I finally made it to the grocery store (I agree with Chris: nothing beats a good grocery store), and to celebrate I had a monster salad for dinner last night. Man, I've missed produce. England has some good foods (mainly cheese and beer, and possibly lamb) but the produce section is filled with (i.e. mostly empty of) things that are just barely ( Read more... )

Well, I'm back in die Schweiz. My apartment is good, the office is friendly and newly expanded, and I'm more or less settled in. My dad and brother are coming for a visit on Sunday, and then Jamie arrives about 5 days later. A few observations ( Read more... )

Well...things went according to plan on Thursday and Friday, with us picking up three more bumps (Thursday involved an additional technical bump because a crew didn't show up). But then we had Saturday. Ah, Saturday. Basically, our division was stopped ("klaxoned") after about 30 seconds because of a pile-up about 4 boats ahead of us, so we didn ( Read more... )

Stoked. So stoked right now. This was the first day of Summer Eights, though the weather is more like mid-March than mid-May. Cold, windy and raining. My boat had 2 races today - in the first one we were starting in the front of division 6, so we had to row over without having a chance of bumping anyone. And we did, though the division was cut ( Read more... )

Second opinion sought. I've made up a playlist called "Big Grin" - it's just a collection of songs that usually make me grin when they come on. This isn't supposed to be comprehensive, but these seem to work pretty well. Any suggestions? Denigrating comments? Feedback at all ( Read more... )

I don't know how it works in other Olympic sports like track and field, but in rowing each year they have a World Championships regatta, in which all of the Olympic boat classes are represented, plus a few others. Here's the question: The Olympics come along only every four years, but the World Champs happen each year. Obviously it's a high ( Read more... )

I'm a grouchy old git. I guess most of you knew this already. But now I have new proof. Jamie and I went to a Strokes concert on Tuesday night at UCSD, and it was intolerably loud. Neither of us could stand it, and we ended up leaving. We stood outside the auditorium for most of the hour-long opening act - which was terrible. I suspect the ( Read more... )

For a buffet-filled experience that went from a country where the national sport is eating to a country where the national sport is drinking - and back - last week's cruise wasn't too detrimental. It was actually pretty fun. There were some decent comedy and magic shows, some gambling and pleasant meals, and a dress-up formal night that gave an ( Read more... )

Well...the last three days of the Lents races were disappointing for a variety of reasons. Here's a short summary: Thursday we showed up and rowed like a bunch of tools, and got bumped by Queens', who we'd held off the day before. This was extremely disappointing. Friday and Saturday were a different kind of deal; we rowed quite well both days ( Read more... )

Short version: rowed over ( Read more... )