Enemy of the State

The weather went from the best of times to the worst of times. Or something like that. We have had four days of thunderstorms and heavy rain (Tahoe is snowed in again) that finally broke for a few hours today. After playing a bit of golf, I took Louie up to Folsom Lake to check out the new Homeland Defense reinforcements.

For those of you not in the area, Folsom Lake sits about 45 miles west and 500 feet above California's state capital, Sacramento, and the rest of the California valley. It's a huge lake (18,000 acres) that was formed by the Folsom Dam (which is next to Folsom Prison). Across the dam, runs Folsom Dam Road, which connects Folsom/EDH (where I live) and the Orangevale/Granite Bay (where Kelly lives).

After 9/11, Folsom Dam Road was closed due to security concerns (Blow up the dam by driving explosive ladden truck across it and flood Sacramento and the California valley). Also considered was the southern side, which is within view of my house. As there is no road here (just a bike path), they decided to put these super high-tech, retractable barriers at either end. I am still not sure what the solar collector is for, but I bet it is super secret.

While I think this is pretty cool (although I am leery of riding my bike over them), Louie is a little wigged out by them.

Mormon Island Relocation Cemetery

One of the reasons that I really like California is that all of the history here is recent. Most of the state was settled in the 1850s (making these our grandparents' parents) so a lot of it still exists. And since California is also a mostly desert and high plains state, there are a lot of huge scale public works projects (read: boon-doggles) that stagger the imagination.

For example, Kelly and I have drinks over at a bar that is one block away from the western most Pony Express station. I am also near Folsom Dam and Folsom Prison.

Some of the history is even closer. My picture today shows the Mormon Island Relocation Cemetery. When the federal govt decided to dam the American River (around 1954) to provide water for Sacramento and San Francisco, they had to flood under several towns. One of these towns was Mormon Island (probably founded by Mormons who didn't stop in Utah). Before they did, they moved the local cemetery out of the flood zone.

This has been relocated south of the lake, just beyond the Llama pasture that I post a lot of picture from. I went down there on Saturday to look around. Very interesting: Most of the people weren't Mormon but Jewish and there were some new burials (probably wives and husbands).

If you look closely through the cemetery gateway, you can see a large house of the hill in the distance. That house is across the street from me.

Rattler

As most of you already know (since I called you up to laugh at your cold weather), it has been in the mid 80s most of the weekend here in NorCal. So besides my usual golf endeavors, I've been taking my bike out for a few rides.

This pictures shows some of the downsides of my rides. As EDH is in the Sierra foothills and pretty arid, we get your normal desert critters. This rattlesnake was blocking my favorite bike trail, so I stopped to shoo him off. He was polite at first, slithering rapidly across the trail until I bent down to get a closer picture (The thing that every park ranger tells you to do when you see a dangerous reptile). He stopped dead on the trail when I took this picture, then raised his head up and started shaking his rattle. I took this as the warning it was and backed off.

This reminds me to update Louie and Zeke's rattlesnake bite booster shots this week.

Hole 9

It's been a while since I blogged (I should just start my posts with this always), but I was in San Francisco for a conference last weekend. The conference wasn't bad, but it is exhausting acting as host (my practice has about 400 people). Of course, the weather sucked -- at least I got to practice at the double decker golf range.

I have also finally fixed my golf shoe problem by buying a new pair -- Callaway Tour Saddles. They're a lot better than the Nikes I had. They have larger spike for better lateral stability and are a lot more comfortable.

To test them out, I shot 9 holes this afternoon at Bass Lake. I shot alright, considering I haven't played in almost two weeks, but it wasn't pretty.

Broekn Things

Sorry I haven't posted in a while. Things are boring here in soggy Northern California since the Superbowl. February is the worst month here, since it is the height of our rainy season.

Adding to my general malaise is the fact that a lot of the things I own appear to be breaking. In the past three weeks, I have broken my Linux server (just put back together today), flatted my bike again (see innumerable other stories) and my golf shoes. Of all of these, really only the golf shoes aren't my fault -- they just gave out on me after six months of wear. You can see in the photo that the sole is just coming straight off of them. I have tried to tell Shelley and Kelly that this is due to the astounding torque that I apply to my driver game, but I don't think they are buying it.

Superbowl

Kelly and I decided to go out to watch the Superbowl at our favorite pub. Of course, this was just a "cover story", as our real reason for going was the 42" LCD TV raffle. Sadly, neither Kelly nor I brought home the TV.

The game wasn't bad considering I didn't like either team.

First Day Of Spring

After three months of rain and sub-sixties weather, Spring returned to the Sierra Foothills. I celebrated by skipping work and taking my first steps towards my PGA tour card.

Coffee House Redux

In my quest to entertain myself during the days, I have found another coffee house, Coffee Republic. Better coffee than It's A Grind, pay wireless ( :( ) and a strangely bookish crowd. However, they have a full menu (with BEER) and green tea. I will see how this pans out - it may be a nice change of pace.

Poor Sign Locations

If you were to say, "Damn, it looks like some truck clipped that sign!", you'd be right.

Captured on my drive through Oakland yesterday.

2005 Resolutions

Last year was full of changes for me: The first half of the 2004, I flew over 150,000 miles working with clients in India and Australia; The second half, I spent managing internal projects largely from my house in Northern California. With the change in jobs and travel patterns, I have reclaimed a large portion of my non-work life and I have been busy figured out things to do with it.

So this year, I have finally resolved to do some of the things that I have always wanted to. One of these was to learn to play the guitar. Although I have no musical experience (nor really any obvious talent), I decided to spend some time of this. Luckily, my mother has helped me out by buying me a Kramer Focus (VT-211S Fatboy) for Christmas.



I've thrown myself into the learning process, buying and watching two DVDs on guitar playing ("Learn Rock Guitar" and "Fender's Getting Started On Electric Guitar") and a cool book called Learn To Play Guitar With Metallica. Needless to say, I am not studying the classics - It is purely a metal thing for me.

Of course, the real reason that I wanted to get started playing was the computer angle: Apple's Garageband has peaked my interest. The old version (version 1.1) lets you record, arrange and sequence software (midi) and real instruments (like my guitar). I just plug my Kramer into the iBook with a cheap $40 USB digitizer (line level input) and then use one of Garageband's built-in guitar amplifier (I like "Arena Rock") to simulate an actual amplifier. It about 10 minutes, I can record a few licks directly to my hard drive, add a backing drum beat or bass line, sweeten the tones and push it out to MP3. Now, of course, that depends on me actually playing something recognizable on my guitar.

I'll have more on my guitar progress when I produce something that's actually presentable. I am also slated to get the Garageband 2.0 upgrade sometime later this week, so I'll report on that too.