Friday night was supposed to be The White Stripes at the Greek Theater on the UC Berkeley campus. A guy I used to work with in SF got me a ticket and I was going to meet my friend Curtis from Portland there, too. Meg White has been having panic attacks, so they cancelled their tour. Plan B turned out pretty cool: Arcade Fire at the Hollywood Bowl Thursday night. I’ve heard they put on an amazing show, and I finally got to see them last week. Curtis flew in Thursday at noon. We went to The Getty in the afternoon. It had just rained that morning, so the visibility was amazing. The Getty sits up on the Santa Monica hills and has amazing panoramic views from the ocean to the Hollywood hills. It was so clear we could see the San Diego skyline over 100 miles away. The building ($12B) is amazing. It has travertine tile floors and walls inside and out. Computer assisted louvers regulate the combination of natural and artificial light. Great art collection, too. Curtis is an artist and art enthusiast, so he was a great tour guide pointing out all kinds of details about the paintings and interesting info about the artists.

The concert was great. Wild Light and LCD Soundsystem opened. They were entertaining. LCD’s lead singer has an interesting voice and a great sense of humor. Arcade Fire got off to a bit of a rough start with muddy vocals and they sounded a bit off. 3 or 4 songs in they got it together and rocked. After the show I went straight to work, slept for about an hour, then started work. Luckily I got lots of sleep Thursday night.

Friday we checked out the Norton Simon Museum. More amazing classics: Van Gogh, Monet, Matisse, Degas, Picasso and ~30 minutes away in Pasedena.

We went down to Legoland this weekend. There was a chance of rain in the forecast and it was Yom Kippur, so NO ONE was there. We parked right on the front row and were the first to ride several of the rides. How does that place stay in business? The kids had a great time. It sprinkled a bit in the morning and then in the early afternoon there was a 5 minute DELUGE of rain. It rains in Oregon, but never the drenching downpours that pop up here from time to time. Highlights were the dragon rollercoaster, the cars, Miniland with it’s new Vegas display and a comedian/ ventriloquist who had been on Letterman/ Leno and America’s Got Talent.

Shannon and I had to talk in church yesterday. Glad that’s over. As the funny to kick it off I listed things we noticed So.Cal had that Oregon doesn’t:
-Sun in December
-Beaches where you can actually go in the water
-In-N-Out Burger
-Palm Trees
-Movie Star Governors
-Sales Tax
-Temperatures above 90 degrees
-Mirrors in the church foyer
-Earthquakes during Sunday School (We had a 4.8 last month!)

Gavin and Grace had their second soccer games of the season. The Grape Crushers and Bone Crushers both won. Grace scored a goal and had an assist. The goalie was playing way out and Grace didn’t kick it too hard, so it rolled slow motion into the goal. Gavin almost scored and played tough “D” as goalie. They take their soccer very seriously here: professionally made banners for each team, treat: Gatorade, bag of carrots, bag of Cheetos and a Milky Way bar.

I took the kids to the BYU-UCLA game Saturday at the Rose Bowl. It was VERY exciting. It took 3 hours to get from our house till we were actually walking in the stadium. I took an early exit, made a few wrong turns, but the biggest delay was the line getting into the “parking lot” we parked on what must have been the very back of the back 9 of a golf course. We got there well into the 2nd quarter when BYU was down 20-0. They scored a field goal just before halftime. During the 3rd quarter BYU launched a come back scoring 2 touchdowns. There were LOTS of BYU fans there. I could barely talk after the game because my voice was shot from SCREAMING. With less than 10 minutes left in the 4th they were driving down the field with about 10-15 yards to go when they FUMBLED!! If they had scored there they would have won. They ended up losing 27-17. Very cool stadium. There were almost 73,000 people there. We left with 3 minutes left when it was obvious the momentum had switched. It only took us 40 minutes to get from the parking lot to our driveway.

Gavin and Grace did well and had fun at their first soccer games Saturday. I didn’t get to see them because I was picking up our new dining room table, desk, entertainment center and coffee table. The house is coming together.

The last tractor trailer pulled away yesterday. Now the fun begins! The relo package offers unpacking, but we elected to unpack ourselves so we can see what we need and what we need to get rid of. There are boxes and stuff EVERYWHERE!! It is great to finally be in the house.

We got in the house the day before school started. The kids are happy with their teachers and the new school. After school Shannon had 20 kids and some moms over for a swim. Gavin (Bone Crushers) and Grace (Grape Crushers) have their first soccer games this Saturday.

It’s a good thing we got the garage attic done the week we did. Last week it was 10-15 degrees HOTTER.