'Memba Him?

Some of you may recognize the handsome 21 year old doing the weather in this video clip, back in 1977. He gets his "15 seconds of fame" around the 3:35 mark. I love the serious, meteorologist voice.. and turtleneck...

Video is after the still

Video

Goofy Girl

Sonoma seems to know that comedy is all about timing (and Santa hats)...

West Cartoon

I decided to draw West as a cartoon... Sonoma to follow....

Isn't he cute??

1,000th Hit!

The Relative News just crossed 1000 page views!

Here's a picture of a map showing where the hits came from - darker green means more hits... white = no hits...

I see the US is darkest, and Germany is on the map (thanks Mom and Dad).

Thanks to everyone for taking the time to visit every now and then!  Let's go 2,000!

Morrill Middle School Crossing Guards

I pass the same crossing guards on my way to work every morning.

Talk about a team sport.  The two of them right outside Morrill Middle School playing traffic defense as school children crossing the street to the goal.  They zealously march into the road from each side, raise up their quintessential red stop signs, and blow their whistles swiftly.  Once in position, they give the signal, and the students flood the road.  Pretty standard procedure one could say.

The two guards wear their pressed, standard issued uniforms each morning.  The first is a short, elder Asian man with silvery-grey hair, and a bushy mustache to match.  He stands stiff as a board and always looks stone faced, except when interacting with the other guard - an overweight, curly haired black woman.  She seems like fun.  He seems too serious.  The perfect team for chaperoning young students to school across a busy road.

While standing on the side of the road, she's constantly engaged in this back-and-forth swinging/dance motion as she nonchalantly raises her white-gloved hands about waist high.  She looks like an overgrown child trying to balance on roller skates for the first time.  She's either waving to passing cars, or dancing to music through her silly Bluetooth ear piece.  I always choose to wave back, hoping it's the former.  We're basically either friends at this point, or dance partners.

He's always glaring at drivers passing by as if each one has personally offended him by driving over the crosswalk.  He has a silly Bluetooth ear piece, also.  Maybe those, too, are standard issue.  Mr. Serious is pretty much a statue on the side of the road until that sidewalk corner starts to fill with students.  And when he feels ready, he'll just suddenly jump out in to traffic and blow his whistle.

"TWEEEEEEEET!"

And after just missing the last car through the intersection by inches, he'll stare at the back windshield as it drives past, guilt his only tool.  He's classic.

I bet they're like best friends by now.  This is at least their second year working as a team every morning to accomplish the worthy goal of getting young people safely across the street.  They even acessorize the same!  Hell, I only drive by once a day and I wave like we're friends.  But to clarify, I'm not waving to him.  He's too serious and will jump out into the crosswalk with his stop sign held high for good measure as I pass through.  And I can't afford to start my day off with that horrible stare in my rear-view mirror.

Frisbee Styles

We have two very talented disc dogs. Sonoma has demonstrated her skills in Frisbee competitions where we've swept 1st place enough times to earn the title of "sand-baggers" with the Disc Dogs of the Golden Gate organization.

You can see two videos from these competitions here and here.

We've really started to reduce the hours playing Frisbee, one, because we've taken such a big step into the world of agility, but also, two, due to us working later in the evenings and the dark arriving so early. Having said that, you'd think West would be a little less capable in the Frisbee realm, but he's got just as much ability as Sonoma! The main difference between the two is the work ethic; Sonoma runs out for the catch at 120% effort and sprints back to return the Fris at 130% effort. She truly understands that the faster she returns it to us, the faster she gets to go chase after another toss. Little West, however, will run out at 120% effort, and return at about 70% effort. He's more like "Hey... I got the Frisbee! Mmm Frisbee! Ooohh Daddy and Mommy want to play more..." where as Sonoma is like "Shit! Hurry! I just caught the frisbee - HURRY - it's been like 2 seconds and Mom and Dad don't have it yet! HURRY!! Crap, I can't run fast enough! Here! Take it! HURRY!!!! THROW IT!!!!" Her intensity level has yet to be matched by West.

See the intensity in her eye and scowl?  No joking around.  West certainly has the upper-hand when it comes to jumping, however.  Check out the height Sonoma gets in the picture below - front feet way up, back feet on the ground.  That's a "jump" in Frisbee for Sonoma...

  Now take West for example...

He's got springs!  He jumps probably about one and half times his height.  This actually creates a concern for us right now because he's so young.  Little puppy knees and growth plates are not fully developed until around a year old.  Up until then, he risks injury by jumping so hard (muscles have to work hard to lift up a body!), and from landing from such a height (all while potentially twisting in the air).  Another reason we aren't playing Frisbee as much is also because it's virtually impossible from keeping this little guy from jumping like a kangaroo.  We opt for the ball fetch session more often.

Here are a few more pics from that outing (which was after our hike at a beach at the Golden Gate Recreational Area):

"Here! Take it! HURRY!!!! THROW IT!!!!"

Red girls can't jump.

Boing!  Oops, missed the 'bee, but still got to jump!

"Shh!  I'm focused!  HURRRRRRRY!!!!"

Thanksgiving Update

Thanksgiving was another great holiday here in San Jose. The weather was beautiful, and we were able to get outside. Crystal and I decided to not make the pumpkin tiramisu - did you know the lady fingers have to soak overnight to soften??! We decided that after work on Wednesday we were too tired to cook or prepare anything, so we ordered . Thursday morning we ran to the grocery store to pick up a (delicious) coconut cream pie.

Here's a picture of Crystal's plate right before we said grace and dove in...

You'll see, moving in a clockwise direction, mashed potatoes with gravy, turkey, asparagus with bacon cheese sauce, stuffing (from in the bird and from a casserole dish), and finally garlic broccoli (not pictured are rolls and coconut cream pie). West and Sonoma also enjoyed a feast of raw turkey parts, and some cooked food as well.

On Friday, we went into San Francisco to meet up with our friends Tim and Becca and headed north to Sausalito, CA to go hiking in the Golden Gate National Recreation Area. The weather was amazing and the temperature was much warmer than we expected. The views in this area of the shoreline are just stunning.

Here are some pics of our hike:

West, our mountain goat...

The family.

Tim and Becca

Sonoma and the Pacific (and a ship).

Mr. West - you can see why we keep them on the harnesses during this walk.

(do the math: Ocean cliffs + 8 month old excited puppy = Potential Hazards)

Another nice picture of us. Thanks, Tim, for your fleeting moment of photography prowess.

The Boys.

We then made a stop at the Golden Gate lookout point getting a picture reminiscent of "Full House".

"Whatever happened to predictability, newsmen, the paperboy, evenin' t.v.?"