Stan’s Obligatory Blog

It’s our 17th anniversary. Wait – no, it’s not. That’s not until next Saturday. But Lucinda is going to her aunt’s house for the weekend, so we decided to do our official big night out tonight so she could come along. She wanted to go to “the restaurant with the moving floor” – L.A. Prime at the Bonaventure Hotel in downtown Los Angeles. Doesn’t everyone let their six-year-old choose how they are going to celebrate their anniversary?

So we made a reservation and headed down there. We’ve gone there for New Year’s Eve before, but I think this was the first time we’d gotten there before dark. Just outside on the street we saw the remnants of a day of filming. There was a rack of odd-looking mopeds and lots of strange-looking potted plants on the sidewalk. The hotel people told us that it was for “Mission: Impossible III”. Since I doubt we’ll see that, we will probably never know if they were right or not.

Once we got inside, we headed for the restaurant. As always, the food and service were superb. The view was only so-so this time, since it was a foggy evening in L.A. But Lucinda still had a fun time going around looking out the windows. And after dinner we all headed to the revolving lounge to look at the moving floor.

Overall, it was a fun evening

Today we went to two kids’ birthday parties, back-to-back.

The first party was a Michael’s in Glendale. The kids all made a tic-tac-toe set, which involved much painting and gluing and pizza and cake. It looked like they had fun.

After that, it was on to the Glendale Galleria and Build-A-Bear. This is apparently quite the sensation with the young kids these days.

When we got there, they were just getting started. Each kid had a $20 budget to work with. They all started out picking out their animals. They have rows of bins with unstuffed animals ready to be picked. Lucinda picked out the rabbit, which turned out to be $20 for the animal alone. So we were on the hook for any accessories. And with racks of stuffed-animal clothing, shoes, hats and even little “Livestrong” bracelets for the bears, there were guaranteed to be accessories. A whole store full of accessories. Oh, the humanity…

They actually did a very good job with the birthday party. They had the kids singing songs while they stuffed the animals. They had them pick out little hearts to put inside the animals. They did everything to keep the kids entertained and engaged through the whole process. I guess that’s what we’re really paying for here.

Anyway, the kids had a good time. And as we were leaving, I noticed that the mall had thoughtfully provided an AED unit just outside Build-A-Bear, perfect for parents when they realize they just spent $50 on a stuffed animal.

After that, we all went to dinner at Islands. The kids had one large table, and the adults got two small tables. And cake was had by all.

Today we took Lucinda and her friend Lucy to the California Science Center for the Magic Exhibit.

We saw the ‘disembodied head’ illusion, the ‘heavy crate’ illusion, the ‘levitating chair’ illusion, and a whole host of card tricks. It was a fun time. There are more pictures in Lucinda’s photo album.

Lucinda got a “Spotlight Award” at school today. They gave out a couple of awards to kids in each class in the school. We don’t actually know how the kids were selected for this, but we thought it prudent to be supportive and enthusiastic for her.

This evening we went out to dinner with Uncle Hsin and his family. We had a big Chinese dinner, complete with Peking Duck, lobster, crab, and so forth. Lucinda isn’t a big seafood fan, so we got some ribs and a beef dish for her to eat. She is learning to use chopsticks now.

This evening we went to Chinatown to an art show. The art was by our friend and tattoo artist, Shannon. Also, there was art by Shannon’s sister Lindsay, and also by another artist who is a friend of theirs.

There was an odd mix of people there at the gallery. It was pretty entertaining, though. We saw Shannon’s friend Alexis, who was all gothed out. She said that she was there to ‘add lack of color’. We decided that she had the best outfit there.

Overall, it was a fun little diversion on a Saturday evening.

Lucinda is now learning to read. Last night she read Green Eggs and Ham. She’s getting pretty good at sounding out words. She also read Go Dog, Go over the weekend. Pretty soon she will be able to read her own bedtime stories.

Lucinda had a sleepover at Aunt Maggi’s house this weekend. We took her down there on Saturday afternoon. On the way back, we stopped off in Long Beach to have dinner at El Torito and look at some desks for Cathy.

On Saturday night, Cathy and I had one of those rare nights out as a couple. It was fun, and we didn’t get home and in bed until close to 1:00. Then on Sunday morning, we both got up early. I went for my regular Sunday morning bike ride, and Cathy went to the gym.

Lucinda and Aunt Maggi went out for a while on Saturday night. On Sunday they went to the pool near her house in Irvine with another family. Lucinda had a couple of other kids to play with, which worked out well.

Sunday afternoon, it was time to pick up Lucinda. On the way down there we saw a car lose its wheel on the 405 freeway. The left front wheel came off, and the hub fell down onto the pavement in a shower of sparks. It would have been spectacular at night. At the same time, the wheel rolled away across all five lanes of traffic. When it hit the center divider, it bounced up in the air and landed on the other side of the freeway in the oncoming lanes. We watched it bounce three times on its way across the lanes before it went off the other side of the freeway. It was probably the single most spectacular incident that either of us had actually witnessed on the freeway.

