Sea World. Also managed to go see a movie at the drive-in in Santee. The beach in Coronado is really nice but Sea World didn't leave me quite as impressed as I expected. The killer whale show Believe, with Shamu and his friends, was good though, although C was a bit annoyed by the religious undertones he sensed in it. The sting rays were pretty cool too. I also like the sea otters, the sharks and the manatees. The rides however were ... well, really crowded for one, and broken for another. I think my little niece was a little let down by that. On the other hand there is something of a rip-off going on in the park with for instance the selling of fry for 5 dollars to feed the sting rays. That makes about 1000 dollars a pound! Seems a bit out of proportion. And this after families had paid an entrance of $54 per person already. Guess they gotta make their money somehow ...

I think our visitors were half glad to leave us finally, after more than ten days of relentless heat. They were not used to that. And neither are we. But we try to live with it.

The Neighbours From Hell

Independence Day brought a few discoveries with it:
1) I'm still as unimpressed with it as I was last year. It's just boozy and rowdy, like some gigantic purposeless college kids party.
2) Try to tell an American that the 4th of July is not celebrated around the world, like for instance in Turkey, and he will be shocked.
3) Our neighbours are much more of a nightmare than I had realized so far. Actually, I'm not even sure if our "transients by the garbage bins" were all that worse. Or the drug addict that was living in our garage last year ... :

