Cheap Date, Hot Tea, and Prayer Requests

Welcome to another day when I'm supposed to seriously hunker down on a project but feel compelled to write. I'm giving myself 10 minutes to share some very random thoughts that normally would/should not appear in the same entry:

• Celebrated our 7-year anniversary earlier this week with a day off and a low-budget date. Caught a kick-ass matinee (literally) of The Forbidden Kingdom. Very entertaining, 'tho if I was supreme ruler, I'd lose the white kid; let the Chinese people speak Chinese; and add English subtitles, regardless of the language spoken (no offense, Jackie and Jet, but even I struggled to understand at times). Then we split a satisfying combo meal at Buckhorn Grill for 31 cents, thanks to a generous coupon. Oh, and lots of hand holding. One of our best dates ever.


• Appreciating my new Narita hot water dispenser, which allows me to savor hot tea on-demand with a press of a button. So what if its label "vacuum bottle ardometer" doesn't make sense to me. Mmm...warm...


• Mourning the loss of Kenneth Arthur, Jr., described as "a proud father, loving husband, engaged community member and Habitat for Humanity San Francisco's first homeowner", who was stabbed to death on Monday near his home in Bayview. (Dammit.) He is survived by his wife Angela and three sons Kenneth, Kendall, and Karl.


• Bracing for the sentencing verdict of a Uyghur Christian, Alim Yimit, accused by the Chinese government of subversion of the government and terrorism. From what I know, though, his only "crime" is owning a Uyghur Bible and believing in the Christian faith. If convicted, he may be put to death. The verdict is supposed to be announced in a few days, at the end of this month. As the country races to catch up with the industrial world, any success is for naught if such persecution continues.
  

Okay, so that took more than 10 minutes.

A Guiding Light

"The meaning of life is to help others find meaning in theirs," according to Austrian existentialist Viktor Frankl. The most recent issue of my grad school's alumni mag made a pitch for mentoring to others -- a student, co-worker, or anyone seeking guidance and wisdom from someone with more experience. A few "mentoring how-to's":

• Be a good listener
• Give advice (when solicited)
• Be trustworthy
• Lead and teach by example
• Discourage negative attitudes and behaviors
• Raise self-awareness by asking reflective questions
• Be committed to your mentee
• Be genuine and compassionate

I consider mentoring something that you don't ever outgrow needing and doesn't requires you to be "old enough" to offer.  We can always benefit from the wisdom and experience of others.

All Hail Chanting Warrior!

Thanks to a friend's birthday party, we entered the world of horse-racing at Bay Meadows in San Mateo the other day. It was my second foray into this other realm since my Chicago office's annual picnic at Arlington Park 10 years ago. Beginner's luck won me $20 back then, and it came through again this time for my guy's maiden voyage.

After being burned in a previous race on bets to "win" (where, to collect, the selected horse must finish 1st), we timidly bet to "place" (horse can finish 1st or 2nd) in Race #5. The horses in this race were in the category of "4-year olds and upwards which have never won three races". The old fogeys were going to run "five and one half furlongs" or about 0.7 mile.

While I lost another $5 on beautiful gray speckled horse Roaring Springs (#8), my date's pick of Chanting Warrior (#11), came in 2nd place and won him $22! Before our addictive personalities got the better of us, we excitedly pocketed our winnings, gave our hosts big hugs, and made a wide-eyed and swift exit soon afterwards.

With this 74-year old landmark slated to be torn down for redevelopment later this year -- and campaigns being waged to stop it -- this may have been our one and only visit. Kinda sad, as historic racetracks continue to be a dying breed.

"Your mind powers will not work on me, boy"

This guy freaks me out. A frog with no lungs that breathes through its skin. Almost as cool as this relic...(as we scientist types go, "Whoa, dude!")

Heroes/Transformers (cont'd)

Last night, I learned about a few more humanitarian Heroes/Transformers. While I'm not a regular viewer of American Idol, I tuned in to their Idol Gives Back episode -- enticed by mentions of Bono and Annie Lennox -- and found myself riveted. I laughed, I cried,...it was better than Cats. This star-studded fundraiser concert supported several charities, including:

One, combating AIDS and extreme poverty around the world. American Idol alum Chris Daughtry and his band were in Uganda a couple of weeks ago and shared a recording from their trip. "What about now? What about today? Before it's too late."

The Children's Defense Fund, highlighted by Board member Reese Witherspoon and which supports Freedom Schools in New Orleans, "a free after school program to inspire a generation of community leaders."

