Stan’s Obligatory Blog

New Year’s Eve 2008. As I said in my Christmas letter, this has been a trying year. But it certainly ended on an up note. Susan and I went out for steaks and martinis at Smitty’s Grill in Pasadena. We made reservations online, which was very easy and pleasant. When we got there, they had a table ready and waiting for us. But we started off with a martini at the bar. We talked about the past year and how it’s been for both of us. We shared most, but not all of it. And it’s been quite an experience. We had lots of great adventures, and we’re looking forward to more.

After the martini, we went to our table and had dinner. It was very good. Afterward, they tried to interest us in the dessert menu, but I had Deep Dark Chocolate Cake at home. Susan had brought a bottle of champagne, so we headed home for cake and champagne to watch the ball drop in Times Square at 9:00. We’re both originally from the New York area, so we figured that was good enough.

It was a fun evening, and a very good way to end the year.

The LOLcat is an Internet phenomenon. Now, if you’ve been following the story here, you know that my year has been quite an experience in both very bad and very good ways. So, here is the story of my 2008, told in pictures from icanhascheezburger.com

Tonight, Susan came with me for my office‘s Holiday Party. Since I’m one of the organizers, I had to be there to be sure the food all got cooked on time and such. Besides, it was fun to introduce Susan to everyone in my office. They’ve seen her picture on my desk for a long time now, but only a few of them had actually met her before.

The entertainment for the evening was Pictionary in the conference room. Linda made up a set of cards for it, and the rule was that whoever guessed the answer had to draw the next card. Susan said that she didn’t want to get up and draw anything, but at one point she just accidentally blurted out a correct answer before anyone else, and she was trapped. So she had to get up and draw, but fortunately someone guessed the answer pretty quickly.

We had a nice time.

Today’s ride was the “Turnbull Canyon plus Temple” route. My camera is still traveling with Susan, so I have no pictures from today. If you want pictures, have a look at the last time we did this ride.

When we got to the temple, we skipped stopping. Gene wanted to experiment with a different route back to Whitter, so we headed up Hacienda Blvd to the top of the hill, where we turned off and rode on a bunch of little winding roads through the hills there to get back to Colima Rd in Whittier. It was quite a bit longer than the regular route, but it was fun. So we told the others that we’d ‘taken the longcut’ to get there.

In Whittier, we stopped for snacks before heading home. It was a very pleasant ride.

56 miles.
cycling

Watching the Delta Airlines flight-tracker.

Today I went for a bike ride with Gene from the Sunday morning group. We did the “Mary’s Market” route that he made up recently. This is a meandering route that goes all over, but nowhere in particular until the end. Because we had no time pressure today, we added a few miles by making a loop through Santa Fe Dam and Azusa. This added about 10 miles to the ride. Then we headed up the canyons above Sierra Madre to visit Mary’s Market. I’d never been there before, and it was kind of a remarkable place. We were just a little bit above the suburbs of Los Angeles, yet it felt like we were far up in the mountains. The climb up there was steep at times, but I managed to make it without having to use my lowest gear. It was a fun ride. But there are no pictures, since my small camera that I usually take on rides is off in the wilds of upstate New York with Susan. I gave it to her so she could take pictures when she went there to visit her mom. So no pictures for the bike rides this weekend.

50 miles
cycling

I’m making a cake to take along to dinner tonight, and I was just checking my supplies. In my pantry I have:

• 15 pounds of sugar
• 15 pounds of all-purpose flour
• 15 pounds of bread flour

Did I mention that I like to bake, and that I do it a lot?

Tonight, Susan and I went on the Museum of Neon Art’s Holiday Lights tour. Being that it’s December, and the tour was after dark, it was cold by L.A. standards. We dressed warmly and brought along a couple of blankets, since the whole tour is conducted from the upper deck of a double-decker sightseeing bus.

It was a tremendously entertaining tour, but sadly, it didn’t transfer into photographs well. To take good photos at night, the camera has to be on a rock-solid platform to hold it steady enough. And the upper deck of the bus just wasn’t a steady enough platform. So if you want to see the lights, you’ll just have to take the tour. But it was certainly Great Fun.

Today’s club ride was Gene’s “San Dimas South” route. The last time we did this one was on a gloomy day in April. Today wasn’t gloomy, but it was cold by SoCal standards.

We took a picture at the start, since Gene and I both had decorated our bikes for the holidays.

Along the way, we saw some amusing decorations on houses, including the big tree decorated with big ornaments. And at then end, we saw a small harem of peahens in Arcadia.

I skipped the snack stop, since I had to get home a bit early to pick up Lucinda, so it was a relatively quick ride. But it was nice.

48 miles.
cycling

In today’s obituary pages, Majel Barrett Roddenberry has died.

Roddenberry, whose pre-“Star Trek” acting career included guest appearances on series such as “The Untouchables” and “The Lucy Show,” had no idea she was establishing a career path in science fiction when she took her first “Star Trek” role.

After “Star Trek” became a phenomenon in the ’70s, she continued on, appearing in both “The Next Generation”, and “Deep Space Nine”, as well as several of the movies. And she provided the voice of the Enterprise computer in most of the movies. And hence her assessment:

“It’s been a hell of a ride.”

Read the whole obituary here.