Mon 14 Jan 2008
Thu 3 Jan 2008
Well, the kitchen remodel is allmost done. We are not totally done with the remodel yet but it’s getting there. It feels great to be able to use the kitchen again! It took about 5 months but I think it was worth it. I love the new kitchen! It has been a test of patience and tolerance (for dirt/dust/chaos) for the last 5 months …
For the kitchen, we went with stainless steel appliances and KraftMaid cherry cabinets (cabernet stain). We went with Kitchenaid for the refrigerator (42′’) , Bosch for the diswasher, GE for the trash compactor and Kitchenaid for the microwave/oven. I choose the convection/microwave option so that I can also use the microwave for baking. I thought about getting a warming drawer but in the end, decided not to get one (mostly due to $$ constraints and I dont think I really need it). For the stove, we went with Thermador (gas) and Zephyr for the island vent hood. We thougt about getting the professional version of the Thermador gas stove but it was getting really pricey and we would also need a stronger hood, so decided not to get it). The stove is in an island with the vent hood. I was a little skeptical about this setup but now, I really like it. It makes cooking and interacting with the people around you very efficient! I must admit, this is my favorite part of the kitchen. We went with granite countertops and I am really happy with it. We used the following vendors:
Western Appliance in Fremont - bought all our appliances there - we dealt w/ Renato, he was great!
Home Depot in Milpitas (Great Mall) - got our kitchen cabinets there (i dont remember the person I talked to - but she was very
helpful)
Best Tiles in Sunnyvale - we bought all our tiles there - i liked their selections
JerongMarble (http://www.jerongmarble.com/company.asp) - we bought all our granite slabs there - they sell slabs that have already been bullnosed
Beacon Lighting in Mathilda, Sunnyvale - bought allmost all our light fixtures there (chandeliers/etc).
Kelly Moore/Home Depot - bought our paints there
Lowes - bought the faucets/sinks/front entry door (pella)/pantry door there - very helpful personnel and overall I’m happy with them
Bay Windows in Fremont- we bought all our windows/french door from them - we’re very happy with their service
Home Depot (various locations) - bought misc stuff there (fairly happy with the service).
The remaining items that need to get done is the stairs and the floor. We are tearing down the stairs and making it curve and then enclose it so that there will be some storage underneath. I think it would look really nice! This has been a learning experience for me … watching the framers create the stair frame. The stairs will be all wood and we picked a dark stain. So, basically, the framers had to build the frame for the stairs, then have it inspected. If inspection passes, another set of guys come in and build the finished stairs. These set of guys specializes in building the stairs since everything is custom. So, depending on how elaborate the stairs, this can get pretty pricey. The stairs that we have is not very elaborate but it is still pricey 
.
Thu 3 Jan 2008
Gabby made it to the 2008 National Judges Cup in San Diego! She will be competing in the weekend of 1/5-1/6/08. I am so proud of her. She has worked so hard and I am very happy that she made it. Go Gabby!
Mon 16 Jul 2007
Well, we’re here in Cabo San Lucas for a 1 week vacation. We got here last Saturday (7/14/07). Wow! .. it sure is hot here! Very dry and dusty but at least, the beach and the pool is just a few steps away.
We’re staying at Hotel Melia in Cabo. The place is much nicer than I expected. I really like the way they designed the place and the service has been very good. The tile work is awesome! The pool area is also very good and of course, lots of eye candy.
Everything is so expensive though but I heard that Cabo is an expensive place (i didn’t know that …). There’s also a lot of people here trying to sell you some thing, so you just have to be careful.
So far, we’ve signed up for the following activities: tour to the Arch/Lover’s Beach, ATV, parasailing and use of the warerunner. I’m nervous about the parasailing, since I’m scared of heights!. So, we’ll see! We got discounts for all the activities that we signed up for but we had to sit through a timeshare presentation. We did not buy but we saw the units that they were selling. It looked very nice but too expensive for me.
So far, we’ve played in the beach and hanged out in the pool, walked around town and went to the mall. It’s quite a contrast walking around the “not so developed part of town” and then going back to the hotel. We’ve gone and done some grocery at this place called the City Club which is very similar to Costco (warehouse style and members only .. ie, you need a membership to shop but you can buy a 1 day membership card for shopping).
The beach is just a few steps away from the hotel and it’s nice. They have this cushions in the beach where you can hang out. The beach itself is OK. I think the beaches in Hawaii are much nicer. The beach gets crowded later during the day and a lot of locals walk up and down the beach trying to sell you something (ie. clothes, jewelry, plates, etc).
