Berkeley Kite Festival

Miranda and I went to the Berkeley Kite Festival and West Coast Kite Championships today. There were people with kites everywhere, and we saw some really amazing and fun ones.

Among the more impressive and interesting things we saw were the Rokkaku kite battles, where people's kite strings are lined with tar and broken glass (The Kite Runner, anyone?) and then you fight to try to cut other people's kite lines and be the last kite standing. Or I guess, in this case, flying.



We also watched Ray Bethell, a 78 year old deaf guy who puts on choreographed kite performances with three kites--one kite string in his right hand, one in his left hand and one tied to his waist. It was pretty impressive. Besides being known as the "three kite guy," Ray is apparently also known for never wearing a shirt, which means he's pretty tan. This fact led the kite festival broadcasters to announce "Well, it seems Ray is wearing a nice brown leather jacket today. Oh wait, that's not a jacket at all. That's just Ray."

Meltdown (and no, I'm not talking about the heatwave.)

I just had a minor meltdown at work. This has been a really shit week, so this should not have come as a big surprise. When your major projects for the week involve figuring out how to make absolutely no work look like $17,500 worth of work, and taking 11 people's conflicting feedback on a buzillion minute details of a potential website design and trying to create one cohesive position to tell the web designer (knowing full well that everyone is just going to keep complaining about the feedback of theirs you didn't take when they see the next round of website designs anyway) and you're not doing anything you feel even remotely good at, and you're definitely not doing anything you even remotely enjoy, meltdowns should probably be expected.

Mine went something like this:

"IhatethisjobIhatethisjobIhatethisjobIhatethisjobIhatethisjob." (This popped out completely involuntarily in the middle of a conversation with two of my co-workers about the aforementioned website. Pretty much apropos of nothing to them, but it's all very clearly connected for me.)

This prompted one co-worker to ask me what I'd rather be doing, and, chiming in, the other co-worker asked, "yeah Claire, what color is your parachute?" which I personally thought was pretty funny.

So yeah, I spent the rest of the afternoon fluctuating between annoyance and frustration.

And while I'm discussing things that annoy/frustrate/trigger meltdown-type drama in me, here's one I'd add to the list:

--The world of celebrity news. Celebrity gossip is bad enough, but when things like "Lindsay Lohan suffers from heat stroke" and "New Miss Universe faints at pageant" make the news, I want to scream. How is this newsworthy? Who cares? Seriously: WHO CARES? I can at least understand the entertainment value in covering the latest Lohan/Hilton cat fight or boyfriend swap, but I cannot even believe there is a whole world of journalists out there who are making their living on reporting that Jessica Simpson brushes her teeth every morning. Get some self-respect and get a real job reporting real news.

Whew. I think that's it for right now. No more melting. Unless I'm talking about heatwaves.

Post-traumatic pet disorder

As a favor to my friend Abby, I am pet-sitting her Beta fish, Alpha. When she initially asked me to watch the fish, I thought this sounded like a pretty easy gig--a pinch of food every other day. Even easier than watering plants and having to worry about them getting too much water or too little, or too much sun, or not enough. (I am not good with plants. She knows this. I suspect that's why she didn't ask me to take care of them.) But a pinch of food? Surely I could handle that without killing anything.

But when I went to pick up my water-loving roommate of the next week and half, I started to remember. Traumatic, horrible memories of dead fish--fish I had killed--as a child. (And I'm not talking your standard "cheapo fish from the carnival goes belly-up in the bowl a week later" kind of stories.) I started to worry that Abby would return to find that I had failed her in the one simple task she had charged me with: to keep her fish from croaking. I started to worry that I was unfit to watch this fish. History has pretty much already proven that.

How bad could it be, you ask? Let me tell you. When I was 9, I had a small tank of neon tetra fish on the nightstand in my bedroom. Now as a child, I was a fitful sleeper. One night, I woke in the wee hours of the morning to discover that the floor next to my bed was wet and my fish tank was missing. Upon turning on the light, I discovered that my flailing, sleeping arms had knocked the tank off the nightstand. To my horror, there, flopping on the floor--amidst the broken, jagged shards of my former fish tank--were my 8 neon tetras, their little mouths opening and closing in waterless gasps as their eyes started to bulge. One by one, they died on the floor. I screamed and screamed, horrified by the sight. (What can I say? I was a highly strung child.)

