Sheila and I just returned from Azerbaijan. Amy looked great and is doing wonderful. We hope to post some pictures soon. David

A Blue Day

We had a busy, very LA day today. First we went to Venice Beach to enjoy the sun, sand, and surf.

I found this funny....you have to be standing on the beach to read it and at that point it seems a little silly to welcome you to the beach. Behind me you can see the super expensive beachfront houses. A lot of them along Venice Beach are in that very modernistic style.

After the beach we drove to Dodger Stadium to see them play the Reds. We hit traffic on the way and it ended up taking twice a long as it should...but we got there.

Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince must have bought a ton of advertising - every game they have a whole commercial on the big screen and the graphics on all the billboards. I may have more pictures of that than the actual baseball game.

It was a great day, with the blue ocean and Dodgers!

1:10pm, Dodgers vs Astros

This was the HOTTEST baseball game I've ever been too. I swear that the Labor Day soccer tournaments in Houston with Rage were much cooler than this. It's baseball, so there's no clock, no way of knowing how long you have to sit in the sun....just sitting there with the glossy painted wooden bleachers searing your legs.

After three innings I couldn't take it and went down below the bleachers for a little shade - it's completely comfortable in the shade, just miserable in the sun with no breeze.


Of course, by the eighth inning it was cooling off and kinda comfortable - hurrah baseball!

Greetings from Hemet!

I went with Doug to work at the Western Center today. There was a newish exhibit I hadn't seen yet - ART meets SCIENCE. It's all about Keva blocks, which are like Lincoln Logs for grownups. Doug built some of the models for the exhibit - it's super neat to see them!

We then went into the main room where we saw one of Doug's favorites, a friendly Harlan's Giant Ground Sloth:

This is Xena, one of the museum's big attractions:

Xena wasn't wooly, but she was a mammoth - about 12 feet high and 10,000 pounds
- and she wasn't even fully grown. How do paleontologists know she was a
juvenile? By her recently fused bones. Paleontologists recovered her
skull, tusks, three leg bones, and 20 ribs - making her one of the most complete
mammoth skeletons found here.

We went see the midnight permier of Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince at midnight - super exciting!!!!!!!!!!!!

Manhattan Beach

After months of Doug trying to get me out to the beach he finally succeeded - and I LOVED it! I had never considered that you could go to the beach and not be hot and uncomfortable and burn your feet in the sand!! It was wonderful!!

Manhattan Beach is (arguably) the birthplace of Beach Volleyball. They were setting up the 2009 AVP CROCS SLAM BUD LIGHT MANHATTAN BEACH OPEN (that just rolls off the tongue) behind me - apparently it's a big tournament?




The Piers are a big thing at the Beaches here - this one has a little aquarium at the end and provides a little shade.

Legen...dary

I know the quality sucks but I was jazzed to hear this:

How Awesome is that!!!!! Seriously, just watching the DVD this morning and boom this pops out. I nearly screamed.

In other news, my complete series HP softcover set DID come in this morning. I did scream for that.

Happy Independence Day!

Happy Fourth of July! For the Fourth we headed down to San Diego (I think that's as far from Boston as you can get and still be in the USA!).

I made friends with the hippo:

and saw a friendly lion:

Doug met a large ground sloth (who looks like he's about to enjoy a bite from the HI AMY sign, num num num):

After the zoo (and a Monte Cristo sandwich from Bennigans) we went camp on Harbor Island for the Big Bay Boom Firework show. The view of the city was pretty - it was fun to camp out and enjoy the COOL weather(what a novel ideal - cool in July)!


Boom!!!! Happy Fourth of July!!