A day late again, but here are my favorite pictures from this weekend:

The Mexican sage in our back yard started blooming recently. All in all the yard is looking pretty nice right now.

Juliette and Jason played with the water table on Saturday morning. I love the look on his face here.

Saturday afternoon we went and visited some friends and their daughter, Lilliana. This picture was pretty representative of their interaction--she kept wanting to hug and kiss him and he was like "Why are you doing that?"

Lilliana had these little boxes that I think are meant to teach colors since each one was full of toys that were the same color as the box. Jason was less interested in the boxes' educational value, though, than he was in wearing them as hats. (I don't know why, but he loves hats right now, and tries to turn just about everything into a hat.) Unfortunately, the boxes were a little snug on his head and he had trouble getting them off on his own.

I'm not totally thrilled with how enthralled Jason can be by the TV sometimes, but it does make it a lot easier to get a few things done in the morning.  In case you're wondering, that's Ricky Gervais singing Elmo a "celebrity lullaby" on Sesame Street.

On Sunday we went to the pool for the first time in almost a year. Jason had unfortunately forgotten most of what he learned in his infant swimming classes and was kind of apprehensive about the toddler pool at first, even though it's shallow enough for him to stand up along its entire length. But he loosened up eventually and had a good time.

I had trouble winnowing down the full set this week, but here are some highlights from the rest of the set:

Yesterday, Juliette and I walked five miles in the rain with some friends (and 2,108 strangers) in order to help find a cure for literacy. I placed fourth to last in the "Male 30-34" bracket (just barely beating out a blind woman, a woman nine months into her pregnancy, and an 89-year-old man), picked up two new blisters, and had the skin worn off the back of my left ankle by a shoe that is sorely in need of replacement. And a fun time was had by all.

All kidding aside, we had a great time. It was, indeed, raining, but it felt good to participate in something for a good cause. We opted to walk instead of run, which meant that we got wetter and colder than we might have otherwise, but it also meant that it wasn't particularly strenuous, and we spent the time talking and laughing, which is a pretty good way to spend a Sunday morning, if you ask me.

Between the event and the weather, Jason had to stay in the stroller the entire time, and all things considered he stayed in a pretty good mood the whole time. Maybe he found the prospect of walking on the freeway as exciting as the rest of us did, I don't know. But for the most part he seemed pretty content, though he did keep trying to find ways to stick his feet out from under the big umbrella that we propped up in between him and his friend Amalea (our race partners' daughter). For her part, Amalea wisely chose to spend most of the race asleep.

Two years ago if you'd asked me if I would ever participate in an event like this I'd have looked at you like you were out of your mind. At breakfast after the race yesterday, though, I was talking about training for a marathon or a century bike race. Most likely I won't be doing either any time soon, since the training requires a bit too much of a regular time commitment for me at the moment. Still, old me would likely be smacking new me upside the head.

Anyway, I'd just like to say thanks to our friends James and Melanie for getting us to come along and walk with them (and to congratulate Mel for doing this just five months after having had a fibrosarcoma removed from her thigh). Also thanks to Emily and Ari for the loan of their stroller. Right on!

A couple of friends from out of town came and visited this weekend, prompting a trip to an Indian restaurant for dinner, followed by a dim sum lunch the next day. Quite a successful weekend, in my opinion.

On Saturday, Juliette and I went up to LA to see a performance by a friend of ours. On the way, we stopped at the Grove to have dinner at the Farmer's Market. For those of you who are unfamiliar with LA landmarks, the Grove is a swanky shopping mall that was built about 5 or 6 years ago around the site of the historic LA Farmer's Market. The market portion of the Farmer's Market is still there, and is home to some excellent food stands as well as some neat little specialty shops and grocers.

Anyway, we had hardly gotten out of the parking lot before I was wrinkling my nose at the overwhelming consumerism and image consciousness displayed by the mall patrons. It's been over a year now since we left Orange County and I guess I've gotten re-sensitized. It seemed like everyone I saw was wearing designer clothes or huge sunglasses or had perfectly styled hair and nails, and I couldn't stop thinking "Ew!" every few seconds. Plus, the place was packed; you could hardly walk ten feet without bumping into someone. I kept thinking of that line from Rent: "When you're living in America, you're what you own."

The irony is, of course, that the very next day I went on a shopping rampage because I was flush with birthday cash that was burning a hole in my pocket. We spent more or less the entire afternoon looking for stuff for me to buy. And now I'm not sure if the funk I'm feeling myself entering is self-disgust or just regret that I can't keep spending. I'm trying to keep my self esteem intact by reminding myself that I only shop for myself twice a year.