After that, my parents passed a rule that I could no longer keep fish in my room. As a consolation, however, my dad did superglue the tank back together, printed out some fish on neon paper and stuck them--on toothpicks--back into my tank. He said they would have to do until I learned how to lie still and sleep like a normal person.

Time passed. Eventually, my parents bought me a new fish, a goldfish named Fred. Now I know it's silly to become attached to fish, but I was attached to Fred. I'd had him for almost a year when Christmas rolled around, and I felt like he deserved a stocking and presents, just like our other pets had. (What can I say? We're a weird family.) For presents, I had bought him some new plants and tiny plastic castle to put in his bowl.

"Aren't you excited, Fred?" I asked, as I scooped him out of his bowl and put him in a cup so I could wash out his bowl and put in his new accessories. He wagged his little fish tail at me; I like to think that he was, in fact, excited about the plants and castle.

In my haste to get him back into his bowl, however, I didn't think to check the temperature of the water. I poured him back into the bowl, and watched, horrified, as he died on the spot--boiled alive in hot water. His little limp body drifted in and out of the strands of his new plants and finally collided with the side of his new castle.

I was a certified fish killer.

I feel like fish usually die in a sort of vague, "no one's really to blame" kind of way. But this was clearly my fault. And I took it pretty hard. I immediately started crying and proceeded to lock myself in the bathroom for more than a hour. Needless to say, it kind of put a damper on that year's Christmas festivities.

There were no more fish after that. It was too hard, too painful.

Until now.

Now, I live in fear that I will come home and find Alpha dead and floating in his bowl. I am terrified that I will trip and accidentally knock his bowl off my dining room table, where he is currently stationed. I worry that my neighbor's cat, who likes to come visit, will think Alpha could make a good after-dinner snack. I fret that sunlight streaming through my windows will bounce off a particularly reflective surface and create some sort of heat-seaking laser beam that kills him dead, like ants under a magnifying glass. I am sure I couldn't handle the trauma of killing off yet another fish.

I am counting the days until Abby comes back.

I just hope I still have a fish to give her when she gets here.

Flight Karma

I have bad flight karma. I always have. I don't know what I did to piss off a flight attendant or a pilot in a past life, but it must have been really bad, because there seems to be no end to my airline punishment. In fact, it's only gotten worse as I've gotten older.

It used to be that anytime I got on a plane, it was pretty much a guarantee that the screaming baby would be immediately next to me. Or if not that, then the snotty three year old who's just learning how to kick would be right behind me.

But in recent years it's gotten worse. Lost luggage, delayed flights, re-routing, cancellations. You name it, it's happened (frequently).

And because I am a former theatre major (and by definition, somewhat dramatic about everything) I always complain when these things happen. I complain so much, in fact, that I think people have stopped believing that my flight karma is as bad as I say it is.

Today, on my way back from a work trip to Los Angeles, I had the opportunity (three hours, in fact, but more on that in a moment) to reflect on my karma and count up exactly how often airline misfortune has befallen me in the past year. Here is my list:

--September 2005: On my way to my cousin's funeral. Delayed in Washington Dulles (the most boring airport EVER) for two hours. Completely missed the visitation and arrived at the funeral home in time to see the janitors cleaning up and locking up. (On the return trip there was another 2+ hour delay in Dulles--but this time I was stuck in what I'm very sure was a converted airplane hanger, complete with concrete floor and grease stains.)
--November 2005: The ever-harrowing trip home to Colorado, this time for Thanksgiving. Made it to Denver, only to be delayed by an hour and a half for the 15 minute flight to Colorado Springs. On Thanksgiving Day. (A side note: Colorado Springs is only about 55 minutes away from Denver. Another side note: being stuck in Denver International Airport--aka the airport from hell--will be an ongoing theme.)
--December 2005: Going to Chicago to visit friends. This trip was a doozy. My flight was actually canceled. They put me on another flight, which was an hour late getting to Oakland, and two hours late leaving. They were in such a rush to make up time because of the lateness that they didn't actually put our baggage on the plane, but put it on a later flight. This meant that we got to Chicago late, and then had to sit in the baggage claim area for another hour (because no one told us what had happened) while we waited for our luggage to appear. Oh, and I was flying into Midway the day after that plane had actually skidded off the runway and into the street. And of course, I was also an hour and a half delayed coming home.
--December 2005: Home for the holidays. Delayed in Denver going to Colorado Springs.
--December 2005: On my way to Boston for New Years. Delayed in Denver (at least two hours).
--January 2006: Coming home from Boston. New Year's Day. My flight was delayed by (and I kid you not) 6 hours. Maybe more. The only upside of this was that if my flight had left when it was supposed to I would have still been hungover (and maybe even drunk) from the previous night's debauchery. As it happened, I caught the delay before I left for the airport, and so was able to spend a few more hours watching the Project Runway marathon on Bravo. And then I went to the airport, and hung out there for a few more hours, while my flight continued to be delayed. And it's always fun figuring out how you're gonna get home from SFO in the wee hours of the morning after BART has stopped running. Good times all around.
--February 2006: L.A. for work. Absolutely nothing bad happened. (This is really just the gods playing with me, because. . . .)
--June 2006: San Diego for the marathon. Am trapped on a plane with a horrible group of marathon running wanna-be cheerleaders called Team Awesome. There is chanting and singing "We Are the Champions" involved.
--June 2006. Washington D.C. for a wedding. (See above note about how boring Dulles airport is.) There is torrential rain this weekend, causing most of D.C. and the surrounding areas to flood, stranding hundreds of people in the airport over night, and causing my flight to be more than 3 hours delayed. (But I will say I am grateful it took off at all.) This also got me back into Oakland at approximately 3 in the morning, forcing a very lovely and--I'm sure--tired boy to pick me up when he should have been sleeping. It also meant I was an incoherent zombie at work the next day. (Usually, I'm just incoherent.)