12:00 AM - We come home from our drive-in movie. As we step into the house we hear a lot of crying and yelling from a nearby house. A woman keeps screaming "Get OUT of my house! GET out of my house! Get out of my HOUSE!" It echos over the neighbourhood and C decides to walk over to the police squad next street and check if they will do something about this. As he comes back, we hear a man shout "Get the F*** out of her house, man!" There's some banging and then it's quiet!
3:00 AM - Our neighbours to the right (the ones with the fence that's falling apart) receive their first 4th of July guests. They arrive in a car with all the honking and clacking and slamming that goes with and their first comments are about what I great parking space they got this year (yeah, right outside our bedroom window).
3:15 AM - Some more guests arrive to join the first ones that still are standing just by the car, smoking, chatting, drinking, laughing (uhh, right outside our window).
3:30 AM - I turn to C and ask him: "Isn't there a law for this?" He answers, "It's the 4th of July, honey. There's spare earplugs on your nightstand ..."
3:40 AM - I get up and close all our windows facing the north side. I take a glimpse outside and notice that the loudest voice outside belongs to a heavily intoxicated, staggering girl standing outside my window wearing only a skinny bikini. I grab a pair of earplugs and return to bed.
3:45 AM - Even through my earplugs I hear something about going for a dip in the hot tub in the back ... I guess I could have been dreaming.
9:10 AM - I wake up super late. As I take a look outside I notice people arriving at my other neighbour's house (the one to the left who hoses his lawn all day). I think: "I wonder how many cars he's gonna be able to fit on his lawn today?"
10:00 AM - I think our neighbour's party has officially started. They got stacks of beer on their lawn now and between 20 and 30 people are already standing there chatting and drinking. "Hmm, great! I wonder if his party is gonna take place there, right in our driveway?"
10:30 AM - Wow, they're firing up the barbecue already. They've put it in our driveway, so that the smoke blows into our house, instead of over their guests.
11:30 AM - The grill's been going for an hour now, but it looks like they're not grilling anything except for the coals ...
12:00 PM - There's about five ghetto blasters gathered on our neighbours lawn now. They seem to be kind of competing with each other. Or maybe it's just to overpower the noise from the talking and (by now) screaming crowd.
1:00 PM - Some more cars arrive. I don't know where they are going to park. Oh, well, looks like they're gonna park in our driveway. Good thing we got nowhere to go. For the moment. Or until we have to go get P&R from wherever they manage to park their truck in PB. They're carrying some stuff out of one of the trucks though; when I realize it's a drum set my jaw falls off.
1:10 PM - The drum set is up! "Are they really allowed to do that, honey? In OUR driveway?" "Uh", C replies, "I'm sure they're not gonna be loud. They don't want people calling the cops."
1:30 PM - They've been jerking off at the drum set now for a while, and I swear, I'm sure one could almost get used to this. We'll just have to talk louder so that we hear each other ...
1:40 PM - I changed my mind: I can't get used to this. Now, they also got an electric guitar and a bass with an amplifier that can probably broadcast their music all the way to Temecula. And they're pretending to be playing some song and all the guests are cheering them on.
1:45 PM - Okay, I get it: the bigger the noise the better the party.
2:15: PM - I've been trying to keep an open mind for this, but the music they're trying to play is just SO bad! These guys badly need a garage to practice their skills ...
2:30 PM - P&R have arrived, they look somewhat bemused by the scene taking place in front of our house.
3:00 PM - Some of the people next door are so drunk by now, they can not stand up straight.
3:15 PM - The cops arrive. They tell the people next door to pack up and get the drum set and the amplifier out of there. I'm kind of relieved. I wonder who called them. Maybe my landlady, I'm sure she wasn't thrilled by their socalled music ...
3:30 PM - The "guitarist" of the band walks up to our porch. I wonder if he thinks we called the cops on them. He asks C: "Is it okay with you if we just play some more? We're just gonna keep it cool, some jazzy kind'uv stuff, something mellow and quiet." C says "No, it's not okay." "Alright, but how about you don't call the cops?" C says: "We didn't call the cops, but I was thinking about it. Yet, I wouldn't of course, not without talking to you first, okay? But you're being way too loud. We can't even hear our thoughts in there anymore." "Alright, I get it", says the red eyed amateur musician as he walks away ...
3:45 PM - They are at it again. I will say though, that they have turned the amplifier down a little bit. If the police gets called again, they're gonna be in trouble ...
4:00 PM - The amplifier is up to max again, and they're blasting our ears off. There's no detecteble music coming through, but a lot of noise. The guy at the guitar is pulling off some very ingenuous solo stunts. The bass player is however doing his own thing.
4:04 PM - "Geez, they're bad!" says R. They're like school kids who got their hands on electric instruments for the first time in their lifes. Thanks to the crowds that are walking past every minute and all the attention they are getting with their impromptu band out there on the street, the wannabe musicians are probably living the day of their life.
...
6:10 PM - C's been out there a few times now to ask them please to stop, but to no avail. Sometimes they get tired and stop for a little while. Sometimes a new person comes and picks up the drums. I'm starting to really like the drums, they are so much less annoying than the awful squeaking that comes out of that electric guitar. I was hoping we would get some quiet while we ate, but I guess not ...
6:30 PM - The crowd has cleared out quite a bit now and some just passed out on the lawn. Maybe they are getting tired (too) ...
6:40 PM - A few of the guys left from the party next door are now playing football on the street. They just broke the side mirror on one of the cars parked in front of our house. After a brief consternation somebody shouted: "Anybody have some Dragon Glue?", after which they continued playing for two more minutes, then quietly let themselves disappear. Wow! It's really getting quite around here now.
7:00 PM - Gosh, I shouldn't have said that. Now they're out of the house again, jumping up and down on the table tennis table that served as a drink table all day, trying to smash it into pieces. They're also throwing beer bottles on the lawn, but nothing broke yet.
8:00 PM - It's amazingly quiet now. The neighbour's dog has been expressing his bond with our great little rock band by peeing on the electric guitar lying there on the lawn and over the drum set at all possible angles. Sprucing it up a bit.
10:30 PM - The neighbour's lot is now completely abandoned. Besides the drum set, in our driveway and on the neighbour's lawn there's also all this nice plastic patio furniture lying in abandon. Maybe we should pick up a few chairs for our front porch while we got the chance.

Happy Fourth of July (expressed in a broken voice)!

Heat Wave

We just hit a heat wave here in San Diego. Since Sunday, temperatures have been exceptionally high with only a minimum breeze. Downtown temperatures went up to 96 degrees (that's 36° Celsius), while we at the beaches got temperatures in the eighties. That's very hot for these parts.

Unfortunately this happens while I have visitors that don't really appreciate hot weather. I have been out and about with them and the heat is a bit draining when walking in the sun and when driving in the car. Yet, we've accomplished quite a lot, we've been to the World Famous San Diego Zoo, visited Balboa Park, Point Loma, Ocean Beach, parts of downtown. We've been to La Jolla several times, the coastlines of La Jolla Cove, downtown La Jolla around Prospect street, been to Pacific Beach boardwalk, downtown PB, the bay, the Birch Aquarium, Old Town, Temecula and ... THREE malls: University Town Center, Fashion Valley and Horton Plaza. And, we were to the Delmar County Fair on saturday. Got some rides, some art, some foods, some animal smells ...

