Just got home from steak birthday dinner (at Morton's in San Francisco) with my folks. Ate until we could no longer lift our forks. About to explode. BOOM.

* * Happy Birthday to Tony * *

We took the basic belay (ropes) lesson at Planet Granite last night. It is serious stuff. It's an amazing feeling to have your partner's life literally in your hands, and almost as amazing when the tables are turned and your life relies on him -- and on the knots you just learned how to tie ten minutes ago. Today we are still alive, exhilarated, sore, and planning to return to take our exam and be belay certified (that sounds impressive, but it just means that we can be trusted not to kill ourselves).

Other than that, today is dedicated to birthday indulgences for Tony. I predict that mostly means lots of great food. Yum.

We did it! We went to the Avon Breast Cancer 3-Day orientation last night and officially signed up. Between us, we need to raise $3800 by July, so the begging, groveling and whoring will commence soon. I'm in the middle of constructing a web page to do just that. (Preview: it will have links to a donation site where you can pledge online, woo hoo.)

But today is 'Day-Before-Tony's-Birthday-Day' and we have some adventures planned. The highlight is this evening -- we signed up for an indoor rock-climbing lesson at Planet Granite. Wish us luck and gentle falling...

Oops. Will not be walking anywhere today. Tony has pulled the Muscle That Dares Not Speak Its Name and needs to recouperate.

(Mondays are reserved as job hunting days anyhow, though there still do not appear to be any jobs in the Bay Area to hunt for. We'll give it our best and then probably cuddle up and treat ourselves to a pizza or something.)

Woo hoo -- just finished our first Hobee's Hike. From our house to Hobee's and back -- 5.7 miles. We needed a longer route for our training program and this is a good one; very scenic, good snacks, lots of geese, and more than a quarter of the 20-mile daily goal we'll be doing in the Walkathon.

We're going to an orientation next Tuesday to officially enroll.

Turns out that we had a non-standard-sized heater filter. We had to buy a slightly too big one and shove it in without its frame. Now the heater makes a loud SUCKA-SUCKA-WHEEZE noise as it tries to suck the loose filter up into its guts. Clearly, another trip to the Home Depot will be required.

Our luck is flawed lately. We tried to meet my sister Dani for a movie yesterday and showed up late ... at the wrong theater. Sorry, Dani!

The definition of Mixed Feelings: when your pants start to fall down in the Home Depot, very nearly showing several orange-aproned handymen your underwear, because your diet is working faster than you expected.

Asthma much better. But still using it as an excuse to drink far too much Pepsi: the caffeine/cold liquid combo really does seem to help.

We now have a big, exciting hole in our ceiling because Tony took out the heater input filter. It was phenomenally grimy, and thus spreading dirt (and causing asthma?) all over our house. Turns out that it was uncleanable, though, so now we have a big hole until I feel perky enough for a trip to Home Depot.

What is so exciting about a hole in the ceiling? Well, it just so happens to be exactly the right size to send up a helium birthday balloon. How do I know that? Well...

Amazon.com posted their first-ever quarterly profit! I got so thrilled that I started hopping around, which gave me asthma, which sent me back to bed. But we're both thrilled nonetheless.

Going to spend another day cuddled up, popping Day-Quils and trying to give my lungs a chance to recover on their own. It's not so bad. Yesterday was marvellous despite the wheezing -- writing all day -- and today should be even better because Tony will be around (he was with friends yesterday) to feed me grapes and obey my every bidding. (ha ha.)

-- ps. TOMV, I'd love to answer your email but your mailbox is full. Please delete something! :) ---

The get-together yesterday was a success; quiet, good food, everyone seemed to leave happy. The GameCube (still on loan from Dave) was a major hit. Unfortunately, the asthma is still getting worse, so today I am relegated to bed all day while Tony goes out with some friends. I'm going to cuddle up with the laptop and try to get some writing chores done.

Having a family gettogether at our house today to celebrate Tony and Rachel's birthdays. We have balloons, tootsie rolls, and a remarkably clean downstairs ready to go. But now must wait for people to arrive. Isn't that always the hardest part of a party? Those empty minutes or hours when everything is ready but nothing is happening yet.

(BTW -- my asthma had been getting awful again, of course. It always gets bad after I've been sick. I'm still hoping to avoid the doctor's Giant Needle O' Cortisone, however. Hate that stuff.)

Just followed the Animal Planet instructions for communicating telepathically with your pet. Gabe wants my fleece blanket and to eat the two ponytail palms sitting outside the glass door. Of course, it does not require telepathy to know this.

(Sorry these links open in the news frame. Have temporarily blanked on the HTML to open a new window. Reminder, anyone?)

Bad news. The Hot Water Heater Inspector Guy, sent last night by the homeowner's association, informs us that our hot water heater is: A) substandard, B) improperly mounted, and, C) requires a drainage pipe. 'A' means we have to buy a new one. 'B' requires a metal mounting structure attached to the wall in our too-wide water heater closet. 'C' is the kicker. 'C' means ripping open the walls under our stairs, through our laundry room, and through our garage, to install an up-to-code drainage pipe.

Not good. We paid for Operation Faucet with Home Depot gift certificates I earned on mypoints.com; earning enough for Operation Hot Water would take thirty years. Think if we somehow forget the whole thing, the homeowner's association will forget as well?

