Hey, just wanted to let you know that Jeff finally posted a musing. And Jason, welcome to the LATE nineties.

Jamie and I didn't get back to the Siebers until 12:30 or so last night. Then, we had to get up at 5:30 this morning to head back up to LA for Jamie's first day of work, which starts at 9:00 am. On the bright side, we made really good time with no traffic. The down side is that now I have to force myself to stay awake until it's time to take her to work. I tried holding my eyelids open with toothpicks to no avail, so I'm writing this instead.

We spent the day on Coronado Island at Jamie's aunt and uncle's place. Jeff was there, as was Noella and her boyfriend Jason. First off, we attended the parade. I mentioned that I didn't really get the concept of parades, and Jeff explained that it was because I wasn't in band in high school. Touche. It was pretty out there for California, but I would like to point out that I did not get sunburned, even though I spent 45 minutes in the sun with no sunscreen. (Upon realizing this, I ran home to lather myself up. with SPF 45 90 3000 googleplex.) In the afternoon, we got to see a patriotic medley of American favorites down the years performed by a 'non-audition' group that had driven all the way from South Dakota just for this one performance. By the way, in case you weren't sure, 'non-audition' = 'they don't have to be good' = 'they weren't. We took all we could stand, went back to the house and had a virtual meat party for dinner (not a real meat party, because Shana's grill wasn't there). We went out to the golf course to watch the fireworks, and while we waited, Orlando Spinelli's lesser known cousins performed some pretty awesome magic tricks with some glow sticks. The fireworks were great, and then we headed back to the house to have dessert and play games until traffic off the island had died down enough for us to leave. The End. Good night.

Well, I didn't really plan to write anything until after the 4th, but I microwaved my TheraFlu for a little bit too long, so I'm sipping on it while it cools off, and I've got to do something. So, the ear-nose-throat affliction has turned into something less painful but more annoying. My throat doesn't hurt anymore, but I've got all kinds of drainage all of a sudden, and a real deep throat cough. I couldn't sleep last night either because of the Claritin that Connie gave me for my illness, or because I started reading Harry Potter yesterday and had a hard time putting it down.

On our way down to Fallbrook today, through multitudes of traffic, I saw a couple things of note.

1) A license plate on a car in front of me that read UB SOBER. I assume that it was meant as an admonishment to the rest of us to not drink and drive. But to me, it seems really counterproductive and a bad idea. Once a person is driving drunk, it's too late to remind them to stay sober. Instead, you may be convincing a drunk person that they really are sober. Imagine a mind in the drunken state, driving along, thinking that he might be a little too tipsy to drive. He's just about to pull over and call a friend to come pick him up when he sees in front of him, barely able to read it, but in his drunken state he thinks it's a message from God, UB SOBER. "Yerrightz," he says to himself, "I be tobally sover." So, my take is good intentions with the license plate buddy, but let's come up with something else, like UB HAMRD.

2) I witnessed my first California wildfire today. It was in Lake Elsinore on I-15 between LA and San Diego. You could see the smoke for miles. The fire itself was about a half mile east of the interstate, and you could actually see the flames. Several helicopters and planes were making trips back and forth from Lake Elsinore on the west side of the highway dumping water on the flames. It was mind-blowing. We could see houses up in the hills engulfed in flames. And people thought it was dangerous for us to live in Manhattan!

OK, the TheraFlu is almost gone...

Jamie wanted to post occasionally as well, so she now has a blog at http://www.thesegues.com/jamie/starr/. Enjoy!  (And coming soon, a blog from Jason).

Well, it had to happen, and now the worrying is over. When we went out to get in our car, which we have to park on the street, the mirror on the driver's side was bent back the way it's not supposed to go. It did snap back into place, and there appears to be no scraping of the paint or contusions of the metal. However, the mirror part is just hanging on by two wires. So, I'll take it by the dealer's tomorow on our way to San Diego for the 4th of July to see if they can snap it back into place. Till then, a nice bit of clear packing tape will keep it from falling off any further, I daresay.  And we'll learn to pop our mirrors in while parked on the street.

