bizarro day

these are not good signs. i think the apocalypse is rapidly approaching:

• ryan dempster gets his first W as the cubs defeat the brew crew 6-3
• kerry wood gets his first major league save
  
• john danks got run support in his first start. this is the same guy who went 0-5 at the beginning of last season despite pitching pretty decent. of course, the universe still hates him, as he didnt get the win. that went to dotel, who pitched a single out. not fair.
  
• new kids on the block, now into their last 30s/early 40s, are reuniting.
  

im scared. what's this alternate reality i'm living in?

brewers 3, cubs 6
white sox 2, indians 1

swamp feet

i blew off work today to go snowboarding today. it was hey you's idea. she's on spring break this week, and wanted to get in one last day. we drove up last night, stayed at rustling wood, went to heavenly (the nevada side) and drove home.

it was a good day. the slopes were slushy, but still good. and i feel so much better about myself when im out there. hey you made me do not 1 but 2 blue runs. i made it ok. im still improving. and she was very patient and continued to give me pointers and waited for me.

we stopped at the oliver garden in vacaville for dinner. i had a craving. we had eaten breakfast before we left, and only had some minor snacks in the car until dinner. the restaurant was interesting, to say the least. a vibrant cross section of america. lets leave it at that before i get petty.

walking to the car after dinner, the air in vacaville was nasty, it smelled like manure. apparently vacaville is a cow town. not the most pleasant smell to walk into. EVEN NASTIER, however, was the smell in my car when we got in. i immediately noticed the rankness and thought that maybe we had left monday's chinese food or some cheese out of the cooler. when asked, hey you had an answer right away -- it was her nasty swampy snowboarding boots. how such a gross smell from such little boots permeated my entire car is unbelievable. and completely disgusting. seriously, drop those boots on the insurgents in iraq and call it a day. all the troops can just come home.

horse show

mopey boy and i went down to pebble today, to see hey you's horse show. it was my first time down there. very interesting the people who participate and watch those shows. lots of rich people, obviously. its not a poor man's sport.

and lunch at the club at pebble was interesting. i was definitely the token asian in the restaurant dining room. my $25 open faced steak sandwich was delicious though.

the pictures of hey you are posted on my flickr. i had to practice timing the slow shutter speed of my camera to get good pics. i ended up with quite a few pics of her horse's butt, or approaching the jump. i SO need a new camera.


here's the best picture i took today. unfortunately, its not of hey you. its of a 13 year old leaping over a height of 4'9" on $750,000 horse. no, all my zeros are in the right place there. what horse is worth a 4-bedroom house in berkeley? apparently this one is.



horse show024
Originally uploaded by sharynkaryn

spring training

so i havent blogged anything about spring training, mostly cos we all know it means little to nothing. but as it comes to a close this week, here are a few random thoughts about my team:

• boyfriend rich hill didn't look so hot his first few outings. but its ST, so its pretty inconsequential. im encouraged by his last start, which was pretty decent
• alex cintron's stint as a cubbie is over. not surprising, as we already had a surplus of infielders who were better than cedeno. and that guy made the team, pretty unbelievable.
  
• the brian roberts deal is not going to happen. hardly shocking. while baseball trades/deals are complicated, if they are going to happen, they never take this long. im glad that the guy who played hard (despite injuries and a heart condition) is the one who's going to be manning 2nd base. go DE-RO!
  

and here are some random thoughts about happenings around the league

• can i get a job putting on 20 lbs a year for 19 mill per year the way miguel cabrera did?
• i'm happy joe crede has a job, but i would have preferred for it to have been with SF, so i could watch him live more often. apparently i'm the only one who likes crede in the bigs while fields is sent down. and we all know how impartial i am. or not.
  
• will modern technology be able to measure how bad the SF giants are projected to be this year? $123 million ace barry zito got beat by the giant's own minor league team today. that's pretty pathetic. hey guys, do you want me to play? i can lose to the fresno grizzlies too, and i bet for cheaper as well. at least you can save some money
  

birshday birshday birshday

i had not one but 2 great birthday celebrations. first this weekend, up in truckee, where cuz and hey you gave me a very patient private snowboarding lesson. and then on wednesday we had a great dinner at kokkari in SF, even though they didn't set my cheese on fire. the wine was good and the company even better. here's a pic of 8 very full people leaving the restaurant


DSC04866
Originally uploaded by jen_chang

(can't you just picture mopey boy doing this in all his family pictures as a kid? i mean, if he had a family or something)

i got some great presents, which while i wasn't really expecting, i really appreciate! its great to be the birthday princess sometimes :) cuz gave me the lesson and a new pink wine rabbit, which i can't wait to use. b got a me an aveda haircut which is 10 times better than my last one. and my mom, unbeknownst to her, got me a black north face soft shell hoodie that had originally been destined for return.

here are pics of my handmade presents. thanks to hey you, i'm probably the only climber in the greater bay area who has a chicago cubbies chalk bag. she had to order the patch and sew it on and everything. i would never think to do that.


birthday 01
Originally uploaded by sharynkaryn

here's the box i got from coley today. all the way from hotlanta. who know such evil lurked within....


birthday 02
Originally uploaded by sharynkaryn

cole made me delicious-looking, multi-colored mini cupcakes for my birthday. too bad i can't eat them. she called me the day after she sent them and told me she had a horrible case of stomach flu and had probably sent me germ bombs. i had to throw them out when i got them. so sad. but they have been immortalized forever here


birthday 03
Originally uploaded by sharynkaryn

so i got a bunch of awesome presents, a fun day of snowboarding, and no stomach flu for my birthday. not too shabby :)