June 18 - July 17: Caltech again, chess, granola bars, Anime Expo, a fossilized shell, washed car, family cruise to Alaska

Greetings from Seattle! I was hoping to blog after Anime Expo and before the cruise … oops. Here are some highlights since my last post:

From Caltech

June 18: My friend Andreea, from Caltech, flew in from Chicago for a wedding. I was able to catch up with her and some other Techers. Clockwise from the left, it's Jon (Andreea's boyfriend), Andreea, Erik (fellow Avery alum), Habib (another Averyite), me, and Diana (Erik's wife).

Also, my old clamshell phone was dying, but Habib happened to have exactly the same model that he wasn't using. Habib, thank you!

From Jim & Mark

June 21: Uncle Derek came to visit. He's actually my blood-uncle's wife's brother, so not technically my uncle, but whatever. Anyway, some of my aunt's side got together to see Uncle Derek. Derek makes his own board games, notably Telepathy and Color Fever. During the get-together, my cousins Jim and Mark played a classic board game: chess.

June 30: Anime Expo was coming up, then my drive up to Seattle. I wanted some snacks for both of those. At Albertson's, I came across some granola bars. Little did I know that these would lead to the most epic series of grocery coupons I had ever seen.

Look at the sale signs for the granola bars. The first is that the bars are on sale at 2 for $5, vs. $4.19 for one. That seems like a great sale.

But additionally, the signs say, "Save $5 on your next shopping trip when you buy 4 participating General Mills products in a single transaction using your Preferred Savings Card." I was confused that "$5" was being used for two different things, but it seemed that I could buy 4 boxes for $10, and it would essentially cost me $5. I decided to try this.

At checkout, I paid $10 for my 4 boxes of granola bars, and the coupon dispenser gave me a coupon for $5 off my next purchase. Sweet!

And then it gave me the label shown.

It reads, "Congratulations! Now save even more! Buy Nature Valley Granola Bars. Buy (3) & get $1 or buy (4) & get $2 or buy (5) & get $3 coupon off your next order."

Attached to the label was a second coupon, for $2 off! (Since I had already bought 4 boxes.)

From Granola bars

Then the coupon dispenser gave me a third coupon!

It reads, "Free: Up to $4.50. One gallon of milk. Compliments of General Mills."

I have no idea why this third coupon appeared, but I wasn't complaining.

So would these coupons work? And could I use them all at once? Could I use them to buy more granola? The answers were yes, yes, and yes. I went back and bought 4 more boxes of granola and a gallon of milk. All three coupons worked, so I saved $11.50. (The milk coupon actually deducted $4.50 off the total, so for a $3 galloon, I saved an extra $1.50.) 48 granola bars and a gallon of milk suddenly cost ~$2.

Then the coupon dispenser gave me the same three coupons as before!

In the end, I left Albertson's with a couple hundred granola bars, a couple gallons of milk, a couple coupons for free milk, and a rotisserie chicken. (I had to spend my last coupons on something other than granola bars, or the cycle would never end. :-)

Thank you to Albertson's and General Mills!

July 1-4: Equipped with my vast collection of granola bars, I went to Anime Expo, at the LA Convention Center.

A lot of the fun of Anime Expo is seeing people in costume, both from anime (Japanese cartoons) and related genres (comics, video games, etc.). The people in costume, known as cosplayers, even self-organize by theme. Here is the Pokemon cosplay gathering. (Check out the guy dressed as Giovanni, right side in the orange suit.)

Anime Expo also has a lot of premieres. They showed the first episode of "Last Exile 2" ("Fam, The Silver Wing"), even before it was released in Japan! This photo is of a life-size picture at the Last Exile booth.

The girl dressed as a sky pirate (right) was handing out "Last Exile 2" posters, but one had to do what she said. She told me to do 15 jumping jacks. Exercise, and a free poster! Win-win!

This cute couple dressed as the Ice Climbers from Nintendo.

Ganondorf from the Legend of Zelda series.

