Finally home for a few days

I just got back from Ottawa around lunch time today. It has been a long few weeks so it is nice to be home right now. Do not get me wrong - the weeks were long but were enjoyable. Switzerland was a great time - 8 days of enjoying small Swiss towns and then exploring the old part of Zurich. We were also treated with great hospitality by people at the hotels and Laura's colleagues. As I mentioned last time we went to an old Abbey church which was followed by a great meal at a nice Italian restaurant - some great pizza, pasta and wine. Thanks to Monika and Bernd for a great treat on our first day in Switzerland.

The rest of the first few days I spent exploring Rapperswil-Jona and doing some running to Ruti. Between doing a little shopping, exploring the castle and the old parts of the town (along with the occasional long lunch with a nice cold Carlsberg) and taking lots of pictures -  my days were full. Thursday we had what was probably the most delicious meal I have ever had in a restaurant, and it was at the hotel's restaurant overlooking Lake Zurich.

Monika and Bernd continued their hospitality Friday night when we went to Zurich for dinner. We met Andreas, another colleague of Laura's, at a wonderful old restaurant called Kaiser’s Reblaube. The upper room was once occupied by Goethe. We ate a wonderful meal in the lower dining room - very traditional with good wine and great conversation.


Saturday we hopped on the train and headed to our hotel for the weekend in Zurich. The train followed the lakeshore from Rapperswl to Zurich. A quick walk from the train station and we were in the center of old town Zurich and at our hotel. We knew we were in Switzerland when we looked across the cobblestoned street and saw the blue cow on the balcony. Saturday we did a little shopping, did some sightseeing in the old churches and of course found a great place for lunch and a nice little Italian place for dinner, It now appears to us that wherever we go we find ourselves eating pizza the first night we are there (true for Victoria, Seattle, Seaside Florida, Rapperswil and Zurich). We continued our sightseeing Sunday, visiting the Grossmunster church (climbing the 186 VERY narrow tower stairs to get the pic on the left), the Art Gallery for a Seurat exhibit, and of course exploring more of old town. Lunch today was a picnic lunch with a nice bottle of Amarone on the Lindenhof Plaza that overlooked the Limmat River. My lunch choice - Roast Beef with mustard and dark chocolate - all in the same sandwich!


Sunday evening was my turn to treat Laura to dinner and I wanted it to be special so I had reserved a table at the Kronenhalle. The Kronenhalle is one of the most famous restaurants in not only Zurich but all of Switzerland and our impression was it was deserved. From the moment you walk in you see the history - not just in the building and the fact that the restaurant has been there for almost 150 years but the artwork that is hung on the walls. It is things that you would see in a good American restaurant where they would hang prints of Matisse or Picasso except at the Kronenhalle they are Matisse and Picasso paintings. One painting in the entryway is valued at over CHF 2 Million (that is 2 million Swiss francs - about 2 million dollars). The food and wine matched the impression as did the service from a full staff. It was a meal to remember. However we did not stop there but stopped at the Terrace Restaurant on the bank of the Limmat for dessert. It was a night that made it hard to leave Zurich because one had to wonder what we had missed and in a city so beautiful you could miss things and not know. Hopefully we will be back in Zurich some day again.


For now - I am happy to be home :-)


.... cu

A long weekend ....

Well it was a long weekend from an activity perspective if not from a federal holiday perspective.

I took the red-eye back from San Francisco on Wednesday night. It was a good couple of days in the Bay area with meetings etc... I did get to do some walking in San Fran before we caught the late plane and did manage to snap a couple of shots on my phone. On the right is a view of San Fran Bay from Polk St looking out towards Alcatraz. On the left below is the first Tesla roadster I have ever seen. It looks pretty slick for an electric car. Not sure that you can see the plate - ZZROGAS.

After getting back from San Fran I had to get ready for the Marine Corps Marathon 10K and pack for Switzerland. The 10K was Sunday AM - starting at 8:05 so it was an early morning making sure I had all my stuff for the race. I got to DC nice and early had just under an hour before the start. The start was pretty dramatic - how could it not be when the starting "pistol" was a howitzer. The race itself was good - ran comfortably - the slopes were nice. I do not wear a watch so I had to rely on the Marines shouting out times at each mile marker. At the finish I felt I did ok for me - first race since April and first since the bike accident. Turns out I finished in just under 51 minutes which placed me 603rd out of 5385 runners. Not too bad for an old guy I guess.

