Descent into Silliness

I thought I would take some photos of Ellie and myself today. It went predictably:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/7547303@N05/sets/72157625958881816/show/

Happy birthday, sweet girl!

Happy 6th birthday, Ellie! We had a fun little party with a few neighbors and friends, and ate the most beautiful, delicious rainbow cake EVER (made by our dear friend Sposita)! Games included "duck, duck, goose" and "pin the horn on the unicorn-pegasus". (You would not believe how long it took me to figure out how to tile an image of a unicorn-pegasus and print it large enough for the game.) The festivities were finished off with a pinata filled with candy and school supplies (erasers, pencil grips, sharpeners, etc). A good time seemed to have been had by all.

1st day of 1st grade

This week Ellie started 1st grade. She was a little nervous, but she perked up a lot when we told her that she would get to eat lunch at school. Apparently that sounded REALLY fun. :-)

This is Ellie's best friend. They were in kindergarten together, and now they are in the same 1st grade class. She moved here from Korea in the middle of the semester last year and didn't speak any English. She was the most morose little thing I've ever seen...never got excited, never smiled. Ellie took to her immediately, and they managed to communicate pretty well without words. They would hug and hold hands while walking home from school. :-) Slowly she learned the language, and now she is quite the talker! We feel blessed to have her in our lives as a sweet little friend.

Down Baby, Down

This is the kids' new favorite game. -confused shrug-

Five Years

Five years ago yesterday, on August 1 2005, we arrived at our new home, excited at the adventure that awaited us:

Two years ago, on August 1 2008, we were happily welcoming our beautiful new baby and trying to figure out how to balance everything:

Yesterday, we enjoyed a particularly nice Sunday at church, chatted with our dear friends, played at the park, and felt grateful to be where we are, doing what we are doing, with our awesome children, and surrounded by people we love:

Letter I'm sending to the White House & all my congressional representatives

Dear President Obama,

I am one of your supporters. I voted for you. I listened to your speeches, and when the Economist endorsed you, I was so happy that I photocopied the cover and taped it in my apartment window. I think you are an inspiring leader, and a much better choice for president than was your main competitor in 2008. I am college-educated, center-to-left-leaning, registered Independent...it was support from people like me that gave you the edge in the election. And I think you are now making a big mistake.

Mr. President, I am writing because I am concerned that, like other presidents before you, your ambition for legacy is leading you to make a foolish choice in a high-risk, high-rewards gamble that will have deep and lasting effects for our nation and my children. You have decided to cancel the Constellation program and the Ares rocket, and instead rely on the development of new commercial rockets to transport astronauts to the International Space Station. If I understand correctly, you believe that the private commercial market will provide the hotbed of innovation necessary to take space travel to the next level. You hope that competition and innovation will help bring down costs. I suspect that you would love to see the commercialization of space travel remembered in the history books as a turning point for the industry, leading to great leaps and bounds in space technology progress.

Many high-ranking and well-respected participants in our past manned space program have publicly opposed your plan, and I have no expertise to add to what you have already heard. I have only worries. I worry that there won't be sufficient financial motivation to encourage the level of investment necessary to build a privately owned space program. I worry that our space technology edge will be lost entirely to Russia or China, with negative national security consequences. I worry that my children will not dream of the stars and will take science less seriously in school. I worry that current experts in space transportation will be discouraged, unwilling to relocate to work with startups, and will get out of the space industry altogether, thus losing a generation of experience and knowledge. Most of all, I worry that this will mark the end of an era for our country.

As a voter and citizen, your confidence in the private market seems odd so shortly after spending billions of dollars of taxpayer money to bail out the failing auto industry. If our private companies can't even make cars without routinely falling into bankruptcy, why will they succeed in a market with enormous startup costs and limited, politically-dependent demand? I can't help but think of a previous president, whom you frequently criticize, who also let his ambition for legacy and his "vision" interfere with his decision making. He ignored the experts, made wildly optimistic predictions, and wanted very badly to be remembered as changing the course of history. He did change history...but not the way he wanted. Please don't follow his example. Our dominance in manned space flight is too precious to waste on a gamble.

Earnestly,

Maile etc.

Fixit Clinic Newspaper Article

Here's an article in the Berkeley Daily Planet about the Fixit Clinic: http://www.berkeleydailyplanet.com/issue/2010-04-30/article/35177?headline=Reduce-Reuse-Recycle-and-Repair It features E prominently. :-)