There were as many anime costumes as video game costumes, but I haven't watched a lot of the newer anime series, so I didn't recognize a lot of the cosplayers.

Sazh from Final Fantasy XIII! This is my friend Godric, from the Game Developers Conference. Godric, great costume!

Anime Expo has a large "Dealer's Room" where you can buy any and all anime merchandise.

Some of the merchandise isn't even related to anime. This booth sold "Giant microbes," plush versions of microbial organisms. Things like HIV, penicillin, and yeast.

From Anime Expo 2011

For a niche company, they sure had a lot of giant microbes. Included on the list are a brain cell, chickenpox, gangrene, red tide, sleeping sickness, toxic mold, and an ulcer.

Note the upper-right: "Catch them all!"

From Fossil

July 7: After Anime Expo, I drove to Sacramento. My friends Joe and Glenn helped me tune-up my car. Also, I borrowed Joe's chisel to break apart a rock that I had found on the beach in San Diego.

Inside the rock were fossilized seashells! The biggest shell in the photo is about one inch long.

From Car shiny

Joe and Glenn gave my car its 60,000-mile tune-up. (Joe's a Toyota mechanic.) They also helped me vacuum and wash my car, so it was clean inside and out for my drive to Seattle!

July 10 - 17: Cruise from Seattle to Alaska, on the Sapphire Princess. This was a Hom reunion, and there were 35 of us!

My sister Mary. In the background is the Seattle skyline.

I had started a gluten-free (no wheat, etc.) diet a few days before the cruise. At first, I was bummed about this. But then I thought, "At least on a cruise, they should have plenty of options!" Here, the waitstaff brought me gluten-free bread (left). The regular bread is on the right.

Our first stop was Ketchikan, Alaska. And my first stop there was the McDonald's! Thank you McDonald's for free Wi-Fi and refills on soda!

I saw this sign on the Ketchikan docks and immediately thought, "PSP: PlayStation Portable." But it's actually an alert for Paralytic Shellfish Poison.

Ketchikan was full of seaplanes. As a kid, I loved watching the Disney cartoon, "Tail Spin," which borrowed heavily from the Miyazaki anime film, "Porco Rosso," which is one of my all-time favorites. Both make seaplanes seem *awesome*.

The cruise ship had many entertainment options, including fancy shows in a theater. This photo is from the Cruise Staff Talent Show. On the left is the Cruise Director, who is in charge of entertainment. I can't really describe this skit adequately, but it featured lots of water spitting and the Enya song, "Only Time." Actually, the skit was clever, cute, and funny, and my favorite entertainment memory of the whole cruise.

After Ketchikan, we went to the Tracy Arm Fjord.

The scenery was breathtaking, literally.

The bright white part in the middle-top is a glacier, slowly melting to the water below.

At the end of the Tracy Arm Fjord is a huge glacier. This was as close as we got, but I think other cruises have gotten much closer. Maybe next time!

I think one reason we turned back was that we saw this pregnant seal on an ice floe. (The onboard naturalist said she didn't run away when the ship got close, because she was about to give birth.)

The ice floes in the fjord were amazing. Apparently they had all come off the glacier that day. Some ice floes had this amazing sequence of blues.

Here, you can see the melt-off from the glacier mixing with the existing water.

During the cruise, we had a couple of Hom gatherings to make sure that we didn't just keep to ourselves. You might have to know us to appreciate this photo, but it's several different Homs just hanging out with one another. Love it.

After Tracy Arm, we sailed to Juneau, where we saw the Sea Princess, an older Princess ship that still looks great. I find it fascinating a ship can be so large as to carry other ships on it. The orange boats in the middle of the ship are called tenders. Here, the tenders were being used to ferry people to shore, since there weren't enough ports.

In Juneau, I did a little souvenir shopping. I really liked these piggy-bank variants: moose bank and …? They were only $13, but I realized I didn't need a piggy bank. Er, moose bank.

