The last time I traveled to Florida for work, I happened to look out the airplane window when there was a fireworks show happening down below. It was really cool to watch, and I thought to myself that it would be fun to be flying around the bay area on the 4th of July. I didn't think much of it at the time but as the weeks passed by the gears started turning in my head. One of our friends, George, is a pilot and loves to take his friends out for rides. A few months ago, he took Tim and I up in the air to see the bay area. If you want to see photos, Tim took a lot and put them up on his picasa website. That day, we flew from the Oakland airport to a small airport in Sonoma, where we landed for lunch. We saw all sorts of old vintage aircraft including a very rare P-40 (think Pearl Harbor) and we went to a deli to eat lunch. We took off from the Sonoma airport later, flew over Marin, the Golden Gate Bridge, San Francisco, and then landed at Oakland again. It had been a lot of fun. When Tim and I were biking with George last Thursday, I asked him about the possibility of going up in the air for the fireworks shows. He seemed interested in the idea, and over the next week he and Tim put the idea into motion. A plane was reserved, and last night Tim and I set Navi up with some Chopin on repeat coming out of speakers surrounding her crate. We covered part of her crate with a thick blanket to help block the noise of fireworks, and gave her lots of bones. We weren't really concerned, but we figured that Chopin is pretty all over the place and maybe the fireworks would sound like an odd note from the music rather than something to be terrified of. After all that hubbub, Tim and I headed over to Vince and Cassie's for a party, and then around 7:30 Tim, George, Shannon and I and headed to the airport. We took off around 8:30 PM and flew around the bay before it got dark. There were a LOT of fireworks going off from random people setting them off in their neighborhoods. It looked like the world was this giant circuit board that was slowly breaking into a million pieces with little, colorful bursts of light everywhere. People always told me that they could hear fireworks going off all night long, and I never really understood the magnitude of it until I went up in the air and saw it all. Everywhere you looked there were little firework shows. We circled around and around for a while, evading other planes that were also out looking for fireworks, and around 9:30 all the shows began! Some shows were hidden by fog, but you could see the fog flickering with all sorts of light. We found one really cool show over Richmond, and we circled around that show until it was over. It was an awesome experience and George is going to make this a 4th of July tradition. It was nice to do something new for the 4th of July, because even though fireworks never lose their ability to hold your eyes to the sky for 30 minutes, you start looking for something you haven't seen before. Watching the fireworks shows from above was the new perspective I needed. It was a lot of fun, and Tim took a few videos with his camera, and he has put some up on youtube. He also took some night photos of the city, and they are posted on his picasa here. There were also new fireworks this year that exploded in heart shapes. Those made me smile. After we landed and made Tim clean bugs off the plane, we headed back to the party for the rest of the night.
This morning I woke up and went to watch the fish swim around their green fish tank. You can see a little more of the tank now, so hopefully that keeps improving. I noticed that one of the fish looked like it had a fungus, so I decided that Navi's morning walk would be to the fish store to buy medicine. So Tim staggered out of bed a little while later, and we wandered over to the store. So now we are armed with fish medicine, and hopefully after this and the death of the green water, we have a happy fish tank again.
I did a lot of cooking today, and Tim makes a good sous chef. He likes to chop things up and follow orders as long as you don't tell him anything complicated. He does well with "please chop this up" but very bad with "please chop this up, then put it in that pot after the sauce has simmered for 3 minutes." It makes it easier, actually, since I don't have to explain all of what is going on. I made some cookie cutter chocolate chip cookies with some new dinosaur cookie cutters I found a while ago. Tim and I like dinosaurs, so I really like the cookie cutters. I can never get myself to buy Christmas style, or Easter style, or anything too specialized because what happens when I want some cookie cutter cookies and all I have are Christmas trees and stockings in the middle of July? We also made a fantastic dinner from the cookbook my parents got me for my birthday from the amazing Indian restaurant we ate at. It's a great restaurant about 2 miles away from our apartment on Solano Ave, and it is called Ajanta. I love that place. They just started having takeout, and when Stephen came out to visit, we got some takeout. It turns out we were their first takeout order, ever! It's nice because it's an online takeout menu, and you submit your order online. So no phone for Tim and I. Yay!
Anyhow, from that cookbook, we made three things from the Hyderabad location of India. I guess Hyderabad is the capital of the state of Andhra Pradesh, South India. We made a Hyderabadi Murg Korma, some rice with coconut and spices, and some Raughani Roti (whole wheat flat bread). It was sooooo good. It was pretty spicy though, so I had to pant and blow my nose all the way through dinner, which makes me think that my parents would really like it. The curry was delicious, and while I had some difficulty with the rice, practice will only make perfect. Tim liked the dinner a lot, and we are very pleased with our venture into Indian cooking. I can't wait to try the next series of recipes, especially the samosas recipe! Yum. :)
This morning I woke up and went to watch the fish swim around their green fish tank. You can see a little more of the tank now, so hopefully that keeps improving. I noticed that one of the fish looked like it had a fungus, so I decided that Navi's morning walk would be to the fish store to buy medicine. So Tim staggered out of bed a little while later, and we wandered over to the store. So now we are armed with fish medicine, and hopefully after this and the death of the green water, we have a happy fish tank again.
I did a lot of cooking today, and Tim makes a good sous chef. He likes to chop things up and follow orders as long as you don't tell him anything complicated. He does well with "please chop this up" but very bad with "please chop this up, then put it in that pot after the sauce has simmered for 3 minutes." It makes it easier, actually, since I don't have to explain all of what is going on. I made some cookie cutter chocolate chip cookies with some new dinosaur cookie cutters I found a while ago. Tim and I like dinosaurs, so I really like the cookie cutters. I can never get myself to buy Christmas style, or Easter style, or anything too specialized because what happens when I want some cookie cutter cookies and all I have are Christmas trees and stockings in the middle of July? We also made a fantastic dinner from the cookbook my parents got me for my birthday from the amazing Indian restaurant we ate at. It's a great restaurant about 2 miles away from our apartment on Solano Ave, and it is called Ajanta. I love that place. They just started having takeout, and when Stephen came out to visit, we got some takeout. It turns out we were their first takeout order, ever! It's nice because it's an online takeout menu, and you submit your order online. So no phone for Tim and I. Yay!
Anyhow, from that cookbook, we made three things from the Hyderabad location of India. I guess Hyderabad is the capital of the state of Andhra Pradesh, South India. We made a Hyderabadi Murg Korma, some rice with coconut and spices, and some Raughani Roti (whole wheat flat bread). It was sooooo good. It was pretty spicy though, so I had to pant and blow my nose all the way through dinner, which makes me think that my parents would really like it. The curry was delicious, and while I had some difficulty with the rice, practice will only make perfect. Tim liked the dinner a lot, and we are very pleased with our venture into Indian cooking. I can't wait to try the next series of recipes, especially the samosas recipe! Yum. :)
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