That brings us up to today. I had to go to Los Angeles again for work. I'd managed to get myself on an earlier flight home and I was feeling pretty good. We got on the plane, listened to the seat belt/safety speech, pulled away from the gate. And then we stopped. Why, you ask?

Wait for it. . . .

Wait for it. . . .

Because all the power went out at LAX and they had no radar or any other way to direct incoming and outgoing flights. Two and a half hours of sitting on a plane on the tarmac later, and they finally figured out how to turn the power back on. Here is an article in the LA Times that explains what happened.

My dad used to say: "If we can't get there by flying, then we're not going." Well sorry dad, but my new motto is: "If getting there involves flying, then count me out."

Note: This tally of bad flight experiences in the past year leaves out some of my best bad flight experiences, including but not limited to Heathrow airport losing my luggage (and 10,000 other people's) because their luggage sorting system broke down; the trip to Boston where bad weather forced us to circle until we nearly ran out of gas and were forced to land in Providence and take a bus back to Boston, and my 25th birthday, where I spent more than 5 hours getting drunk by myself in a bar at Denver International Airport, because of--you guessed it--a delayed flight.

Good times at the airport. Good times.

Yosemite--first the funny . . .

I went to Yosemite this past weekend. I've been putting off writing about it for my blog, because I was torn by quite the dilemma: should I highlight the funny and interesting bits, or talk about the profound and thoughtful moments?

But here's the beauty of the blog: I can do both. So here is version #1 of my weekend in Yosemite--with all that was funny and random and action-packed. Stay tuned for version #2. . .

My reasons for going to Yosemite were two: 1) get away from work and people and have a little time to sort some stuff out; and 2) climb Half-Dome. (More on this later.)

I spent Friday in Tuolumne Meadows (for those of you who are looking at that word and wondering how to pronounce it, I'm pretty sure it's something like Two-AH-loh-meh. I wasn't sure at first either). Tuolumne Meadows is the High Country of Yosemite, which means it looks a lot like home for me. In fact, it was probably a little too much like home, because it also came complete with tons of mosquitos in the woods and really intense sunlight. Meaning of course, that I spent the whole weekend covered in mosquito bites and completely sunburned. So now I have this awesome farmer tan that cuts right across my biceps (I'm secretly hoping it makes them look really jacked. Somehow I doubt it.) and these huge pink welts from where I couldn't stop scratching at the bites. Good times. But the meadows are beautiful, and have way less people than the valley.

Tuolumne Meadows

The valley. This leads me to day number 2, where my goal was to climb Half-Dome. Climbing Half-Dome, for those of you who don't know, involves a 17 mile round-trip hike, climbing some 4,000+ feet in elevation. And oh yeah, the last 900 feet or so aren't really hiking so much as they're pulling yourself up a nearly vertical granite rock face using some loosely anchored cables and an occasional plank of wood. You could call it a ladder of sorts, but I wouldn't. I'd call it scary.

