Stan’s Obligatory Blog

Today we went down to Long Beach to see the Russian submarine and the Queen Mary. Cathy and I had been there to see the submarine once when Lucinda was a baby. Now that she’s big enough to climb through it, she wanted to see it. And we hadn’t been on the Queen Mary tour since 1988. When we got married, we spent our honeymoon playing tourist in Los Angeles.

The submarine is tied up next to the Queen Mary. There is a little building with an exhibit and gift shop by the entrance. They were playing Russian martial music, which the sign said they have available on CD. Just in case you’re missing the old days of the Soviet Union.

We took the tour through the submarine. Lucinda was amused at how small it was inside, but climbing through small spaces is easy for a kid.

After the submarine, we took the tour of the Queen Mary. It was interesting, although I kind of think the computer in the radio room was not original equipment.

We stopped for lunch at one of the onboard restaurants. They had had an exhibit of Hurrell glamour photographs of Hollywood stars from the 1930s on the walls. That was interesting, and it also fit with the whole art-deco theme on the Queen Mary.

Continuing the tour, we headed up to the bow. Lucinda was amazed at how heavy the anchor chain links were. We also saw a pelican flying among the seagulls overhead, which is a little unusual. Then we headed down to the engine room. I loved the 1930s control panels. We also saw the propeller, which was interesting, since it’s something that’s not normally visible on ship like this.

Of course, I also took a bunch of pictures of Lucinda. They are in her photo album.

I went and checked my records for 2006. I’d decided to keep track of my car just to see exactly how much I was (not) using it.

During 2006, my car came out of the garage 44 times. I was a bit surprised at that. I thought the number would be lower.

I drove a total of 904 miles in 2006. This works out to an average of 20.5 miles for each time the car came out.

The longest time I went without using my car was 6 weeks from the end of July to mid-September. When I took it out after that, I had to hose it off because it was so dusty it was hard to see out the windows.

I drove to work 3 times in 2006. I was a bit surprised at this, since it usually rains more times than that in a typical winter here. But this year was relatively dry, so I was able to ride my bike almost every day.

It hardly seems worth keeping the car for this. The insurance alone costs about $18 for each day I used the car. Or, on a per-mile basis, it comes out to 88 cents per mile. I didn’t have any repairs this year. I changed the oil once. But on the other hand, renting a car 44 times would probably cost more than I spent on keeping mine.

Oh well. I guess I’ll just keep it the way it is. At the rate I’m going, it’s going to last a long time.

I woke up early this morning to the sound of the B-2 bomber circling overhead. Normally, this might be cause for some alarm, but today it just meant that the Rose Parade was about to start.

Being an airplane geek, I got the ladder and climbed up on the roof for a better view. I got a pretty good shot of it when it made the turn at Colorado and Sierra Madre. The planes banked over towards my house, so I could see them pretty well, even if they were a mile away.

A bit later, we all walked down to watch part of the parade. As always, there was a tremendous crush of humanity there, and since I don’t like crowds, it was somewhat unpleasant. But it was still worth it to see the über-geeky Stormtroopers in the parade. I don’t really understand this, since the Stormtroopers were just about the least sympathetic characters in “Star Wars”. They were just anonymous agents of evil. It was also funny to see them in the park after the parade, eating In-N-Out burgers while still in costume.

We walked back home to see the horses. They always park the horse trailers in our neighborhood. Along the way we saw a guy shoveling horse shit off the street. I always marvel at how they manage to keep our streets pretty clean despite the number of horses.

On the way back to the house, we stopped to pet a llama. That was a new experience. Its fur was very soft.

Next, we walked up the street to where the horse trailers were parked. I had a bag of carrots, so Lucinda, Claire and Rose could have some treats for the horses. We got to pet the miniature horses from the “Petite Elite” group, which were all very cute.

We also visited with some of the other horse groups. The girls got to sit on top of one of the big horses so I could take pictures of them. We hung around the horses until the carrots were all gone.

It was a fun day.

