The only place I’ve found here that serves queso is Chili’s. And I’m sure you know, that’s just not quite the same thing. Somebody in Austin, go to Chuy’s and beg them for their queso recipe for me please.

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There were these two things I have been wanting for a long time. A new watch and a new bike. I could never justify the expense before now. Funny, having a job is kind of cool.
First of all the watch. The first year I lived in Austin, I got a Swiss Army watch for being a heavy smoker. Actually what the deal was, I had saved up a whole lot of Marlboro miles and traded them in for the watch. This was an awesome watch. But after almost a decade of use and about 3 different bands, I decided it needed to be retired. Over the years, I had tried other watches but most had always sucked for some reason or another. I knew my next watch needed to be another Swiss Army but they were never really affordable and I didn’t smoke Marlboro anymore. But after I got this job, the hunt was on for a new watch. The old watch still works, but the face is heavily scratched and apparently the water resistance isn’t that resistant anymore. I took the watch swimming this summer and since then every time my watch is exposed to warm air (every time I go outside), the face gets a bunch of condensation on the inside making it hard to read. So I did some research online, picking out the watch I want, and started looking for it every where I went. I had debated buying it online, and even tried once, but they were out of stock. So one day while we were at the Great Mall in Milpitas, I saw my watch in a Saks Fifth Avenue outlet store. It was over 30% off so I had to snag it. It’s cool, see below.
Old and busted: my old Swiss Army (left).
New hotness: my new Swiss Army (right).

One down, one to go. I’ve had a bike before. I never liked riding it that much because the shifter broke (it was a Wal-Mart bike) and it’s really hot in Texas. Here the weather is a lot nicer and, if you can believe it, there are even more bike lanes and other bike friendly stuff than there is in Austin. One thing I didn’t like about my old my bike is that it was heavy to carry and I was never that comfortable leaving outside to be stolen by some piece of crap with some bolt cutters and a desire to pawn my bike at the nearest pawn shop. So here’s a picture of my new bike. I found this cute girl wandering around in my apartment so I had her stand next to the bike for scale.

This picture raises a few questions. These questions are summed up best by the response Rob (my younger brother) gave when I showed him a picture of my bike:

WTF? It looks like those circus bikes that monkeys and bears ride. Why does it look that way? Does it have more than one gear?

Yes, now that you mention it, it does look like a bike that monkeys and bears ride. Why does it look like that? Because it is a folding bike. This solves the problem of me not wanting to leave my bike locked up outside. It folds small enough to easily be stored indoors without taking up the space of a normal bike. And because it’s so small and light, getting it in and out of the apartment is not an ordeal. It also means that I can take it inside places with me and not have to leave it locked up outside. It also fits easily in a car trunk so if there is somewhere I want to ride at but not ride to, I can just throw it in the car and drive there. Does it have more than one gear? Yes, it has 3. The cool thing is that it has internal gear hub. I have no idea how this works buts it’s cool because it means that there will not be any chain derailments and it won’t have all that ugly derailleur garbage hanging off the back wheel.
Here’s a picture of what the bike looks like after it’s folded up:

Rob’s comment:

That pic looks funny. Like what a bike looks like after you run it over.

I like talking to my younger brother because he makes me feel like I make very wise investments.
Anyway, my bike rocks. Sarah and I went for a bike ride today on the Stanford campus. It was a lot of fun. On top of not dealing with the Texas heat, riding my bike is really no different than riding a conventional bike. It looks small but the seat and the handle bars are high enough off the ground and spread apart enough to wear it feels like a normal bike. It rides smooth and it’s a lot of fun. Sarah rode it too and she agrees, so I’m not just crazy.
This bike was a pain in the ass to buy though. Well not as much to buy, but to get a test ride. I was never able to find a store that carried it in Austin. When I got here, I thought I would call around to some of the local bike shops and see if they carried the folding bikes. Nope, but all of them were more than willing to order it for me. One shop I called, which listed the bike as “in stock” on their website, told me, “No we don’t keep them in stock at the store, they’re in stock at the factory. We can order one for you.” Thanks chump, I really appreciate it. This frustrated me. Especially because the Dahon website says in one of their FAQs, “blah blah, our bikes rule, blah blah… but don’t take our word for it, take a test ride today and see for yourself!” So I e-mailed them and asked them how I was supposed to take one of these test rides when nobody keeps their bikes in stock. I’m pretty clever right? I stuck it to ‘em good, made them choke on their own FAQ. Their response was:

