New York at Christmastime

I'm not dead yet. New York City at Christmas is a wonderful place to remind me of this. I went to visit with the folks at the Economist Intelligence Unit, which is doing research for us. But I also got to see the tree and ice skating at Rockefeller Center, along with 100,000,000 pennies school children collected for charity.

I got Chieko a "Coach" purse in Chinatown for $35 at her request. I considered getting her a real Coach purse at the Coach store next to Rockefeller Center, until I saw the $485 price tag. The M&M and Hershey stores at Times Square are my favorites (plus, I stayed in the Double Tree just across the street for $440.88 per night), so of course I stopped at those two stores two or three times and got an M&M luggage tag and a sleigh Christmas stocking holder, as well as some dark chocolates with almonds and a tin of Good & Plenty. The Sapporo Ramen restaurant was just around the corner, so I had to stop there. And I ate a hot dog at a corner stand.

That was on Monday. On Tuesday I visited EIU and FAO Schwarz, the toy store, where I got a really cool item that I can't mention because I'm probably going to give it to someone. But I have to say I paid $40 for it. When I got home I found the exact item on Amazon.com on sale for $12. Oh well, that's New York. I also paid $46.50 for a $15 meal.

That was on Tuesday evening, when I ate dinner at Angus McIndoe, across from the Shubert Theatre. I was told a lot of the show producers and such hang out there, but I saw only a guy (at the bar; no tables available) who looked about as much like Richard Gere as the China Town handbag looked like a real Coach--pretty close, but no autograph.

Then I went to what I've been waiting two and a half years to see.






















It was well worth the wait.

On Wednesday morning I went to my next favorite store: B&H Photo, where I bought a 10' x 12' green muslin screen. Chieko would have thought to bring a half-empty suitcase to New York, but I brought a small one just big enough for three days' worth of clothes. Somehow the purchases squeezed in, though.

Just remember: Always look on the bright side of life.

Disneyland with the Texastles

The week after Thanksgiving was the annual Crawford Disneyland Adventure (I don't know if they actually go only annually). Chieko and I went, too. We haven't been to Disneyland for more than 20 years together. (I did go with Sara on Take Your Daughters to Work Day 13 years ago, but that's a whole nuther story.)

We arrived on Tuesday evening, and on Wednesday morning we drove to Little Tokyo in LA on our ongoing Best Ramen in America quest. Of course, the ramen shop Chieko had found on the Internet didn't open at 11:30 as the sign indicated it would. The girl working there said in very broken English that they didn't have enough soup. "We have some soup, but it takes ten hours to prepare. We also have some little soup, but we may need it for dinner. I don't know when we will open." I asked, "Do you have any idea, say in 30 minutes, or 1 p.m. or 5 p.m.?" She said, "Yes." So we ate at another ramen shop. It was pretty good. On the way out, we noticed the first shop was serving customers. Santa in San Mateo is still on my first-pick list, along with the Sapporo ramen shop in Vancouver, BC.

Then we drove to San Diego and watched the sun set.













The weather on Thursday was wonderful. We spent the day at California Adenture with the Crawford Gang. We really enjoyed Soaring Over California and the Bugs show--Ooo! But mostly we enjoyed seeing John, Misa, Caroline, Elliot, and Mei Mei. When we met the C Gang in the parking lot of the Best Western Park Place (don't stay anywhere else--you can't get closer to Disneyland), Caroline ran up to me excitedly, jumped into my arms and said, "Hi, Grandpa!" She is so happy to see people. She did the same to Kate, when Kate met us at Space Mountain on Friday evening. Caroline spent most of the time hanging with her cousins, so we didn't see too much of her, but we spent a lot of time with the remaining four, and especially Elliot.














We made the mistake of taking Caroline and Elliot on the Tower of Terror first thing. Elliot didn't want to go and wouldn't stand up straight under the you-have-to-be-this-tall post. We coaxed him in and kept telling him it would be fun. It was not fun. It scared him to death. He didn't want to go on any other rides and refused to stand tall enough to go on Soaring Over California. (Susan got him to go later, and he loved it.) After a while he did find that he actually enjoyed the roller coaster rides. Caroline, on the other hand, had wanted to go on Tower of Terror. Afterward she said she enjoyed it, but when I asked whether she wanted to go again, she said, "Maybe tomorrow." She loved the other wild coaster rides, though. As soon as we got off Space Mountain, she asked, "Can we go again?"

