Happy Valentine’s day folks. I hope it was a good one. It’s funny that there’s a special day for love.. but not special days for some of the other normal human emotions.. Apathy day ? Anger day ? .. Well. I’ll take love any day..
We did a low key observation today.. but it had all the right elements.. Heart  shaped cookies from my mom, heart shaped plates with hearts on them.

Sleepy boy with heart shaped waffles.

Even Chai got the opportunity for some flirting.. she went to the Crate Escape, Doggy Day Care place.. She gets so excited that she almost jumped out the window.  We take here to Crate Escape sometimes when neither Diane nor I can take her out for some exercise.

The day passed as most days do now.. fast and full. I spent the day at Champlain.. I’m trying to get our joint project wrapped up for our deadline tomorrow..  I love going there… but I’ll sure be glad when this project’s out the door.

I dropped by work on the way home to load my gear fro the show I hav tomorrow morning at Baird school.  

I also took the chance while at work to get a new badge.. I loose my badges all the time.. every few months it seems. My dirty little secret is that I usually am able to get into the building without them using simple Jedi mind tricks (” I look like I belong in this building.. please open the door for me”)  .. I do want to have a badge though.. so I went in and got one.. They offered to use my old picture.. but I wanted one with my Sam Button.. Here it is

By the time I got home it was nearly 7.. The three of us had a nice low-key stir fry dinner.. then we did a bit more Valentining.. Gabe made us a cool card..   And we did some more chocolate, flowers and stuff like that.

Then we did the est thing possible. the three of us when to Sam’s room and watched a really dumb/good  Jacky Chan movie (Rush Hour 3) together… I couldn’t have asked for a better night..

I was getting ready for bed when I came across this old valentine that Diane had found behind her dresser today.. It was good to see it.. it brought the tears that I had somehow been looking for  since my birthday last week.. good tears though.. Sometimes they just get backed up

Well my friends.. hug you loved ones for me… do it everyday !.. And while we’re thinking of hearts.. remember to carry and organ donor card with you.. and discuss it with your loved ones. There many ways to give love…

Love you guys.. love you Sam

-me

Gotta make this short.. I’ve gotten about 8 hours sleep in the last two days.. and I’m zapped..    I Woke this morning around 6AM in NYC.. I had to get on the road early in order to make soem meetings here back in BTV. I quickly packed. made myself a cup of tea and then placed a SamStone in David’s wonderful apartment.

I went  out for a quick bite of breakfast..

I love the streets of NYC early in the morning.. everything seems so fresh and alive.. . (Speaking of fresh.. how’s this for a weird slogan ? )

The streets and elevators were full of dog walkers.. what a life that must be to be a dog on the 26th floor..

I loved this button in the elevator.. It gave me hope.

I had a brief scare when I thought I’d lost my cash card and my drivers license.. ‘luckily’ i found them in the bottom of my backpack.. I sorted that out and got on the road at about 7AM

I was on FDR driving north when Ir realize that I was driving under the building that I was born in.. Now.. that’s something to think about…

I think this sign typifies the difference between New York City in Vermont.. in Vermont the hills are the view !

Driving in the city is pretty nerve racking.. but after I I hit the ‘hutch’.. I can got on autopilot.. I got on the phone.. and basically was in meeting the whole 6 hours back to VT… Speaking of cell phones.. how do you like this weird looking tree ?

The rest of the drive was restful. busy and uneventful. I skidded into Burlington with only 5 minutes to spare before my face to face meetings at Champlain.
I spent the rest of the afternoon working there.. then drive home to pick up Diane for our meditation workshop tonight.   Diane had just gotten home from Burlington with Gabe.. We both turned around and drove back to Burlington for the workshop.. It was nice seeing all of our new friends there..   It’s a very warm and interesting crowd.  One nice surprise tonight is that the meditation center had put a SamStone on the meditation ‘altar’ (right word ?) .   Robert-the-leader gave us a few moments to describe SamStones to the others in the class. I really appreciate him giving us permission to do that.   Tonights class was a very interesting discussion about the Shamabala tradition.. What I learned tonight is the importance of simultaneously being a fearless  warrior  and being gentle..  Now that’s something I need to meditate on .. But now I must sleep.. G’nite all you fearless warriors .. G’nite Sam…
me
   We

I stuck between trying to recreate what I wrote.. and the reality that I need to leave here at about 6 AM tomorrow and REALLY need to sleep.. I think I’ll do this in abbreviated form.   So..

Yesterday:
   Woke late.. Diane, Chai and I took a great snowshoe.. all three of us were pretty lazy.. we turned around about half way through our normal loop.. but it was still a great workout because of the deep snow. Chai kept rolling in all the deer sleepign areas.. she must like the smell.. she didn’t like the snow it got on her.. Diane had to help her get this stuff out of her fur..

