Trials and Joys of Ma

Decide for yourself which are trials and which are joys:

Still choosing a New Year's card picture, given Nimue's apparent desire to be Calvin. (Yes, ours are officially designated as New Year's cards rather than Christmas...)


Old commute bike suffered one too many broken parts.

New commute/adventure bike: the Salsa Vaya. The shop (Roaring Mouse) was nice enough to build up an orange frame with a triple for me, even though the orange one doesn't usually come with this gearing. This thing is awesome -- fun to ride on the road, while still quite capable on dirt singletrack. She likes climbing dirt roads best. And she is definitely a she, as well as being a big happy orange bunny rabbit of a bike.


Cherry Chase Band concert. Nim got to do a duet. (Concert recordings coming in a later post, so you too can enjoy.)


Malfunctioning flute discovered the afternoon of said concert.

Lots of singing, for both Ma and Nim. Nimue's group (Cantabile Youth Singers) is quite good, given the ages of the singers; mine (Stanford Early Music Singers) is the same as it has always been.


Invasion of the Grammas: Both Linda and my mom visited at the same time last week to see Nim's and my concerts.



Discovered a brand-new section of the Bay Area Ridge Trail, sort of by accident. Chad and I rode up Sierra Road in San Jose, with the notion of exploring side bits off of it, and found a beautiful new trail that wound its way back down to Alum Rock Park. Leaving your exact route open to serendipity has its rewards.


Mountain biking in the frost with my Frost.

Full moon hike up at Montebello Open Space Preserve last night. It was docent-led, but truly excellent to be allowed to hike to the top of Black Mountain in the dark, with views of the twinkling Bay Area lights spread out in front of us in one direction and moonlit hills rolling off toward the ocean in the other.

10-foot Christmas tree (labelled as a 7- to 8-footer) that had to be trimmed to fit in the living room. I put it up myself, with only minor help from Nimue. Now I'm in denial about her need to put up ornaments today.