Merry Christmas everyone! It's hard to believe that this year is almost over. Here's to a safe, peaceful holiday and a good start to the new year!

Comments won't work on this site for a while... I've been hammered by comment spam and it's driving me crrrazy.

Update: Okay, they're back. Installed new version of MT Blacklist; let's see what happens.

You know that violinist in the video for "Celebrity Overnight"? Yeah, the one who kinda looks like Sandra Bernhard? Well apprently she is Miri Ben-Ari, "The Hip-Hop Violinist." Trippy. Coulda been me!

HOMEWARD BOUND

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Saturday night Mariel and I had our Second Annual Sha/Mariel Housewarming Shindig. Because of my temporary insanity, I didn't get home until mid-afternoon, leaving us pretty pressed for time. But Cheryl came over to help, and Mariel's sister was staying with us, so we had a couple extra pairs of hands. Instead of the standard fare, we decided to try some new foodstuffs and ended up with Swedish meatballs, little pizzas (recipe courtesy of Queer Eye), crab puffs (by Myra), cucumber/avacado/cream cheese sushi, chicken adobo, sugar cookies, gingerbread cookies, and various purchased dips and things-to-dip. Mariel also bought a bunch of yummy tamales.

Around 20-25 people came, which made things pretty crowded, but it was great to have everyone together before the holidays. As Marc pointed out, I realized that I generally put my friends into one (or more) of these three catagories: Work, School, and Association. Try to figure out which one you belong to. And now that I think about it, Home should be its own category as well. Anyway, I liked that everyone was together and could finally meet each other.

Fun was had by all (I hope) and it again reminded me yet again that I have Super Awesome friends. I definitely couldn't make it without them. Thanks to everyone who came!

So tonight is the long-awaited finale of The Apprentice. All signs point to Kelly being the winner by a landslide. However, this being reality TV, I'm guessing that it's more clever editing that's making Jenn look so bad, rather than an actual huge difference between their performance. I also know that big surprises are a TV show's best friend. Therefore, I'm making a prediction now that Trump will pull some tricky sh*t and hire Jenn.

There, I said it.

Check back later to see how wrong I am.

Update: Okay, I suck.

Last night as I was driving home from work on the freeway, a police car came out from behind me, swerved around me, and continued on its way. Since it was going pretty fast, I sped up too. Eventually I settled in the left lane and he was two lanes to the right, and we were both going around 80. Suddenly, he started to slow down. Not wanting to go faster than him, I slowed down too. He slowed to 75, 70, 65, and even past 65, but I stayed at around 65, since I didn't want to go below the speed limit. The police car pulled up beside me, and the officer inside turned on his spotlight, shone it directly in my face, stared at me for a second or two, then sped off.

Perhaps it's just me being cynical, but if I were, say, a black man, would he have pulled me over? What exactly was he looking for? I have a friend who lives in Mississippi and he told me a story once about a time he was pulled over by the police. My friend happens to be a somewhat dark-skinned Indian man. When the policeman walked up to his car, he said, "Oh, I should have figured that it was one of you people." Now I'm sure that there are many, many good policemen (and women) in the world, but in my experience, it seems like they more often harrass and annoy people than protect them.

Another busy weekend in ShaLand. Friday night we had our annual company holiday party at the Westin St. Francis in San Francisco. I was automatic designated driver, as usual, so I drove up Rahul, Erik, Scott, and Nigel. The party itself was okay, but I knew only a handful of people there. I'd like to attribute that to the size of our company, not my relative lack of social skills. But you never know. I participated in food consumption, a little bit of dancing with Rahul "I don't remember anything from my swing classes" Gupta, and gambling with fake money. They gave each of us 100 unspecified monetary units to gamble with, so I tried my skillz at the blackjack table. I was doing quite well (I was up around 50 unspecified units), but after the dealer called last hand, I bet it all and busted. If it wasn't last hand, I would have pestered the dealer for the number of unspecified units I could get for my wristwatch.

Saturday I ran a few errands in Mountain View (got the dog washed, got a haircut, and washed the car...a triumvirate of cleanliness!) and had brunch at Hobee's with Brendan and Matt. That night was dinner and Dave & Buster's (or D&B's as the cool kids say) for Barbara's birthday. Matt, Walter, May-Ling, and I pooled together our tickets to buy Babs a little D&B's goodie bag that consisted of a poodle/purse (imagine if you took a poodle, attached handles to it, and put a zipper down its back. It's actually quite cute and not at all as gruesome as it sounds), 4 shot glasses, and a little elephant grabby head. The elephant was the cheapest item (in tickets) in there, so of course it was her favorite. We might have been better off ditching the other items and just getting her 28 grabby heads.

