We rented a car early Monday morning and headed north to Port Townsend. It is about an hour drive from the Wallen's house. We walked around the downtown on Water and Washington Streets before Lunch and then had lunch at Fins. Sharon and I both had some very interesting Manila Clam Chowder.

After lunch, we checked in the bed and breakfast where we are staying: the Anne Starrett Mansion. Sharon had found the place on-line and booked the Master Bedroom.


In the afternoon, we went out to the Old Fort Wolden State Park and wandered through some old bunkers that housed large guns guarding the coast. Jack feel asleep in the car as we left the park. When we stopped at the visitor's center on the way into town in the morning, Sharon had gotten a map that include a driving tour of the area. We spent an hour or so following the driving tour of the area, including a large number of impressive Victorian Mansions.

We had dinner at the Silver Water Cafe.

Wallen and I went out for a 10k run in morning. We ran around their bay and out to the end of the peninsula between Oyster Bay and Twice a Day Bay. We are both too competitive for our own good. Wallen end up running the distance in 48:01 which works out a 7:45 per mile pace. I was about 20 seconds behind him for a 7:48 per mile pace. After working hard to close a 60 yard gap on a long downhill coming back into their bay, I completely ran out of gas and Wallen pulled away from me on uphill to their house.

When we got back to the house, Sharon, Jill and Jack were already in the boat. After John and I cleaned up, they picked us up. It was an absolutely beautiful day. We cruised around the Sound sightseeing and looking at houses on the water.

We ended up back at the Gregg's house on the water where we had dinner the night before. We picked them and headed to the Boatshed for a late lunch.

Jack and I ended the day by cruising around the bay in the Wallen's paddle boat out

John Wallen, Sharon, Jack and I took the ferry to Seattle to see the Red Sox play the Mariners at Safeco Field. We stopped and had lunch at J&M's before the game. Pedro Martinez pitched for the Red Sox and the Marineers lost 5 to 1.


After the game, we took the ferry back to Bremerton. Meeting up with Jill Wallen, the five of us went to dinner at some friends of the Wallens. The Greggs have a very interesting modern house on Osyter bay.

In one of those odd six degree of separation stories, the Greggs had spent a few years in Fresno and knew my ex-wife's sister Sayre and her husband Byron.

We played some ping pong on a table set-up next to the water, had a few drinks, watched a large family of raccoons fight over dog food and had dinner about 10:15 p.m.! It was almost 12:30 a.m. before we got home.

Sharon, Jack and I took off for a long weekend to visit the Wallen's who live across the sound from Seattle in Bremerton. Wallen picked us up at the airport and we headed back to their house. The Wallen's have a great house on Phinney Bay. It faces to the west and has a good view across their bay of the mountains in the Olympic peninsula. We sat on their deck and barbecued on Friday night.

Today is Jack's last day at the Cottage Kids daycare center. He started going there in February 1999, almost four and a half years ago.

Almanor Diary, Day 8--Saturday, August 2, 2003

I woke up about 5:00 a.m. on Saturday morning and it was pouring rain. I finally got out of bed just after 7:00 a.m. and it was raining cats and dogs. In all of the years that we have been going to Almanor, I have never seen it rain that hard. I stood on the porch with a cup of coffee and watched it rain. Tomasin joined me and we both sat there shaking our heads. Tomasin had some concerns about the boats. It had been raining for several hours and John was concerned about how much water was collecting in the boats. At this point, there was an amazing amount of water running off the cabins and running through across the Dorado Inn grounds.

It took us a little more than 30 minutes to get Tomasin's boat out of water. By the time that we were done, I was soaked and cold.

We spent the next two hours loading up the trucks and cleaning out the cabins in the rain. The Wallens left a little after 9:00 a.m.; they were planning to make the run all the way back to Seattle in one jump, probably a fifteen or sixteen hour trip. The rain finally started to let up after 9:30 a.m. By 10:00 a.m., everyone was loaded up and ready to go.

In past years, we have usually spent the morning on the lake skiing one last time; it was wierd to be packed and ready to go so early. We caravaned with the Tomasin's and Bachman's down the Feather River Canyon to Oroville. At this point, we split up and headed for home.

Almanor Diary, Day 7--Friday, August 1, 2003

Sharon, Jack and I took off Friday morning for a hike on the Bizz Johnson trail. We hiked for about four miles along the Susan River. The trail is the old railway right of way from Susanville to Westwood. The hike included both of the old railroad tunnels on the trail.