On our ship, my mom, Mary, and I slept in one room. But we had a great room with a balcony. In the photo, look at the sizes of the balconies. Notice the ones in the middle have larger balconies (and thus larger rooms)? One of those was ours; I think they're for handicapped people. My mom didn't need a walker or wheelchair on the cruise, so I think we just lucked out with an upgrade.

After Juneau, we sailed to Skagway. They have a small but dense museum, which includes this bear.

Notice the shadow of the bear. Isn't that interesting?

The Skagway museum had an old map showing where gold was in Alaska. The map seems to indicate that gold was everywhere, which would make the map a bit irrelevant.

Uncle Well and my mom rest from walking around Skagway. Skagway is a small, quaint town of 700. I really liked it; it felt like the show, "Northern Exposure," in a good way.

Skagway has a train that runs for tourists. Next to the train is this ice digger, which just looks awesome. Like something out of a Jules Verne novel, except this was real!

A couple nights on the cruise are designated as "formal nights," in which everyone is supposed to dress up. It's a good opportunity for formal pictures. Here is a small fraction of the Hom generation after mine. Five families (out of 30+) are represented here.

On the cruise, one can eat at a buffet or experience "traditional dining." We all had the latter, so we would eat together. This fancy appetizer had caviar and salmon eggs.

On the last night of the cruise, some of us gathered together to eat some more and play some games. This is nine (or ten) Homs, from three different families, playing the game "Sequence."

I hauled that game up all the way from LA. (Kristen and Mike, thank you for letting me borrow it!)

The last night wasn't over yet. My sister wanted to check out the "Farewell Party" in Club Fusion on the ship. She said no one else was dancing, so we should. Surprisingly, some of my other relatives really wanted to go, too, and I also went. Here are my Auntie Valerie, cousin Jonady, cousin Adrienne, and Mary dancing. In the background is Uncle John.

There's actually a video of this scene. (I can't believe I'm linking this.)

From Hom cruise 2011

A post-cruise tradition: checking our cell phones. This is my mom, my cousin Lance's wife Jonelle, and my cousin Lance.

This was our second Hom-reunion cruise; the first one was to Mexico in December, 2005 and had ~60 Homs. That cruise was life-changing, but I enjoyed this cruise to Alaska just as much.

Thank you to Uncle Al, Aunty Loretta, and everyone else for organizing such a wonderful time!

May 15 - June 14: Ditch Day, San Diego, Church camp, Glenn visits, Bologna, Caltech Commencement

In my last post, I said I'd write not every two weeks but now every three weeks. And wouldn't you know it, then all this stuff started happening! So, this may be a very long post. But maybe the next one will be really short, so enjoy it while you can! :-)

May 20, Friday, was "Ditch Day" at Caltech. That sounds so innocuous, but it's really quite elaborate. I did an extensive writeup of just one "stack" at Ditch Day 2006 here. (There are ~40-50 unique stacks on Ditch Day.)

I didn't find out when Ditch Day was until the day before. It's a surprisingly well-kept secret each year, so even one day's notice is a privilege (or great luck). The late notice didn't stop me from changing most of my plans and waking up before dawn.

Because Ditch Day is a secret, a lot of the props and puzzles are hidden until the last minute: the seniors spend all night finishing, moving, and assembling hundreds of puzzles throughout campus. Ditch Day starts at 8 am, so I arrived before 7 in order to see all the stacks and puzzles in a pristine, unsolved state.

"Officially," I was there to help the "Harry Potter" stack of Avery House. (They turned the Avery Library into the "Shrieking Shack"–a two-level maze formed from moving boxes.) I wouldn't be needed until later in the day, so I happily explored the rest of campus to check out the other stacks.

Around 7:30 am, I was checking out Ruddock House when I saw two guys from the "Leverage" stack moving this big, wooden … sculpture. I asked if they wanted any help, and they said yes. We spent thirty minutes trying different ways to carry this bulky thing across campus, until we finally got a ride from one of the campus supply trucks. When we finally made it to the designated field, the dummy collapsed! (He's doing the splits here.) Although it seemed like a fail at the time, I'm sure the participants found a way to still have fun with this guy.