I feel as if I'm allowed to take a little time off after I finished the quarter. And the school year, by the way, also with straight A's! Summer quarter, and my research assistantship, hasn't officially started yet. So, I am juggling work with my free time. Try to spend as much time as possible with my family, make short trips to campus to touch base with my advisor and do the stuff I wouldn't as easily do from home. I have a couple of projects going now: the mitochondrial one that I will try to make into a paper in the next few weeks, and the MS proteomics project I had with Ines and which we are also gonna attempt to turn into a publication. So, all is good.

Otherwise, summer was supposed to be about the good life and it most likely will be. I'm even learning to appreciate our lovely house by the bay with the nice front porch and our little garden plants.

... Johny Cash compared to Michael Jackson

We took ourselves to an outdoors concert last night, in celebration of the quarter being over. As it happens, Baaba Maal was in town, in fact he just started his summer tour. C has been to his concerts twice already, but me never, although I have some of his music. I have however been to Youssou N'Dour's concert and that was one of the most fun, vibrating shows I've ever been to.

Some british guy warmed up for BM, I wasn't too much into him although I guess he was ok, the star Baaba Maal however started slowly with some traditional 'griot' type music, no percussion and I was beginning to wonder where all the fun was. He really wasn't measuring up to Youssou N'Dour anymore than one would wanta compare Johnny Cash to Michael Jackson. I just wasn't feeling any swing. But then, things started heating up a bit, and we finally got the whole package: rythm and beat, unresistable percussion, the bright colours of African costumes, and a couple of female dancers jumping around as if possessed by the devil. It was fascinating. It was just over too soon.

It's an interesting venue where the concert took place, down by the marina. We walked for a little while after the concert and admired the views of the sailboats and the San Diego skyline across the bay.

Where did everybody go?

It's monday morning again and I'm back at work. The same can not be said of other members of my group. I ask myself where everybody must have gone. The only living person I've ran into all morning is this visiting PhD student from Austria who's here for just a brief period of time. I can only assume my colleagues here are taking a break after a tough quarter. However, as far as I know, I am the only one who actually was taking a full schedule of classes. And now I'm on a research assistantship, so I better get some work done. Alone! Well, at least there's peace and quiet. I am not gonna complain.

Although, ... it feels a little bit lonely.

Inconvenient Truth or Lies

Tonight we saw Al Gore's documentary on global warning. It seems like a surprisingly personal movie, and I can't but admire his dedication for this cause. It's not that he looks any more appealing than he did in the year 2000 when he had the misfortune of "losing" his presidential election to you-know-who, I mean, he still looks like a politician to me. But, there seems to be sincerity in his message. And anyway, how is it that the subject of global warming has been disputed so vehemently, there is just something wrong with that.

Climate conditions obey very complex models, yes, but there must be a way for scientists to lay down the facts and depict their predictions together with the assumptions they rely on. And then tackle the subject once and for all. What is there so hard about that? And why is it that some people seem to feel so strongly about the "non-veracity" of global warming that they seem to be ready to fight all the battles it takes to stop the message from reaching us? I mean, even if your profound beliefs told you the message was a hoax, is the cause of stopping measures to counter global warming *that* urgent? Where is the danger, where is the fire? What is the worst that could happen if we put some efforts into trying to stop this evolution and then found out that our concerns had been exaggerated? Would we lose a lot of money? Would *they* lose a lot of money?

I guess those are the important questions. Without the answers to that, none of his whole debate makes much sense to me. And to follow the discussions, as polarized as they are, is frankly exasperating. But that movie is worthwhile, I think. You might not think you learned much you didn't already know, but it does pretty much sum up the debate so far, and maybe put some things into context ...

Do Fish Jump?

Among the things on my agenda for what to do when I would be done with finals was the 'picnic on the beach'. I've totally been longing for that one. The beach is just around the corner from our house, so the logistics of organizing a beach snack are not overwhelming. So, here is what we did: We went to the new spanish food specialties store up on Garnet (actually, they also have a restaurant there that serves tapas, another idea for a night out ...), picked out a slice of sheep's cheese and cured dry sausage. Packed this with half a baguette we had since this morning, olives, grapes, a sliced up mango, and a cheap bottle of red. I grabbed my sunhat and two minutes later we were blissfully sitting on the beach, glasses of wine in hand.