After the hike, we went into Susanville for lunch and then toured the museum at the trailhead.

In the late afternoon, all of the adults went over the Chabriers (they own a vacation home just up the lake from the Dorado Inn) for cocktails. Danny Hunter had to take off for Mexico at 6:00 a.m. on Saturday and Loren Hunter had a soccer game at 10:00 a.m. As a result, Hunter spent most of the afternoon packing. He stopped at the Chabrier's and then took off for home from there.

Sharon and I made burritos for dinner. Cal and Cheryl, the new owners of the Dorado Inn, joined us for dinner.

Almanor Diary, Day 6--Thursday, July 31, 2003

Most of the week at Almanor, Jack slept on a fold out couch in the front room of the cabin. About 3:00 a.m., we were awaken by Jack screaming like a banshee. I went into the front room and Jack was standing in the middle of the bed screaming. I asked him what was wrong and he said that his stomach hurt. I picked him and carried into the bathroom where he almost immediately started to throw up. While he was throwing up, Jack continued to wail at the top of his lungs. Once there was nothing left in his stomach, He started dry heaving. Jack did not take this in stride; it was the first time that he has gotten sick to his stomach. After the dry heaving, Jack had diarrhea. fun, fun, fun...

Interesting, while all five of the Heringer's got sick during the week, only two other people got sick. David Tomasin was sick on Wednesday, while Gail Bachman was sick on Thursday. Bachman and Tomasin complained on several occasions that their stomachs were upset and suggested that they might have a touch of the bug. More likely it was the 97 beers they had.

I got up the fairly early the next morning with everyone else still asleep and went for a four mile run on Highway 147. After I got back, Sharon and Jack were still asleep. Morgan and I ended up going out on the boats for the morning.

Several people asked me during the course of the day about the amount of noise that Jack was making at 3:00 a.m.; he apparently woke up a number of people with his wailing.

We went to the Hamburger Hut for a late, long lunch. The adults had more than a few beers, while the kids swam in the swimming area and threw each other off the dock. As we were getting ready to leave, everyone got involved in throwing everyone off the dock and into the water.

When we got back to the cabins, Sharon and I went into Chester to do some shopping. Each family takes one night to cook dinner during the week; we were on the hook for Friday night.

Pat and Kathy Tomasin, John's mom and sister, showed up for several hours in the afternoon. Wallen's brother Bill also showed up with his wife and three kids.

After dinner, we had a birthday celebration for Robby Hunter and Kendall Brown. Kendall turned 20 on Thursday, while Robby turned 19 on Friday.


Jack rallied pretty well. After dinner, he was running around with Bill's two boys playing baseball and football.

Tomasin, Hunter and Bachman took off about 10:30 p.m. for a boat ride to Plumas Pines returning about 1:30 a.m.

We spent most of the weekend working on Jack's bedroom, including new paint, moldings and curtains.

Almanor Diary, Day 5--Wednesday, July 30, 2003

After sleeping in on Wednesday morning, I spent most of the morning helping Sharon put together billing statements and correspondence for her law practice. In the rush to get organized and out of the door at the end of last week a few things were left undone. We had been talking for a couple of weeks about how to provide Sharon with internet access so she could do some work while we were at Almanor for the week. I played around with some cellular solutions, but never found any options that would support a PC internet connection while we were at the lake. I said something to Cheryl on Wednesday morning about going into Chester to try and make and internet connection and she offerred us the use of the fax line in the office. I reconfigured her laptop to use a Pac Bell Internet account that I keep as a back-up and we were able to send and receive mail using the Dorado Inn's fax line.

After lunch, we took off for the Bailey Creek Golf Course. Hunter, Jill Wallen, Sharon and I played in one foursome, while Robby and Danny Hunter, Chris Tomasin and Nathan Wallen were in the other foursome. After the three days of great weather, the weather changed on Wednesday afternoon. As we pulled in the parking lot at the golf course, a series of thunderstorms started to move over the lake.

Sharon and I only played the front nine. I was very happy with the way that I played. I had a par on a long par five that has destoryed me in the past (>10). Coming up to the ninth tee, I thought I had a chance to shoot a 48 on the front nine which would be a very good score for me. The wheels came off on the very easy ninth hole; I hit into a fairway bunker, shot an 8 and ended up with a 50 on the front nine.

