Photo of the Week (12/30/07)

Greetings from My Parents’ House in West Covina, California, USA!
Photo was taken on Tuesday, December 25, 2007 (CHRISTMAS!).

2007, GOODBYE! The trees in this week’s photo have a holiday story. My parents have had the same fake Christmas tree for over 3 decades but in the late 1980s we bought a living one. For several years the potted tree was brought indoors and decorated in December than outside again for the other 11 months. Eventually we retired (i.e. planted) the tree, which flourished for many years in the front yard. Unfortunately the neighborhood has trees that behave like weeds. One took root next to our tree, which we discovered too late. The dying pine was cut down and later “cremated” in a beach bonfire – truly leaving in a blaze of glory. My dad replaced the old tree with a trio of pines – three Christmas trees instead of one – as shown in the photo (see my car in the background).

Nowadays Christmas is a low-key affair for my family. Long gone are the days when uncles, aunts and their children gather in someone’s house to celebrate the holiday. Now all my cousins are adults, several are married, some have kids and a few live more than a day’s car trip away. My brother and I have neither wives nor kids yet, so it’s just us with our parents, making for a relaxing Christmas Day.

With the year ending, now is a good time to tally up some figures with hopes of finding fun facts about this inaugural year’s 25 photos of the week. Somehow I managed to choose photos that cover every day of the week – Mon: 2, Tues: 3, Wed: 2, Thurs: 1, Fri: 3, Sat: 7, Sun: 7. Weekends dominated, reflecting a comment from a previous email – even without a job taking up my weekdays, I had more activities on weekends. Also on at least three occasions I found myself on a Sunday afternoon without a single picture taken in the past week and hustled to take a shot of anything. From one mad dash came my favorite photo – the beach sunset.

The photos were taken in 10 cities with just one outside the United States. In fact the other nine cities all lay in California, covering the 3 southern counties of Los Angeles, Orange and San Diego. The final count is 6 in Newport Beach, 4 each in Costa Mesa and San Diego, 3 in West Covina, 2 in Irvine and 1 each in Brea, Fountain Valley, Lake Forest, Universal City and Rosarito (Mexico). With a full year ahead, the photos are sure to showcase a greater diversity of cities

Lastly on December 21, we had the second of the biannual solstices, the official start of winter in the Earth’s northern hemisphere (summer in the southern). While I am no fan of cold weather, the winter solstice has at least one positive – the start of longer days and shorter nights. WOOHOO! HELLO, 2008!!!

Angelo

Photos of the Week (12/23/07)

Greetings from Newport Beach, California, USA!

Photos were taken on Wednesday, December 19, 2007.

Last week I mentioned not using people’s names in these messages. It’s one of my rules. What are these rules and why do I have them? Read on…

Rule 1: 500 Words (or so) maximum. This limit helps me cut my ramblings and focus the messages. Also “a picture is worth a thousand words” but if I write that much, will you read them all? Some of you deal with so many emails a day. At my last job I easily received and sent between 100 and 200 messages daily. Then at home, I would not touch my personal emails. I like to believe that you read my messages immediately upon receipt but that is wishful thinking as we all have busy lives. I simply hope that reading these emails (whenever that may be) gives you the same moment of calm that I get when writing them.

Rule 2: 1 Picture. Everyone’s email system is different. For some the photo is an attachment that must first be downloaded to be viewed. For others it is embedded as a viewable image in the message. Multiple files could be time-consuming to access as well as max out mailbox space. Then there are weeks when I barely took any photos and other weeks when I have a tough time choosing just one. I’ve already found a “loophole” to this rule when I placed two photos side-by-side and save it as one file. But this week I have included more than one and no loophole in sight. Sometimes rules just have to be broken.

Rule 3: No Real Names. I could be self-centered and say that these emails are all about me so all other names are banned. Okay, not true. The real reasons? Privacy: I do many things with people who also receive this email and don’t want any one thinking – for example – that I will mention the trip to a “gentleman’s club” with “John Doe”. Simplicity: I only mention people who are absolutely relevant to the picture or message. Mystery: Some things you will only learn if you talk to me directly and sometimes only after a drink or ten. You will only get so much info from my emails. Face time is worthwhile.

Now as a holiday gift, I give you TWO photos. I’ve managed not to bombard you with Christmas shots week after week. Instead you get them all at once. One photo is from a nearby office building. The other one shows some of the lights and flowers that deck the halls of my home. My roommate and I had a small holiday party a few weeks ago. He had the tree and plenty of lights. I had ornaments and plenty of free time on my hands. Yup, plenty of lights and plenty of time. I didn’t use all the lights but sunglasses are now required when entering the living room.

Angelo

Photo of the Week (12/16/07)

Greetings from Newport Beach, California, USA!
“Photo” was taken on Tuesday, December 11, 2007.

I was surprised to learn that the movie Four Weddings and a Funeral came out over thirteen years ago. You may be surprised to learn that it is one of my personal favorites. “Wedding” in the title practically screams chick flick but it’s well written (Oscar winner for Best Original Screenplay), well casted and well acted, making it very entertaining (Oscar nomination for Best Picture too). I mention the movie when joking that after three weddings, if I attended a fourth one this year, the funeral would be mine. Not a single wedding is on my calendar but last week there was a funeral – obviously not my own or the origins of this latest email would be very suspicious. The recently deceased was a friend’s mother – I never actually met the woman but ironically I first met the friend at a wedding almost three years ago.

Fortunately my list of weddings far exceeds funerals in my thirty-odd years of life. Unfortunately my list of dearly departed covers the entire age range from my cousin’s daughter (she was stillborn nine years ago this month) to my maternal grandmother (After we spent a day together, she passed away that evening at age 81). In between?

