long hair no more!

before

during

kinda grosses me out...

after

a little more than 10 inches going to locks of love :)

memorial day camping

last weekend we went to lake del valle with a group from church.  we camped with our friends jacob and suzie and we had a wonderful time sharing meals, relaxing, and wine tasting.  it was a bit cold in the morning and at night, but during the day it was wonderful weather.  can't wait until next year!

camping breakfast!

laughing about something...

our camp

sunday worship

my future home at the vineyard.

malari's wedding

yes, this was already two weekends ago...i'm getting a little behind in my blog updating.  

it was a beautiful day for malari and dan and a very fun reception following the ceremony at the crystal cathedral.  the drive down wasn't so bad, but forgetting my camera at home was a bit of a bummer.  here are some pictures i took on the classy throw-away camera.

when malari walked down the aisle, the fountains in the middle turned on...it was sweet.

my handsome man.

my beautiful married roommate.

julia was there too with her fiance.

we were able to stay with denouden relatives and we headed to hollywood the next day.  as you can see i have my own star on the walk of fame.

and if you look to the left of the palm tree you can see the hollywood sign...i'm missing the zoom feature on our nice camera :(

More Fun With Poetics

I just noticed tonight after my Poetry class that someone had commented on my previous post suggesting an alternate line reading for my months poem.

I decided to respond, and my response became more and more in-depth (I just had me poetics class, remember).  Because of this (and out low post out put) I decided to post my reply on the main page.

Before I do though, let me just say two things.

1) I LOVE the suggestion.  I wish I could use it.

2) I could go into much more detail (it's amazing the things you learn, but don't realize you're learning), but have chosen to keep it as brief and simple as possible (partly because I want to go to bed!)

So...here it is -

"That's a great thought Anonymous, but unfortunately that word order would change up the rhythm (which I am defining as the sequence of accented and unaccented syllables) a little bit.

Currently the poem reads:

THIR-ty/DAYS-are/IN-sep/TEM-ber
JUNE-and/A-pril/AND-no/VEM-ber
TWEN-ty/EIGHT-in/FEB-ru/AR-y
BUT-be/CARE-ful/IT-can/VAR-y (are these one syllable or two??)
ALL-the/REST-have/THIR-ty/ONE
WHO-KNEW/that-MONTHS/could-BE/so-FUN

As you can see, it gets kinda awkward after the second line.

Your suggested line would read like this:

the-REST/all-NUM/ber-THIR/ty-ONE

Which is a much nicer iambic (unaccented syllable followed by an accented one) line but, unfortunately would become the ONLY regular iambic line in the entire poem making the poem feel that much more awkward. The last line is ALMOST a regular iambic, and would probably become one were we to substitute your line for mine, but the spondaic (double accented) foot leading the line works to transition the poem into the regular iambic meter.

If you notice, the majority of the lines are trochaic (the opposite of an iamb - accented then unaccented) which means the lines all start with an accented syllable and end with an unaccented syllable. Part of the problem created by the new line is that you would have an enjambed (spread out over two lines) anapest (double unaccented syllables). To better explain what I mean, I'll write it out as a single line:

BUT-be/CARE-ful/IT-can/VAR-y//the-REST/all-NUM/ber-THIR/ty-ONE

Notice how there is a subtle "hitch in your gitty-up" as you read that line?

That being said, I LOVE the line and would totally use it if I could figure out a way to write the entire poem as regular iambs, but regrettably the second month of the year has too many syllables and is almost as difficult to rhyme as 'orange' to be able to accomplish that task with any ease."

I didn't realize that I had learnt all this stuff so far this semester.

Thank you, Anonymous, for helping me to see that.

Months, Metre and Rhyme

Two nights ago, my lovely wife was lamenting about the awkwardness of the standard poem used to teach kids (and many adults) how many days are in each month.
You know -

Thirty days hath September,
April, June, and November.
All the rest have Thirty-one,
Except for February.


I mean talk about elegance and brilliance.
So me, taking a (graduate level) class on poetics and poetry, and being the aspiring literary artist that I am, endeavored to make the poem better. (You can tell we have pretty hoppin' social lives around here).
This is what I came up with -

Thirty days are in September,
June, and April, and November.
Twenty-Eight in February,
But be careful, it can vary.
All the rest have thirty-one.
Who knew that months could be so fun?

