Ethan, Happy Birthday and Go Bears!!

Ethan landed a sweet, late addition to his birthday gifts. Not only did he get to have six of his best friends over Friday night for a sleepover game night, he was also able to attend the history making Cal Bears game against the top ranked Arizona Wildcats that unfolded as a toe-to-toe basketball slugfest from beginning to end.

Arriving at the game, we found yellow T-shirts at our seats so we put them on and happily ate our sandwiches from Bongo Burger (a Berkeley institution for many Cal students that deserves a bow on the Food Networks' "Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives" show if not a higher level of recognition) and waited for the start of the game. Sightings at the game included Lute Olson (former Arizona coach and all-time Pac-12 winningest coach), the Pac-12 broadcast crew including Dan Belluomini (a familiar voice to die-hard Cal basketball fans), a stadium fully festooned in yellow with T-shirts at all seats in the Haas, Cal Bears jacked-up in warm-ups with Bears trying all kinds of crazy dunks, and although not spotted by us, others in attendance included Bob Melvin (former Cal Bear and current Oakland A's manager) and over 20 scouts from 14 NBA teams. The atmosphere was electric, quite appropriate for a Super Bowl weekend.

The game did not disappoint as the Cal and Arizona sections (yes, Arizona fans travel well and they were at the Haas in large number) went back and forth with full-throat cheers, jeers, chants and yelling. As soon as chants of "U of A" would go up, they would get swallowed up by chants of "Cal-i-fornia" or "Go Bears." And so the night would go on in this manner over the top of a well-played game.

At the time of the game, we did not realize how much the Bears relied on one player: Justin Cobbs. He apparently scored the final 12 points of the game for the Bears: with game at 48-42 Bears, Cobbs makes two free throws; with the game at 50-48 Bears, Cobbs makes two free throws again; with the score 52-50 Bears, Cobbs scores on a lay-up; with score 54-56 Arizona, Cobbs makes a jumper; with the sore 56-58 Arizona, Cobbs makes another pair on a one-and-one; and finally with the score netted at 58, Cobbs hits the game winner with 0.9 left on the clock to all but decide the game.

The end of the game was really chaotic. The student section stormed the court twice. The first time was when we all thought the game was over, but the refs apparently wanted to check to see if there was time left on the clock so they had stopped the game. Coach Montgomery had to take the court to try to help escort a few hundred delirious Cal fans off the court. Not an easy task, but somehow order was restored. After the video review, they put 0.9 seconds back on the clock and Arizona ran one final futile play after both sides were able to adjust and prepare for the play. Then the students got to storm the court for real. We stayed to soak up the atmosphere for a little bit. It was crazy. Richard Solomon was still walking around with the game ball in his mitts as if he were Smeagal clutching the ring.

The game was history making not because of what the announcer said at the end of the game: first time for a Cal team to knock off a number one ranked team. This actually was incorrect. This was the first time for a Cal team to knock off a number one ranked team at home at Haas. Cal has done this twice before. >br />
Here's Ethan at the game.

What's not to like about the usual serious Coach Monty doing the "Nae Nae." Check out the end of the video below. Although it's not easy to see the coach, you can see him in the middle of the Bears' mosh pit with arms flailing doing his version of the "Nae Nae."

One More Week...

Sequoia Middle School Jazz Band

Here's the other song that the band played. it's kind of hard to see Ethan but he plays first trumpet.

Sequoia Middle School Jazz Band

This is one of the two songs that the band that Ethan is in played at a recent concert. You have to click on the logo below to go to YouTube to see the video.

You Just Never Know...

The following are some interesting facts about Russell Wilson being drafted by the Seahawks in 2012:

Here's a quote from a talking head expert on NFL.com about Seattle's third round pick Russell Wilson: Mayock's take: "I can't tell you how much I like this kid. ... Not only can he be a competent backup and change-of-pace quarterback, but I think someday he can be a starting-quality player." Little did they know that Wilson would become the first quarterback from the highly touted 2012 crop of QBs that included Andrew Luck of Stanford to play his way to a Super Bowl in only his second year in the NFL.

Russell Wilson is taken in the third round as the 6th QB taken following Luck taken by the Colts at 1(1), Griffin III taken by the Redskins at 1(2), Tannehill by the Dolphins at 1(8), Weeden by the Browns at 1(22), and Osweiler by the Broncos at 2(25). Except perhaps the Colts selection of Luck with the overall number one pick, the other teams probably would take Wilson if they were able to redraft.

Russell Wilson is the 8th ranked QB in the class after the above five QBs and also Cousins and Noles who would be drafted after Wilson.

Wilson is the 75th player drafted in the entire draft. Even the Seahawks take Wilson as their third player.

Wilson finishes up his college career at the University of Wisconsin. The home state Packers have three chances to take Wilson before he is snagged in the third round by the 'Hawks, but fail to do so.

