Sherman like new!

After my last post about my car, I decided to write a formal letter of complaint to the General Manager and Volvo. Right as I was completing the letter, the General Manager gave me a call. He received our survey and apologized for our last service visit. In addition, he also extended the VIP service to our other car. In about an hour, someone picked up my car, dropped off the loaner and spent two days fixing the problem. Turned out to be both the ECT sensor and battery. I picked it up last night, cleaned, washed and shiny like new. When I started her up - she was her old self. I was pretty impressed with the follow up by the General Manager and they picked up the repair costs too!

I guess it does pay to be a loyal customer and have my car regularly serviced. I plan on driving sherman for another 90k!!

Calling all mechanics

I need to start off this posting by saying - I love my car. I have a 2003 Volvo S40 and bought it off the showroom floor (another long story). Since then, I've religiously brought it into the dealer for regular service. Last month, "Sherman" (named after the Sherman tank) went in for her 90k appt. I mentioned to the dealer that she was having a hard time starting, cranking for a few seconds before turning over. The service rep told me that they ran a computer diagnostic as well as a "visual" scan but didn't find anything wrong. After a little back and forth, which he obviously did not enjoy, he gave me the options of (1) changing everything that is a "could be" factor or (2) wait until it completely won't start and bring it in. REALLY? ARE YOU SERIOUS? I cannot believe this was the response I received. Obviously, my car's health is not life or death but I love my car - I love how it's been running like a charm for all these years.



Just so you know how much I love my car, a few months ago, Bill's car "the beast" finally retired. Being a semi-spoiled brat, I told Bill he can have my car and I can get a new car! We did end up with a new car and after I drove it for a week, I gave it to Bill and asked for Sherman back.



So... if any of you know a mechanic that can problem shoot above and beyond "running an electronic diagnosis" please let me know!!

Are you right handed?

Hello, Hello!

Long time no blog. Well, it's been kind of busy lately and I've been needing as much sleep as I can get - must be old age creeping in...

Anyhoo - I have to blog about a recent observation. A few weeks ago, I somehow injured my left wrist. Don't know how, but there was just a dull and sometimes sharp pain. It was not severe but a bit of a nuisance. I thought I had a very logical argument "I'm right-handed, how could I have injured my left hand? This will be pretty easy, I'll just leave my left hand alone and do everything with my right" HAHA Here is my challenge to all of you - try to not use your left hand for one day if you're right handed and vice versa.

If you can do it with ease - two thumbs up. For me, it was really difficult! I immediately realized that I use my left hand... A LOT. I will never second guess my left hand 'handiness' (Don't worry if you forgot to laugh on that one)

Minnesota's Cherry Blossoms

Anne and I vividly remember how gorgeous the cherry blossoms in Japan were and were really jealous that nothing like it exists in Minnesota. Then fall came and we were reminded how beautiful a fall in the states can be. They may not be cherry blossoms but they are not without their own beauty.

Another Birthday

On Oct 26th Anne and I went to St. Cloud to celebrate my father's birthday. My mother wanted to do a surprise birthday party and invited a bunch of his friends and family. Looking at the picture my mother is on the left and my father is on the right (the man in the middle is my dad's childhood friend). Anne, enjoys baking almost as much as my family and I like eating her baked goodies (which is a lot, in case that statement was ambiguous). She decided to make a burger cake, because his last name is Berger, and also cookies that looked like severed fingers (my father has a history of pretending to sever a finger on April Fools Day). After arriving we discovered that my mother had picked up a burger cake at a bakery. So basically Anne's cake and the store bought cake were right next to each other which inevitably resulted in comparisons, mostly from young children. Since Anne and I don't have and usually don't spend much time around children we forgot how brutally honest and socially unaware their comments/actions tend to be. Fortunately for Anne everyone thought her cake was much better to the point where the store bought cake wasn't even cut to serve. Sorry store baker.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY ANNE

Once again its that time of year,

Where Anne is full of Birthday cheer,

In search of presents her eyes will peer,

And she states "where did you hide them my dear",

In which I say "Oops, I forgot them I fear",

While I try to quickly escape from the rear,

Then she springs after me as fast as a deer,

Towards our second bedroom I turn and veer,

To smile and point out "your presents are here".

Love ya Anne - Happy Birthday (and sorry about the cheesy rhyme, but the second grader in me just has to some of the time.)

