Not Photoshopped!

This is the launch of the Celebrity Solstice, a 3000-passenger dinghy available to entertain one and all:

 

I think these things may be getting a bit too large.

What On Earth?

Alright, gentle readers. I need some help here.
What on earth is this 4" insect I found on the front stoop last night? It looked like a grasshopper, but it was light brown/tan in color. Is it a grasshopper/chameleon? An albino?

All information proffered will be studied and appreciated.

Sights & Sounds In Scotland

The Falkirk Wheel is on my short list.

 

Read the Wikipedia article. An eighty-foot lift! It must have been a wonderful design challange.

My First Car

(Don't I wish!)

Autumn!

Taken early this morning. (Notice the shadows.)

Christ The Light Cathedral, Oakland

This appears to be a wonderful building. Reminds me why I like architecture. (Pix are from CoCoTimes)

This is a super execution.
(and I'm not a Roman Catholic.)

Daddy, Where's Our House?

Hurricane Ike

Missing Them Already

Gosh! It's quiet around here.
Anyway, from earlier this week, that's Mark and Henry (George John is behind the camera), Cousin Randy, and the Wondrous Hanako.
(Randy is into computers, and speaks in tongues with Rudy. Sigh.)

Friday lunch

 

Quick Friday lunch, leaving Daughter & her 3 boys at home. Sister-in-law suggested Persian, so we headed into Walnut Creek and found Bijan Restaurant 1. Service was slow, slow, slow (the place was understaffed, it appeared) ranging from C to B-, but helpful and friendly when the waiter finally had time to show up.

Started with a delightful, hot, fired hot bread and an assortment of dips/wraps, including cilantro leaves, fresh onion, goat cheese, and olives. A separate plate of mushed eggplant. Great stuff!

Accompaniment was a bottle of 2006 Wente Reisling from their Arroyo Seco vineyards down in Monterey County. A bit too sweet for my tastes, but perhaps I shall learn. Perfect wine for a sunny lunch with Mediterranean food.

Two kabobs, beef and chicken, with saffron rice and lima beans, and a further combination of dipping goodies, made up the lunch.  Good choices, all.

Food A, ambiance E (knotty pine indicates an earlier incarnation for the building).  We shall return.

Politics . . .

I know, I know. We try to avoid politics here, particularly during an election year.
However, I've been hearing more and more from beyond the Pond, that the EU really is rooting for Obama to win this one.
I checked the electoral vote map. This is what I found:

We may have to answer this one by ourselves.

First Day In California

Two friendly nations, divided only by one language.

I'm having a composition problem with this new version of Blogger. Anyway, here's Henry with that bl**dy golf ball still off its tee:

Arghh! Now, I'll have to wish that Blogger had a tutorial. Anyway, so far, so good. Nice to see/meet the grandsons.

Vice-President?

Guess Who's Coming To Town!

A hearty hip, hip, hooray!

Neighbourhood Pub

I may take Mark and Hanako here.  Just thinking...

Chris Wolter, D.D.S.

This is my neighborhood dentist.

With his favorite drill.

I love my dentist.

Sand

These are two of many Iraq photos on the internet. I have never been to Iraq, but I did spend two 1-month periods in Saudi Arabia, many years ago.

While there, I saw a lot of sand, a few wind-driven events, but never a legendary sand storm as photographed here.

I consider myself fortunate. In'shallah.

Stick Built

When someone says that a house, your house, is "stick built", this is what that person is referring to:

Now, that's a whole lot of sticks!

(We won't get into balloon framing, platform framing, single-wall, etc.)

And, yes, that's our new neighbor to the Northwest of us, in Lafayette.  It's the final house in the Hidden Oaks subdivision.

Soon, very soon, the sounds of hammers will cease. And the sounds of lacrosse sticks will take their place.

Good Old Days!

Update! (Sat.eve.) I just added up the costs, and it looks like the manager is skimming an extra 1/2cent per gallon!  Lawsuit!

That's about $1.87 in 2008, inflation adjusted.

My kind of prices!

Our Fiftieth State!

49 years ago today. Welcome & Aloha!

Rising Again

Earth Rise

(Click to enlarge.)

One Guy In Ohio

It's easier than it looks! Just follow me, here:

I'm going to the back yard now.

