Sweeney Ridge and Mori Point hikes

So, a few weeks ago I went insane and developed a crazy schedule for what can roughly be called "our travel." It has everything: weekend hikes around the Bay Area and week-long jaunts off to Mexico.

This weekend marked the inauguration of my crazy schedule, with two hikes in the Golden Gate National Recreation Area: Sweeney Ridge and Mori Point.

Sweeney Ridge (via Mori Ridge Trail) was a generally easy/moderate 5 mile hike with about 1000 feet of elevation gain. The gain, though, came all within a mile. That part could have been rough, but BDR and I were troopers, and we were rewarded with...

...the depressing remains of a Nike Missile Site....

...lots of foggy views...

...the site of the "Discovery" of the San Francisco Bay...

...and the always picturesque Portola Gate.

Next, we trotted over to the 1.5 or so mile Mori Point Trail. After hiking through private property, we encountered this...


...but continued anyway. It turns out, this entire promontory is criss-crossed with trails, mostly from mountain bikes.

And, we were rewarded with what Kevin loves the most: ocean views.


As always, more photos are available via Flickr:

Sweeney Ridge

an ill-advised parking-lot rant, part 2

Lest you think I might have been bragging about my "above average" driving skills here in the Bay Area. I offer you exhibit A:


I could barely squeeze my round bottom into my car.

It's really getting to the point where I might be unable to enter my vehicle.

I'm not vain, but...

I've been having what I'll politely call a "miscommunication" with the woman who's been cutting my hair since moving to California. I'd tolerated the situation for a while, because, really, the salon is down the block and the prices are crazy cheap for this area. But after my last experience, I decided "no more! be a woman, Amy, and stand up for yourself."

I'd made the mistake of telling Jeannie I'd like to grow out my hair; after that, she was unwilling to hear anything else I had to say, even if I were as clear as I could be. (For example: "Please cut the back of my hair so it is shorter than the front of my hair, as I am developing a fe-mullet, and it's not attractive.")

The last straw came when she made some incoherent excuse for why she couldn't exactly cut my hair evenly. Understand? Me either.

So, anyway, I'm going to see someone at a much more expensive place in Palo Alto. I was kind of looking forward to it...until I realized the stylist is named "Dre." Hmm. It could be interesting.

Since moving to Mountain View - well, really, since the start of 2007 - Kevin and I have been asked to do a series of increasingly insane things by well-meaning people who think that we actually can accomplish the tasks and handle the responsibility.

Most recently, we've been invited to be a part of an "executive committee" in charge of raising over a million dollars, as part of a larger campaign to raise 100 million dollars for the Diocese of San Jose.

Apparently, we don't need to do anything but just "be young" and "be new to the area." But I think it involves going to parishioners homes and hitting them up for cash money, something I don't know I feel comfortable doing.

Oh, well. Maybe this is how we'll fund BDR's college education.

Strangers with Candy: The Movie

I've really never been so disappointed in my life. What's the opposite of bravo? Because that's what this movie earns.

I suppose I'd been prewarned, what with the poor reviews and all, but I hoped against hope that it would actually be funny. It was not. I fell asleep multiple times, and while I could blame it on overall exhaustion, I'm placing the blame squarely on the inherent lameness of the movie.

mmm...ice cream...

Dreyers (a.k.a. Edys) has released several promotional flavors to tie-in with American Idol's return to television, and all I can say is YUM.

We've tried two: Chock 'n' Roll Caramel and Take the Cake.

Chock 'n' Roll Caramel purports to be chocolate and caramel flavored ice cream, but it tastes exactly like a Wendy's Frosty. It does have yummy bits of chocolate and caramel, though.

Take the Cake tastes like pure yum, as it is stuffed full of icing and sprinkles. I promptly developed gestational diabetes after eating it.

Kevin: I think birthday cake ice cream is the greatest innovation in ice cream in the past 15 years.

once again, I am vetoed

Kevin's been making some editorial changes to our grocery list:

Note "unLucky Charms" at the end.