Malaria No More, showcased by Forrest Whitaker and his wife who reported from Angola that "An African child dies every 30 seconds from malaria." Damn. "One net, one pill, one life. $10 per net, $2 for the medication. Let's do it together." Then British PM Gordon Brown came on and committed his country to donating 20 million mosquito nets (or $200 million) to support this cause. Wow!

Save the Children, which, according to NOLA boys Eli and Peyton Manning, is helping young survivors of Hurricane Katrina overcome the trauma and move on with their lives (among other global projects).

Memorable moments? When Annie Lennox's rendition of Too Many Rivers To Cross made me cry...after her video report about the four orphaned boys in South Africa made me cry. When Miley Cyrus (she's 15??) exclaimed to Billy Crystal, "You're famous, too? That's so cool!" When Alicia Keys, in her cool eloquence, said, "It's amazing to think that we can change someone's life forever...for the cost of a pair of shoes. If the media gave half the amount of time to this as it gives to celebrity dramas, we would be well underway." And when the Idol contestants (and a gospel choir) sang Shout to the Lord as the closing song.

Making A Memory

I re-lived my younger years and cherished new memories at the Bon Jovi concert last night. OMG, it was more incredible than I had expected! I shouldn't have been surprised, considering the last two times I saw them (during the Slippery When Wet and Keep the Faith tours in '87 and '93) were life-changing, at least at that age. But 'tho I was speechless when AT gave us the tickets in December, my adrenaline didn't really start surging again until we embarked on the hour-long journey to the South Bay, and I slipped in a Bon Jovi hits CD that I had burned only 10 minutes prior.

My excitement continued to mount as we dined at 71 Saint Peter, where I savored halibut next to a window view of "obvious" Bon Jovi fans en route to the HP Pavilion. Women in tight jeans, even tighter tops, and stiletto heels. Men in tight jeans, old concert t-shirts, leather jackets with tassels, and leather boots. I may have looked out of place in my REI ensemble, but I gave a knowing nod to this familiar crowd.

Daughtry kicked ass as the opening band. And then Jon, Richie, David, and Tico took over. And we the audience, as a single 18,000-celled organism, paid homage by belting out every song with them for the next 2 hours. Contact highs kept us grinning; swaying BIC lighters were replaced by glowing cell phones during the ballads; and the decibels we hit during the old favorites -- Living on a Prayer, You Give Love A Bad Name, Wanted Dead or Alive -- were literally heart pounding.

Amazing.

1,2,3...1,2,3...Back-step

I picked up the basics of the East Coast Swing the other day in a 1-1/2 hour class where I was among the youngest on the dance floor. As expected, the moves were tamer than the ones I learned from Beginner's Swing/Jitterbug class at the Discovery Center 10 years ago. No fancy lifting or carefree flinging of ladies across the room, but I did have to concentrate whenever my aged partners went wild and led me into consecutive inside and outside turns, followed by a hand change behind the back. Whoa!

Rocky Mountain High

It's been awhile since I last wrote, so I'm making up for lost time. Hold on to your butts...

We had a Small Mammal Bus reunion in the Colorado Rockies a couple of weeks ago. Two other former co-workers and I, all of us biologists, gathered with our families to catch up and frolic in the late winter snow. During that week, I discovered the Top 5 Things To Do in the Rockies in winter:

1. Stroll through the picturesque cowboy town of Grand Lake, where friendly greetings met us at every turn and store hours were, "10 to 5, sometimes earlier, sometimes later,...if we're closed, that means we're away."
2. Rent snowshoes for $15/day from the nice folks at Never Summer Mountain Store in Grand Lake and trek up to Adams Falls and the meadows beyond. Be careful of the tree wells!
3. Soak in hot sulphur springs. Start in the 100 degree pool, then take a deep breath and sprint in 20 degree temps to warmer ones up a snow-covered hill, finally settling in a 116 degree pool at the top and staring at the stars.
4. Cruise through Rocky Mountain National Park with eyes peeled for moose and elk. Spot an impressively large mother moose and her calf, chomping on pine leaves and settling down for the night.
5. Ski in fresh powder at Sol Vista in Granby. And it's okay if it takes you 15 minutes to zigzag down the bunny slope!

Thanks, SMB et al., for a fun week in one of the most beautiful places on earth. Next time: the Yukon?

Why is it...

