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Tricia's Kindle2 arrived today! So of course, I had to check out what davidguido.com looked like on it. Not to shabby, huh?

Her family and I pitched in to buy it for her birthday. I bought it a month in advance, and of course, it was back-ordered. So for her birthday, I found a picture of a Kindle, wrote a message on it in Photoshop, printed it out, and pasted it to a piece of card-board. It took her about 5 minutes to figure out what it was. But once she realized, oh man, was she excited. You see, this is the first gift she's received in a long time that was entirely for her; not for the family, not for her-and-the-kids...just for her! So she was extremely excited about it.

She wanted it about a year ago when it first came out, but I talked her out of it based on the poor reviews of other reading devices that I've heard. When I started researching it, turns out things like eye-strain, poor battery life and clunky UIs have all been fixed on the Kindle. So I got together with her family and bought it.

After her birthday, and after she told everyone that she's getting it, Amazon announced that the Kindle2 is out. I immediately thought we were getting old technology, so I was kinda pissed. I check my email and Amazon writes that we're getting upgraded automatically for the same price...now that's pretty cool.

We were supposed to get it on March 3rd with free shipping, so Tricia kept asking me to track the package. It ended up coming way early (today, 2/27). Tricia screamed at the post man with excitement when she saw the Amazon logo.

Needless to say, she's stoked...and I'm golden for at least another year!

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Posted: 2/27/2009 06:09:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Ava was born last night and she's doing great! So is Tricia, which is surprising considering the stats...

Weight - 9lb 3oz (Keep in mind that Tricia is normally 105 pounds soaking wet)
Length - 19.5 inches
Time - 9:50pm
Date - June 27, 2005
Hospital - Kaiser
Full Name - Ava Michelle Guido

We induced at 10:00 am and the contractions built up slowly throughout the day. It was finally Go Time at 9:40 pm. Tricia gave 5 hard cycles of pushes and 10 minutes later, Ava was born.

We had a bit of a scare because she was completely purple and didn't breath for a little over a minute (which seemed like about 5 minutes to me.) It was so quiet, you could literally hear a pin drop. Then she started crying and everyone gave a huge sigh of relief.

The next morning Tricia was up walking around by herself and we were out of there by 4:00 pm. She's a trooper that Tricia!

The baby is absolutely beautiful. See for yourself...

Ava's First Two Days

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Posted: 6/28/2005 09:50:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

We picked up our Golden Retriver puppy today and surprised Ryann with it. If anyone knows Tricia, they know that this has been her dream dog and any other dog just wouldn't do. So, being the great husband that I am, I gave up a huge chunck of our tax return to buy this thing. Oh it's cute alright! But damn... 1200 dollars??? Come on! This dog better do the dishes and drive me to work for that kind of money.

No, I'm not bitter or anything. He's actually really really cute. We couldn't think
of a name so we let Ryann name him. She came up with "Cooper". Whatever.

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Posted: 5/18/2003 06:28:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Today, we took a one-day trip to Las Vegas to see some of my family. My cousin David
got married there yesterday, so Cathi, Tricia, Ethan and I decided to go up for the day. I haven't seen these cousins (Johnny & David) in almost 15 years, so it was really great to hang out for a day and catch up. I also haven't seen my Aunt Denise in while. And it's always great to see my second mom, Aunt Mary.

We stayed the night at Cathi's both nights because it's on the way. So Cathi babysat for us while we took Jordan to see The Matrix Reloaded. I definitely have to see it again to completely understand the story, but generally, I agree with the critics in that the story was a little weak while the action was kick ass.

Labels: family, movies, trips

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Posted: 5/17/2003 10:32:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Well, what can I say... I've been busy the last few months.

Typically I write about the things I do, the movies I see, etc. But I can pretty much sum up the last 5 months right here. Basically, besides working, I've been hanging out with the family and attempting to get the house organized.

Ethan is getting huge. He's almost 5 months now and he's as strong as a bull. Still bald, but he's pretty much doing all the things a 7 month old would do; holding onto something while standing, he's rolling over like crazy, and many other amazing things. It's been really great so far. It's hard to explain unless you've been there.

The house is coming along... slowly. There are still boxes all over the place and no pictures hung up yet. It's pretty sad. But I can't really do anything in the evenings, and just about every other weekend we're traveling somewhere. We did manage to plant a very cool vegetable garden and we got a trampolene for... uh ummmm... Ryann. Now, talk about fun!

Other than that, Ryann's adapting to her school a little more. Besides getting into huge trouble by telling two other kids that she was going to kill them, she's actually doing really well with her school work. We're hoping she makes more friends at her new school in July.

Tricia has been doing such a great job with the kids. I'm so glad she's able to stay at home and take care of them... cuz I'd never be able to do it. Seriously, she's doing all the hard work. She hasn't had a full nights sleep since the baby's been born. She's been incredible.