To be fair, all I eat are clementines, cheese sticks, yogurt, oatmeal, Whole Food's version of Triskets, and soy drinks.

Oh, and ice cream.

separate but equal

In order to save some of the non-breeders out there from the ridiculous amount of baby blogging that is just on the horizon, we've constructed an alternate source of information:

www.babydavisross.blogspot.com

it didn't taste good, but I ate it anyway

I'm blaming this one on pregnancy.

I thought it would taste good. Alas, it kind of tasted like vomit. And it gave me cancer tongue.

But, as you can see, it's really a health food. No cholesterol, no trans fat, and kosher to boot!

I am concerned as to why it can't be exposed to direct sunlight, though.

mystery alarm

We've lived here for almost seven months, but this is a first:

Last night, the alarm on our ancient stove went off. We heard it around 5:15 a.m., but who knows how long it had been going off.

From the bedroom, it sounded suspiciously like water running through the bathroom pipes. From the kitchen, it sounded vaguely alarm-like.

Anyway, after some furious Internet searching, it appears we still have no idea how to work the ancient contraption.


But really, my question is: why now? We've not touched the assortment of dials and knobs that constitute the brains of our pre-Carter stove. We didn't even use the stove last night.

possible causes for sudden alarm

(1) Protest following State of the Union address. Perhaps our house is soaking up all of our anti-Bushism?
(2) Divine intervention. Is it any coincidence that neither KJ nor I could reclaim that last hour of sleep that was stolen from us? Perhaps we ought to be waking up at 5 a.m. This is a singularly depressing thought.
(3) Imminent demise of stove. This is the most likely explanation. I suspect it's all downhill from here.
(4) Prankster neighbors. Perhaps "the old dude," the gentleman who lives above us, sneaked downstairs to get his inner Puck out. I rather like this theory, as I suspect he has a lot of built-up irritation toward us and our loud ways.

my new barometer for what's good in the world

BDR's been kicking, punching, and headbutting with such ferocity in recent days I suspect she's staging a one-woman escape party. What's the hurry? All the awesomeness out in the world. For example:

- The Colts are going to the Superbowl. (BDR was especially frantic during the end of this game, engaging all of her small appendages to cheer.)

- 24 is back! (BDR already has a crush on Jack Bauer. She's her mother's daughter.)

- Global warming is upon us. (Er...yeah. This doesn't work so well. Perhaps BDR was protesting the ineptitude of government environmental policy? At any rate, she made her presence known while we were watching An Inconvenient Truth last night.)

And on the topic of An Inconvenient Truth, can you offer me some advice, Al Gore? It's a great movie, but at the end, KJ and I were left with only a few paltry examples of what to do to abate this problem.

The most depressing part of the movie? When the polar bears started drowning. Oh, man, that was tough.

Who's in Amy's Belly? Round 3: NCAA Basketball Edition

Believe it or not, I'm only 19 years old.

Baby Davis-Ross has taken on a new set of characteristics in the past few weeks - she's apparently GI-NORMOUS. Why do I say this?


- Frequent revising of BDR's ETA. Recent estimates at May 6, but it could be a week earlier.

- Frequent amazement that I can feel BDR, Kevin can feel BDR, and that we can see BDR move.

- The rather depressing news of my current weight status, explicable only by BDR's gigantism.


So who's BDR this week? How about Ohio State's mature-before-his-time Greg Oden?

things you don't want to hear your mechanic say...

Argh. Friday saw me spending an unanticipated 7 hours and $700 in car repairs.

We knew we needed new tires and an oil change.

We didn't know about the new shocks and struts.

Anyway, like I said, I spent a lot of quality time with the mechanic supervisor while the car was being repaired. He didn't exactly inspire confidence.

Some so-true-I-couldn't-make-it-up conversations:

(1) (After the mechanic asked me how Kevin proposed.) "Yeah, I wasn't very romantic when I proposed. I was in Reno with my girlfriend, and we were selling a lot of drugs, so we had a lot of money and were really high. We were jewelry shopping, and I bought her a ring, and then said, 'We're going to the Justice of the Peace.' I kidnapped her."