There was a family friend’s daughter who drove too fast and hit a dip in the road, causing her car to flip with her boyfriend and her inside. Seatbelt use – he did and lived, she did not and died. There was a classmate from my high school years who collapsed after coming home from his college class. He had an undiagnosed medical condition, probably the same one that causes the seizures that his twin brother starting having years later. There was the neighbor’s son who lived in excess – too much eating, too much drinking, too much smoking – until his body endured too much. He left behind an out-of-wedlock infant daughter who will never know him.

The first death was preventable. The second death was unfortunate. The third death was sadly inevitable. What’s worse is that they were all my age. The family friend’s daughter died at 17 and I was 16 at the time. The classmate was 20 and so was I. The neighbor’s son was 28 and I was 27. Death is bad enough. When it happens to someone your own age, especially in your youth, your own mortality becomes more palpable.

You may have already noticed that I have no photo this week. You may also notice that I end these emails on a positive note. In lieu of a photo is a simple placard to honor my friend’s mother. I avoid using people’s names – I should explain why in a future email – but this is a worthy exception. As for a positive note after writing about death, here it is: In the season full of giving and getting, remember to appreciate what you already have.

Angelo

Photo of the Week (12/09/07)

Greetings from My Parents’ House in West Covina, California, USA!
Photo was taken on Sunday, December 9, 2007.

I was all set to use a shot of the balloon ride at the Great Park in Irvine (http://www.greatparkballoon.org/) as my photo of the week. Thursday afternoon I was driving home from a lunch meeting when the “giant orange” came into my peripheral view. The new ride has odd operating hours – open only on Thursdays & Fridays 10 AM to 3 PM and Saturdays & Sundays 9 AM to 3 PM – but I was in the right place at the right time so I decided to take the ride. Unfortunately strong winds grounded the balloon for the day. I took some pictures with absolute certainty that one of them would be the weekly photo. But something happened.

The windy weather was a precursor to a rainstorm on Friday leaving smog-free skies and snow-capped summits. Last weekend I visited my parents and from their house is a great view of those peaks. I saw the white-on-white scene of mighty mountains and cotton clouds and had to take a snapshot. The picture isn’t perfect. The foreground shows power lines from an electric sub-station and a blue building with its semi-obscured yellow sign – the Ikea superstore in the neighboring city of Covina. Nonetheless it’s the photo of the week.

The rain and snow are clear signs of autumn with winter soon to follow. The days are still sunny and warm but the nights have gotten chilly. Then again I consider anything below 70 degrees Fahrenheit to be cold. I have never experienced a winter of sub-zero temperatures and hope I never do. Then there are people who dream of them…

Take Irving Berlin for example. This songwriter’s musical talent brought him to Hollywood and the entertainment business. His time spent here inspired the song and movie “White Christmas”. The warm weather and tropical trees of America’s Southwest contrasted starkly to the cold and snowy winters of his youth in New York City and the Northeastern USA. The song’s original first verse was about the palm trees and swimming pools of Los Angeles and explained why Mr. Berlin was “dreaming of a white Christmas, like the ones [he] used to know.”

Give me a Southern California winter any day. Hmm… “I’m dreaming of a warm Christmas, like the one I had last year. With palm trees swaying and children playing on the lawn with the fake reindeer.” Mr. Berlin must be turning in his grave. Sorry, Irv.

Angelo

PS: I had a typo in my last email. The correct French phrase is “C’est la vie” not “Cie la vie”. Alas, I’m only human – I think…

Photo of the Week (12/02/07)

Greetings for El Torito Restaurant in Fashion Island Shopping Center, Newport Beach, California, USA!
Photo was taken on Tuesday, November 27, 2007.

This week’s photo was taken at a friend’s 41st birthday celebration at El Torito. We were in the restaurant’s patio where these decorative lights added to the festive atmosphere. If you do the math, you’ll see that my friend hit the big 4-0 last year and he wasn’t alone. In addition to plenty of weddings, I also went to at least five parties celebrating the 40th birthday milestone in a 16-month period of time from November 2005 to February 2007. Not surprisingly all the celebrations were for men and not a single woman. I know one lady who celebrates birthday #29 every year, never reaching #30. I should point out that I have known her for 10 years. You can do the math and then contemplate the age double standard between the sexes.

By the way I have known about the El Torito restaurants for years and yet only recently I realized that its name is Spanish for “The Little Bull”. (You can see wall art of bulls in the picture.) I took five years of Espanol in grade school and the simplest words and phrases still stump me. Then again my last class was nearly twenty years ago and I haven’t used the language much, not even during my trip to Mexico last September. Cie la vie. Wait, that’s French. Oy, vey. Wait, I mean… Oh, never mind.

Back to milestones, next year will mark twenty years since I went to Australia as a high school exchange student. While my Spanish-speaking skills have suffered, my Aussie-speak has fared much better by keeping in touch with a handful of classmates in Oz, several of whom receive this weekly email. I made a return trip to the Land Down Under back in 1994 (almost fourteen years ago) but in two decades only a single classmate made the trip across the Pacific to see me - just one in twenty years. Maybe this guilt trip will result in a plane trip from one of them. Two decades, mates, what are you waiting for?

Finally last Friday was the last day of November. I predicted rain by month’s end and it happened. There were even flash flooding warnings. Nothing close to biblical proportions but I will take what I can get. Ready for my next prediction? I predict… Nothing. I got nothing. Check back next week. Until then, um, er… What is good bye in Spanish? Caio? Wrong, that’s Italian. Arigato? No, that’s Japanese for thank you. Aloha. (Close enough.)

Angelo