Sunday I had another chiropractic appointment, and then I went to Buddy's so he could teach me how to drive stick in his car. Not to toot my own proverbial horn, but I am pretty awesome at it. We started out in a parking lot in Foster City and very soon thereafter, I was doing hills in Belmont and driving on the freeway. Go me. I think I've discovered another one of my sekret skillz.

(In case you haven't noticed, I'm having a harder and harder time thinking of titles for these posts, so I've settled for quoting lyrics from songs that are stuck in my head.)

This morning we had our company's annual awards meeting. Typically these meetings are long and drawn out, filled with rich execs making bad jokes that only other rich execs understand. Well that was still true this morning, but there was something else that will forever make this the Best Meeting Ever.

I walked into the gym with Buddy and noticed a bunch of instruments and sound equipment. "Hey they have a band again," Buddy commented. Every so often we'll have an employee band play at our meetings so I didn't think much of it. We sat down and after a bit I saw a guy walk to the band area wearing an Ozomatli shirt. "Hey, Ozomatli shirt!" I pointed out to Buddy. Then as more people walked up to the instruments, I said, "Wait a second...that IS Ozomatli!"

They started off our meeting with "Saturday Night" then left the gym during the meeting. Afterwards they closed it with "Ya Viene El Sol" and "America." During the last song Buddy and I got up and stood in front of the band. Afterwards I thanked all of the band members (sadly, Shef wasn't there) and got a chance to talk a teeny bit with Adsru. I thanked him for coming and told him I was at the Fillmore show last week. I added that I really respect what the band stands for. He thanked me and gave me a hug. I told Uli and Raul that I first saw them at the Bridge to Bridge over the summer. Uli asked me if I ran, (I did) and he told me that he was the guy screaming "GO GO GO!!!" at the finish line. I asked Uli if they were going to be playing at our company party tonight but he said that they had to be in Albuquerque for a show.

Sadly, although I brought two cameras to work today, they were both in my car! But all of the members were really nice and gracious, and I'm still bouncing around with excitement. And this totally isn't helping my Ozomatli obsession.

I [Triple Heart] Ozomatli.

Last Friday I went to an Ozomatli concert. This was the second time I saw them live, the first being at the Bridge to Bridge run, which is where my slight obsession with them began. It was also the first time I went to The Fillmore, which is a very cool venue. Posters and pictures from practically every performance there covered the walls.

We got there just before the opening act, which was a rapper called 2Mex. He was okay, but I didn't really listen to him. After he was done, we made our way to the floor. I was pretty literally bouncing with excitement waiting for them to start. Finally, DJ Spinobi came on stage and introduced them with the same intro as the one to "Ya Viene El Sol" on the Street Signs album. One by one, the band members came on stage. I'm embarassed to say that I can't remember which song they opened with, but boy was I excited. They had tons of energy as always and they played songs mostly from Ozomatli and Street Signs, with a couple from Embrace the Chaos. They have a lot of members but they mesh together perfectly, with each instrument adding something to their sound. Each of the band members is a fantastic musician, and several of them play multiple instruments. My favorite is Shef the trombone player. That man can dance. Coming up close behind are Asdru (vocals/trumpet), and Raul (vocals/guitar).

It was an amazing concert, and might be, dare I say it, the best I've ever been to? If you ever get a chance to see them live, DO IT. Run, don't walk.

Aaaaaaand scene.

Anyway, the rest of the weekend was also pretty full. Saturday morning I hurt my knee (read about it here) so I missed out in the scavenger hunt thingy I was supposed to do with Peter and Walter. Instead I went to a party at Buddy, Marc, Scott, and Ash's house. I played some 8-player Halo 2, foosball, and fell asleep on the couch. Life of the party, let me tell you. Sunday I went to dim sum with Cheryl, and then looked at houses with her, including some at the new Rivermark development which I thought was very, very planned and kind of creepy. It reminded me of some weird combination of Disneyland and the Stepford Wives. Sunday night I had dinner with Yar, Jan, and Kurtis and gave Jan her awesome creme brulee torch for her birthday.

Only 2 1/2 weeks until I go home. Woo!

Watch this: World on Fire.