On the days that Christine and Anders are out romping, I try to head out to the Hayward Hills trail in the next canyon over. It is 3.5 miles of uphill and downhill rolling terrain. The entire trail is under a dense canopy of trees that shelters hikers even on the hottest days. The trail follows a two streams that carve out the canyon face.

What I like about the trail is that it changes every time I hike. The steep terrain makes it hard for the trees to establish a firm foothold. Any rainstorm will cause a number of weaker to trees to fall. The dense vegetation amplifies the competition for sunlight. You see trees bending their trunks, growing parallel to the ground, to work around other more established trees. Naturally, these two factors don’t work well together, and calamity ensues, big trees fall, some with trunks larger than my arms in a bear hug.

I used to run these trails when I was in better condition. Lately, I’ve been trying to slow down. Bringing my camera along with me, I had goals other than to use nature as a treadmill and spend more time in appreciation.

Peter and I took over this piano video lesson website earlier this year. This site shows video lessons of popular songs (not classical) for users of all ages to learn by ear. The emphasis of the site isn’t to properly learn piano, but to have fun and play the songs you like.

Seems like I lied.. I narrowed it down to 6 choices. Our site will have a light background, so focus on the logo examples with white/gray backgrounds.

Please put your favorite in the comments section.

EDIT: 8-16-2010

New Logo G game in last night.

Most inspirational of all was that Maria was a week away from her delivery for her second child! Both Anders and Arden had a great time and passed out immediately after they got in the car. Although we only live a couple minutes away, they were fast asleep by midway home.

Just a side note, Christine and I share the camera, so it is quite hard to determine who took what photo.  As with everything in life, she’s good at some types of shots, and I am with others.  Giving credit where credit is due.

Summer of 2010 is the happiest in my recent memory.   The kids are growing nicely and everything is stable.  Unfortunately, I had an incident of shingles, and may have permanent dark spots around my eye.. but hey, as my dad put it.  I’m married with kids.  What do I care about looks!

The next day we found our way to Descanso Gardens to enjoy the summer weather, plants, and animals.  The night ended with a solid ramen offering from Daikokuya with the best ramen egg we have had in the states.  An entire egg was offered per bowl of ramen, not the usual half-egg.  The middle of the egg was half-cooked in the perfect amber-colored glaze.

Oddly enough, the drive down and back from LA went by incredibly quick.  Maybe time does speed up as we get older.