We got back and Diane started breakfast.. we had a bunch of kids sleeping over..In addition to Gabe and Max,  I think we had Mason , Mowalka, Alex L, Abbot , Jessie and her friend Marley. Jess had cut her hair to bangs and was wearing black and looked like Audrey Hepburnesque to me..

We just met Jessie’s college friend Marley . she was not named after Bob Marley… even though Bob Marley had come up several times last week.. in fact it was Bob Marley’s birthday last week .

Diane made an amazing birthday breakfast for me with fresh fruit crepes and smoked salmon.. and two birthday cakes (chocolate and apple) it was so nice !

We lit a candle in one of the cakes and did the birthday song. I loved that all four of us were together. We also lit the Sam candel to bring Sam into the picture..

I love Diane3’s Apple cake.. .. it’s probably the worlds most ugly cake.. but it’s also the best tasting. iI’s my absolute favorite.

Then we went ad opened presents.. my folks got me these cool mcoassins.. (thanks ma and pa) .. I also got a mug, a cordless drill and a new PC for upstairs.. a nice haul !.. With that I declared an official end to the marathon 3 day birthday .

We had a few hours before we planned ot leave for NYC so I went down to Champlain to give the team that was working the weekend some morale support. Those guys are working SO hard on this project. I took them some birthday cake to build their strength

I got home around 4 hoping to get on the road.. but we weren’t all ready.. Instead   I talked to Julia Z who told us a cool Sam story:L She was doing Yoga with Diane at MMU. She came out of Relaxation and looked up.. and for a few seconds she could see Sam sitting peacefully right beside Diane,smiling. She blinked a few times and he disappeared.. I love hearing stories like that..

Then I went outside and  helped Gabe try out the new rail in the backyard.. He got a few test runs in before his binding broke.. We had to give up because it as getting dark. It looks like it’s going to work !

Max and I finally got on the road at about 5:40 .. Its impossible to describe the 8 hour drive down.. it was black ice all the way from White River to Brattleboro.. we would have turned back if that had been an option. In all we saw 16 cars off the road, three of them on their roofs. It was bar one the scariest driving I’ve ever, ever done.   The lessons here are a) leave earlier, b) check the weather before you leave and c) take a four wheel drive car if you can..

Luckily the ice cleared at the Mass boarder. max and I ducked into a Chinese restaurant for some General Tsao’s Tofu and Chow Fun.. good stuff. I really enjoyed our drive down.. good conversation and he always turns me on to the best music.

We finally got to Pratt at about 1:45…Max had homework to do.. so I basically stopped the car just long enough for him to grab his stuff and go. He gave me a hug and ran ..

I headed into the city to find the Apartment that good friend David has graciously allowed me to use on this trip.. I got there about 2:30. what a beautiful building.

I got up to the apartment, took a quick look around and fell fast asleep..I woke to a beutiful and cold day. the views from this apartment are gorgeous.

David even has Tin’s Giraffe picture on the all. it looks great there .

I had an ultra productive fay working in the apartment.. Around 2 I headed out to my meeting at the IBM building at 590 Madison.Ave.

My friends were waiting for me there.. This was the kickoff for a Technical Vitality Council for Manhattan. I gave two short talks.. one on the IBM academy .. and one on Video game engines.. both talks when pretty well. it was a good crowd.. lots of good conversation.

After the talk one of the guys offered to take us for a beer.. we all tromped over to his favorite hotel bar.. only to find that the hotel was missing !.. He swears it was right here a few months back ! We headed to another palace.. As soon as I got there, my friends from the IBM?Sesame Street meeting called. They were cross town at a Chinese place. I hopped a cab and met them there.. I had the best talk with Mr Beckwater, the cab driver.. he’d been driving for 43 years.. and never had anything bad happened to him.. the weirdest thing that happened was having a baby born in his cab in 1966.

The IBM/Sesame Street meeting was great. No Burt or Ernie.. but the humans that showed up were really great …   they all obviously love what they do.. I spent a bunch of time talking to Biola (cool name !) who was doing a Sesame Street production in Tanzania. I gave here some SamStones to take with her on her next trip.

The restaurant was great.. they had  these great carved vegie animals

One of the IBM folks tried on my hat and did the Statue of liberty pose.

After dinner, I hitched a ride cross town with one of the IBM Research folks.. I noticed it was 16 degrees.. cold for here !

I was happy to get back to the apartment.. I’m pretty beat.. I shut the door and peered out the spyhole.. this is what it’s like to live in the big city !

This place really is beautiful. It was so wonderful of David to let me us it !!!!!!

Here’s aa picture off ne of the 100’s of windows I can loo into from here.. what an interesting life..