Once Ditch Day started, the undergrads donned shirts for their chosen stack. Then they went puzzle-solving across campus. I ran into this stack and had to get a photo. The stack is "Indiana Jones and … the Ocarina of Time"! ("The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time" is a Nintendo game from 1998 and is the highest-rated video game of all time.)

Even though I graduated in 2005, I still have some friends at Caltech. One of these is Cynthia Carlson, who works for my old boss, Steve Mayo. I took Cynthia on a whirlwind tour of Ditch Day stacks. Here we found some top-secret, fragile documents for an unknown stack.

That's one tough thing about Ditch Day: we saw all these cool things on campus, but for most of them, we didn't find out what they were for. (But a few times, we were in the right place at the right time!)

This grid shows the stacks for one of the Caltech houses; the grid is to help each student decide which stack to participate in that day. Along the top is the name/theme of each stack (e.g., "Futurama"). Along the left are different aspects of each stack (e.g., tunnels, fire). Note that "Gardening" is missing from all of the stacks.

While Cynthia and I checked out Avery House, we saw a group across the street at the maintenance plant. We were just in time to see this clever puzzle!

The plant has this deep shaft. A dozen boxes of various sizes had been placed at the bottom, and the students had to use a makeshift crane to bring up each box. (Presumably they needed something in some of the boxes.)

I liked this puzzle because it was well-hidden, it revealed something neat (I lived in Avery for 6 years and never knew about the shaft), and it was a great exercise in anticipation and problem-solving. (The boxes are easy to see; but how do you reach them? Which one has what I want? And what will it look like when I find it?)

Back in Avery, the Harry Potter stack ("Harry Potter and the Mysterious Legend") had moved on to another part of campus. But they had converted one of the lobby areas into a Sorting Hat area, plus the wand shop.

It's amazing how effective a little calligraphy can be.

We caught up with the Harry Potter stack in front of Beckman Auditorium. They were playing Quidditch, of course.

Notice, in the foreground, a tarp revealing just a bicycle wheel. Which stack is it for? And what's under there?

A professional video crew finds part of the "Jedi vs. Sith" stack.

One of the great tragedies of Ditch Day is that almost all of the awesome and creative puzzles, etc. are seen by only about a dozen people (the students solving the stack). There are so many wonderful stories and histories that would bring joy to others. So, I was glad that the administration hired this film crew. But there's no way one film crew could cover even 5% of Ditch Day, especially without knowing what's where.

Back in Avery again, the conference room had been turned into a kitchen/class for "Transfiguration" for the Harry Potter stack. Transfiguration in Harry Potter is the art of transforming one thing into another (e.g., a car into a potted plant). How to adapt this into a real-life stack? Cake-making!

The students had to turn cake materials into a given animal (owl, turtle, teddy bear, cactus).

Can you guess which one this is?








While the transfiguration class was in session, I saw some familiar faces in the custodial room next door. It was Maria and Enrique, two of the long-time custodial staff! In the middle is John Liu, an Avery alum who flew in from Boston just to help out with Ditch Day.






Another great thing about Ditch Day is seeing how the campus is transformed. Consider just Avery: the library became a cardboard-box maze, a lobby became a wand shop, the conference room became a kitchen/transfiguration/sculpture class, and the vast dining hall became: a life-size word search! The Indiana Jones stack used it to adapt a scene at the end of the "Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade," in which Indy has to step on the correct letters to spell "Jehovah" … in Latin. As with most Ditch Day puzzles, this word search had some Caltech/nerdy twists. Either way, it was totally cool. And the use of sand to cover just enough of the letters was inspired.

Again in front of Beckman Auditorium, we find what was under that tarp on the Quidditch field. It's a bicycle frame … welded to a shopping cart! Apparently the red team's bi-cart hadn't worked out, but that didn't stop them from having fun!

