dave's posterous

various memories

kanye & jay-z

for our third anniversary, steph got us tickets to go see kanye and jay-z in concert together (watch the throne tour).  amazing gift!  unfortunately, the concert got moved from it's original saturday date the following wednesday.  not ideal considering that the venue was at hp pavilion down in san jose.  we hatched a plan to take caltrain down to bypass to all the rush hour traffic.  the last caltrain stop is right across the street from the concert venue.  and as an added bonus, you can drink on the train!  

on concert day, we dropped by a convenience store on the way to the train to pick up some drinks.  somehow steph became convinced that we needed to pre-game on fourloco - which is banned in several states for its unhealthy combination of caffeine and alcohol.  turns out it also tastes like robitussin.  but it certainly made our train ride more entertaining.  we got to hp pavilion at about 7:20 for our 7:30 show.

as we entered the building, steph observed: "you know, it really don't look like there's about to be a concert here.  i'm concerned"  in an arena designed to hold thousands, there were maybe… 50 people seated.  after we found our seat, an usher walks by and casually tells us: "so, the show will start around 9:15ish and it'll wrap up around 12:30"  shit.  not only were we 2 hours early but the show wouldn't be over until well after the last train home.  we actually considered the ludicrous idea (i thought) of caltraining back immediately and then driving back.  we ultimately decided that we'd just crash with christine in san jose if we really couldn't get back.

once the concert actually got underway(at 9) it was a-m-a-zing.  10:30 came and passed along with the last caltrain home.  a bit of additional iphone research revealed that there's another public transit option home departing at 11:05.  by then, we had seen 2/3 of the concert so we thought we'd give it a shot.  we rushed back to the caltrain station but were there any trains around?  of course not!  we ran into someone who suggested that maybe we were looking for the lightrail stop.  as fortune would have it, one came at exactly 11:05 so we got on.  was it what we were looking for?  of course not!  but we were lucky - this train was initially going the same way as the bus we were trying to catch.  we could just get off at the next stop and hop on to the bus.  we got off at god-knows-where in san jose.  did we catch that bus?  of course not!  by this time, we finally admitted defeat and called christine to rescue us.

she picked us up off the street like stray dogs and brought us to her very festively decorated apartment.  as she wished us goodnight she informed us: "you see how there's a big window right next to you?  well, the blinds are down so no one can see in but the walls are quite thin.  as you're sleeping, if it sounds like someone is inside the room with you, don't worry about it.  they're outside."  perfect ending for our epic night.  i say that with no sarcasm.  without steph, the night would've been miserable.  with her, it was an epic adventure.

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chief of staff

congratulations to poonam and jerry on their marriage and putting together one helluva wedding.  it was beautiful, fun, urban, and modern with just the perfect touch of tradition.  these are exactly the adjectives i would've picked for them as a couple but i still have no idea how they managed to translate them into a wedding.  that was some real creativity at work!

but how is the sausage made, you might wonder?  this is my retroactive diary of the hours leading up to the wedding:

T-11h: woke up and get ready for the day
T-10h: got texts from poonam indicating that jerry went to bed at T-11h.  the day before was iPhone (4S) day - a perfect storm of bad timing.  jerry spent all night trying to make sure bo's phone didn't get deactivated (story for another time).  since he now needed to sleep, the following tasks needed to be done: 1) follow up to see if bo's phone is ok 2) drop-off items at the bridal suite 3) make the "story of the ring" poster 4) final assembly of some programs 5) rendering of ceremony videos - 2 hours each 6) selection of wedding day attire.  GAME ON.  i was about to find out if my chief of staff title was deserved.  the chosen strategy was to start with activities that did not require jerry to maximize sleep time
T-8h: confirmed bo's phone was fine, completed ring poster
T-7h: acquired jerry's keys from poonam, completed hotel drop-off
T-6h: entered jerry's apartment and kicked off video rendering.  woke him up to start attire selection.  determined that his best strategy was to build a wardrobe around his best fitting shirt - which turned out to be black.  suit was also black so we were going black-on-black for the big day.  badass.  only problem was that we needed a tie and belt to go with it.  i assumed chief personal shopper duties.
T-4h: after visiting about 4 stores, wedding day attire was all set
T-3h: arrived at groom's suite to get dressed and start photography session
T-45h: photography completed, departed for wedding venue
T-30m: realized that we couldn't find the laptop needed to drive ceremony videos.  after dropping everyone off i went to grab my own laptop as a substitute.  i was waived off after the original laptop was eventually found
T-10m: returned to the venue.  guests were arriving.  we were as ready as we could be

