Albert? Is that You?

Damn, a frog just jumped on our second floor window. No, a real, real frog.

Albert's the default voice on my ibook. Apple Mac peeps will know what I'm sayin'. Maybe.

What did you say?

Applied Minds just invented Babble™ for Sonare Technologies™, a new company of Herman Miller. It makes a conversation in open space -- say, your office cubicle or in a hospital area -- virtually incomprehensible to those in hearing distance and perfectly private.

Applied Sciences even maps the chemical signature of blood proteins -- to identify candidates for certain cancer treatments -- since most treatments only work for 5% of the population -- matching candidate to treatment.

What do I want for Christmas (ok, so I'm a heathen, but still...)? Applied Minds is also behind the Touch Table, a map that uses your handsignals for movements. To zoom out, place both hands (or just two fingers) on the table and spread them apart (If I saw this demo'd, I'd've cried.). Zoom in? Yeah, push your hands together. You touch points -- grab the earth, turn it on the screen, navigate, zoom into the location you want, get a historical view of the same location... in real time. You can even take a pen and draw on the map when you're pointing out information for those around the table. You can imagine my pool of glee regarding this fascinating invention. I happen to read maps for fun and even the new Google Maps Satellite pictures have given me plenty of entertainment. If this wasn't enough, they've now built a 3D version where the screen actually deforms so you can feel the hills and valleys. Watch the video (41MB) on NorthropGrumman. Cry all you want.

[just edited the links; NG originally posted information in 2004; sometime between the original posting her and April 2009, they updated their site and moved the links. The zooming thing is now in the hands of the masses by way of the iphone...)

We interrupt your day to promote: Parsnips.

I roasted some delicious vegetables today. Parsnips ought to get more credit. They're sooo good.

Actually, what I made was a lazy version of a very complicated but super delicious squash casserole recipe I have. One of these days I'm going to post it but someone should make it for me (I just hate peeling acorn squash)... Or better yet, I'll make it and you peel the squash...

World Jump Day

World Jump Day is July 20, 2006. It really should be called World Jump Moment, as jumping will take place at 11:39:13 GMT exactly.

If 600 million peeps jump at precisely the same moment, we could drive Earth into a new orbit, thereby (in their words) "stop global warming, extend daytime hours and create a more homogenous climate." 155,094,135 people have already registered. Go and find out how.

While you're at it, take a photo for the Fakefunk Jump Project run by Souris.

To be or Not to be... productive

It's been a bit difficult trying to get my priorities straight, between caring for dad, managing the house (updating their wills today), doing work for Lannam, and doing work for AXA Realty. In between, though, I'm cooking for dad which I'm enjoying -- I haven't done it really since I lived in GV in NYC. Tonight we're having typical summer dinner with Vietnamese influence: barbeque chicken with corn-on-the-cob, tossed mango salad and some tomato-garlic rice on the side. My mom had some amazing five-minute recipes she used to just toss together for us as kids. I wish she'd get her cookbook done soon!

Otherwise, I have a handful of other things keeping my ADHD head busy. There are hilarious things to scan and send to family that have risen from the storage closets of the old house, my 2004 taxes to file, photos to print, copy to write, clothes to wash, and decisions to make.

And I want to move back to this.

I am in the midst of a right-hand-left-hand debate over whether or not I should move to Santa Monica or go back to my beloved New York.

And I discovered this week: Santa Monica is comfortable like a couch is comfortable. New York is comfortable like chicken pot pie is comfortable.

And who can't love my old 'hood, snow and all?

Personal Hell Perspective

If there is a personal hell, mine would be a place described as the ultimate suburbia in which all homes in all developments look exactly the same -- and yet, ugly-the-same -- where I must go shopping at Bed Bath and Beyond, wear clothes from Old Navy, and eat at T.G.I. Fridays, and where the temperature runs around 90F.

This is what I'm talking about.