Today was the Back-to-School picnic at Lucinda’s school. They took a lesson from last year’s picnic and had this one catered by In-N-Out Burger, which worked out pretty well. I also took a few minutes to marvel some more at the setting of the school. It’s right at the base of the San Gabriel mountains, and the view from the playground is really quite pretty.

The official class lists were posted at the picnic, so we found out that Lucinda is in Mrs. May’s class. We had met Mrs. May once at the Caltech ponds, and she seemed nice. We went to see the room and find out the pick-up and drop-off information, since they’ve redone the bus routes, and there is no longer a stop right by our house.

Big excitement coming on Thursday.

Here’s the story of our family vacation at Lake Tahoe this summer. I have links to some of the photos here, but if you want to see all the photos, they are here.

Saturday, August 20

We decided to do something a bit different this year, and fly out of Ontario airport instead of LAX. It turns out it’s actually a bit closer to our house, and Southwest Airlines has a one-stop, no-plane-change flight to Reno from there. And they were running a special, so it was cheaper than LAX.

In the airport gift shop, we saw a romance novel, Gone with the Nerd. Yikes. When did nerds become characters in romance novel, and why wasn’t I notified of this?

After a brief stop in San Jose, we took the short hop over the Sierras and landed in Reno. We stopped for dinner at Carrow’s near the airport, and then we drove over the mountains to South Lake Tahoe. We got to Grandpa’s house there at about 8:00. I made a quick run to Raley’s to get food for breakfast and that was the end of our day.

Sunday, August 21

We woke up this morning and had to take another trip to Raley’s to get some Orajel. Lucinda’s six-year molars are coming in, and she needed some help. Also, we had realized that we had forgotten to bring books for her bedtime stories, so we had to find a few of them, too.

After that, we went to do our favorite hike up to Cascade Falls. As always, Lucinda didn’t really get interested in it until we got to the part of the trail that was on the rocks. But she enjoyed it after that.

The chipmunks came around while we were sitting up at the falls, but we made sure that they couldn’t get into the pack this time. Last year, they got into the pack and ate our chocolate chip cookies.

When we were starting back down, my phone rang. Turns out Sprint has a good signal up there on the mountain, so Lucinda got to talk to Aunt Maggi while we were hiking back from the falls.

After the hike, we went to the pool, and Lucinda showed us what she had learned in her swimming lessons this summer.

That evening, we had dinner at The Broiler Room at Caesar’s. The food was good, as always, and they had the usual flourish at the end with the chocolate-covered strawberries and dry ice.

Monday, August 22

Today we made a trip to the Attic, which is the local hospital thrift store. We cleaned up the owner’s closet a bit and donated some old clothes and other items. Then we had lunch at Carrow’s. The staff at this particular restaurant seemed really quite lax for some reason. But it was all right. We were on vacation, after all.

After that, we went to the K-Mart to buy some new bathroom rugs and other furnishings for the house. While we were there, we heard The Cure, and we reflected on how strange it was that a band that was considered so alternative and edgy when we were young was now being played at K-Mart. And we felt a bit old. Then we went back home and went to the pool for some more swimming.

Dinner tonight was at The Horizon casino’s Josh’s restaurant. We remembered this restaurant as having a great dessert cart, but they didn’t have the cart this time. The desserts were still good, but we missed getting to see them before ordering. Also, while we were there, we noticed that the music in the restaurant was almost completely easy-listening versions of ’60s standards. Again, we felt a bit old.

On the way out of the casino, I had a look around the blackjack tables. The last time we were there, they didn’t have anything for less than $10 a hand, which is just too much for my taste. This time, they had several single-deck tables for $5 a hand. They’d even loosened up the rules a bit by allowing double-downs on hard 8 and 9. But then I noticed that they also changed the rules and only pay 6-5 for blackjack. Years ago, I wrote a program to play blackjack and figure out how the game works. Turns out the player who uses basic strategy wins something like 42% of the time, the house wins about 56%, and 2% are ties. If the house pays 3-2 for when the player gets blackjack, it all works out that then the player is almost even with the house. By changing the blackjack payout, they take a big bite out of the player’s expectation value. So I didn’t play this trip.

Tuesday, August 23

This morning, Cathy did some more cleanup in the owner’s closet in the house, and we made another stop at The Attic.

We also did some exploring around the house. The neighbor’s house had a bird’s nest built underneath the deck. Lucinda also found a lizard on one of the rocks.

Next, we went to Anderson’s Bike Rentals and rented some bikes for a ride along the lake. We got a little trailer for Lucinda to ride in. The bikes were worn, but well-maintained, and they provided helmets, a map, and a lock. Normally, Cathy and I don’t ride bikes together, since I tend to go a bit faster than she does, but having 50 pounds of trailer and kid attached to my bike slowed me down a bit, so we were almost evenly matched.

