Double Duty

First item is this:
Yesterland

I haven't had a chance to see everything, but it was fun to look at some of the stuff that was there when I was a kid, and especially during my 8 years of employment (1991-1999). Everyone that lives here in SoCal used to work there, or knows someone who did. So, if you didn't fall into either of those categories before, now you do.

Oh, and No, there is not a city of tunnels under the whole park. Disneyworld, yes, but not Disneyland. One tunnel that starts across from the Prince and Princess bathrooms that goes next to the stage at Tomorrowland Terrace (or whatever it's called now) and ends just under the America Sings building aka Innoventions. There's a big kitchen under New Orleans square, but it's more like a basement under it all than a network. Any other Disneyland questions you've got? Ask away, or you can also read Mouse Tales, or More Mouse Tales for lots of employee stories.

Second item:

Rode the train overnight Thursday-Friday to Flagstaff to meet up with my wifey for a wedding. It's not easy to sleep on a train, that's for sure, in the seats anyways. Had a great time, beautiful wedding (even though they nearly lost the ring between the slats of wood on the deck), and great visit with two of my three brothers in law. If you've never been to Flag (as people in the know call it), I recommend going... especially if all you've ever seen of Arizona is Phoenix, Tucson, or the Grand Canyon. Flag isn't the desert, it's a mountain town. First time I saw it, I sure was surprised that something like that existed in AZ. Yet another in a long list of how my wife has opened my eyes to more of the world. The town is trying to explode right now, but the city isn't letting it grow too fast, which means that housing prices are climbing. Not quite to our levels, but still high. Not sure I would want to live in a place that small though, everywhere we went with people who live there, someone in the group knew at least one person who walked/biked/drove by all over the place. And since I'm a fan of not seeing people I know in public (I don't know why, I'm just weird like that. Maybe it's the unexpected surprise of it, I don't know), it would be tough for me to be in that situation, at least at the beginning. But, I could be wrong. Here's what it can look like in winter:

We drove back home yesterday and got in fairly late. I think an early bedtime will be in order for tonight.

Wiser Meisner

Last night there was a workshop type of thing at the church for people in the arts minisries. They had instructors in many areas, dance, singing, songwriting, drama, instruments, etc. Went to the drama one, where we learned about The Meisner Technique . Now, I've never had any type of acting classes, so it was all new to me, but it was really interesting stuff. Not that I'm planning on being in any sort of major production, but I do wish that Jen was able to go, I think she would have enjoyed it a lot.

Useful information?

Wiki how cracks me up. While wikipedia usually contains interesting information, wikihow tends to just have random stuff, which is why I love clicking the random how on the right side of the page, you never know what you'll learn how to do. Just in case you don't make it around Dead Man's Curve is very useful.

Wisdom

Last night, I heard a fantastic definition of what wisdom is:
Skill at living.
Before it was "the application of knowledge" but that one sounded too textbook-ish.
As my year and a half old niece would say:
I yike it, I yike it!!

2 things from lunchtime at work

First, Picassa by google is a fantastic app. A great way to organize all my photos, and it makes creating posts that have photos even easier than before. I highly recommend it to everyone. Although, I will say that I am slightly in love with Google. Not as in love as with Sony, but they are creeping up quickly.
Second, today hit 99 days left until the big vacation. Some people don't like counting down to things because they say that the time goes by slower. For me, the time goes by at the same rate. I just enjoy doing it because it builds up the anticipation and excitement. I counted down for more than 300 days until my 30th birthday, and am currently in 3 countdowns... the vacation, my wife's 30th birthday, and my dad's 60th. Hmm, maybe I should start counting down hours until each weekend. No, that would be silly!
Anyone else countdown things?

Count to 12

So I've seen this enough times, thought I'd give it a try...