I guess Elliot can be a bit of a wampaku (he set off the buzzer at the airport, so a search of his pockets ensued, and that turned up house keys, a metal bracket to a car seat, and a screw driver), but he was a lot of fun. We spent lunch at Mimi's on Friday drawing on his place mat and identifying the items printed there. If he didn't know what something was, he said, "Boo boo." And then laughed and laughed. That became a joke between us for lunch. When we said good-bye the next morning (we came home, while the C Gang was staying until Tuesday), as I was walking away, Elliot said, "Boo boo" and laughed. He's a really cute boy. The only kid I know who willingly puts his hand up to hold when crossing parking lots and roads or getting in line for a ride.

At Disneyland on Friday evening, Mark had taken Caroline on the Go Coaster several times--she kept getting back in line. Elliot decided he'd like to go, so I got in line with him. But he wanted to go with Mark and grabbed his hand (Mark's still his favorite, but I'm working on what bribery I can devise to change that). Expecting to deal with a sulking three-year-old or a tantrum, I said, "Caroline's already going with Mark. Do you want to go with me?" To my surprise he said, "OK" and was happy. I was just impressed with how happy he is to do what he's asked.

On Thursday evening, we watched the Disney Christmas Parade. Then Chieko and I watched the fireworks set to Christmas music over Sleeping Beauty's Castle, while the kids went off to bed. We decided the fireworks were the best entertainment of the day, aside from hanging out with the kids. "Silent Night" ended with a single slow-shooting star.

Mei fed popcorn to Elliot while waiting for the parade.

Friday morning we woke up to pouring rain, which lasted until mid-afternoon. Chieko and I spent Friday morning walking right onto all the rides we wanted--Small World, Pirates, Indiana Jones. Because of the rain, there were zero lines anywhere, except at the new Nemo claustrophobia submarine, which we didn't ride. I'll take rain to people any day. But by lunchtime we were pretty well soaked, despite buying ponchos along with all the other die-hards at the Quick Stop. So we dried off, changed to dry clothes and went back to hang out with the C Gang.

On Saturday morning, we walked to Goofy's Kitchen in the Disneyland Hotel, where we stuffed ourselves on the biggest and tastiest (and most expensive) breakfast buffet I've ever enjoyed. Ham, omelets, creme brulee, Mickey pancakes and waffles, cakes, bread puddings, pizza, and a whole lot more. But not just the food, Disney characters came around to the table signing autographs and entertaining the kids every so often. Goofy also gathered the kids a couple of times during breakfast to dance the Macarena or play cups in a band.

Saturday afternoon, Chieko and I went to Torrance to find more ramen restaurants. The one we chose, Shin-sen-gui, served a "Hakata" (Fukuoka) ramen. The pork-based soup was very good. The noodles were skinny, too skinny, and too soft. The barbecued pork slices were good, but too thin. We gave the shop about a B- overall. We also stopped at Mitsuwa grocery store in Torrance. That has to be the biggest and busiest Japanese store in the United States. I thought I was back in the lower floor of Itoyokado department store in Japan. And the seven or eight checkout lines were 20 people deep. We actually went into the store twice, once in the afternoon, and once in the evening on the way to the airport, and the crowds were even larger the second time. The store is very close to the U.S. Toyota headquarters and Hitachi.

We also drove to Redondo Beach, where we nearly froze in the chilling wind, and watched the sun set. And we looked at all the crab and fish and sea urchin shops on Redondo Beach's Board Walk. Chieko would like to live there just for the fish.

Sad Day

I was happy when Jamie, Brian, Kali, Caleb, and Emeline lived only 30 minutes away. With the John Astles and Weavers so far away, the Austins weren't just our kids and grandkids, they were also surrogates for the others.














They came to dinner many Sundays. As well as spending Memorial Days, birthdays, Mirror Lake Days, and all the other get-togethers with us.




























I was sad when Brian was laid off from his job last summer. Most of us younger than about 65 have been through that.

I was happy when he found a promising job that he likes.










I was sad that the job was to be in Colorado Springs.












I was happy that they were able to sell their home here relatively quickly, especially in today's scary real estate market.











I was happy that they were able to buy a house in Colorado Springs in just one day (after Jamie did her homework on the Internet and with the real estate agent).





I was happy that Jamie and the kids could stay here for a few days.

I was happy that they all were able to spend Thanksgiving with us.








I was sad the day after Thanksgiving.

Hooray!!

The Broadway strike ended while we were at Disneyland! Spamalot, here I come. 

All Grown Up

            What can I say?

Tagged

Looks like I've been tagged by Sara. I might be able to come up with six things about myself, but I don't know whether I can come up with six people to tag. 

