Donna Summer: 1948 - 2012

Donna Summer died today in Miami at age 63. Yes, she was the Queen of Disco, the First Lady of Love, the Voice of a Decade, all of that. She was also my sister's doppelganger, and a vehicle for Giorgio Moroder avant garde synthesized dance music.

Maybe the first time that I saw Donna Summer was 1974 when she performed "The Hostage" on the "Van Oekel's Discohoek" tv show. It's a classic. Watch as she's handed the telephone by Evert van der Pik: "Hier Donna, 't is voor jou!"

Halftime in America

It's been a month since the New York Giants won Super Bowl XLVI in Indianapolis. Just like in 2008, they beat the Patriots.

Of all Super Bowl commercials this year, the one that resonated the most was Chrysler's Halftime in America commercial. It was viewed by some as the first 2012 election ad for president Obama, even though Chrysler denied any political intentions. But Clint Eastwood's line "It's halftime in America, and the second half is about to begin" appeared to refer more to a second presidential term than to the Superbowl's second half. Obama of course saved the US car industry and made money in the process, while Republicans almost uniformly rejected the auto industry bail out.

Robots that fly ... and cooperate

I'm a big fan of TED talks. I subscribe to their podcasts and watch a few every time I travel. The variety of the talks, the creativity and originality of the ideas strikes me.

This week, TED published a talk by Vijay Kumar from the University of Pennsylvania. In his lab at Penn, Vijay Kumar and his team build flying quadrotors, small, agile robots that swarm, sense each other, and form ad hoc teams -- for construction, surveying disasters and far more.

They also produced a video of the flying robots performing the James Bond theme. Enjoy.

Einstein Bros. Bagels

When Greg or Sammy have an early morning soccer game, I usually go to a bagel place for a toasted bagel with a shmear and coffee. My favorite is this Einstein brothers store in Richardson. Set in a Spanish colonial strip mall, it's a good place sip some darn good coffee and read the morning papers.

The structure of the earth

School has started again. Sammy worked on a project to model the structure of the earth this week. We had to drive to a Walmart in Frisco to buy a styrofoam ball.  They were sold out at our local Walmart. That's what happens when  Now I know that there are four layers: crust, mantle, outer core and inner core.

Elevation 681 ft.

Dutch folks keep track of their elevation. Especially when below Normaal Amsterdams Peil - the normalized zero elevation level in Holland - we need to know.

Most floods in North Texas are caused by excessive rain. A rising sea level is less of a concern up here. Nevertheless someone placed an elevation marker at the pond down our street last month. It's good to know that we're at an elevation of 681 ft. And that Sammy's head is at least 684 ft above sea level.

Ugly Christmas Sweaters

Ever since I came to this country, I wondered why people would voluntary dress up in ugly sweaters during the holiday season. Elderly ladies would conquer the shopping malls and the workplace with blindingly extravagant designs with wildly mismatching colors.

More recently, ugly Christmas sweaters have become cool. Hip ugly Christmas sweater parties are being thrown all over the country. The parties are said to have started in 2001 in Vancouver, British Columbia. The market for ugly Christmas sweaters has picked up, leading to dedicated stores and even more stores.

New designs are created, staying faithful to the ugly sweater tradition, but touching on contemporary themes. The Occupy Wall Street movement inspired the creation of this sweater where baby Jesus is casually pepper sprayed by a police officer.

't Heerlijk Avondje

At least once a year, Greg and Sammy remember their Dutch heritage. Usually around December 5th, when 't heerlijk avondje is around the corner. They will start reciting Sinterklaas songs - well, just one actually:  Sinterklaas Kapoentje - and will be working their wish lists.

We are never sure Sinterklaas will make it across the Atlantic. But when the weather is cold, windy, and wet like today, we're hopeful that Sint will feel right at home in Texas.

Cowboy JPG

We visited the Dallas Museum of Art today to see the exhibition on Jean Paul Gaultier - from sidewalk to catwalk. The show included many of the iconic sailor boys, religious madonnas, Madonna corsets with pointed bras, Mohawk tartan punks with leather jackets, and Eiffel tower decorated catwalk wear. A pretty cool feature was that the mannequins appeared to be alive through the use of video projectors displaying faces on their white heads.

Gaultier traveled to Dallas to open to show last week. He had created two modern day cowboy outfits displayed at the show's entrance. Perhaps his next collection will be inspired by Texas and Parisians will wear stetsons, big buckled belts and ostrich leather boots.

The Tailgate Party

Andromeda FC, Sammy's soccer team, held a tailgate party at FC Dallas today. A tailgate party is a social event held on or around the open tailgate of a vehicle. They usually occur in the parking lots around sports stadiums before the game. Tailgating often involves grilling food and drinking.