Not much to report. It's all Dave's fault. He loaned us his GameCube, and we are now addicted to The Simpson's Road Rage. We're camping on the couch, eating noodles and hard-boiled eggs, and only occasionally wandering upstairs to check Tony's email for job responses. Ha.

(I guess this means that our first day of training for the walkathon was not a raging success. Hmm. We'll try again over the weekend.)

Changed our minds. We found a different walkathon -- this one is San Jose to San Francisco, 3-days/60-miles, for breast cancer. Next July. But we each need to raise $1900 in pledges. Yikes. We need some fundraising ideas, quick. We've never done anything like this -- either the fundraising part or the walking part -- but we're enthused about the idea and the cause, and we have lots of time to train. Right? Besides, if we can't do a 3-day walkathon, how will we ever get up Mt. Kilimanjaro?

I stepped on GLASS. One step and had an inkling something was wrong. Two steps and I was sure. Three steps and I was howling, hopping on one foot and begging Tony to come pull the glass out of my toe. Blood. More howling. But now I'm wearing a jungle-spotted bandaid and the world is right agan.

Time to come out of hibernation and shed some winter pounds. We walked all over the golf course last night with my Mom & Stephen, and took another Jamba Walk today. (That's when we go clear down to Jamba Juice and home again... it's about 2.2 miles each way -- 4.4 total. I generally lose one pound every five times I do it.)

Still contemplating the MS 50-mile/3-day Walkathon in June, but we would need $1500 in pledges. Each. Any sponsors out there?

Added Ngorongoro Crater pictures to the photos section.

The manager of the local Mailboxes, Etc., upon hearing that we had filed a complaint at the main office, left us an agitated phone message. Decided not to respond. Later, a regional manager called. Turned out to be a very nice lady. Hopefully, this is the end of it.

Took our first Jamba Walk of the year -- 4.5 miles. We're considering signing up for the MS walkathon this spring, going 50 miles in 3 days. Sounds exciting!

Added our first photo page! Ten pics from Lake Manyara, Tanzania. Please let us know whether or not they display properly on your system.

Would you believe that our local Mailboxes, Etc. charges a 200% service charge to mail packages? True. Charge for a $10.88 UPS package (base price confirmed with UPS): $32.64. Charge for an $18 US mail package (base price confirmed at post office): $54 dollars. And the manager would not admit these totals included service charges at all until we confronted him with the evidence. It was quite an adventure yesterday and I'm going to write up a web-site expose on the subject as soon as I collect a little more info.

Quiet other than that. Saw 'A Beautiful Mind' with our friends Dave and Kim. A great movie, but a lot more intense than we expected. Came home reeling.

Went to the unemployment office at 8am only to discover that it has been bulldozed and we must file by phone. Hmm. So we came home and: 1) called Unemployment every 20 seconds to try to get into the filing queue, and 2) wrestled to have our health insurance turned back on. Finally succeeded at the first, but not yet the second.

Making up for horrid day with a Taco Bell feast, Robinson Crusoe on Mars, and a bowl of popcorn.

Happy birthday to Dad!

The world seems full of possibility, now that we are finally recovering. Planet Granite -- the indoor rockclimbing place in San Jose -- is calling out to us. So is the Haunted Mansion in Disneyland. (Why didn't anyone tell us they'd made it over in a Nightmare Before Christmas theme for the holidays?) So is Krispy Kreme. So is the big Kepler's bookstore, because Tony stole my Kepler's bookmark and I must replace it. (He denies this adamantly but it is true.) So is the next phase of Operation Faucet.

But before any of that happens, we must stop being such phlegm monsters.

Happy birthday to Rachel!

We went shopping on a Quest for Jeans and Calendars today. Jeans because my last pair of jeans died last night, and calendars as an optimistic gesture that Tony will need an office calendar sometime in 2002. We got tired along the way and crashed in front of a demo TV in Circuit City. They have comfy leather couches there!

ps. isn't he fun? -->

Went to refill my asthma medicine last night and... our insurance was rejected. This should not be so, as we're supposed to be covered through this month and we signed up for COBRA after that. Nonetheless, there the pharmacist was, saying that we owed $100 because our insurance was cancelled.

Ugh. We hope to resolve it with the insurance lady on Monday.

Recuperating from our colds has a bright side. We've watched Here Comes Mr. Jordan, Angel On My Shoulder, and Hedwig and the Angry Inch, all since yesterday. Not bad!

Relapse. Ugh sick. Both of us. Popping yukky echinaecea capsules like mad.

Was coherent long enough this morning to add a Links page to the site. <-----

Happy 22nd Birthday Jessica!

While still under the weather, we felt good enough to get up and do some things on the first day of the new year! We spent the most of the day hanging out with our friends Susan and Tom, and their girls Sophie, Anna and Ellie. We hung out, saw Monsters Inc and played Lion King all over the upstairs.

Also, I have done a major update to the Games section of the site (many new images to see and click, including videos of my defunct online games in my EA.com section!)

Finally, we have also added support to allow people without inline-enabled browsers to read this news page (Thanks Stephen!)

Maybe tomorrow we will tackle the final phase of Operation Faucet.