1 - empty glass
2 - surfboards
3 - speakers on my computer
4 - full bookshelves
5 - full glass bottles of soda
6 - blank CDs in the stack that had 100
7 - CD cases
8 - my wife's workout tools (weights, exercise ball, etc...)
9 - PS2 games in the rack on the wall
10 - Lord's a'leaping (just seeing if you were paying attention)
11 - wooden matches left in a matchbox
12 - pens in my Darth Vader coffee mug

That's harder than I thought it would be.

deep thoughts...

So, if wisdom comes from the application of knowledge, is it possible to have knowledge that can't be fuel for wisdom? And is the gain of knowledge only for the sake of having that knowledge bad, or a waste of time?
Kinda deep, I know, just got to thinking about it last night.

Gotta hand it to the croc, he wins!

This look interesting to you?
Check this out!

no feel like it

I don't feel like working today, I feel like sleeping more, and then sitting around.
That is all.

We went for a one night camping trip to San Elijo State Beach, down by Carlsbad and Encinitas. It was a really neat place. We usually like camping away from stuff, and this for sure wasn't too remote, but having a tent on a cliff over the ocean, pretty sweet. Here's our campsite with our sweet tent.

This is one of many pictures of the awesome sunset we were priviledged enough to see.

I love fire. Also, notice how the flame made that little face on the right side, creepy....

We also treated ourselves to a delicious snack. Neither of us had eaten these in more years than we could remember, and they were still just as delicious as they ever were.

The campsite was rather expensive, 35 bucks a night, but for a one-nighter, it was worth it.

grrrr

When the Angels lose to the A's, I worry about their position in the division, and it makes me hate the A's.

When the Angels lose 10-1 to the Red Sox, it makes me angry. Not regular angry, the kind of angry where I want to punch every Red Sox player in the face, and especially all the fans.

Is that bad?

BBQ

Wednesday after work I was sent to Costco to make some purchases. I then, that night, Thursday night, and Friday morning worked on the prep for the big feast at work today.

I caramelized a bag of onions, and sauteed a bunch of mushrooms. I also cooked then wrapped in foil with butter and garlic salt 32 of these:

I used a 20 lb bag of potatoes to make a ton of this:

I grilled up the wrapped up corn and 32 of these:

After we ate pretty much all of it, I heated up a pot of this (It's bananas foster):

It all turned out really well, I was pleased. Everyone seemed to enjoy it too. Good times.

Did it make me miss cooking as my job? A little, until I realized I was going to be off work tomorrow, and every upcoming weekend, and I felt better about it.

Dominican

So, I was doing a little googling about the Dominican Republic to remind myself to save money so we can make the trip in August. I found some reviews of the place we're going, Sunscape The Beach which I was reading through. Most of them gave very high reviews. Main complaints were that doing extra stuff away from the resort took time to get to, and were expensive. Well, we plan on staying there, so who cares about that. Then I found one that made me laugh. This guy, who chose the 35-45 age category, could barely say anything nice. He complained that the road from the airport was in bad shape, and even went as far as to complain that we had to share the road with vehicles from farms. Ummm, the DR isn't a very wealthy nation, which shouldn't be news to someone going there to visit, so the roads aren't going to be perfect. He also complained some that most of the staff didn't speak perfect English, and he was horrified that nobody at the airport spoke English. Maybe he got on the wrong plane to go there and was expecting to end up in Miami or something, but I would think that if someone was to travel to a foreign land, where the national language is Spanish, you shouldn't expect everyone to speak your language. I was pretty baffled that someone could be so "American" that they would expect the whole world to be like home. As for the actual quality of the resort, he said the rooms were nice and the food was good and the beach was nice. But overall, he would not recommend it as a destination, because it was too different I guess. It kinda makes me sad, but then again, I'd think that it would be a better time without people like that there, so what can ya do? Part of the reason to go is to experience something different. And, for those of you wondering about the Spanish part, no, I'm not fluent. I can get by from what I know, but mostly I'll be relying on my lovely wifey of 2 years, who speaks it like it's going out of style. Yay for a wife who knows more than me!!

wow

While following links to blogs, I ended up finding this. good stuff.
The Personalized Easter Story

10 words

I am sorry. I was wrong. Will you forgive me?