Route map

Update: Here is the ride profile

Today’s ride was Gene’s “Newton’s Nemesis” ride, which is a ride up and down the canyons above Sierra Madre, Arcadia, and Monrovia. It’s not a super-long ride, but it’s hard. Newton is the hillclimber in our group, so Gene made this route just so that he would have a chance to show us just how good he is at it.

We started out from Victory Park. Only one guy drove his car there, but then he realized that he couldn’t park there today because of the preparations for the Rose Parade. So he had to move his car, and Gene brought his bike along. Then we started the ride, heading east up Sierra Madre Blvd. We passed the area set up for the post-parade float viewing. Then we turned left at Michillinda and headed up the hill.

The first canyon climb was up above Sierra Madre. It went up a steep hill in a canyon, making a loop and coming out on the same street where we started. Then we rode down Mountain Trail almost to the freeway before heading east a little more to get to Santa Anita. Then we turned left, up the hill again.

Climbing up Santa Anita, we rode up another steep canyon road there. This was probably the hardest climb on the ride. I had to say ‘uncle’ and shift there. Then, when we got to the top, we came back down, ending up on Highland Oaks and Foothill.

Going left on Foothill, we crossed into Monrovia. Usually we ride across on Hillcrest, but this time, we rode up yet another steep canyon. Here, we saw three deer snoozing on someone’s front lawn. They were ignoring us until I stopped to take pictures. Then they got up and left.

On the last canyon climb I had a little laugh about the cars I saw parked in front of one of the houses. When you put a cover on a car, nobody can see what kind of car it is, so it no longer functions as a status symbol. Unless you’re this guy and you get car covers with “BMW” printed on them. Then you can prevent sun damage and still make sure everyone knows you have a BMW. Of course, I didn’t peek under the cover to see if maybe it was really a Hyundai or something under there…

After the last canyon, we rode out through Duarte and took the San Gabriel River bike path up to the mouth of the canyon above Azusa. Then we went south through Azusa and back west to Monrovia, where we stopped for a snack at Planet Cookies. It was pretty good. Then we rode home.

I rode part-way across Pasadena with Vikki just to see the masses of people who were already camping out along the Rose Parade route. I think they’re nuts. But that’s just me.

47 miles.
cycling

Back when I first got on the Internet in 1991, it was a different place than it is today. It was pretty much all text-based, and mailing lists were a big deal. I got hold of the master list of mailing lists and I was looking through it to see what looked interesting. Along the way, I saw a list called Skeptic, which was about discussion and debunking of the paranormal. I think that sort of thing is a grand old time, so I signed up. And I’ve been on that list ever since.

There’s not always all that much on-topic discussion there, but it’s still a good time for socializing. So when Wade from Boston said he was going to be visiting Los Angeles for the holidays this year, the local listmembers made a point to arrange a gathering.

There were seven of us there today. It was a fun time, with stories about traveling to strange parts of the world, looking at some of Dave’s photos, and of course Magic Dave pulling out his cards and doing tricks. One of the tricks even involved a deck of ESP test cards. We all know there’s no such thing as ESP, but it was still a good trick.

Overall, it was a fun time.

In the pictures:
1. Dave and his cards.
2. Scott W.
3. Dave doing his mindreader trick: “Your card is named Phil”
4. “Feeling the vibrations”
5. ESP test cards
6. Dave and Wade doing the card and yarn trick
7. Dave’s card finale
8. Scott W., GJ, Ben, Scott P., Stan,Dave, Wade

…or why you should not automatically follow directions from Google Maps.

I was going down to Huntington Beach today to meet my friends from the Skeptics mailing list, so I asked Google how to get there. I mostly wanted to know how far it was. I used to live around there, so I pretty much knew how to get off the freeway to get on Beach Blvd.

When I saw the directions, there was a funny bit at the end, so I zoomed the map in to see. WTF? How and why is that more direct than just taking the ramp down to Center Ave, taking a left and then right on Beach? WTF?

It occurred to me today that I’ve never written anything about Ripley. She’s the ‘forgotton middle child’ of our dogs. We got her back in 1995 when we first moved to this house. She’s a corgi/cocker mix, and she’s the sweetest and mellowest dog we’ve ever had. When she first came to live with us, she decided that she was my dog. I don’t know why, but she picked me. And before we had Lucinda, Ripley was the ‘practice baby’ for me to hold.