"Some rich man came and raped the land, nobody caught 'em,
Put up a bunch of ugly boxes and, Jesus, people bought 'em.
And they called it paradise, the place to be,
they watched the hazy sun sinking in the sea."
- The Last Resort, by the EAGLES

Mars is starting to look pretty good.

I just finished reading a book. In the last two years, I've started about 17, but I shamefully admit I only finished one in Santa Monica. Yesterday, I drove my dad to Columbus, Georgia where my oldest sister lives, and where her husband, an Army Ranger, is stationed at Ft. Benning (where dad himself was trained in 1957). After the combined stress of helping my parents pack up and sell our childhood home and then take my dad through minor surgery, and then have my mom leave town and be left to care for him post-op, and then driving 13 hours to Georgia... I arrived at my sister's where I just chilled. It just so happens that this sister of mine maintains my library [it should be noted that in my former life, I did in fact complete books more often]. So I sat and read Raise High the Roofbeams, Carpenters. One of my favorites.

Wanted: Comfortable digs on Mars.

Craigslist, the imminently useful classifieds collective, is beaming 138,179 ads to outer space.

This is not a hoax. It is for real.

Bye House!

Mom and Dad on the last day at the house we grew up in... eating Krispy Kreme donuts!

To Do.

6:30 a.m. go to bed.
11:30 wake up.

• Call utilities to close accounts
• Take dad to Physical Therapy
• Take dad to Radiology center to pick up barium for CT Scan
• Pick up boxes for mom for moving
• Buy digital camera for aunt's chauffeur in Vietnam
• Buy phone charger for mom
• Set up Dad's pharmacy in FL
• Arrange transfer of mom and dad's health care through FELRA to FL
• Take dad to PT Wednesday 4/27
• Take dad to CT Scan 4/28
• Take dad to urologist 4/28
• Take dad to pre-op appt 4/28 (Movers come 4/28!)
• Take dad to PT Monday 5/2
• Take dad to surgery 5/3
• Take mom to airport 5/3
• Fill dad's pill box daily.
• Go to Closing for sale of house 4/29 to read documents
• Pack and move (my) boxes to Eileen & Mike's basement
• Pack and move plants
• Set up utilities in FL
• Set up DSL in FL
• Shred Kaly's files
• Ship Kaly's box to UPS
• Pack Kiki's boxes (five)
• See Eva Zeisel exhibit at Hillwood
• Go to Crew Alumni event for Tom Chisnell
• 2 Chefs with Pat and Caroline

A new era.

On April 28, 1975, my mom took the five of us -- aged 8 weeks, 18 months, 32 months, 3.5 years, and 5 years old -- onto one of these. A C130 cargo plane that took us to Guam, in hopes of one day soon reuniting with my father. They then started a new life in America.


On April 28, 2005, Town & Country movers is going to load up a truck with three decades of our American life to Florida.

I'll drive my parents down there, a journey that 30 years later, is likely to be much easier. They're starting a new life in Disney World.

Who said life isn't fair?

Traveling to Mars

As if traveling the entire earth was not enough (it's not), I've recently fallen into discussions with friends about traveling to the other planets. Most notably, we wondered about Mars, and if you check, it looks like you can make the trip in just nine months! Yeah!

Update

For anyone who's been looking, I'll try to start up again, but moving around makes blogging a bit harder. Though I'm not in 10014 any longer, I'll keep my posts in one place, since I can't seem to keep myself in one place. Less confusion all around.

No Contest

Since we can all use a laugh on something unrelated to the elections. From Harper's.

Vote!

Mailed my absentee vote from Saigon.
Thanks to Mike D and Lori N for the push!

Bush by Numbers

For years I've quoted the fact that one in ten American high school students can't find the United States on a map of the world. Where the hell are we heading?

News from the UK.

SHOOT!

Paintballing with the Climans on Sunday was loads of fun... What a better way to meet a bunch of folks, by teaming up to shoot down "the other team"? Thank Buddha for Lori N.'s arnica gel which erased the bruises I would have suffered from getting shot so often!