After the race I took the girls out for dinner, finished packing and then we grabbed a cab for the airport. The  flight to Zurich was good but I did not sleep much, neither did Laura. We arrived in Zurich and took a train to Jona and a short cab ride to our hotel. Laura went off to work and I went walking around. I visited nearby Rapperswill and the castle there. After work one of Laura's colleagues wanted to take us out - we were beat but figured we did not have many opportunities like this. We were ever so grateful, for a great meal and a trip to a nearby abbey church, Einsiedeln, which was absolutely stunning. We could not take pictures there but suffice to say it was awe inspiring. This morning I went for a run and Laura went off to work. Before she left she took a quick picture of the view from our room - may qualify as stunning as well.

OK - off for more sight seeing, walking and some lunch. I will post more pics later.

..... cu

Back from one trip ....

... and onto another.

Well I guess technically I was back from two trips and I literally am on the plane for my next. October and November are turning into travel month. Florida, Texas, California, Switzerland, Ottawa, Ottawa again and then Tennessee - all in a matter of 6 weeks.

That being said I am not complaining, especially after last weeks initial trip. Grant it I did have to leave earlier than planned due to having to get to Dallas for meetings but I did have a fun few days. Laura's sister, Lisa, has vacationed twice a year for the last 7 or 8 years in a little place called Seaside which is on the Florida panhandle. As you can guess it is on the Gulf and quiet nice. Large beautiful homes and white beaches. This trip she invited Laura and I and Laura's younger sister, Leslie, and her family came in from Australia as well as Laura's mom, from Texas, also were in Seaside. (Pic on the left is Laura's Mom, Lisa, Laura and Leslie) Lisa's daughters were coming in a few days after we left so we did not get to see them this time but we will on Thanksgiving.

The trip was great. Lisa had a wonderful little house with a great kitchen just a short walk from the beach and from some great little shops that included the requisite coffee shop. The shops had galleries along with your regular clothing and jewelery and beach wear stuff. In some cases the art was on display in wonderfully manicured gardens.

We did take great advantage of the beach. Not excessive but every day for a couple of hours of walking, swimming or playing with the kids, who were a whole lot of fun. Gracie, quite the little cutie, loved to play in the sand and the water, and would always want to involve her mom who is on her way to number 3 (woo hoo!). Daniel, Gracie's big brother, loved to get in the water, whether swimming or body surfing or just playing in the waves - he would stay in there forever but we did find time to play on the beach with some airplanes we got for them.

In the evenings we would try to catch the sunset from the beach but a little cloud cover in the evenings kept the sunsets elusive for us, so instead we enjoyed the glass of wine on the beach and then a great meal. It was hard leaving Seaside. Not only was the few days off fun but the company was great and the wine and food matched. I look forward to Thanksgiving in Nashville to see most of the Bell family again.

So for now I am off to San Francisco for a couple of days then back to race Sunday before I fly off to Zurich Sunday evening. What a busy few weeks - but worth every second.

.... cu

Virginia Nature

Myself and the girls decided to take a hike on Sunday. I guess that sounds worse than it was. And in reality it was myself and Tika deciding to take a hike, Kris agreeing and Sam reluctantly coming along. Sam of course would much rather go do something sporty - mini golf or any thing like that.

We did not have a lot of time since we had a late lunch and there was a College Fair at SBHS that Tika wanted me to go to with her. So we decided we would drive to River Bend and hike down to Great Falls. It was a great afternoon for it - not too hot but Sunny, well at least on the way down to GF. It clouded over quickly on the way back and we got a few sprinkles on us - but I think that was mostly because Sam was teasing the rain gods. We did not see a lot of wildlife this time but we did find out that the lizard that has been living in my backyard is a five lined skink.

We did see some other wildlife - but that was a bunch of kayakers in the Potomac, some trying to learn to do eskimo rolls. We also got a kick out of the C&O canal which looked more like the source of the Nickelodeon Slime.

Of course I do not need to walk far to see wildlife. On my way over to get coffee one day I saw something in the waterfalls next to my place. I took a closer look and saw a small turtle zip off. I stayed still for a bit and he stuck his head up and I grabbed a quick pic with my cell phone.

Now all I need to do is to get pics of the skink and the bunny that has started to inhabit my backyard.

... cu

Good News on the work front ....

Well - not on my side but on Laura's side.

Laura has spent the last few years working on a test for detecting the Human Papillomavirus. This is not any old test but is one that is designed to address the needs in less developed countries. She has told me stories of doctors literally parachuting and kayaking in to villages in Africa to treat women. Well this test is designed to be portable, not require advanced training to operate, provide rapid results and to allow detection and treatment. To give you an idea of the operational ease, in a trial in rural China, all the women in the village were screened and tested by one of the farmer's daughters after she was taught to use the test. The goal is to reduce the cases of cervical cancer in women in these countries where prevention, detection and treatment is a rarity. An article, earlier this year, in the New England Journal of Medicine expected that the use of this test would cut cervical cancer deaths, often the leading cause of death, in half in the developing world saving hundreds of thousands of women a year.