Should I even bother to say the marriage didn't work out? Because it didn't.

(2) (After a mechanic came in from the shop, glared at me, and muttered something to the supervisor.) "Your car killed my mechanics."

(3) (After trying to explain what Kevin did for a living.) "I'd have to smoke a lot of weed to get through that job."

Mostly, I find offense with the notion that he kidnapped his girlfriend to marry her.

Required Reading # 7: World War Z

Let's get this out of the way first: Yes, it's a book about zombies. So, technically, it's science fiction. (Pause to recompose. Continue.) But, it's really smart science fiction. And, David Sedaris told me to read it. So, there.

The world Max Brooks - the curious progeny of Mel Brooks and Ann Bancroft - has created is eerily plausible. Well...except for the zombie bits. I mean this with all seriousness, however: if you remove the zombie parts, it reads like the oral history of the avian flu, or the Spanish flu, or some heretofore undiscovered supervirus. There are no superpowers (unless you count China); there are no superweapons. It takes the U.S. Army a few years to realize that their fancy guns and body armor really aren't any match for something that can only be killed by a direct hit to the brain.

What I appreciated the most about the book, however, wasn't the military strategery, but rather the sensitivity to international relations. Brooks portrays a reasonable description of what the world would look like if in 10 or 15 years in the event of a catastrophic virus, like avian flu. Israel fares particularly well, due to what Brooks describes as a Jewish paranoia of mass extinction. Cuba also turns out well. Iceland? Not so well.

And who leads the U.S through all of this? No names are mentioned, but it's clear that Brooks has tapped Colin Powell and Howard Dean as Prez and Veep, respectively. Curious...

Kevin's Lament

Those 15 hours of Season 3 of Battlestar Galactica you DVR-ed while we were away on vacation?

Yeah, the ones on the Sci-Fi Channel?

Did I tell you we don't GET the Sci-Fi Channel?

Kevin's sense of loss is palpable. And the series was just getting good again!

No more sexy Cylon dreams for Kevin Ross!

Baby Davis-Ross, Preview Edition #2...now with more mystery

So, over Christmas I kind of exploded, to the point where I look "pregnant" and not "chubby." However, I am still not at the place where people will ask if I'm expecting, for fear that I'm just pleasantly plump in an really awkward way.

To wit, a picture where I look gigantic. (I also look like I just rolled out of bed, which I did.)


However, don't let your eyes deceive you. A few days later:


I'm decidedly smaller in this take, although half of my belly is covered by the gi-normous waistband of my maternity jeans.

I'm about 21 weeks in both of the pictures. I say "about," because every time Baby Davis-Ross gets checked in on, she gets about 2 weeks older. At this rate, BDR will be arriving mid MARCH, not mid MAY.

In other barely-interesting pregnancy news, I'm happy to report that my pregnancy symptoms are possibly the lamest ever. For example, I have a stuffy nose all of the time. Also, I'm itchy all over. (Hmm...now that I think of it, I may be allergic to BDR. Interesting proposition.) My food aversions are mostly gone. I'm not even tired any longer.

In fact, things are going so well that I often forget I'm pregnant, but then one of two things happen:
- the baby kicks my bladder (her favorite pastime);
- I try to squeeze through a tight space (like, any place in our apartment) and get stuck halfway through;
- I try to bend over...and get stuck halfway through. My sense of balance definitely is off.

Christmas Photos - the last bits

Our camera finally arrived today, which means new photos for all!

What's Christmas like in Indiana? It's a lot of games, followed by some general mischief.

Exhibit A:

Games...

...then Mischief

Christmas in Indiana

31 photos

a few of my career chocies...