Just pictures, for a while

Moon Rise

(click to enlarge)(I think)

Kenichi Pacific

I can't spend a week in Kona without at least one visit to Kenichi Pacific. This time, we went to the original in the Keauhou Shopping Center, and the new outlet at The Shops at Mauna Lani.

I love this restaurant. Very good food, great service, delightful presentations, and good wine. 4 stars = heartily recommended.

I'll let the pictures tell the story:

These are delightful scallops in a tomato cream sauce with curry powder. Some sort of cabbage leaves on top.

Dynamite shrimp, to die for.






Not bad at all.

Hey, they have restaurants in Aspen and Austin, so they're available to all!

Mauna Kea Beach Hotel

I remember when the Mauna Kea first opened in 1965. I was an architecture student at Cal, and I deeply admired the S.O.M. (Edward Charles Bassett) design. Based on a "haole" affection for Hawaii, it offered pristine views, marvelous sequences on "interior" spaces, lots of Asian art works, and a signature lack of air conditioning. It was an instant star in the architectural firmament.

A south wing, and a lot more air conditioning, was added later. You see, it takes a human body about 7-10 days to become comfortable in Hawaii's climate, and most tourists spend only 1 or 2 weeks on the island.

I, as well as several family folks, have stayed at this hotel. We enjoyed it tremendously, especially the friendly hotel security folks who reminded us frequently that we weren't the only guests in the hotel.

Anyway, in October 2006 a 6.9 temblor hit a few hundred feet offshore, and the southern (new) wing of the hotel collapsed, and the remainder was deemed unsuited for human occupancy. The place shut down.

There is hope, and some faith, that the newly remodeled hotel will reopen later this year.

Time will tell.

Julian Beever

This is a rather focused artist. He works with chalk on sidewalks, employing a form of perspective drawing that must have a name, which I do not know.

Something strange, going on here, but, without question, the guy has talent! (That's him, standing on top of the globe.)

Off To The Big Island

Back in a week or so. Keep your eyes on the road!

Here's Looking At You

What little thingy is the cat holding?

Where's My Dinner?

(I'm sorry.)

Shinkansen!

This is music, but it's actually a pretty good reminder of the very fast train.

I like that! (But, I miss the bento box at the intermediate stations.)

Paris For President!

This is certainly an interesting, and unusual election year:


I think I'll go to Hawaii without a radio. :-)

Interesting Anecdote

I heard this at the dentist's office recently:

In the "good" old days, Saturdays and weekdays after school were busy "drill and fill" hours for all dentists. That's when the adolescents came in after school for fillings in their rotted teeth. Good business model. Wealthy dentists.

However, in the 1960's, cities started adding fluoride to their water systems and, voila, the number of cavities started dropping. Seriously dropping. Some kids came through adolescence without a single cavity.

Then, God bless the French, everyone started drinking water out of plastic bottles, and the Law of Unintended Consequences took over. Bottled water has no fluoride.

Now cavities are becoming more and more prevalent in teenage teeth.

(That's what I was told.)

Here's A Smile Just For You

High Energy Physics

Okay, I'm a bit over my head here, but I do note that the High Energy Accelerator at CERN, near Lake Geneva, is to be turned on soon.

     I remember discussing CERN back in the 1960's when Ian Mackinlay & Associates were designing the housing for Cornell's Synchrotron, which later became the Wilson Synchrotron Laboratory.

This interior shot of CERN looks very much like the interior of the Wilson Lab tunnel.

Here's Maury Tigner, whom I well remember, in the Wilson tunnel:

I guess all tunnels look about the same.

So when, and if, you read about CERN being the latest and the bestest, please remember that Bob Wilson was doing the early investigations, on a shoestring, 40 years ago.

(Thanks for listening)

No Further Comment

Who knew?

At the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco, there's an exhibition of Chinese art from the Dynasty of Ming (1368 - 1644, Western)

There's this shot, which apparently is not photoshopped, of the early Ming LPGA during a tournament.

And, you thought the Scots invented the game.

Scampi In Garlic Tomato Cream

Home-grown cukes made it all work! Mmm, mmm, good!

Meanwhile, the cat joker in the entry was happy this morning, when the horizontal sun shone upon her/him/it.