Wednesday, September 24, 2008
Life with Ina
I took Tina's advice and started a blog about our exchange student, Ina. I plan to include lots of photos so that Ina's family back home can check it out even if they can't ready English.
Here is the link:
Here is the link:
Labels: Exchange Student
Tuesday, September 23, 2008
Multi-Faceted Volunteer Day
As I sit here procrastinating due to some work that I need to get done, I am catching up on blogs and reflecting on my day. Thinking back to this evening, I covered a lot of volunteer ground.
4:30pm - Arrived home from work to prepare for the evening's activities. Spent time reviewing a homework assignment with our Exchange Student from Norway.
Group: EF Foundation
5:00pm - Left the house to coach my daughters' volleyball team.
Group: US Youth Volleyball League
6:30pm - Dropped the girls off at home, picked up Celeste & a friend to drive to Anaheim for Girl Scout "Older Girl" leader training.
Group: Girl Scouts of America
9:45pm - Arrive home to continue the work that I was not able to finish earlier when I left early for volleyball, etc. I have a demo with my customer from Sweden early tomorrow morning and I have to make sure that everything is ready to show!
Lee / Tina / Shoo (probably a large percentage of my reading audience!): Sorry that I missed our WoW session tonight. I forgot about the training that I had to attend to become an official Girl Scout leader.
Not exactly solving the world's social problems, but doing my little part to help others when and where I can. I know that most of you reading this have similar stories. What are your favorite volunteer organizations?
4:30pm - Arrived home from work to prepare for the evening's activities. Spent time reviewing a homework assignment with our Exchange Student from Norway.
Group: EF Foundation
5:00pm - Left the house to coach my daughters' volleyball team.
Group: US Youth Volleyball League
6:30pm - Dropped the girls off at home, picked up Celeste & a friend to drive to Anaheim for Girl Scout "Older Girl" leader training.
Group: Girl Scouts of America
9:45pm - Arrive home to continue the work that I was not able to finish earlier when I left early for volleyball, etc. I have a demo with my customer from Sweden early tomorrow morning and I have to make sure that everything is ready to show!
Lee / Tina / Shoo (probably a large percentage of my reading audience!): Sorry that I missed our WoW session tonight. I forgot about the training that I had to attend to become an official Girl Scout leader.
Not exactly solving the world's social problems, but doing my little part to help others when and where I can. I know that most of you reading this have similar stories. What are your favorite volunteer organizations?
Labels: Exchange Student, Family, Scouts, Volleyball
Monday, September 15, 2008
Rise, Egor! - Part 2
By request...
The basics of the Egor skit are pretty simple. The beauty of the skit is in the execution. This is something that we had down pretty well in our Boy Scout days. Not everyone needs to be good. As long as everyone provides some basic level of acting ability and talks loud enough to be heard by the audience then a few standouts will make for an excellent skit experience.
Rise, Egor - plot summary:
We open on a mad scientist gleefully announcing to the audience that he has made the ultimate invention with which he can take over the world (very Pinky & the Brain-like). The invention is Egor, a monster that follows the mad scientist's murderous directions by choking the victims to death. From there, a series of visitors come to the door (one at a time). The mad scientist has Egor dispatch each of them with a series of simple comments: "Rise, Egor", "Walk, Egor", "Kill, Egor". After dispatching the visitor, then Egor is sent back in hiding for the next victim.
After going through a number of visitors, the scientist is pleased that the tests worked. The visitors would usually be a typical door-to-door salesperson or donation solicitor of the time: vacuums, Fuller Brush, Jerry's Kids, etc.
At this point, the Mad Scientist is ready to start conquering the world. He turns back to the audience and announces that he can take over the world with three simple comments:
"Rise, Egor" (behind the scientist, Egor rises)
"Walk, Egor" (Egor extends his/her arms and advances towards the scientist)
"Kill, Egor" (Egor dutifully dispatches the scientist -- the best laid plans...)
I honestly only have 2 clear memories of the performers of that skit. We had a number of people participate with repeated performances of the skit over time. My general recollection is that everyone did well and that we had a lot of fun with it. However, the two performers that stick out are Lee and Shoo.
With Shoo, his preference was to be the visiting Avon Lady (do they still do that?). Anyway, he would come to the door and in a falsetto voice attempt to sell various cosmetics. Shoo would also make a futile effort at defense with the Avon Lady purse when Egor attacked. That was one of the few cases when the victim would notice their fate before it descended upon them.
With Lee, it was a great, stereotypical mad scientist performance. He had the voice down, the mannerisms down, and interacted well with the audience and each of the visitors.
The Girl Scout that played the mad scientist last weekend did a very good job. She definitely did not look the part. She is the most petite girl in the group and has long, California-blonde hair. However, she put her hair up in a crazy do and did a good job with the voice and mannerisms. She had a bit of a false start, but then fell easily into the role. In fact, it was a bit scary at just how much she got into it!
