Chi chi chi le le le vs. USA

Last Saturday we loaded up the car

& drove to The Home Depot Center,

stopping along the way to pick up

our friend Jen.

For this futbol match,

we were a house divided.

Z donned his USA jersey

& I was loyal to my beloved Chile.

Of course, none of the major players

were present from either team,

but it was still a great match.

17 minutes in, and one of Chile's

coaches is already ejected.

Looks like someone lost a contact.

Chi chi chi le le le! Viva Chile!

GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOL!

USA answers the Chile goal with a PK.

Pastor(s) USA!

Z made me touch Teal Bunbury

(who scored the US goal).

Jeff Larentowicz chats with fans

& Matt Reis, goalkeeper for

the Revolution.

So the end result was officially a 1-1 draw.

But I maintain that Chile won for 3 reasons:

1. More yellow cards.

2. Coach ejected from the game.

3. Our goal was not from a PK.

Therefore, Chile wins by way of

making the match more interesting.

Viva Chile.

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A walk in the park

Recently I went with Z

to a large park on the outskirts of town.

While he was off running

like a billionty miles,

I took a long hike with my camera.

This particular park is interesting.

It has ponds, paved trails,

a disc golf course,

a lake, mountain bike trails,

a soccer park, hiking trails on the bluffs,

& lots of wildlife.

Attached to the park is CALM,

a small zoo that mostly houses

creatures native to this area,

but lots of migrating birds & other

various animals tend to visit the area, too.

In addition to the CALM animals,

the park is home to hundreds of cats.

Evidently it is a popular place to

abandon felines, but don't worry;

there is a group that comes every

evening & leaves them dishes of cat food.

There are also large numbers of peacocks.

Definitely not your typical park.

Place holding

Obviously it's been a little while

since I've posted, so I apologize.

At least three times I have started

sorting through photos to post

& then gotten distracted or called away

for other things.

Unfortunately

I don't have much time this morning,

either, so I'm posting a couple

of new photos

to hold you over until my next big post,

hopefully soon!

ALA Midwinter @ San Diego

This past weekend I was happy to

experience my first ALA Midwinter conference.

Going to conferences can be expensive, but

I took advantage of registering with the student

rate before I graduated.

Since the conference was in San Diego,

I drove down & stayed with a college friend, Jessica,

who lives pretty close to the convention center.

It worked out perfectly.

I started out the conference with an author panel.

It was a fascinating discussion; I especially loved hearing

David Levithan.

A view from the convention center

as I looked through my registration packet.

When I wasn't busy with conference discussion

groups & meetings, Jessica took me to explore

a bit of San Diego & La Jolla.

It was so awesome to get to catch up with her

& see more of Southern California.

Back at the conference, one of the highlights

was an afternoon with

Nancy Pearl & Neil Gaiman.

Afterwards I took my copy of

The Graveyard Book

to be signed & got to chat with @neilhimself

about his upcoming episode of Doctor Who.

Total nerd euphoria.

I love these bike racks.

Inclined moving walkway at a grocery store.

Offspring of an escalator & airport walkway?

After one final discussion group,

I snapped this photo on the balcony of the

convention center before heading back up to Bakersfield.

The job center offerings, networking,

participating in discussion groups,

sitting in on committee meetings,

catching up with old colleagues & professors,

author events, and of course all the free books

made ALA Midwinter a really great experience.

Now I'm back to the job searching!

Beyond the backyard

I often photograph my backyard

(see above),

but I thought I'd share a few things

that caught my eye recently

in the downtown area near my house.

I'm also sharing this post over at Outdoor Wednesday.