Tricia managed to get us a free digital camera with her American Express points. She collected over 100,000 points from doing a lot of the purchasing at the company she used to work for. She did the same thing to pay for our honeymoon too. Any way, we got the Canon Powershot s45 and it's sweet! I've taken hundreds of picture already, too bad I don't have time to do anything with them. But as soon as I finish that clone, I'll be able to catch up. Damn, I don't even have time to work on my clone. Whatever!

Well, we have a bunch of plans for this summer, so I'll try to keep this updated.

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Posted: 5/09/2003 10:38:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

We're finally moved into our home. If you're ever in the area, don't hesitate to stop by.

Here are a couple of snapshots of the house. It has a great back yard!

Front
Back
Aerial

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Posted: 12/22/2002 09:01:00 AM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Ethan was born today. And there is my conclusion for one hell of a year. This year alone, I got married, became a step-dad, got a new job, bought a house, and finally, became a new dad. I'm surprised I'm still standing.

Having Ethan was something that's really unexplainable. But I'll at least tell you how the day went.

It started off 2 days ago, when Tricia had her membrane stripped (I know some of you guys love to hear that!) She's been having some really mild contractions, but this made them slightly stronger and more frequent. We thought this would get things moving because if any of you have seen Tricia lately, you know that she was *more* than ready. Yesterday, we went in at 6:00 pm to have her induced. Things got started off around 7:00. From there she slowly built up and had mild contractions all night long.

At 4:45 am, her water broke and it was go-time. She was dilated to about 3 cm at this point. As soon as this happened, her contractions really started to hurt. It took about an hour for the guy with the happy juice to get there (technical term for epidural). Let me tell you, during that hour I was looking at a woman that I've never seen before. I swear to you that this was not my wife... an actual intruder snuck in and morphed into her body. I was just waiting for her head to start spinning.

Finally, the happy juice kicked in and my wife was back. The doctor came in around 7:30 to check on her and she was already dilated to about 7-8 cm. She came back about 8:40 and asked Tricia if she was ready to start pushing. By 9:20 we had a brand new baby. I first checked to see if he had the Guido Toe... Check! All other toes and fingers... Check! Check! He quickly turned bright pink and as cute as a button.

I can now say that he is the cutest baby I've ever seen. I know everyone says that about their own babies, even though they're butt-ugly. But seriously, this baby is cute!

Tricia is doing great. Besides the hemorrhoids, peeing on the floor, and playing practical jokes on the nurses, she's been a trooper.

Official Stats:
Name: Ethan David Guido
Weight: 8 pounds, 5 ounces (yes, he's pretty thick!)
Height: 19.5 inches
Hair: Light brown and a bit fuzzy.
Born at 9:20 am, 12-20-02

Special 'Thanks' goes out to Dr. Leslie Gonzales, nurse Julie and the staff at Los Alamitos Medical Center. We had absolutely top notch service the whole time we were there.

Here's a first Round of Pictures

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Posted: 12/20/2002 10:07:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

I just have to say that the last two months have been the busiest of my life. First, I got a new job at Washington Mutual Bank as an Interaction Designer. So that's been keeping me very busy. But with any spare time, I've been packing like a maniac. Tricia's about to explode, so she couldn't help that much (although she's been great at doing the light stuff). Aside from all that we had Mitchell and Marlene's re-wedding to prepare for. Tricia made their cake which turned out awesome. We moved into our new house (taking care of the paperwork is a full-time job in itself), and took a short trip to Maui. Holy crap, I can't wait until I have nothing to do, but with a baby coming in about 8 weeks, I don't see that anytime soon.

So now that things are a litte more calm, I'll try to update this section more often. Keep in mind that my home computer is packed away in my garage somewhere. I had to steal Emily's cable modem connection and plug it into my work laptop to update this.

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Posted: 11/04/2002 07:17:00 AM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

We moved into our new house today and the day probably couldn't have gone any better. Thanks again to Ian, Heather, Michael, Austin, Angela, Graham, Curt, Crystal, Emily, Gerry, Gina, Chris, Cathi and Jordan. Aren't friends and family a
great thing to have?

It's just too bad that we have to leave all of our boxes there and live at the Keene's for the next 1-2 months. There's nothing wrong with living at the Keene's, it's just that our house is just sitting there. Yep, all of our stuff is there, waiting to be unpacked. We're going to stay at the Keene's until the baby is born because Ryann's school and Tricia's work are so close and we wanted to keep the same doctor and hospital. I'll be making weekend trips to unpack.... very slowly. But next weekend we're going to Maui!

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Posted: 10/27/2002 07:29:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

We went in for our ultrasound today to find out. We're both really excited about it, especially me. I'll finally have a riding partner I can ride dirt bikes with.

We got to see him yawn, rub his eyes, suck his thumb, and he had hick-ups for a little while. It was amazing to see. He's about as big as a soda can now. Pictures coming soon.

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Posted: 7/30/2002 07:32:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Went to Ventura because my Aunt Rose was in town from Florida. I haven't seen her since I was a kid and the wierdest part is that she looks exactly the same... just more white hair. It was great to visit with her.