The knock against him is that he is too short to play QB in the NFL, measuring out at "only" 5'11" in height. Of the 74 picks before him, only 9 are shorter than his listed height. Of the 11 QBs drafted in the entire draft, the next shortest QB is 6'2."



Often, you can learn about a person, by learning about the other person in that person's life. Salted caramels, a little more refined than Skittles?

Can't Hold the Seahawks Back

Two Seattle originals...Macklemore and the Seahawks...

Go 'Hawks!

Is this the year for Seattle? Seattle that lovable loser has done nothing in terms of sports championships since 1979. Okay, so maybe the record is not as futile as that of the ultimate lovable loser in sports, the Cubs, but it's just as painful especially if you consider Seattle's recent history.

That team that last brought a major sport championship to the Sound, the Supersonics, left town in a very inglorious manner that has made David Stern, the outgoing NBA commissioner, public enemy number one for most Seattle-ites. At Red Mill Burgers, a well-known Seattle burger joint that has been voted best burgers in Seattle for 10 years running and has been cited in GQ magazine and on the Oprah Show, there's even a Wanted Poster with a photo of David Stern.

In addition, the original MLB team brought to Seattle back in 1969, the Seattle Pilots, lasted all of one solitary season before being bought by a group headed by Bud Selig, the current MLB Commissioner. Luckily, Seattle has been able to get a new MLB team since, the Mariners, although this team too has not had much success on the field. The team holds the record for the MLB to win the most number of games during the regular season and not win the World Series.

So we now have the Seahawks going to their second Super Bowl and possibly their first championship in their history. So hope reigns.

2013-14 Christmas and New Years Slide Show

Here's a slide show of our Christmas and New Year's.

Highlights include: kids learning to play pinochle, lots of great food, salmon and chips, trip to Snoqualmie Falls, trip to Bainbridge Island to visit good friends, white elephant gift exchange (steals?), funny eyes glasses (who ended up with these?), Diane getting her first digital camera (welcome to the 21st century!), ziplining at at Seattle public park, visiting other parks, ozouni on New Year's Day, shirogumi winning again ( think that the odds are stacked against akagumi), Space Needle fireworks at the stroke of midnight on 12/31/13, and finally spending quality time with family and friends.

Lose Yourself to Dance

Family Photo 2013

Last Day of 2013

We are down to the last day of 2013.  It is a Tuesday.  We will get to try my mom's ozouni tomorrow.  Ozouni is Japanese New Year's mochi soup.  It usually has vegetables like spinach.  Sometimes oyster too.

This was a light blogging year.  Not enough time for blogging and our "family" joined the legions of Facebookers last year.

So what did we learn in 2013.  Ryan loves to shop.  We always knew this, but what little kid likes to go check out antique shops?  His latest find was a Bedford Falls train set from 1994.  Not quite an antique, but well used.

Ethan likes to wear hats.  We always knew this too, but what young boy will wear top hats in this day and age?  He has baseball caps and a plaid pattern fedora as well.

Naomi like to sleep in whenever she can.  We knew this, but she's taken sleeping in to new heights.  Maybe it's because we told her that you do your best growing when sleeping.

Tomorrow is a new year.  A fresh start for new experiences and adventures.  I wonder what we will learn or confirm in 2014?

John's Birthday Today...

Happy birthday John.  You didn't miss much this year with football. Basketball is going a little better but the competition will be greater than last year. Bay Bridge new span opened this year and your Mustang was one of the first to make the crossing.

Christmas 2013

Here are a few sights from Christmas this year.  Had a clear flight to Seattle that offered spectacular views of all the peaks. Ryan scored a train set after Christmas and captured it in a picture frame with Uncle Tatsu. On the way to a geocache, we came across two sets of Four Daughters.  What would be a family gathering without electronic devices. How about a family photo?  Of course, there was plenty of food. The highlight of the white elephant gift exchange was the giant Snickers bar opened by Ojiichan.

Lack of Recent Posts

Although we have not had too many recent posts here, you can check us out at the site for our cub scout pack:  Pack 380

From Vet Visit to Flight Day to Festival

The day in the life for our family for today, August 10.

The day started with a vet visit for our Hazel.  Hazel is cured for now was the good news!  Now we need to decide if we will get a friend for her.

Next, Ryan attend flight day with scouts at the Martinez Marina.  We've attended this in the past and getting out kite to reach for the skies has always been a challenge, but today the winds were with us.  That's Ryan below with his kite flying high!

Then this evening we went to the Diablo Japanese American Summer Festival to take in the sounds of San Jose Taiko, play games, and most importantly eat.

Look It's a Bass Player!

Mumford & Sons at Red Rocks Amphitheater in Morrison, Colorado. Looks like an incredible concert venue.

So Long Opal and Ninja Warriors

We dropped off Opal the Octopus and the Ninja Warriors (referred to in the world of geocaching as travel bugs) that we picked up at the Geocaching.com headquarters in Seattle.  Happy travels to the two!

