On the eve of before Californians are set to go to the polls to vote on the history ballot initiative  that will decide whether or not adults over the age of 21 should legally be allowed to  consume and grow marijuana within the states borders, I came across this interesting article on webMD discussing the dangers of alcohol. The exact title of the article is “Experts: Alcohol more harmful than crack or heroin.”

As someone who recently become a teetotaler for health reasons, I found this study particularly interesting. It’s found that abusing alcohol is almost 3 times as harmful as cocaine or tobacco. It makes me wonder why we allow a drug as dangerous as alcohol to be consumed without judgement, yet other much less dangerous substances are demonized.

I was actually thinking about alcohol a lot this past weekend, as I ventured out to various halloween-related events and parties. Take Friday night, for example. I was at the Independent to see Lotus in San Francisco and during the set break a group of girls standing next to me were completely hammered. So much so, in fact, that one of the girls fell over and passed out on the floor. It took 3 of her friends to carry her out of the club and,  I assume, left with her to take her home. That girl was done for the night.. and not only that, she was probably so hung over the next day that she didn’t get to do much on Saturday either.

I’m not saying that I condone the use of Marijuana, however, I can’t say that I’ve ever heard of a similar experience from someone smoking weed. I just don’t quite understand why there is such a double-standard when it comes to the health of Americans. If the government was really concerned about the health of its citizens, it’d not only take a look at the alcohol consumption in this country, but also at the food that it allows its citizens to consume.

That said, I’ll be curious to see what happens tomorrow and will be excited to see how people vote on this groundbreaking piece of legislation.

It’s been quite a while since I’ve come ’round these parts. It’s been a hectic couple of months, for those of you that know me well.

The Design
The look of The Diatribe was driving me nuts. It didn’t feel right. I needed to revert it to a more blog-like style. I figured this was a little more appropriate. Considering the lack of authorship from my cohorts, I’ve also personalized it a little more for your truly. I’m not kicking anyone out of The Diatribe, just personalizing it, considering I have more than 3/4 of the posts on here. :)

Where am I
I moved up to the Big City a few months ago. It was partially this move that probably prompted my downfall, but I’ve taken up residence in the Noe Valley neighborhood of San Francisco — which is right about here (and no, that’s not my house):

View Larger Map

My Health
Over the past two months, I’ve been battling a terrible case of pancreatitis that was brought on most likely by a gallstone. I spent 2.5 weeks in the hospital (two of them, actually) and the rest of the time I’ve spent resting in bed and on the couch laying down. In my most recent doctor’s visit, I found out that I was no longer suffering symptoms caused from my pancreas, but it’s most likely that the gallstone that caused this little issue is now in some inappropriate place in my innards, causing the pain and discomfort.

I’ve been on a lovely feeding tube for the past 2+ months, and would die for some pizza, chicken wings or pad thai. Regardless, I have a procedure scheduled for this Wednesday to find that little bugger and then I should know more about my return to normalcy.

Conclusion
So, for the most part, I won’t be updating the Diatribe that regularly. It’s more of a place to put some thoughts or commentary that is longer than 140 characters. So, stay tuned.. but don’t expect a flood of new bathroom reading material to crop up here. We’ll take it in stride. :)

Less than a block from our house here in Los Gatos, a train derailed causing a main road in Los Gatos/Campbell to be shut down. I missed the action, though Winchester is expected to be shut down through tomorrow morning. For full details of the story, visit the Los Gatos Observer.

“Only you can prevent Forest Fires.”

Well, I wish someone was listening to Smokey when the fire started down in the Santa Cruz mountains yesterday morning. This is about 13 miles south of us, and as it stands now — we’re not in danger of the fires, but that doesn’t mean that we don’t know its there.

It started as a very small contained fire yesterday morning at 5am and spread so quickly that by 7:45 as I was getting ready for work — it was classified a full-on forest fire. Having never lived near forest fires before in my life — the past year or so has been interesting.

Last summer, there was an onslaught of fires which left the sky orange for several days. Last night, while walking little bogart, you could look to the south and see an orange glow coming off the mountains — nothing freaky, just looked like there was some football game or something with an orange hint.

This morning, though, was something different. You looked out the window and it looked like there was a mild fog everwhere — until you left the house and were greeted with the distinct smell of a campfire. From Los Gatos to Mountain View, you could see the smoke in the air and smell the fire. It was very strange.

In case you’re wondering where things are — here’s a map of the activity:

I tell ya, we really lucked out last year. Between the time that we moved to California in October 2007 through October 2008, I believe it rained no more than 30 days during the entire year. And most of these days, it would rain for a few hours — then clear up.

This winter is much more “normal” — from what I’ve heard. It rained half the month of December and I think it’s been sunny maybe 7 or 8 days here in January. And when I say rain, I mean it rains — non stop, solid rain for the entire day.

It’s been raining like this for at least the last 3 days. I’m not too heartbroken.. 50 degree rain is better than 10 degree wind, snow and ice.. It’s also nice, too, because rainy days make the sunny days that much better.

The weather was starting to get a little boring — I’m glad we can mix it up a little out here.

Man, we’ve really lost our thick skin as we head into the winter season. It’s been “cold” out here for about 3 weeks or so now, and we’re freezing. Now, let me clarify what I mean by cold. It’s currently about 49 degrees here — with a low tonight going down to 36.

50 Degrees — and we’re bundled up like ski bunnies. I guess it takes just about a year for your body to adjust to a new climate. Unfortunately, I’m headed back to Boston next week on business just in time to get hit with another storm hitting the Northeast.

