Wednesday, March 28, 2012
Saturday, October 24, 2009
Where do you see yourself in five years?
Interviewers ask the question, "Where do you see yourself in five years?" all the time. Usually I am tempted to respond with the old joke about being ruler of the underworld, lord of all I survey. But today I woke up thinking about the question. And specifically, how different is my life than my answer would have been five years ago. You see, five years ago, I (we) had not yet made the decision to move to London. I was working for the San Diego Union Tribune and the answer to the above question on a good day would likely have been, "I want to be managing a Classifieds Sales Team." On a bad day, it would merely have been, "Not here!".
Thursday, October 01, 2009
Monday, November 10, 2008
Coincidence or a sign?
Wednesday, November 05, 2008
Wednesday 5, 2008
It's hard to believe that it's been 3 years tomorrow since we celebrated our Wedding Anniversary in London. What a wonderful time it was. We had a life that was filled with adventure, now sadly we are dull. We have nothing to write living in crap suburbia in North County San Diego. I love reading our old blog post, and hate that I have nothing of substance to contribute now. London has been calling to us for far too long and we are starting to feel like all the people we know that say "Someday I will..." We keep saying we will move back, but it keeps getting postponed. I look at the lack of posts to this site and feel a great emptiness I so desperately want to fill. I keep hoping that very soon we will be back to blogging on this site regularly with updates on a move and finally on our new life back in London instead of memories.
Friday, March 21, 2008
Thunderstorms
Thursday, September 27, 2007
Tuesday, July 17, 2007
Anniversary
I have been thinking a lot about this blog of late. We just passed the one year mark since we have returned to the
And yet, it still isn’t home any more. For all of the professional and personal gains, the bigger apartment, the dryer, the family, the friends, it still is no longer home. I can’t stand suburbia. I REALLY CAN’T STAND SUBURBIA. I hate talking to people who have never seen anything more than Southern California, or if they have seen more than SoCal, they saw it as part of a 7 day 6 night bus tour of Europe with all of its required picture spots and canned souvenirs. I hate that the only thing in walking distance is a gas station. How’s that for irony? I hate the gigantic SUVs with one person in each and every one of them clogging up the roads. And I hat e that it is going to take me another year to get home.
Friday, July 13, 2007
What I Will Miss
So what will I really miss when we move back? I will miss my friends and family, I will still miss the wonderful salads at Nordstrom's Cafe, the American showers, and American washers and dryers, I will also miss the art store in Little Italy (which will be resolved once I find an art store in London I like.)
Well, to be honest, that is all I can come up with. Maybe if I can think of other things I can post them later, but really that's all I can come up with. Next post will be all reasons we miss London.
Tuesday, July 10, 2007
July 10,2007
London is calling
Wednesday, July 26, 2006
And Back Again
don, Suzanne, and baby Litz.
Sunday, June 25, 2006
Louvre Continued (and more of day three)
I actually managed to catch this one with no one in the background. I love the intimacy and intricacy of Psyche and Cupid.
Here is Hermaphroditus, who seems strangely appropriate in this day and age as the lines between genders appear to be blurring all the time. Not physically, necessarily, but emotionally and mentally. For example, the stay at home dad is not the farce Mr. Mom once portrayed. And power business women are not considered a threat to men any more. I think it safe to say gender boundaries have been successfully blurred when you have women like Donna Dubinsky and Carly Fiorina dominating the technology sector for years.
Here is Athena. She has always been one of my favorite Greek deities, as she didn't seem to take crap from anyone and was powerful in her own right. Both Athena and Hermaphroditus were in an area that was supposed banned from taking pictures. But as they were statues, the security guard in the room let me take them.
After we left the Louvre, we headed for the Arc de Triumph. I knew it was big, but didn't realize just how big until we got there. Andra and my dad walked up to the top of the arc, but Suzanne, Mom and I decided to hang out below. I figured that walking to the top of anywhere in the city other than the Eiffel Tower would be pointless, as none of them would offer the view that the tower offered. Here is a picture of the Arc (Notice the trophy wife in the foreground):
After the Arc, we walked back towards the tower/hotel. When we arrived at the tower, we decided now was a good time to go up it. The tower had been closed on a couple of prior walks underneath it due to the high winds. And even with it approved for ascent, it was still really windy on top. Warning! Cheesy tourist photos to follow.
If nothing else, proof we were there. Below is a shot I took from on top of the tower leaning out and looking straight down. Don't they look like ants down there?
After three tourist traps in one day, I was starting to feel pretty done in. All five of us decided to go back to the previous night's restaurant and have more of the same. This time, I had a fish meal and a divine creme brulee for dessert. The food was wonderful yet again, the service was fantastic and all was well.
And finally, the tower at night. The digital noise in this one is pretty bad, but considering it was taken at night without a flash or the use of a tripod, I am happy with how it turned out.
More to follow with all the fun and excitement of day four.
