Monday, January 28, 2008

Hyunjoo driving

Hyunjoo has slowly been learning how to drive and so far so good. She's done really well considering I've never taught someone how to drive. I don't like teaching people how to drive. Too stressful.

Sunday, January 27, 2008

Dinner time

The little guy is doing pretty well even after such a long flight. He
gives me a powerful reason to procrastinate, but I've got too much
preparation to do.

Actually he just fell asleep. I think it's his nap time back in Korea.

They're home!

Unfortunately they had to wait a while in Immigration. Guess they're a
suspicious couple.

Waiting

We're just waiting for them at the baggage claim. I hope Ryan and his
mom had a good flight.

Cloudy day

Off to the airport to pick up Ryan and his mom.

Night time Nintendo

Must get to 98th level...
:-Z
Go Hyunjoo!

Friday, January 18, 2008

OGE crew in town


Click on slideshow to view a larger version or to download images.
Marc, Mike, Josh, and Audrey from The Outdoor Gear Exchange came into Las Vegas a couple days ago to climb at Red Rock Canyon before the Outdoor Retailer trade show in Salt Lake City. I joined them on their first day out climbing. We drove out to the first pullout: Calico 1 and hiked about 40 minutes to the Ultraman Wall at about 4100 ft.

It was a mostly cloudy day and the temps were in the high 30's. It was pretty cold standing around and I'm sure it got quite chilly on the longer routes. There are some long climbs there, well beyond the reach of a single 60M rope. It's good to bring extras with you in case you get too high to rap off the anchors.

It has been great to hang with the crew again. Lots of old and new stories to swap. Even though I'm not really climbing anymore, it's great to rekindle my past life.

We went out for a sushi buffet last night and they're off climbing again today. I don't know where they are today. I suppose I could drive around looking for their white Hyundai (?) they've rented, but I'd still have a considerable hike to find them. I guess we'll have to rely on more SMS texting.

Thursday, January 17, 2008

At the library

We're at the library right now. I'm trying to get some work done. I left my laptop at home because I was planning to do all my work on the iPhone. Unfortunately Google Docs doesn't let the iPhone edit docs only view them. On well. Thankfully I have a lot of editing to do on paper.

We're meeting up with the guys from the OGE later for dinner. I think they were interested in some sushi over at Makino. It'll be good to catch up about their day of (cold) climbing.


Wednesday, January 16, 2008

New iPhone

Well, after getting the word from Steve Jobs that Apple wasn't coming out with a 16GB iPhone, I went with Hyunjoo to pick up my birthday present:



It does kick major butt! Sent from my iPhone

UPDATE: Looks like Blogger doesn't like images sent directly from my iPhone. I'll have to see if there's another photo system that'll accept emailed photos.

UPDATE: Found out that in order to post images directly from the iPhone, you have to have a GMail account and it must be set as the default email account in the iPhone's settings. Problem is that GMail isn't my default account, but at least I can still email directly from my Yahoo! account via the Mail app on the iPhone

Friday, January 11, 2008

A night to remember

This day has just cruised on by. I gotta get ready soon to head over to Winston's, Scott's brother, house. They only live a few minutes away. I already dropped Hyunjoo off around 3PM.

We're all headed over there to pay respects to Scott and Winston's mother. Koreans remember their deceased relatives on the anniversary of their deaths. Unfortunately their parents passed away at a very young age.

So, there'll be a ceremony of sorts this evening and then we'll have a traditional Korean meal there.

I've been pretty busy with my Electronic Village Online session for the year. I've returned to co-moderate the 2008 Teaching with PowerPoint session. Things haven't even really heated up yet, the session begins on the 14th.

I also just found out when my presentation will be at TESOL this year. I'll have to be in NYC around the start of April to give a quick series of presentations on our EVO session.

I was supposed to finish my cover letter for Penn State, but that might take another day. It's easy to get side tracked with seemingly important tasks, but I really need to prioritize.

They've finally started to build up the graded lots behind Scott's house. I fear his wonderful view of Red Rock Canyon will evaporate faster than I had originally imagined. With the poor housing situation every where, I'm surprised they're bothering to build new homes.

I'm still holding out on picking up an iPhone that "everyone" pitched in to get me. Thank you Mom & Dad, and Mom and Dad in Korea, Hyunjoo, Scott, Nayoung, Winston and Julia! Macworld in SF is next week and it would be extremely hasty to buy almost any Apple product right now.

Some folks speculate that Steve has so much to announce that he's getting some of the hardware upgrades out of the way now, like the Mac Pro. I'm not expecting the iPhone with 3G - I just want 16GB of storage (or more). So, I'm crossing my fingers.

I haven't really been watching much football, but I'll be keeping my eyes on the Patriots this Saturday after the wildcards are in. I can still remember the painful beating we took from "The Refrigerator" Perry back in the 80's.

Tuesday, January 01, 2008

Happy New Year!

To friends and family across the globe... Happy New Year!

Hyunjoo and I had a lovely evening last night. We were originally invited to a $400 inclusive package deal at a local country club with Scott, Nayoung, Winston and Julia, but we decide to explore the Strip on our own.

Hyunjoo really wanted to see the Stratosphere Tower on the Northern end of the Strip and I was excited since I've never been up close. We arrived around 7 and easily found parking. That's one thing great about Las Vegas. It's easy to find free parking in all the best locations. We walked around the casino and quickly decided to head down the Strip.

Our first stop was the "Worlds Largest Gift Shop". I doubt the moniker was true, but it was loaded with goodies only black-velvet art collectors could love. That's being a little harsh, but it was a scene to behold.

The cops had already blocked off the Strip to pedestrians only, and we were in a group of some of the first to walk down the middle of the road. It was kinda strange being the first ones. I kept looking around the usually busy street for some crazy car to some careening through, but of course nothing of the sort happened.

We walked on for about a mile in the brisk cold to the Fashion Show, across from the Wynn, and found a great place for dinner... the Capital Grille. We might not have had the view early reservations might have given us, but the setting was perfect and the food was delicious. 

Around 9:30, we headed back up the Strip to the Stratosphere. It was colder out then, but we survived. We milled around the slot machines for an hour or so and listened to some live music playing. A little before midnight we head up to the Pool deck for the count-down we had bought tickets to earlier. There were a bunch of folks up there listening to a DJ and at the stroke of midnight we saw one of the most interesting fireworks displays I'd ever seen. From on the top of the tower, we were almost sprayed with explosives almost 115 stories directly above us. It was an incredible sight.

So, I hope you had a wonderful celebration and may all your resolutions come true!