Back in Avery once more, I had time to wander the halls. Avery House has a mixture of not just undergrads and grad students, but also some faculty. Here is the apartment door for one faculty family, and it really surprised me! These are the Zmuidzinases–a.k.a. the Z's. The Z's lived in Avery until about 1999 or 2000, but then they moved away. It's great that they came back!

From Ditch Day 2011

Of course, there was a ton of Ditch Day that I didn't talk about, and a ton that I'm sure I never saw. Even for the Harry Potter stack, there was a lot more. (We ended with games and dinner at a park 30 minutes away.) But alas, I still had other things to do: I had to pick up a cake for my Bible study group that evening, and pack for a trip to San Diego the next morning!



May 21, Saturday, was the "Ridiculous-Obstacle-Course Race" in San Diego. The website is here. It's a 5K with a dozen obstacles thrown in.

Now before you think too highly of me, I didn't run the 5K. But I did drive 60 miles to watch some friends in it. That counts for something, right?

Left to right, it's Mel, Elise, Sue, and Jeanne. We all worked together at Genentech.

I have several relatives in San Diego. This trip, I took the opportunity to visit my cousin Lance and his wife Jonelle. They graciously let me stay at their place. I also got to visit their church on Sunday.

Later on Sunday, I caught up with Mel, Elise, and Jeanne. We decided to try a famous breakfast place in San Diego. The wait was a little long, and the place may be a little overrated. However, I appreciated their chorizo, which is the red stuff at the top. What I appreciated was that it looks like chorizo, and it tastes like chorizo, but it's actually tofu. Same taste, more healthy = win!

After our big lunch, we went for a hike near Torrey Pines golf course. Just past the golf course is a nice hike to the beach, and along the way are some really unusual rock formations.

Here again is Mel, me, Jeanne, and Elise. Only Elise lives in San Diego, so it was really cool that we could all get together again.

From San Diego, ROC race

A better look at some of the rock formations.








So, it was a super busy weekend. But super fun.




The next weekend, Memorial Day weekend, was my church's church camp! I was really looking forward to this as a chance for people at the church to get to know each other better, and my hopes were pleasantly fulfilled.

Church camp was on the campus of Pepperdine University, in Malibu. It's nice. Here, we're worshipping in the amphitheater, which has a view of the sea.

From Church camp

Church camps can be quite diverse. I've heard some are almost like academic conferences, but ours was more like church vacation. That suited me quite well! Here, I was having quiet time on a balcony with this great view.

Actually, I think the key to our church camp was that everyone was divided into pseudo-random, same-gender small groups. My group had an 18-year-old, a 24-year-old, me (34 years old), two older guys (45 - 65?), and Pastor Ken. It was a great mixture of ages and experience. We met for a few key moments throughout the weekend, and we definitely got to know each other better than we would have at church. (I'm not sure I would have even met any of the guys during church.)

I didn't take many pictures during church camp, but others did. I think this link will go to our church's Facebook photos page.

My favorite part of church camp was during communion ("The Lord's Supper") at the end. We did it in our small groups. I didn't even take communion (long, same ol' story). However, I was almost moved to tears watching each group get up, look for its members, and just be together. It was really impactful to me for some reason. (I just hope everyone got to be in a small group, like most of the organizers.)

Everyone at church should be in a small group! (Or at least get to experience being in a small group.)

So that was my Memorial Day weekend … except for one thing. The Friday before the weekend was the birthday of my good friend Glenn Mondro. (Glenn's the guy who drove with me on part of my Minnesota -> Sacramento trip.) Glenn lives in Sacramento, so I called him up on Friday to wish him Happy Birthday. Of course, we ended up talking for a couple hours, mostly about video games and how he should take a trip down to LA to visit me. I thought we agreed that Glenn would research transportation options, email me later, and we'd go from there. Hopefully he could visit in a few weeks.

Then on Sunday, while I'm in Malibu for the whole weekend, I get a call on my cell. Glenn had driven down on Saturday to LA! He ended up visiting another friend, but he needed a place to stay or he was driving back on Monday. Crazy guy.

