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The view over the lake

Here’s what it looks like as you’re going over the lake. It’s truly a sight to see. The sunset was magnificent. You can also take a look at a video view of the city that I got.

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My first PHX light-rail ride

Crowd reflected on train

Originally uploaded by N-Sai

Man, I am floored about the implications of today. We’ve been waiting so long for this to happen. Finally. Saturday, December 27, was the first day the general public could board the light rail trains running through Phoenix!

I’m just waiting for things to settle down a bit so that I can ride without too many hassles. Going to have to visit in February or so just to check in and enjoy a much-quieter situation with the transit. I couldn’t really enjoy all the festivities with all the people.

We boarded at the Montebello/Christown/Spectrum stop and the wait was about 3 hours for us. The news reports of 1.5 hours seriously underestimated the wait time. The photo shown here is a picture of the train at the station with the crowd reflected in the window. Lots of people!

The ride was good and smooth and I think everyone is really jazzed. I can’t wait to see what happens.

Peach-faced lovebird sighting

Happy Holidays!

Ah, so pretty!!! Those red-and-green birds at the bottom came just for the holidays and I couldn’t be more joyful about it.

They are big in the Phoenix area for some reason. I hear you can find them in London, too. They’re a kind of parrot. I have seen them before, but they really seemed to appear at just the right time and I thought a commemorative photo would be appropos.

UPDATE: Peach-faced lovebirds

Originally uploaded by N-Sai

On the holiday itself: We had a pretty special day I guess… had a wonderful Christmas dinner at Chompies (which is technically a Jewish deli). Lots of people eat Christmas dinner there because it is so awesome. I had potato pancakes and a couscous salad. There are great bagels and fun pastries. I do enjoy that very much. It did rain a bit and there were heavy crowds at the Cine Capri theater when we went to see the Benjamin Buttons movie with Brad Pitt. I still can’t remember the full name of it. I think “The Curious Case of Benjamin Buttons.” It’s based on an F. Scott Fitzgerald concept. I really like this story, although the premise was hard for me to swallow at first. The construction could have been better but it’s so nice. Like a Fried Green Tomatoes with a touch of magic and a hint of Forrest Gump to taste.

It was a little strange to see the South in a movie and walk out again and see the desert. And then we went to Cafe Pino nearby and I snickered about potential other names for this establishment. And now I’m back.

Getting me sport on

This weekend, I did go to the Braves game vs. the Cincinnati Reds on Saturday. I made the first of many bloopers this weekend when I bought tickets for the Friday and we had to buy again for Saturday. Ooops. The next blunder was when I lost my MARTA card but we won’t get into that… anyway, I think I’ve come up with solutions to these issues.

So the Braves creamed the Reds and that was great. I thought it was unusual that people are actually allowed to do Tomahawk chops and all that. In Arizona I bet someone would complain, but in Georgia there isn’t such a large Native American population. So Braves it is. There were some pretty fired up attendees, and I shot a video of the fans up top as well as the joyous crowd out beyond us. There were actually two groups of guys that were chanting at each other in a strange sort of manly solidarity. It was pretty awesome. And another guy was geeked out in American flag pants. Hey, to each their own.

But wait, there’s more from this oh-so-sporty weekend:

• BULLET OMG: It was a big week for the Hawks, as they managed to not suck as bad as everyone thought they would. They tied the series vs. the top-seeded Celtics and gave sportswriters and angry forum commenters plenty of fodder for a couple days. I saw a good chunk of Game 6 and the Celtics were really sucking it up. Imagine if the Hawks had won Game 7… imagine all the people. It’s funny though, former Suns player Danny Ainge is a big shot over at the Celtics now (the Celtics was his former team besides the Suns). I guess in a way I don’t mind too much that they’re succeeding. I always liked Mr. Ainge and his Hat Store in the malls in Phoenix.
• Of course, as you know, the Suns got kicked by the Spurs early in the week. For a while, it looked like the Hawks were doing *better* than the Suns. I would like the Suns to get a championship someday. They’re long overdue, but alas, not this year. Not with the current setup.
• ANOTHER BULLET, HOLY HECK: My Suns fandom goes way back to even before the 1992-3 dream season, when the Suns managed to Not Suck enough to get to the NBA Finals. Back when we had Sir Charles Barkley and Kevin Johnson and Dan Majerle and Danny Ainge and I could go on and on. Even back when they were playing in Veterans Memorial Coliseum instead of America West Arena, er, U.S. Airways Center. They even had one of the most thrilling games of all time as they stuck it out with the Bulls into a third overtime. But, alas, the Suns have never had a championship. I read an interesting article that said it pretty well as the writer mused on the demise of the Suns’ “Seven Seconds or Less” era: the Suns are that team you love to love, but you have to wonder what’s happening and if the success will continue. That said, I’m no sports expert and I’ll always be a fan.

So there you go. This is the most un-female series of postings/musings that I’ve had in a while. But computers and sports are for everyone, not just the boyz.

Car fire!

I shot some pics of a car fire out by the Wal-Mart Supercenter at 51st Avenue and Indian School Road when I was out with the fam in West Phoenix last week. It was a pretty random thing. I feel like I’ve been taking a lot of pictures, what with the recent tornado incident back here in the ATL. Yeah, that tornado was an amazing feat of natural havoc.