We rode the bike path north along the lake, stopping at the Stream Profile Chamber for a look at the fish. Then we took the path south through town. This part went through the auto-body ghetto. Every town needs to have wrecking yards and auto-body shops, but they are usually pretty well-hidden in tourist towns. We even passed the very smelly refuse recycling building and an apartment with a warning sign about a hazard we don’t have at home in L.A. The bike route went past all of this stuff, and it was actually pretty entertaining. In all, it was about a 20 mile ride.

For dinner, we went to Harvey’s casino. They have a restaurant on the top floor called “19″, which is their ‘nice’ restaurant. When we got up there, the view was impressive. And I realized that I’d forgotten the camera. D’oh! The menu was a bit odd. It was high-priced, but they had things like french fries and macaroni and cheese as side dishes. The dessert menu included “warm doughnuts with two sauces”. For their after-dinner flourish, they brought out a ball of pink cotton candy big as your head. I hate cotton candy. The smell of it makes me nauseous, but Cathy and Lucinda chowed down on it, and I once again was infinitely irritated that I’d forgotten the camera.

Wednesday, August 24

Today’s adventure was over the hill in Carson City. We went to the Nevada Railroad Museum, where we got to try riding and pumping an actual railroad hand car, as well as seeing the preserved trains there. We also saw an exhibit about the role of the Chinese in building the railroads in the west.

Lunch was at Applebee’s in Carson City, and after that we went and did some more shopping for new items for the house. We got some long wood screws so I could repair the front deck railing, as well as a new stereo for the house.

After that, we went back home and went to the pool. Dinner was at Evans, which is easily our pick for the best restaurant in South Lake Tahoe. I had the Grilled tenderloin of beef on gratin potato cake with garlic compound butter, sauteed spinach and port wine sauce. Yum. Lucinda and I shared a dessert. We even came in under-budget this time, with a bill of $99.99. It was good.

Thursday, August 24

Today I did the repair on the deck railing. It wasn’t too hard to do, but it was still a bit of an adventure, since I was using unfamiliar tools.

We did another hike today. The Hawley Grade Trail follows the route of a wagon road from the days of the ‘49ers. The hike was 3.8 miles, which was a bit long for Lucinda, but I functioned well as a mule for her to ride most of the way.

As always, after the hike, we went to the pool. Lucinda is finally able to swim on her own with her pool noodle or kickboard. She was also able to swim almost all the way across the pool by herself with no floatation devices. So the swimming lessons were a Good Thing.

Dinner was at the Four Seasons at The Horizon. The sign in the lobby has a picture of a nice prime rib dinner, but guess what wasn’t on the menu. D’oh!

After dinner, we went back to the house and watched “Racing Stripes”. I had noticed that one of the couches was coming apart, so I got out the little sewing kit and sewed it back together.

Friday, August 25

Lucinda said that she didn’t want to do another hike today, so we rented bikes again. This time we went to Lakeview Sports. Their bikes were not as well-maintained as at Anderson’s, and the counter guy was kind of a doofus. I had to oil the chains on both bikes, adjust the brakes, and tighten up the pedal cages before we could ride. Then we did basically the same ride as Tuesday, but in the opposite direction. We went past the lumber yard, where some graffiti tells us a bit about what the locals in Tahoe do for fun. We passed the Moose Lodge and also saw a coyote. This time, I brought along my little GPS unit and measured the ride, which turned out to be 19 miles. When we got back, the manager gave us a good discount on the rental, since I’d had to fix the bikes for them. He was apologetic about it, saying that their bike mechanic had been taken ill. Since their season only runs through the summer, they were having a hard time hiring a mechanic for just a few weeks.

We always have our last night’s dinner at Evans, and this trip was no exception. We picked different items from the menu, and as always, it was all good. Lucinda and I also shared the same dessert.

Our final bit of house maintenance involved rearranging the couches in the living room.

Saturday, August 26

This morning, we all got up early for the trip home. We drove over the mountains to Reno. Along the way, I collected a picture of a new sign for my Animal Crossings collection.

When we got to the airport, we had just enough time to check in and get on the plane. The trip home stopped in Las Vegas, so the plane was full of rowdy people on their way to a weekend of debauchery. I also got to do a bit of atomic tourism on the way. We got a view out the plane window of Frenchman Flat at the Nevada Test Site. This was the site of the 1957 “Priscilla” test, where the AEC built a town out on the dry lake bed and then nuked it with a 37kiloton bomb.

After the stop on Las Vegas, we continued on to Ontario, passing over the Solar One power plant near Barstow. It didn’t look like it was operating at the time.

Finally, we stopped off at the kennel on the way home to spring the dogs.

All in all, it was a fun trip.