A Reminder That We Live in Minnesota

One of the many adjustments that Anne and I have been undergoing since our arrival back in the States is getting used to the temperature. We found that we tend to like the temp much warmer than we used to. For example our thermostat was set at 67F or 19.5 C (which I turned down to 65F/18.5C at bed time) before we left the States. After arriving back in the States we set our thermostat at 77F/25C and eventually we worked our way down to 72F/22C. Though we should mention that at 72F/22C we wear pants and sweatshirts, only changing to shorts and T-shirts after going under covers at night. Even during the hottest day in Minnesota this summer I spent most of the day outside doing yard work thinking that it was not very hot (in Minnesota's defense this summer was unseasonably cool). But, I digress and made a short story long, sorry folks, back to the point.


On Saturday Anne and I woke up to find snow on our lawn. We then looked at the temp online to find it was 27F/-3C with windchill of 16F/-9C. For those of you who are lucky enough not to know what windchill is it is what the temp actually feels (including the wind). We then looked at the temp in Tokyo and Shanghai, both of which are currently enjoying weather in the mid 70s F/20s C. Fortunately the snow melted, but on Monday it snowed for at least another 6 more hours. Just a little reminder that, yep, we are back in Minneapolis.

Goodbye Wood Peckers

One of our many home improvements this summer was new windows and siding. This is mostly an FYI to friends and family who plan on visiting us so they don't get confused when they can't find our dark brown house (its a light tan color now). I know it probably doesn't sound like the best time to do a major home improvement project when only one of us was working, but with tax credits, city incentives, and good connections it worked out well for us.



At this point you are probably wondering what the title has to do with the entry, well here comes the connection. We used to have cedar shakes that were dark brown in color. As a result wood peckers would mistake our house for a tree and peck holes into the shakes leaving it quite unsightly in places. Not to mention it is pretty irritating to be woken up on the weekends by a wood pecker hammering its beak into your bedroom wall. After we got the siding it was nice to faintly hear the wood peckers moving on to other houses in our neighborhood (sorry neighbors!)

Home Improvements Finally Ending?

It's been about 3 months since we've returned to Minnesota. I've been busy working while Bill's been busy finding work. In addition to this big task, he also keeps busy updating the home and doing random chores/ errands. I don't know about you, but I usually don't get excited over painting, staining, sanding and cutting the grass. Even though these are on the "least desirable" list for Bill, he has been very diligent in painting cabinets, staining the deck, painting the kitchen (including trim) and coordinating the siding and windows.

I think his "fun list" has finally come to an end. Bill received an offer on a job today!! Let's just say we are both very excited. The job is a good fit with his background and experiences. During this time of job seaching, I've learned a lot about myself. I always tell myself that whatever the experience may be.. good or bad.. I need to learn something. Here is what I've learned:

-Don't try to help when your spouse just wants you to be a spouse and listen. I always want to put on my HR hat and offer recommendations, suggestions, solutions. Sometimes, I just need to be a friend and listen.
-You're in this together. Bill took a back seat with his career for me so I need to show more patience during this process - easier said than done!
-Wants v. Needs. I usually think of myself as a pretty down to earth kind of person, I don't own 50 pairs of shoes and a closet full of designer purses. However, during this process I realize that I have a lot more "wants" versus "needs". I remember teaching this to 1st graders during a JA volunteer opportunity once. The term "practice what you preach" really came into effect here.

We both sat down and talked about our learning lessons this weekend. Then, the offer came today.

The Great Minnesota Get Together

Ahh yes, the Minnesota State Fair - gotta love it. When I first moved out here, I had no idea what a big deal the state fair was. Honestly, I don't even think there's a state fair in NY/CT/NJ. If there is, it's not as popular as the MINNESOTA STATE FAIR.

The background (Minnesotan blog readers can skip this part).

Every year, around Labor Day, the MN state fair takes place for (10 days?) at the State Fairgrounds. From morning until night the fair is open with endless amounts of activities: showing animals, seeing baby animals, horticulture, local companies advertise in booths, music, concerts, amusement park rides and MOST IMPORTANT of all... FOOD. Fair food is greasy, unhealthy and extremely delicious. Ladies and gentlemen, I have to say.. the majority of the food at the state fair were unknown entities to me until my first MN state fair experience. Yes, yes, there's always the classic - cotton candy, hot dogs and hamburgers. But.... it's so much more than that.