We got a few drops of rain while we were playing and watched some impressive lightning displays to the south of us over the Lake. Jack rode in the cart with Sharon and I. He has taken some golf lessons and has a set of clubs. He hit a few tee shots and putted on a couple of greens. His favorite part was raking the sand traps. He started cheering at one point when point when Jill hit into a sand trap! Once the lightning started, he mostly stayed in the cart and insisted that we end back to the cabins.

The adults went to Plumas Pines for dinner. We loaded up the Hunter and Wallen boats and headed across the lake.


The after dinner excitement was that shortly after we turned the lights on in the Wallens boat the temperature gauge showed the engine was overheating. Through trial and error, we realized that if we left the running lights off the engine temperature stayed normal. We ended up heading back across the lake running dark; there is really no boat traffic on the lake at night so it was not a major problem. Although we ended up about a half mile north of the Dorado Inn, we made it back uneventfully, albeit slowly.

I have always loved being on the lake in the middle of the night without a moon. It is one of the few places where we go that you can see the milky way; it is a very cool sight.

Drew is in Southern California today for a one day orientation at UCI. The fall quarter starts September 22. Twenty eight years ago in the summer of 1975, I attended a multiple day orientation at UC Davis.

Almanor Diary, Day 4--Tuesday, July 29, 2003

By Tuesday morning, everyone was back up to close to full speed. We spent the morning on the boats.

Rick and Karen were involved in a motorcycle accident in early July. Rick hit a patch of transmission fluid in an intersection near Clear Lake at fairly slow speed and dropped the bike. They both broke their ankles and had surgery. Tomasin performed the surgeries! Rather than use crutches, they were using wheeled carts. Rickie preferred the carts to crutches because it allowed him to have his hands free while he worked. It was quite a sight to see Rick and Karen going everywhere with the carts over the course of the week.


After lunch, Tomasin and I took on Bachman and Hunter in horseshoes. Although Bachman and Hunter won the first game, Tomasin and I took the second and third games and the match.

After Dinner, the boys went to the Ranch House to play pool and more horseshoes. Bachman and Hunter beat Tomasin and I two straight games of pool. Bachman then insisted that we play more horseshoes behind the bar under the lights. I had enough horseshoes for the day. Wallen and Tomasin played Bachman and Tomasin and won two of three games. Wallen threw a double ringer to win the third game.

Almanor Diary, Day 3--Monday, July, 28, 2003

THE LOST DAY--Drew got sick late Sunday night. At 1:00 a.m. Monday morning, Morgan was sick and by 2:00 a.m., Sharon was sick. Although I did not get phyiscally sick to my stomach, I felt very bad all day Monday with flu-like symptoms. Interestingly, Jack did not get sick. As a result, we spent most of Monday trying to keep track of Jack, while marshalling our strength and staying close to the bathroom.

Monday turned out to be one of the nicest days at Almanor in years. It was hot and very calm all day long; the wind never came up in the afternoon. As a result, the boats spent almost the whole day out on the water. In my fever induced state, I seem to remember Tomasin returning to the dock to reload with people and beverages five times during the course of the day.

Late in the day, Sharon wanted some Chicken Noodle soup. I started to get in the car to drive into Chester and then started to doubt whether I could make it. I ended up getting Wallen to drive me to the store.

The Heringer's all ended up crashing at about 8:00 p.m., including Jack, hoping that Tuesday would bring a better day.

Almanor Diary, Day 2--Sunday, July, 27, 2003

We spent most of Sunday morning on the Tomasin boat with Morgan skiing on doubles, Drew wake boarding and Jack tubing with Mike Tomasin; Tomasin and I slalomed. It was first of three straight hot days with calm water well into the afternoon.




In the early afternoon, we loaded up all three boats and headed for Hamburger Hut for lunch. Afterwards, Wallen and I carried down a ping pong table from Bachman's trailer. Although I was initially skeptical, the ping pong table got a lot of use over the week, particularly by Mike and Jack.

The Dorado Inn changed hands about three years ago and the new owners, Cal and Cheryl, have started a tradition of having a cocktail hour at 5:00 p.m. on Sunday. Greg and Dean Chabrier joined the group for cocktails with their twin one year girls!

During dinner, Drew started to complain that his stomach was brothering him. He ended up getting sick about 10:00 p.m. Sunday night. Unfortunately, this was only the beginning of our problems...