I think next time we might be tempted to bring our portable grill and a fishing pole too, because the bay seems to be swirming with fish. We have previously seen some good sized raies swimming under the walking bridge. Tonight, after the sun went down but before it went dark, we saw long, big fish jumping out of the water. They were longer than my forearm and we decided one of those would be perfect meal for the two of us. We then looked them up and it turns out that these were probably Corvina.

Summer Arrived

I can finally say that summer arrived for me. I've been working night and day to meet deadlines for the past three weeks, and now all finals are behind me, all projects and papers have been turned in, and there is nothing more left to do except take a nice weekend break.

Otherwise, I don't want to talk about school any more for the moment.

My husband will be happy to have me to himself as I finally take my nose out of the books. We haven't even decided what to do with the freetime. Probably nothing, to start with.

And, the weather is even nice! Sunny, breezy, pleasantly warm but not hot. Ah, heaven ...

Rach' Three

We made it to Copley Hall yesterday at the occasion of a Rachmaninov performance by Yefim Bronfmann. (Click here for an excerpt ...)Jan, from C's lab was kind enough to get tickets for us, and off we went. It's my first time in Copley Hall, yet we've been talking about going all winter. You know how it is ... But there's a decent symphony orchestra here, and there's sometimes cheap seats to be had, so there's no excuse.

The program went well: Schnittke's (K)ein Midsommernacht's Traum, Rachmaninov's 3rd Piano Concerto and Tchaikovsky's 4th Symphony. Their Tchaikovsky wasn't particularily fiery, I thought, and in parts a little slow for my taste, but decent. The pianist was spectacular. The intermission, crowded.

The one thing that stood out as different about this concert, from the concerts I'm used to, was maybe the speech given at the beginning at the concert. The chairman of the symphony board stepped upon stage. I thought "Nice! Maybe he'll say something about the works they are about to perform, or the composers, or the soloist ...". Wrong! He talked about what a great year this had been for the San Diego Symphony as their ticket sales went up 7%. He said he was hoping the ticket sales would go up even more next year. And he invited us to donate money, preferably before the end of June. Which is all good. I mean, of course a symphony orchestra needs money to survive. I just found this 'business/money' speak something of a mood killer at the moment where I had actually been expecting the director of the orchestra to come on stage. But maybe that's just me. I'm sure the "money money" thing is something I will eventually grow used to here in America ...

Weekends in Pacific Beach

I think we are finally starting to learn to enjoy living in this neighbourhood. For the price we pay (not that there are any cheap neighbourhoods in and around San Diego either) I think we might as well make more of it than just using it as a place to sleep between our trips to campus.

We have now added to our Saturday morning routine a little bike ride to the farmer's market. The market's really nothing special, to be honest. It's a few scattered stands at best and the selection consists mostly of avocados, citrus fruits, tomatoes and some flowers and plants. It's got nothing to do with the colours, the smells, the atmosphere and the abundance of an ordinary local Paris neighbourhood market. It's mostly expensive and the vegetables/fruits are occasionally a bit tired, but I guess we go there under the illusion that we are buying from the farmer, not a corporation, and that we might come upon something fresh. But for us this is also, and not least, a good motivation for actually getting out of bed before noon ...!

It probably takes a few times to figure out where the good stuff is to be found. We have had some really watery strawberries at the market already, and avocados that were so tasteless they weren't even fit for guacamole (or maybe in particular not fit for ...) But, we now have an egg-woman we like to go to, who recycles our eggboxes too, an avocado woman who gives you exactly the ripeness of fruit you ask for (and more than seldom gives you a big discount too because of whatever ...), and there's a guy that sells fresh orange and tangelos juice. And we got great basil and tomato plants there too. And, like I said, it's the bike ride. Besides, not everyone in America has a weekly farmer's market in the neighbourhood, so it's sort of a privilege ...

I try to remind myself every day that we now live only a few steps from fabulous Sail Bay in Mission Bay, and that if I want to smell the sea I only need to walk around the corner. Another way is to do a jog along the bay down to the beach. This is now part of our routine, as much as I abhor running in general. It probably takes about ten minutes to run along the bay until the isthmus where we can cut across to the ocean beach, and ten minutes is probably as long as I can run in one stretch. So, we run down to the sea, I catch my breath while C runs five minutes further down the boardwalk and back, then we run together to our house along the bay again. All in all a thirty minute workout. I do hate running, but I might come to enjoy this eventually!