Now you might be asking, what would possess someone to do this? Well, there's the bragging rights of being able to say you climbed Half-Dome. But for me, it was more about proving to myself that I could--I didn't really need to prove it to anyone else. You see, three years ago, my JVC roommates and I went to Yosemite, and several of them climbed Half-Dome. I did not. There was absolutely no way my out-of-shape ass was going to make it up that. I barely made it up Yosemite falls, which is equally steep and not nearly as long (or as scary). So I wanted to mark that I am much healthier than I was three years ago, and in much better shape.

And guess what? I am.

So here, quick style, are the highlights of Half-Dome:

--The loud Fresno hikers who apparently make the trek to the top of Half-Dome every year. This year they had Brie cheese, fried chicken and red wine (in little plastic wine glasses) to celebrate their ascent.

--The 10 Mennonite women (all wearing really ugly long-sleeved, ankle-length flowered dresses and white bonnets) who I ran into as they were hauling their way up the last bit to the top of Half-Dome.

--The San Jose girls who befriended me and got me up (and back down) the dome itself. Especially helpful was the girl who, when I stopped mid-way up and told her I thought I was going to throw up, informed me that that wasn't an option, because there were guys watching, and did I want them to think I was some little wussy girl?

--The two guys I hiked down with. I'll call them Big Talk and No Talk, because one wouldn't stop talking about how awesome he was, and the other--who had apparently pulled a groin muscle but didn't want to stop because of some guy-ego-competitive thing--never said a word. They were at least entertaining, and they made the end of the trip go faster.

--The twelve people who very helpfully informed that I was sunburned ("Yes, I know.") and then asked if I needed some sunscreen ("No, thanks, I've got some. But where were you yesterday when I could have used it?")

--And oh yeah, the view from the top: You could see all of Yosemite Valley and up and out the other side, as well the lush, green sprawl of the back country. It's convinced me that the next time I go to Yosemite, it'll be to get out of the valley, away from the tourists and back into the mountains.

View of Nevada Falls from the John Muir Trail

View of Half-Dome from Little Yosemite Valley


The next-to-last part of the Half-Dome ascent. This, ironically, is the not-so-steep part

The final ascent. Those little specks, by the way, are people. When I saw this, my inner mother screamed out that climbing this would rank as the stupidest thing I'd ever done. Of course, I did it anyway, but I at least thought twice about it.

Me and the view from the top.

The Occupational Hazards of Ironing

I am slowly coming to terms with the fact that I am not, and will never be, a domestic goddess. The three weeks where dinner consisted of microwave popcorn 5 times and peanut butter and crackers 3 times was the first clue.

Then there's the fact where I have managed to kill nearly every plant I have owned in the last 4 years. Even with regular watering and trying to figure out the right amount of sun exposure, they all still died.

But here's the kicker:

When I went to iron clothes tonight--the first time I had attempted to iron in at least 4 months, I am sure--I managed to give myself what might be a first degree burn from scalding hot water dripping out of the bottom of the iron. While I really blame this more on a crappy iron than anything inherently deficient about my ironing skills, I do still think I should take it as a sign that Martha Stewart will not be calling to recruit me as her second-in-command anytime soon.

Yeah. I'm off to find some ice. And some microwave popcorn.

An Ode to T.O.O.

My good friends Carrie and Miranda believe in the concept of "The One," (aka TO) and have long held that they are TO (In a strictly platonic, good girl friend kind of way) for each other. In their infinite wisdom, they decided it was also important to have a back up to TO, someone they call "The Other One" (aka T.O.O). I am Miranda's T.O.O., and I suppose she is mine (although I'm also currently accepting applications for the TO slot, if you know anyone who's looking).

Here is why Miranda is my T.O.O:

The last two weeks have been really exhausting. There's been cross-country travel, delayed plane flights, late nights at work, a LOT of drinking, and having to say goodbye to two very good friends. Now don't get me wrong, it's been a lot of fun, but I'm a natural introvert and too much people time makes me a little bit dysfunctional. With so many good friends on their way out of town at least semi-permanently, however, I felt that I should put the introvert nature aside, and soldier on, trying to cram as much extroverted fun as possible into the months of June and July.