Almanor... Every summer since 1988, sixteen straight years and counting, a group of families has spent a week at the Dorado Inn at Lake Almanor. The core group has included the Hunter's, Tomasin's, Bachman's, Wallen's and Heringer's with appearances over the years by the Snipes', Nooter's, Chabrier's, Foss', Geselbracht and Connor. When we started going there, Morgan and Drew were one and three years old, respectively.

The week includes lots of time on the boat with skis, wake boards, knee boards and tubes, lunches at the Hamburger Hut at the Lassen View Resort, horseshoes, Dinner at Plumas Pines, midnight boat rides across the lake, pool and shuffleboard at the Ranch House, 21 aces and some great sunsets.

In a three-team, five-player trade, the Kings get Brad Miller and a newly inked seven-year, $68 million contract from the Indiana Pacers. The Kings traded backup center Scot Pollard and Hedo Turkoglu to the Pacers. The Pacers turned around and traded forward Hedo Turkoglu and guard Ron Mercer to San Antonio for forward Danny Ferry.

With these moves, the Kings have eleven players under contract for next year.

                            Under contract until     Annual Salary

Mike Bibby, G                    '08-'09               $    11.4

Brad Miller, C                   '08-'09               $     9.7

Doug Chrisite, G/F               '05-'06               $     6.5

Geoff Petrie, GM                 '05-'06

Peja Stojakovic, F/G     '05-'06 with Player Option    $     7.5

Chris Webber, F          '05-'06 with Player Option    $    17.5

Rick Adelman, Coach       '04-'05 with Team Option

Bobby Jackson, G                 '04-'05               $     2.7

Vlade Divac, C                   '03-'04               $    10.4

Lawerance Funderburke, F         '03-'04               $     3.4

Keon Clark, F/C                  '03-'04               $     4.8

Gerald Wallace, G/F       '03-'04 with Team Option     $     1.1

Darius Songaila, F               '??-'??

Monday night, Sharon and Pat had dinner and drinks at Red Square in the Mandalay Bay Hotel.

Sunday night, Sharon and Pat had dinner at Wolfgang Puck's Postrio in the Venetian Hotel. Afterwards, they went to Mystère, Cirque' Du Soleil, at the Treasure Island Hotel in Las Vegas.

On her way to the Bellagio Monday afternoon, Sharon saw a sign on a bank showing the temperature as 117. July is probably not the best month to go to Las Vegas...

Sharon and Jack are off for several days at Las Vegas. They are visiting Pat Funk and her kids. Pat, Ryan, Brianna, Sharon, Jack, Pat's Nanny and I spent two weeks in January wandering around the islands of Luzon and Boracay in the Philippines. Pat is back in the states for a couple of months and her family lives in Las Vegas.

It was 102 in Las Vegas when Sharon and Jack's plane landed at noon!

Ryan, Pat and Brianna Funk

I watched the Fellowship of the Ring DVD.

In the late seventies at the University of California at Davis, I seem to remember paying about $225 a quarter or $675 a year for tuition. As part of the ongoing debacle that is the California State budget, the UC regents have ratified a 25% hike in student fees and the annual tuition will be roughly $5,000 next year depending on the campus.

Drew will be heading to UC Irvine in September.

John Mayer

Tuesday night, Sharon and I went to the Sleep Train Amphitheater outside of Marysville to see the Counting Crows and John Mayer.

Sharon has been listening to the John Mayer album over the last year. She was surprised to hear his songs being played in Boracay (Philippines) and in Bangkok (Thailand) during our trip in January; an example of how small the world really is today.

Sharon spent the day in Napa with Janie Daigle and Jeana Hultquist wine tasting and having lunch at Tra Vigne.

There are three new pictures from the Marathon that Sharon ran in early June at http://www.heringer.org/marathon/index.html.

2003 Sugarloaf Fine Arts Camp

Morgan took off today for a week at the Sugarloaf Fine Arts Camp. She is signed up for the Chorale major.

Drew is a counselor for the camp this year. Starting last weekend, he is spending two weeks teaching Theater at the camp.

For almost 13 years, from October of 1987 to June of 2000, Sharon had a black manx cat named Max. We have talked as Jack has gotten older about getting another manx, but had trouble finding one locally. After spending some time looking for manx breeders on the internet and looking at pictures of kittens, Sharon bought a kitten from North Carolina.

We spent the day driving to San Francisco and back to pick up the kitten at the San Francisco Airport.

Waiting for the cat to arrive, we had an interesting lunch at the Millbrae Pancake House.