The place where we dropped the two off is the oldest continuous cache in San Francisco.   It's located in a community garden in Fort Mason.

Although you wouldn't know if from the picture, it was a typical breezy, cool day in the city.  Check out the next picture of our drive in.  The fog was already pouring into the Bay.

Here's where we placed the two travel bugs.  It was a metal can right in the community garden.

After this we headed to Japantown for some food and browsing in the Kinokuniya bookstore.  By the time that we were headed home, fog had reached the Oakland hills.

When I'm Gone...

This is a fitting song for what we learned today. We learned that Ryan has a spot at Sequoia Elementary School this fall that we are going to take. It will be sad to be leaving the only elementary school that we have known, but this is the best situation for us.

It may both help and make more difficult our commute at the same time. The school is right next to the middle school that Ethan attends so we're thinking that both will be picked up together, but since he will be new at the school we are probably going to be driving him to the school on his own at least at the beginning. We'll play it by ear and see what happens.
 

Ethan Returns from Camp Chawanakee

Seems that Camp Chawanakee was a resounding good time once again.  The scouts returned to the Scout Shack at about 2pm following a drive that started some time before 9am and included a 45-minute stop for lunch along the way.  It was difficult to tell if the scouts had gotten slightly tanned (the camp is at about one mile in elevation on the shores of Shaver Lake with day time temperatures this time of the year in the 80s) or if it was just a layer of what is affectionately called Chawanadust.

A main way in which the troops at camp get recognized for their overall performance at camp is at evening flags where what is called the "thumbstick" is awarded to the best troops in camp.  The troops are recognized for a long list of accomplishments such as: how the camp site is arranged, neatness of the tents, cleanliness of the camp site, presentation of important information on the camp site bulletin board, the gadgets that have been added to improve the camp site (such improvements have included a four-hole golf course, archway into the site, a compass rose, an equipment rack, a wash basin, a medic station, a towel rack, and a weather rock to name a few items), and overall scout spirit (behavior of the scouts, quietness after taps, cooperation, etc.).  Each day of camp, one troop from each the groups of troops is awarded the thumbstick for that group and is required to do something to improve the thumbstick.  One the last day of camp, an overall winner is announced for each group and that troop is able to retain permanent possession of the thumbstick and take it home with them.  Last year, we were one of the thumbstick winners.  You can see last year's thumbstick below.

I don't have a picture of this year's thumbstick just yet, but they were winners again this year.  It's a little bit larger and pink - covered in pink duct tape!

This year, not only are they thumbstick winners, but they won the Spirit Arrow given to the top overall troop for the entire camp.  This is camp that has as many as 20 or more boy scout troops from all over California, some as far away as San Diego.  So winning the Spirit Arrow is a significant achievement.  Below is a photo of the score sheet from the middle of the week.

In the score sheet, you can see that a perfect score each day would be 100, but the commissioner responsible for inspecting the camp site and monitoring the behavior of the troops has the ability to award extra points to troops that go beyond the usual level.  In the above sheet, you can see where Ethan's troop got scores significantly above 100 for three of the days.  Ethan says that on Friday they got a score of 165.  I guess this is like acing your AP classes and having a GPA higher than 4.0.

The other significant aspect of this achievement is that they did this with a larger troop size than what our troop usually has at Chawanakee.  There are pluses and minuses with the larger troop size.  A larger troop size means that the troop can accomplish more things but a larger troop size also means that there are more items that need to be kept in order.  Two years ago there were something like 8 scouts that attended camp, last year there were 12 scouts and this year the count was up to 22.  See below for photo of the group that attended this year.

So although the scouts have many fun activities, the camp also emphasizes the development of character, teamwork, good citizenship, and other sought after traits.  The fun activities include sailboating, canoeing, row boating, swimming, polar bear plunge (6am plunge into the lake - okay, not nearly as bad as water on the Bering Sea), mile swim (one of our scouts broke the all-time record for the mile swim this year by swimming it using the butterfly stroke and then broke his own camp record swimming it free style), five-mile hike, archery range, rifle range where you can shoot 22s and shot guns (and on the last full day, adults are able try black powder shooting), horseback riding, and many different classes for boy scout merit badges.  There are also evening campfires attended by all troops at camp.

The last day of camp they have this competition called Chawanadayze which is a campwide competition of leadership.  This year there were seven stations with a variety of competitions.  The scouts break into their patrols for this competition.  Each troop could have several patrols of six to eight boys.  Ethan's troop had three patrols this year with Ethan being the patrol leader for a patrol named the Forks.  The Forks managed to win third place at two of the seven stations (first aid/stretcher relay and tomahawk throwing).

Ethan is ready to go back next year for his third year at Chawanakee.  The year after that will be Ryan's first opportunity.

Can't Hold Us

Seattle rapper Macklemore who is a big fan of all sports Seattle. Video has great shots of Seattle, but supposedly was shot in 16 days on six continents. One shot even looks like it was taken on SF Bay.