Into a Routine

Sorry for my prolonged blog absence- I have been up to fun things like going to Coppelia ballet, Quidam (a Cirque du Soleil show), and the big one- visiting my new little nephew Tyler in Rochester, Minnesota which also included an art tour of the Mayo Clinic AND . . . fulfillment of a dream here . . . spending several hours riding the roller coasters at the Mall of America. In the midst of all of this, I have been working 40 hours at PAMF doing qualitative research and started teaching Intro to Sociology at Santa Clara. It took me a bit more time to fully "get into the swing of things" than I was expecting- a little over two weeks- but I have managed to get a good schedule going and still have some time to spend with my William in the evenings. I joke that I am still not quite working as much as he does even with my two jobs. But, that leaves me with not as much time- and sadly desire- to blog. However, I know that I have several avid readers and so I promised that I would not neglect the blog like the last time I taught in the fall.

As for how my class is going, I love it. There was only 1 semi-painful day when we talk about the "dead white guys"- aka social theorists Marx, Durkheim, and Weber- and I managed to prep them for it, add a few humorous jokes (at least to me), and I only had 1 student falling asleep. This is a massive success over last year when I had like 5 people falling asleep and WAY to many vacant stares. It has taken me a bit of time to figure out now the 90 minute class as I have taught 60 minutes before- I've learned that with that much time, I HAVE to have a video to show them and so I have skipped ahead in material just to show the video and re-engage them. Fortunately, it has worked. I am looking forward to Thursday when they will turn in their "breaking social norms" assignment and we can discuss their experiences. I didn't do this last year and it is something that I wish I had done.

Life is busy but VERY good and I am quite enjoying myself. I'll try to be better about posting now that I "hopefully" have things under control :-)

Calafia

Last week I went with my co-workers to the restaurant opened by the former Google chef for whom the "Charlie's Cafe" there is currently named after. His restaurant is in Palo Alto and is called Calafia. My co-worker loves it because they have a vast selection of vegetarian items- as well as some meat ones as well. I was curious to try one of their menu items which is macaroni and cheese with golden beets. I have never heard of that combo and would never have thought of to make that a pairing so I had to try it. The presentation was great with the little Le Cruset pot but I have to say that it was the most BLAND mac and cheese I have ever had- Kraft has more flavor. And my friend Ashley didn't like it either. The beets were ok but really didn't add any depth of flavor. I am happy to report that the curried butternut squash soup was good (not something to crave) but the dish that completely sold me that he is a good chef was, not to surprising, a dessert. This has to be the BEST banana split that I have EVER had. You wouldn't think to order it, but this one has one unique touch to it. The bananas are sliced in half, sugared, and bruleed. The crunchy caramelized top is GENIUS providing the best texture to creamy, high quality vanilla ice cream. I am a convert and very happily, our waiter told us that while some desserts are seasonal, this one is NOT- they can always make it. I think that I will definitely need to go back at least for that sundae. Good thing that William doesn't like bananas as it will be all mine :-)

All Tchaikovsky: SF Ballet

This ballet featured all music by Tchaikovsky- there were 3 pieces. I absolutely LOVED the first one which was called "Themes and Variations" choreographed by the great Ballanchine. Apparently, the SF ballet does this piece every year because it is so fast paced and technically challenging. It was beautiful- I actually liked being so far back so that I could appreciate the precision of the ballet dancers in maintaining the intricate formations. I could have just saw this piece and it would have been worth it.

The 2nd piece was SO BORING. it was called "Winter's Song" and it was based upon Anton Chekov's "Three Sisters" but it went on for nearly an hour of just pairs coming out and doing the same dances with the couples splitting apart and running away and then coming back together. As we were leaving the theater, a couple in front of us were also complaining about it so it was good to hear that we weren't alone in our assessment.

The third piece was a new work done by the resident choreographer Helgi Tomasson and I have to say that it was definitely better than the 2nd piece but no where near as good as the first one. I actually really liked the music as it was a piece of Tchaikovsky that I had not heard before. It was much more modern and had an organic quality to it but it just wasn't up to that same standard of choreography from that first number.

One more ballet left for the season for us- Coppelia. Definitely looking forward to this one.

Bali: Art, Ritual, and Performance

Before the San Francisco ballet last Thursday night, my sister Sarah indulged me into going to the new exhibit at the Asian Museum of Art entitled "Bali: Art, Ritual, and Performance". I have a very limited knowledge of Bali- the only things I know about it are the song "Bali High" and the section in the book Eat, Pray, Love. The exhibit is only $10 and it was well worth it to see the BEAUTIFUL objects. I was impressed by the dolls made out of coins threaded together and the elaborate carvings surrounding their temples and shrines.The most fascinating part was learning about their cremation ceremonies- we watched a video of this ritual where they take the body and parade it through the streets- literally housed inside of a pagoda-eque temple and then is placed inside of a giant animal casket that is then lit on fire. This is so important that people spend thousands of dollars on this ceremony. I saw several photos of Bali and it looks so beautiful- my sister said that the terraced rice paddies were similar to the ones she saw in rural China. Yet, another place to add onto the ever growing list of places that I want to travel to . . .