...that I get most inspired to write when I have a gazillion other more pressing things on my plate? As I tear myself away from the juicy bait of procrastination, I'll leave you with some fascinating stories by other chicas. More later...

In Their Backyard (cont'd)

About 7 months ago, I wrote about a community meeting in West Oakland where most in the audience were "out-of-towners" who could leave this highly polluted neighborhood and return home to a healthier place.

At Wednesday's follow-up meeting on diesel impacts on health in West Oakland, the demographics were only slightly different, in favor of the local residents, but not different enough to dismiss the recurring question of why more people directly impacted by these issues were not there. Was it that the meeting hosts (California Air Resources Board, Bay Area Air Quality Management District, Port of Oakland, and Union Pacific) didn't get the word out? Aren't the residents concerned about their health? Were they too busy or tired from working already long hours -- or possibly even at work during the meeting -- to attend?

Whatever the reasons, something needs to be done to get the community more engaged, because, as was confirmed last night, "The West Oakland community is exposed to diesel particulate matter concentrations that are almost 3 times [higher than in other parts of the Bay Area] (West Oakland Study)." This supplements findings that "In 2005,...state data [revealed] that West Oakland children ages 5 and under visited the emergency room for asthma at a rate nearly 3 times higher than children in the county overall,...and a study of death certificates dating to the 1960s showed that residents of West Oakland live 10 years fewer than people living in the Oakland hills (SF Gate article)."

So will this continue being an issue of "in their backyard, so not my problem"? For many of us, I think it needs the attention and involvement of the residents themselves first.

Patricia's Green

...in Hayes Valley. That's the name of the thin strip of urban park in northeast SF, bordered by Fell, Hayes, and two halves of Octavia Streets; and surrounded by picturesque rows of unique shops. Frolicking kids climbing the domed jungle gym are a regular blur to us each time we speed past this patch of green along the Fell Street artery to the west side of the City. We decided to pull over recently when slowed traffic allowed us to notice Isotope, a fun comic book store adorned with madly illustrated toilet seats and run by joyful tall-haired owner James. Our stroll took us past a walk-up kiosk of the Blue Bottle Coffee Company, which is all the rage among some friends; and Stacks', a chic breakfast joint. We also visited La Boulange de Hayes, featuring "only organic flour, filtered water, and sea salt" in its delectable pastries and aromatic breads. While sipping our mocha and Orangina in the bakery, we stared skeptically at Patxi's Chicago Style Pizza across the street.  That'll certainly bring us back during mealtime on another day, to see if it passes my Chicago boy's authenticity test.  As we departed, the rain came to nourish Patricia's Green, a haven in an otherwise urban expanse.

Reach The Summit

I'm a slug...or my friends are freaks. No offense to slugs (or freaks), but compared to buddies who have achieved amazing athletic feats like marathons, the Iron Man, and the Century Ride, I'm quite the slow mover. The latest physical challenge I'm hearing about is CR's Reach The Summit trek to the top of Mount Hood, Oregon's highest peak, in June. He's doing it in support of the American Lung Association of Oregon.

From underground to the top of the world... I first met the guy in 1995 during my summer internship at Lava Beds National Monument ("Club Beds") where we explored caves and monitored bat colonies. Not sure how deep underground we ventured, but I remember many hours of hiking in dark catacombs illuminated only by our headlamps, and eerie silence except for our steady boot steps and occasional *thunk* of a hardhat against a low overhang.

Now CR is training to hike from about 4,000 to 11,237 feet in two days! (You go!) He has a fundraising goal of $6K, which will be used to support... [excerpted from his letter]:

• Research into promoting lung health and preventing lung diseases;
  
• Being pro-active in environmental health issues and the fight against outdoor air pollutants;
• Reducing tobacco use, especially among young people, which is responsible for >40,000 deaths in the U.S. each year.
  

I'll send you more info if you'd like to sponsor him.

The Real World

It's fast becoming a trend these days to spend vacations on "reality tours". That's when socially-conscious travelers sign up to get up-close with life in the slums or alongside those on the frontlines of humanitarian crises like modern-day slavery. The main purpose of these tours is to educate, with the hope that people, like ambassadors, will tell others about their first-hand experiences and help create greater global awareness about social injustices. Some outfits also serve a secondary cause, like the ones aimed at favelas (shanty towns) in Rio, which train local children to be tour guides as an alternative to begging.

But I wrestle with whether these tours really benefit the people who are living the hard life. Is a 300-rupee tip to take a photo of a child digging through garbage a charitable gesture? Critics call these kinds of tours voyeuristic and accuse tour guides of making money from the plight of others. For now, I tend to agree...

