San Diego John

Monday, December 25, 2006

Phoenix Trip

I spent a few days in Phoenix and had a great time. I left San Diego Thursday afternoon, so I was able to capture this beautiful shot of the sunrise on my way.

It was a quick trip, but there was time to visit with my uncle Warren, my friend Sharon, and of course, Nate, Bridgette, Patrick and even Greg, who showed up Saturday afternoon.

The trip ending with all of us sitting around a fire in Nate's backyard. He has a little fire ring, and we had a BIG fire, so I am a bit surprised that there wasn't a 9-1-1 call required.

I came home early Sunday morning, so I also enjoyed an incredible desert sunrise. All and all, it was a great trip. Thanks for the hospitality, folks. I'll be back soon!

Thursday, December 21, 2006

And I'm off again...

I leave shortly for a weekend trip to Phoenix. I will spend some time with my Uncle Warren, then visit with my friends Sharon, Nate, and Bridgette.

Lock up the guns and booze and hide the menfolk! I'm coming to town!

Wednesday, December 20, 2006

Dreamgirls - The Movie

While in LA this weekend, I saw that Dreamgirls was playing at the ArcLight theater. I just assumed it had already opened, so I made plans to catch a matinée while everyone else was taking a nap. AJ and I went to the theater at 2 for a 3pm show, and we managed to buy the last two tickets. Apparently, it is an exclusive engagement at this theater right now. Tickets were $25 each, but included a slick program and a poster. In the lobby they had costumes and props from the film on display. I mean, we even had reserved seats in the theater. Not just tickets, but assigned seats. Oooohhhhh...

And the movie itself? Fantastic. I have never been to a show where the audience applauded at the end of each song, but they did Saturday. They also gave a standing ovation mid-show when Jennifer Hudson sang "And I Am Telling You I'm Not Going."

The movie is great. It's definitely a musical, so avoid this film if watching 30 different musical numbers is not to your liking. The rest of you, though, should catch it as soon as you can. It's fantastic!

The View from San Onofre

On the way home from LA, we stopped at the view point at Camp Pendleton. It's a great spot to see the ocean, from San Onofre beach to the north towards Oceanside to the south.

Ric's Birthday Weekend

We started the weekend early, heading out to Bacchus House on Thursday night for drinks. It wasn't a wild night... more a relaxing evening, a few drinks and a few laughs.

Friday we headed up to Hollywood. Traffic was minimal, the weather was nice, and my little car was flying at nearly 100mph. Whoo hoo! We wandered around West Hollywood for a while, did a little shopping, then dropped Grant and the car off at the hotel and headed out to the Eagle in Silverlake. The rest of the night was a blur - the Faultline was in there at some point - but it was all fun.

Saturday we slept in, then gave Ric his birthday wish and had breakfast at IHOP. Yum! We met up with our friend AJ (more on our afternoon later!), then were joined by our friend, JW. We checked out another club - blah - then headed back to the Eagle. Lots and lots of fun there.

Sunday we were up and on the road fairly early, getting back to San Diego early afternoon. We napped for a while, then headed to Urban Mo's for Ric's favorite meal - a burger, meaty mushroom, rare, avocado, on a bun.

It was a nice time, lots of laughs and drama-free. In fact, we think it was the perfect way to welcome in a new year for Ric!

Friday, December 15, 2006

And we're off!

Ric, Grant and I are heading to Los Angeles this morning. We are celebrating Ric's 52nd birthday (tomorrow!) with a weekend in West Hollywood and Silverlake.

Keep your cell phones close, in case we need to call someone for bail money!

Happy Birthday, Ric!

Tuesday, December 12, 2006

Neutral Underground

As many of you know, I enjoy talking politics. I enjoy arguing, fighting and mud wrestling politics, in fact. But it's not easy to find a political discussion group online that isn't more frustrating than it is worth. Some of them are Right Wing yap fests, and there is nothing but anti-Left hate oozing out of every post. Others are the same, but anger and hate directed at the Right from so called liberals and progressives. And even if the Left board isn't totally anti-Right, it is usually pretty limited in its debate.

But I got lucky a month ago. Someone referred me to a website called Neutral Underground. It has people from all along the political continuum, from the Far Left all the way over to the Far Right. And there is debate galore. More than that, there are forums for everything from good to culture to humor. You can get a lot out of the site and never get involved in a single political discussion, if you choose.

I am registered over there as San Diego John. Come on over and check it out. Left or Right, you will find something there that interests you!

Sunday, December 10, 2006

And the tree gets better and better...

Here is the tree with all of the lights on it.

And here are some of our favorite ornaments.

More to come!

And it's Christmas time...

With all that has been going on, it has taken us a bit to get ourselves into the spirit of the season. But Ric and I talked about it, and we decided yesterday to get out of our funk and get it together! It's Christmas time, and we need to not be grumpy Scrooges.

First stop, the tree farm. We headed down to Mission Valley to the Pinery Tree Farm and found the perfect tree. It's a noble fir and it's gorgeous. From there, we had to pick up nearly two thousand lights. Yep, I said two thousand. Half of them are color, half are white. And Ric arranges them so you can turn all the bright white lights, all the multi-colored lights, or every light on the tree. It's spectacular.

Part of our holiday tradition is watching "The Wizard of Oz" and then "Scrooged" while setting up the tree. "Oz" is an old tradition for Ric' family, and "Scrooged" is just about the perfect Christmas comedy ever. It really kickstarts our holiday mood!

While Ric worked on the lights yesterday, I started foraging through the garage to find the holiday boxes. I found five of them so far, but there are still more hiding somewhere. Wish me luck as I continue the great "holiday hunt!"

More photos to come this evening, after we get the tree and the rest of the house finished. By the end of the day, this house will look completely different. Yes, the Christmas season has come, and we are ready for yet another "Miracle on 34th Street."

(And for those who don't know, we live on 34th St. here in San Diego. When we first bought the house, it seemed so perfect for us that we started calling it our "miracle on 34th street.")