In an attempt to liven my spirits and give Jamie something to do in between Harry Potter chapters, we took a drive down to the beach this afternoon. We headed down Santa Monica Blvd, all the way to the ocean. The 12 mile route took just under an hour of travel time. But it was nice with the windows down, going a mean 15 mph. We strolled down the beach a bit, where Jamie got her feet and pants wet. We admired the sand castles and the sunburns of people who very recently must have looked like me. Then, we headed back, but this time I noticed a sign for Interstate 10, or "the 10", or the Santa Monica Freeway. I thought this might be a lot faster, and it seemed that way for a full 5 seconds, when traffic ground to a halt, and we averaged about 30 mph all the way home. Needless to say, it is going to take me a while to gauge how long it is going to take us to get from point A to point B. So, if I say I'm on my way, that means I should be there within the next 24 hours.

Well, boo, I've come down with some sort of ear, nose, and throat affliction that has robbed me of my will to talk, smile, and just move in general. But out of sheer discipline, I thought I shouldn't go too long without posting something here. Somehow my sinus problems are mixing with the smells coming in through my office window to become something quite disturbing. I know it's not just the smells, because Jamie would have picked up on the bad smell miles away. The fact that there are smells coming from my office window reminds me to let all of you Texans know that we don't have air conditioning here. In spite of that and it being July, it's quite comfortable in our shady little bungalow with the windows open and a cool breeze blowing through.

Great news! Jamie officially got a job today! She'll be working at the Tony Hawk store in The Grove. Since, it's related to Quiksilver, she's getting to start out as supervisor at the same rate she was making in NYC! For those of you who aren't down with Tony Hawk, he's just about the best darned skateboarder of all time. So, this store is more geared towards skating than surfing. Jamie's going to have to learn how to put together skate boards, and maybe even have to learn how to ride them. I'll be selling tickets to watch that spectacle. She goes in tomorrow to fill out paperwork and starts working on Saturday. Until then, she'll be feverishly trying to finish the new Harry Potter book.

OK, I now have time to personally report on the Australian battered potatoes at the San Diego fair. But before I get to that, let me tell you about the rest of the day, leading up to the potatoes. As soon as we got to the fair, we headed straight to the stage where the legendary Jack Jones was performing. For those of you who don't recognize the name (like I didn't), he's famous for many songs, but the one I recognized was the theme for "The Love Boat". If that still doesn't ring a bell, he also performs the "Old Navy" theme song, which is actually just "The Love Boat", with the words "Old Navy" in their place. Anyway, it was quite a sight, watching the aged performer flirt with his elderly groupies in the audience. From there, we went on a window shopping spree through all kinds of booths and kiosks. There was one massive tent devoted to spas, which have gotten pretty fancy over the years. Many of these models included a TV and DVD player in them. Apart from that, most of the booths were selling things that you could normally only buy on TV. I've never seen so many 'miracles' all in one place. Which brings us up to the battered potatoes. That's right, they cut the potato long-ways. Imagine the biggest ruffle you've ever had, but not curled up. Then, they batter it like it's fried chicken, and they deep fry it. Then, it's smothered in cheese and/or ranch dressing. It was tasty, but after one bite, I immediately became fat. Or maybe it was the funnel cake I had earlier. Anyway, we topped off the evening with a few songs from David Cassidy himself. And yes, he still thinks that he is a teen idol, but I think the best he can hope for is to be a teen-at-heart idol.

On another note, we are now living in our new apartment. The refrigerator is safely in place. I'm all hooked up in my office. We've got the stereo hooked up, with the exception of having TiVo connected to a phone line. We won't get the phone line installed until July 17th! Isn't that ridiculous? We went to see our first movie in Hollywood yesterday, Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle. It was not as good as the first one, that much I can tell you. I did spot my first celebrity, Clea DuVall, whom I recognized from the movie '13 Conversations About One Thing,' but whose name I didn't know until I came home and looked it up on IMDB.

Well...see ya later!