1. My boss gave a little class last week on how to present effectively. He said we should stay true to our own style and personality. One of the personality traits was introvert versus extrovert. Extroverts can stand up and start talking with little preparation, often walking among and feeding off the audience. Introverts prepare carefully for presentations and practice them, sometimes for hours before presenting. After I spoke at church one time someone told me I was a natural speaker. I thought, Sure, after I just spent six hours writing this 20-minute talk and the past two hours practicing how to deliver it naturally. I am an introvert. 

2. I like to drive. I enjoy the adventure of going anyplace. I look forward to getting away from the everyday and doing something different. Driving usually means new adventures, getting away, and avoiding the ordinary. Flying has a bit of the same feeling, especially if I'm going to Japan or Italy. But if I can drive, flying deprives me of the adventure of getting there. I'd rather drive two days and feel like I've really gone someplace--and seen the in-betweens--than spend two hours flying there and feeling like I just went next door. When I bought an old GMC pickup from our neighbor several years ago and drove it over about 90 miles of dirt road along the old pony express trail, I thought it would be fun to drive every mapped dirt road in Utah. But that wouldn't be possible in one lifetime. One time I drove on that dirt pony express trail in our Astro Van on Presidents' Day in February. When I stopped to put chains on the tires to get over an icy pass, I found a 16-penny finish nail in the sidewall of a tire. I pulled the nail out, and air hissed out, too. So I stuck the nail back in, put the chains back inside and drove the remaining 90 miles of dirt road to Wendover and then back to Salt Lake on I-80. That was fun. 

3. Foods. There aren't many I don't like. There are some. I don't like the little fish eggs in some sushi. There's a lot of authentic Chinese food that I wouldn't mind if I never knew existed. Chicken feet aren't the worst. If my eating senses went on cruise control, I'd probably eat beef steak, baked potatoes and asparagus every night. But I also love real ramen--the best ramen in the United States is chaashu tonkotsu ramen at Santa in San Mateo, California--Italian, Greek, and seafood. My favorite seafood includes scallops, king crab, salmon, and halibut. I was on a quest once to find the best fish and chips in North America. There's a place on the pier in Victoria, British Columbia that's really good. I was also on a quest once to find the best barbecue in America. When I was in Atlanta once for a trade show, just before the Olympics were there, I decided to try all five BBQ joints listed in "Parade Magazine" as the best in the city. I made it to only three, but Fat Matt's Rib Shack was the best, and I stopped there every time I went to Atlanta. I even ate there three times one week. Last summer we bought a small smoker. BBQing is a great hobby that comes with great rewards. We've tried salmon, turkey, baby back ribs, and brisket. Ribs and brisket are the best. 

4. The outdoors are inspiring and invigorating. Mountain biking, hiking, camping, fishing, sitting, smelling the evergreens, anything you can do outside that isn't an extreme sport is great. Someday I'd like to road bike down the coast highway through Washington and Oregon, but road biking is a little bit scary with all the traffic and little room for bikes on most roads these days. 

5. I like to tease kids, mostly challenging what is obviously true. I don't know why. Sometimes I tell myself it teaches them to be on their toes. For example, if they have a book, I might say, "That's a nice shirt you're reading." They have to be thinking and willing to defend what they know. But that's not really why I do it. It's just fun. And they're gullible. It's not fun if they're too gullibe, though. They have to catch on at some point. I usually make the stories more unbelievable until they finally catch on. When I was about 17 I dated a girl in American Fork. I remember visiting her at her home once with my friends, and we started telling her wild stories about the rules at Murray High, something about going to jail for impersonating teachers and more. The more she believed us, the wilder our stories got. She never figured out that we were making it all up. She was too gullible. 

6. I need to lose weight. About 60 pounds. I love Dr. Pepper. It's been my favorite refreshing drink since I was a young teenager. Randy and I used to ride our bikes to the Cottonwood Mall, stop at the Walgreen's store there, and buy a quart bottle of Dr. Pepper and half-pound Hershey chocolate bar with almonds. All the people at Hart's quick stop know me from my daily visits. And the 7-Eleven down the street. And the Phillips station on State Street. Pepsi, too. Novell had soda machines in the halls, with a can costing 50 cents. I almost always had a can of Pepsi on my desk. When it got a little warm, I'd dump it and buy another one. I used to say that if I quit drinking Pepsi, Pepsico stock would crash. Last June I decided that if I am going to lose weight I need to quit drinking sugared soft drinks. And if I'm to quit drinking the sugared drinks I need to give up the caffeine drinks. At first I thought I'd quit slowly, allowing myself one 20-ounce bottle a day for a few weeks. The first day I drank one bottle. The second day I drank half of a bottle. The third day I drank the second half of the previous day's bottle, but I didn't enjoy it. That was then end of that. I have still been drinking caffein-free, sugar-free drinks, but none of the loaded stuff. Now I need to cut down on the fats and carbohydrates, and I need to exercise a lot more. 

