water water everywhere

One advise:

Don't drink bottled water at home.

Just don't ... I can explain, but it takes a long while. Email me if you need to know, by then, I would have finished reading this 300 page document from WHO (yes, yes, the world health organization) on the 'hazardous health impacts of bottled water'.

Say NO.

the weekend still keeps you going!

This morning, an email from Paul R:

>>>

Dear friends and family of Bee...

Please do not be alarmed, but Bee has been going through some
changes here in California.

We are not sure what is happening to her, but she seems to
be in a state of metamophisis and appears to be turning in to
some sort of feline super hero....

>>>

LOL

San Diego - The attack of seven interns

We have been planning this for a while. We all want to go and see how sunny 'sunny San Diego' really is! So, we as in, Darrell (MIT intern at XPF), Elizabeth (Illnois intern at XPF) and Paul, Christian, Ramon and Carlos head out southwards to escape the LA traffic and madness.

I forget how long roads go here, I am sure they don't even change names after passing through a multiple states! So, we take a detour for the road that we want and end up being an hour and a half late! But we finally meet up with the boys.

In short, San Diego was great!

We went on an aircraft carrier called 'Midway', saw lots of planes - including the american Hawk(!!), and the helicopters that were used to airlift apollo astronauts! Here's me with it!:

We all went to the SD zoo - saw pandas and galapogas turtles and flamingoes! The zoo was amazing! I was not too sure about it at first, but it was totally great to be a kid again and just let nature amaze the senses!
We tried to get into a bar or club, but oh no no! Keeping that we had two people who were not yet 21 and one person who didnot have their passport, I think they were just being unfair not letting us in anywhere! So, we all just got back to the hostel and went to bed at 3! lol

Next day, we went to find out what the famous 'La Jolla' (la hoya) cove was all about. Now I understand the fuss - its awesome! Saw seals basking in the sun and a great beach. We all soaked our feet (and much more!) - it was irrestible!

Some one also invaded the 'do not enter' beach! (heehee, see Paul caught on camera!)

Life changing experiences- encore!

Hey Hey Hey,

Teju finishes her last A level exam...
Voila!

I feel a little challenged here, everyone seems to be going on doing great things, wheres my breakthorough!?

Talked to Mum, its always fun: it surprises me how many things she does at a time, with jobs and all!

Life changing experiences

Chris ran a marathon! In norway, the midsummer marathon!

C O N G R A T U L A T I O N S

You rock hunny!


Katie also did yet another half marathon at the same place - She rocks too! WELL DONE KATIE!

Happy Father's Day Daddy!

I don't say this often, but I am extremely proud of my Dad. However crazy in different ways he can ever be - he is fantastic!

Love you dad!

Bee

Oh gee!

Its been so long since I last wrote, but its been a busy time!

So, what happened - in my tiny little world,

Rasheed (my house mate's) daughter Tiana is visiting -shes cute. I spend saturday morning drawing doodles in her numbers book on her strict orders. 'As you say madame', shes cool and got the coolest hair!

Rest of the week, every evening, I have missed her - I forget she is a kid and has to go to bed at like 8 o'clock!

On saturday later that afternoon, I went to Venice to meet up with the office people - Elke has organized to meet up to watch the USA vs Italy match - it was good fun. Later, Paul from ISU joined us and we all soaked some sun by the Venice beach, Elizabeth (another intern from Illinois) and I shared a raclette - yummmm...

So, Darell and all of us youngsters decided to head off and catch out the getty centre... little did we know it was so awesome. Great paintings, lovely serene surroundings, landscaped gardens, great birds eye views and you could quite literally sit there and write a book!

We vowed to go back there when they have any evening concerts. It was also funny - we were amongst the last people to leave the centre in the evening when it shut. The center is on a hill, accessed only via a special tram. So, whilst waiting for the tram, we got chatting to one of the attendents. (A small talk habit I have developed - I guess I am compensating for having to avoid that in French earlier in the year!) He was bored and wanted some food for thought I guess

Tram attendant: 'Ask me a question'..
Paul: Erm, what time is the centre open till?
Tram attendant: Naaaah, a difficult one, go on, try me...
Me: Ok, what is the area of the centre in square kilometers
Tram attendant: Erm, hm , naah, erm - when are you coming next?

But he had the distance between the Earth and the Moon worked out - so I was impressed.
Good guy!

Oh Jefferey!

My mate Jeff is getting married in Orlando in Jan of 2007. Congratulations Jeff!!!!

He does remind me of 'jeff' from Coupling - but he is less pervy! :-)

Heres a picture of him and his great find, Kristina! Jeffs a great buddy from last summer - we got on really well and he talked of Kristina non-stop! Awwwwwwwwwww.... :-D

Bike-around Europe in LA!

So, its a sunny saturday morning. What better to do than work? Well, I had to wait till afternoon turned up (you know, catching banks, getting new bike locks, etc) - I had a great chat with mum, and a long one too! So, I decided to take a map and check a few places around Santa Monica...