Ripley is easily the best-behaved dog. She’s never been a problem in any way. Her only remarkable ability is her eye/snout coordination. She can snap dropped food right out the air before it hits the floor. Sometimes she even catches flies right out of the air and eats them.

Ripley has never been an ‘only dog’, but it looks like she’s going to have to be the only one for a while now.

Our little puppy Bella died last night. We have no idea what happened to her, but yesterday morning Cathy found her burrowed into the cushions of the couch. She was alive, but comatose. Cathy took her to the emergency vet and they said that she appeared to be suffering from liver failure.

When our regular vet opened, Cathy took Bella up there, and they put her on an IV to help her blood pressure and they confirmed the diagnosis. They said that it looked like she had eaten something that poisoned her. They kept her there overnight, but they said that there wasn’t really anything they could do. She would either recover or die. And she died last night.

We’re all very sad about this. Bella was a sweet and loving dog, and we’re going to miss her a lot.

When Cathy took Bella to the vet, Lucinda told us that she didn’t want to talk about it, so she doesn’t know yet that Bella died. We think she probably knows on some level, but she just can’t deal with it yet.

This is a very sad day for us.

Corporations put out an annual report. We put out our holiday letter. I always see lots of hits in the server logs around this time of year from searches on “Christmas letters”. So just in case you’re curious, here’s the condensed version of our year.

Today’s bike ride was my old ‘Lake Hollywood’ route. Gene convinced the club to do it as a regular Saturday ride. So I had to go along, if for no other reason than to see the looks on everyone’s faces when they saw the hill up to the Hollywood Sign.

It was a sunny day. A bit chilly by SoCal standards, but nice.

We started out from Victory Park in Pasadena and headed west. On Yosemite Dr in Eagle Rock, we had to stop because Sandy got a flat. I whipped out my camera and took a picture for the Flat Tire Gallery. Then we continued on down to the L.A. River and across into Los Feliz and Silver Lake.

The Shakespeare Bridge was decorated for the holidays. Then from there we rode Franklin Ave across Hollywood. At Beachwood, we turned right and headed up the hill. This is the street that goes almost directly up toward the Hollywood sign. We rode up to the stone gate that marks the entrance to the old Hollywoodland development, and then we turned left on Belden Dr. At this point I told everyone, “You may or may not spot any celebrities around here, but by the time you get to the top of this hill you’ll be seeing stars.”

Belden Dr climbs up the west side of Beachwood Canyon, and it’s pretty steep in places. Probably around 15% or so. Then we turned on Flagmoor and it got even steeper. When we crested the hill we were all panting with the exertion. Somehow, I managed to make the hill without having to shift out of my Stupid Gear that I usually ride up hills. It’s a 39×17, and I stubbornly insist that it’s a fine hillclimbing gear.

Passing Wolf’s Lair Castle at the top of the hill, we rode up to Mulholland Dr. We stopped there to regroup, and I took the little side trip up Mulholland to just below the Hollywood Sign. Then we all headed down the hill, past Lake Hollywood, and then up one more groaner of a hill to get to Wonder View. I took out my camera to get a picture of the view of the Hollywood Reservoir and downtown Los Angeles. Then we headed down the hill into Burbank.

The snack stop was at Priscilla’s in Toluca Lake. I had the requisite bagel and orange juice. Then we headed back by way of Griffith Park and into Glendale. I snapped a couple of pictures as we passed by the Dreamworks offices. Then we took Glenoaks across all the way to Chevy Chase, including the short but steep hill at the end.

Turning left on Chevy Chase, we headed up the hill. We went right on Linda Vista and up to the crest of the hill. That was where Figueroa St crosses, and I noticed that the sign was misspelled. It said ‘Figueora’. Heh.

We rode down Lida into Pasadena, riding around the Rose Bowl and stopping to peek into the big tent where the are building the floats for next week’s parade. Then we took Orange Grove back to the park.

It was a very pleasant ride.

43 miles.
cycling