Stayed at my Mom's house and woke up with a dead battery. I left my cargo light on all night... What a dork.

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Posted: 7/16/2002 07:47:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Spent a few days in Mammoth with Tricia's family. They go up there for a week every year and this year there were about 30 people all together. We had a great time hanging out with everyone and Ryann caught a ton of fish this year with her grampa.

Thursday I rode my dirtbike all the way up to Laurel Lake. When I did this trail in May, it was blocked off with snow. This time I was able to make it all the way. It was so nice and peaceful up there.

Friday I rode my mountain bike down Mammoth Mountain Bike Park about 4 times. And later that day I rode my dirtbike at the track for a little while.

Saturday I took a nice little mountain bike ride from the condo up to the village. I then caught a shuttle up to Ski area, rode about 1 mile up to Minaret Lookout, then about 2.5 miles up Hard Core to Deadman's Pass. The view from up there was incredible! I could see June Mountain and a large portion of the Sierra's including the Ansel Adam's Wilderness, which we are supposed to hike this fall. I rode back down Hard Core, down the Mountain View Trail including a kick ass single track, over to the Earthquake Fault. I then crossed over the 203 and jumped on the Downtown Trail back to the village. It took me about 3 hours to ride 12-15 miles climbing about 2500 feet. It was a great ride!

July 10-14, Wednesday-Sunday, 2002

Labels: family, moto, mountain bike, trips

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Posted: 7/14/2002 07:49:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Had our 3rd baby doctor's appointment today and got to hear the heart beat for the first time. Tricia is now 13 weeks and 5 days pregnant and finally starting to lose the nausia, but still feeling really tired and light headed.

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Posted: 6/25/2002 05:37:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

My Mom, Cathi and Aunt Mary went on an Ensanada Cruise that made a one-day stop at Catalina Island. So I went there for the day to hang out with them as well as Toni, Kevin and Karly. It was such a beautiful day and a lot of fun to hang with the family. I wasn't feeling that great because I really didn't sleep last night, but we still had fun. We rented golf carts to drive around the island and check out the scenery. It's been about 10 years since I've been there and they really cleaned up the place.

Later on, Tricia and I watched Three Kings, a DVD I borrowed from Trevor. It was a pretty good story, but depressing as hell. Tricia couldn't finish it, but I kinda liked it.

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Posted: 6/04/2002 11:48:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Went to Jordan's basketball game and got to hang out with my Aunt Mary. She's here to visit and go on a Mexican cruise with my Mom and Cathi. After Jordan's game everyone came over to watch the Laker game. The Laker's won, but unfortunately, I didn't get to spend much time with Aunt Mary. I'll see her again on Tuesday.

Still fighting a cold.

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Posted: 6/02/2002 06:51:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Tricia and I were supposed to go on a date, but I came down with a cold. So we ordered take out from Olive Garden, watched our When Harry Met Sally DVD, and watched the Laker game in picture-in-picture.

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Posted: 5/31/2002 07:00:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Tricia and I went to our second baby doctor appointment. Dr. Gonzales clarified that she's 9 weeks and 5 days pregnant, and switched our due date to December 26th. She gave us another ultrasound, so, presenting for the first time to the Internet,....

BABY GUIDO

I was so cool to see the heart beat and see the baby move around. It really hit
home for me. Dude, the little bean was actually moving around!! How cool is that?

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Posted: 5/28/2002 04:02:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Tricia and I just took it easy all day. We watched American Pie, one of the first DVDs we bought, but never got to watch. Later, I washed my truck.

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Posted: 5/27/2002 10:04:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Took Ryann and a friend to Disneyland for her birthday. She's actually big enough to go on a lot of the rides now. So we did, except that 4 main rides were closed for repairs. They should lower the price when they do that.

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Posted: 5/18/2002 07:32:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Found out my sister Toni is pregnant as well!! I tell ya, there's definitely something in the water.

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Posted: 5/07/2002 07:43:00 AM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Took Jordan to Magic Mountain for his birthday. We had a great time, even though we waited 4 hours for the new "X" ride! In a way, it was totally worth it. I can't even explain in writting how incredible this coaster is. You have to experience it for yourself. But I highly recommend paying the extra 15 bucks to get the fast-track thing... just for this ride.

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Posted: 5/04/2002 07:49:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Ian found this Chinese Lunar Calendar that tells you what sex your baby is going to be. It's supposedly 99% accurate, and says that we're going to have a girl. Just kill me now, please.
Add rest of post here

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Posted: 5/02/2002 07:57:00 AM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Went to our first Doctor's appointment. We found a new Doctor, Dr. Gonzalez of Los Alamitos, and interviewed her. She's a little too new, but we like her a lot. She did an ultrasound, confirmed that we're pregnant and gave us a due date of December 22 (my Mom's birthday). Tricia hasn't felt anything in the last day or two so she thought that the two home pregnancy tests she took were faulty because they came in the same box.

Rode the Luge again in Whiting Ranch. It was a little easier this time.