Its funny, how parts around Santa Monica are all named after european places: Valencia, San Vicente, Venice. So, I cycled off to San Vicente first - its a gorgeous long road (where they rang the marathon in the LA olympics) with shady trees on both sides. Another attraction of the area, which I have been to twice already is Banyan trees. Its really strange to see Bamboos, Maple trees and Banyan trees all standing next to each other! (and those who have heard me speak incessantely about my homeland would recall I come from the town where the banyan trees orignate from!?)

So, anyway, I rode from San Vicante, to the beach and across the pier, 5 miles route to Venice: Its a lovely bike route - paved like silk for bike tyres! on the occasional patch of sand I realized that my bike tyre prints are custom made and make the same pattern as the custom bodywork - oh Heather, you have such great taste! :-) Its a great gorgeous beach cruiser!

Venice beach is covered in overflowing crowds because of the highly highly hippy market - everything selling anything that looks, smells and tastes Indian! (and occasionally, the same theme repeated in Chinese). But apart from the pot-smoking and heroin taking side alley business, it s a very nice place, with some very funny people and very expensive looking brothels. It hosts a 'muscle beach' where there is a open, sea facing, free to all gym - I didn't try it.

I parked my bike to quench my thirst by a small patch of green grass and coconut trees facing the sea - in the distance, there is a graffiti contest (on small walls set in a certain fashion), there is a beach rave right in front of me - melange of several instruments... made it somewhat bizzare, but after a while, once your ear got adjusted to it, it was pleasant. Far on my left is a rather huge crowd. I stood up to investigate, but all I can see is a LAPD building with a sign "We are recruiting". I thought thats hardly something that would draw a crowd as big and unstructured as this!

What I found was that I had just walked into the westcoast's national low riding bike convention! I would exclaim that I was missing it if I had heard about it before! But anyways, it was quite an education: There were all these custom build (hand made) low riding bikes - some were gorgeous, some were just what I would describe as 'odd'.

Anyhoo, after talking to a few winners, who were being hassled by reporters to move away from their own bikes and let the bikini clad big boobed girls get their pictures with it, I decided to ride further inland in search of the canals. [[You see, 'Venice' in LA is made like the real Venice. They started to creat canals and turning this area into an exotic replica of the real Venice, but roads and railroads took over and were fasters, so much of the waterways got filled. There are some canals still preserved and make a very beautiful view I was told.]] But, this is where I went wrong: I asked a couple of cops where to go.

Needless to say, they didn't know where I wanted to go, so pointed me out in the wrong direction. Everyone in LA has this idea that if you are lost, you just better go back to Santa Monica! (its a block system, god damn it! if you take a wrong turn, you could use simple goemetry or trig to come back! -but no!). After an hour and a half of getting back to where my map pointed out... I came by Marina Del Ray - its a small dock for private boats. Jim has a slip here (I hear) and my friend George is hoping to live on a boat here - I thought I d inspect some for him and let him know... great fun!

Making my way back, I almost forgot about the canals, when I just passed one! Ooooooooh, they are gorgeous! They reminded me of Bath - it felt like home. (albeit, ultra modern architecture and shallower canals!) but great! When I grow up, I ll have my friends and family stay in one. I have already shortlisted some banks I d have to rob for it...

Anyhoo, I got a boat and rowed for a couple of hours in the canal soaking in the atmosphere. I have only kayaked alone, never rowed alone -so was a little scared, but then the canal was like about 3 feet deep (I am sure the algae at the bottom is another 3 feet!) but that got rid of my fear...

I rode my bike back via the beach route. I stopped at the pedestrain 3rd street promenade and got lured into the cinema by a 7.30 Da Vinci code show... which I had been wanting to see for a very long time. Its an ok film - I liked it cos it reminded me of the book.. but I do think it misses out on some very fine points of the book, which would have helped anyone who hadn't read the book... but never mind. I am glad Audrey Toutou did another film - I like her.

Tired and full up with my large tub of salted buttered popcorn, I rode the bike back and got home rather tired. At 11 pm the night still felt young, but I just chilled in the house and caught up with what I should have read!

Just in case

Just in case anyone of you look at my blog,

Just in case you happen to find yourself in the woods some day heres a link that is really good:
http://www.wikihow.com/Survive-in-the-Woods-for-3-Days

Just in case...
Bee prepared.

Enjoy!

Fenton from australia...

Got an email from Fenton this morning... says:

" I just thought I would inform you that there is a satellite named after you its called BeeSat, here is the link http://www.beesat.de/

Combined with the fact you are best friends with Prince Charlie it seems you are on your way to being really famous. "

too funny!

busy otherwise

Now I have moved on to working on two projects full time! woo hoo! Also, got the roll out for media - SGC 2006 next week. it all happening!

Sorry, I am so busy, that I can't get the time to write the juicy details of everyday life here... in other words, I am ill now! no really, its great office - everyone is friendly and its all really amazing work, my telecon calls have gone from 3 a week, to 30 a week: its really nice as it is fast paced.

I met up with Heather and Bruno yesterday - it was lovely to see them again!

Beex