I may have been slacking in my personal swims lately, but smelling the chlorine vicariously this morning with this video.

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Love being able to combine alumni fan-boyism with the vicarious smell of chlorine in the morning.  It’s especially good when it involves seeing Cal Bears out giving back locally and working with the kiddies.  Now if I could only get up the energy to get to an actual swim…

Cal became national champions at Rugby again yesterday, beating BYU 19-7 at Stanford.  I didn’t get to see this year’s team play, but there are some shots of the 2008 and 2009 teams up from their visits to San Diego.

This is the 24th time since 1980 the Bears have been national champions.  Go Bears!

Had a great weekend with the alums cheering for Cal at the Crew Classic. Not much to write up: Great food, Cal’s men won four races outright and was the only boat with the balls to take on the Olympic Team in an exhibition race, and for whatever reason, Cal’s women did not travel to the event this year.

Psyched for an alumni fan boy weekend. Randy will be out of town being judgmental, but I’ll be spending Sunday down at Mission Bay cheering for Cal Crew. Once again the very cool local Cal alums are hosting a tent and it should be as good as ever, despite the city’s paternalistic attitude about alcohol on the beach.

I missed last year due to an opportunity to head to Vegas (and watch Randy be judgmental), but definitely looking forward to heading back down this year. It’s always fun to watch the Bears win.

Wanted to go up to Irvine this weekend to catch #4 Cal water polo in action, but alas, it is not to be.  C’est la vie.

Going to have to let my alumni spirit be pumped by last night’s high school outreach session.  These college fairs are always fun events, with the alums working the table to talk to high school students about Cal, what it means to be a Bear, and why Cal is Cal and not just another UC[FillInTheBlank].  There were three of us at it last night: an attorney, a banker and a Marine officer with graduation years from 1984 to 2001, and it was a blast.  As always, there were just enough kids that had the right attitude and class that I can really hope to be seeing them at alumni events in six years or so.   There were a lot of others too, mostly being towed around by their parents, but I’m just tuning them out.  Looking for leaders and hope, not more sheep.

Need more positive thinking and hope for the future.  California, and Cal, have huge problems facing them.  Years and years of chronic mismanagement have led to a state so gridlocked that it can’t keep office doors open for forty-hour workweeks and courts have to take furlough days to keep their budget balanced (and it’s not like they were providing timely services in the first place).  Really having a lot of doubts about the future of this state, and not yet seeing a light at the end of the tunnel.

Maybe one of these kids will have the answer.  Unfortunately I think they’ll have a shot at solving the problem.  I don’t see the current officials in Sacramento (or the self-proclaimed outsiders positioning for office) having the answers, and certainly don’t see anyone paying down the massive public debts before these kids graduate and enter the work force.

Sorry this is turning so serious.  Maybe I should’ve been irresponsible and headed up to Irvine anyways.  Fiscal extravagance is the California way.  Then I could be sitting back in the bleachers saying ‘oh, that’s pretty‘ and watched Cal dominate the way Bears should.

It’s been a long week.  I’m ready for the weekend.  Big thoughts are just depressing me, so, to paraphrase Buffy “fire pretty.”  If I remember right she meant fire literally, but I’m just thinking of the hotness and the glistening light.

Cal’s 2007 Alumnus of the Year and a great philanthropist passed away today at age 81.  Let’s have one last big GO BEARS for a great man.

Hiding in a dark but air-conditioned home office right now. The outside temp was 92 at 11:00 am, and we’ll probably hit triple digits today.

We went out Friday night and held our own little North County Pride dinner at a table overlooking the koi pond at the Karl Strauss in Sorrento Valley, then skipped the official parade on Saturday to join the Cal alums at a picnic and BBQ near Solana Beach. Great food and great fun, with no drama and no crowds. No photos though, due to some bad batteries.

Every year around this time the rumors that Comic-Con will leave San Diego for greener pastures start rumbling around town again.  Comic-Con is huge, maybe too huge for the convention center.  Comic-Con needs more parking and hotel rooms than the eighth largest city in America can offer.  Blah, blah, blah, they always come back next year though.  Inertia’s a wonderful thing.

Unfortunately that’s not the way with every big gathering though.  Las Vegas appears to have stolen the USA Rugby 7s tournament. This tournament was a part of a larger Rugby gathering that drew Cal Rugby to San Diego the last two years, giving me two enjoyable February afternoons watching the Bears beat up on OMBAC and Wyoming.

Cal sports teams come to San Diego rarely enough as it is.  I hope they’ll still find a reason to visit this far south, but I’m afraid this will just be another opportunity for the UC penny-pinchers to cut some more on the great drive to mediocrity by at least eliminating a road trip for the national powerhouse program.

Finally coming to the realization that next weekend I’m going to miss my first Crew Classic since I moved to San Diego in 2001.  I arrived too late in the year for the 2001 regatta, but made it in ’02, ’03, ’04, ’05, ’06, ’07, and ’08.  It’s not a bad thing necessarily – we’re going to be in Vegas and I’m sure we’ll have a great time.  Just a bit of sadness at missing an opportunity to hang out with the alums and cheer at a sport where Cal usually does really well.  It’s been kind of a symbolic start of spring for me (the first weekend of April)  and the local alums always host a great tent.

Having a very good Friday here.  The weather held just long enough to spend most of the day at the San Diego Rugby Invitational at the Polo Grounds.  Caught three games, two of which featured Cal, and the other being the Cal Poly – Navy matchup in the posted photo.   Great event, lots of fun and entertaining even for someone with a pretty minimal knowledge of rugby like myself.   Eye candy, naturally, and a fun time with the alums as always.

Also got to see the return of Ellen in the latest Battlestar, which was verrry interesting, even if it raised more questions than it answered at this point, and am giddy as a schoolgirl for the debut of Joss Whedon’s Dollhouse, which comes on in about 45 minutes.  Tonight’s about the geeking.

And yes, just to rub it in, I do have plans for Valentine’s Day tomorrow.  Dinner and whatnot.