Empathy and Computers

I know that my blog post title seems odd but it relates to two DIFFERENT lectures that I saw within the past week at Stanford on very different, but fascinating, topics. Last Tuesday, I went and hear Frans de Wall speak about Empathy in Animals. I loved his book- The Age of Empathy- and the talk was even better because he showed actual video clips of the reactions to the animals. It was incredible to see a monkey get upset because another monkey got a grape when he only got a cucumber. It was also touching to see a herd of elephants rally together to help free a baby who was trapped in the mud. As he said in his question and answer that the findings from these studies only apply to primates and other mammals but I think that you can reasonably extrapolate that we have more in common with other living organisms. The lecture is sponsored by the parents of a former Stanford undergrad who loved human biology and taught science to inner city youth but tragically passed on prematurely. I thought that this was a great tribute to her, as there was a large group of high school students that also attended the lecture. This trip reminded me just how much I LOVE

Last night, since William was out of town, I went to another lecture at Stanford by Kevin Poulsen about his book Kingpin: How One Hacker Took Over the Billion Dollar Cyber Crime Underground. It turns out that Kevin Poulsen is a "rehabilitated" hacker who in the 1980s managed to hack into the telephone systems so that he would be the first caller for radio giveaways. He went to prison for several years and for the past decade has been a journalist. To me, it was fascinating to hear about how this one guy managed to hack into the "Ebay" of credit card fraud and how he was ultimately caught by the FBI. I haven't read the book yet but it sounds fascinating and at the same time, slightly frightening about how technology dramatically improves our lives yet still leaves potentially vulnerable victims of crime. I am trying to fit in all of the lectures and night time activities that I can in the next few weeks because I am sure that I probably won't have much time to do that after my class starts on March 29th.

Sacrifice

As some of you know, I taught a lesson last Sunday in Relief Society on "Sacrifice". This lesson really humbled me and made me consider ultimately what would I be willing to sacrifice for eternal life? I thought a lot about this and had an experience before teaching the lesson that showed me that I need to question my level of commitment to God. I did not instantly respond when my neighbor needed help- I ultimately came back, but I am sad to report that I left first and then came back. The part of the lesson that connected with me was a scripture from Romans 12: 1: "I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service." One phrase in particular struck me with such force that I am still thinking about it, even though I am "done" teaching that lesson (though obviously I haven't fully mastered that lesson myself)- a LIVING SACRIFICE. What am I doing to make myself a living sacrifice to God?

I wish that this article would have come out LAST Thursday so that I would have been able to share it during my lesson. This article is about the life of Clayton Christensen that was on the cover of Forbes magazine. Christensen was one of William's Harvard Business School professors as well as being one of the area authority seventies for our church while we were in Boston. I knew that he was an incredible man- very kind and brilliant- but this article has given me a new perspective on what it means to be a "living sacrifice" to the Lord. I did not know that he had diabetes for a good portion of his life and I was particularly shocked by what happened to him over the past 3 years. He suffered a heart attack, cancer (lymphoma), and a stroke. To me this was beginning to sound kind of like what some of what Job went through health wise. In particular, the heart attack story particularly touched me as he was in Montreal and was supposed to speak to a congregation. He woke up early that morning with chest pains and prayed to the Lord to help him be able to be able to fulfill his meetings with the members that day. And the Lord granted his wish- he didn't have his heart attack until the next day when he was back in Boston. What a selfless man- he wasn't worried about his own health but more about the spiritual well being of the members in fulfillment of his calling. To me, this exemplifies what it means to be a "living sacrifice"

My old roommate in Boston, Natalie, wrote a great follow-up piece that talks about how he truly is one man who, despite all that he has been through, shows his devotion to the Lord through serving others and furthering the work of the church. When Natalie congratulated him on making the cover of Forbes, he laughed and said: To me, this completely encapsulates what it means to be a "living sacrifice" to God.

“My face may be on a magazine today, but tomorrow I get to wake up, get out of bed, and find someone to help.”

Again, he provides another example that completely encapsulates what it means to be a "living sacrifice" to God. I wish that I would have been able to share this during my lesson, but at least I can share it with some of you. The experiences over the past few weeks have convinced me of the importance of sacrifice in my life and that I need to be doing more of it.

Hogle Zoo Lights

My in-laws were kind enough to take us to see some more holiday lights- and these were my personal favorite :-) With our Little Caesar's pizza purchase in Utah, we gained $3 each admission to the Hogle Zoo Lights- what a bargain for a great event! It was a light misty rain for part of the time we were there, chilly, and crowded, but well worth it. Get there as close to opening as possible because the lines only get longer as the night goes on.

Again, many of the displays were animated. Here are a few of my favorite light displays
The Unusual- scorpion and snake

Exotic birds

A tender moment between giraffes

All creatures helping in the holiday spirit

And some time Under the Sea

I liked these cute elephant ornaments

But, the nostalgia was greatest for the lion water fountain. This is really the icon of the zoo as I have many memories of taking a drink from the lions mouth when I was growing up.

Some of the other great light displays was the animated 12 days of Christmas (and its best watched under the heat lamp) and the skunk using his magic to frighten away a bear

Besides the lights we were even able to see some of the animals, like monkeys and porcupines- but the tigers were particularly active. This one was stalking the fence and eying us like he wanted to eat each of us for a snack! It was a little unnerving to think that a mere chain link fence separated us.