One Year in America

It's been one whole year since I first arrived here. How do I like it? I don't know. Yes, and no. But, I made it. That's a start ... ! Although just barely. And I don't have time to even think about it now. Back to my books ...

The Best Mexican Restaurant in San Diego

We finally added a new restaurant to our repertoire. We have been overly conservative for the last year, sticking to the same places mostly. I do love eating at the Fishery though!

So, we discovered a great Mexican restaurant, El Agave Teguileria, close to Old Town. They have great starter plates, a fabulous collection of moles, a variety of seafood dishes and the biggest selection of tequilas I have ever seen. Their margaritas are pretty expensive, but at least they are sharp, not sweet and watered down.

After a big plate of starters which included shrimp empanada, shrimp sopecito, two crispy beef taquitos, mushroom poblano quesadilla, pickled cactus paddles, guacamole, crispy potato taquito and cuitlacoche (corn fungus) tlacoyo, C had Calamar a la Talla, fresh squid served with a light chile pasilla sauce, and I had Camarón Cancún, sautéed large shrimp laid in a mango sauce with a splash of mustard, sprinkled with coconut and served with tropical fruit.

One more place to recommend. They have a nice overbuilt terrace and a nice atmosphere.

Haunting Munich

Munich was one of those films I missed when it was out in the movie halls, but our DVD rental had it on display yesterday and I grabbed it. So, we watched it last night, and it was good, very good. But haunting. It´s kind of been working my mind all day today. The movie takes a surprisingly objective stand on the terrorist acts and subsequent assassinations it relates. It places you in the midst of the action but doesn't really pass judgement except in the sense that it allows you to watch as the seemingly "normal" people involved disintegrate. So, the movie is sort of humane but also sort of creepy and certainly does not leave you at rest. What is all this violence, anyway? Well, depending on where you are coming from, it may be everything. The beginning, and the end. Everything, and nothing else is conceivable. It's a necessity and yet it brings no resolution. It's a vicious cycle, a snake biting its tail.

Then, to another issue: What are people actually thinking, scheming invasions into countries in a whole other part of the world, whose people we do not know, do not understand and who, if only we weren't imposing ourselves on them all the time and interfering in their business, would have no interest in having anything to do with us ...? Can we spare the anger we will be provoking? Is this somehow going to make the world a better place? Or is this necessary to keep the vicious cycle alive? Is the "devil" pulling our strings?

"He who has done evil, expects evil."
-- African Proverb

Swimming With an Army of Me

One of my favorite pastimes is now the pool on campus. We generally go there a few times a week now, usually after work, sometimes in the middle of the day and every so often on the weekend too. The pool is quite good, in fact. It's not too cold for my standards and I'm getting used to 25 yard laps, as opposed to the 50 meter laps we used to do. It's rarely crowded and in that case it will at worst have 1-2 people per lane. And the dip in the hot tub afterwards really does it for me!

The rule is that we swim 800 meters, then hang out in the pot for five minutes. Kinda like we would do at home. (Ok, maybe we would spend a little longer at home, and listen in on conversations ...) Some things are somewhat unlike home though. The locker rooms, for one thing. Although showers are provided, I rarely spot anyone using them, so if they are they are doing it all the more discretely. In fact, aside from myself, I never saw anyone really naked in the locker rooms! It's a mystery to me. I mean, to dress or undress for the pool, at some time you should be forced to take your clothes off, right? Although, I have seen women come to the pool wearing their swimsuit under their clothes. However, you would hardly put your clothes on again over a wet swimsuit ...

Anyway, this is one of those cultural mysteries that baffle the intruder. I'm frankly intrigued. I am sure the showers are being used by somebody (other than me). They even put up soap dispensers recently, after I asked about them. So, I've come to the conclusion that this is a display of the American's contradictory feelings towards nudity. As comfortable are they are with naked/halfnaked women in the magazines, on the television, on the beach and in music videos, they abhor the sight of a naked body in a publid shower room, and they hardly want to expose their own nudity to a real person that's going for a swim like them and might possibly interact. So, on one hand I'm slightly amused by the hypocrisy, on the other hand I'm sometimes invaded by paranoia. As I shamelessly put on my bra without covering myself I sometimes suddenly get the notion I'm being watched by big brother and that tomorrow I'm gonna by sued for sexual harassment ...