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Posted: 5/01/2002 07:59:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Found out today that my nephew Jordan, who is 10 years old and in 5th grade, just
passed a highschool math exit exam! Not only is he the first 5th grader in 23 years to do this, but he actually got a 100%. What a great kid!

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Posted: 4/23/2002 08:06:00 AM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Tricia took the test today and it was positive! Although we were trying for this, it's still quite surprising. She gave me the news by giving me a wrapped book titled, The Expectant Father. It took a couple of seconds for it to hit me, but I finally figured it out. I couldn't be any happier.

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Posted: 4/22/2002 08:08:00 AM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Watched Jordan play basketball with his new team. This is a different league where there are much better players. This game was so intense. They ended up winning by one point with a last second buzzer shot. Great game.

Being the handyman that I am, I single-handedly changed our garbage disposal. Yep! That's right... all by myself. Next I think I'll tear down a wall or something.

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Posted: 4/21/2002 08:09:00 AM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Play D-Golf at La Mirada with the boys.

Went for a little hike in Silverado Canyon with Tricia. We've been trying to find fun, out-doorsy things to do together. So far it's hiking, camping and tennis.

We later watched Snatch, a DVD I bought used at Blockbuster for cheap. Very funny movie! Especially when the dog swallows the squeaky toy... That's just too much!

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Posted: 4/14/2002 08:16:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Had a neighborhood yard sale over at the Keene's, to which nobody showed up. We only made about 120 bucks. I think the only productive thing that happened that day was that I tought Marlene's brother how to juggle.

We then took Ryann to Magicopolis in Santa Monica. Tricia got free tickets from work so we couldn't pass it up (I did a lot of free stuff this weekend!). It was fun! Ryann got to go up on stage with the magician, she was so cute up there. We also got to see some good breakdancers on 3rd Street Prominade. I'm surprised they're still doing it, but they got some really cool moves now.

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Posted: 4/13/2002 08:19:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Today is Michelle's birthday, and we all met at Fred's in Huntinton Beach. After that we went to Mr. K's to enjoy some entertaining karaoke, which Tricia and I were just observers. It was fun.

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Posted: 3/29/2002 10:51:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Today is my birthday... whoopee.

Tricia got a bunch of my friends together and we met at the Yard House in Costa Mesa. I really don't like birthdays, but Tricia always seems to make them worthwhile. It was great to hang out with everyone.

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Posted: 3/27/2002 10:47:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Went to Jordan's final basketball game of the season, and he kicked butt as usual. Oh, he only scored 25 points this game. The kid is simply amazing!

T and I later watched High Fidelity. This has to be Jack Black's best performance (besides on stage). Great movie.

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Posted: 3/10/2002 07:51:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

For our honeymoon, we went on a 7-day Mexican Riviera Cruise for four reasons:

• It was free!


• We didn't want to drive or fly anywhere; the port is 20 minutes from out house, so it was nice and simple.


• Neither of us have been on a cruise before.


• And it was free!

Tricia managed to get the whole thing with her American Express points from work related purchases. So we would like to thank Wellspring Solutions (formally Object Automation) and Linfinity for indirectly paying for our cruise.

We'd also like to thank Debi and Ian for pitching in points as their wedding gifts. They were great gifts!

Oh yeah, the honeymoon... The cruise was at sea for three days going all the way down to Puerto Vallarta, where we went horseback riding and saw a Mexican bullfight. The next day we stopped in Mazatlan where we hiked to the top of Dear Island and kiyacked half-way around the island. And the third day we snorkled in Cabo San Lucas. Besides that, we slept.... A LOT!

Pictures of the honeymoon are here.

January 6-13, 2002, 1 Week

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Posted: 1/13/2002 08:31:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Today is the big day... The queen-mother of all days... Our wedding day!

I slept Ok last night. I fell asleep pretty easily because I was so damned tired, but I woke up around 5:00 am ready to go. I was wide awake, but eventually fell back to sleep for a couple more hours.

Alan went with me to pick up the Viper. The Viper has been my favorite car for a long time and this is pretty much the only thing I wanted for my wedding. I will probably never own one, so I felt I should at least treat myself for one day and rent one. I can't even begin to explain how awesome it was to drive this thing. The only bad thing about it was that it was a little too heavy in the front, which made the back kick out if you weren't careful. But besides that, I had so much fun driving it. I planned on getting at least 2 speeding tickets today, but was pretty lucky to get none. Actually, I was extremely lucky because I was driving very, very fast.

I took my Dad with me in the Viper to get to the chapel. He kept asking questions about the car or whatever else and it was kind of getting to me. So, finally, I calmly said, "Dad, I know you want to chat, but I have A LOT on my mind." And he was quiet the rest of the ride. He actually only told me I was driving too fast one time, and I know that was hard for him to keep in.

