More bridge

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Antioch bridge

We took a field trip at work to check out a bridge. We went way out under the bridge on a catwalk.

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Some inconsiderate person...

...dumped these fries outside my house. They are now swarming with ants.

Chris and Helen

We headed out to Pleasanton to see the wedding. Super hot day, but the music was good, the food was good, and the venue was beatiful.

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Rich and his crustacean obsession

We went for a walk and the crabs were everywhere. After some tag teaming, he caught this one.

Four spicy rolls

Brooke and I split the four. Sigh. Sushi Fridays are the best.

Eric's first shotgunned PBR.

A bit messy, but well done for a first attempt. The conceptual communication failed to convey that he was supposed to drink from the newly cut hole, not from the pop top. It went much better the second time around.

Zorro, the BBQ bandit

Eric received this awesome BBQ rapier, complete with mask.

Z squared

Zelda and James, formerly known as Ziggy.

Drew and corn

Somehow he looks almost bored with it?

Cross-eyed!

Drew picked it up pretty fast.

Need your car washed?

I've got three kids, eager and waiting. It'll cost you, though, in chocolate cookies, milk and strawberries.

A selection of woods

I think these will eventually be a cutting board.

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Boneless sleeping...

...I wish I could sleep like that. The sleep of cats and babies. Uh...when they sleep, that is...

Drew and James

On our way

Sfo bart station

It was quite a wait for the train.

Space quarantine vehicle

This was used after the first space flights to make sure aliens hadn't laid eggs in the astronaut's chest cavities.

Museum of flight

We went to the smithsonian air and space museum in DC with Dave and kids. Drew's biggest surprise was seeing Jetfire from the transformers movie (SR-71), so he got several pictures with it.

All 3 kids

In front of the blackbird, of course.

Enola gay

Very big. Photo doesn't do justice.

Concord

Space quarantine vehicle

This was used after the first space flights to make sure aliens hadn't laid eggs in the astronaut's chest cavities.

Satellites

Photo credit: Drew

Space shuttle!

Transformers display

It was surprisingly complete.

Catch of the day

Drew reeled it a big fish. But he wanted nothing to do with it afterwards.

Giant beetle

Emma looks on as I hold the beast. She held it after I took the picture.

Swinging

Andrew Hood

Drew loved archery. I might have to get him a bow some day.

Amy climbing

Tree climbing

Drew was probably 20 feet high at the highest.

Nice horsie

Drew got in for a shot, then ran away.

You sunk my battleship

Drew and julia learned battleship. Drew had some tricks like hanging his ships off the grid.

Helicopter

I rebuilt Alex's destroyed lego set. The hardest part was finding the pieces from several tubs.

Fort

I built a blanket fort for the kids. They loved it.

Fast friends

Watching a movie at 75 mph.

Dead tired

Landed!

A full day of travel is over, and Drew celebrates by the luggage.

Dentist

A perfect check-up.

Cheeto fingers

He's also showing off the new ink.

It even has...

...windows!

My temporary desk

At IFC is so much nicer than my cube at my office.

Drew's bed companion

I wonder what their pillow talk is like?

Like father, like son

Slightly different tech, both valid ways to kill time at LAX.

Ready for the zombie attack

Scooby sandwich

Craigslist is music to my ears

Some people heard me complaining about my music woes. The stereo that I have set up in the kitchen has served me well for probably 6 years, and it was great. It had a 5 disc changer, played mp3 files, had a great digital tuner, got great reception, and had a nifty line in we used to listen to ipods and other external music sources. Unfortunately, it's been dying a slow death over the last 2 weeks. It has a 'click of death' that comes in randomly, and will cut the audio out for several minutes at a time. I thought it might be rogue IR beams from outside, and tried blocking the receiver port, but it happened day and night, and pretty much rendered the unit unusable.

We never really used the cassette or CD player functionality of the unit. We had it up on top of the kitchen cabinets and had a line in dropped down through the cabinets for external music, and otherwise, it was used to listen to AM or FM. What I really needed was something that just did that.

So I hit up craigslist, looking for a deal. Eventually, I happened upon this puppy - a Pioneer DSX-V412, which was just a 6x100w DPL2/DD/DTS receiver. It might be a bit overkill for this function, but it works perfectly. The best part of all - it was only $25! I picked it up from a very nice lady in American Canyon during our trip into Richmond and Berkeley today.

Here it is, majestically perched on top of the corner of our cabinet. The line-in goes through a hole in the top of the cabinet, and comes out at the bottom of the same cabinet (credit: Amy).

And here's the whole setup from a distance. The only shame is that I now have enough power to push 6 speakers, and I'm only running 2. If we happen upon some more speakers in the future, we'll add them on later.

The target shopping cart-o-vater

Safe for kids? We didn't test it.