THE RULES

1. The player lists six facts or habits about himself or herself. Try to find six you haven't already posted. 

2. At the end of the post, the player tags six people and posts their names, and then goes to their blogs and leaves a comment to let them know they have been tagged and to request them to read the player's blog for the rules. 

I don't know six people with blogs who haven't already been tagged. 

More Ticket Woes

More than two years ago, Monty Python's Eric Idle created a Broadway play called Spamalot. It's based on the movie "Monty Python and the Holy Grail." I promised myself I'd go see it. I downloaded the soundtrack on iTunes. I was determined that the next time I got a chance to go to New York, I would be sitting in the Shubert Theatre watching the show. Then last Christmas we went to New York City. But Chieko has never been excited to see this show, and we were with Sara and Jared and their kids. So we didn't consider going. I had to wait for my next opportunity. 

My boss asked me recently to manage our relationship with a research partner based in New York, and I said, "Sure, that would be a great opportunity to advance my career." What I thought was, "That means I'll likely have to go to New York and see Spamalot." I mentioned to the research partner that I should meet everyone and go over our objectives and strategies. We decided that December 11 would be a good time. Even before I arranged the travel, I bought a ticket for a great seat in Center Orchestra in the Shubert Theatre on the evening of December 11 for $120.50. This was going to be a super business trip.  

But then I read in the paper two weeks ago that the stagehand union called a strike and shut down most Broadway shows, including Spamalot. Maybe the strike would be resolved before December 11, I thought. After all, the last strike, by the musicians, lasted just four days. The strike previous to that was way back in the 1970s. However, this time the union and producers weren't talking. But then they spent all last weekend negotiating, and surely they'd come to an agreement before the Thanksgiving holiday. Nope. The union said the producers weren't generous enough. Now it looks like this strike will go through Thanksgiving and possibly through Christmas. December 11 is not looking good at all. I could see Spamalot in Las Vegas or even the traveling show coming to Salt Lake, but those shows have been cut shorter than the Broadway show. The intermission has been eliminated. Worse, they aren't Broadway. I'm really bummed. 

Going to See Celine Dion

Chieko is a Celine Dion fan, and since we resisted the $600 to $1,800 tickets to see her in Las Vegas, we decided to go to Celine's concert in Salt Lake at the Energy Solutions Arena next week, the day before Thanksgiving. Actually, Chieko said it would be fun to go. I said, "Uh huh." Then she mentioned it again about 10 times, and I said, "Sure, whatever." When the full-page newspaper ad for the concert appeared on my desk I decided I should try to get tickets. They were to go on sale Saturday morning at 10 o'clock.

I knew enough about Celine Dion to understand that the tickets would go quickly, so I logged onto the Tickemaster website about 9:50 a.m. A message said the tickets weren't available yet. About 9:58 I started hitting the "refresh" button. At exactly 10 a.m. the tickets became available. I hurriedly selected two $125 tickets. "Not available." So I selected "Best available." Two tickets showed up in Section 10, Row 5. Good seats for $125 each. I selected them. On the next screen, I had to enter my email address twice and a password, twice. And I had one minute to do so. I entered the information, but I typoed the email address and had to redo it. Then I got a message that said I already had a Ticketmaster account. So I went to the other computer, looked in my password vault, and found the account info. I went back to the Mac and entered the password. A message said that my minute had expired. Too bad. Go back to the beginning. Do not pass Go. Do not collect $200. Do not sit in Section 10, Row 5.

I started all over and zipped through all the screens, past several error messages (the site was busy), and finally got my tickets. With only a minute on the selection screen and on the credit card page, I didn't look at the details. And when I did, I discovered we had tickets in Section 130, Row 5. This is officially called the Nose Bleed Section. I think the seats are suspended from the Goodyear blimp over Rice Eccles stadium. With powerful binoculars and Celine Dion playing on our iPods, we may get the feeling of actually being in the concert.

But the story doesn't end. Later Saturday night I was looking at the tickets and I noticed that the date said, "Friday, November 21." I thought this must be a typo, since November 21 is on Wednesday, the day before Thanksgiving. Then I looked more closely and realized it said, "Friday, November 21, 2008." This concert is next year, in 372 days. I just hope Celine doesn't retire before then, or we don't lose the tickets, or we don't forget we even have tickets.

Weekend with the Grandkids

Jamie and Brian went to buy a new home in Colorado this past weekend, so Chieko and I tended their three kids. We learned three things: 1) Kids are a lot of fun, 2) Even young grandparents get tired quickly, 3) Forget trying to keep any room within three blocks of the kids orderly.