i loved every second of it - the teamwork, the action, the drama - all of it.  and while it felt like i accomplished a lot that day, i know it was just a tiny fraction of what it took to organize this wedding.  poonam and jerry, thank you for an amazing evening and for letting me be a part of it.  it was an honor to serve as your chief of staff.

goodbye seattle

it has been seven wonderful years.  there's not much to say except to thank all the great friends i met in that city for making it a place i'll always want to visit.  special thanks to jerry for throwing me a killer going away party and arranging for a parting gift (a san francisco print which was almost lost in the crevices of the elysian.  it was heorically retrieved with the use of an assortment of macgyver-esque tools.  but not before lauren punched herself in the face and spencer dismantled the booth we were seated at)

and with that: hello san francisco

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55,000 miles

one might say that a gold infiniti sedan is an old man's car.  in fact, many have said that.  but this one served me well.  it handles roadtrips with the best of them.  commutes like champ.  tight turning situations... not so well.

repelling chicks since 2003.  it's been real.

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long jump

dave martin's deck (on the 3rd floor) is pretty close to his neighbor's roof... so close it's debatable whether it is a makeable jump.  jerry was convinced it's less than 12 feet so obviously we had to measure.  luckily, dave had a tape measure that was exactly 12 feet long.  the problem, of course is that if you extend a tape measure all the way, it'll flex before it reaches the other end.  enter mike with a genius plan: "why don't you extend the tape measure all the way, hold one end and throw the heavy end at the other building?!"  yes... other than the personal injury that will probably occur, that is an awesome plan.  (why we didn't just measure the distance at ground level, i have no idea.  we had been drinking, ok?)  so they do this... and incredibly, the tape measure lands safely on the neighbor's roof - just barely.  so instead of the darwin award moment that i had predicted, i was just out a dollar.  fortuntely, we weren't drunk enough to actually try the jump.  plus, there was a railing in the way.

two days later the subject came up again.  i wasn't sure if i could make 12 feet but i made the claim that i could clear 10.  here's my thinking: during the capitol hill olympics of 2008 we timed our 100 meter dash after usain bolt's inspired record-breaking 9.69 finish.  we clocked in around 15 seconds - only about 50% slower than the world record time.  guess what the long jump world record is.  over TWENTY NINE FEET (to add a little perspective, that's 5 feet longer than an NBA 3 pointer).  if we can be within 50% of the WR 100m time then i should be able to clear one third of the WR long jump distance.  right?!  my claim drew significant laughing (and not of the laughing-with-you variety) and two more dollar bets (against).  fortunately ballard high, which was just a few blocks away from where we were having brunch, has a long jump pit.  all of this culminated in my one shining moment.  in my three attempts my best finish was about 12.8 ft.  good enough to silence my critics, make me two bucks, and confirm that if i had to jump onto dave's neighbor's roof in a pinch, it could probably be done.  maybe.

