Wednesday, December 24, 2003

Vous pouvez me trouver dans le club

Hello from Paris!

I've been way to lazy to enter an internet cafe since we left the Bay Area so here I am in Paris on a rainy afternoon taking a break from all the walking. By the way...the title translates to "You can find me in the Club"

Being the extra witty fellow I am I was going to post from London with the title "You can find me in the Pub". You now know why I'm not a comedian or a speech writer.

Paris is not too much different from last time except for the cost. With the dollar very weak against the Euro and general inflation, I'm now paying over $5 for a crepe when it used to be $2.50! And London? Forget about London if you're on a budget. It's a very cool city and I really enjoyed it, but I was running to the ATM every chance I got.

To this point, London has been the better of the two cities. The people are much nicer, the weather was better and the Guinness was as expected. Bath was a great time too, but not long enough. We only got one night there since we had trouble with our car rental and we didn't get onto the road until about 12:30. We did however get to stop by Windsor Castle and Stonehenge.

As for Paris...well it's Paris. It's a beautiful city and quite romantic. This is the third time I've been here, so we've been trying to find new things to do and see. Buddhe Bar is nice and could certainly do well in the Bay Area. Of course, paying $15 for a mojito won't work in the Bay Area, but if you do it just right, we can charge $10 ;)

Since I'm in Paris, I won't stay in this cyber cafe too long...time to do more French things. Like eat crepes, drink cocktails with funny straws, and translate rap songs into French. Ahh Paris!

Friday, December 12, 2003

Tha O f'ing C

That's "The O.C." for all of you who didn't get it. No I'm not talking about the TV show (although it seems to be on everyone's mind nowadays)

I'm working from Irvine today since we dropped by SoCal for the weekend. Lemme tell you, the ability to work from so many different offices is great! For those that don't know, Irvine is one of the larger cities in Orange County. And for those that don't know, it borders the rich cities in O.C. like Newport, Laguna, etc.

Every time I work outta here, my friend and I can't stop counting the number of kick-ass cars we find on the roads. There are so many that we lose count just over lunch. It's not just lowly 3 series Bimmers and C-class Benzes. Anything less than a S500 and you're slumming. Seriously, it's common to see S600's, SL600's, CL600's and in every color of the rainbow. The real hard job here is keeping up with all the extra these people have on their cars...AMG, Brabus...damn I don't even know most of the other stuff.

This is just an extension of the LA car culture that many people may already know about. When driving down the 5 freeway, once you get to about Burbank you start noticing the difference from NorCal. You may not see as many nice cars as in Irvine, Newport, etc, but so many of the cars you see are kept in great condition. Nice sparkling wheels, lowered suspension, etc, etc. In NorCal you don't normally see this stuff except on the little pocket rockets that people race on weekends. In SoCal, everyone and their grannie has after-market wheels. That's one nice thing about not living in SoCal any more...I can be lazy about upkeep on my car and not be embarrassed. But once I'm down in SoCal, I start to notice the peeling paint on my hood, the scratches all over, etc, etc.

I'll definitely write more about the SoCal/NorCal differences soon. I rant much less about it now since I've been living in the Bay Area for almost 4 years now, but I'm still an Angeleno at heart and it just takes a few days back in SoCal to get my juices flowing. The Laker game on tonight will only help get my riled up. Watch out!

As a side note, we're heading off to Europe next Tuesday so I'll likely not be posting too often. Being the nerd that I am, I'm taking my laptop just so I can download pics off my digicam, but I doubt I'll be going online too much. I'll try to keep track of anything interesting that happens to us along the way.

Friday, December 05, 2003

Pandemic

I neglected to mention World AIDS Day earlier this week. I actually didn't think too much of it until bedtime when I was flipping channels and came across a show on VH1. I won't even comment about why this show was on Vh1 rather than MTV (actually, MTV didn't seem to give a damn even though the younger audience watching MTV should learn more about AIDS).

In any case, the VH1 show focused on some of the latest numbers about the spread of AIDS. However, it mainly focused on the points in time when people were forced to deal with AIDS in some way or other. Ranging from Rock Hudson and the shock of Hollywood to Majic Johnson and the shock of athletes. While the show was interesting, it didn't do justice to the seriousness of what AIDS is doing to much of the world.

Before proceeding, I should mention that for years I had thought that AIDS would be less serious than more common diseases in the 3rd World like malaria (which actually affects many more people every year). Over the past couple of years, however, I've come to realize that AIDS really could devastate entire populations in less than a decade. But rather than talk about these generalities, I encourage you all to read what the Economist has written. It's very frank words for a population that may be sick of hearing about AIDS.