The Dahon dealer in your area is:
Avenue Cyclery
756 Stanyan St.
San Francisco, CA

Thank you for your inquiry,
Dahon

Yea right. I’m going to drive into the city, find a place to park, go to this bike shop just to find out they only have these bikes “in stock in the factory.” So I find the number and call them up. They say, “Sure we have them in stock, come own down and try them out.”
Oh. I guess I’m not as clever as I thought. I guess I’m the one choking on the FAQ now.
Anyway, Sarah and I head into the city on Saturday after we left the DMV. It was a real pain finding a place to park as this bike shop was only a few blocks away from the Haight & Ashbury intersection. Lots of bums. Reminded me of the drag in Austin. So we find a place to park a few blocks away and head to the shop. We get there and they already have two of the bikes out showing them to a girl. She was there for the exact same reason; To compare the difference between the bikes with the 16 inch wheels and the 20 inch wheels. I would prefer the 16 inch wheel bike because it would fold smaller and be lighter. But I imagined the 20 inch wheel bike would be more stable. Once the girl was done, I took both for a test ride. Before I left, I asked the guy if I needed to leave my wallet or anything while I took it for a spin. He pointed at Sarah and said, “I’ll keep her.” Not exactly a fair trade since Sarah is way cooler than a bike but I decided it would be ok for a few minutes. The two different sized bikes seemed equally stable. I was trying to find a good reason not to get the 16 inch because I imagined myself ignoring flaws because I liked it better. But I couldn’t find any flaws. Sarah and I left the store to think about it for a minute and after wandering around for a bit we went back to the store and I took the 16 inch for one more test ride. I told Sarah that if I didn’t crash and hurt myself then I would get the 16 inch. I didn’t crash.
So anyway, I now have two toys I’ve been eyeing for quite a long time. I’ve wanted a new Swiss Army for probably the last five years. And I’ve wanted the folding bike for the last 3 or so years. Yay!

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So apparently I’m a bad blogger. I don’t update enough. I got an e-mail from my mommy scolding me because I haven’t updated since the 9th. So here is an update. The last week was cool. Sarah’s mom (Joan) came to visit and she stayed for a week. It was pretty cool though, having another Texan here that we could show off the awesome weather to. Plus I like Joan a lot, she’s fun to be around. We spent most of the weeknights watching and expertly judging the Olympic gymnastics. Ignore the fact that I know nothing about gymnastics; I can tell a loser when I see one. Also, I didn’t pay for a single meal while she was here. She claims it’s due to the fact that we were saving her so much money on hotels and other accommodations. Regardless, I appreciated it.
From what I’ve heard (I had to work all week), they had a pretty good time. For all the details, check Sarah’s site.
Anyway, Joan had to be at a wedding on Saturday afternoon, so that meant that her flight left pretty early. But it worked out well because Sarah and I needed to get up early and go get ourselves some “California Style” driver’s licenses. The DMV is never open on the weekends except for the third Saturday of each month from 8 to noon. So we get up at 5:30, take Joan to the airport, go get some breakfast, head home for some quick beautification (DL pictures), and head for the DMV. We got there right before 8:00. The line waiting outside wrapped around the side of the building. But once the got started it moved pretty quickly. For some reason, people getting driver’s licenses have to take the written portion of the driving test. No big deal, I remember this test from high school. It should mostly be a bunch of common sense questions. Wrong. I failed. Ahh… memories from college. It was a 36 question test, and you couldn’t miss more than 6 to pass. I missed 7. Remember, I have a medal. Some of these questions were hard and/or stupid. For example:

Which of the following children requires a child passenger restraint system?
A. A six year old weighing 60 pounds.
B. A five year old weighing 55 pounds.
C. A five year old weighing 65 pounds.

