Turkey Trot

Matthew and Kristen made the long drive down the lovely scenic I-5 for Thanksgiving. They left on Saturday early in the morning, much to the displeasure of Kristen. After a brief stop at the Best Buy to get something for the iPod (yet another toy Kristen thinks Matthew doesn't need), the ride to LA began.

With light traffic for most of the way, the trip was lovely except for the dreaded 405 strectch aka the worst freeway in America. The trip was highlighted by a delightful turkey day meal complete with pumpkin pie dessert afterwards. The dynamic duo got to spend some quality time with Ms. Molly and other various members of the family.

Another highlight was a little get together last night reuniting the fats.

That is all for now, more later...

Halloween --- Mario Time

Hello to everyone. Last night we went to a Halloween party at our friends' (Emily and Jason) house, and we dressed up as Mario and Luigi. Matthew wanted to be Mario, but as usual he did what Kristen wanted and dressed up as Luigi (he insists that he looks great in green or red, so it worked out okay). After an exciting drive over there, we arrived and had a good time hanging out.

Today we are going to watch the Cal vs. Oregon game despite the inclement weather. Hopefully the bears can eat the ducks and get back on track.

Big Apple and Blue Angels

Hello friends and family. This weekend was an eventful one for both Matthew and Kristen. Kristen ventured off to the East Coast to see her homies while Matthew stayed at home and watched the Blue Angels who were in San Francisco as part of Fleet Week, when a parade of Navy ships come to San Francisco.

In another fun news, we have booked our tickets to Bali and now just need to find a couple hotels. Matthew of course bought a book to read and has been learning about the fascinating history of Bali. We are very excited to have our tickets and are looking forward to the trip in a big way.

Stay tuned.

Molly's Baptism

Well the big baby finally received her baptism at the lovely Wayfarer's Chapel in Palos Verdes. The ceremony was wonderful and the chapel was awesome. Following the baptism we had a lovely lunch at Mom's (my mom not Molly's) house. Kristen and I were honored to be named Godparents, and were happy to be there to watch the adorable Molly get baptised .

Outside Lands Festival

Kristen and I went to a three day music festival in Golden Gate Park called Outside Lands. We got to see Steel Pulse and Radiohead on Friday night, which was very exciting since Matthew really enjoys Radiohead.

Saturday was a lot of fun with Ben Harper, Cake, Tom Petty and many others. We were joined by numerous friends who took in many of the shows with us.

After two days of festival going, we were pretty tired, but we checked out some pretty cool bands including Broken Social Scene and Rodrigo Y Gabriela. It was a great time, and we hope that they do it all again next year.

Lake Tahoe Adventures

Lake Tahoe was a blast. Kristen got a chance to show off some hot fashion items while on a very exciting nature walk that had some dynamite views.

Matthew spent a week up in Lake Tahoe while Kristen made it up there for a weekend and got her first taste of the Lake Tahoe. It was a nice week of hanging out and relaxing while taking in the natural beauty of the lake.

Many things to catch up on

I am sure that our loyal blog readers have been clamoring for more updates about our adventures. Well, you may have noticed that it has been a long time since a new blog has gone up, but we have been busy with new adventures to share with you.

First, there was Melissa's graduation from her Ph.D. program, which was very exciting. Although Ms. Molly didn't have the best day, it was still a great day, and we are all very proud of Melissa. Congratulations sister! After the graduation ceremonies were complete, we had a lovely evening and the next day was father's day. We were lucky enough to get all the fathers together at Johanna and Sergei's house for a wonderful (but noisy) get together.

From LA, it was back to work for a week for Matthew while Kristen took a very exciting road trip with some girlfriends (back to LA ironically enough). She was lucky enough to FINALLY get to go to Disneyland and California Adventure (We had been struggling to get to Disneyland for a while now).

After Kristen's road trip, it was off to upstate New York for an engagement party. Albany is lovely this time of year--especially Watervliet. We were joined by Kristen's youngest sister and one of the maids of honor--Lauren (we were thrilled to have her there). The party was held in Kristen's Aunt Theresa's backyard. There was a slide show (which was quite well done), good food, and some great back yard games of horseshoes. It was a quick trip, but definitely fun, as we got to see where Kristen would go very often with her grandma Scully and ride the merry-go-round (Hoffman's for those of you who were wondering). While at Hoffman's we had some intense bouts of bumper cars and a couple scary adventures on rides that were probably older than Kristen and I put together.

From New York, it was back to San Francisco. Matthew only had a quick respite as he was headed off to Las Vegas for some fun with John, Eric, Justin C. and Justin V. Good times were had by all, but it took about a week for Matthew to recover and catch up on sleep.

Finally, this last weekend, we went up to a great little house in Sonoma for the long weekend and Matthew's birthday. The place was tremendous and very relaxing. It was a great way to spend a long weekend and the last weekend before Kristen starts her new job at Sun Microsystems (insert your own technology company joke here...).

So that about covers it. We will try to be better about updating the site, but the events will get much more boring we are afraid.

