Ham-Daddy

On the way back from San Diego, I made arrangements with Mike Hamler to hang out for a little while. Apparently he's busy working on a new movie, and we still had lots of miles to travel after a disappointing first leg of our trip... so the visit was short and sweet. We headed up to his apartment to check out the pad. Andrea was 'ooo'ing at all his Dreamworks memorabilia.

We had lunch at a 'fancy' Americana joint called the Granville Cafe downtown Glendale. Mike specifically recommended the Mac'n'cheese and Andrea ordered it. I was impressed that I could stomach it when I tried a taste (not a fan of the mac).

After lunch, Mike asked if we'd like a tour of the Dreamworks studio. It was a tough sell, let me tell you. The grounds were impressive. They had pictures of all the voice actors from the various Dreamworks films as well as several cases with awards (including 2 Oscars... but Mike said those were probably replicas). The halls were lined with artwork of various forms, all focused around Dreamworks films. In the middle of the campus, there was a large outdoor eating area with a large Koi pond & fountain at the center of everything. There was a fancy outdoor grill, which apparently gets use daily for all the employees free food (*jealous*). It was all very cool to see, and it really didn't feel like a place one comes to 'work'.

Mike's work-space was a pretty normal cubical except for 1 thing. He works on lighting, which means everyone around him is concentrating on subtle variations in light on a computer screen. Everything they do is very sensitive to ambient light, so they do pretty much everything in the dark. Mike said the only time the overhead lights get turned on is when someone needs to install a new computer or something of that nature.

While we were at Mike's cube, he showed us a fair amount of footage from the movie he's currently working on: How to Train Your Dragon. It looks like another great movie, hopefully on the same scale of success as Kung Fu Panda.

Thanks so much to Mike for the awesome tour. I enjoyed it, and I know Andrea appreciated it immensely.

Tijuana

Andrea's current visa expires on the 27th of August, so the plan was to drive down to Tijuana over a weekend to cross the border and come back with a new visa. Andrea's sister called the American Embassy to make sure this was possible, and everything seemed to check out.

So last week, we made arrangements for Moose to stay in a kennel, reserved a room in San Diego and headed off on a grueling 2 days of nearly non-stop driving. We left around 8am on Saturday after dropping off Moose. The drive seemed to be going well. We were covering good ground, and everything suggested we'd arrive at our motel in San Diego around 4pm... and then we hit LA. The traffic on highway 5 was unbelievable starting on the north end of the city, and it just never let up. I basically cruised the entire length of Los Angeles in 1st and 2nd gears. My feet started getting blisters from all the shifting and clutching.

There were some cool things to play around with in traffic, like the carpool lane. They have limited access in LA and always active (unlike here where you can drive in them on non-peak hours). Although it didn't help much... especially for a particularly memorable segment where the carpool lane was backed up more than the normal lanes due to an accident.

After we passed South of Orange County, there was a little relief. But it was short-lived. As highway 5 made its way to the coast, the traffic picked up again. After another hour in stop & go conditions, we finally drove out of it, and I was shocked to see the cause. There was some sort of marine training exercise taking place on the beach, and people were simply slowing down to see it. I literally screamed!

We finally arrived in San Diego around 7pm, checked into the motel room and then headed out to walk across the border. Of course I was too tired to even think to bring the camera... and that was probably for the best because there were several people who had theirs confiscated.

We strolled over to Mexico, and then looped back to pass through the American customs check. When we showed our passports, the customs agent sort of raised an eyebrow at Andrea. He wanted to know how long she intended to stay, because clearly her current visa wasn't sufficient. We were separated temporarily, and then sent back to an office to wait in line for a chance to apply for a new permit to enter the US. After an hour and a half waiting in line, we finally got to the front. The agent was, again, apprehensive in dealing with Andrea. In the end, he denied her a new visa. He allowed her to enter the US again on her current visa, but said she would be in big trouble if she didn't get her butt back to Mexico before August 27th.

So Andrea is on her way back to her mom's in Mexico City next Wednesday (August 26th). She's already said her goodbyes at the zoo since we're not really sure when she'll be able to return to California. It's definitely a sad time. She's requested an early birthday celebration, so I'm going to put something together this Sunday and make another banana nut cake.

Teddy Bears' Picnic

Before I say anything... yes, this is me wearing various bear suits.







So how did this happen? It certainly was a surprise to me. Andrea has been doing volunteer work at the San Francisco Zoo, and today she was asked to help out for half a day with an event called the Teddy Bear Festival. When she takes public transit to the zoo during the week, she has a 3 hour commute each way. So, I decided to drive her this morning and save her roughly 4 hours on buses. My plan was to just hang out in the zoo while she did whatever they asked and then drive her home. She signed in at the volunteer's board, and we went back into a conference room to wait for a volunteer director.

