La Jolla Festival of the Arts

This weekend was the LaJolla Festival of The Arts. It was great fun roaming around and enjoying all the art work. There were a few really interesting photography exhibits. Some of travel photographs mounted on canvas were quite compelling. My favourite was the jewelry boxes from Tom Thorton Fine Art Woodworking. I was very tempted - and I don't even wear jewelry. Another fave was the Art of Chocolate exhibit. I had a pretty amazing handmade peanut butter cup!


I wasn't the only one enjoying The Art of Chocolate

There was a large section in the middle of the fair dedicated to sidewalk art. Young, old, free spirt and professional were all busy at work with their chalk making wild and wonderful creations.


Young and Old making sidewalk art

In the green/eco-friendly section they had an old Rolls Royce Woody that had been converted to run on electricity. Behind the gas cap was a place to plug in and charge.


'Electric' Rolls Royce Woody

King Of Kong

I have been on a kick of watching quirky documentaries. The latest,King of Kong - A Fistful of Quarters, the story revolves around two grown men who are wrapped up in holding the title for highest Donkey Kong Score. That's right, high score on the classic video game where Mario battles Kong to save the pretty lady. It turns out to be a crazy story of good vs. evil... or so it seems. You can be the judge. It has the craziest cast of characters, but remember this is a *real* documentary. At times it may seem like a spoof filled with stereotypes and caricatures. What makes this so quirky - is that it is a true story. It is wild to get a glimpse into the gaming subculture. More than a few times I wanted to yell at the TV screen - 'get a life'. It amazes me to think there is a group of people (Twin Galaxies) that dedicated themselves to certifying video game scores. Great ending to this true life story - it's worth a watch.

Saturday Bike to Work

Today I made a dry run of riding my bicycle to work. I have been wanting to give this a try for a while - but was stalled on finding an appropriate route. The 'official' bike route requires hopping on the 5 freeway for 3/4 of a mile. I see people do it - but I find it bad enough riding in the traffic trying to get on the freeway. Nope, riding on the shoulder of the freeway is not an option. This week one of the guys at work suggested I check out the satellite view in Google Maps and try and find a dirt path or abandoned access road through the canyons. To my amazement I found an abandoned dirt access road right across the street from my church. I was scratching my head - it can't be there, I have never seen it. Well, guess what - it is hidden but it is there! Dirt roads here basically translate to sand traps. No way my nice light road bike with thin racing tires would be able to navigate the sand. That left me riding my old steel framed mountain bike. I get a work out just riding around the block on it.

It took me about an hour, but I made it!.


Standing in front of our offices - nope not going to go in and work!

Not only did I find the dirt access road, but I found a really nice abandoned paved road that is now a bike path. Combining the two I have a ride that managed to cut in half the miles I will have to spend in crazy city traffic.


Closed Road Becomes A Bike Route

Once I arrived I had a little picnic out back and re-charged for the return trip. They were painting the parking lot this weekend. So I had company. This guy was doing the taping. Super friendly and cheerful!


Parking Lot Painting

Buried Treasure

E-T- found this gem in the fridge at work today. An impressive find

Notice the date (yes its blurry). Expired in Nov of 2007!!!



Thanks B-E- for the Pic!

Thought For The Day

“And whatever your labors and aspirations
in the noisy confusion of life,
keep peace in your soul.”

-Max Ehrman

Wanda

Wanda went in for her 30,000 mile check up today. Good news - she got a clean bill of health.

We are thinking of making a little road trip to celebrate!


Wanda home from her check up

P.S. thanks C- S- for the lift.

Hot Air Balloon

I snapped pic this through the windshield of my car on my way home from work tonight.

It isn't every day you see a hot air balloon parked by the side of the road!!

Creative Thank You

Yesterday was my brother-in-law's birthday.

Today this arrived in my inbox (click here)!

Snack Time

I have discovered the most amazing snack. Technically, it is a breakfast cereal - but in my book they are bit sized little peanut butter cookies. I take a handful in my lunch box and treat myself to a mid-afternoon snack at work!

You gotta check out Puffin Peanut Butter Cereal. Low Fat, Lacto-ovo Veggie, Vegan, Wheat Free, Kosher, No Cholesterol, Dairy Free. Wow, that is a mouthful.

So all that healthy stuff and tastes waaaay better than a peanut butter cookies I get from the local bakery. Who'd of thunk it??

Submerged

The weather here has been freakishly hot all weekend. My apartment has become a slower cooker- and I have not enjoyed stewing in my own juices. Rather than melt in the heat ...I decided to escape, have some fun and find a cool body of water to submerge myself in. Yesterday, I surfed and snorkled at Cardiff. Today I stayed local and floated around the community pool.