All in all, an excellent memory from the past Boy Scouting days and the current Girl Scouting days. It was fun to bridge the two programs in this way.
The basics of the Egor skit are pretty simple. The beauty of the skit is in the execution. This is something that we had down pretty well in our Boy Scout days. Not everyone needs to be good. As long as everyone provides some basic level of acting ability and talks loud enough to be heard by the audience then a few standouts will make for an excellent skit experience.
Rise, Egor - plot summary:
We open on a mad scientist gleefully announcing to the audience that he has made the ultimate invention with which he can take over the world (very Pinky & the Brain-like). The invention is Egor, a monster that follows the mad scientist's murderous directions by choking the victims to death. From there, a series of visitors come to the door (one at a time). The mad scientist has Egor dispatch each of them with a series of simple comments: "Rise, Egor", "Walk, Egor", "Kill, Egor". After dispatching the visitor, then Egor is sent back in hiding for the next victim.
After going through a number of visitors, the scientist is pleased that the tests worked. The visitors would usually be a typical door-to-door salesperson or donation solicitor of the time: vacuums, Fuller Brush, Jerry's Kids, etc.
At this point, the Mad Scientist is ready to start conquering the world. He turns back to the audience and announces that he can take over the world with three simple comments:
"Rise, Egor" (behind the scientist, Egor rises)
"Walk, Egor" (Egor extends his/her arms and advances towards the scientist)
"Kill, Egor" (Egor dutifully dispatches the scientist -- the best laid plans...)
I honestly only have 2 clear memories of the performers of that skit. We had a number of people participate with repeated performances of the skit over time. My general recollection is that everyone did well and that we had a lot of fun with it. However, the two performers that stick out are Lee and Shoo.
With Shoo, his preference was to be the visiting Avon Lady (do they still do that?). Anyway, he would come to the door and in a falsetto voice attempt to sell various cosmetics. Shoo would also make a futile effort at defense with the Avon Lady purse when Egor attacked. That was one of the few cases when the victim would notice their fate before it descended upon them.
With Lee, it was a great, stereotypical mad scientist performance. He had the voice down, the mannerisms down, and interacted well with the audience and each of the visitors.
The Girl Scout that played the mad scientist last weekend did a very good job. She definitely did not look the part. She is the most petite girl in the group and has long, California-blonde hair. However, she put her hair up in a crazy do and did a good job with the voice and mannerisms. She had a bit of a false start, but then fell easily into the role. In fact, it was a bit scary at just how much she got into it!
All in all, an excellent memory from the past Boy Scouting days and the current Girl Scouting days. It was fun to bridge the two programs in this way.
Labels: Scouts
Sunday, September 14, 2008
Rise, Egor!
The family went to a Girl Scout family camp outing in San Pedro this weekend. Nice camp, lots of cool things to do there (both in camp and nearby outside of camp).
Ina had her first chance to actually touch the Pacific Ocean on this trip. We had taken her to Laguna Beach on Labor Day, but only had time to get to the cliffs overlooking the beach and let her take some pictures. On this trip, she got to play in the sand and visit the local tide pools.
On Saturday night, the girls had a campfire. The girls were trying to come up with a skit and I made a couple of suggestions. The first suggestion was considered too gross even by their standards (which are much lower than I thought, but that is another topic). That skit was "A Hot Meal." I won't go into details, but those of you who know it understand when I say it is gross.
The one that they did like was "Rise, Egor." This was one of our favorites when we were in Boy Scouts. I have very fond memories of Lee as the mad scientist and Shoo as the Avon Lady. But I digress. The girls talked me into playing a part and I had the honor of being the first to die. The little girl that played the part of the mad scientist did a great job. Hayley played Egor and at the end of the skit had the audience cheering her on.
The campfire included the making of s'mores. This was another first for Ina and she seemed to enjoy it.
Ina is a great sport and is doing a good job of putting up with our kidding and even starting to return it. I don't think that camping on the sand is what she expected, but it is definitely a unique California experience!
Ina had her first chance to actually touch the Pacific Ocean on this trip. We had taken her to Laguna Beach on Labor Day, but only had time to get to the cliffs overlooking the beach and let her take some pictures. On this trip, she got to play in the sand and visit the local tide pools.
On Saturday night, the girls had a campfire. The girls were trying to come up with a skit and I made a couple of suggestions. The first suggestion was considered too gross even by their standards (which are much lower than I thought, but that is another topic). That skit was "A Hot Meal." I won't go into details, but those of you who know it understand when I say it is gross.
The one that they did like was "Rise, Egor." This was one of our favorites when we were in Boy Scouts. I have very fond memories of Lee as the mad scientist and Shoo as the Avon Lady. But I digress. The girls talked me into playing a part and I had the honor of being the first to die. The little girl that played the part of the mad scientist did a great job. Hayley played Egor and at the end of the skit had the audience cheering her on.