I might survive for the three days that I’ll be visiting the Boston Google Office, but — the two weeks that I’ll be out there for holiday break — is going to be C-O-L-D. We’ll be excited to come back to the ‘balmy’ California weather. Heck, in Boston, 50 degrees is shorts weather after a cold winter.

I guess it’s all relative. Anyway, time for me to get my hat, scarf, gloves, and jacket — to take the dog out for a walk. BRRR.

Holy Moly! We just experienced our first earthquake. It registered a 5.6 and was located about 15 miles East of where we live. The house was swaying — very surreal feeling — and Bogart didn’t even know what was going on.

I recall a story The Captain once told me about hearing pebbles and rocks “jumping” outside, after a small Quake in Boston. And I think that’s the best way to describe it — a low rumble, rocks and pebbles falling, the apartment shaking and swaying.

When I first saw the Quake reported, it was stated as about a 3, which concerned me.. “If this is a 3, what’s a 7?” But — after a few minutes, they adjusted the reading to a 5.6. Much more in-line with what I’d expect a “5 or Moderate” Earth Quake to feel like. Whew.

So, I guess we’re no longer Quake Virgins.

Update: According to the 11pm News, this was the biggest Quake to hit the Bay area since the Loma Prieta Quake of 1989. Additionally, the only thing to have shifted after more careful evaluation of the apartment was ‘Naughty Betty,’ who appeared to be 3″ skewed, but still hanging and perfectly safe.

If you’ve been with me to the Googleplex, you’ve likely seen Tan Chade-Meng’s photo wall on my abbreviated tour of the campus. There’s actually a very nice article about the tradition in Today’s New York Times.

If you don’t have time for the article, here’s a link to his Photo Gallery of Famous Folks on Picasaweb.

I got back last night, just in time to take Miss Possible to the airport for a trip back to the East Coast for weekend full of baby showers, hoping that she doesn’t get any funny ideas. I spent just about a day and a half in Los Angeles, and that was more than enough time for me.

Business aside, the city itself was interesting, to say the least. We booked our hotel online at a place called The Beverly Pavillion, on Wilshire just blocks from the famed Rodeo Drive in a lovely area known as Beverly Hills. Looking at the photos online, we were thrilled to be in such a luxury hotel in such a great area of the city.

One of my co-workers brought his Tom-Tom (or as we called her Luella) Portable Navigator so that we were able to get around the city without much need for directions. As we were coming down Wilshire, we heard Luella say “100 yards to your destination” — but all we saw was an ugly brick building covered with scaffolding. As we pulled into the Hotel Garage, we began to get very nervous as it served several purposes at once: Garage/Valet Drop, Hotel Lobby, Registration Desk.

As we pulled up the sound of drilling and jackhammers was so loud you could barely hear yourself think. It made for a very bad first impression.

We had a 2:30 meeting with a client and arrived at LAX around 11am, thinking this was plenty of time. Their office was just blocks from our hotel — and yet somehow — we barely made it due to the traffic. Unbelievable. I knew that the city had bad traffic, but this was ridiculous. Even the carpool lane on 405 was creeping along at a whopping 5 mph.

Dinner was great. We took our clients out to a restaurant called Lucques which was amazing. We were actually sitting at a table next to Jane Lynch, most known for her role in Best in Show. Of course, I didn’t see her until we left (and needed to have her pointed out to me), but that’s just me. I can never spot famous people.

I failed to mention this earlier, but when we checked into our hotel… we felt a glimmer of hope. The rooms were amazing. There were these leather pads along the wall, and this bar graph type mirror thing along the ceiling. Not to mention the strange ball-shaped lights that hung from the ceiling. One of the most contemporary rooms I had ever stayed at — that’s for sure.

After dinner, we ended up hitting the oldest Irish Pub in all of LA — a place called “Tom Bergins” on Fairfax near Wilshire. A great bar. They have four-leaf clovers covering every wall labeled with people’s names. I had asked who these people were, and the bartender explained that these were all the regular customers that the bar has had over the years. Some of the names were so old you could barely read the names. A very neat place.

We made it back to the hotel late, and I crashed — we only had to meet up with a client for lunch the next day, so we were able to sleep in.

Or so we thought. By 8:30, the drilling began and after a 30 minutes I had developed the world’s worst headache comprised of 2 parts Guinness, 5 parts construction. I turned on MSNBC in an attempt to drone out the noise and managed to get some restless sleep for another hour or so. We met up around 11:30 to prepare for lunch, which I had found out was going to be around the corner at a little place called Spago.

We patiently waited at the table, while our client was 15 minutes late (traffic). I notice out of the corner of my eye that Wolfgang Puck was talking to a couple at a table across the room. It took quite a bit of convincing, but my co-workers finally believed me that it was him. Three quarters the way through lunch, I noticed him continuing his rounds and making his way towards our table. He came over, shook each of our hands and thanked us for coming — as we thanked him for coming by and saying hi. A very LA moment indeed.

The meal was divine, and the restaurant was amazing. But despite all of these great meals, LA still rubbed me the wrong way. The people were so ridiculous — I don’t even know where to begin. MP asked me what I meant by this.. and I can’t quite put it into words. The world of Entourage couldn’t be more correct, I felt as though everyone was trying to look the part of “Vincent Chase”. Absurdly expensive clothing, too cool for school, and thought they were someone they weren’t. Yick.

All in all, it was a great trip. It was a good experience, but.. I was very thankful — at the end of the day — to be back in The Cats

While Cool Jesus was out partying the night away with The Police, MP and I were busy cleaning up our apartment. It’s done… finally. We’ve had a number of delays and weekend activities that have prevented us from putting the finishing touches on our new abode, but we were finally able to do it this weekend.

With the help of a little Tenchu Z we’re done and I present the photos, courtesy of Flickr.