the birthday party

well, as Ricky Nelson's song said, "people came from miles around, everyone was there"
It was an incredible assemblage of family and friends, seventy plus to celebrate seventy years. Held in our back garden, the evening was cool and clear and the flowers obliged by blooming profusely.
Unbelievably, the CEO of HP, the "squeaky clean" Mark Hurd so revered on Wall Street, resigned the day before in an inexplicable 'non-sexual encounter' with an associate, and the party was abuzz with conjecture and invective. This guy was probably the sleaziest duplicitous CEO of a large corporation in America -- almost the same as the crafted Tiger Woods persona.
We used nametags, since a lot of the friends came from disparate backgrounds -- folk I've met over a long time, interwoven on occasion but not that many people knew each other 'ahead of time'. The name tags had logos on them as an icebreaker -- Yenta, an airplane to signify traveling together, companies we worked at, hobbies or civic groups, family... And then Jenny told a story about each and every one of the attendees to everyone. Mesmerizing, enchanting, as was the evening
I came away feeling so blessed, so lucky in my life, with such good friends and family to nurture me. Truly magic

where did the time go

My gosh, here it is almost mid-July, and nearing the "autumn" of my days, meaning that I turn seventy in eight days!

The time does fly by, especially when you're having fun. And I have been having some, indeed.

A big trip happened in May/June, traveling to Long Island, NY for a Board meeting (where I resigned as Board Chair after five years), then to London (where I gave a talk for HP Enterprise Group, a FIRST!) and HP Bristol Labs and then to Warwick Business School for a fun evening about Innovation. Then on an early morning flight to Madrid, followed by a late-evening flight to Sao Paolo, Brazil where I was part of a Monitor Group three-day workshop. On the back end, I stopped over in Lima, Peru, which turned out to be fortuitous and exciting.

There is an ancient city about 200 kilometers from Lima north along the coast, built some 5,000 years ago, with nine ceremonial pyramids, built all at once some 400 years before the Egyptians got with their program. This historic site called Caral is hardly known, and gets very few visitors. I had a car, driver, and guide to myself, as well as the assistant curator of "the dig" for several hours. Regal treatment for a truly fascinating experience. Go check out http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/1269

Coming home after a whirlwind two weeks, I was glad to be back in California, but surely privileged to have had the excursion.

Easter 2010

We were off to the Marin (CA) headlands, specifically to the Tiburon Yacht Club, yesterday to celebrate Easter with Jenny's Irish-Catholic paternal family side. 54 worthy souls showed up, on a sodden rainy blustery day out on a spit in San Francisco Bay. Beautifully stormy, and the kids made the Easter Egg hunt a piece of cake even in the downpour (1.1 inches of rain in 3 hours). Volleyball, crochet, and sack races all got scrubbed, but the conviviality and love flowed like always. Meredith surprised a few cousins with news that her twin girls (now 3 years old) will have a baby joining them in August; Tommy Dowley brought a lovely girl to the party -- a diver on the Berkeley diving team (whose major is PHYSICS, hooray!). The hit of the day for at least one attendee was the platter of barbequed oysters -- scrumptious!!!

springtime in Menlo Park

A shot of our backyard last week, a teaser so to speak.

The rock walls are about half done, but I got enough of them in place to plant some tulips, daffodils and ranunculus, which you can see blooming here. It has been a nice spring, with plenty of gentle rain so far... and the heifers look pregnant in the pasture

Life is good at our house, although moving the twelve yards of dirt that I had delivered last weekend, along with six tons of rock, was a little daunting

springtime

well, a lot going on in the garden right now.... First, all the daffodils are trying to outdo each other -- Ice Follies and Fortune competing a week later with Rijnveld's Early Sensation, just outside our bathroom door. And now, a hundred Christmas Dream tulips have just bloomed in their midst. On the side yard, Grape Muscari and Hyacinth have repeated from last year, joined by a half dozen Formosa azaleas in front of some Duc de Rohan azaleas and Redbird azaleas.

And then, four new climbing roses, for the lattice arch we brought from New Hampshire -- a Climbing Sombreiul, Eden, Full Moon Rising, and Climbing Colette. Two pinks and two 'whites'

Should be nice, to go with the 1,200 bedding plants so far this spring....

Olympic time

Cindy and Charlie got to go to Vancouver, NBC put them up at the Four Seasons and got them great tickets (front row) for (GET AHOLD OF THIS):

a. Ohno's 1000 meter Short track race (he took 2nd)

b. Lysacek's long program for gold in men's figure skating

c. Lindsay Vonn's gold in the Downhill skiing

d. Shawn Lewis' silver in the 1000 m speed skating

e. the Swedish ice hockey victory on Friday (with brother Warren)

f. the Finnish ice hockey victory on Friday (also w Warren)

Why?  

Well, Charlie's company, MobiTV, just happened to produce the great App for the i-Phone called NBC, available via AT*T.  1.4 million downloads the first day....  It is a WAY COOL app, you've probably seen it on TV with the skater on the Samsung phone while the guy walks around the plaza

where has the time gone?

My gosh, the last post was at Christmas time, and now Valentine's Day has come and gone.
And a hectic time it has been! Punctuated by some wonderful happenings, a few of which might be worth mention.

First, IMPORTANT NEWS FLASH -- we celebrated our 22nd wedding anniversary on February 4, which sets an all-time record for each of us, even more so because we are (a) still together, and (b) still in love with each other.

We celebrated by going to the Stanford women's basketball game (where they won, in an awesome display), and then the next night trying Marche, a highly touted French restaurant in Menlo Park (the touts were right!).

We celebrated Valentine's Day two ways -- (a) with tickets for Michael Buble, pronounced B00-blay or something like that, in April; and (b) with a party for a 15 year old beagle Todd, owned by Ian Gilchrist, one of our crazy neighbors from the old Woodside environs (Preston Road...).

I called my 'big sister' Sharon last evening to get caught up on all their goings-on; the big event in their life is that they are anticipating a little boy in April -- their first great-grandchild. WOW!

Quick note, doesn't begin to convey how frenetic things feel. But for now, peace and love!