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We did last summer a trip to San Francisco and British Columbia, to see Cindy’s brother get married and then visit some of Cindy’s friends in BC. Chantel was able to make the trip up to BC as well, so it was great getting to see some familiar faces from Lafayette – I know Cindy was pleased!

San Francisco definitely lives up to its nature – a very “fruity” city, but the charm was there, from the Golden Gate Bridge to Pier 39. Cindy and I also took a wine tour through Napa Valley, and we really felt cultured while going through it. Will’s wedding was quite nice also, Cindy was asked to read an original poem during the ceremony. <3 <3 to my writer wife. Great trip overall.

British Columbia really reminds me of Norway, with the greenery, rainy weather, and incredibly nice people. Terry was nice enough to take us on a tour of Vancouver Island, from one side of the island to the other, before taking us on a trip to Whistler-Blackcomb mountain. EXTREMELY beautiful nature out there. I guess I can mark up British Columbia as another place I’d like to retire to :p

And finally, Johanne and Magnus came to visit us, all the way from snowy Norway to enjoy our winter heat. We spent some time in KL showing them around, then made a trip to Kuching in Sarawak. I had hoped that we would be able to do some jungle hiking, but the weather was too rainy and chancy to do much – even the tour companies weren’t running We still got to see a bunch though! Tusen takk for visiting us!

Coming in next update… our Norway trip pictures!

I apparently forgot to make a post about the whole reason I brought back my website, the Singapore Marathon!  Cindy and I decided to challenge ourselves to run in it, with her doing the 1/2 marathon and myself doing the 10km run.  It was our first time for either race, and we spent the last few months training for it.  My training started off pretty spotty, but by race day,  I can proudly say that running for 30 minutes isn’t a problem anymore!  Cindy did her 1/2 marathon in <strong>under 2 hours</strong>, and I managed to get through my 10km in 1 hr 19 min.  Not the best time certainly, but I’m happy I was able to do it.  I likely would’ve made better time, but at the 5km mark we had a steep bridge to go up, and that just took the wind out of me from that point on.  I simply hadn’t trained for that kind of steepness.  Up until then though, I had really been kicking my treadmill time by a fair margin.  Best of all for me though, is that this was 2 days after my 30th birthday – I really proved I was in the best shape of my life, and I hope to get better.  I’ve slacked in December some on continuing to run, but I will be getting back into the swing of things for January.

I had some work to take care of that week afterward, but we did manage to make our way out to the Singapore Zoo.  We had done the night safari last year, but the zoo proper is just astounding, right up there with the San Diego Zoo.

And to share the general photos of Singapore

You know, there are times that I’m glad that I’m not in the US to get caught up in whatever the hysteria-of-the-month is, and this is one of them. The “crotchbomber” on NWA 253 has really messed things up for flying in the US with the jerk knee reactions, namely the “don’t have things in your lap 1 hour before the flight lands.” Granted I kinda get why they would put a limit on this, since a plane crash on approach is more disastrous than one midway over the Atlantic, but it still doesn’t end the problems. A plane going boom is a plane going boom, just the body count might be different. With these new idiotic policies, and likely more coming down the road, one could say they’ve…

I travel fairly frequently for business, nearly always internationally. Even traveling to Sarawak requires me to go through immigration. And I am so thankful that on my last couple of trips, that I just have to throw my bag on the belt and waltz on through security. No taking out my laptop, keep my shoes on, or anything awkward. On the flight it is business as usual, do some reading, doze off momentarily with my headphones on, have a quick snack, and continue reading until we pull up at the gate. I don’t think there is any way I could survive that last hour without something to keep my mind off the sometimes very shaky landing approach. Ah well, thank goodness for places that don’t go insane over useless shows of security.

The issue that disturbs me the most though, is that the rules were already in place to prevent his actions, starting before the would-be-bomber even stepped foot on the plane. The man was apparently on a watch list, his family had reported him, pre-flight security detected nothing wrong – I can’t imagine the explosive residue that would have been all over him – and he still just walks on without a problem. Thank goodness the man is either an idiot or incompetant with his bomb plot, or the total failure of security would’ve had horrible consequences, and likely even worse shows of security theatre.

Then again, it would be nice to live in a world where people don’t try to blow up planes and buildings.