./janella.com

well, time to write more about the hawaii trip, since i have some time on my hands.  it’s a hot one here today in sunnyvale.  i’m not sure if it’s hotter than it was at hanauma bay, but it’s pretty close.

on my first full day on oahu we went to hanauma bay.  it was a sunday and the bay was fairly crowded.  some things have chanced at the bay.  it’s five dollars to get in (the same, i think).  before being let loose on the bay you are required to watch a film about the habitat and rules about the reef.  the film is about nine minutes long.

the trek down to the bay wasn’t as long as i remember it when farrah and i went back in ‘97.  you can still snorkel in the bay, but you can’t feed the fishes any longer.  we spent sixhours at the bay.  needless to say most of us paid for it with a nice sunburn, especially me.  my whole backside and most of my frontside was sunburned.  the only one to escape this fate was farrah.  [see hanauma bayphotos]

later that same evening, we had a bbq at auntie’s house.  oysters, korean bbq, and plenty more to be eaten that night.

after the bbq we rested for more site seeing around oahu.

ugh, getting back from vacation has been rough, especially with work being a drag right now.  i’m slowly getting the vacation pictures up.  log on a take a look when you get a chance.

in order to get it all down, i’ll start writing about our vacation coinciding with each album.  for example, arriving in hawaii:

the trip over

i took off on saturday august 7, 2004 by myself.  farrah had left with yen and heidi on wednesday.  doug took me to the airport (pic above) and i was off.  the flight was straightforward with little turbulence.  i bought the lousy two dollar headphones to watch the movie, then promptly fell asleep after eating dinner and missed most of shrek 2.

the humidity was the first thing to hit me when i stepped off the plane.  i forgot how wet hawaii could be.  luckily i wore shorts on the plane. the first night was spent saying hi to everyone, getting settled, and making plans for the following days of vacation. [see photos in arriving in hawaii]

congratulations to scott and stefanie on their new baby boy!  seth emilio salvotti was born on august 18, 2004 @ 12:33.  we’ll need to meet seth and skylar soon.

thanks to fina for this link

rating:  **1/2 of 5

quick shot: val kilmer does his bit for country and mamet.  a good thriller even though the ending is a bit deux machina.

what i liked about the film mamet’s writing.  snappy dialog and interesting plot.

what i didn’t like part of the ending (you’ll know what i mean)

[this link] courtesy of sa. here’s hoping th new batman is better than the last two films. check out the trailer also at the [batman begins] website.

ernie and i went to the shooting range after dinner yesterday. it was ernie’s first time, while i hadn’t been to the range in over three years. we shot a rented 9mm and a .40 smith & wesson. ernie did pretty good being the first time out. i was a little rusty but managed to hit the center of the target a couple of times

the web hosting of the janella sites has changed. fina’s galleries are now located at

[http://nothingcouldbefina.janella.us/]

and janella.com has moved to a new web hosting provider as well. why the changes?

at work we had test web hosting accounts for an old service we no longer offer. the test account i had the domain name janella.us. unfortunately my account was accidentally canceled. i looked at this as an opportunity to try a new hosting provider. so i signed up for [phpwebhosting.com] and moved the dns over to that service.

for janella.com i decided to go with [hostgator.com] after reading recommendations on a web hosting review site. for a short period of time i tried 1and1.com, but didn’t find the service up to snuff.

all of this means that each site will have enough room to grow as we continue to post photos and other content.

enjoy.

did you know that dvd movies can be different from country to country? they are not only defined by region (north america is region 1) but specific countries can have cooler versions than others. this is where a region free dvd player comes in handy!

anyway, a cool site to see what is different is dvdcompare.net for example, look at the different versions of kill bill volume 1. cool huh?

how far can you make this dude walk drunk? use your mouse to control the left-to-right movement.

i’ve been reading comic books again.

it has been several years since i picked up comic books on a regular basis. but late last year i was in a mall and stopped by the comic book store. i picked up two hardback compilations:

• [daredevil: yellow]
• [new xmen: volume 1]

both books were excellent in there own way. daredevil was done by the team of loeb and sales. loeb knows how to write a clean story with excellent dialog, while sales can draw in such a minimal but expressive fashion.

by comparison, the morrison written x-men was dark, brooding and sadistic. it was nice to see the x-men go through pain and deliver it back to the enemy at hand. i didn’t feel confused jumping back into the x-men (which was confusing when i left reading the book due to some characters and subplots). morrison did and is continuing to do, an excellent job with the x-men.

after these two books, i’ve been picking up issues here and there. i enjoyed loeb and jim lee’s run on batman, and lee’s current run on superman (more later on this). i’m also enjoying the batman/superman book by loeb and turner.

i’m taking a different approach to my comic book reading now also. i’m more into the hardbound collection as opposed to collecting individual issues. i don’t know, i can’t stand the ‘bagging and boarding’ of comic books any longer. i guess i’m not a collector any longer. i just enjoy good comic art and a good comic story.

i’ve been quietly adding back photos to the page. by quitely i mean i forgot to update this page! anwya, here is what’s been done so far:

• most of the birthday photos have been added back
• a couple of sjsu albums have been restored as well
• two out of five wedding albums are posted right now

new albums

• calypte [located under friends] has been added
• yen's graduation photos have veen added [under friends] as well

as always, viewing of these albums requires login right. please [register] in order to be able to sign and view an album. as stated before please use a username i can recognize. i will then approve the registration which will allow you to login.