Morgan will be a Junior this fall at Union Mine High School. Her class schedule for the next school year includes:

2 terms of jazz band (0 period);
2 terms of ap us history;
ap psychology (first term);
italian 2 (first term);
creative writing;
chemistry a;
algebra 2;
advanced english 3; and,
2 terms of ap music theory (independent study).

2003 Rivercats versus Sidewinders

Rudy Jugoz, Dave Hamilton, Lew Gasper and I attended a HP IT consolidation presentation in a suite at Raley Field. After the presentations, HP hosted everyone for a Sacramento Rivercat's game. Sharon and Jack joined us for the game. The Rivercats lost to the Tucson Sidewinders 9 to 3

Morgan stayed with Jack on Sunday evening, while Sharon and I finished up a busy three day weekend by going to dinner at the Riverside Clubhouse and then seeing Fleetwood Mac at Arco Arena.

Jack, Sharon and I went to Hunter's 50th birthday party Saturday afternoon at the Brookside Equestrian Center. There are some pictures on the web at: http://www.heringer.org/hunter50/index.html.

While Sharon went to the club to work-out, I went out for a long run pushing Jack in the "buggy." He got out of the jogger and and ran for about 3/4s of a mile along Laguna Boulevard.

The three of us went to Sharon's parents for a barbecue. Both of her brothers' families were there. Jack played hike and seek, baseball and table hockey with his cousins. We ended the evening with a couple of hours of fireworks.

Although the Kings ended up without a pick in the NBA Draft last week, the team has made a number of recent moves. The Kings traded for the rights to Lithuanian forward Darius Songaila and then signed him two days later.

The Kings then signed Coach Rick Adelman to a contract extension.

Finally, Keon Clark exercised the player option in his contract and will be with the Kings next year.

With these moves, the Kings have twelve players under contract for next year.

                            Under contract until     Annual Salary

Mike Bibby, G                    '08-'09               $    11.4

Doug Chrisite, G/F               '05-'06               $     6.5

Scott Pollard, F/C               '05-'06               $     5.1

Geoff Petrie, GM                 '05-'06

Peja Stojakovic, F/G     '05-'06 with Player Option    $     7.5

Chris Webber, F          '05-'06 with Player Option    $    17.5

Rick Adelman, Coach       '04-'05 with Team Option

Bobby Jackson, G                 '04-'05               $     2.7

Vlade Divac, C                   '03-'04               $    10.4

Lawerance Funderburke, F         '03-'04               $     3.4

Hedo Turkoglu, G/F               '03-'04               $     1.4

Keon Clark, F/C                  '03-'04               $     4.8

Gerald Wallace, G/F       '03-'04 with Team Option     $     1.1

Darius Songaila, F               '??-'??

2003 Best Places to Work in IT

Computerworld conducted a survey to identify the 100 Best Places to Work for IT professionals. With over 4,000 companies included in the survey, Sutter Health ranked 64th!

In order to escape the heat, we headed about 90 miles east for a day hike in the Sierras. We did a four mile hike on the Caples Creek trail. Jack hiked about 3 1/2 of the four miles; I ended up carrying him only about 1/2 mile.

hot, Hot, HOT It reached almost 104 degrees today at our house.

We went to dinner with Sharon's parents and both of her brother's families to celebrate her parents 61st wedding anniversary! Afterwards, everyone went back to her parent's house and Sharon made an amazing Baked Alaska.

It rarely gets over 100 degrees at our house. Last year, there were only five days with temperatures over 100. We are about a mile and a half east of the main channel of the Sacramento River and almost always get a breeze in the afternoon. Nevertheless, today, the temperature hit almost 101. This is the first 100 degree day at our house since July 10 of last year.

Unfortunately, this afternoon was the Sutter Health Support Services company picnic! Sharon, Jack and I went to the picnic at a park off of the Garden Highway. Jack did a few games and activities, but it was just too hot.

While I attended meetings at CPMC and 345 California Street, Sharon and Jack went to the Steinhart Aquarium and the Natural History Museum.

I have a series of meeting in San Francisco tomorrow starting at 8:00 a.m. so we headed over to the city late this afternoon. We stayed at the Galleria Park Hotel and ate at Ristorante Fior d'Italia. Established May 1, 1886, the Ristorante Fior d'Italia claims to be America's oldest Italian restaurant.

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Sharon, Jack and I met Noah and his mom at Hagan Community Park to ride the Sacramento Valley Live Streamers.