This is not what I originally came up with.
At first I left the first two lines (or couplet) alone. It was the same as the original.
I also, had "But beware" instead of "but be careful."
In both instances I made changes in order to create a regular rhythm and metre.
I wouldn't have had words for it before this class, but you can feel it when you read it, especially out loud.
Just now, I tried to make the second-to-last (or penultimate) line eight syllables like the rest, but it just didn't work.
I think because almost all of the lines start out with a first stressed syllable, and the line wanted to start unstressed which didn't want to flow from the unstressed syllable ending the line right before it.

Well, I think I've bored you all enough with all of the deconstruction, and it's past my bed time.
Good night!

winter getaway

last weekend mom and dad snow came to visit us and we had a great time taking them to sonoma, santa rosa, monterey, and carmel. things didn't go exactly as hoped for with the weather (quite rainy for california standards) and 17 mile drive was closed (due to the pro-am golf tournament), but we had a great time enjoying the long weekend together. we even got dad to go to ikea! here are some pictures from their visit.

what exactly is a "door to nowhere" doing in a vineyard?

our tour guide. we were the only 4 on the tour which was pretty great. i guess the rain scares most people away.

they gave us blankets to keep us warm, which made us pretty happy.

in the wine cave

after wine tasting we headed to santa rosa to stop by the charles schulz museum and to eat dinner at chevy's. these pictures are for you aunt diane :)

on saturday we headed to monterey/carmel to enjoy another day of the rain/sun mixture.
see hannah, you were with mom and dad on this trip :)

enjoying valentine's day where we went for our honeymoon :)

love this view.

dutchmen make wine?

ok so this post should have been done 3 weeks ago...but i was a bit busy, so here it is. better late than never :). we went wine tasting in amador valley in the beginning of february, and our favorite new winery was "the dutch winery." the man inside who owns the winery was wearing wooden shoes and along the driveway there were wooden shoes with tulips in them. It was a great place to visit and the wooden shoe with the wine bottle in it just cracks me up.

you gotta love the wooden shoes traveling up the wall

a few of my new favorite things

1. pandora radio...try it you will like it i promise.  you tell them an artist or a name of a song you like and they'll make a playlist of a ton of other songs they think you will like.  plus it's free!

2. 73 degree weather in january!  sunshine is great but nice weather to go along with it, major bonus.  anyone want to move to california soon?  we actually took our workbooks outside on monday because it was just too nice to work inside.

3. fair oaks farm.  yes i know i posted about them earlier but now i'm able to give rave reviews about the cheese we purchased there and brought back with us.  don't worry, you too can order cheese online from this amazing place.

4.   my new mittens...yes, i know the weather is 73 degrees out here, but it's a cool 42 in the morning and my little hands just can't handle it.

they were handmade by my friend's mom.  she makes awesome stuff, and you should totally check out esj designs to see a few of her amazing creations (image from their website).  they have many items that are made from recycled goods which makes their stuff even cooler.

city church and exploring the sf exploratorium

we were blessed to visit city church of san francisco this morning to do some research for our own church. it was a wonderful experience and we look forward to going back to visit.
afterwards we went to the baker street bistro and enjoyed an amazing breakfast of french toast for myself and eggs benedict for jeremy. such amazing food we were able to eat while there. after our meal we headed over to the exploratorium to check out some hands on science stuff. it was a great time and we could have spent even more time exploring everything there is to see and do. three hours just doesn't cut it :) it was great to relax and take our time wandering through the museum together. i highly recommend this place and wish i could take my students here this year.
the sweet tessellation that we made. and i wonder why my students don't pay attention when i pass these things out.
skills my friends...skills.
the big chair
yes, that's jeremy drinking from the toilet...
a funny sign that we saw
we ended our day trip with a stop at everyone's favorite big box store IKEA! we stopped by to see what items were on sale for the winter sale and were able to grab a few small items i've had my eyes on. dinner was also enjoyed at ikea before we headed back to sj to rest up for the work week ahead. blessings to you on this sabbath day!