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barbara smith

its now been about two weeks since i recieved this text from steph:

"David jay is in the hospital.  Steph and Craig found her unconscious and not breathing this morning, she's been checked into the ICU.  Not a lot to be done right now, I just wanted you to know."

even now, it is a little scary to read.  but it was the beginning of an incredible story of fortune and family.  jay had cardiac arrest - an event that is extremely rare in fit 24 year olds.  also an event that is almost always fatal.

jay's a medical student at ucsf and it was the morning of her final exams for the year.  craig and steph (different steph), her roommates, were getting ready for work in their bedroom when they thought they heard a thud.  thinking nothing of it, they kept doing what they were doing.  it was craig's bithday and he was wearing some orange shorts that needed to be steamed - which caused them to go to work a bit later than they normally would.  after a minute or two, they came out to go to work and noticed jay collapsed near the kitchen.  no pulse, no breathing, and unconscious with just minutes to live.  they immediately called 911 and administered CPR.  since jay lived only a few blocks from UCSF, first responders arrived in a flash.  if any detail of that morning had been different, jay might not have survived.

jay was taken to the ICU and the family wasn't far behind.  she was checked in under the alias barbara smith to protect her privacy since she's also a student there.  the team at UCSF used cooling therapy to reduce the odds of brain damage.  her body temperature was cooled and gradually warmed back up.  those were the darkest times for the family since she would be in a coma state the entire time and it was unclear if she would eventually wake up.  her attending neurologist (who happened to be the leader of one of her small groups in medical school) predicted that it could be days.  jay, always the overachiever, started to regain consciousness after only about 36 hours.  she was worried about missing her exams - jay hadn't changed a bit.

she was soon moved out of the ICU to her own room, which was quickly turned into a combination florist and bakery.  her facebook profile, email, and phone were filled with hundreds of messages wishing her well.  next came days of tests to try to determine the cause of her cardiac arrest.  she was examined by some of the foremost experts in cardiac electrophysiology.  over the course of 10 days at the hospital, she was treated by a team of nearly 50 medical professionals.  clear causes are hard to come by in these scenarios so it is likely jay will need to get a an ICD as an insurance policy for the future.

throughout this entire episode steph was by her side - literally every minute she was allowed to be.  she slept in waiting rooms and showered only when jay was in surgery.  she listened to the doctors.  she managed the visitors.  she kept the family under control in a time of crisis.  it was a more complex and delicate problem than anything she had tackled professionally and she handled it with amazing poise.  jay is lucky to have had her cardiac arrest in a rare moment when she could be saved.  she's just as lucky to have a sister that would never ever ever give up on her.

herbfarmaganza

most extravagant meal i've had to date.  hit up the "chambers of the sea" menu with steph, angelbert, and keather (yeah, two couples with combo names.  i love them all to death, but FML.)  actually, the most impressive thing is that chris weber, the chef, looks like he could still be in high school.  unreal.

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south by

visited austin for sxsw this year and it. was. awesome.

it didn't start off so well... my trip to austin took nearly 24 hours because of frontier airlines.  my flight got diverted due to high winds in denver, which caused me to miss my connection.  after waiting in a massive 2 hour custom service line they basically told me they could do nothing for me.  thanks for the help frontier!  my final itinerary turned out to be: SEA > COS > DIA > TUL > DAL > AUS.  yup, four layovers.  by the time i got off the plane i felt like i should be in india.

it all eventually paid off.  the talks themselves were pretty hit-or-miss.  i started off with the strategy of choosing talks based on the title/synopsis.  HUGE mistake.  this year i was primarily interested in the mobile web, designing for slate, and html5/css3.  those all happen to be the buzz words of the year and as it turns out, the quality of talks is roughly inversely proprotional to the number of buzz words in the synopsis.  the other lessons i learned: never go to a talk about design by a non-designer.  it is pretty much a guaranteed colossal waste of time.  for pete's sake, book a hotel downtown and do it yesterday.

the food in austin was amazing.  our highlights:

  • uchi (twice.  yeah, sushi in texas can be that good)
  • lambert's - most expensive bbq i've ever had.  but worth it.
  • justine's - excellent french food

the real key was being there with friends.  steph and i saw sush, paul, dan, mike, dawn, paula, russell, amy, and a bunch of former KIN folks.  maybe someday i'll try to score my own talk...

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