The work is hard but some days she gets to see the rewards and last week had one of those days. PATH, www.path.org, is an organization that Laura works with. Her program has some funding through the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and if all goes as planned will be the first product that becomes available based on funding from the foundation. Last week the Gates wanted to see the test in action so PATH demonstrated the test to them in Seattle. As you can imagine this was a big thing for Laura and her team - and something to be VERY proud of.

Sometimes the rewards are more personal. The women in Haiti sent Laura a carved "Tree of Life" in appreciation of the work done in Haiti where the screenings were the first ones they had ever had. It is made from steel from oil barrels that are pounded out and then carved and now hangs beautifully over the fireplace.

Today was another big day for the team as well as her company, Qiagen and Merck announced a joint initiative to provide HPV vaccines and HPV testing for the world's poorest countries. This is yet another big step in beginning to reduce the threat of cervical cancer to women in developing countries.

If you cannot already tell I think the work that she is doing is more than admirable and I know I have lots of reasons to be proud of her but this adds one more to the big bag of reasons. Congratulations Laura!

OK - I need to get back to work - I have been trying to find a few minutes to get this post out in my hectic schedule.

.... cu

Another busy couple of weeks .....

So the good news ---- the girls all like their teachers (or at least so far). Yes they are back in school. Sam loves one of her days as it is with teachers that she likes and not a lot of homework. Kris seems to be enjoying her second year of high school and yes Tika is now a senior. I have yet to meet all their teachers, some I already know, but next week I will get to meet the rest of Tika's and Kris's teachers (need to figure out how to do that in one night) and then the week after will be Sam's back to school night.

I did say it was a busy couple of weeks - all of it has been fun so no complaints. This past Saturday myself, Tika and Laura went to DC to see an exhibit of Tika's Art teacher. He was showing with another artist at Studio Gallery on R street. His work was very intriguing. The exhibit included some of his sculptures along with some paintings/prints that are based on utilizing oxidization as a basis of the process. Here is a link to the exhibit - Kirk at StudioGallery. We did make a stop on the way at the DC VegFest - some good food but quite a lot of strong voices for the vegan or vegetarian lifestyle. I am a big believer in choice but I would rather make the choice than have someone force it on me. Do not get me wrong - it was still fun and we did find a couple of new restaurants for us to try.

The weekend before all of us, Kris, Sam, Tika and Laura went to lunch at Sunflower, a vegetarian restaurant in Vienna. Tika of course loved it as did I (I think I was the only one to clean my plate). Kris and Laura enjoyed theirs and Sam - well I think she liked it but I think she would have been happier with a Five Guys burger. I did make it up to them after and we went to Cake Love so the girls could get dessert and Laura treated them to some Starbucks drinks.

OK - I better get out of here - wanted to go workout - now I have two races coming up - a 10K last Sunday in September and then the Marine Corps which is last Sunday in October.

Have fun ....... cu

All kinds of good news ....

This past week was definitely a good week.

Martika has finally gotten her braces removed and she could not be any happier. The first thing she ate was an apple. Not that she could not eat apples with her braces on BUT she did enjoy finally being able to eat an apple without slicing it up.

She still has some work to do - she gets her retainer on Wednesday and she has to make sure she uses it. Given the efforts she went through with her braces I am sure that she will have no issue in making sure to use it as needed.

The other bit of good news is that I am allowed to start running and riding again - Woo Hoo!

I went to my Neurosurgeon on Thursday and he had seen my last CAT scan report and the scan itself. He said that all of the bleeding had stopped in my brain and that the blood and scar tissues had been absorbed as they should be. He did some tests to make sure things were physically working right and asked some questions to make sure things were ok there as well. He did say I would still have some headaches, especially for a few more weeks while the orbital socket finished healing. After all of that though he said I could start running again, just cautioned me to take it easy (so only do 3 miles at a time right this week) and he also said it was ok to get back on the bike. Again with the bike he said take it easy to start. The bike will wait a bit as I need to fix the brakes on my mountain bike and the road bike still needs to be repaired from the damage from the accident. I am just happy I get to run again. Of course everyone else is happy that I got the all clear for all of the other reasons.

Well now you can start looking for race results in October :-)

.... cu