First steps!

On Friday, Jane took her first two steps on her own! She's been walking around with me or Liz holding her hands in the last few weeks, but this was the first time she took steps on her own. Wow, it's very exciting, but as Apple says "this changes everything!"

Colorado Rocks!

Last week we got back from a trip to Colorado. We were there for a week, attending a wedding in Ouray and also visiting family in Colorado Springs. It was a fun trip, and Colorado was beautiful. And, Jane was great and did really well throughout all the traveling we did, even with the time change.

Here's a travelogue...

We arrived in Denver last Thursday, July 30. It was Jane's first plane ride (and our first plane ride as parents w/ baby in tow), so we were a bit nervous about how things would go. But everything went really well -- Jane slept most of the way and was otherwise really good on the plane. Phew! We drove from Denver down to Colorado Springs where we were visiting family. We stayed in Colorado Springs for one night, and then it was off for a drive through the Rocky Mountains to Ouray, a small town surrounded by mountains in southwest Colorado for a wedding.

The drive to Ouray was long, but really good. The scenery was amazing! It seemed like every mile I said "wow." The highest point on the drive was Monarch Pass which was 11,000 feet. The views were incredible. We also went through several river valleys which were lush and green. We took US Route 50 through the mountains, going through towns of various sizes, many of which started as mining towns: Canon City (home of 13 penitentiaries!), Salida, Gunnison, and Montrose. The pictures we took just don't do the scenery justice.

When we got to Ouray late afternoon on Friday, July 31. Ouray is a very small town of around 800 people with only paved road. But it's a beautiful setting at the head of a river valley and surrounded by mountains on three sides. We were there for one of Liz's old friend's wedding. We spent Friday night at a rehearsal dinner party. And Saturday in the morning we hiked up to the Box Canyon Falls, a local waterfall, and then up a mountain to a bridge that had great views of the town. Saturday evening was the wedding, and it was very nice. It was an outdoor wedding under the mountains. Again, Jane was great throughout the wedding even though she was it was way past her bedtime.

We took off from Ouray on Sunday morning to head back to Colorado Springs. The drive back was just as great, in fact, it took less time, and in some ways the scenery was even better than the drive to Ouray. We got back to Colorado Springs in the late afternoon.

Back in Colorado Springs, we spent the rest of our time (about 3.5 days) visiting with Cathy and Doug and their kids. It was great to see them -- they moved from MD back in February, so we haven't seen them since then. We went to a pretty park with Cathy, Gammy, Braeden, Abby, and Jane for a picnic and some playground time. That was fun; there are some pictures of me on a seesaw -- that's my best event. (Oh yeah, we had to drive on Rollercoaster Road to get to the park -- not making that up.) And, we visited the Cheyenne Mountain (yes, the home of NORAD) Zoo with Cathy, Gammy, Braeden, and Abby. Jane liked the monkeys (as did Dad) and the giraffes. The zoo was literally on the side of the Cheyenne mountain. Liz, Jane, and I went to Garden of the Gods, a park of natural rock formations. I took a lot of pictures there, and then we visited Manitou Springs for some lunch. If you hadn't guessed, Garden of the Gods was beautiful, as was pretty much all the scenery we came in contact with.

We got home Thurs, Aug 7, pretty late -- our flight out of Denver was delayed -- so we were tired.

Take a look at all the pictures we took.

This is a map of our travel routes:

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Is Google Making Us Stupid?

This is a pretty thought-provoking article about the Web and how it may be affecting our minds and how we think and process information. Of course, the ironic thing is I didn't finish reading it.

Is Google Making Us Stupid?

Nats Park

A few Sundays ago, we went to our first Nats game at the new stadium. I think we both agreed that the experienced was mixed. The day we went was pretty crowded since the Nationals were playing the Orioles. Of course, the stadium is brand new, and so everything looked great and new. Our seats were great, just a few rows back from the Nats' dugout on the first baseline. The field was beautiful, and the jumbotron was very... big.

BUT, it was also really hot, and we had seats in the sun and we didn't realize they got ridiculously hot in the sun. Liz had a hard time sitting in them because her shorts weren't long enough to provide protection. There are big ugly parking garages that sit and block any sort of view of the city past the outfield walls. It seems they're still ironing out the kinks even after 3 months of being open. The lines were long, they ran out of concessions, and the food was super expensive. It's true the stadium doesn't have much character, I guess, but I'm not sure what kind of character I'd expect from a brand new stadium.

I am really hopeful, though, that when they finish developing that part of town that it will be lively and fun and full of action. It seems that will happen, but you never know. And hopefully the team will win more than lose. That could never hurt.

Crafty Bastards...