Tonight I went for early evening walk over to the grocery store and stocked up on fruit popsicles. I figure I can float in the pool until nightfall,then I head back and sit on the balcony enjoying popsicles until bed time.

The weatherman says the heat should start to ease off soon. Either way, tomorrow it is back to work. I don't think I will be complaining 'bout the iglou conditions caused by the air conditioning in the office!

Breakfast

Tippie's Breakfast Burrito

1 whole wheat tortilla
smear with laughing cow cheese
fill tortilla with
scrambled egg whites
grilled zuchini, bell pepper, red onion and tofu chunks
sprinkle with raw sesame seeds
top with Mango Mariachi Salsa



mmmm good!

True Colors

if this world makes you crazy
and you've taken all you can bear
you call me up
because you know I'll be there

And I'll see your true colors
shining through

I see your true colors
and that's why I love you
so don't be afraid to let them show
your true colors
true colors are beautiful
like a rainbow

- Cyndi Lauper

California Dreamin'

Most days I'd rather be at the beach...then tip tapping at the key board.

I saw this in a catologue the other day. I am thinking of upgrading my desktop Zen garden to a beach sandbox .



After work today ... I made the dream a reality. With my boogie board is tow - I stopped at the beach and played in the ocean. The surf looked small - but it was perfect. Lost of nice long rides!



Shortly after I snapped this pic ... I was flagged down by a tourist in the parking lot. I love bumping into people on vacation - they are always so open, relaxed and friendly. Turns out she was a little over enthusiastic in her evening walk. She came down the bluff stairs a few miles back and got caught up in the beauty of the evening walking, walking, walking along the beach - only now, at 7:30 pm, realizing she needed a plan to get back before dark. There was a rather daunting looking hill and long walk ahead of her. I gave her a lift back up to her hotel and we had fun chatting on the drive.

My Hippie Dayz Are Over

In honour of hair cut day - no more hippie tippie!

Thought for the Day

" The arrangement, the design, colour, shape,
depth, light, space,
mood, movement, balance,
not one or all of these fills the bill.
There is something additional,
a breath that draws your breath into its breathing,
a heartbeat that pounds on yours,
a recognition of the oneness
of all things."

- Emily Carr

Détente

After several weeks of escalating tensions - this evening I came home with a peace offering. I bought several cans of 'wet' cat food to try and negotiate my way out of the dog house.

Father's Day, Golf and Bike Ride

Walking out of church this morning a cheerful gentlemen asked if my father was in town. His face dropped when I said, 'no, my father passed away a few years ago'. At that moment, sadness hit me. I would really like to pick up the phone today and be able to wish my Dad a happy father's day. I miss him. I thought of spending some time at home with a photo album and remembering good times. Just thinking about it made me sad - so I opted for some fresh air and an afternoon bike ride.

The traffic was eerily light today Instead of the usual whirr of cars and SUVs speeding by - it was just the occasional shuttle bus, taxi or limo slowly climbing the Genesee hill with me. I guess all those ominous road signs warning to 'Avoid the area' scared people away. About half-way up the hill I came upon a man in golf clothes held up a fistful of U.S. Open tickets. A taxi pulled over and he was off running to make a sale. The area was crawling with men in orange vests guarding empty corporate parking lots. The odd lots advertised parking, but most were taped off with yellow police tape and everywhere there were 'No Event Parking' signs. There was an explosion of orange cones everywhere. A fun little obstacle course for my Sunday afternoon ride.



The most entertaining part of my bike ride as all the crazy road signs. The sign below says no stopping and no standing. There was a policeman near by, watching me closely, as I stopped my bike for a moment and stood there to snap a picture.



Just past this sign was another series of signs - including a big yellow sign that showed a person walking with a big circle with a line through it - along the walkway leading to the admissions entrance. Go figure!




With all the excitement- I almost wish I had an interest in or knew a bit about the game of golf.

Surf Buddies

Unpacking Wanda* and heading out for an afternoon of chasing waves.



What a great day to be playing in the ocean. The water was warm and the sun was muted by the marine layer (typical June gloom). We stayed on the inside, riding waves that had already broken. It was just Jac and I and a few folks walking on the beach. Absolutely no one competing with us for waves. Perfect!



All smiles after an afternoon of playing in the ocean. Suprise, suprise we actually caught and rode a few waves!

*Wanda is my car.

Happy Ending

The happy ending to this earlier post.

Team
We have now successfully arrived in Michigan!!

That's right folks - after a cold and rainy night camped out in GMT ... we have successfully landed and confirmed transactions are being logged with EST timestamps.

I would like to officially thank and confirm the greatness of iTim

- Tippie

Quote Of The Day

We must become the change we want to see in the world.