Sharon and I met with our financial advisors this morning: David Stone and Adam Andelin. We worked on the annual update to our financial plan.

Jack has been taking swimming lessons every night for the last two weeks.

Today is also Hunter's 50th birthday. I left him a voice message yesterday about getting together for a beer but have not heard back from him.

I spent one and a half hours at the dentist this morning getting a root canal. The only good news was that it gave me a chance to catch up with Mike Wilson, my dentist. Mike is another old aggie. He and I played rugby together in Sacramento after he came back from dental school in D.C. We had a wide ranging conversation while the Novocain took effect that included his two boys, 11 and 14, and his trip to Paris.

Ranked by staffed acute-care beds, Sutter Health is the second largest secular not-for-profit healthcare system in the United States.

Jack and I scooped up Morgan and headed to the Bell's. The Bell's have started a tradition of hosting a barbecue on the Saturday before Father's Day. They have a group that heads to the Crawdad Festival on Friday. They barbecue and hang out by the pool on Saturday and finish up the weekend recovering and watching the last round of the US Open on Sunday.

Sharon did her first wedding as a wedding coordinator and then met us at Matt and Sherry's. Anyone who gets a chance should ask Sharon about her first time as a wedding coordinator; it was a unique experience.

We swam in the pool and enjoyed a Matt's barbecue!

2003 SHSS IT Golf Tournament plus preschool graduation

Friday was one of those days where everything seems to fall on the same day. Sutter Health Support Services IT Department held its annual charity golf tournament. In the past two years, Sharon and I have played in a foursome with Donna and Kevin Gainsley. Sharon had another commitment so we recruited Jayne Wong, Sutter's IBM account rep and the wife of someone (Randy Wong) who I have gotten to know personally and professionally over the last sixteen years. We started off pretty well; we were 1 over after six. Then, as Kevin aptly described, the wheels came off and we bogeyed six straight holes... The weather was wonderful and we had a great time.

I bolted from the golf tournament to attend Jack's preschool graduation. Jack has gone to daycare at the same place for more than four years. There are a number of kids who have been together since they were six months old. They are all starting to spin off to kindergarten.

Finally, Sharon enlisted to be a wedding coordinator for the church and today was the first wedding she was coordinating. She spent the afternoon working with the Priest and the wedding party at the rehearsal.

A ranking by net patient revenue in Modern Healthcare shows Sutter Health as the tenth largest healthcare system in the United States.

Elk Grove is the fastest-growing city in Sacramento County and the second-fastest in the six-county region, behind Lincoln in Placer County. In particular, Elk Grove Boulevard west of the old downtown is being developed rapidly. There was a good article titled: "Elk Grove Boulevard: Fields today, dreams tomorrow" in the Sunday Sacramento Bee that outlines the planned growth. We live at the western end of Elk Grove Boulevard and about two miles west of the intersection of Elk Grove and Franklin.

We took Sharon's mom and dad to church at St. Marys this morning. Afterwards we stopped by Kim and Brun's and saw their one month old baby, Velta.

After a number of hectic weekends in row, we stayed closer to home today. Sharon, Jack and I went to see Finding Nemo this afternoon at the UA Laguna theater. Afterwards we wandered across the street for a graduation party that our neighbors were having for their daughter who just graduated from UC Santa Cruz. We ended up staying a couple of hours and having a great dinner and a nice time.

Their house is on the lake and it fed some discussions that Sharon and I have had about wishing we had brought a lake lot! After going out to dinner on Friday night, we had driven around Laguna West looking at houses on the lake.

Sutter Health is pursuing several IT initiatives that stress patient safety. We are working on two very rewarding projects: building electronic ICUs and a system to reduce medication errors. Both of these projects are outlined in a recent article in InformationWeek.

We finished up a quick trip to San Diego by wandering around the Zoo this morning for a couple of hours.

Sharon successfully ran the Rock and Roll marathon in San Diego today as a fund raiser for the American Stroke Foundation. She did great! Here is a copy of the message that she sent out afterwards:

From: Sharon Heringer
Subject: I did it!

Well it was a long day – starting at 3:15 am and finishing around 2:00 pm but it was a wonderful, hard, and great experience. Thank you again to all my donors and emotional supporters. It was an honor and an incentive to run for my mom and all my other stroke heros. I couldn’t have done it without you.

