it’s been a long day. a meeting at a community college to present our 90% design drawings. usually the day is done after the meeting. nope! head back to the office…resend a proposal out to the architect who made a request the night before. why is it architects usually are so disorganized and so “last minute”? it was essentially an indirect request to lower our proposed design fees. done? let’s add more work…plot drawings for the san diego project for monday morning – something, in my opinion, should have been coordinated on thursday but was asked of us friday morning. then to answer questions from the night before that i was not able to answer – just little tasks that add up.

next i went to a local apple store to get some help with the UP arrow key that broke. turns out that they can’t fix the key in the store – they have to ship the entire laptop to a service center to fix it. so then i make a call to the apple service department to have them send a shipping box and take some information about the problem. 5 days approximately will be the time they will need to have the computer to fix the button! wow, what a drag!

but the day is still young and there’s much time to make up for a not so great day so far. the stomach is growling and i’m near the mitsuwa for some ramen at santouka. regular shio ramen with some negi meshi on the side. slurp and mmm! stomach is feeling good. it’s been a while since eating some hot tasty noodles.

felt giving today and headed to the bookstore to search for the thai cuisine book for Rie. she’s been wanting this book for a long time…and finally i was able to get it for her. and it was a nice thing to see her eyes light up when i gave it to her.

now i sit at the sofa with some beer (singha and fat tire) watching the NBA! a nice friday the 13th indeed!

tonight i attended an engineering dinner meeting with Rie for her work. it was a semi annual meeting for what i believe was a local chapter ASCE meeting. ASCE is the americN society of civil engineers. similar to the venue i patron for ASHRAE.

it was interesting to see another society in engineering and to learn about the state of their art. i humorously introduced myself as a ‘mechanical engineer’ with the poke that i had no reason for being there. people chuckled and i even got a ‘what are you doing HERE!?’ jab from someone at the table…that elicited another wave of chuckles.

the dinner program was on a presentation of one of the large ongoing port of LA projects. i got to see a project entirely non-related to my field of mechanical engineering. it was enlightening to see such an enormous project with so many aspects to plan around. oceanic hurdles such as the ocean grass that needs to be considered prior to dredging. removal of contaminated soil and how/where to dispose it. and many other items i can only imagine took place.

i am amazed at the enormity and complexity of such projects. and in this time of age when economics is a major factor, projects such as these are even more under the watchful eyes!

sometime ago we joined a running club that meets every sunday. we’ve been active with the club for the past 2-3 months. i might have blogged about it before…i guess i’m getting a little old.

the training is beginning in preparation for the LA marathon in march. we did a 10 mile run yesterday. 10.4 miles to be near exact. essentially twice the distance we usually do every sunday.

i feel a little sore but notice my recovery rate is much faster. after the half marathon last month, it took 3 days before i felt rested. i’m figuring by tomorrow morning i will be regenerated for tuesday night basketball.

our first halloween at our house! we christened it by cutting each our own pumpkins. Rie’s pumpkin is there on the right…mine on the left in the foreground.

*quick poll…who’s is cooler?*

this was with my 50mm f/1.4 nikkor lens. great bokeh and also very nice for how dark it was. earlier i had played basketball (every saturday from 3:00 pm to 5:00 pm) and headed straight to ralph’s to get some pumpkins. soon as i got home, we pulled out the knives and went at it – and behold our creations!

we had many many kids stopping by with their funny costumes and their bags full of candy. i feel for the parents in the late evening when they will probably be driving crazy by sleepless kids. what else can you expect though? a few kids came as teenage mutant ninja turtles and little princesses! we quickly ran out of candy and had nothing left to hand out. we kept hearing a faint screaming and crying noise down the hill…so we decided to take a stroll out in the neighborhood to see what was happening.

one of the homes had a haunted house for all to walk through. freaked us out pretty good! Riechan met a friend employing the guillotine out in the front yard. well, she posed for this…but you get the jist of it!

R.I.P. to all the lost souls!

as promised, i got up at 5 am and suited up for a morning run. put on the nike sweats and two t-shirts (short sleeves unfortunately). oh and let’s not forget the iPod for logging the run.

it was a cold, dark, and quiet run this morning. not a soul in sight except for the rare car passing by on the run up and down the hill. not one person walking their dog or jogging. no one crazy enough to get up for a leg beating i guess! because it was so dark, i could barely see the pavement – i actually hoped there were more cars coming up and down to get a better survey of the terrain. my pace was slower than normal for fear of turning an ankle while running virtually blind. it also took about 2 miles for me to warm up. i actually never did warm up completely.

it was 5.26 miles in just over 45 minutes for a pace of 8:39 min/mile.  some 25 seconds slower than my usual pace.

not looking forward to the coming winter months…it cuts into the running!

いまかぜがつよい！

it’s near the end of october and my blogging posts have been few and far between. it’s time to post an update.

after a late night coming back from an after work meeting, i’m fortunate to come home to my baby and to a clean home. to my delight, i find all of my work clothes freshly washed and hanging in the bedroom! she even used woolite and ran the washer on delicate cycle! nice!

the trees are rustling outside and the bedroom hovers around 70 deg. F. i’m reading my nihongo book to study a bit before going to sleep…

REMINDER: run tomorrow at 5 am!

おやすみなさい！

we did the LB half marathon this morning. we woke up about about 4:30 am (something not very common for us) and headed over to LB. we had to use the restroom RIGHT before the race so we ended up missing the start of our wave. the weather was very cool – perfect for running! i’d say 60-65 deg. F all morning.

our times?

rie – 2:26:39
me – 1:56:48

we got a picture of us after finishing. i also took a snapshot of the times from the main website off of the iPhone. we will probably train harder next time. our next goal? the LA marathon!? stay tuned…

rie and i after 13.1 miles…we later pigged out at the trump golf course brunch buffett…

our official times…rie kept pace all the way through and i started to fatigue toward the end…

sunday rie and i will do our first half marathon together. this will be her first race ever. this will be my first race since doing the 2006 honolulu marathon.

i got 13 fish today. we just came back in from san diego on board the daiwa pacific. great boat!

5 aku – skipjack tuna
5 ahi – yellowfin tuna
3 hamachi – yellowtail

broke the new pole…suits me for going ‘cheap’ and not getting the most suitable gear for the job.  i got a $110 californian 15-40 lbs. pole.  got a daiwa spinning reel with it.  now that i know better, i should have gotten an open face.  much stronger for deep sea.

here are some pictures from the trip.

me with some yellowfin…mmm sashimi!

the gang…as always, nishida hooks it up with the trip!

until next year!

yesterday i equipped myself with a nice fishing pole for our upcoming deep sea fishing trip down in san diego. our hope is to get some yellowtail, yellowfin, bluefin, and some mahi mahi. i picked it up from turner’s outdoorsman in redondo beach. it’s my first fishing pole – usually i have been renting poles when we head out to catch. this time i have my own gear!

15-40 lbs. 7’-0” pole and a decent daiwa spinning reel – good beginner grade pole and it set me back just under $200. i already have a slew of hooks from previous trips. my feet will stay dry from the waterproof boots – tip for first time deep sea fishermen…the deck gets wet and bloody when the action is up and dry feet goes a long way for making the trip fun. so get some rubber boots!

all i need to do is bring ebisu (god of fishermen, the ocean, and good fortune) along with us for the ride. this means inviting him in spirit – through use of ebisu stickers and charms on the pole!

and finally in the words of hawaiian fishermen, it’s time for some hana pa’a!