Saturday:
Check in to the hotel @ around 5pm (our flight was 2 hours late). Went to our room and looked around. We were very hungy (no food in the flight) so we ate at the restaurant in the hotel (Tiki Beach). The food was very good but also $$$. Our favorite was the salmon. While eating, we were watching the activity in the pool … Lots of very young and good looking men/women hanging around and partying in the pool.
Sunday:
We went to the gym and worked out, then just hanged out in the beach and pool. For dinner, we went to a restaurant on the beach called “The Office”. The food was very good but also $$$. The place is very colorful and the tables are right there on the beach/sand.
Monday:
We tried the breakfast buffet in the “Passion” restaurant. It was very good! We then walked to the mall and looked around. The Haagen Daz place there is very nice and I ended up buying a couple of swim clothes. In the afternoon, Nick, Jen, Alexa and Nathaniel arrived. We met up with them and talked about schedule and things to do. They are staying at Pueblo Bonita Rose. We had dinner at La Golondrina restaurant. The food was really good and we liked it a lot! Definitely worth coming back too!
Tuesday:
Tuesday was a fun day. In the morning, we went to the The Arch via a glass bottom boat. It’s not really a “full” glass bottom boat. What it has are 2 rectangle glass openings in the floor in the middle boat enclosed in a wooden box with a cover on top. You take out the cover if you want to see the water. Overall, it was a “rough” ride but it was fun. We saw a lot of fish. It was great to see “The Arch” up close and the beautiful rock formations. We were told that this was the a very unique place in which the Sea of Cortez meet up with the Pacific Ocean. The Sea of Cortez side was much calmer as opposed to the Pacific Ocean side which was very rough. We wanted to spend some time in the “Lover’s Beach” which was on the Sea of Cortez side. The beach was very nice and the kids had fun playing. We met a couple from New Orleans who kayak’ed to the beach … They are brave esp. since the water was getting rough! When we left, the beach was getting crowded.
In the afternoon, we went ATV’ing. This was a lot of fun but also very dusty. I managed to hit the vehicle behind me (Romy and Gabby) as we were going up (for some reason, my ATV wasn’t moving … wrong gear!). On the way home, I hit the ATV infront of me (sudden brake and I didn’t press my brake in time - Nick and Nathaniel). I also got stuck on the way home and hit a ditch (which was probably good since I would fallen over a fairly steep ravine if I didn’t hit the ditch)! Needless to say, it was an adventure for me. No one was hurt of course! I think I need to drive better next time . Our ATV guide was very nice and was very patient with me! The drive to the beach was pretty rough and bumpy but once we were in the beach, it was very flat and we had fun driving around. I even let Gabby drive the ATV. Everyone agreed that the ATV activity was loads of fun!
For dinner, we went to Mariscos Mazatlan for some Mexican seafood. The food was really good and we celebrated Grant’s birthday there. July 17 is his 15th birthday!
Wednesday:
We went to a place called Lenny’s for late breakfast/early dinner. The food was pretty good and the prices were very reasonable. After that, we hit the gym! Even Gabby is working out . At around 2:50pm, we met up for parasailing. We boarded that boat but when we got to the designated area for parasailing, we had to cancel out because it was windy. It’s not good to parasail when it is windy, so we had to reschedule.
For dinner we went to the Marina and ate at Tiki’s. On the way to Tiki’s, we passed a lot of restaurants. It was interesting to see representatives of some restaurants standing infront of the establishments and “hawking” the menu to the passerby’s and enticing customers to the restaurant. It was kind of noisy.
Thursday:
Went on a bus tour around the city and out to Todos Santos. On the way, we stopped at a place where they make blankets, place where they sell dulces (candies), jewelry place and the final stop was @ Hotel California in Todos Santos.
I bought a nice rug (i liked the color) at the blanket place and we watch how they make rugs the old fashion way. It was interesting! The “dulce” place was a lot smaller than I expected but the sweets were interesting and some I am familiar with esp the coconut and taramind sweets (i know of someting similar when i was growing up in PI). I bought a mirror in the jewelry/artscrafts place. We were a little concerned on how we are going to bring home the mirror but we managed to bring it home in one piece (some minor damage but not much and it still looked nice).
We has lunch at Los Adobes in Todos Santos and walked around the place to see all the cactus plants they had in the garden. It was very nice! I think I’m going to create a cactus garden in the backyard! . The food was good too and after that we walked around town and everyone met up in Hotel California.
Overall, it was a very educational tour and gave me an insight into the way of life in Cabo. Our tour guide was very informative.
