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Monday 29 August 2005
	We're off to Burning Man 2005. Even though I hear there's WiFi available on the playa I won't be making any attempt to post the travelogue in real-time (as I sometimes do with our other travels. We'll see you in a week!
Sunday 28 August 2005
	Hurricane Katrina has passed Miami, and Gabriel is out of harm's way (he tells me, via dial-up, because his DSL has been knocked out for the next week or so). Let's hope that's the last we hear from Katrina. In more local, and dry, news, the learning starts at Isaac's school. So many parents show up and linger, many of us with digital cameras :-) Here's the principal, Willem Vroegh, chatting with the parents after the offspring have been herded into class. Here's Rose and Lila listening to the presentation and enjoying the snacks. Some new faces this year; that's always fun. Some old faces as well; everyone doing well.
Friday 26 August 2005
	Hurricane Katrina is threatening Miami. Why do I mention it? Well, because a net.friend of mine, Gabriel Morales, lives near the southern tip of Florida, and it looks as though he's going to get hit. Worse even, he hasn't been online lately, so I'm not sure whether he's just out and about or he's already been swamped. Good luck, Gabi.
Wednesday 24 August 2005
	It's Jewish Heritage Night at SBC Park, and Rose has been asked to participate in a demonstration dance recital at the baseball park, during the game. Free admission, free parking, and the kids get to come along to see. Isaac saw a night game there, a few days after 9/11. Lila hasn't been to the ball park at all. Let's change that; join us.
Tuesday 23 August 2005
	Noted on the official Burning Man website: "Commercial use of images taken at Burning Man without permission is subject to cunning legal action and punishable by death." Gotta love it. Isaac and Lila have done some play decoration of their fingernails and faces, but today Lila opened up one of her birthday presents and when I returned from the café she proudly showed off her rouged face and purple and pink fingernails. Her first-ever makeup. A papa is so proud. The boys show off their home-grown haircuts. I'm the mushroom-head, Isaac is a 20s society boy, although it's a bit difficult seeing it from this angle. Yesterday he looked like he really needed a tuxedo and a convertible. A neighbor has brought Joeseph Schmidt truffles for the kids, and both of them wind up with chocolate all over. Lila's a bit too fast for me, but I catch Isaac with sweet stuff on his forehead, fingers, and mouth. When I corner the monster he rolls his fearsome eyes and shows his terrible claws... Be afraid, be very afraid. :-) The news can now be told: Google Talk, an Instant Messaging and VoIP service, opened today. This was the way Google told alpha- and beta-testers: Within a few minutes I had all my talk.google.com friends connected through Adium, my Macintosh IM all-in-one client (shown in this screen-capture).
Monday 22 August 2005
	For this year's event I decided to make a gift patch for the Rangers. After a lot of email and mock-ups and quotes I decided on a supplier in Guangzhou, China. There was some adventure in getting the idea across, given differences is cultural norms for patches, several different languages, and materials. But it all worked out, even a last-minute snag in avoiding hyper-expensive shipping. The patches arrived today.
Saturday 20 August 2005
	With Burning Man 2005 a bit more than a week away I assemble the following desktop image from the satellite view offered by maps.google.com. Large sizes available. This afternoon, while Ranger Lefty and I are driving around the city, a motorcycle rider races by us and screams "GOT KILT"! Sure, that's my license plate, but it's a rather over-enthusiastic reaction. Then I realize he's kilted. On a motorcyle! It's a whole bunch of kilted men, and a few women too. The one at left tells us that she's driven all the way up from Los Angeles for this ride. One of the chores Ranger Lefty did while in the city was to pick up another hair clipper. I have a nice one at home, but the clipper part is now chipped and it pulls when cutting hair. Isaac doesn't like it. As I head over (later) to pick up one for myself, and feeling bad about having my clipper sucumb to entropy, I discover they have the replacement part. I love fixing, rather than replacing. Isaac is pretty excited about it too. As soon as I tell him he grabs the scissors and goes after his bangs. He loves that the clipper doesn't pull anymore, and turns it on me. He's working on taking all my hair off, our traditional cut, but I stop him and try a new style (for a few days, at least). Lila does whatever her big brother does, so it's her turn to trim off some of my hair. Happy with the trimmer, Isaac asks me to turn it on him. His hair has been pretty long and unruly this summer, but that's the way he's wanted it. I like this better.
Wednesday 17 August 2005
	After another trip up to the Corona Heights playground, Isaac is able to ride his two-wheeler all by himself: He starts from standing, rides, and brakes and stops.
Tuesday 16 August 2005
	Lila shows off the latest love of her life, a doll she's calling "Polly". They're inseperable. Dziadziu and Zofia are heading off to another cruise, this time to Alaska. Rose is picking them up and the kids and I will take the historic F-line MUNI trains; we'll all meet at Pier 35. Here's Isaac, looking out of the rear window of a Boston Green Line train. A panoramic view from our vantage point in the back seat. We get off the trolley at Pier 35, moments before Rose's delivery service arrives. Perfect timing. And here's the ship, the Royal Princess. I'm hoping Dad takes a lot of pictures during this trip. He says he wants the family to do the next one. That'll be some quality time! On the way home to do some client work I drop the kids off at the Aquarium of the Bay, a miserably overpriced tourist attraction, for which Isaac earned tickets by reading books over the summer. Yea, Isaac!
Monday 15 August 2005
	Isaac calls me on the cell phone, to find out exactly from where I'm telecommuting today. Isaac: Papa? You're at the library? Are you at the Eureka Valley branch or the Bernal Heights branch? I'm amused by the sounds of adult specificity coming out with that little voice. Later in the day Dziadziu came with us to May's Coffee Shop and brought along his new camera; these are some of his pictures: Here's Lila taking her birthday gift out for a spin in our neighborhood: The big news is that Isaac decided that he wanted his training wheels off his bicycle today, so I did. With my dad looking on, with memories of him doing the same to me, I ran behind my son's bike as he learned to start, balance, and stop.