The anecdote about the reindeer catching antlers in the lights was amusing.
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The Station Fire in the hills behind the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Photo by Bill Westphal.
One year ago, this is what the hills above my workplace looked like.
Even though I lived through it, it's still hard to believe such a monster fire was so close.
]]>The Album, Counting Stars, evidently won't be out until mid-summer.
Andrew Peterson is one of my favorite artists, and one of the few whose albums I still buy on CD. Go ahead and listen to the new song, it's rather awesome.
Andrew even posts a comment on Justin's post...
]]>Dave and Ryan and families are friends from church. Kim and I love going over to hang out at Jameson Brown since it is less than a mile from our place. We just don't make it there as often as we'd like! But we love the coffee...
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We have eight little platys swimming around now. I'd thought that some fish either kill or eat their young, but so far, these guys seem to be doing ok! They're very small and hard to see. I thought we had six for a while, then saw a seventh, and Kim spotted the eighth. I wonder if they're able to even eat the regular fish food flakes?
We have three adult platys right now, one of whom still looks rather big. I suppose it's possible that we might have even more babies soon. Maybe I should have asked the pet store for males!
]]>Not too mention how the Lakers actually played. Do they care?
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- Click "Create Filter" located at the top of your Inbox
- In the "Has the words:" field, enter: lang:Russian
- Select "Delete it" within the Action List, and (if you have existing Russian Spam) select: "Apply Filter to Conversations below"
- Click "Create Filter"
Of course, if you expect to receive legitimate email in Russian or Chinese, don't do this. :) But I'd say 80% of my spam is in Chinese...
]]>The exact count of the vote — 136 to 70 —had town officials hitting their calculators yesterday. The zoning measure needed a two-thirds vote to pass. A calculation by town accountant Trudy Brazil indicated that 136 votes are two-thirds of 206 total votes, said Town Clerk Cynthia Slade.
Brazil said she used the calculation of .66 multiplied by 206 to obtain the number.
But using .6666 — a more accurate version of two-thirds — the affirmative vote needed to be 137 instead of 136, according to an anonymous caller to town hall and to the Times.
Almost makes me cry. "A more accurate version of two-thirds"? What?
Quick, pull out your calculator. Two-thirds of 206 is 137.33 (with repeating 3's), which means you actually need 138 votes. So the town accountant and the anonymous caller were both wrong. Err, so do you think they changed the results of the vote?
]]>And a fansite is trying to get people to buy sandwiches at Subway to show support.
On April 27th be sure to BUY A $5 FOOTLONG from Subway and if possible, drop a note in the comment box at the franchise letting them know you’re participating in the Finale and Footlong campaign to save NBC’s Chuck, of which Subway is a product placement sponsor.
I'll put that on my calendar...
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I just got married! Woo-hoo! My lovely wife's name is Kim, and we enjoyed a wonderful wedding at Sierra Madre Congregational Church and a honeymoon down in Huatulco, Mexico.
We had two amazing photographers, from Karen Leah Photography, and Karen just blogged about our wedding. Kim and I were complimented on our choice of photographers so many times. Karen and Brian were very good, and they were also very enthusiastic, supportive, and competent. We'd really recommend them very highly!
Now I'm back at work. I'm enjoying a life without wedding preparation again! Coming back from the warm weather and beautiful water in Oaxaca to rainstorms in Pasadena was tough.
In particular, the shot catching the shell leaving the barrel of the howitzer is pretty amazing. I wonder how many times the photographer had to try for that shot.
]]>]]>When same-sex marriage became legal in the state on June 16, the health department issued new gender-neutral marriage forms with the words "Party A" and "Party B" where "bride" and "groom" used to be.
The latest paperwork, which county clerks will be required to use starting Nov. 17, will have blank spaces for applicants' names and personal information next to the words "First Person Data" and "Second Person Data" and boxes for checking "bride" or "groom."
But I waited too long to send the letter to the UCLA Athletics Dept. or to one of the local papers. Oh well...
]]>Congratulations to the UCLA Bruins and Coach Neuheisel for an exciting win last night. The Bruin defense really kept their team in the game in the first half, and the offense came through when it mattered. The resilience of the football team was impressive.
Unfortunately, the experience at the Rose Bowl as a fan was anything but impressive. As a transplanted Volunteer fan, I was excited about the chance to see Tennessee play in the Rose Bowl. I was sitting in section 14 with five friends, tickets that I was told were in the visiting team section. In reality, it was a fair mix of Vol and Bruin fans. Bruin fans appear to believe that when you go to a football game, you sit down and don’t raise your voice until the fourth quarter. My friends and I were on our feet cheering for most of the first quarter. That didn’t sit well with the fans in our section, who called security over to tell us to sit down. We were rather incredulous when the supervisor told us we were not allowed to stand up again until halftime. Is that what passes for football excitement for UCLA? I’ve never been in a quieter stadium during a game in which neither team ever led by more than seven points.
The security supervisor was very cordial and told us that it was considered UCLA courtesy at the Rose Bowl to stay seated. I hope every Bruin fan who makes the trek to Knoxville next year realizes that they probably won’t be able to see much if they stay seated. If the football monopoly in Los Angeles is truly over, UCLA fans will need to be educated about how to cheer at a real football game.