Friday:
We mostly hanged out at the beach and I tried to get some tan. I am darker now and got sunburned a little bit. The guys rented a waverunner and checked out the water and the coastline. For dinner, we went to Mi Casa for some authentic Mexicon food! I love this place .. The food was awesome!
Saturday:
This was our last day at Cabo. We had parasailing in the morning, so we had to wake up early, had coffee at the Sandbar (on the beach). We were the only ones there and met up Nick/Jen/Alexa and Nathaniel to do parasailing. Parasailing was fun … and was not scary as I expected (i dont like heights). It was really nice and calm up there and the view was spectacular. The kids wanted more action but they enjoyed it too! We all did double parasailing to shorten the time spent doing the activity since our flight back to California was at 2:55pm.
After parasailing, we went back to the Sandbar for late breakfast/early lunch.
Checkout at Hotel Melia was @10am (kind of early), so we took a shower at the Spa and got ready for the flight back home.
We left the hotel @ around 1pm, i think to go to the airport and this time, our flight home was on time. Checking in was not too bad either. We flew United.
So, overall the Cabo trip was fun and educational and I totally enjoyed myself!
Wed 11 Jul 2007
Well, the remodeling project is in full swing. The contractors are hard at work digging, pouring cement and banging on walls. Right now, they’ve poured concrete and put in the flooring area. They’ve also taken out the stucco in that section of the house, ready for the walls to be taken down. They’ve also taken out a portion of the roof because they are going to extend it 5ft in one section. They’ve also connected the plumbing in the area where the sink will be.
So far, it’s been interesting watching them work - ie. it’s hard work being in the construction business. This got me wondering about a lot of things - immigration, the US labor force, minimum wage and a lot of others things.
Anyway, we’ve packed allmost all the stuff in the kitchen in boxes, ready for the wall/cabinet teardown. We’ve sort of figured out what we’re going to do for cooking/food while the kitchen is being worked on. I’m not looking forward to that - probably lots of microwave food, take-out or use the bbq grill more. Oh well, we’ll just have to take it one day at a time. I’m more worried about the kids. At least, they’re older and can handle this better.
We’ve also ordered the new windows and started looking into purchasing the kitchen appliances. It’s burning a hole in my pocket .
On another front, we’re also fixing up Gabby’s room. We fixed up Grant’s room, so now it’s Gabby’s turn. Grant ripped out the carpet in Gabby’s room and we’re going to put hardwood floors in her room. I’m painting her room right now. She’s picked out the colors that she want for her room (green/blue). It looks nice - pretty colorful! Gabby’s room remodel is Grant’s summer job. He’s going to lay down the hardwood floors and we’re going to pay him for doing it, so he’s motivated.
So, the house is a mess right now. Oh well. At least, I have an excuse for it being so messy!
Wed 4 Jul 2007
I never thought we’d do this again .. but here we go again!
We’re doing another house remodel. We’re redoing the kitchen and adding more square footage to the area. We’re basically tearing down the entire kitchen and redoing everything! So, we’re putting on all new kitchen appliances, cabinets, etc … I’m kind of excited and looking forward to the new kitchen. I’m a little nervous about the budget too. So far, we’ve looked at kitchen appliances - there’s so much selection. The Subzero refrigerators are awesome but the price is awesome too!
We’re also looking into extending the front entrance to the house and redoing the stairs. Hopefully, there’s still some money
left for these 2 items!
We worked with an architect (recommended by a friend) to get the plans drawn. He’s pretty good and he gave us some really good ideas. The permit has been approved by the City of Fremont and we’ve decided to work with a contractor who’s a very good friend of the family (he helped us when we remodeled our previous house in Milpitas).
Work started last week and so far, it’s been good. They are only working in the outside area right now so the inside of the house is still OK …
Tue 26 Jun 2007
I met Chris Rummel in the Yahoo Boot Camp class. I didn’t really know him very well but I noticed him because he was very energetic and enthusiastic about working out! In most days, I needed that to get motivated!
It was to my surprise when our bootcamp instructor told us about Chris’ accident. Actually, one of the students told me as we were jogging and warming up for the class. One of Chris’ co-worker is also in the class, so we got regular updates on his condition. The hard part is that no one really knew what happened because there were no witnesses to the accident (he was riding his motorcycle going home from Yahoo and the accident happened near Mathilda and Innovation).
The group decided to send him a card to cheer him up. Unfortunately, we sent the card too late. He was already gone.
This really affected me in some ways. First of all, he was very young and I think just starting out to live his life!
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I want to thank all of you for signing the card today.Thomasz and I went to the hospital today a little late, about 4:00pm to drop off the card. We met with Kelley, Chris’s girlfriend and the immediate family. This was taken from the website and I don’t have anything to add to it.