The other thing that differs from the pool back home, well, that is the crowd. Obviously, a campus pool is mostly attended by young people in their prime. No seniors, no children, although the odd faculty professor can be spotted sometimes. And unlike the pool back home, there is constantly music on the loadspeekers. I doubt its function is to entertain the swimmers. I think it's rather to help the couple of lifeguards on duty battle their boredom. I find this music very anti-climactic or surreal lots of the time. It doesn't help that they mostly play awfully bad music, and they are in particular amazingly geared towards country. When they put on something familiar though, it can help you get through your laps: 550, 575, 600, 625 ...

Today as I was coming towards the end of my swim, they were playing Björk, and I thought: "Isn't this weird?" Would I have imagined 30 years ago when we were having a little christmas get-together in my choral group, that this funny dark eyed girl that ate so many cookies at the christmas party that she had to puke and couldn't sing carols anymore would be providing the background music to this scene: and in golden California, ten thousand miles from home, I shot through the shimmering water with "An Army of Me" in my ears ...

Back to climbing

This weekend C had the wheel on my 15$ cruiser bike fixed. That cost him $35, which is more than my bicycle lock and basket cost together. I feel more comfortable on it now that the front wheel doesn't swing to the sides. So, we took me and my bike to the farmer's market Saturday morning after breakfast and after I talked with my sister on the phone for an hour. Somehow we always manage to show up there at closing time. They close at noon. But we snapped a little basil plant and another variety of tomatoes (we already have one on our front porch with three flowers, and it's been growing pretty fast since we got it) before they cleared the tables. Also got a couple corn cobs, and strawberries. The strawberries this time turned out to be watery, much unlike the ones we got last time.

C went out sailing with a buddy from the lab, but I stayed inside. Wanted to work on my Matlab and my approximation algorithms homework and make some advances on my phylogeny project. Sunday however I was forced to take half a day off! And we drove up to Mission Gorge for climbing. Spent four hours and I finished two routes out of the three I tackled. One 5.6 face route, called Ramaghast, had a couple of tricky spots but many hand holds. Then I did a 5.7 called Gandalf on the same rock, but this one was a crack route and aside from two moves at the bottom straightforward. The last one we did was a 5.8, and I probably knew beforehand that I wasn't going to finish it. C did it and fixed anchors, I did the first few moves, sort of for shows, but then stopped at the crux and asked to be lowered. Maybe I could have done it, it was a smearing face route with some nice disks, not many proper hand holds, but it was quite high up and intimidating in that way. C tried a 5.10+ on the other side of the rock but couldn't make it. First time I really had to hold him with my weight as I belayed him when he fell on the rope. The rock face was partly overhanging and the anchors fixed in such a way that he would each time swing over the corner to the other side of the rock and hang there. The first time that happened I jumped up in the air too, then I placed myself where I would have better foot holds and more weight.

The sun was out and I would have gotten a bad sunburn had I not had a double layer of sun screen. It was almost too hot at times. As soon as one leaves the beach front here in San Diego one loses the ocean breeze of course.

It was a good climb session though. We were all sweaty, sticky, dirty, nasty and tired as we returned.

I want my (M)TV

At last we got something to put on top of the TV stand we bought previously. Got a television second hand from an Australian couple that's going back down under, 27'' flat screen Sanyo and it really fits fine. C was thrilled. Now he won't be on my back anymore when I'm trying to study. He'll have his own thing. Worst is though that I don't know if it will help him relax a bit, most often I catch him watching C-SPAN, PBS or the UCSD channel ...

"Honey, you have to understand that TV is not meant for learning stuff. It's supposed to bring a slow, soothing death for your brain cells!"

Compatriot Spotted

I saw a fellow Icelander on my way to work this morning. We were driving on the highway when C pointed to a white minivan in the next lane and said "What flag is that?". On the back of the car there was a big sticker with the icelandic flag. As we passed the car I saw that the driver was definitely Icelandic. (Don't ask me how, I just know.) Maybe there's another Icelandic woman living here in San Diego? Then she turned right into the 52, while we continued our way on the 5.

C's never had a bumper sticker in his life, but he said: "Maybe we should get one like that?" ...

Google Lookups

This is always fun! What do people expect to find on my site, by web search lookup:

• climbing trees without rope
  
• life of pi pi patel's journal
  
• whitney turtle creek campground altitude
  
• what happened to tioga pass resort?
  