So I goofed. It seems that me and planning ahead are not getting along lately. We have an Improv show on the 28th, and that has been known for a while. I also have a wedding to attend in Flagstaff, AZ that same day, which has also been known for a while. Basically I forgot that they were the same weekend so I have to back out of the show, and I didn't figure this out until last night. After notice was given to Slice, after everything was set up. Ugh. So to Ron, Jeremy, Jennifer, and Jim, I apologize.
Also, if anyone needs a guilt trip email done right, ask Ron. Ouch.

No title.

Yes, this is an actual backyard in Texas. Awesome. The large metal tub in the background of the bottom pic is either going to be a fish pond, or a swimming pool, that hasn'e been decided yet. The top one is the big mystery. A cut in half trash can attached to the stand alone piece of fencing. I can't figure out what it's for. Maybe a planter of some sort? I really can't tell.
I should also explain that in no way do I dislike Texas. Every time that I've been there in different parts was a pleasant experience. Very nice and friendly people. Just a very different culture, and fascinating.

two more things

Check this out, the future is getting closer to being here.
laser keyboard

found this poster too, i wish it was a t-shirt

Chewie

Arrrgh! (not like a pirate)

So I'm a little torn right now. Here's the story.

While waiting in line for our hot dogs at the game Monday night, a guy walked up and started complaining that there weren't any more onions. Saying, "If you guys are out of onions I want my money back because there's absolutely no way I'm eating a hot dog without onions." Ok, fine, he likes onions, but he already irked me with his rude attitude to the workers (I firmly believe every single person should work in food service at some point in their lives). So after that, Jen and I were across the way putting the good stuff on our dogs, and he was right there next to us. During the time we were there, I heard him make three phone calls to three different voicemails of, I assume to be, Angels employees. All of his messages were extremely rude and had the attitude that he should be treated like a king and that not having onions was the worst thing they could possibly do to him. Here's how I'm torn, on the last message, he left his cell phone number. I entered it into my phone and I now have it. I haven't called him yet, but I want to, and say a number of things:

-That I work for the Angels and that we have some special seats for him, just talk to so and so at the next game, etc.

-Just that the season ticket holders who sit next to him say his breath stinks too much and that they complained that he didn't need any more onions.

-call a morning radio show and have them call him

-pay one of those search engines to find the address and mail him an onion a day for a week
(i'm not actually doing that one, but it sounds like fun right?)

The worst part is that he was in the same section as us, and he acts like a normally nice guy to the people around him, and I assume is pretty well known amongst the season ticket holders in that area because of his signature thing he does at each game.

I suppose I could also just let it go, but I just hate for people to be treated like lesser beings by someone who thinks they deserve whatever they want whenever they want.

Any ideas?

Frozen Napoleon

Went and saw Blades of Glory last Saturday before performing a sketch for the 430 service then doing my show at night. Oh yeah, and we went and picked up a new couch before that. It was a busy day.
Anyways, the movie was good. Not as many laughs from what they said as from funny visuals, so this one might end up being less funny the more times you see it, but maybe not. I sure did laugh though, but Jeremy and Ron laughed way more than I did. I guess I'm just a stick in the mud. Saw the new Spiderman 3 preview, and when it was over and quiet, I said "oh man" probably a little too loud. But, I like to do that, wait for the silence then give my opinion of it.
The sketch for church went really well, but we got cut after the first one. It's ok though, it was fun to be in big church and force myself to do something out of my comfort zone. The improv doesn't make me nervous anymore, I'm way more comfortable making stuff up on the spot than memorizing it. That show went great, had a really good turnout, thanks to some Doug Plugs in church the weekend before and some flyers that got passed around. I guess advertising really does work!