Attached below you will find a link to a website with pictures from throughout the day. Mark and Jack met me at mile 10, 19 and the finish line for support.

http://www.heringer.org/marathon/index.html

Drew's High School Graduation

Drew graduated from Union Mine High School this morning.

Sharon and I have had some ongoing discussion over the last six months about where to send Jack to Kindergarten. Sharon is a product of Catholic schools. She attended grammar school at St. Mary's and high school at St. Francis. We had tried to get Jack into St. Elizabeth Ann Seton at Good Shepherd where we have been going to church, but got a notice about two months ago saying that he had not been accepted. We got a call yesterday afternoon telling us that a space had opened up for Jack at St. Elizabeth Ann Seton.

Drew and I had dinner at Steve's Pizza in El Dorado Hills. We talked mainly about jobs for summer and college in the fall. In some ways, it is hard to believe that Drew's high school graduation is Saturday morning.

As part of her training for the marathon, Sharon ran 8 miles this morning. When she was done with the run, Sharon called and said it was "a piece of cake." After four months of training, including running 22 miles last weekend and 19 miles three weeks ago, she is definitely ready for the marathon a week from tomorrow.

With the end of baseball last weekend, Jack is switching sports! He went to basketball practice this morning.

Sacramento Kings Roster at the end of '02-'03

                            Under contract until     Annual Salary

Mike Bibby, G                    '08-'09               $    11.4

Doug Chrisite, G/F               '05-'06               $     6.5

Scott Pollard, F/C               '05-'06               $     5.1

Geoff Petrie, GM                 '05-'06

Peja Stojakovic, F/G     '05-'06 with Player Option    $     7.5

Chris Webber, F          '05-'06 with Player Option    $    17.5

Bobby Jackson, G                 '04-'05               $     2.7

Vlade Divac, C                   '03-'04               $    10.4

Lawerance Funderburke, F         '03-'04               $     3.4

Hedo Turkoglu, G/F               '03-'04               $     1.4

Rick Adelman, Coach              '03-'04

Gerald Wallace, G/F       '03-'04 with Team Option     $     1.1

Keon Clark, F/C           Player Option for '03-'04    $     4.8

Brent Price, G                    Expired              $     2.6

Mateen Cleaves, G                 Expired              $     1.4

Jim Jackson, G/F                  Expired              $     0.8

Damon Jones, G                    Expired              $     0.6

Source: Analyzing which players are in the Kings' future

The first day over 90 degrees since September 25, 2002, almost eight months ago.

After church and kinderchurch, Jack, Sharon and I went to Susie Connelly's 40th birthday party at Cameron Park Lake. There are some pictures on the web at: http://www.heringer.org/susie40/index.html.

As part of her training for the Marathon, Sharon ran 22 miles this morning! This is the last long training run before the marathon two weeks from tomorrow.

After as many rain-outs as games, Jack finished his first T-ball season today. This is my first experience with four year olds playing organized baseball. Drew was seven in 1993 in Woodland when he played his first year of organized baseball. The game that Jack and his team, the Rookies, played this year bears no resemble to any organized sport that I have ever seen, but they sure enjoyed themselves.

Velta and Sarah

Velta and Sarah DiGiorgio

Larkin and I went to game 6 of the second round NBA playoff series between the Sacramento Kings and Dallas Mavericks at Acro arena. It was a great game! The Kings won 115 to 109 forcing a game seven on Saturday night. ESPN has it right; The crowd was deafening!

Straight from Winter to Summer

When I was talking to Pat Funk on ICQ about week ago, she was asking about how Sharon was handling training for the Marathon in the heat. So far, Sharon has spent a lot more time running in the rain than in the heat. We have had a very cool damp spring; much colder and rainier than anything I can remember.

The average temperature for first week of May was 58.8 degrees, compared to 55.3 in both March and April.

The weather finally changed this week with the temperature hitting more than 88 degrees on Tuesday.

Evita

Sharon, Jack and I went with the Tom Frame's (Sharon's Brother Tom, his wife Rebecca and their two boys, Eric and Kevin) to see Morgan and Drew in Evita tonight. Morgan, Drew and Kaylen all did a great job!

Joe (Brun) and Kim DiGiorgio had a baby girl at 7:51 p.m. tonight. She is named Velta after Brun's mom and was 7 pounds 14 oz. This is their second kid; Sarah will be two in August.