But, on to the purchases.

One of my birthday purchases was a pair of Philips SBC HN050 Noise-Cancelling Headphones. I was a little hesitant about buying a set of headphones that requires a battery, but I've been intrigued by active noise cancelling for a while now. Unfortunately, I've discovered that activating the noise cancelling function messes with my ears in a very odd way. Even without music turned on, I feel a strange "pressure" in my left ear that quickly spreads to my left temple. After thirty seconds or so, that's followed by a disoriented, dizzy feeling and mild nausea that's reminiscent of being ever so slightly carsick. It's quite disappointing, because this sensation makes it more or less impossible for me to use that feature. Still, the earpieces are reasonably comfortable when positioned properly and the sound quality is more than adequate to my non-audiophilic ears, so it's not a total loss.

(Note to self: size 36 belts are not meant for people who wear size 36 pants. And, for crying out loud, try stuff on before you buy it!)

I also bought a ridiculously expensive remote control. So far, I like it, but I have to say, for $250 it should really be easier to set up. It took me the better part of an hour to program two activities, mostly due to the cumbersome web interface. What would be most intuitive to me is to have an activity represented as an editable list of actions. Perhaps you could throw in some AJAX for some drag-and-drop functionality, and add some smarts to fill in a default sequence. Instead, you get an only partially configurable list that comes after a rather convoluted wizard. I was less than impressed, even factoring in Best Buy's $50 instant rebate. On the bright side, once I did manage to beat it into submission, it seems to work pretty well.

By the way, I mentioned that we were up in LA to see a friend's performance--well, if you're in the LA area and you're intrigued by avant-garde theater, the friend's name is Elke Luyten and she's doing a corporeal mime performance called "Here Is Someone" For those of you unfamiliar with corporeal mime--I imagine that's pretty much everyone--it's quite a bit different from the "guy trapped in an invisible box" shtick you're probably imagining. Corporeal mime is a variety of movement-based performance art developed by Étienne Decroux in the early part of the 20th century as a modern (in the sense of "modernism") redefinition of the mime artform. The actor uses a codified series of movements involving the entire body as his or her medium of expression. Often times text or music is added, but this is done subsequent to the choreography and in many ways the choice of words and sounds is almost incidental. Meaning, in the traditional sense, is not made explicit, instead arising out of the synthesis of movement, text, and the audience's subjective experience.

If that sounds esoteric and "artsy fartsy" to you, well, it is. But it's also quite beautiful, just in terms of pure visual aesthetics. It can also be unsettling, confusing, intense, serene, or even playful. Elke's performance in this piece definitely falls into the "intense" category, but, lacking a more developed critical understanding of this sort of art, I'm not sure how much better I can describe it.

If you're interested, the performance is at the Son of Semele theater (3301 Beverly Blvd., Los Angeles) at 10 PM on Friday and Saturday nights from now until July 15. The performance runs about 15 minutes and admission is $5. Elke's show follows a 90-minute play by the hosting company, called King Cat Calico Finally Flies Free. If you want to see both shows, admission to the mime show is free if you buy a ticket to the play. Incidentally, the play is interesting if you like your theater on the experimental (and low budget) side--Juliette and I liked the style and performances, although not really the text. So you know, King Cat Calico is not family-friendly.

One more note: the theater is in what looked to me like a really sketchy neighborhood and street parking is all that's available. Juliette and I were a little concerned about leaving our car and even though everything turned out all right for us, I feel like I'd be remiss if I didn't mention it.

I'm finding it a little difficult to focus at the moment. My mind is quite scattered, kind of like the way sunlight scatters as it passes through the atmosphere, producing the blue color we're used to seeing in the sky. So instead of a tight, cohesive, laser beam of an essay, today you get this dim, flickering candle of a post.

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I'm not nearly as good a poker player as I would like, as evidenced by the $25 I've lost so far playing micro-limit online hold 'em. Does this mean I'm going to quit? Of course not.

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I'm always a little behind the times, which probably explains why it was only this past week that I subscribed to my first podcast. At first I just didn't really get the point. For the most part, I don't listen to talk or news radio, so why would I listen to essentially the same thing on the Internet? Well, things have changed somewhat. Over the past few months the number of web comics I read has doubled, as have the number of blogs I regularly check. Text-only blogs led to video blogs and that, combined with my growing interest in indie music over the past year, led to podcasting.