Derrald
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To the dear friends, family and loved ones of Chris Rummel,
Many of you I know well and some of you I have never met. I come to you now to tell you all the worst news I have ever had to endure in my life.
Today, June 21st at 3pm Chris passed away.
Chris was the strongest and most persistent man I have ever met and he fought to get better with all of his boundless energy but the damage to his body was too much.
I wish to thank you all so much for sharing your love with Chris the past week. Many days we sat with him recounting old stories, reading the messages you sent and telling him how much he was loved. Chris was never alone throughout his hospitalization and he passed with his family by his side.
It is very difficult for me to write this letter and impossible for me to put into words my grief over the loss of his love and life. Instead, I would like to leave you with a quote his mother shared with me about how she feels he lived his life.
“Be the change you wish to see in the world”
In this quote I see the man that Chris was, the people he influenced and the life he lived. Chris was never short on opinions and he had an activity to fill every minute of life. I am so lucky to have shared the past four years of his life with him and I am forever changed by the love he shared with me. I promised Chris that I would never give up and with that I will continue his message and hope to live even half the life he lived.
I will keep this care page up for a while and continue to update it with new info as we set a date for a ceremony. I would also encourage everybody to continue to share memories, messages or thoughts about the life of Chris Rummel. If anybody would also like to add pictures of Chris to the page please e-mail them to me at kmevent@yahoo.com.
With all my love and deepest sympathies,
Kelley Edwards
Mon 28 May 2007
So, after being in Yahoo for about 1.5 year, I finally got a laptop … Not sure what to think about it though (ie. why it took so long to get a laptop) …
Anyway, having the laptop was so much trouble (at least in the beginning!). First, I had problems with the docking station. The entire screen would freeze after using it for a while … then the laptop started crashing on me. Eventually, over the weekend, the laptop would not boot at all. I think the disk crashed. I blamed the disk crash to Microsoft. The only thing that I did was I cleaned up my Outlook mailbox, since I had about 32000 messages in one of mailbox folders that I dont really need anymore, so I deleted all of it. Now, I’m wondering if that caused the disk corruption!
So, off to Customer care, I go, first thing on Monday morning. Well, there was about 10 people or so ahead of me, so I had to wait. There we 2 people in Customer care helping out folks w/ various laptop problems. Finally, it was my turn … and it was a bad disk, so I had to turn in the laptop for them to look at. I didn’t get a loaner so I had to figure out a way to get some work done …. (now, I’m thinking that maybe I should ask for my desktop back! ).
Fortunately, my laptop was ready to be picked up the following day with a brand new hard drive! I was told to pick it up at customer care. So, off I went to customer care again. When I got there, there were about 15 or so people ahead of me! I told customer care that all I needed to do was to pick up a laptop, and do I need to wait ? .. I was told ..”sorry but you have to wait”. So, I was there pretty much the whole morning .. Oh well, there goes the whole morning .. what the heck, i was already behind with my work anyway … what’s a few more hours ? …
I dont know if customer care is always this busy but there has to be a way to expedite things better .. Maybe have an express line or something for folks whose problems do not require a lot of time to diagnose/fix/etc …
The laptop that I got was new too .. It’s an HP .. and so far it has been very good and I’m happy with it .. after such a rocky beginning!
Tue 20 Feb 2007
Well, today is the day … (2/20). I started the day at the gym!
I had to do my run (5 m) and some weights and spent the rest of the day hanging out with Gabby.
She has the whole week of today and I took the day off. We went to the nail place (get nails done) and then to Westfield for some shopping!
We got some clothes and runnng shoes for Gabby (and a couple of items for me). I wish we could have spent more time hanging out but I had to drive her to the gym (gymnastics) and then pick up Grant from school.
Overall, it was a good day!
Tue 9 Jan 2007
Do you ever have one of those days when you start questioning if what you are doing makes a difference in the world? In the grand scheme of things, does it really make a difference?
As I read the news and see what’s happening in the world … Pres Bush new Iraqi plan and wanting to send more troops to Iraq … Florida #2 beating Ohio #1 to win the college National football championship … Nancy Pelosi sworn in as Speaker of the House …
It almost seems like what I’m doing is not that important. So, what if a twiki status page is not updated on time? So, what if a product is released a day late, an hour late? Is it really such a big deal? Will the world end?
Well, maybe in an alternate “grand scheme of things”, it makes a difference. In the very competitive world of web services, deploying timely and quality products does make a difference … and if the process to get there requires doing all these things that may seem meaningless … well, they still need to get done … and i suppose that’s all there is to it …