Welcome to the Family

We welcomed 8 new additions to our fish tank ecosystem this weekend. Meet newcomer neon tetras Frodo, Sam, Pippin, and Merry; and long fin blue danios D'Artagnan, Athos, Porthos, and Aramis. They joined the fellowship of Gandalf the gold-skirt tetra and Ottawa, our algae-eating Otto catfish.

I'm a cat-lover, he's deathly allergic to felines (to the extent of "OMG, my throat is constricting 'cos a cat was in the vicinity within the last 24 hours"). He'd like a dog big enough to ride, and I'm not into the heavy slobber that I associate with "rideable" ones. So unless we discover a hypoallergenic cat or dry-mouthed dog, our pets will probably always be fish.

Note: Amazingly, these stock photos look very much like the ones in our tank!

Springing Forward

Interesting. I guess I was saving money without even knowing it during my pre-Daylight Savings days in Bloomington, IN, and Singapore...

Another eHow

For our first Thanksgiving dinner that we co-hosted while we were dating, A & I got instructions on how to roast a turkey from eHow.com. It turned out pretty well! Useful tips for almost any challenge you may be facing, from overhauling your car's suspension to styling your limp hair (very important) to busting the latest break dancing moves.

Instructables.com is another survival guide that's worth checking out, especially when you find yourself in a bind like this.

Maybe I should share some wisdom of my own...like how to enjoy scary movies without really watching them. (Deadpan accomplice required.)

No Whey!

I stole that title from a speech I heard today at Toastmasters. I'm never disappointed when I attend a meeting 'cos I get to practice my public speaking skills and learn about some fascinating topics that my fellow TMs choose to expound on. Today, we were schooled on the deleterious* effects of cow milk. In a riveting 10-minute spiel, this guy built a fairly strong and convincing case against the popular national mustache campaign by presenting medical findings linking milk consumption with the exacerbation of several diseases, including Crohn’s, diabetes, and (get this) even osteoperosis. A major culprit: recombinant Bovine Growth Hormone (rBGH) produced by biotech company Monsanto, which has been charged with falsifying data in product tests, was a maker of Agent Orange, and has one of the strongest lobbies in D.C. (I learned a few other things I didn't want to, like how pus and other icky stuff plays into all this, but I'll spare you the details.)

Milk. Building block of life or White Poison? This is making my head hurt. (Supposedly another side effect of drinking milk.)
__
*deleterious - our meeting's word of the day

The Recovery Continues

We're preparing to send at least one more team to St. Bernard Parish, Louisiana, this year. This will be our church's 9th organized group to help in post-hurricane recovery efforts over there. Most of the previous ones went to St. Bernard, with one sent further east to Pascagoula, Mississippi. The volunteer coordinator at The St. Bernard Project anticipates the rebuilding efforts to continue for at least 5 more years. She said applications for assistance are still coming in, at a rate of about five a week. Another reminder that although the press may no longer have this on its radar, there's still work left to be done...now 2 1/2 years after Katrina.

Arirang, Pyongyang-style

North Korea has allowed 300 Americans in for 48 hours. The journalists' accounts that I've read so far are surreal. The stirring performance by the New York Philharmonic Orchestra before an audience of neatly coiffed men in dark suits and women in colorful hanboks; the tour of the Grand People's Study House, an immaculate library where, while neatly-dressed patrons stared at computers, "no one was waiting, no one came and no one left." This is truly a historic event, but it's tough to shut out the images of smuggled video footage showing public executions of dissidents and starving people just 2 years ago. What's really going on there?

In 9120 Steps

I enjoyed several "pause and lean in" moments during my hike to and from BART today.

My outbound walk on this President's Day off took me past half a dozen men washing or polishing their rides in front of their homes. 90s Nissans, Volkswagons, Hondas, all with keys in the ignition to power their pumping stereos. An old Chinese man on a recycling (wage-earning) expedition fished out a plastic bag full of empty beer bottles from a trash can -- jackpot! -- before stepping aside for me to pass.

On my way home, three guys in hoodies lined a bench outside the darkened public library, hunched over their laptops. It was after hours, but they could still get wi-fi access. Every dog owner seemed to be out for their pre-dinner stroll. Said hello to a rottweiler, beagle, spotted mutt, and a couple of low-riders.

Pretty interesting 9120 steps, I'd say.