Why would I have any idea what the answer to this question is? If you know the correct answer (without having to look it up), post in the comments. Anybody who posts the right answer will receive a prize of nothing.
Anyway, they gave me a book, told me I could study for a bit, and take the test again if I wished, so I did. I passed this time (I do have the medal after all). I only missed 2 questions. Yay for me!
Here is one of the questions that Sarah had:

You must use your seatbelt:
A. Unless you are riding in a vehicle built before 1978.
B. Unless you are riding in a limousine.
C. If the vehicle is equipped with seat belts.

The correct answer is C. Sarah answered B. Sarah doesn’t have a medal. Sarah passed the first time.

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His name is Dumpster Picard. I saw some feet sticking out of the trash and instantly recognized them as the feet of a Starfleet Officer. Yes, I am that dorky. But the main reason I recognized the feet so quickly is because Mike had given me a similar cut out of Data one year for my birthday. I don’t remember exactly what happened to Mr. Data. Most likely, at some point along the way, he got his name changed as well and became known as Dumpster Data.

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Well it’s been a cool weekend. We went out with a coworker and his girlfriend last night. We decided we wanted to go bowling but it was going to be 15 bucks a person to bowl as much as we want. Once we got there we saw an air hockey table for 75 cents a game so we just got some drinks and did that instead. We got about 5 dollars in quarters and set them on the side of the table so that when other people came up they would know we were going to be there a while. But we felt bad when these two little kids came up and started patiently waiting with sad looks on their face. So we left the bowling alley and headed back to our apartment. From there we walked to the BBC. They had a band playing so there was 5 dollar cover, which sucks because all we wanted to do was hang out on the patio and not listen to this crappy band play crappy covers of crappy songs. But we hung out there a while and had a good time exchanging stories and stuff.
Today we went and saw Napoleon Dynamite. This movie was really funny. One of the funniest lines is when Napoleon comes home from school and starts arguing with his brother who tells him, “Napoleon, don’t be jealous that I’ve been chatting with babes online… all day.” Maybe it’s not as funny unless you see the movie so go see it. Now.

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I talked to my mom last night and found out that my favorite dog had to be put to sleep yesterday. He was 13 years old, so he had had a long life. But the vet said he had pancreatitis and that he was also having kidney failure.
Fatdog, or Calvin as the infidels called him, was an awesome dog. He was named Calvin when we got him but I soon figured out that the name fatdog fit him better. It didn’t really matter because he answered to both. But one day he secretly told me that he preferred fatdog. And yes, I know he doesn’t look fat, and he never was. He always had way too much energy to gain any excess fat. Between chasing the sprinkler and attacking the water, trying to catch the little red dot of a laser pointer, and herding basketballs around in the yard, he managed to stay pretty fit. No he never was fat, but that was never the point. If you ask me why I called him fatdog, I couldn’t tell you. I was calling everything fat back then. Regardless, that’s who he was to me.
Fatdog was really smart. He only took 5-10 minutes to learn new tricks as long as you kept the pieces of cheese coming. He also loved playing tug. So much so that nobody’s arm could ever hold out as long as he could. And whenever you finally did give in from exhaustion, he would just bring you the toy and place it in your hand… and wait. The second you even twitched a finger that signaled the beginning of play again and he instantly started tugging and growling. He was an awesome dog and I’m going to miss him.
These pictures are from about a decade ago but fatdog didn’t really look much different. The quality of the images isn’t that great because I don’t have a scanner so I had to take a picture of a picture. Regardless they are really good pictures of fatdog.

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It’s weird, it was actually cloudy and overcast for most of today. What’s even weirder is that Sarah had said yesterday that she kind of missed the cloudy days. And what do you know, it got cloudy. Spooky!

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