And it is all Sharon's "fault..." Kim was in charge of the infant room at Jack's day care. After spending lunch's with Jack and Kim every day for several months, Sharon thought that Kim might be a good match for Brun. After some haranguing by Larkin, Boone and I over beers after playing golf at Mather, Brun asked Kim out. A trip to Paris, a wedding in Alaska, three and a half years and two kids later...

Morgan is 16 today!

Morgan is 16 today! She took and passed her driving test this morning and now has her driver's license!

She is modeling the cell phone that she got as a birthday present.

Sharon ran almost 19 miles this morning! She is training for the San Diego Rock and Roll Marathon on June 1. Sharon is running the marathon as a fund raiser for the American Stroke Association; her mom had a serious stroke in January of 2002. We want to thank everyone who has contributed! You can still make at donation at her web site

As part of her training, Sharon, Jack and I ran the Run Against Pain 10K last Saturday morning. Jack rode most of the race in a jogger, but insisted on getting out occasionally and running along side.


This afternoon, we went to a lunch in celebration of Eileen's first communion; Eileen is Sharon's niece. Sharon and Brun are Eileen's godparents.

The lunch party included Sharon's two brothers and their famlies, her parents, Brun and Jim Dunn.

Drew and Morgan are appearing in Evita. There is a review of the play on-line in the Mountain Democrat. Drew plays Chi Guevara (the Antonio Banderas role in the film), while Morgan is in the Chorus. Kaylen, Drew's girlfriend, plays Eva Peron (the Madonna role). Evita runs May 1 to 3 and 8 to 10 at Union Mine High School. Curtain is at 7:30.

Drew has returned his SIR (Statement of Intent to Register) to UC Irvine and is planning to go there starting Fall of 2003!

I exchanged e-mails with Devan Hunter and Robbie has decided to attend Sonoma State.

Shopping Colleges and Kindergartens

Drew has been accepted into a number of colleges for next fall, including UC Davis, UC Santa Cruz, UC Irvine, Sac State and San Diego State. With many of the UCs requiring a commitment by May 1, he and I made a quick trip to Southern California to check out UC Irvine on Thursday, April 17 and Friday, April 18.

Drew and I took an early morning Southwest flight from Sacramento to Orange County's John Wayne Airport. A quick ten minute cab ride from the airport got us to the campus. We spent an hour and a half in an overview and sales pitch for the school followed by an hour presentation by the School of the Arts. Drew has applied to UC Irvine as a Drama major.

After a quick lunch, we had a guided walking tour of the campus. I was very impressed with the campus; it is laid out around a central park with lots of trees. Next, we took a tour of the on-campus dorms. The dorms are very different than my experience at UC Davis. At Davis, I lived in an eight story high-rise in a group with three other eight story buildings on an open flat wind blown plain. All of the dorms on campus at Irvine are small, two or three story buildings on hillsides. The overall feeling was very intimate. After the dorm tour, Drew attended a class--Drama 35, Speech for Theatre--for an hour and a half, while I sat in the coffee house at Arts College and read my book.

The parents and kids in the morning sessions and on the tours could be roughly divided into four groups: young girls who were physically attached to their mothers; kids who were engaged with their parents; kids who were indifferent about their parents; and, kids who would clearly rather have been anywhere rather than on the tours with their parents. I am pleased to say that Drew fell easily into the second group.

At the end of the day, we caught a shuttle to a nearby hotel and rented a car. After checking in, we drove to Newport Beach which is literally about ten minutes from the campus. Heading south to Laguna Beach, we ended up having a leisurely dinner at an upscale Mexican food restaurant. It almost 10:00 p.m. by the time we got back to the room. With a 5:00 a.m. start to day to catch the early flight, it was a long day.

Friday morning, Drew and I took the rental car and drove around the campus to get a feel for the area and the surrounding neighborhoods. There is a lot of open land east and north of the campus.

I ran into Kurt Snipes in the last month in the wireless networking aisle of Fry's. It turns out that Kurt did his undergraduate work at UC Irvine. When I ran through the list of colleges that Drew was considering, Kurt said "you know, I was an anteater." The school's mascot is an anteater!

We had breakfast, dropped off the car and hopped the flight back to Sacramento. Getting back into Sacramento, Drew and I picked up Jack at daycare.

Jack is four and will be five at the end of August. He is starting kindergarten this fall. Sharon and I have been debating the relative merits of a number of different schools: the Elk Grove pubic school system versus various catholic schools and other alternatives (Waldorf?!).

It feels more than a little incongruous to be evaluating colleges for one son, while looking at kindergartens for other...