Long story short, I told Glenn to hang around LA on Monday during the day, and later we caught up and he stayed at my house for a week. I don't have any photos, but it was a full, fun week. We played a lot of video games and board games. We also caught up with Nick McGee, another childhood friend. On Friday, June 3, the three of us watched an improv comedy show that Nick is sometimes in. The show is called Improv Shmimprov. It's sort of like the TV show, "Whose Line Is It, Anyway?" There are two opposing improv teams, and various improv games they act out in front of the audience. Improv Shmimprov can definitely get raunchy/offensive, but we were laughing throughout. Three of the funniest parts:

1. A game in which one person has committed a crime and will receive a punishment, but he has to figure out what both of those are from clues from his teammates. The guy's crime was that he "broke into Narnia." There were references to wardrobes, lions, witches, "see us loose" (C.S. Lewis), Christian fables, and even Turkish delight. And the criminal is like, "It's like … the Golden Compass!" When he finally apologized by saying, "So, I broke into Narnia …," we all cheered. (The punishment was that he had to tease his hair. Go figure.)
2. A game in which an everyday scene is acted out repeatedly, but each time the actors have to "step it up." The scene was three people at the DMV, and the first time, one guy mentions some bees buzzing around the room. By the last iteration, one of the other guys was transforming INTO a bee because he had to wait so long at the DMV! (And he drove a Volkswagon Bee-tle, har har.)
3. A game called "Time-Travel Raptor." The game was made up on the spot, and it involved a dinosaur raptor (think of "Jurassic Park") travelling to three key moments in time and wreaking havoc. The first two times, the raptor (violently) stole the Wright Brothers' plane and then (violently) tried to save President Kennedy. The third time, two people were about to sign the Declaration of Independence. The raptor actor walks in with a finger above his mouth for a mustache, and his other hand out for a raptor claw, and we all somehow know that the raptor's impersonating John Hancock. And the raptor just signs the Declaration of Independence.
   

Great stuff.

From Bologna

Oh, I suppose this photo is related to Glenn's visit. Glenn didn't have much money for food, but I told him he could eat anything in our freezer. Somewhere, he found this unopened package of bologna.

If you look closely along the top of the photo, you can see it says, "USE BY NOV 01 2005."

Glenn left before he could try the bologna, but I tried it. Still okay! (Knock on wood!)

Finally, on Friday, June 10, I was scheduled to visit the Headington Institute in Pasadena. More info about them is on their site, but they wanted my input on designing a mobile app to promote the well-being of caregivers. (Imagine an app to help a person's physical/spiritual/emotional well-being! Intriguing.) I mention this because if you have any input or assistance for them, I'm sure they'll appreciate it.

The day before my visit to Pasadena, I learned that Caltech's Commencement would also be on Friday! Perfect timing! So I arrived a couple hours early to see if I still knew anyone graduating.

And I did! This is Habib. Habib and I both lived in Avery. We had a lot of fun hanging out together over the years. Habib, congrats on getting that Ph.D.!

From Caltech Commencement

Ah, a second familiar face! This is Si-Ping, another newly minted Ph.D. Si-Ping and his fiancee, Jackie, also were in Avery with me and Habib.




Whew! That brings us to the present. See you in three weeks!

Good Friday, Transformers, and Three Weeks

At the church I go to, we had a Good Friday service. "Good Friday" is the Friday before Easter. Easter is supposed to correspond to when Jesus rose from the dead, so Good Friday is supposed to honor when Jesus died on the cross. I feel we should instead call it "Bad Friday," because when Jesus died, it sounds like everyone who loved him felt really bad.

Anyway, for … that Friday, the church tried something new. They tied loaves of bread to the cross, and for Communion, people had to walk up to the cross and tear off part of the bread. Since the Communion bread is supposed to symbolize Jesus' body, I felt this was a surprisingly appropriate idea. But it sure felt weird (and I didn't even take Communion, since I didn't feel ready).