- Mahatma Gandhi

It's Smoothie Time

This morning's smoothie experiment was a HUGE success.

Yup, I was right - Trader Joe's Pomegranate Green Tea makes an excellent smoothie base!

Here is the scoop...

2 cups Trader Joe's Pomegranate Green Tea
2 scoops of Pomegranate Sorbet (365 Brand, fat free diary free from Whole Foods)
1 cup wild blueberries
1 scoop of Soy Protein Powder with Spirulina (Whole Foods Brand)
1 scoop fiber supplement (Benefiber)
3 fl oz Mixed Berry Flavoured Probiotic Immunity Drink (DanActive)
4 ice-cubes

Blend until smooth. Enjoy!

No filter today

It has been one of those long frustrating work weeks. That combined with feeling ill today -- I guess I just didn't have it in me to pretend. Lately, I have noticed when I am not feeling well I start to loose my *filter* - I start to say exactly what I am thinking...

Dealing with data across timezones is always fun. Today, I was trying to enter a transaction from our office (PST) on a server in the midwest (CST) and have it appear in our web portal with the client's timezone (EST). After some configuration changes by another engineer on the team - I did some testing this was my report back.

Team

Good news is we are no longer stuck in the windy city of Chicago (a.k.a Central Time) - bad news is we flew right by Michigan (our destination of EST), St John's, NFLD (Newfie Time) and ended up God knows where.

I submitted this transaction at at 1:04pm PST, was expecting was expecting to see 4:04 pm EST, got 8:04 PM Mystery timezone.

516 Approved Change Demographics Susie Test 06/12/2008 06/12/2008 08:04:40 PM History

Shall we try again ...

-Tippie

Stimulus Cheque

Mr. Philip A. Belisle
United States Department of the Treasury
Internal Revenue Service
Kansas City, MO 64999-0025

Dear Sir:

On May 9, 2008, I received an “economic stimulus payment” from you for the amount of $600.00. I’m concerned that I received this check in error. As I understand it, you are $9 trillion in debt. You have outstanding bills with:

a) 47 million people in the United States without health insurance
b) 27 million Iraqis
c) 35.5 million Americans living without adequate food
d) 744,000 people in the U.S. without a place to live
e) 2.9 million disabled U.S. veterans
f) at least one polar bear

...


This is a snipit of a blog posting by Rose Marie Berger. Rose Marie is a Sojourners associate editor, is a Catholic peace activist and poet. She sent her stimulus cheque to charity.

For the complete posting click here

Abandoning The Life Raft Mentality

Ever since they broke with the mainline Protestant churches nearly 100 years ago, the hallmark of evangelical's theology has been a vision of modern society as a sinking ship, sliding toward depravity and sin. For evangelicals, the altar call was the only life raft — a chance to accept Jesus Christ, rebirth and salvation. Falwell, Dobson and their generation saw their political activism as essentially defensive, fighting to keep traditional moral codes in place so their children could have a chance at the raft. But many younger evangelicals — and some old-timers — take a less fatalistic view. For them, the born-again experience of accepting Jesus is just the beginning. What follows is a long-term process of "spiritual formation" that involves applying his teachings in the here and now. They do not see society as a moribund vessel. They talk more about a biblical imperative to fix up the ship by contributing to the betterment of their communities and the world. They support traditional charities but also public policies that address health care, race, poverty and the environment.

From the New York Times Article
The Evangelical Crackup
By DAVID D. KIRKPATRICK
Published: October 28, 2007

Another Juice/Tea Combo

Recently, I have been reading the book Skinny Bitch. Ouch, if the title doesn't scorch your ears, the content will. Let's just says it uses much more colourful language than I am accustomed to. That aside, it is an interesting expose on 'we are what we eat' and a reminder to be more intentional about what we consume.

When life gets busy I have an unfortunate tendency to be less intentional about my meals and grab for the quick and easy 'junky' snacks. That has happened a bit too often lately -- so I made a point of stocking up on some healthy groceries for the week. My quest for a replacement for my fave and now extinct Zen Blend Iced Tea is ongoing. Today I am trying out Trader Joes Pomegranate Green Tea. I still prefer POM's Pomegrate Peach White Tea - but the Trader Joe's Tea has a friendly price tag. I am thinking it might actually make a good base liquid for a fruit smoothie. I'll let you know how that works out.

Surf Diva

This weekend my friend Jac became a certified Surf Diva!

I grabbed my camera and parked myself at the beach during her lessons and acted as groupie, paparrazi and cheerleader. It is fun watching the look of determination as the grommets paddle for their first waves and are rudely tossed about by the chop. Ahhh, but there is nothing like that feeling of jubilation when you stand up and ride for the first time. Brought back great memories of my Surf Diva initiation.