They came over late Friday night while we were at the movie "Martian Child." Good movie. Three and a half stars.

Jamie and Brian were gone when we awoke Saturday. Chieko cooked French toast using thick French bread. The kids also ate scrambled eggs, and so did I.

Later, I finished putting cedar trim around the door I built for our shed at the back of the patio last week. Now no one can mozy into the backyard and walk off with our bikes, firewood, mice, and spiders. Kali and Caleb were going to help me, but when I pulled out the circular saw they high-tailed it into the house to watch from the kitchen window. No loud noises for them.

They did a great job after that sweeping up the sawdust and leaves from the patio and dumping it into the black garbage can, while I raked the leaves from the Japanese maple in the front yard into a big pile. Then Kali and Caleb jumped into the pile and made a mess. But they also grabbed big armfulls of leaves and stuffed them into a black bag until almost all the leaves were gone.

They joined me on the east side of the house to scoop up the rest of the leaves, but their interest was waning at this point and no leaves made it into the bag. I suggested they call Marcus to come goof off with them, so they did but ended up going to his house. Janet also came by on a walk by herself. She was her usual happy self.

About 5 p.m. we all (including Marcus) went to see "Bee Movie." It was cute for children. The kids shared a big barrel of popcorn. I think Caleb likes movies only because they mean popcorn. When I told him beforehand to be prepared to go to a movie, he said, "You mean bring popcorn?" Emeline drank half of my 20-ounce bottle of diet rootbeer. I then cut the top off the bottle and filled it with popcorn. She ate about five bottles full of the popcorn. She's unbelievable.

On Sunday we went to church. Emeline was happy to go into the nursery. Caleb was a bit shy to go into his class, so he went with Kali to Primary. They were all good in sacrament meeting, although I had to drag Caleb out once. He stood with his face against the wall for a while. I told him to tell me when he was ready to be reverent so we could go back in. He said he was ready, so we went back and he was pretty good the rest of the meeting. I was impressed that they were able to sit quietly through three hours of meetings with such little hassle.

We ate pot roast for dinner and made chocolate sauce from cocoa, butter, powdered sugar, and water for banana splits. The kids had never had a banana split and weren't that impressed. They didn't eat the bananas.

We visited Grandma and Grandpa Great and headed for the kids' house about 8 p.m. We forgot a key, so Kali broke into the house like a burglar, climbing a rail and sneaking into a patio window. They all brushed their teeth and went to bed very nicely.

I was very impressed that they were so easy to tend, even if our house looks like the aftermath of a typhoon. Kali is very mature and ready to please and help out. Caleb is a bit of a handful, kind of like a five-year-old boy. I don't have a lot of patience, so he didn't get away with much, and he listened pretty well. Emeline is just a sweetheart. She smiles and laughs a lot, and loves to be held.

We're sad that they're moving, but I'm really glad we had this weekend to spend with them. They won't be too far away, so I hope we'll still get to visit them often, and maybe they can spend some time with us during the summers (I don't know about all three at once, though).

Just Getting Started

Sara sent an email today saying that she decided to start a blog. So I read her first entry. It was very interesting. Then I poked around and discovered that Jamie also has a blog. And Brian. And Tiffany. I can't believe I'm so out of it. (I actually started a blog and photo journal on Mac.com more than a year ago, but I never finished posting it.)

Although I profess to be a writer, I am terrible at keeping a journal. The only time I've written faithfully was on my mission, and I started copying it a few months ago into MS Word so I'd have a version when the pages of the original start to decompose (if they do before I do, that is). But after I got through the first three months of the mission, I put the journals down and haven't picked them up again. I will sometime.

What I really enjoy doing is documenting our lives through pictures and video. Unfortunately, I'm pretty slow at that, too. I just finished editing and burning to DVD two video tapes that John sent me...in April 2005. But it was fun to watch Caroline, when she turned two, and Elliot, when he was just three months old. Kids grow so fast, especially when they're that young, and we forget what they were like even a couple years ago. That's why I love videos. I have a drawer filled with 31 home VHS tapes, beginning just before we moved to Japan in 1983, when Jamie was about seven. They all need to be edited and burned to DVD. I have maybe 10 miniDV tapes that need to be edited. I also have several hours of 8mm and super 8mm films, beginning when I was about five years old. I've had some of those transferred to miniDV and am working on editing and burning them to DVD. So far I have my mission movies on DVD, and I'm about halfway through editing the first hour of my parent's home movies. There are probably three hours of those.

I don't have any thoughts to share today. I'll try to keep this blog up to date. But even if I don't, I'll enjoy reading yours.