The campfire included the making of s'mores. This was another first for Ina and she seemed to enjoy it.
Ina is a great sport and is doing a good job of putting up with our kidding and even starting to return it. I don't think that camping on the sand is what she expected, but it is definitely a unique California experience!
Labels: Exchange Student, Family, Hayley, Scouts
Wednesday, September 03, 2008
Bethany's Birthday
I completely glossed over Bethany's birthday earlier this month. She turned 15. It has been a busy month between the reunion, our new exchange student, keeping up at work, and so on. Anyway, one of the busy items this month was the celebration of Bethany's birthday.
Bethany has a number of friends that have Disneyland annual passes. As a result, we decided to allow her to have a Disneyland birthday. This included renting a room at the Residence Inn nearby for 2 nights and covering one day of admission for a couple of friends that did not have passes.
By staying at the Residence Inn, we had great meals in the hotel room courtesy of the full kitchen. The hotel also offered a nice breakfast. We saved a ton of money by not eating at Disneyland!
The weekend was called a great success by the girls. We parents were a bit worn out though. Bethany had a good 15th birthday celebration!
Bethany has a number of friends that have Disneyland annual passes. As a result, we decided to allow her to have a Disneyland birthday. This included renting a room at the Residence Inn nearby for 2 nights and covering one day of admission for a couple of friends that did not have passes.
By staying at the Residence Inn, we had great meals in the hotel room courtesy of the full kitchen. The hotel also offered a nice breakfast. We saved a ton of money by not eating at Disneyland!
The weekend was called a great success by the girls. We parents were a bit worn out though. Bethany had a good 15th birthday celebration!
Labels: Bethany, Disneyland, Family
Middle School
Today is the first day of school for the 7th graders that start middle school (middle school is 7th and 8th here). The 7th graders get a day to get used to the school without the 8th graders around to terrorize them. Naturally the 8th graders will assume their role starting tomorrow.
Anyway, Hayley is excited about the new school. She had a brief stint in Preschool when she was 4, but did not last long. So she really has only ever known her Elementary school. She is looking forward to the interesting new experience.
Although the 7th graders start a day before everyone else, the good news is that they get out a day early at the end of the school year.
Anyway, Hayley is excited about the new school. She had a brief stint in Preschool when she was 4, but did not last long. So she really has only ever known her Elementary school. She is looking forward to the interesting new experience.
Although the 7th graders start a day before everyone else, the good news is that they get out a day early at the end of the school year.
Labels: Hayley
Tuesday, September 02, 2008
32 ft to 64 ft
I read a friend's blog today and he made an interesting observation. I realized that the observation can be extended to many different things. For example:
it's been observed many times by many different people that you travel farther in your second second of free-fall than in your first. me the idealist thinks this is wrong.
it's been observed many times by many different people that you travel farther in your second second of free-fall than in your first. me the idealist thinks this is wrong.
Labels: Just Weird
Ina is here
Last Thursday night, our Exchange Student, Ina, arrived from Norway. It was over 24 hours from when she left her home until she arrived in Orange County. The last leg of her flight was from Chicago to Orange County/Santa Ana/John Wayne Airport. She was scheduled to arrive at 8:12pm. We had a meeting beforehand and planned to get to the airport at 8:15pm. When I checked the flight status, it showed an early arrival at 7:56pm. As a result, we decided to arrive at the airport at 8:00pm and meet her at baggage claim.
This was Ina's first flight out of Europe and her first time to travel alone. As a result, we really wanted to be there when she arrived with signs to welcome her to the country.
Sometime between my last check of the flight schedule and when we got to the airport, the pilot floored it. The plane arrived even earlier than expected. By the time that we got to baggage claim, she was already there. I never thought that I would be disappointed by an airline arriving EARLY!
Fortunately, my mom came to the airport to meet Ina too. She got there much earlier than we did and was able to meet her as she came down into the luggage claim area. *phew* That avoided a really bad first impression!
Anyway, things have settled down and she seems to be doing fine. We kept her busy through the weekend and she seems to be doing fine on our timezone.
This was Ina's first flight out of Europe and her first time to travel alone. As a result, we really wanted to be there when she arrived with signs to welcome her to the country.
Sometime between my last check of the flight schedule and when we got to the airport, the pilot floored it. The plane arrived even earlier than expected. By the time that we got to baggage claim, she was already there. I never thought that I would be disappointed by an airline arriving EARLY!
Fortunately, my mom came to the airport to meet Ina too. She got there much earlier than we did and was able to meet her as she came down into the luggage claim area. *phew* That avoided a really bad first impression!
Anyway, things have settled down and she seems to be doing fine. We kept her busy through the weekend and she seems to be doing fine on our timezone.
Labels: Exchange Student