Paris Day Three
The gentleman immediately looked at me with surprise and said "croque monsieur???" then looked (I am not making this up) as if checking for the croque monsieur directly at the floor. After a thorough scan of the floor, he said "croque monsieur?!?" with a bit more emphasis and started opening drawers. Then he started checking under the papers used to wrap up pastries, then he checked the microwave. All the while muttering "croque monsieur?, croque monsieur?" Finally, he checked the display case where they are normally kept. When he realized this was empty, he called to someone offstage and after a couple of quick sentences that my shrug fluency didn't understand, he said croque monsieur with a big smile on his face and held up one finger. Five minutes later, sure enough, my mom was presented with a freshly made croque monsieur. A couple of things occurred to me during this exchange. The gentleman serving us was definitely a disciple of Jerry Lewis. And either it truly was a stage for performances, or he had to own the restaurant. After a satisfying, if drawn out breakfast, we went back to the hotel to get ready for the Louvre.
We took the water taxi from the Eiffel Tower down to a stop just across from the museum. We could have stopped right outside the museum, but it would have required waiting for the water taxi to complete its entire loop and come back up the other side of the river, so we figured we would get off on our side of the river and walk across. It was really nice and sunny out and the temperature wasn't so high that a nice stroll would be uncomfortable. After about five minutes, all that changed. Much like on our first day, we went from sunny to a vertical tide. Luckily, Suzanne was wearing her trusty Burberry trench coat, so was able to keep our camera dry. I was wearing a jacket, but not a waterproof one and we didn't think to bring an umbrella, so we began a mad dash to get across the river, across the street, and under some trees. My sister gave chase and arrived under the trees shortly after we did. My parents, who had brought my mom's sacrificial umbrella with them, decided to pull the twisted and tortured thing out and try to use it as cover. My mom wasn't quite up to running, so it took her a bit longer to get to the copse of trees we were sheltering under, and when she finally did, voila, the rain stopped. Or at least slowed down to a San Diego rain, which doesn't really count as rain as much as mist. We walked the remainder of the way to the Louvre and entered through one of the back entrances. The building itself is very interesting, with a blend of some great old and new. But the real art is in the building itself. Of course there is the Mona Lisa, not nearly as awe inspiring to me as I might have thought, but what really got me going was the statues. Some amazing sculpture is in that building. Unfortunately, we didn't have three days to see the place inside and out, but I have to say, what I did see I loved every minute of. Here are some pictures:
I wish I could give you a sense of the size of this sculpture. Suffice it to say she is a pretty, big girl. She is also known as the Winged Victory of Samothrace. And for a girl who is more than 2200 years old, she looks fabulous. It is almost unfathomable for me to imagine creating something that would last more than two millennia and still be beautiful and relevant.
And you can't possibly do sculptures in the Louvre without covering Venus. While this is just another picture of her, it was actually something to get to see her in real life. I wanted to kick out all the people in the room so I could get a good shot without background tourists. Oh well, at least you know it isn't a product shot, right?
And speaking of people in photos, these idiots were determined to bogart my photo on this one. Every time I walked around this sculpture to get a different angle, they would wait until I raised the camera to my face and then walk into the frame. If the camera wasn't so expensive, I would have beaten them about the head and face with it. I tried to get a clean shot for about fifteen minutes before my patience ran out. May the sands of time fall in their lunch for all eternity and may all their progeny resemble goats. The sculpture is absolutely beautiful, though. And worth sharing even if it means sharing the idiots in the background. More to follow.
Paris Day Deux Part Deux
Alas, no Andra. We decided to go back to the hotel and check and see if she was there. Instead of taking the Metro, though we took a water taxi along the river. Quick comment about the Metro: You don't realize how important good wayfinding is until you come across poorly done wayfinding. The London Underground map is a stroke of pure genius and even the wayfinding signs on the underground make it very easy to figure out where you want to go. Walk up to the diagram, find your station, take that train. The Metro on the other hand, doesn't have all of the stations listed, so you need to know the terminating station for a particular line as well as your own personal destination. This tends to leave you constantly checking to make sure you are on the right train or getting on the the right train.
The water taxi ride was very peaceful and we got an opportunity to see more than just the front of the Notre Dame from a distance. Below is a picture taken from the river.
When we got back to the hotel, we finally found Andra and it was about time to start looking for a place to eat dinner. The previous night's fare had been brie sandwiches all around and we decided that we wanted something a bit more substantial for this meal. So we found a nice little restaurant not too far from the hotel and I had a vat of mussels brought to me for dinner. They had been cooked in a cheese sauce and were absolutely fantastic food. I almost had myself convinced that I was eating healthy too because it was seafood. Almost. Suzanne had a Salmon dish that she also enjoyed a great deal. The service was also excellent despite stories of the French being rude. The walk back to the hotel was late enough that we were again treated to a light show from the tower. Blogger is giving me fits right now, so a picture of that will have to follow.