First, MN state fair food has a popularity of "food on a stick". Everything you can think of is served on a stick - pickle on a stick, cheese on a stick, fried fruit on a stick, pork chop on a stick, if you can think of it, they have it. Exhibit 1 - bacon on a stick

Second, most food at the fair is deep fried. Greasy, drippy food. Fried candy bars, fried cheese, fried hot dogs, everything. A fair trip is not complete without fried cheese curds. Cheese curds? Yes, little nuggets of cheese, deep fried. Exhibit 2 - cheese curds

Third, very much like our Asian excursion, the state fair is full of PEOPLE. The people watching is worth admission itself. There are so many people that state fair goers often take shuttles to there from remote parking locations. Exhibit 3 - Minnesota's "people mountain, people sea"

In conclusion, our state fair experience was well worth the over-priced, artery clogging, lard and sodium overloaded, sugar showered food. What did we have you ask? Our golden food list included:

A BUCKET of cookies (exhibit 4)

Cheese curds

Mini donuts

Gyro

Shaved Ice

Cotton Candy

Hot Dog

Burrito

Some custard, corn, and tater tot hotdish on a stick- worthy of it's own blog.

Tara & Wade's wedding

This weekend, we attended Tara and Wade's wedding. Last year, we missed two of our friends wedding :( so... we were looking forward to our first wedding in 2009. Let's just say the last few years have been filled with weddings, weddings, weddings, and babies.




For those of you reading this from the other side of the world, a Minnesotan / Midwestern wedding will never be short of:

• Cheese - there will always be a cheese spread, typically during social hour, as an appetizer or perhaps after dinner and dancing. We had a variety of cheddar, swiss and pepper jack on Friday.
• Beer - non stop flow of keg beer and a variety of wine & spirits. You will never have a shortage of alcohol in the Midwest.

Steak, salad and Shrek

Beginning to see a pattern here? Last weekend, we went to see our friends Chad and Melissa. Melissa was one of my bridemaids and I haven't seen here since the wedding two years ago! In addition to seeing her little girl Niki, we also saw her new home and found out she is 8 months pregnant. I know, I know, terrible at this keeping in touch thing.

Steak, salad, and watching Shrek twice (Niki's favorite). I have to say, since we've been back our diet has turned from 70% veggy 30% protein to 80% red meat and 20% veggy. Bill even picked up some V8 because he felt that we needed more veggies and fruits in our diet.

We had a great time with Chad, Melissa, Niki and Chloe - I'm definitely not waiting another two years before we meet again :)

Burgers, brats and babies

Greetings!

It's been a few weeks and I've been a little delinquent with my blog updates. The summer is flying by and I can't believe it's almost September. Two weekends ago, we went to see a couple of friends for a BBQ in St Cloud. Apparently, since we've been abroad the past year, everyone's been having babies... all girls too!

The rain certainly didn't put a damper to our day of brats, burgers and babies. Both Tim & Jess and Eric & Sara are new parents. Here is Greta (green) and Elsa (pink). Aren't they the cutest?

NYC

For the first two days of the Orange extravaganza, I made it out to NYC to see my trendsetter friend - Shanna (who I call SB, short for Shanna Banana). My 2.5 train ride to the city and back was well worth it. I arrived in Grand Central and realized how much I missed the city. The quick taxi ride across Central Park to the west side further re-affirmed that I wished I lived here.

Our first stop was shopping in SOHO. SB has been on my back about getting a pair of 'premium denim' for 8 months now. I finally sucked it up and after trying on 30+ pairs, made my first outrageously overpriced denim purchase. But they looked amazing. This is the first time I realized that if you pay enough, you too can look hot in a pair of jeans. A few stores later, we went back to the apt. and picked up a LARGE sausage and pepperoni pizza from Patsy's. A New York slice is unbeatable and just to keep reminding myself, I had more than one, two or three slices.

Evening festivities involved meeting up with some of SB's friends from work and volleyball and even had a drink or two myself. I love the diversity. In Minny, I'm usually the token Asian or token minority, but NYC felt right at home for me. If there was a transfer opportunity to NYC or CT, I would be on top of that!!!

The Orange Extravaganza

Every year Anne and I try to make it out to Orange, Connecticut to visit some of her family. This year it turned out to be quite a party. Normally we visit the Camerato's - Anthony, Katrina, Johnny, and Kathy (Katrina & Anthony being Johnny and Kathy's kids). This year Mama Wu (Anne's mom), Mumei (Anne's cousin), and Andrew (Mumei's son) visited too. Fortunately the Camerato's have a big house so we were all able to fit. As always it was a LOT of fun and as always we are really sad to leave. We went to the beach in Rhode Island one day and to the Mystic Aquarium another and the rest was filled with video games, shopping, eating, movies, and entertainment provided by the Camerato's. The big addition to this years trip was all of the Chinese food that Mumei and Andrew brought (1 full suitcase). They made tons of bubble milk tea for us and lots of good eats.