The Art of Speed

Just got home from this RES Screening and party RES did with Nike Lab for Nike's "Art of Speed" project. I gave up my food gift box to a homeless lady asking for money. Hung out with Kozy and Dan most of the evening after working the tickets and food assembly... we made plans to climb Mt. Fuji!!!! Yay! Slated for next August.

We Rattle for No One

My brother once said to my sister: "We're Us. We Rattle for No One." It's weird. My siblings and I have an ego-manaical nature when we think of ourselves as a family unit.

But damn, when I meet someone who shakes me up, I don't think I know quite what to do. Speechless, and what words that come out, tumble awkwardly forth. I'm hyper-aware of my words, yet lack control over them. I met someone recently who does this to me. I don't understand it. This doesn't happen to me. Jonathan in New York would be shocked. In his words, "you have an impermeable confidence." I guess he's wrong.

Qualities that rattle us? Fame? Fortune? No way. We know plenty of those. It's Family. It's intelligence, creativity and personal success. Human kindness. People who have their shit together and their priorities straight. People who put Family first. Food second. And yeah, I'm kidding about the food part. Kind of.

and three

OK, three handshake comments today. This tracking of comments is getting boring so I think I'll stop counting.
Why all the blog about it? It started with Governor Cuomo a while back. In June when I came out to Santa Monica, I started to notice... What's the big deal? Maybe I'm doing it wrong.

eight

Eight handshake comments in eight weeks.

cool tech trick

a cool tech trick to convert a CSV file to vCards. Where was it when I needed it the other day? (I found another way to cheat, and it worked.)

who taught you that?

Another handshake comment today, from Frank, one of Mike's oldest friends. Then he asked me "who taught you how to shake hands like that?"

I think to myself, Why would any one have had to teach me?

Not Enough Yellow

The WearYELLOW LiveSTRONG has exceeded expectations. Nike donated the first $1 million and there are now more in the making. You can buy it on Ebay (running around $4 a pop now) but I wouldn't recommend it as the proceeds may not benefit the Lance Armstrong Foundation for cancer. The other way to get it is to find a good friend named Les who will buy you one when he's at the beach.

Previous posts re: Yellow:
May 22, 2004 : Live Strong
May 23, 2004 : More Yellow

University Red

Interestingly, Pantone 201 is the official color for Stanford University (web #990000), Massachusetts Institute of Technology (web #993333), Washington State University (web #990033), Indiana University, Wharton School at UPenn, University of Baltimore, University of Oklahoma (web #990000), and Hastings College... those are the ones I found in only a few minutes.

It's the Pantone red for my corporate identity. Because everyone in my family has compulsive behaviors, I Googled it to see if I could find other companies that use it and to see how I might put the color into context.

Unusual though, that one color can be used by so many in the same "industry". Maybe all these university folk will associate their alma mater colors with my company... and sign up!

Doggy Rubs

Okay, while previously denouncing $95 cashmere sweaters for pups, I'm promoting Doggy Rubs... Lori's new canine massage therapy service in Park City, Utah. Here's the Park Record article, and Lori's Cloud 10 (she does people massage too!) site.

Is My Little Baby Going to Go Gay?

The Landover Baptist Church web site is a pretty ridiculous site. Their tagline is "Guaranteeing Salvation Since 1612. Where the worthwhile worship. Unsaved Unwelcome. As Jesus Commanded." They have a permanent injunction against all unsaved persons making it unlawful for unsaved persons to be allowed within a 10-mile radius of the church.

And from the home page, you can click on where you can find such delightful articles as Tampons: "Satan's Little Cotton Fingers".

I am not making this up. Somebody else did. (Yes, it's a joke, but it's almost hard to tell, isn't it?)

Postcards from the hedge

Do you think this is funny? Because Mica made me laugh. Either I'm blinded by love, or just a dork. If you're wondering, here's what a Highland Cow looks like. It was on the front of the postcard.

Another

...handshake comment at Chris & Allison's reception party.