Boxer, mascot, astronaut, imitation Krusty, baby-proofer, trucker, hippie, plow-driver, food critic, conceptual artist, grease salesman, carny, mayor, grifter, bodyguard for the mayor, country western manager, garbage commissioner, mountain climber, farmer, inventor, Smithers, Poochie, celebrity assistant, power plant worker, fortune cookie writer, beer baron, Kwik-E-Mart clerk, homophobe, and missionary.


Actually, I'm not so sure I'd like to be Smithers.

Behind the Music: Charlie Brown Part II

A recent acquisition is the Complete Peanuts boxed set, including years 1955-1956 and 1957-1958.

In these comics, Linus emerges as my favorite character. He's just bizarre - blowing square and half balloons, constructing puzzles vertically, and defying all other laws of physics.

Unfortunately, Snoopy's starting to show up just a little too much for my taste in these years. I suspect the next box set (1959-1960 and 1961-1962) may be my last.

Some highlights below. Click on the comic to view larger image.

Lucy Van Pelt - my kind of girl.

Snoopy's short lived days as the mascot for the Queen Mary.
Which must not have gone over well with Charlie Brown's Young Republican friends.

Someone went to the George W. Bush School of International Relations.
Matt Groening's favorite strip.
Lucy has an interesting way of solving arguments.

Linus has developed his own way to solve arguments. I kind of like it...

...until it just gets macabre.
Linus clearly has some anger issues.

But it's not like he has a way with the women. (Besides, isn't Violet out of his league?)

Who's in Amy's Belly? Round 2

After much deliberation, we've landed on the second "winner" of the so-called Belly Contest.

Julius Peppers.

Why Peppers, even though the Panthers have eliminated themselves from the playoffs?

Three reasons:

(1) Baby Davis-Ross has started kicking in earnest. I'm not sure if I'll ever get bored with watching the baby kick. It's the weirdest thing ever. So, BDR has earned herself the nickname "Sir Kicks-a-Lot." This naturally lead to a discussion of putting a kicker in the belly - someone like Adam Vinatieri. But...

(2) What if BDR's a boy? We've been really consistent about referring to the fetus as a girl. So, we need someone a little more...manly...inhabiting the womb, to balance all of that "she" and "her" talk. Frankly, kickers don't cut it. But defensive ends do.

Could a girl tackle like this?

(3) Why not Peppers? Two sport athlete, great name, good career. Did I say two sport athlete? It's an obvious choice.

mail and other mysteries, part 2

re: mail and other mysteries, in which is revealed the myriad ways in which mail comes addressed to the Davis and Ross household...

People who get it right?
Family, Friends, and the IRS.

It's almost enough to re-inspire confidence in our government.

Required Reading #6: Water for Elephants

There was nothing about this book that I thought I'd like...an old man, remembering his circus days? Snooze-a-rama.

Plus, within the first 20 or so pages, I knew this would be the type of novel I dread: in which the major plot point is revealed at the start, and the rest of the novel just fills in details before and after.

I couldn't have been more wrong.

In a time in which I can barely keep my eyes open long enough to choke down a few pages of a graphic novel, I ripped through this book in just a few days. (I would have finished it more quickly, except for someone's insistence I go to sleep.)

In looking over the list of books I've read in the past year, I can easily say this is the best, by far. Perhaps in the past two years. Perhaps the best book I've read since The Plot Against America.

My only regret is that I'll have to return it to the library in a few days.

Christmas, 2006

This was the Christmas That Never Ended. Every few days, Kevin and I would pull up our stakes and head out to another family to celebrate Christmas cheer (and collect some great presents along the way.)

Even Baby Shaquilla O'Neala got into the festivities. Not only the recipient of some surprise gifts, she had her own stocking and showed off her kicker's foot a few times for Kevin.

Some highlights, in no particular order:

- A huge Christmas morning at the Ross's, with all siblings and most significant others in tow.
- And, it's not Christmas at the Ross's without the Macy's née Lord and Taylor née Wanamaker's light show and the freaky Dickens Village.