Yes, we did go, but we only managed to get there a bit before it shut down. It was super hot, so we breezed through the thing in probably about a half hour. I wanted to go to support this type of thing because I think it's good for SS. But the thing about these events is that they are selling stuff that is cool and kitschy, but it's stuff that you don't really need. So we didn't support it with any purchases. It seemed to be well attended though, even at the end of the event. We missed all the bands, too. Hopefully, they'll keep holding it in SS.

Crafty Bastards in SS

This year, there is a Crafty Bastards event in Silver Spring (in addition to the one that is in Adams Morgan). They're gonna have live music too... hopefully we'll be able to make it.

Root Boy Slim and Wikipedia

I stumbled upon Root Boy Slim's wikipedia entry and found it sorta interesting. I never really liked his stuff that they used to play on the old 'HFS, but I came on his entry in the usual roundabout web route. Started at 30 Days of Night (vampire movie I watched tonight -- pretty good!). That movie was based on a graphic novel written by Steve Niles, who played bass for Gray Matter. From there I found my way to an entry for Count Gore De Vol (!?), then an entry for the Bayou, which led to Root Boy. And there you have it. Sometimes these rabbit holes are useful.

R.I.P. Bo Diddley

Rehoboth Beach for Memorial Day weekend

We just got back from a fun weekend at Reboboth Beach. We shared a house with four other families and their kids. Of course, with that many kids there was some chaos, but aside from the kiddie mayhem, it was enjoyable. The weather was perfect all weekend: mid- to high-70s during the day, in the 60s at night, and clear skies. We had some good meals, Jane got her first taste of the beach (literally), and we tried to relax as much as we could.

Here are some pictures from the trip.

Jane's First Birthday

Jane is now one year old! All the cliches about time flying and kids growing up fast have already begun to ring true -- it *is* hard to believe that it's been a whole year since she was born. It has really flown by. We had a small birthday party for her, and she had fun. She wasn't totally into the cupcake and didn't dive into it like some kids do. She studied it more than tasted it.

There are some other new developments/favorite activities that she's doing now. One thing is she loves climbing up the stairs. It always makes her happy when she gets to the top. She'll usually let out little yells. She is also pulling up all the over place and cruising as well. It looks like she is also dangerously close to standing on her own. She seems to want to do it but is not quite there yet. She's got two bottom teeth coming in, and the doctor says some teeth on the top are not too far behind. She's off the formula (yes!) and is happily eating regular food, although she doesn't like meat too much but loves her veggies -- a budding vegetarian?

Here are some pictures from her birthday party. (I've moved over to flickr.com because it's much easier, and time is a premium these days.)

Black Keys @ 9:30 Club, May 13

My thoughts on this show are mixed. I like the band, and I've now seen them three times. But every time I always think "well, that was pretty good, but not great". Dunno. I should probably stop seeing 'em. I like their records well enough. I don't love 'em though.

They definitely rock. The drummer is great to watch -- he just beats the crap out of the drums. The guitarist rocks -- he really fills up the sound (no bass). But during the set, I found myself a bit bored at times. And, I'm no master musician, but these guys definitely play on feel and not strict time -- they are not tight but super loose. The crowd was loving it, though -- sold out show. In fact, they sold out two nights at the 9:30. NPR recorded it too.

It was fun to get out, but I think I'll pass next time they come along.

Charleston for graduation

Over Mother's Day weekend, all of us (plus my brother's family, my sister, and father) drove down to Charleston, SC, for my sister's graduation from College of Charleston. We were only there for about a day and a half which made the trip a bit of blur, but we enjoyed it. The downtown area is really nice -- like a southern version of Georgetown or Annapolis. Lots of old historic buildings and trendy shopping. We drove down and back -- we broke up the ride down into two legs by staying overnight in North Carolina. We drove back in one shot though, which turned into an 11hr drive home in almost constant rain. That was pretty bad. But through it all Jane was great (and so was Liz), so everyone got home in one piece... :-)

San Francisco on the company dime

I recently got back from a business trip to San Fran. I went to the Interwoven conference, GearUp 2008. The conference was pretty good, considering a large chuck of my time was spent in rooms about 3 floors below street level listening to discussions of varying degrees of usefulness. But that's what a conference is, and that's what I knew I'd be doing. They fed us pretty well, and the hotel was pretty nice. And the topics were generally pretty good.

There were a couple of good speakers. One was Guy Kawasaki, who was highly entertaining. He's written several books and is currently a venture capitalist. Tim Ferris spoke too, and he was interesting as well. He just wrote a book called "The 4-Hour Work Week". He looks like a better-looking Steve-o from Jackass.

