New dog

The long dog saga if finally over! We have successfully procured a one and a half year old Maltese/Poodle mix named Sophie.

Chicken pox

First my son got it, now my daughter has it. About a fourth of their school has it now. By the end of the week, Bengt will be the only there.

More car work

Just a couple of weeks ago, I spent the better part of a weekend changing the timing belt on my Honda Passport. Right afterwards, the water pump starts to leak! My brother warned me to change it while I had everything apart but did I listen? Noooo. Off came the fan, belts, timing covers, timing belt and finally the water pump. I am getting quite proficient in this procedure now. The only real difficulty was in removing the gasket from the old pump as it was stock on the block pretty good.

Agua Caliente

Had a great Indian Princess campout at Agua Caliente in Anza-Borrego this past weekend. There was hiking up the stream beds, off-roading to exercise my seldom-used 4WD, swimming in the hot springs and explosions (only one dad had to go to the hospital and he is going to fine).

Snow in San Diego

In San Diego county at least. We took a drive up to Mount Palomar to check out the recent snow fall. The kids griped most of the way but were very excited once they saw the snow on the roads going up the mountain.

Car work

I did some major surgery on my Honda Passport this weekend. It was due for a new timing belt and had a leaky valve cover gasket.
The gasket was fairly straight forward, but time consuming since some of the bolts are hard to reach.
The timing belt was another matter. The job was going good until I got to the crankshaft pulley. The bolt holding it on is quite tight as you can imagine but the hard part is keeping the pulley from turning while you try to get it loose. The Haynes guide says to simply hold the pulley with a big set of channellocks. This is nearly impossible. I first tried putting on a strap wrench with the handle up against the frame to keep it in place. I broke two strap wrenches this way. Plan B. The Passport board had a good suggestion: stick your breaker bar down through the bottom of the car, slip on a long pipe and hit the starter (make sure you pull the ignition so it doesn't start). I had to get a pipe from Home Depot, but it worked like a charm. The second major difficulty was getting the new belt on. I had inadvertenly left the camshaft pulleys inbetween strokes so when I removed the belt, they snapped into a new position, throwing off my timing markings. I had to turn the sprockets with one hand and weave the belt with another; it took about an hour to get it right. Then I realized I couldn't get the hydraulic tensioner back in so off came the belt and I had to repeat the exercise. The last diffuculty involved reattaching the crankshaft pulley bolt. I had to find a way to stop the pully from turning while I torqued the nut. Since I was out of strap wrenches, I jury-rigged a solution. The pulley has a flange on it with two threaded holes. I imagine this is for a tool that the dealers use to keep the pulley from turning. Since I don't possess one of these tools, I screwed in a small machine bolt. I then borrowed a large pipe wrench from my neighbor and gripped the screw with it; the handle of wrench was up against the frame to keep from moving. I then was able to torque the nut a good deal. My breaker bar is 28" long and I was able put full strength into it, so I imagine I want over the specified 123 foot-lbs.
I haven't decided if all this was worth the $600 bucks or so my mechanic would charge.

Dream Car

I want to build one of these before I turn 40.

Bin Laden tape

Is everyone tired of these ridiculous UBL tapes already? He has been turning out these hollow threats for 4 years now and nothing has happened. If this guy has so much money stashed away in Swiss banks or gold bouillon, how about checking out Best Buy or Circuit City for some decent recording equipment. Any middle school a/v club could produce better material than this joker.
You can argue about Iraq, Bush and whether the US really is trying to find Bin Laden, and if Pakistan is covertly hiding them from us, and whatnot all day, but one thing you can't argue with is the ineffectiveness of terrorists in striking US targets. You would think by now that one attack, even a "failed" one (ala the first Trade Center bombing) would have gone down by now. I am not crazy about the Patriot Act, the TSA and HLD, but it is hard to argue with results.

The Great War

My wife recently picked "A Very Long Engagement" to watch. It is a good movie; half love story, half mystery. The subtitles didn't bother me at all. The setting of the movie is early 1920's Paris where a young woman searches for her fiance whom was supposedly killed during World War I.
I had great interest in military history when I was younger (primarily World War II) and this film piqued my desire to re-read some of my old books. I review two of them on my reading page.

California Burritos

I love California Burritos. Ever since I discovered them at Rico's in Encinitas, I won't eat Mexican food at an establishment that does not proffer the delictable bundles of goodness. For the uniformed, a California Burrito is a burrito filled with carne asada, cheese, sour cream and the pièce de résistance: french fries.
They are also easy to make at home:

Ingredients:

• Beef, use the cheapest cut you can find. I usually use chuck steak since it has little fat. Buy alot and freeze it in portion sized baggies.
  
• Cheese, cheddar is perfect
• Sour cream
• Frozen french fries, any brand will do.
• Tortilla

1. Start the fries per the manufacturer's instructions. They usually take 20 minutes in the oven to cook nice and crispy.
2. Fry up the beef until cooked through. This isn't filet mignon so don't keep it rare.
3. Grate the cheese.
4. Warm the tortillas a bit.
5. When the the beef and fries are done, pile everything on the tortilla and enjoy!