• joaquin cortes
  
• life nudist
  
• mega sleepover church
  
• chivalry in the 21st century
  
• land in phrump
  
• death valley stovepipe wells spa truck parking
  
• cured hamachi
  
• stinky feet at yoga class
  
• kiera knightley nipple
  
• saddlebag hike
  
• mark appartment repainting sex
  
• laila josefowicz
  
• kabah archeological site
  
• 2006 my husband and i finally got a home of our own guestbook
  
• chivalry umbrella
  
• flavor milk proteomics
  
• bioinformatics exam'
  
• surprised phrases
  
• journal-agression of southern american
  
• lava bed pictures owens valley, ca
  
• adeline yen mah journal entry

... love restaurants ...

We got lucky this weekend. C's mom came down to be with H while he was working in Encinitas, and we had two get-together's with them and also P & R who came in from Temecula.

We actually planned to have them over, but when there was 6 of us, they decided rather to go out for dinner. On Friday we drove up to an Italian restaurant in Carlsbad. I had a Salade Caprese and a big steak of Seared Tuna with Jumbo Shrimp rolled up in Prosciutto. C got a halibut and his mom salmon, as usual, H got clams, R got a steak and P some sort of salad, I think. I shared a Creme Brulee with my husband afterwards, but we agreed that it wasn't half as good as the one H makes (and which I never tried). It was kind of heavy and grainy. Well, maybe that's the italian style. But I think H will now feel compelled to make us his recipe next time we go up to the ranch ...

Saturday we went to good old Fishery. They never fail! This time I got the Pan Fried Halibut with Stewed Tomatoes, Garlic Mashed Potatoes and Asparagus. We shared a platter of starters: Oysters, Eel and Tuna Sushi Roll, Jumbo Crab Cake and Goat Cheese on Grilled Bread with Strawberries and Cheddar. Warm Strawberries with Balsamic Vinegar on Vanilla Ice-cream for dessert!

As good as settled in ...

After terribly neglecting furnishing our new appartment since we moved in, after we came back from Colorado it seems we finally more or less completed that. Last weekend we found a dining set we were content with, added bookshelves and put together a TV stand, whereas the weekend before I had been lucky enough to come upon a desk that fit into my study room. And, we got this fabulous set of german knives as a pending wedding present from H.
Otherwise, just about everything we go sofar was either on sale or second hand. That saved us a lot of money. I didn't actually think we would be able to do this without resorting to credit, on our tight budget, but it all worked out finally.
So, we paid 60 bucks for a chair with chair and a hutch, 200 for a solid wood dining set, and our Pier 1 bookcases were probably the only thing we acquired full price!
We even had a dinner guest last weekend! H came up from Escondido where he's been working for a couple of weeks.
Oh, we still didn't find a TV set though. C is getting a bit anxious about that. After all, we haven't had TV now for two months. Oh, well ...

Shopping at Ralphs ...

We were to Ralphs supermarket for the first time yesterday. Still, it's just across the street from campus. I guess we are somewhat snob when it comes to groceries. But what can you do? Our favorite local grocery store burned down while we were in Colorado, so now we are kinda lost.

The Ralphs supermarket is enormous compared to the stores we usually go to. However, I managed to run into Cynthia there, as well as a couple of other people that were in my classes last quarter. Actually, the store was swirming with students from UCSD, especially foreign students. There were for instance probably more Indian people in there than what you will find in all the other markets of San Diego put together. I guess some people don't like to venture to far from campus. And I guess they are sort of right in that. I suppose our lives might be simpler if we were just living on campus in university housing and went about our life up there without all this commuting and going to the beach nonsense.

Anyway, the selection at Ralphs is not bad. Good drugstore, big meat and seafood counters, lots of fruits and vegetables including organic, good variety of ethnic foods and condiments. Like, we picked up everything for our Thai Curry there. But, the service is not like at the stores we usually go to. We waited more than five minutes for somebody to show up at the fish counter, and the kids at the register are not friendly. Not like at Trader Joe's where they'll wanta tell you there favorite music band is Sigurrós and that they are going on vacation in Brazil while they bag your groceries, or like at Henry's Market where they may shamelessly share with you that they just had a nervous breakdown and that getting up in the morning is sometimes hard ...