Saturday, December 10, 2011

Pouring One For My Homies

Ok, so it has been a while since I have been here but I'm back with something pretty good to report on. Many of you may not know this but today is my Mom's Birthday. My mom passed away on January 18th of this year. I won't go into the details of her death or the circumstances around it but if you would like to know more about that you can read another post of mine here.

Yesterday my brother Chris asked me if I was going to go to her grave tomorrow (today) for her birthday. I have been thinking about her birthday this past week or so but I never intended to go to the grave. I'm not really one of those kind of people who finds comfort in visiting graves. To me, I know that she is not there just her body is. I know that my mom lives and her spirit is not confined to her body anymore. I felt like I could remember her just as well in my home. The more I thought about it the more I felt like I was a bad son for not wanting to go to the grave. A lot of my family is going and they plan on singing Happy Birthday and leaving flowers but that's just not me. While I was thinking about this I came up with a way that I can remember my Mom on her birthday in my own way.

If you know anything about my Mom you would know this. #1 She was physically confined to "The Blue Chair" for the last part of her life. The Blue Chair was a place of confidence to a lot of people. Thousands of visits took place at the Blue Chair, thousands of laughs, thousands of tears shed. The Blue Chair was a sacred place to many people and my Mom sat there for much of her ending years. #2 My Mom had a love for the out doors and a love for outdoor activities. She loved being outdoors and in the sun. She was an excellent skier, tennis player, she loved the beach, and so on. She loved Nature and loved the Outdoors. #3 My Mom had a love affair with Coca-Cola Classic. It was her poison. She had cases hiding in her room and though out the house. She would have someone fill her sippy-cup cup to the brim with ice and she would gulp away. In her life time she probably drank a million cans of coke. Ok, maybe not but she liked it. So with those three things in mind and a little help from my friend Carleton, this is what I did to remember my Mom on her birthday.

My friend Carleton and I had planed on an early morning bike ride from our houses. We have a trail next to our houses that enters the Santa Ana Mountains. Our destination...Sierra Peak. If you are in East Orange County by Yorba Linda, Sierra Peak is where you see all these towers way up in the mountains. It is very easily seen from the 91 and 241 freeways looking east (towards Corona). I left at 6:00 carrying some mementos. I pinned a picture of my Mom sitting in her Blue Chair on my chest and went off riding. Here is a picture at the bottom of Skyline Road which is the beginning of the trail at sunrise.

The ride was fun. It got a little hot so I had to shed my jacket but finally here we are at the top of this section of the mountain with a sippy-cup and Coke in hand.


Here I am giving my Mom a sip.

Taking one for myself.

And pouring one for my Mom.



It was actually a very beautiful day. I couldn't have asked for better conditions. From this vantage point you could see probably close to a 75 miles or more. We could see Catalina, Mount Baldy, Down Town LA, Rancho Palos Verdes, Way into Riverside, Lake Matthews and so on. It doesn't come out on the Camera that well but here is a faint picture of Catalina. Look hard, it's there.

91/241 to the bottom left...Yorba Linda to the bottom Right...and Down Town LA smack dab in the middle.

Lake Matthews in the lower right part and the San Gorgonio Mountains (Where Big Bear & Arrowhead is).

Mount Baldy and Chino & Ontario below.

It was a beautiful day and a great ride. I used to go and tell my Mom about my Mountain Biking adventures and I know deep down she always wished she could go. Today was her day. The ride down was fun and a little crazy. Mom loved every second of it. She was laughing the whole way down. I love you Mom and Happy Birthday!

Tuesday, September 13, 2011

Baby Names

So I was looking back on my blog today and ran across this one. Now that Jennifer is pregnant, we are talking about names. Names are a hard thing to come up with. Hopefully we don't blow it. By the way, because Jennifer is pregnant and this is what pregnant people do who have blogs...why don't you vote to see what the sex of my first born is.

Thursday, September 1, 2011

An Announcement

Since it's been a while that I have written here on the blog I thought I would make an announcement by way of an intense action packed video. This is a true story about what happened to Jennifer and myself. Enjoy.

Click Here to watch.

Thursday, July 7, 2011

Happy Anniversary

Happy Anniversary to the biggest babe I know!!! You have given me the best 5 years of my life. I love you Jenny!

Thursday, February 17, 2011

I Love Bob Dylan

I had the most real dream last night. I was watching the news and they were doing a story about Bob Dylans death. I was so bummed out. I love Bob Dylan and I was really sad about his death. The dream was so real that I had to look it up this morning when I got to work to see if it was true. In my dream, Jennifer couldn't understand why I was so upset that he died. I'm telling you now and I solemnly declare to the world that Bob Dylan is the man. He is the greatest song writer I know and although his singing is border line unintelligible these days, I still love to hear him sing.

My wish for February 2011 is that all of you will know what an amazing man, singer, songwriter, and person Bob Dylan is.

Here are a series of videos of one of my favorite songs of Bob Dylan. All of these artist were obviously inspired by Bob. Some of these versions are long but it is an amazing song and worth listening to every version. Please enjoy All Along The Watchtower performed by:

Dave Matthews:


Pearl Jam Sorry, I couldn't embed this one.

Of coarse Jimi:

For some reason Bob's version is not on youtube and I don't know how to embed his song from my itunes so you'll just have to trust me that it is amazing.

Tuesday, February 15, 2011

THE STEELWELLS

My one of my best friends band, The Steelwells, is currently in a competition to be on the cover of Rolling Stone! Please click on the link below and vote for them. You will love their music.

Sunday, January 30, 2011

Mount Baden Powell

Sorry we didn't get a chance to get to this post for a while. Right when I was going to post it, I had to wait because of what happened to my Mother. Naturally her post took precedence. So here we are a month after the event posting about Mount Baden Powell.

On New Years Day a few weeks ago, Jennifer and I decided that we wanted to go on a hike for the day. We also wanted to play in the snow. Mount Baden Powell is what came as a result.

Mount Baden Powell is a hiking trail in the Wrightwood area in Southern California. This trail covers part of the Pacific Crest Trail (Which I would love to hike someday) and is named after the founder of the Boy Scouts. We decided to take Sam with us because she has never seen the snow before. Here is our photo journal of the trip.

Sam loved the snow! We were worried about her getting cold, but her thick coat kept her plenty warm. We loved throwing snow balls off in the distance simply to watch her frolicking through the thick powdery snow. Sam couldn't resist munching on snow during any down time.



Jen and I tried covering all of our bases while in the snow, such as making snow angels, eating snow, and you guessed it peeing in it (Jen didn't want to participate in the latter part).



Love this picture.




I couldn't resist getting a little Bear Grills.




We ended our trip with this breath taking view. Nothing gets better than this. Afterwords we enjoyed four hours of traffic, but it was all worth it. Jen and I would love to come back someday and do an official camp out.