I showed up with my Dad at the Wayfarer's at 3:00 to take pictures. Everyone was pretty much on time. We put on our boutonnieres and began. Our photographer, Brian Glenn, arranged a special "first viewing" for Tricia and I and got some really good shots. It was a little difficult to get everyone else arranged for pictures, but I think he got most of them taken.

I met with Reverend Bruglher, who flew in from Canada to perform a few ceremonies. He is the president of the congregation, so I guess it was a privilege to have him marry us. I felt kind of honored, but I couldn't get past his sandals, the butterflies on his robe, the earring and the fact that he talked like Barney the dinasour. Other than that, he was an extremely nice guy.

The ceremony started a little after 4:00 and it was simply beautiful. The groomsmen and I came in through the back after everyone was seated and it was nice to see all the faces in the crowd. The girls walked up the aisle one-by-one, then there was Tricia with her Dad. It was so incredible to see her walk up the aisle, she was so beatiful. I shook Jerry's hand, took Tricia in my arm, and began the ceremony. It only lasted about 20 minutes, but it felt like about 5. It was quick, but beatiful.

After that, we took more pictures with the sunset, shoved Tricia and her huge dress into the Viper and took off to the reception.

The reception was at The Madison Restaurant in downtown Long Beach. Tricia managed to get the whole restaurant on a Saturday night through her friend Ashlee who manages all the parties there. Out of all the people we hired for the wedding, Ashlee was one who went way above and beyond what we paid her for. The Chapel was incredibly beautiful, but I think the reception was what really impressed everyone. She wanted this reception to be so perfect, she even made the restaurant buy new plates for us. The restaurant is impressive by itself, but the service and food are to die for. I realize that people are supposed to compliment you on this and that, but everyone, and I mean everyone, raved about the whole thing. I'm talking about older people saying that it was the most elegant wedding they've ever been to and brides-to-be sweating about how they're going to top this one. Even Jeni, the maid-of-honor, said that she doesn't care what Tricia thinks, she's copying our wedding exactly!

Pictures of the wedding are here.

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Posted: 1/05/2002 08:36:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Beth went with me to pick up Dad at LAX. It was really good to see him. Since he had a direct flight from Florida, he had a cigarette and lighter in his hand ready to go. We took him to get fitted for his tux.

We had our rehearsal dinner at the Keene's. This is the first time our entire families
are going to be together, so we wanted to create an environment to get well acquainted. We decided to have an Italian theme since that's what both of our families have in common. We had two large tables, with the red and white checkered table cloths, red glass candles, and Emily's famous lasagna with sausage and meat balls. It turned out so good, we had a blast.

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Posted: 1/04/2002 11:40:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Well, things are starting to get a little bumpy. Debi and her family are snowed in somewhere in North Carolina. Beth was supposed to meet them in a different city, fly in together and drive together in a rental. No Debi, no ride for Beth. So after our rehearsal tonight at The Wayfarer's, I had to go to LAX to pick her up.

Ellen also got delayed and didn't arrive until around midnight. So instead of driving all the way to Toni's so they can drive all the way back the next day, they just stayed one extra night at The Renaissance in Long Beach.

The rehearsal went pretty well. I think this whole marriage thing finally hit me when I was standing up at the alter with Tricia. Although we were just practicing, it suddenly occurred to me that it's really happening. I started to get a little nervous.

Alan went with me to pick up Beth. She was surprised because she didn't know who, if anybody, was going to pick her up. Since her regular flight got delayed, she got bumped into first class. She was very happy when she arrived.

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Posted: 1/03/2002 08:43:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Happy New Year!

4 days and counting to our wedding. Today we are basically tying up any loose ends. The planning is going very well, so the wedding should be pretty smooth... We'll see.

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Posted: 1/01/2002 08:46:00 AM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

We had a pretty mellow New Years Eve this year. Last year we threw a party at my Huntington Beach apartment that was pretty fun. This year we had Ryann and way too many things to worry about with the wedding coming up in 5 days. So we went over to the Keene's with some other friends and played poker till about 2 in the morning. Overall, Tricia and I lost about 20 bucks, but it was fun nonetheless.

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Posted: 1/01/2002 08:16:00 AM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

We actually woke up before Ryann this morning, mainly because the Keenes were coming over at 7:00am to watch her open gifts. We totally fixed up the place to make it look like Santa was here. The cookies & milk, the gate for the fire place was moved... She was totally convinced. It was pretty cool.

We spent the rest of the day at the Keenes, playing games and just hanging out. Oh, and I finally got to wash my truck. It's been a while.

We had a pretty humble, but awesome Christmas this year. Humble because we're having a very expensive wedding in about 10 days. But it was great nonetheless.

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Posted: 12/25/2001 08:21:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

We spent Christmas Eve at Cathi's in Victorville. We drove up last night right in time for dinner, and ended up opening all our gifts that evening. There were a few more this morning from Santa for Jordan.

I then went for a nice little jog with Jordan through this area that I usually ride my dirtbike. It was a little cross-country-like, up and down hills... He kept up with me pretty good. In a few more years, I'm going to have trouble keeping up with him.