San Francisco, what little time I spent actually in the city, was great. It was my third time there. I managed to walk around a bit. The hotel was in the downtown / South of Market area, so I walked around SoMa a bit and then down to the Embarcadero along the water. One night I joined the local culture in a pub called the Chieftain and had a couple pints while witnessing a trivia contest. My last day there, I had a whole afternoon free, so I took a bus up to the Haight and went to Amoeba Records. Wow, that place is pretty impressive! It's beyond huge. I walked out with only 4 CDs -- I exercised restraint. The bus ride there was also fun and interesting. Public transportation is usually a great way to see a city. I've never used the SF Muni before -- only cable cars -- and this time worked out pretty well. SF is really a beautiful city. If I *had* to have a west coast perch, I think I'd opt for SF. Assuming that, you know, money was no option.

It's good to be home, though. I missed Liz and Jane a lot. We had tried to work it so they'd come with me, but in the end we decided it would be more trouble than it was worth.

Carbon/Silicon @ 9:30, April 6

Boy, this show was a real surprise. We went in with pretty low expectations, and they were well exceeded. Carbon/Silicon is the new-ish band with Mick Jones (The Clash) and Tony James (Generation X). I had downloaded a bunch of their songs a while ago, and to be honest I didn't really listen to many of them since I wasn't too into the ones I did listen to. But "The News" has been getting some airplay on 94.7, and it's a pretty darn catchy song, so I thought maybe the show might be okay.

It didn't take long for my expectations to be bounced out the door. Mick Jones is a real kick to see live. He's so loose and easy-going -- really refreshing. He was joking and smiling and exchanging looks w/ the band. It was clear he was enjoying himself. The songs were fairly simple/straight-forward: simple riffs and solid rock beats. I think that might've been what turned me off to the songs I downloaded... maybe a bit light, a bit repetitive. But wow, when I heard 'em played live with some oomph behind them, it was great! So, now I've seen all members of The Clash, except for Topper, at the 9:30, but not as The Clash. :-)

The crowd was definitely into the show and was a mix but mostly older folks (like me). It's also a real pleasure to see a show at 9:30 that isn't sold out! You can actually move around... What else can I say except what a great show for a Sunday night! Thanks, Mick!

The Pogues @ 9:30 club, March 10

A lot of this blog seems to be me catching up and posting about things that have happened in the past. This post is in that category. Way back on March 10, we went to go see the reunited Pogues at the 930 club. This was the second of two sold out shows. We had seen the Pogues on their first reunion tour, about a year earlier, and it was great, amazing, all I expected. This time around was just as good, but not as much as an event.

We got there and of course, the place was packed. Interestingly, the Hives show (which we had gone to two nights before) was also sold out, but not nearly as packed. My friend Scott had gone to the first night show the night before, and so we had the advantage of being able to compare the two shows. Our crowd was way less drunk and also less boisterous. Which was fine by me, honestly. I would've liked it if our crowd was more boisterous, but if that meant being really smashed too, then I'll take what we got. There were of course many people who were clearly way too drunk but fortunately they didn't infringe on my good time. Also, according to Scott, Shane MacGowan was in better form (it's all relative!) on our night.

In general, this show compared w/ the last (and first) reunion, was not as good. But how could it be. When we saw 'em the first time there was just a lot more excitement b/c we'd never seen 'em before and so there was a lot of build up and anticipation. Plus the show was on a weekend night so there were no worries for the next day. But that's not to say that this time around wasn't good -- it was great! It's just the shine came off it a bit.

Anyway, the set list was great w/ the usual "greatest hits", although there was no "Fairytale of New York". Shane did sound good (like I said, it's all relative) and the band was tight as usual. I ran into a couple of people at the show. One was a girl named Jennifer who sorta recognized me as someone familiar and I did the same w/ her. Turns out we went to high school together, travelled in similar circles, but were not friends then. She was friendly, and we talked for a bit during the Pogues. She is now married to the drummer for Black Market Baby. I also ran into Joe Englert and chatted with him for a few minutes. Super nice guy. I can usually count on seeing some familiar faces at shows like these, and this night was no exception.

Jane at 11 months

Hard to believe that in a few weeks Jane will be a year old! I know it's been a while since I've posted any new pictures, so this slideshow is 3 months worth. She has become pretty proficient at crawling although she is a not a long distance crawler... her specialty is more like very short bursts of crawling. She loves standing up (with helping hands from a grown up) and will go up and down for hours. OK, minutes is more accurate but the point is she loves it. She's eating real food now and is doing very well in that department. But she has no teeth yet! Something to look forward to. She's been doing the sort of babbling thing and making vowel sounds. And as you can see, she's still working on the hair, but it's starting to get a bit thicker. All in all she's really doing well. Enjoy the pictures!

View the slideshow

The Wire has checked out

OK, so this post is more than a week late... I'm catching up a bit. The finale of the Wire was a week ago, and it was a sad day for TV (if I can say so). The Wire was by far my favorite show on TV in the last maybe 3 or 4 seasons. OK, maybe not my only favorite -- the Sopranos, of course, was also great until it ended.