If Jac is able to find a board and wetsuit -- by Saturday we will be bobbing up and down in the waves together.

Jac, standing tall and riding the waves


Wave of Victory


Official Surfing Diva Portrait

Early Morning At The Beach

Today

Hangin' at home...

What's all the ruckus about some Hockey Song?

I hung out at the beach this morning and watched a friend's surf lesson. Afterwards as we walked on the beach she asked me about - some controversy in Canada swirling around a hockey song?!? Apparent, NPR and Yahoo news have been runing stories about it.

Ah, yes, earlier this morning I was reading on CBC.ca that the beloved trumpet fanfare/Intro to Hockey Night in Canada may have played for the last time.

Canadians are pretty passionate about their hockey and with 40 years of passion and tradition associated with HNIC - they are not going to let the theme song slip away without a fight. Many have even nicknamed the theme, the second national anthem

In fact one Ottawa paper reported that, "Conservative Heritage Minister Josée Verner must defend one of Canada's most famous musical traditions and do everything possible to ensure the CBC continues to broadcast the theme. The Hockey Night in Canada theme is a part of Canada's culture that goes beyond sport," Coderre said. "If the minister wants to show that she cares about Canadian heritage, this is her chance."

Wondering what all the fuss is about. Below is a YouTube clip of the HNIC opening.



CBC now has a blog page where you can share your special memories of the HNIC Theme song?!? Click here to read. The Toronto Star did the below Man On The Street piece about Toronto's reaction to the demise of the theme song!

Twit-ter

I have a couple of weekly Geek indulgences. I subscribe to the following weeklyTiVo-casts: DLTV, Cranky Geeks and David Pogue's NY Times Tech Review.

All of these shows have been debating the merits of a new service called Twitter.com. I love the Twitter tagline -- 'Real life happens beteen blog posts and e-mail'. Twitter is kind of like a collection of micro blog posts that answer the question 'what are you doing?'.

Listening to the debate I have been intrigued but not enough to actually sign up. Well today, twitter was featured on the Ross Blog. So I finally decided to check it out! You can find me on twitter by searching for thetippiecanoe.

Speaking of Geek TV. David Pogue did an interesting piece today on Free Voice-Activated Phone services. Click here to enjoy!

Quote Of The Day

Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.

-Martin Luther King Jr. (1929 - 1968)

Geek Girl Goes Green

Some Green talk from Geek Girl.



Links:

• www.cristina.org
  
• givingworks.ebay.com
  
• www.epa.org

Welcome?!

A road sign from my drive home this evening.



What could possibly be afoot that I needed to avoid the area near my home.

Once home, I found the following e-mail from UCSD. The menacing road sign is our way of welcoming the U.S. Open to town!


We want you to be aware of a major event in June that will impact traffic around the campus. The U.S. Open Golf Tournament will be held the week of June 9-14 at the Torrey Pines Golf Course and is expected to significantly affect transportation and roads surrounding our campus.

It is recommended you allow extra time for your travels that week. Approximately 50,000 persons are expected to attend each day. The profound impact of this on many people in the vicinity of the campus cannot be over stated. Peak hours for arriving traffic are 7:30 a.m. to 11:00 a.m. and peak exiting hours are 3:30 p.m. to 6:30 p.m.


Hmmm...
I wonder if I can use this note as justification for a 10:00 am - 2:00pm work schedule next week!

Everything Green

Double Dippin' Sunday

Today was double dippin' Sunday.

I have been off on my weekend Eliz-adventures and it seems like ages since I have been in town on a Sunday. It was good to be back home at LJCC today.

The theme of this morning's service was humility. There is nothing more humbling than to be reminded that a mere 45 minutes from where I live in affluence, there are people struggling day to day in abject poverty. Building a home is such a small drop of help in an ocean of need.

I arrived at church this morning as the following song was being sung.

Gloria (selected lyrics)
by Paul Colman

We all walk the same earth
We all breathe the same air
We all feel the same rain that falls

We all have the same heart
Beneath our skin the same blood
Flowing from our maker's hand

All God's children, all God's children
Sing Gloria, sing Gloria
All creation, come before Him
Sing Gloria, sing Gloria

After church I took what I thought would be a 15 minute power nap. Wow, I was out cold for 5 hours! Fortunately, I woke up just in time to scoot up the freeway and catch the Come Build Hope celebration service at SBPC .

Out on the patio was a wall filled with our build team pictures and several family biographies. It was fun to meet up with several members from my team, stand in front of the wall, and share our memories of the weekend.



Our trip celebration and highlight video. Enjoy!




Slowly, our online photo album is being built out here.