My family helped us assemble the wedding favors and they turned out really cool. I just have to say that they are very unique, and most importantly, Tricia is very happy with them.

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Posted: 12/24/2001 08:23:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Today is the day that Tricia officially freaked out about the wedding. She called frantically, huffing and puffing about all the stuff we have to do with only TWO WEEKS LEFT!!! She's been pretty solid, and everyone warned me that this was coming. It was pretty funny. So I sat her down and made her a nice and organized to-do list for the following two weeks. She's breathing regularly now.

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Posted: 12/20/2001 08:26:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

We bought our christmas tree today, but we couldn't decorate it because our lights were broken... plus we really weren't in the decorating mode.

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Posted: 12/04/2001 08:52:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Got out the Christmas decorations today. Usually that would be no big deal, but let me tell you about Tricia and her Christmas decorations. When I moved in with her I organized all of her holiday decorations in storage boxes and the Christmas stuff alone took up a nice-sized portion of the garage. Now, the garage is kinda far away from the condo itself, so I had to actually load up my truck, which has a long bed, and it was basically a FULL load. That's my Tricia!

She decorated the place while we both cleaned up and everything actually looks really nice. We'll probably go get a tree next weekend.

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Posted: 11/25/2001 08:08:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

I wanted to meet Tricia at home around noon, but it was raining so hard I had to wait until about 1:30 to hit the road. By the time I got to LA, the freeway was so packed it took me forever to get home. Tricia and I just lounged around the rest of the day. Ryann was with her dad, so we ended up falling asleep around 8:30. I woke up an hour later, but Tricia slept the whole night till about 9:30 the next morning... Which is VERY strange because sleeping in to her usually means an extra half-hour or so.

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Posted: 11/24/2001 08:10:00 AM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Today is Thanksgiving. Tricia left with her family to Arizona at 3:00 am this morning, and I took off to Toni's house in Oxnard around 7:30am.

Thanksgiving dinner was great! Kevin cooked a big fat turkey with some ham and all the goodies. He is such a good cook.

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Posted: 11/22/2001 08:14:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Both Tricia and I are starting to feel a little sick, so we ordered some Olive Garden to go, and ate in bed with a bottle of wine. It was nice.

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Posted: 11/21/2001 08:16:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Took a day off from work today to hang out with my Dad some more. We didn't do much... Went walking around downtown Huntington Beach in the afternoon. Today was a beautiful day, I must say.

We then met up with Tricia's family at a restaurant to watch Monday Night Football. That was the first time they met, so it was cool.

After that, I drove him to Scandia in Ontario to meet my sister Cathy (which is about half-way to Victorville). Hung out with them for a little while, playing video games with Jordan, then took off.

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Posted: 11/19/2001 08:17:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Today Tricia and I took my Dad to the Orange County Swap Meet. It's pretty cool there. We found a little something we might use for the wedding favors.

We then went over to The Block and saw Heist with Danny DeVito and Gene Hackman. I thought it was pretty damn good. Great acting by DeVito, I like that guy.

Tenacious D was on Space Ghost tonight. It was great!

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Posted: 11/18/2001 08:19:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Tricia and I met with one of the ministers at The Wayfarers Chapel to talk about our ceremony. He said we're getting married by the head honcho himself, the president of the congregation who will be in town from Canada. I guess that's a pretty big deal.

Picked my Dad up from LAX today. He's in town from Florida for Thanksgiving and to look around because he might be moving here in a year or two. So I need to get busy and do some research.

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Posted: 11/17/2001 08:24:00 AM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Tonight Tricia and I had a little sit-down talk with her family about the wedding. Turns out Tricia isn't having much fun. In fact, everyone is pretty much stressing her out. When her and I have to do something for the wedding, we make sure we're having fun while we're doing it. But with everyone else, my family included, there's always an issue of money, time or inconvenience. And everyone has been complaining to Tricia about it and we finally had enough. We got everything straightened out and got a lot of crap off our chests. Now let's have some fun damnit!!!

Afterwards, I did homework with Ryann for the first time. You wouldn't think that drawing the letter "d" would be so complicated until you try it with a kindergardener.

I've had a pretty stressful evening. I'm gonna kick back, relax, and watch Space Ghost on Adult Swim. I don't watch much TV, but I think that's my favorite show right now.

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Posted: 11/15/2001 08:29:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Today we knocked off a couple more things off our wedding to-do list. The first thing is my dad's plane ticket to come out here. It was pretty tough because he can't stay that long and it's right after the holidays. But I got a pretty good deal on it.

And a huge item from our list is the honeymoon! We're going on a 7-day Mexican Riviera cruise... and Tricia managed to get the whole thing for free!!! She's been collecting American Express points for the last few years and ended up with about 225,000. No, she didn't buy $225,000 worth of stuff, this is from the companies she's work for and the stuff they bought on her card. Cool huh?

The cruise is 250,000 points, so Ian gave us 10,000 and Debi gave us 15,000 as their wedding gifts. These are such great gifts. Thank you so much!

