New spot

I am moving the blog to my new website. If you would like to know the new address let me know, and I will give it to you. Thanks to everyone who supported my blog through it's duration.

Save the last dance

To start off my first post of the new year I will catch you up with the big news. In late November I got officially engaged. The wedding will be in spring of next year, and I am very excited. I proposed to her on my birthday mostly because I thought that it would be a surprise to her since she mostly knew it was coming sometime. Christmas came and went fairly quickly, but it was a good one. I spent New Year's Eve in New York, but not in Times Square. It was a fun New Year's spent with my fiance though.

The end of last year seem to be when a lot of the main events happened, and this year so far has been about planning the wedding and everything. I hope that everyone has a had a good year so far and that the year continues to be good.

Times like these

As I previously posted, my Aunt was very sick. Everyone who knew her were all hoping that she would win her fight with cancer, but after almost a year of fighting the disease she passed away. It is still very surreal to think that she is gone at such a young age. I have been close to her and her family all my life, and she was not only my aunt but a roll model who taught me to embrace the differences in people as well as to live life to the fullest.

Her memorial was this past weekend, and it was amazing to see the amount of people that she touched. She was an amazing person, and it showed through the stories that were told as well as the love that people have for her, even if they had known her for a short time. She is a person who truly lived life to the fullest and loved unconditionally, and I am sure that her memory will remain for a long time to come.

High Tide or Low Tide

It's now getting a little cooler outside, but I'm coming out of hybernation for another post. After a lot of time thinking about how to finish school and get my degree, I am now taking classes at the Art Institute Online, which has so far been a really good experience. I will be doing some animation classes that I'm sure I will enjoy, and it allows me to make my own schedule, which is a lot easier since I work full time during the day. I'm also hoping that it will allow me to get out faster since the courses are accelerated.

I don't do it very often, but I also wrote to some of the city council members here the other day when I heard about a campaign to save the surf spot Trussels here in Southern California. I figured that sending a quick e-mail is the least I could do to help raise awareness of a proposed Toll Road that will go through that area, possibly damaging the beach and surf in that area, which is a pretty famous surf spot mentioned in songs by the Beach Boys. I have learned to surf in that area. It has a lot of historical surf culture, and I think is a great place to learn to surf and enjoy a beautiful beach. I have not read any reports on the impact the toll road could have yet, but at the same time I don't think that anyone truly knows what the impact could be. I just didn't think that the risk is worth the reward of a toll road that I don't think would get used as much as it costs to build. Other toll roads in the area have not been that successful from what I know. Anyway, I'll get off of my soap box. :)

Other than that, things have been going fairly well. Football is back on, which is always great. I've been learning some programming for work, and that has been interesting. I am also taking some time off soon to spend some time with my girlfriend, which is always great too. The only thing that has been unfortunate is that my Aunt has been really sick, but, like everyone in my family, we are all hoping that she will get better. She is a great person.

An Open Letter to NYC

Here is another bi-monthly post. :) Everything has still been going well here. I got to go to the Siggraph conference this year, which I always find interesting. I feel like I've learned a lot about computer animation over the past few years, but the classes that are taught at Siggraph are always a humbling experience for me. I feel like I understand more about the things that are taught at the classes, but they always do show me that I still have a ways to go in some areas. I always learn more by going, which is good. Overall, it was a great time.

Everything else is going well. This summer has been a lot of fun. I got to go to Disneyland last week with my girlfriend, which was a great time. The California Screaming ride is one of the most fun rollercoasters that I've riden in a long time also.

I saw World Trade Center last week too, which I thought was well done. I was a little bit afraid that Oliver Stone would make it into a conspiracy movie, but it was more about the lives of two of the police officers that were working at the tower when it collapsed. It was an intense movie, but it ended up being mostly about the heroic effort of the people doing search and rescue than anything else.

That's been the major news here.

The grass is green

It's been quite a while since my last post, but I am back. It has been an absolutely incredible past few months. I started dating a woman who is amazing, and who has become a great part of my life. A couple of really good friends have moved back to San Diego. One of them I think is leaving again at the end of summer and will be missed. Another great friend of mine that I've known for a long time will be moving out of the country for a while and will be missed as well. It's been good to catch up with these friends over the past couple of months, especially with the ones that will be leaving.

Everything else has been good. I started to learn to surf again. It's been a while since I've done it. I was a little timid after getting stung by a stingray a while back. It was fun to get back out into the water again though.

I also got to see a lot of New York city a week ago. I've never been there before so it was great to experience that city. I feel like I got to see all the sites that I wanted to see.

The World Cup has been fun to watch as well. There have been some great games even though the United States is out. That's about what I've been up to recently. :)

Every Dog Has It's Day

March has seemed to be going quickly. I didn't really have any big plans for Saint Patrick's Day. My mom's side of the family does have some Irish in them, but I don't think that I can consider myself Irish. I do think that it's fun to spend the holiday drinking Guiness and eating corned beef and cabbage every once in a while though.

The past couple of weeks have been fairly busy, and I've also been dog sitting for my Mom and step dad while they were out of town for a couple of weeks. Their dog is an older dog that they rescued from the pound, and he's really mellow so it was good to have him around for a while.

Also, I've enrolled in an advanced scuba diving class, but I'm still working on getting medically cleared due to a minor heart defect that I've had since I was a kid. It has never been a major problem, and I didn't seem to have any issues while doing the beginning dive class that I did a long time ago so I'm hoping to get cleared soon.

I am looking forward to diving again though. The advanced class seemed fun. The first class that I took I didn't get to see a whole lot of fish or anything like that because the visibility was really bad due to a red tide. Hopefully more exciting dive stories will come from this class.