A nice new year's treat

Our Piano, originally uploaded by Cameron Maddux.

One of the treats we got for ourselves this new year's is an 88-key Casio Privia Piano. It's quite nice. I don't play and Sam just plays around on it a bit. However, Mary is playing regularly. She's even taking a couple of classes at College of Marin.

This morning it was such a treat to work on my classwork while she practiced and welcomed the morning with song.

Kayaking

Mary checks out the Harbor Seals from the Kayak, originally uploaded by Cameron Maddux.

One of the great things about living in Marin:

Mary and I were taking a morning walk; we were sitting on a dock watching someone kayak in the water and thinking, "It sure would be a nice day to kayak."

So, we decided to go kayak. We ate some lunch and headed to Sea Trek to rent a double sit-on-top. We kayaked up Richardson Bay along the harbor seals in Sausalito (you can see them on the left on the dock.) We didn't want to get too close and disturb them. We lucked out though. One gray, spotted harbor seal didn't feel the distance was necessary! He/She followed us for quite some way, popping up often close enough to splash water on us or the kayak. What a wonderful companion! We watched the cormorants and pelicans of course and just enjoyed the lovely January weather. We made it pretty far up the bay, even getting to go under a small bike path bridge due to the exceptionally high tide. 

My favorite part was when these two seals popped up right in front of us and it was so peaceful that all we could hear was the deep breaths they were taking through their nostrils, collecting air before plunging down again.

A nice way to spend the afternoon! (Not too many pictures due to the camera being wrapped in a plastic bag in my pocket in a limited mobility situation.)

Hanging around some smart, wonderful people

Last week (if Sunday is truly still part of a week's end) was quite remarkable in the people (who I normally don't see often in person) that I got to listen to for a bit.  Here they are in order of influence on my life so far:

4th + 3rd place, respectively - Stewart Brand & Wade Davis - On Wednesday night, Mary, Sam and I went to dinner at Greens and then to the Wade Davis conversation at the Long Now Foundation.

To be honest, I am just learning about Stewart Brand's thinking and influence. He's obviously quite intelligent, controversial and doing a fantastic job of bringing both attention to issues & amazing speakers to the SF area for a cheap ticket price to us. I look forward to exploring more about him. I definitely respect and understand his push to get out a picture of the whole earth; what a wonderful idea.

I was so thankful to hear Wade Davis talk about his new book/lecture series: The Wayfinders: Why Ancient Wisdom Matters in a Modern World.

Quick note.  Um, how cool is the CBC Massey Lecture series? A week long lecture series hosted in Canada that is then converted into a book. Lovely idea. I want to start something like this.  Who's in? Anyway, you can hear some of the lecture streaming on the site. Although like the book, the podcast loses a bit of its impact by not having Davis' striking photography of the people and places he is discussing.

I first made note of Wade Davis when Boing Boing reported on his, "shit knife" story (which we heard told in-person at the event - I'm pretty sure that had a significant impact on Sam's impression of what lectures can be.) I greatly enjoyed reading both Light at the Edge of the World & Serpent and the Rainbow. He's really helped me in taking a more realistic world view.  I don't see human cultures as fragile as I did before, but I want to fight more aggressively for them. I have a better understanding of how to approach people and investigate human priorities.  Lastly, I am deeply curious about the collective non-technological intelligence that has built-up over the past centuries.

2nd place - Daniel Pink - Friday evening, we went to a @DanielPink book lecture here in Marin County. He totally got marin-countied (which means bombarded with distracting, single-minded questions-statements about government, politics and education from a bunch of Boomer hippies!) So I didn't get to hear him discuss the topic of his newest book (Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us) as much as I would have liked; I wish I had gone to the Google lecture.  But it was good to see him on his first visit to Marin County, tell him thanks for helping us discover a vision for the program & putting us up on his blog and get a few signed copies of his books. I'm looking forward to reading Drive - and not that I needed encouragement, but one of my favorite thinkers agrees.

1st place - John Murphy - Dr. Murphy "Boss" was in town for the annual University of Texas Advertising student visit to San Francisco. I attended a nice reception at DDB which led to Dr. Murphy and I scheduling an early-morning breakfast later in the week which led to us scheduling a nice drive, beach walk, dinner with Mary & Sam and co-attendance to the Daniel Pink lecture.

Murphy taught me Introduction to Advertising (like he has to thousands.) As a "project-winner" I got to have lunch with him and we became quick friends. He offered me a T.A. position, where I was fortunate to actually spend some quality friend time with the fabulous Heather LeFevre. And he introduced me to Owen Hannay, who would offer me my first job in advertising (again thanks to an assist from Heather.)  He was also quite comforting in a troubled time for me.

Spending time with him is ALWAYS a joy.  We are hoping to colaborate on a few efforts this upcoming year. Good fun.

A great bunch of people that will have lasting impact on my thinking.

(Oh the picture ... Pablo and Kristie came up for a visit.  They wanted to spend New Years Eve somewhere besides Dallas.  We loved seeing them ... but they don't count on this list since that was weeks ago - but my blogging has been so slow lately!)

Yes, Tahoe for Christmas!

We did head out to Tahoe for Christams '09.

The trip started sourly with Alamo promising me a 4WD SUV and then saying, "No, we did not promise that."  Plan B - Chains and taking the Accord (sans grocery).  We left Sunday December 20th for the short drive to Homewood, CA on the west side of Tahoe and came back on Sunday December 27th.

Last year in Truckee was amazing (beautiful home and a remarkable amount of snow), but this year we got to stay right on the Lake. You can see the whole experience on my Flickr set.  Mary is starting to Flickr the time as well in more digestible chunks (1, 2, 3, 4 ... so far).

I'm actually feeling a bit under the weather and not up for much of a narrative.  So, here are 10 highlights in addition to the photos and videos. 

1. Sam loved his rocking loft in what was a fun house from the 60's.
2. Instead of a BIG Christmas morning of presents we opened one present a day and it was always boardgame-related.  We played games every night.
3. No internet, no phone, almost no TV (a bit of Weather Channel and LOTR DVD), no screens.  Disconnected from everybody but my wife and kid.  Harmony.
4. A gigantic, powerful snow fort.  Seriously, those who stormed Normandy would have looked at it and thought, "Damn - glad he wasn't there."
5. Snowman and snow angel - check.
6. Sunning myself on the Lake Tahoe shore ... in snow shoes
7. Sledding until it hurt ... really bad! (Mary will hopefully post a video soon where my head and butt met on the sledding track.)
8. Squaw Valley & Sam doing some Olympic snowboarding - while Mary and I rested our wounds
9. Sunrise on Lake Tahoe Christmas morning - 3 1/2 years after celebrating during a sunset.
10. One of the most peaceful canyon hikes I've ever had.