Some of the highlights of the trip were...

Squid and scallops linguine (Thanks Johnny!)

Various Chinese cuisine (Thanks Mumei!)

Hearing Anne sing a funny tune from a video game throughout the trip

Having nightmares brought on by playing too much word warp (an iphone/itouch game requiring you to find all the words you can with 6 random letters)

Just being able to spend some time with family

Being in one room with 3 forms of videos games going on about half the time

All in all it was a great trip and one that we are planning again in 2010.

Good Bye Allison

On Sunday 7/26 our time fostering Allison came to an end. We returned her to the Midwest Animal Rescue where she was adopted by a nice young couple from Burnsville. Both Anne and I felt sad to see her go especially when she ignored her new owner and the Animal Rescue staff and stared out the glass door at us as we left. She was a great dog who transformed from being super shy and anxious to very friendly and comfortable. Though both Anne and I miss her we have come to agree that it was good for her to move on to her adoptive family's home.

Are we in China again?

Anne and I love authentic Chinese food, so to us one of the best parts of our trip to LA was the plethora of places we could enjoy it. What makes it even cooler is that the Chinese food in LA is cheap. They even had my favorite bubble milk tea (here is a picture of one from China in case you forgot and a link in case you don't know what it is (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bubble_tea ) for $0.75, though they call it boba milk tea in LA. You can get it in Mpls but it costs $4.50 for one of the same size. In an attempt to satisfy our cravings we had a combined 4 dinners/lunches, 8-10 bubble milk teas, and we walked around and made purchases from 3 large groceries stores selling only Chinese products. We visited China Town, little Tokyo (not Chinese related but cool to see none the less) and visited a few cities in which most of the signs were in Chinese and where the people were completely fluent in English and Chinese. The real cool/sad part was that the authentic Chinese food in California was better and about 1/2 to 1/4 the cost of the same type of food in Mpls. We were so jealous.

Welcome to Hollywood

Last/this week depending on which days your week starts or ends (all the country hopping has gotten me confused on this topic) Anne and I went to Los Angeles. I went for fun (and to support my hard working wife) and Anne went for work. Anne's family (Mumei, Jim, and Andrew) were nice enough to show us around since they live in the area. They were phenominal hosts - Thank you! Our first stop after arriving was to Pink's. It is a famous hotdog shop that has been featured on several travel shows and is known for having a lot of celebrity patronage. As it turns out there was a camera crew onsite recording what I am guessing was a british music group, but I could be wrong. We also went to the Hollywood Walk of Fame and saw Michael Jackson's star - which still has a large crowd of people around it. We miss you Michael! We also saw the Hollywood sign which was kind of funny because it now reminds me of the keelung sign in Taiwan (check out the Taipei Day 4 post from november).

Later in the week we went to Santa Monica and Venice Beach. Both are pretty close to each other, but there couldn't be more of a different crowd (okay there could, but they were pretty different). Santa Monica is a nicer area that has a pier with a ferris wheel and other fun things. It also has a section that is closed to cars, but open to lots of nice shops and street performers (We saw one from America's Go Talent - or so they said about 15 times). Venice Beach on the other hand has a weight lifting gym (right on the beach), basketball, and handball courts each with bleachers for viewing. Note - the movie White Man Can't Jump, was filmed at these basketball courts. Venice Beach also has tons of suveniour stores and individuals selling various goods. One of the more bizarre stores was the medical marijuna and botox shop. Yes, you read that correctly you can get medical marijuna and botox shots at the same shop. Sounds like a disastor waiting to happen if you ask me. I guess the upside is that if you end up looking like frankestien at least you will feel good. The last stop of the day was to In-N-Out Burger. We ordered off their secret menu (just to feel like locals). I had heard several times from different sources that In-N-Out Burger was awesome. I am sad to report that though the burgers were good they don't come anywhere near Sasebo burgers in Tokyo.

Bill the Dog Catcher Extraordinaire

On Saturday & Sunday Anne and I spent most of the day sitting in our backyard playing with our foster puppy Allison. Well technically Anne spent a good deal of time working, this was due to both a busy schedule and wanting to play with and be near the puppy, but also being allergic to dogs so she can't have too much direct contact. This results in me being Allison's main source of physical attention and she soaked it up all weekend.