Exploring San Francisco's

Today was get out and explore San Francisco day. We went to Twin Peaks (which was awesome).


After checking out the top of San Francisco, we went to the Zoo, which was pretty busy even though it was not superb weather. We went and saw all sorts of wild animals including ostri, giraffes, and others. All in all, it was a great day!

Wine Country Awesomeness

Hello friends,

After Kristen's graduation, we decided that it was time to celebrate a little bit more, so we decided to head to wine country.

We visited several lovely places (Silver Oak, Merryvale, Grgich Hills, and Prager) and braved the heat. The highlight for me was driving the minivan around that I rented (I am not kidding). It was a great day and everyone had a lot of fun.

That's all for now.

Graduation Day!!!!

Hello loyal blog readers (okay all four of you). Today was Kristen's graduation from Berkeley's business school. It was a scorcher today! The friends and family sat in the merciless sun in the Greek Theater.

The ceremony was nice and included a speech from the CEO of VS Spirits (Absolut is a brand of theirs). He was from Sweden, and I kept waiting for him to go "It's cold outside, bundle up" (reference to commercial) or try to sell me some Ikea furniture. In all seriousness, it was a wonderful day, and we are all so very proud of Kristen.

I should have a lot more free time as I intend to retire now that Kristen has graduated and can support us.

Happy Friday, and have a great weekend.

Matt

Wedding Hunting

Hello blog readers. Kristen and I were back in Austin this weekend looking for a wonderful place to get married. After visiting several places, we found a place that we really like. The photo you see to your left is the lovely deck of the Driskill Hotel in Austin, Texas. We have tentatively set the date for the wedding of May 2, 2009. We are working through the contract, and knock on wood will finalize the date in the near future.

We have posted several more pictures on Picasa here of the places that we visited: Matthew's Pics. More to follow shortly......

Five Year Reunion - Duke

Last weekend was my five year college reunion at Duke-it is absolutely terrifying that time has gone by so fast. It was a great weekend of catching up with people and getting some great Carolina living. I was able to take in food from all the old haunts: Armadillo Grill, Cosmic Cantina, Bullocks BBQ, and of course Waffle House.

The Gala on Saturday was really awesome. The tent was tremendous and they had a really cheesy/fun band. The rest of the weekend was pretty nice and we got to try a new bar near the Durham Bulls (Minor League Baseball) stadium. Overall, it was a great weekend, and I am definitely glad that I made the journey back to Durham, but I did really miss Kristen.

Fishing

We (husbands/fiances of Kristen's bschool friends and I) had a lovely day fishing yesterday in the San Francisco Bay. The weather was a little cold in the beginning, but it definitely warmed up. Unfortunately, the fishing stayed cold the entire time. We only caught a few bat rays (which we threw back) and a leopard shark, which we kept. Overall, it was a really fun day, but I wish there had been a few more fish to be had.

The boat was pretty cool, and I think we will definitely go again--hopefully with better results. Oh well.

More Progress

Kristen and I continue to make progress on the apartment. It rocks, but there are still a good amount of my clothes around on the floor. Kristen is off to Mexico for a bit of an adventure with her business school friends, so it will just be Matthew this week. I have some exciting fishing plans, so check back to see the huge fish I am going to catch. I plan on stuffing any price fish caught.

We had a lovely weekend filled with dinners and a 30th birthday party. Today was basically a lazy Sunday with some gym time and a few errands as well as catching up with some past tv episodes. More later.

Moving Day

Kristen and I moved into our new apartment yesterday, and we absolutely love it (except all the boxes that we still have to unpack). It is on the top floor of the building (only a three story building), but don't worry everyone there is an elevator for the mobility challenged. It is still a one bedroom, but has a little office or den area, which is lovely. Also, since we are up so much higher, we get a ton more natural light (as compared to the basically subterranean apartment we had before).

We are in a new neighborhood-Pacific Heights. Its cool to try something new, but it is definitely not a knock on the old neighborhood--Russian Hill (Polk Street), which was awesome. We hope that we will have many visitors to the new apartment.

Thanks for all the well wishes over the last week.

Matthew and Kristen

More Details

I managed to take a couple pictures of the ring, but they didn't turn out super well. Hopefully, we can get some more later.

Thanks for all the well-wishes.

Wonderful News

Well there people, we have wonderful and exciting news. Kristen and I have gotten engaged after almost 3 years of dating. We had a wonderful day and evening with massages and dinner. There will be more news about the progress of the plans as soon as we start planning.

Thank you for your well wishes.

Dad in SF

Howdy my limited blog readers. This weekend Dad Friedman paid a visit to SF and was rewarded with a lovely rainy weekend. We had a great visit to Alcatraz and the De Young museum despite the weather.

Well that is all for now.

Mammoth

Hello friends and Kristen, who is the only one that reads my blog. There are some lovely new pictures of Mammoth in a slide show on the right. It was a wonderful weekend of eating and snowboarding and drinking games.

Enjoy the pictures.