Category Archives: Home & Family

I am in meetings all day today with potential SEED mentoring
program participants as well as with site managers and executives.
Tomorrow, John and I get to do some sightseeing around St. Petersburg.

Last night, we went to a very good Russian style dinner at Senat
Restaurant. When the driver
took us home, we saw the Neva river sending up huge sheets of steam
into the frozen air. We also went by the heroic bronze statue
of Peter the Great on horseback. He does not have any spotlights on
him so the big wedge-shaped white rock he is riding up looms out of the
dark. We drove by the statue of
Catherine the Great standing tall on her pedestal in the middle of
the park in front of her palace.

It is a very strange
feeling to have the inside of my nose freeze as soon as
I step out of a car. Everyone walks very fast on the street and
they wrap up in coats and furs and scarves so only their noses
show. Monday, we fly to Tel Aviv where it will be at least 20 degrees
warmer.

Jessi had mid-term exams this week. She thinks she did well. She
has also started seriously working on her college plans.
Harker
has an excellent college counselling program – as you might expect
from a Silicon Valley college prep school.

Today, Jessi started
researching what scholarships are available. We will not know about
academic scholarships until Jessi has her Junior year grades and test
scores – probably next summer. However, there are many dozens
of scholarships which target social, political, racial, professional,
and national groups. Others are awarded to winners of a competitive
essay contest. Most of the essays have bland set topics but others
are stranger. One essay Jessi is thinking about writing is about the
effect of food allergies on her life (caffein makes her heart race
so no spiked sodas and minimal chocolate).
We also ordered two study books to help Jessi prepare for her SAT
tests in April.

My favorite recent quote about local government:

“For connoisseurs of government, the most attractive
thing about bureaucratic warfare is that it’s like a
sporting event. You may feel passion for your team.
You may root hard. But the world as we know it won’t
end if the other guys triumph.”

Scott Herhold “In My Opinion” San Jose Mercury News,
p. B-1, 5 January 2006

Of course, having your own time and money and future plans at
stake greatly increases your focus on the game.

We just successfully bid to buy

GGRM WP 668 (Golden Gate Railroad Museum, Western Pacific –
Feather River Railroad, Caboose number 668). GGRM has until

15 February 2006 to clear out of San Francisco’s Hunter’s Point.
We have until 15 February to move our caboose. We are in negotiations with
the San Jose City Planning Department to get a permit to replace our
dead swimming pool with a new office and library in a caboose. See
my husband John’s blog
for the details of this discussion. We don’t need the permit to move
the caboose from GGRM into the storage location but I shudder to think
of what we are going to do with many tens of tons of caboose if the city
does not allow the permit.

Before Monday, when we fly to Russia and Israel for a 2 week business
trip, we are busily making arrangements for the crane, truck, soils engineer
inspection of the existing pool, and lots of other activities which we will
kick off as soon as we return. Packing, did I mention we were also
packing?

After several nervous days of us waiting for a response, the
Golden Gate Railroad Museum just
accepted our bid to buy
GGRM WP 668 (Golden Gate Railroad Museum, Western Pacific – Feather
River Railroad, Caboose number 668). This is a historic piece of train
equipment, already listed on
The Western Pacific Caboose List. It was built in 1916 as a boxcar
and converted into a bay window caboose in the 1930s. It is a wooden shell
just a few bits of the original furnishings like a built-in wooden bunk bed.
It looks very much like the caboose in these photos.

We are now arranging with the crane and trucking company to get it from
the GGRM in San Francisco to San Jose where we live. We will start working
on the move as soon as we get back from our work trip to Russia and Israel.

My kids had a quietly amazing conversation on the
drive to school this morning. Jessica is taking 11th grade Honors Biology
and has been studying genetics for some weeks. She was studying
for a quiz and had a question about Punnit Squares.
Paul had studied them in 7th grade last year. Watching the two of them
with their heads together over her laptop working out a genetic inheritance
problem was a real delight, if somewhat humbling. First, I barely remembered what
a Punnit Square was! Second, they were not squabbling. (This in itself is a minor
miracle.)

I pray that my kids grow up to have the loving and supportive
relationship that has developed between my brothers and me. It is a source
of stability and comfort to be in good communication with both of the other
people who share my particular family context.

Today is Halloween, probably the most popular American holiday on which
everyone has to work. I have seen some costumes at work already (besides
my own!) but I am sure to see more when I go to the cafeteria for lunch.

My daughter went to High School today as a Clever Gipsy Girl (a character in one of
the songs she is learning). We spent hours at the Goodwill used clothing
store yesterday finding bits and pieces of things to adapt for her costume.
She has a grey underskirt, orange and red overskirt, a sheer green shawl around
her waist, a silver concha belt also, a white lace top, a red paisley pashmina shawl,
black boots, and lots of necklaces and bracelets. She put on lots of eye makeup and
is having a wonderful time sashaying and jingling around campus.

My Middle School son is the character Yoda from Star Wars. We bought the costume
ready made and then had to look all over for his heart’s desire – a green plastic
lightsaber that makes noise. Of course, as soon as it left the store the light burnt
out but he still likes it.

We were going to create a haunted house at home but school activities got in the way
so we will just have the standard bowl of candy when the little ghosts and goblins
come with bags to fill tonight.