The three main feeds I'm listening to at the moment are all from radio stations. KCRW, the NPR affiliate in Santa Monica, is well-known for its influential "Morning Becomes Eclectic" music program. That program was one of the few things I was sad to leave behind when I moved to San Diego, so I was delighted to find that they also stream it from their web site. And now they have two very interesting podcasts. The first is a collection of live sets from the show--only updated infrequently because they only include unsigned or independent artists--and the second is a "song of the day" list. The latter, along with a similar feed from Seattle's KEXP, have turned up some really interesting songs that I doubt I would have heard otherwise.

I also subscribe to the video podcast from Rocketboom but it has the irritating quality of failing to work from my office.

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Speaking of video blogs, I started watching Ze Frank's The Show last week and I really like it. I understand that Ze's vlog (yes, it's a stupid word, but that's what they're calling them these days) is one of the more popular ones out there, so you may already watch it. If not, I suppose you'll want a description. OK. If The Show were an ice cream sundae, it would be two scoops of making fun of news items, one of making fun of his viewers, liberally drizzled with fart jokes, and sprinkled with tidbits (mostly complaints) from his own life. And, of course, the cherry on top would be the project to make a sandwich out of the Earth.

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One of my good friends got her master's degree this past Sunday. A lot of thoughts and feelings were going through my mind as I watched her commencement ceremony--I felt proud of her for her accomplishment, a little jealous that I hadn't done it yet, and maybe a little hopeless at the recognition that I probably will never get around to grad school. But most of all I was struck by how boring the ceremony was. I mean, of course it was cool to see my friend walk across the stage, but that was the sole interesting thing about the entire two-hour event

I remember both my high school and college graduations quite well. Both consisted of what I think of as pretty standard graduation elements: a processional to "Pomp and Circumstance," the national anthem, the Pledge of Allegiance, some opening remarks by the principal/president, one or two student speeches, a faculty award or two, a keynote speaker, the awarding of diplomas, some closing remarks, and, finally, the recessional.

Actually, my friend's graduation was actually pretty much the same, except that some of the elements had been changed. Instead of having short opening remarks, for example, they had long opening remarks that mainly consisted of introducing a bunch of faculty and staff that I didn't know or care about. (Judging by the applause, some of them didn't even matter to the students.) Instead of having a valedictory address, they had some student get up and accept a diploma on behalf of the whole class. And instead of a keynote speaker, they had, well, nothing.

I had figured beforehand that it would be somewhat different from my college graduation, being a huge state university instead of a small, private college. I thought that meant that the boring part would be longer, considering there would be far more diplomas to hand out. I didn't expect the extent to which my prediction would hold true. On the bright side, at least I know what to expect should I ever get back to school.

In any case, as boring as the ceremony was, it doesn't take away from the magnitude of my friend's accomplishment. I really am happy for her--I mean, not only does she have a master's degree now, but she also has all kinds of free time in the evening. So congratulations, Mel.

One of my good friends from high school got married this past Saturday. Juliette was very excited about it because even though she was never actually the groom's friend, we hadn't been to a wedding since our own--almost three years ago--and like any good junkie she needed her fix. I was excited, too, but more because I was just so happy for my friend.

I ended up having quite a good time. At first I was a little worried because I didn't know anyone but the groom and a few of his family members, plus it was uncomfortably hot--the wedding was held in the town where the couple lives, which is way out in the middle of the Mojave Desert. Anyone who has been to a large wedding knows that the newlyweds won't be able to make much time during the reception to hang out with any one guest--they've just got too many people that want a piece of them. So if you only know the couple and you're not very outgoing, you're in for a sort of slow night. As it turned out, though, my friend had invited another guy I knew from high school, and Juliette and I spent a fair amount of time that evening chatting with him and his wife, catching up and reminiscing. It was really nice to hear what was going on with him, not to mention interesting.

What will stay in my mind as the defining image of the wedding, though, was the look on the groom's face during the ceremony. As long as I've known this guy--and it's been about twenty years since we first met--he's always played it close to the vest when it came to emotions. We've had many a chuckle, but I can't think of a time I've ever seen him angry or depressed or ecstatic. But the expression he had when he was looking at his bride was so full--joy, love, amazement, one after another all nakedly present on his face. I swear I even saw him get choked up. It was amazing. In fact, it was one of the most beautiful things I've ever seen. I'm glad I got the chance to see it--it's things like that that make your own life richer.

Congratulations, MacKenzie and Stephanie. I'm really happy for you guys.