From Good Friday

After the Friday service, my Bible-study group went out for dinner and drinks.

Those aren't beers, I swear! :-)




A few weeks later, my friends Robert and Stephen Mar came to visit. Rob and I used to hang out all the time when we were kids.

While in LA, Rob and Stephen wanted to visit a place called Frank & Sons. It's basically a warehouse full of collectibles, especially comics, figurines, toys, collectible-card games, and sports cards. Entry is free, and each time there's some special event, like a baseball player signing autographs.

From Transformers

This time, the special event was "Star Cars." They had famous cars from TVs and movies. For example, KIT from "Knight Rider," Herbie, and the DeLorean from "Back to the Future." Those were all nice, but I really liked the car shown, which is Ratchet from "Transformers." Ratchet was the main medic/mechanic for the Autobots; I remember having that toy when I was a kid.

On top of Ratchet is the Decepticon "Ravage." (He's like a wolf, with missiles. And he transforms into a cassette tape.)

Finally, I want to mention that I'll be spreading out my posts more, from every two weeks to every three weeks. Frankly, I don't feel I currently get enough work done every two weeks to warrant a blog post. We'll see how this change goes!

The La Brea Tar Pits and Griffith Park

A few weeks ago, some foreign friends from the Game Developers Conference (GDC) were visiting LA. Another GDC friend, Jeff, acted as tour guide and showed us around. We visited many places, including Venice Beach and Mann's Chinese Theater. However, I took pictures of only the La Brea Tar Pits and Griffith Park.

From left to right, here are Robert (from Sweden), Irene (from Norway), and Jeff. I had always wanted to visit the La Brea Tar Pits, so I'm glad Jeff took us. There are two main parts: the museum and the tar pits. Unfortunately, we didn't have time to visit the latter.

Another view of the elephant/mammoth skeleton. I had always thought that the tar pits were full of dinosaur bones, but actually the tar pits are too recent for that. (The tar pits date back maybe 100,000 years, but the dinosaurs date back millions of years?)

The La Brea Tar Pits also has a volunteer program in which you can learn to dig out and clean up the fossils. It's a tempting opportunity!

In the evening, we headed up to Griffith Park. The park is up in the hills around LA, so there's a spectacular view of the city. There is also an observatory, but it was closed that evening.

From LA w/Jeff, Irene & Robert

Grad school took me six years, but I never went to Griffith Park in all that time. I'm glad I got to see it.

Perhaps someday I'll do some other LA things: the Getty museum and Mount Wilson.

Trip to Berkeley with Helen and Bibi

In March, I was in the Bay Area for the Game Developers Conference. I also got to see my Auntie Helen and cousin Bibi. We took a day trip to UC Berkeley, aka Cal, my alma mater.

At Cal, one of the biology buildings houses the Museum of Paleontology. They have a life-size T-rex skeleton! Her name is Sue. Bibi's in the lower-left.



GRAW-AUR!








There are a lot of hills in Berkeley! Here, we took a snack break in front of the campus bell tower, which is called the Campinile.








Bibi borrowed my camera and took this picture of a squirrel. I'm still not sure what the squirrel was doing, like whether he was resting, or about to zoom off somewhere.


This is one of the bells of the Campinile. Thankfully we didn't have to climb very far; they have an elevator.

The bells ring automatically on the hour, without warning. They are LOUD.

The Campinile offers great 360° views: the Big "C" in the hills, the football stadium, the Bay, Golden Gate Bridge, etc. The funny-looking building in the middle is the art museum. Below that are some tennis courts, where I once took a tennis class. You can also see a swimming pool; in the surrounding building, I once took a tap class. And in the field below that, we used to play ultimate frisbee.

From Cal w/Helen & Bibi

Bibi did some quick tree-climbing on campus.

We also visited the campus bookstore and a food court on the south side of campus. (We had Korean BBQ.) Then we took the BART back home. Even though it's a short BART ride from Auntie Helen's home to Cal, it sounded like they hadn't been there in years.

I'm glad we went.