Now, the actual transfering of points is a whole different story. It turns out that AMEX doesn't allow the transfering of points. Why not? Who in the hell knows? With any other program like this, you can transfer points till you're blue in the face. Any ways, Tricia convinced them to make an exception because it's our honeymoon (and because she's spent a butt-load of cash with this card). So, they eventually made the exception and allowed us to transfer points.

We leave at four o'clock the day after our wedding.

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Posted: 11/13/2001 08:32:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Today was our wedding shower, or uh, Tricia's wedding shower. I guess it's more of a chic thing. Anyhow, we got some really cool stuff. Now I can start bugging Tricia every day to write the Thank You cards like she did with the invitations. Ha ha ha... sweet revenge!

During the shower I watched Ryann with all the other guys and their kids. We went over to Mike Dyson's, hung out and watched some college ball. Poor Ryann was bored out of her mind, so I started to make up games with the drink coasters.

Toni, Cathi, my Mom and Julie all stayed the night at our place, so it had to be *spotless*. I watched Memento for the third time with them. I think that is a great movie! Probably my favorite movie of the year.

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Posted: 11/10/2001 08:34:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Took Ryann to Chuck E. Cheese's tonight because she got 10 "blue days" in a row. She's in kindergarten and they give the kids blue days if they are good. Let's just hope she never gets a red day.

Of course, on my way over there, I run out of gas. What an idiot. I thought I knew my gas gauge well enough to run it low. I guess not. AAA saved my ass in less than a half-hour. I've been with them for 11 years, it's about time I use them. I think I ran out of gas maybe once before.

I can't believe gas prices are back down to $1.15 per gallon. That is so awesome! It's only awesome because my friggin truck gets only 12 miles per gallon. It really sucked a couple months ago when it was around $1.80.

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Posted: 11/06/2001 08:37:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Mailed out the invitations this morning, so keep an eye on your mailboxes and let me know what you think.

Finally finished unpacking our bedroom. Yes, I moved in a month ago, and yes I'm still unpacking. Between designing the wedding invitations and working on the Surrex web site, I've had absolutely no time to finish unpacking. So, now I'm done... except for the pictures I have to hang... Damn! I have to get this done before this weekend when my sisters come over for the wedding shower. We also have to clean. It it VERY important that the house is spotless when my sisters come over. They are very meticulous when it comes to cleanliness... but I love them any ways.

Tonight I also taught Ryann about animation with a flip-book I made with extra paper from the invitations. I drew the stick (for the body) and she drew the head, arms and legs. I started each page, moving the stick over a little on each page. After she drew in all the body parts, we had a very cool animation of a stick figure dancing across the page. It is so awesome! Tricia got a big kick out of it.

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Posted: 11/05/2001 08:39:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Finished the wedding invitations today... F I N A L L Y ! !

This project has been so stressful for me, I'm not really sure why. I guess it's from the pressure of designing something for my own wedding. I was going to just buy them, but I had a feeling that everyone just expected me to do them myself. So I basically had no choice.

I think they turned out pretty cool, but I'm usually pretty critical about my own designs. They will be mailed out Monday morning, which is only 5 days late. Not too shabby!

A big "Thanks" goes out to Tricia, Emily, Marlene & Mitchell for helping me put them together. And I just have to say that Marlene is the fastest envelope-licker I've ever seen in my life.

Tricia and I treated ourselves to a movie for working so hard. We saw From Hell with Johnny Depp and the lovely Heather Graham. It was pretty good but a little slow, which made it a little hard to follow. Plus I was just exhausted to really enjoy it. It was, however, a nice treat away from today's typical movies crammed with special effects.

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Posted: 11/03/2001 08:44:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

We took Ryann out trick-or-treat'n in her Grandma's neighborhood, and I was shocked to see how few kids were out. I understand how some parents might be paranoid because of recent terrorist attacks and what not, but it was down right ghost-townish. We then took her to her school's Harvest Festival and it was packed with kids. She had fun and I got to snatch some of her candy.

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Posted: 10/31/2001 09:45:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Met my sisters at Universal Citiwalk today to talk about my Grandma. We ate at Buca De Beppo and walked around for a while.

Then Tricia, Ryann and I made the drive to the Chapel and the restaurant to test out the maps and directions I made for the invitation. They turned out pretty good. You guys shouldn't have any problems finding the place.

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Posted: 10/29/2001 09:47:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Went to see this DJ that Ashlee recommended. He does most of The Madison's parties. He seemed pretty cool and is giving us a sweet-ass deal... I mean really sweet, because we're friends of Ashlee's. But we still have to see him in action.

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Posted: 10/29/2001 09:46:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Worked on the wedding invitations tonight. I think they are going to turn out pretty cool, but this has to be the last print design job I do. I'm so tired of print design work. I enjoy digital design so much more.