The finale was pretty good, and this season was decent, but last season was by far the best. I didn't always catch every line of dialogue, or keep up with all the characters' names, or understand every plot nuance. But to me, it was a very well done, affecting, and entertaining show that (I'm guessing) comes as close as possible for a TV show to depict what is happening in our cities' institutions. Yeah, the newspaper storyline could've been better this season, but Jimmy's wake in the final season was great, I thought. So many great characters: Jimmy, Bunk, Omar, Lester, Bunny Colvin, and the kids from season 4.

When we lived in Columbia Heights, I would usually watch The Wire on Sunday nights and then go walk the dog in our 'hood. And I gotta say that watching the Wire put a new spin on living in a place like CH. For one thing, it made me more paranoid about crime directly after watching each Sunday night -- everyone on the street while I was walking the dog was up to no good! But more generally, it really made me look at the things that I was seeing in CH streets in a different way. Seeing the people on the streets and knowing that they had stories behind them, some positive, some negative. Right now I'm writing at a superficial level, but the show really did affect me in the way I looked at my 'hood.

I was in Baltimore a few years back for a work retreat and we took a tour of some of the worse-off neighborhoods in Baltimore. Drove through streets of boarded up houses and I thought "wow, that really looks like something out of The Wire." And then we turned a corner and saw a bunch of HBO trucks set up for filming.

So now that The Wire's gone and The Sopranos is done, I might have to cancel my HBO... I like Big Love and Entourage well enough, but that might not be enough to keep us subscribed. Although Flight of the Conchords is pretty good... hmmmm.

Some Silver Spring news

Here are a few pieces of info I've "repurposed" from other Silver Spring blogs.

- From Silver Spring, Singular, the City Paper Crafty Bastard fair will have an event in Silver Spring this summer.

- And from Silver Spring Scene, some info on the upcoming Hook and Ladder brewpub in downtown SS.

Hives & Donnas @ 930 Club

Last weekend was a busy show-weekend. On Sat, we went to go see the Hives and the Donnas. (On Mon we went to go see the Pogues -- more on that later.) I was looking forward to it for a few reasons. One, the last time we saw the Hives, they were great -- funny, tight, energetic, and rockin'. Two, I haven't seen the Donnas in a few years and was looking forward to seeing them again since I like their older stuff a lot.

The Donnas have a new album out (Bitchin'), and the word on the street is that it ain't too good. (I don't have it.) This is not too surprising since their last album, Gold Medal, was a bit of a clunker. So this all solidifies a downward spiral since Spend the Night. But even so, they have been a source of fun rock n roll for me and my friends for several years, so a chance to see them is an anticipated event. What a disappointment. The set consisted of nothing older than anything off of Spend the Night. The new songs did not sound all that appealing. Plus, the singer has developed some stage banter consisting of things like "yay-aa!" and she really wasn't singing too well. I think in the past, we'd give 'em a pass on some aspects of the musicianship since they had great funny/catchy/rockin' tunes. The guitar player however sounded great like she always does. I was disappointed not to hear at least something from the older records...

The Hives were, in contrast, great. Second time I've seen 'em. The singer, Pelle, definitely has watched a few Rolling Stones films because in the same way that Mick Jagger used moves by Tina Turner, Pelle uses Mick's moves. But beyond that, the music was tight and it would be hard to imagine a less energetic performance. To be honest, my opinion of the latest album was pretty low the first time I listened to it. But it grew on me. And seeing the new songs done live, I thought they were great. They played a varied set, with songs going back to Veni Vidi Vicious (a great version of Hate to Say I Told You So). The crowd was very into the show, which for me always makes things more exciting. I really think it's a drag to go see a show -- no matter what type of music -- and not see the crowd make any indication that they're enjoying themselves. To me, that's what the live show is all about: feeding off the band, and the band feeding off of you. I know, it's a cliche, but that's how I feel. Anyway, enough of the rant... great Hives show and a fun Saturday night.

Ladies and gentlemen, we now have crawling!

Jane has reached a milestone -- she has started to crawl! It is a tentative, sort-of shuffling crawl, but a full-on crawl nonetheless. Legs and arms move together, for the most part, and she can go about a foot or two. It was amazing when I watched her do it. Amazing to watch her figure it out. We, of course, had to put the proverbial carrot out in front of her (in this case a book) to motivate her, but it worked! I have some video of her doing it for the first time. And that's the first time that I saw, anyway. Our daycare provider tells us that she has not seen Jane crawl before, so I'm gonna assume that I saw it first. I'd like to put the video online, but I've got a feeling that may never happen. Maybe some pics!