On Monday Anne went back to work and I continued my search for work, but apparently this interrupted with Allison's allotted attention time and that was apparently unacceptable for her. So she came up with a brilliant solution. She broke her collar and decided to explore the neighborhood. At one of my breaks I looked in our back yard to find one of our patio chairs sitting in the middle of the backyard 25 feet from our deck. I realized that her chain/leash (whatever it's called) was attached to the chair, but Allison was no where in sight. I will tell you nothing makes you fell terrible like having a foster dog and losing her on the 3rd day. I spent the next 1 1/2 - 2 hours searching for her. I eventually found her about 4 blocks from home sitting in someones yard. They were kind enough to give her water. Allison greeted me with the "Hey dad, where have you been or what took you so long?" look. I took her home and called Anne to let her know she was ok.

Allison was recently spayed and all the activity irritated her stitches so I was off in search of the Midwest Animal Rescue to have them check up on her. I received directions from Anne and drove off to find them. Now as I am sure Anne can attest to I from time to time behave less than intelligent. This was one of those times. I wrote down the directions, but forgot 2 of those directions. This resulted in Allison and I driving for about 1 1/2 hours without finding our destination. We arrived home to see Anne waiting for us and after a laugh at my incompetence we made a second trip - this time arriving at the destination.

Midwest Animal Rescue was nice enough to give us a new collar and the matching leash. They also gave us some medication to prevent infections since the spayed scar was a little bothered by her off the leash antics. They said that we should give Allison the medicine with peanut butter. I had always been told that dogs and peanut butter are funny to watch but I had no idea how amusing it actually was. Long story short, I learned that Allison is quite capable of monopolizing my day regardless what I have planned. Now she is tired out and resting for her next big adventure.

Foster Parents

Before your imagination gets too out of control after reading the title, we're fostering a dog. One of my friends, Hilary, works at an animal rescue shelter - http://www.midwestanimalrescue.org/ She asked if I was interested in fostering a puppy before they're adopted. The puppy will come with food, leash, kennel, everything covered. How could I say no? I've always wanted a puppy but Bill told me I would have to pick up the poop. Yes blog readers... that was the hold up for the past 1.89 years... I did not want to pick up doody.

After perusing the website, there were tons of puppies that needed a foster home! Initially, I had my eyes on Koko. However, Bill and Hilary were way ahead of me in thinking (potty training, etc) We're now proud foster parents of Allison. Allison's a 15 month old Anatolian Shepard. At first, she was a bit shy, but she's warmed up. She loves to hang out in the kitchen under the table, but prefers the sun room or outdoors. She's super quiet, we haven't heard her bark yet and the best part of it all is that she's potty trained... really potty trained. She went through the entire night w/o going potty. NICE

Last Week's Project

We have been considering having our kitchen cabinets remodeled for a long time. Anne decided that the best way to do it would be to paint them white and get new hardware for the knobs. After finding out that we would be moving to Asia we put that idea on the back burner. After arriving home it was decided that it was time to make the change. So the majority of last week I removed the cabinet doors and drawers and removed the hardware. I then sanded all of the wood work down. I applied one coat of primer and 3 coats of ulta white paint (apparently there are different grades of white). I knew of pasty white and glow in the dark white as they have been terms to describe my skin (I don't tan well and I am not the outdoors type).

Back to the project at hand, I added some new knobs (which required some drilling of new holes) and placed the panted cabinets back in their place. I have to say the cabinets look like new and it turned out to be a great idea Anne!

Before...

After...

Nawlins

In the past few days, I've been in Nawlins (New Orleans) for a conference. I've never visited New Orleans before because I've heard it's humid. Well, having Tokyo still fresh in my system (physically), I have to say that it is TRUE. New Orleans is VERY HUMID. Actually, these few days have been "extra humid" according to the locals. In addition, it thunderstorms every evening, right when I decide to start my walking tour. It stormed so hard yesterday that here is a pic of Bourbon Street.

In addition, I've noticed a few differences (in random order):

1. People are very welcoming - Everyone from the bus driver to servers would say "Welcome to New Orleans, we're glad you came" Wow - perhaps we didn't understand it when most of the people said that to us last year.. .or maybe they never said it at all.

2. Safety - the locals are very kind in telling us "be very careful of your surroundings" and even demonstrate how I should be holding my purse.

3. Streets change names when you cross Canal St. - don't know the story behind it, but our airport shuttle driver mentioned it

The fourth one is very funny to me... I would describe it as "escalator etiquette". There's about 10,000 people attending this conference and all the sessions end around the same time. Even with all this people piling onto the escalator at the same time, I observed a couple of things:

a.) In the escalator line, I had my 24-36" of personal space

b.) Even though you can fit two people on one step, everyone naturally took one whole step
c.) On top of the 'one step per person', people also stood on the opposite end of each step (right, left, right left) to ensure optimum space. Fascinating...