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Posted: 10/26/2001 09:50:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

My Grandma Hartman passed on this morning. She was 91 and a great woman. The last time I saw her was when I went back to visit Cleveland in January 2001. I got to spend some time with her, my Aunt Mary and Uncle Tom. It was a great visit and a great last memory. My sisters and I were going to try and go back to Cleveland for the ceremony, but I don't think we're going to make it. We're going to have a ceremony here when my mom gets back in town.

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Posted: 10/23/2001 09:53:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Slept in today... I love to sleep in.

Tricia and I played a little tennis this morning. Then Ian and I took our women out on a special bike ride around Huntington Beach for Sweetest Day (Heather insists that we celebrate this lame-ass east coast holiday). I say it's a special bike ride because Ian and I are the ones that do all the pedaling. He has a tandum bike and the Rasticle, a red, black and green beach cruiser with an extra back seat on it... very cool. We had wine around sunset, ate sushi at a new place on Main Street, then went home and watched O Brother Where Art Thou. The movie was pretty good but the sound track was great. I just might go buy it.

Labels: family, movies, sports

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Posted: 10/20/2001 09:54:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Had another doctors appointment to check out the cut on my leg. It's all good. Still can't get it wet for another 5 days.

Feeling a little under-the-weather today, so I stayed home from work. I still got some work done, and I was able to finish this "what's new" page. Everything before today is from memory or from my calendar.

Tricia insisted that we watch HeartBreakers. I guess it was better than I thought it would be.

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Posted: 10/19/2001 09:56:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Started working on our wedding invitations tonight. I've been putting it off for weeks, but I now have a pretty good idea of how they should look. Got to get them done by November 1st... Yikes!

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Posted: 10/17/2001 10:01:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Finished moving my crap into Tricia's. Even after our huge yard sale, I have so much shit. I have no idea what I'm going to do with it all. Thank you Mitchell, Chris and Ian for helping me move. You can borrow my back and my truck any time.

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Posted: 9/30/2001 03:13:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Tricia and I drove up to Ventura for Karly's first birthday. She's getting so big.

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Posted: 9/22/2001 03:15:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Alright, I moved more stuff into Tricia's, including my clothes. So, uh, I guess this means I'm actually moved in.

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Posted: 9/16/2001 03:16:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Had a very successful yard sale today. Those of you who didn't make it missed some KILLER deals. We made about 500 bucks and are putting it towards a new dish washer in Tricia's place. We are both very excited about not having to do dishes.

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Posted: 9/15/2001 03:17:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

I started moving some stuff into Tricia's. I can't believe I'm doing this... I've never cohabitated with another female before.

Yes, that's right... We're going to live in sin for a couple of months.

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Posted: 9/09/2001 03:19:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

The wedding planning is going great. Today we chose Brian Glenn as our photographer, and went to the chapel for our planning conference, which included picking out our music.

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Posted: 9/08/2001 03:20:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Today we checked out The Madison Restaurant in downtown Long Beach. Wow, what an amazing restaurant. Tricia knows the director of banquets there, so we're getting a killer deal on the whole restaurant for our reception.

So, only after a few weeks of being engaged, we already have the locations for the ceremony & reception, the dress bought and a good idea on the photographer. My baby doesn't mess around.

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Posted: 8/31/2001 03:21:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

We went down to the Wayfarer's Chapel in Rancho Palos Verdes. This is definitely the place we are getting married. The chapel is simply incredible... Not to mention it has witnessed the marriages of the likes of Mash's Gary Burghoff (Radar), actress Jayne Mansfield, actor Dennis Hopper and the Beach Boy's Brian Wilson. Plus it's been in movies such as Innerspace.

I also found out that the chapel was designed by John Lloyd Wright (Frank Lloyd Wright's son), who also happen's to be the designer of Lincoln Logs.

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Posted: 8/18/2001 03:25:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment

Well, people... I finally did it. I proposed to Tricia tonight and she actually said 'Yes'. I've never been so excited about anything like I am with this. We haven't set a date, but we're thinking soon.

The proposal went down like this. I've been researching and looking for the perfect diamond and ring style for months. I finally went to buy it and have it made last Tuesday and it was going to take about a week. I didn't know exactly where and how I wanted to ask her, I just knew she would want it to be private. So around Thursday, she started planning out our day for Saturday, which was strange because she always makes me make the decisions on what to do. She wanted to play tennis in the morning (that's about the extend of her exercises), go to Downtown Disney for a while, and have a bon fire on the beach. Friday morning I get a call from the Jeweler saying the ring is ready. I think "perfect", I'll ask her on the beach Saturday night. So Friday night I ask the parents for their blessing, and we did everything as planned on Saturday.

The beach ended up to be too crowded to have a bon fire, so we picked a big empty spot, laid down a blanket and chairs, and watched the sunset. We had chips & salsa and some red wine to loosen up. When it got dark I pulled out the ring box, which just so happened to light up when you open it, got on my knee and asked her. She started balling her eyes out and eventually said "yes". Overall, it was pretty cool.

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Posted: 8/11/2001 11:30:00 PM | Comments (0) | Post a Comment