The guy took one look at me and decided I would make a good teddy bear. Apparently they had planned for people to walk around all day in these 4 bear suits and greet children at the entrance as well as make appearances at the event. One of the guys who was supposed to this didn't show. So I got to spend the entire morning putting on and removing bear costumes and getting mobbed by small kids... well, the ones that weren't terrified of course. I don't understand how anyone could be afraid of this:



Nevermind, I kind of freak myself out with that one.

Andrea was assigned as my "guide" because your visibility is pretty much non-existent inside those suits. Andrea had to call out directions for where kids were coming up to hug me or take pictures.

One of the rules of wearing the suits was that you weren't allowed to keep one on for more than 30 minutes at a time because they are so hellishly hot. Luckily this was San Francisco, so it was a mild 65 degrees. It almost didn't matter, because I sweat through every suit I put on. Especially when they had me sit there for story time. Andrea said I left a big sweaty butt-mark when I got up. If I stayed standing and moving around it was tolerable, but any time I sat still for too long it got pretty uncomfortable. Now I'm back in Sunnyvale, and it's a balmy 90 degrees outside. I can only imagine what that suit would have been like in this heat.

Of course we had a changing-tent so that we didn't scar small children by pulling off a teddy bear's head in front of them. While I was changing in the tent, Andrea tried on one of the masks to check out the visibility.

Broadcom drops their Emulex takeover bid

http://www.reuters.com/article/ousiv/idUSTRE5683PD20090709

If you recall what I wrote when NetXen got bought, it probably had something to do with Broadcom's positioning to buy/take over a network fabric company called Emulex. QLogic bought NetXen as a reaction in order to stay competitive with a potentially large competitor if Broadcom were to acquire Emulex.

It looks like QLogic emerges from the fray as the only company able to service 10Gig NIC as well as FCoE and iSCSI needs.

TOEFL 2: Redemption

Last Friday was a bit of an adventure. Andrea scheduled her next TOEFL attempt in Oakland on that day. I took the day off work to drive her, and her friend Christian (who's in town staying with us until the 20th) tagged along for the ride.

The test began at 11am, and I'll admit I took a bit more of a conservative approach than was necessary. Fearing the bridge traffic on 880 in the Oakland area, I had us leave at 9:15am, which put us at the testing center around 10am. We sat around in a Starbucks to pass the time, then took Andrea up to the testing area to get her checked in.

This time Andrea actually got to take the test, so Christian and I spent the middle of the day wandering around Berkley. We walked up and down Telegraph and got to see all the hippies. After we had seen enough of Berkley, we headed back to Jack London Square to wait out the rest of Andrea's test. Things seemed to go fine from what Andrea was saying, but we'll know her score in about another week and a half.

When we got home, Andrea signed on and found this email:

Dear Andrea Paulina Ramirez Olvera,
I have received your inquiry regarding the iBT TOEFL that you had scheduled to take on May 15, 2009. Please accept my apologies for the problems that prevented you from testing. As an exception I have processed a full refund of your test fees. Please allow 7 to 10 business days for the credit to post to your credit card account. If you have further questions, please contact me. Good luck on your test today.
Sincerely,
Steve Krimstock
Educational Testing Service
Test Taker Advocacy
609-771-7285
skrimstock@ets.org

This response is the result of the Better Business Bureau complaint we registered the day she was turned away for the first TOEFL test. The system actually worked for us, as strange as that sounds. We were both tickled that this finally got resolved, but still shocked that this refund was anything more than a no-brainer.

Mystery Bruise

Andrea and I went hiking on Saturday. After we got home, I was showering and caught a glimpse of this awesome bruise on the back of my arm in the mirror. I have no idea where it came from. We've been racking our brains for the past day and a half trying to come up with an explanation, but we've got nuthin'. So for your viewing pleasure, I present... the Mystery Bruise!

Moose Gets Neutered

We took Moose in to the vet early this past week for a little procedure. You're still a man in my eyes buddy (don't hate me)! He's healed very well, and it's actually a little hard to keep his energy level down where it needs to be. Supposedly he needs to be confined to a small room or kennel for almost 2 weeks. We've allowed him the run of the apartment, even if he just bulls through anything in his path with his spiffy new collar. Walls, legs, speakers... nothing makes him think twice. He's stuck in that collar 'o destruction and forbidden from running outside for another 10 days. I don't know if he's going to make it without exploding.

We also had the vet take some xrays of Moose's hips and elbows while he was under for his surgery. They said his hips look "good", but not perfect. Meaning there's a low probability he'll develop hip dysplasia (we were quoted 10% chance), but it's possible he'll end up with some form of arthritis. His elbows looked fine. No surprise there, except for the extra $100 they charged me for the third xray.

The consultant who examined the xrays mentioned that Moose is a touch overweight. So poor Moose gets neutered and his food cut back. Sounds like the start of the best week ever.