This past weekend, those plans included an Ethiopian dive bar on Saturday night and a day at Stern Grove (to listen to a New Orleans jazz band) on Sunday on top of playing tour guide for a good friend who was in town. While all of this sounded really fun when we planned it, after my stint as San Francisco tour guide on Saturday afternoon, the last thing I wanted to do was schlep back into the city, spend too much on food and beer and be sociable and entertaining. (And then do it again on Sunday afternoon.) I took a nap Saturday afternoon, hoping that would make me more inclined to be fun Saturday night. When I woke up feeling groggy and even less fun, I called Miranda, and prepared myself to tell her that my inner-old woman had surfaced and she was not up for going out. As it turned out, I had woken her up from a nap of her own, and she didn't really want to go out that night either. We made plans to skip the Ethiopian dive bar and just do Stern Grove the following afternoon.

The following morning rolls around. I am awakened by a phone call. Miranda. In my head, I'm hoping that she's calling to cancel on Stern Grove, because I really don't want to spend all day at a concert, and I don't want to deal with being cold, or having to do all the work of getting in and out of the city. I listen to the message: "Hey, so I was just wandering if maybe you'd be OK with not going to Stern Grove, and maybe we could just stay and get breakfast in the East Bay instead?"

This is why she is T.O.O. A friend gives you shit when you decide you're too tired to go out. T.O.O. doesn't give you shit, because she feels the same way too.

Oh, and one more reason Miranda's my T.O.O: We had planned on going out and grabbing food and beer to celebrate the 4th of July. What we did not plan on, however, was the number of bars and restaurants that felt like it was acceptable to close for the holiday. I mean, come on people! It's a HOLIDAY. That means that everyone's off, everyone's probably hungry and everyone can drink because they don't have to work. Wouldn't that seem like a good reason for bars and restaurants to be OPEN on the 4th of July?

Apparently not in Oakland.

So after 40 minutes of driving aimlessly from bar to bar, looking for one that was open, we found ourselves cruising down Grand Avenue. Our criteria: a bar with food. Even a restaurant that served beer would be OK. I was just about to give up on the mission as hopeless and head for the nearest Safeway to grab a 6 pack and some chicken wings, when Miranda screamed out: "Oh my gosh! Food! Beer! Food! Beer! Go there!"

Now, it's not just her joy at having accomplished our mission that makes her T.O.O. She hadn't just found the one restaurant in Oakland that was open on the freaking 4th of July. She had found the one that was serving 99 cent draft beers! Good work, T.O.O.

Boy, did I ever call that

Exactly one week after witnessing the first wedding of a good friend, one more friend has made the leap into (soon-to-be-married) life. Congratulations to Meaghz on her engagement!

I can't help but be a little in awe of all the mature life decisions happening around me: engagements, marriages, babies, grad school, new jobs, new cities. Very impressive examples--all of them--of people who know what they want and are going after it.

A sad day in the Bay Area

Had to say goodbye to two good friends last night. For those who don't already know this, some of my very favorite people are leaving the state to go to grad school and/or pursue long distance relationships up close and in the same place. I'm happy for all of them, and I think they're making great choices for their futures, but I still get to be sad.

Last night involved saying goodbye to Carrie, who's going to grad school in Boise, and Becky, who's going to grad school (take two!) in London.

As would only be proper for Carrie, her final send-off took place at the "Brewery," where we drank beer and ate pretzels with her mom and dad, before they drove off into the sunset in a big U-Haul truck. At least Carrie is leaving with a few little pieces of the Bay Area: 4 boxes of Drake's Beer (compliments of Bob Parrish) and a shirt that says "I Hella <3 Oakland." (That's my best attempt at drawing a heart on my blog by the way. Sorry if you suddenly got really confused.)

After a brief stop at my friend Orli's semi-regular Shabat dinner (AKA Awkward dinner--I have a bad tendency of dating people I meet at Orli's house and then have to regularly put up with the awkwardness of running into them after it invariably fizzles out) we went to Becky's going away party, held by her friend (and most fabulous boss ever) Helen.

If only all boss/supervisee relationships could be this good. . . .

Helen, doing her best impression of a Jewish mother (or my grandma) put out quite the spread (which she forced us to take home at the end of the night in little tupperware containers). And Helen, Josh and I were all officially adopted as each other's surrogate Beckys, so that we won't be lonely now that she's gone. Overall it was fun, but bittersweet. But I'm counting the days until I get to see both Becky and Carrie again. (Camping trip post-job in Idaho, baby! London--and Holland--here I come!)

Abby, Josh (with a mountain man Alaska beard to replace the purple tank top), Becky and Claire


Becky's trademark pose. If you were to go back through my blog, I guarantee you could find this post at least two, maybe three more times!