- Finding out Baby Davis-Ross has a bum kidney. (This isn't really true. She's fine, but one of her kidney drainage tubes is a little big, which doesn't cause problems other than UTIs. Our doctor: "I hope I have impressed upon you how not serious this problem is.")
- Reading Kari's email updates from the Congo, which invariably involved some sort of gorilla (or was it guerrilla?) spotting, tale of woe, or mention of foul drink.
- Discovering a bag of long-forgotten TVP in our suitcase. (Which is kind of sad, since I've been looking for TVP everywhere.)
- According to the new James Bond movie Casino Royale, Ugandan war lords are surprisingly risk-averse in their investment portfolios. I suppose it makes sense.
- Deciding what Baby Davis-Ross likes, based on her movements during the activity. For example, Baby Davis-Ross likes The Sopranos, Carolina basketball, and (alas) Polvo. Baby Davis-Ross remained skeptical about real East Coast pizza though. Hmm. I've probably already fed her too much Mexican and Asian food for her to appreciate a $7 cheese pie.
- Abby Gray's Dance Class, in which Kevin was allowed to learn more about Irish dancing than I was because, "he's more Irish." True enough.
- Visiting with the Grays in Columbus.
- Seeing the whole Davis clan, even soon-to-be-members of the Davis clan, except for my punk cousins.
- Trying to convince my nephew how lame Purdue is.
- Coming home! It was great to be able to visit our families and be away for so long, but we were very much ready to get back to our own place.

Now, we have a crazy amount of work head of us, including setting up the alcove - er, nursery - for Baby Davis-Ross.

Photos are posted below, via Flickr. There are more to come, pending the arrival of our left-behind camera.

Christmas in New Jersey

Christmas in Columbus

The Bun, Half Done

It's still cookin', but we've taken another peak into the oven.

Both Kevin and I retained our resolve to keep Baby Davis-Ross's identity a secret, although...we both thought we might have seen something revealing in the ultrasound. Then again, we're both pretty convinced it was just the umbilical cord. At any rate, we still refer to her as a girl.

We also got to check up on the baby's heartbeat. Curious what a fetal heartbeat sounds like? Imagine the theme to 24, but faster and "whooshier."

BD-R, in profile. (Kevin and I agreed, BD-R has my chin.)

In the photo above, BD-R is kissing her own kneecap. Flexible!

I've posted a ton of pictures to Flickr. Many have some comments, to help figure out what is what. Click below to access them.

Week 20 Ultrasounds

21 photos

Baby Davis-Ross gets a name

Maybe I've been inspired by the honest-to-God names of some of these kids in California. I've met a Galileo, a Weston, and a Slater. (Yes! Slater.)

This, of course, pales in comparison to Cosmo Archimedes. Who is he? That's a good question. We have no idea, really, but we know of his existence. At any rate, Cosmo Archimedes is a great name.

So, we've been brainstorming baby names, and have arrived at:

Shaquila O'Neala Davis-Ross (for a girl)
James LeBron Davis-Ross (for a boy).

Apparently, we think our progeny will somehow defy his genetics and become an NBA superstar. (Well...we're not greedy. A stand-out college basketball star would be fine enough with us.) Which begs the question, who exactly is in my womb? And how did he get there?

Kevin's wanted to start a blog series with just this premise: Who's in Amy's Belly This Week? In other words, who's the baby channeling this week?

I think it's roughly inspired by a rock-opera I improvised about three years ago, where I sang of my failed love affair with Herschel Walker and our offspring, Genevieve Charlotte Davis-Ross.

There are at least two puzzling things about this rock-opera: first, I couldn't really pick Herschel Walker out of a line-up to save my life. I think I really meant Charles Barkley, but it didn't rhyme.

(From Top): The NFL's most sensitive running back; The Round Mound of Rebound.

Second, why does this bastard child have Kevin's last name? I like to imagine that Kevin, in his undying love for me, adopts this girl as his own, even though it's clearly not his daughter. Perhaps he is playing out some kind of Joseph fantasy?

So, who's in my belly this week?

Shaq. Definitely Shaq. I can feel his post moves already.