Stan’s Obligatory Blog

Today we went to the big Body Art Expo at the L.A. County Fairgrounds. As tattoo conventions go, this one is kind of lame in that it’s not put on by tattoo people, but at the same time, all our tattoo friends are usually there. We took Lucinda along, since she said that she wanted to go. We wandered around there and visited with everyone we knew. Lucinda got a little temporary henna tattoo, and we generally had a fun time.

We had an earthquake this morning. M4.4 centered near Fontana. This wasn’t a Big Deal as these things go, but it did make for a busy morning at my office. The non-seismologists at Caltech tend to measure earthquakes by the ‘news truck’ scale, and by that measure, this was only a ‘two truck’ earthquake. Still, it made a traffic spike on the Earthquake Hazards Program web servers, and generally made things busy for a while.

So we had it all planned out. We had reservations for an early dinner at Cafe Bizou in Old Town. But after I rode my bike through there today, I thought that the traffic and parking would be a nightmare. But we thought we’d be able to beat that. We could take the train.

So we went to the train station, and we waited. The train station is in the middle of the freeway, which is actually a kind of hellish place. And we waited there for about 15 minutes before the train got there. This should have been a tip-off that something was wrong. We got on the train, the doors closed, and then we just sat there for 10 more minutes. Then they announced that there was some sort of problem with the tracks up ahead, and they were having to run single-track, so we were waiting for the train going the other way. And then we sat some more. Finally, we pulled out of the station. And the train went rocketing down the track at a good 15 miles per hour. When we got the next station, then the train just stopped and sat. Then the train going the other way came in. We bailed out and got on it and rode it back to where we started.

All of this ended up being a good hour spent sitting on the train. So we left the train station and went and had dinner at El Torito, which was just fine.

It’s been raining all week here, so I haven’t been able to go bike riding, and today was no exception. I even got so desperate that I brought my bike inside and hooked it up to Cathy’s air trainer thingy and rode stationary for about 45 minutes. I hate riding indoors. It’s work. I just keep looking at the clock and thinking, “am I done yet?”

But then, this afternoon, the clouds parted, and the sun came out. It was still cold, but I decided to go for a ride anyway. Then I noticed an aneurism on my back tire. It was going to blow out at any moment. I still went riding, but I made sure that my first stop was the bike shop.

I got a new tire, and then I set out. I went down Colorado Boulevard to check out all the people camping out for the Rose Parade tomorrow. So, as I promised Grace, here is my report from the butt end of the Rose Parade. This is the first of two parts.

First off, I noticed the that the Pasadena Christian Church had staked out a big chunk of the sidewalk – directly in front of our neighborhood gay bar. Was this a coincidence? Traveling down the parade route, I saw lots of stores with temporary chain-link fences over their storefronts. Office Depot was boarded up, and we aren’t even expecting a hurricane. In Old Town, there were several board-up companies doing a brisk business covering up the storefronts there. And the traffic was horrendous.

After that fun, I did a regular ride. This was a slightly shortened version of Gene’s “Just One Hill” ride. And, as always, there was just one hill. But it’s a big one, and the route goes up and down it several times on different streets. There was still a lot of water on the roads, but up in the hills it was quiet, and there were very few cars out. I noodled about in the hills for a while before coming down into La Cañada. From there, I went past JPL and back into Pasadena for the ride home.

22 miles.

Today we rode the train down to San Diego to take Lucinda to visit Grandpa Schwarz. This was an all-day affair that started by taking the Metro Gold Line from Pasadena to Union Station in downtown Los Angeles. From there, we got on the Amtrak Surfliner for the ride down the coast. The rain had stopped, so we got a good view of the mountains with a fresh coat of new snow. The train goes along the coast for a lot of the trip, so we got some nice views of the beach, as well as the San Onofre nuclear power plant.

When we got to San Diego, Grandpa picked us up and we went to his apartment there. He showed Lucinda how to hold the castanets, which she enjoyed, since it meant she could make lots of noise. They also played the piano together and drew pictures on the computer. There are more pictures of Lucinda from the day in her photo album.

Finally, at the end of the day, we rode the train home. It was really a very pleasant ride.

The rain is falling harder now, and for the first time in years, we are getting a little lake in the back yard. This is the first time we’ve had the lake since the El Niño of ’97-’98. It’s impressive. We don’t get many thunderstorms here, but there’s lightning and thunder tonight.

Who says it never rains in California? Today was pouring down rain for most of the day. So I had to take my car to work instead of riding my bike. Trying to make the most of this, I stopped off on the way home so my car could get its every-other-year smog test. Like in an alien abduction, it got a probe up its butt and got measured. But all is well, and it passed.

And thus ended the dreary day.

Yesterday I heard that an article I wrote was published in Seismological Research Letters. It’s a novel thing to see something I wrote printed up and looking official. So today I borrowed a copy to have a look. It’s a fairly light article, the gist being that every time people in L.A. feel an earthquake, they all come to our web site and sign up for the mailing list. This surge lasts for about two weeks after each major earthquake, and it represents a ‘teachable moment’ which we in the earthquake business can use for public education and outreach.

Today we went to Lucinda’s school for their Holiday program. Parking near the school is always a problem. But I am the Master of Parallel Parking. I got the car into this space, and it wasn’t too bad. I had three fingers clearance at the back and five at the front. So the space was actually a good six inches longer than the car. Not a record by any means. Still, it was amusing, since Cathy didn’t think it was going to fit.

Also, when we got there, I was kind of amazed to see the towers of downtown L.A. off in the distance. They’re about 15 miles away, but usually we can’t see them through the smog.