Raptor IOC today

The Lockheed F-22 Raptor went operational today. The controversial plane will take over the air superiority mission from the venerable F-15. Critics have questioned the need for the expensive planes since likely adversaries (and especially terrorists) don't field air forces that would need to be shot down. The Air Force even tried tacking on a ground attack role.
The US has been steadily losing ground to advanced Russian designs like the Su-37. The Indian Air Force (in modified Sukhois) has already bested the USAF in exercises. It would be interesting to see how the Raptor fares. I imagine it would win handily.
The US doesn't need 400 of these units, but we do need to show the world (meaning China and Russia) that we are still numero uno.

Yahoo Fantasy Sports Profile

I am a big fantasy sports nut. I used to do every sport but will probably drop hockey and basketball after this season. Yahoo Fantasy just launched a neat feature that displays your stats from 2001 on. There is even a little trophy case with your top 3 finishes.

Swami's

Took advantage of the wonderful weather and went to Swami's. Had a wonderful brunch at Swami's Cafe and then hit the beach.

Battlefield Airborne Communications Node

A co-worker recently reported on our project, BACN.
Quick overview of the project: BACN is, like the name says, an airborne communications node. It allows different radio and data links to be routed to different users. This allows various users, including the warfighter, to access communications they might not otherwise have access to. Our piece is a web-based situational awareness display that shows Link16 data.
I finally made it out to Miramar to view some test flights. Plenty of technical difficulties but pretty neat nonetheless.
Here is some video from a local news cast.
An history of the plane can be found here.

Last weekend

Today, the family and I took a small roadtrip down the 101. I was using Jack Brandais' Weekend Driver San Diego as a guide.
We started at Encinitas and headed to Torrey Pines for a nature walk. If you haven't been there, you must take a trip. We were on a quick quided walk.
We then headed to La Jolla and Mt. Soledad. The Brandais book has some micues in the directions, but that may be attributable to the construction in downtown La Jolla.
With one of the clearest days of the year, the view from the Mt. Soledad was spectatular. I have some pictues but they do the view justice. We only stayed a short while since it was late and the kids where cold.

LA road trip

I have a soft spot for Los Angeles. Most people in San Diego seem to feel the opposite. But I went to school there (UCLA), met my wife there and our first child was born there (Cedars-Sinai). We still have friends there, but don't get a chance to visit nearly enough.
Today we finally decided to make a trip of it. Jyoti really wanted to see the King Tut exhibit at LACMA. Tickets were expensive but it seemed like a cool exhibit. Even though I bought the tickets well in advance from the fine folks at Ticketmaster, they never showed so I had to contact their "customer service" people and arrange will call pickup.
Getting up there was no problem since there was little traffice (for LA). Tickets weren't a problem either and my Dad and Jyoti picked up the audio tour hosted by Omar Sharif (didn't know he was still alive). When we finally got in the building, the problems started. One of our kids is not good with darkness and other doesn't like mummies (but I thinks she's faking it). The exhibit started with a movie about mummies in total darkness. Thankfully it was short or I would have had to leave. Most of the other rooms where well lit. The items on display were very nice and most didn't look very old. You could have made them in your garage and no one would have noticed the difference. Then the biggest disappointment. The exhibit was billed as King Tut this, King Tut that. But the only item from King Tut's tomb was a small dagger. No gold coffin, no gold mask, just a knife. And I had to hurry past that since it was in a dark room and the boy was getting antsy. Anyway, the exhibit was nice but no where worth the money. They did have a very nice kids activity center right next door though.
Part of the same complex is the La Brea Tar Pits. This was one of my favorite museums as a kid but I haven't been in years. This was much smoother for the tykes although the boy needed coaxing past the wooly mammoth. The museum was as good as ever. We even made it out back where they have pits with fossils still being removed.
Next on the agenda was our old stomping grounds in Santa Monica. We lived just two blocks from the beach on Main Street when were kid-less. Back then, the bums and car thieves didn't bother us as much. We drove by our old apartment and went to the pier. We we not impressed with the amusement park they have there now. It is amazingly expensive and very sterile. We did take a few rides on the old carousel (once featured in a "Charlie's Angels" episode). They also have build a small aquarium underneather the base of the pier. Originally run by UCLA, it is now operated by Heal the Bay. It was great for such a small facility. The tanks were well stocked and the touch tanks were much better (and had laxer rules) than the ones at Scripps.
Lastly, we ate dinner at Fritto Misto, just off of Fourth Street. It was one of our favorite places to eat. We were surprised by the number of families with children there, having never seen any before. We then realized we used to eat at 8:00, not 5:00! It was also our first look at the "Early Bird" menu. How things change with kids! The food as good as I remember it and the wine list still as cheap as you will find.
Overall a great day. I hope to make the trip to LA much more frequently in the future.