After the tailgate party, the boys and girls from Andromeda were invited on the FC Dallas field to create a tunnel for the players of FC Dallas and the Vancouver Whitecaps to enter the stadium. All this was topped off by watching FC D. beat the Whitecaps by 2-0.

Mending Fences

The boys have been playing a lot of soccer in the backyard. The fence behind the goal has been hit hard, shaking loose the nails and even breaking several beams. Today we used screws and wood glue to put it together again. Hopefully it will last. With all these soccer balls flying, we may soon have to shop for a new fence.

Barcelona vs. Club America

We went to Cowboys Stadium to watch the 3rd match of Barcelona's North American tour. After losing to Man. U in DC and to Chivas in Miami, Barcelona finally recorded a win. Club America from Mexico City lost 2-0 to the Euro champs. The crowd of 65,000 were about evenly divided between the two teams. Sammy was certainly on the Barcelona side. Ina took lots of pictures of heart throb David Villa.

The shopping cart

Everything is big in Texas, even the shopping carts. The latest model shopping cart is developed by Fiat. It's an evolution of the classic 500 model, and it's slightly bigger than the more traditional hand pushed shopping carts. The Fiat 500 shopping cart can be purchased at Fiat of McKinney. Please note that Texas law requires this shopping cart to have a license tag if you want to take your cart out of the store into the parking lot. This pink Texas tag shown in the picture reads: "I ♥ BACI"

The fortune cookie

We have been waiting for over two weeks for Ina's passport to be returned in the mail. Earlier this week, we finished a dinner at a Chinese restaurant with the traditional fortune cookies. Ina's cookie read: "a small lucky package is on its way to you soon". And sure enough, today it arrived. Yay!! Just in time.

Lightning Medicine Cloud

Over 2,000 Indians from across the U.S. flocked to Lakota Ranch in Greenville, TX, near Dallas, for a big celebration. The reason for this gathering was the birth of a white buffalo which is a very rare occasion.

White buffalo are considered to be sacred signs in Indian religion. The Lakota Sioux believe that Whope, the goddess of peace, once appeared in the form of a white buffalo calf, and the belief is that the goddess will return once four such calves are born. The calf born in Greenville is the third one that has ever been born. To qualify, the calf had to be male, have a black nose, black eyes and a black tipped tail. This one had all the features.

In a ritual naming ceremony, the native Americans named the calf "Lightning Medicine Cloud", as he was born during a thunder storm. At the ceremony Arby Little Soldier, wearing elaborate beading, a feathered headdress, held a spear above his head as he rode his horse into an arena. He then thrust the spear into the dirt declaring it sacred ground. Then a small group of tribal leaders moved to the center, offered a prayer, then smoked a special pipe.

Beat the Heat

Beat the Heat! Beat the Heat! We don't watch much basketball throughout the season. March Madness passes us by. But we did watch the last quarter of the NBA Finals games this year as Dirk, Jason Terry, Jason Kidd, and JJ Barea beat the Miami Heat superstar team. Tonight they brought home the NBA title to Dallas for the first time ever.

#23

Sammy's favorite number is 23. Here's why:

23 is a odd number

23 is not an even number

David Beckham is number 23

1x23=23

15+8=23

Maine is the 23rd state

Benjermain Harrison is the 23rd president

14+9=23

23 is a comonly cited number

GCF=1

LCM=1

23 is abundant

23 is not perfect or difficent

I was born on October 23

Twenty three is divisible by 1

19+4=23

7+16=23

11+12=23

72-64=9+14=23

If 1 = $1.00, 23 would be $23.00

26-3=23

25-2=23

24-1=23

My house is 23 miles away from a mall

My house is 23 feet away from a friend

My room is 23 inches from the stairs

Half of 46 is 23

The egg hunt

Sammy and Greg had no idea that the Easter Bunny had left eggs in our yard. It was Carly who found the first egg. She was trying to hide it like her other treasures, mainly bones. But the pink egg she found set off an egg hunt that's still raging.

Sammy's animated video

Sammy had a creative moment with the HP mediasmart webcam. You can also watch this video on Sammy's facebook page.

Cupcakes

Cupcakes are taking the nation by storm. Hip cupcake shops are springing up in every city. LA gave us froyo, New York gave us cupcakes. Chains like Crumbs, Magnolia, and Buttercup Bake Shop originated in New York. Cupcakes are nostalgic, they're creatively decorated, they're bright and festive. But will they last?

For now, Greg and Sammy are enjoying their cookiemonster cupcake. Happy birthday, Jasper!