This is a free article:
Help at Last

Unfortunately these articles are only for subscribers, but drop by a newstand if you get a chance and read these relatively short articles:
A Mixed Prognosis
Lifting the Veil

The most alarming thing about AIDS right now is that it literally will prevent an entire generation of children from prospering. Here's a rather devastating excerpt:

Governments everywhere should look at Africa and tremble. In some countries, more than half the population will still die of AIDS. All of Africa's famines are now AIDS-related: hungry people lack the strength to fight off sickness, sick people lack the strength to grow food, and dead parents cannot teach their children how to farm. Other regions can avoid this, but they must act now. The rewards will come slowly; it will be years before current investments make a dent in HIV prevalence, let alone the death rate. The worst is yet to come


I could say much more about the possible affect of AIDS if it is not addressed in significant ways in the next few years. The brightest spot seems to be South Africa, where after years of denying that HIV even causes AIDS, they have developed a very realistic and comprehensive plan to get medication to a large portion of the population. The size & smarts of this program dwarfs anything that has been planned previously and it should give us all hope.

Wednesday, December 03, 2003

Thanksgiving dirt

A friend has left a comment asking for more details about Thanksgiving dinner. Well, I don't want to diss too much on the family mainly because they are actually very kind at heart and were gracious hosts. The description in my previous post was mainly to get some smiles from readers :) In any case, though, it is all true...and as my man Homer J. Simpson so rightly pointed out, "It's funny because it's true"

As for ADD & ADHD, well, I'll admit that I'm very skeptical when it comes to behavioral problems, especially with children. That's not to say there isn't some valid biochemical imbalance in such children, but many times, I really wonder if the medical & psychiatric fields have not gone too far in defining diseases and conditions and looking for a drug to solve every little problem. Before I say anything else, I should mention that I don't have children myself and I haven't had to care for children with ADD (perhaps if I had such experience, my thoughts would be very different).

In the case of these two children, I suppose taking the ADD drugs helps the whole family's life (not to mention the childrens' teachers' lives) easier and a bit more calm, but this weekend was a prime example of one of the downsides. These children don't take the drugs on weekends (including the whole long weekend) and it really showed since these boys just couldn't stop running around, spitting while munching on food, etc.

I feel like many times doctors and patients are looking for quick outs and look for a way to treat the "problem". I can only imagine how tough it is to care for two growing boys who are very hyperactive and can't keep their attention on anything, but I really feel like call this a disorder and giving the children drugs to calm them down is the wrong way to go.

First of all, such diagnoses imply that this condition is out of the norm of society. Aren't most young boys hyperactive? Does the rest of the world rely on drugs to address such problems or do they think it's a normal part of growing up?

Second of all, using a drug to make the problem go away isn't really solving the problem, it's just masking it. As far as I know, these drugs don't help to alter chemical imbalances permanently, they just temporarily calm the children down, don't they?

One of the issues with this is that taking the drugs helps the children to focus on school work etc. That may be true, but at the same time, shouldn't parents & teachers work with the children to help them focus and learn? Like I said, I haven't really dealt too much with ADD/ADHD children so I don't know how difficult they are to handle.

Overall I feel ADD/ADHD is one of those things that modern science and society have unecessarily deemed to be nusuances. Who knows, if I have to care for children who are excessively hyperactive and can't focus, I may resort to calling it ADD/ADHD and giving them drugs. At this point, however, I can't really see the validity.

I'd love to hear everyone else thoughts on this, especially from anyone familiar with caring for anyone with ADD/ADHD.

Monday, December 01, 2003

Mile High and Light Headed

Happy Thanksgiving folks. Yes, a bit late (as usual for me), but nevertheless, hope you all were able to spend time with family and friends.

We got back from a weekend trip in Denver to visit some family. Neither of us had been there so it was definitely an interesting trip. Among other things, we had Thanksgiving dinner at the house of a dysfunctional family (not my family, but friends of the family we stayed with), we did a bit of snowboarding in rather icey conditions, and we drank a lot of water.

As usual, let me bore you with details...without being too specific...I don't want to get tagged for talking about people that may know me :)

Dinner was actually quite fun. Two children with A.D.D., a very friendly rottweiler, a grandpa who races cars and lives in a double-wide, and a generally dis-combobulated aunt. Now if that doesn't make for a barrel of fun, I don't know what would. Thank God we're not related to them! In all seriousness though, I'm not too familiar with the goings-on in "American" familes. Since we grew up in an Indian household, we never really celebrated Thanksgiving. While I've had thanksgiving dinner at friends' houses before and even made the dinner with roommates, I've never had a formal t-giving dinner. The familial interactions were definitely jacked up in this case, but it was an interesting day nonetheless.

Snowboarding was rather disappointing. I was looking forward to some great snow since it had just stormed in Denver the weekend before. I figured it would be great to get in some smooth runs and teach my wife on soft powder. Unfortunately, most of the snow had hardened and some was really too icey. While I got in some decent boarding, I was slipping and skidding way too much to have fun. And my wife? Let's just say that hard snow is a really pain in the ass. Literally. Luckily, she still had fun and we'll be heading to Tahoe soon enough to try and get some powder.

On the climate front, let me tell you, Denver is really a mile high. It's really dry air. It's really thin air. I couldn't get enough water all weekend. I always felt a little sleepy and lightheaded (well, that could have been the drinking too). I was happy to come back to sea level and a little humidity in the bay area.

Oh, and visiting the family? Well, it's always fun to spend time with these folk. Since they recently moved to Denver it was nice to see their new home and their new life away from SoCal.

Overall, a good time was had by all. Now...onto the planning the rest of the holidays.