Random Brain Dump

If you frequent this blog, you know that I am a shutterbug. I know, I know… You’re thinking: "gee whiz, what gives that away." My main subjects are my two daughters. (Again, I’m stating the obvious.) If you view their pictures here, it’s really easy to spot how different my 2 models really are in front of the camera.

Katelyn loves to be in front of the camera–always flashing a smile, even when she was a little toddler. She’s a willing subject, posing for her shutterbug dad without asking. She is easily excitable. And she’s photogenic (well, her dad likes to think so), most of her shots come out great. It’s very easy to shoot Katelyn. She’s a pure joy to shoot.  

Now that’s not to say Allison isn’t photogenic or a joy to shoot for me. But she’s different. She’s more shy of the two, the serious one. She’s still a bit uncomfortable in front of the camera. She’d pose or smile if I ask her to, but she does it in the most uncomfortable fashion. She’d always lean her head to one side and say "cheese"; and breaking a half-smile once in a while. That’s her pose and it’s her only pose. It’s become a habit too. Now everytime she sees a camera, she breaks into her ackward pose. It’s rather funny. A perfect example is pictured here. Note the contrast of the two poses, the smile on Katelyn and Allison’s signature head tilt?

So I learned to shoot Allison differently. Most of the good shots I got out of her when she isn’t posing. I try to shoot her when she isn’t aware of the camera. Natural shots suit her more. I call these "private shots" because I feel like I’m stealing her private moments with these kind of shots. Now if only she’d smile more frequently, because she usually looks serious in some of these "private" shots. Allison is also a joy to shoot, abeit in a different way.

 My daughters provide me the motivation to learn photography. They’ll be my excuses for buying expensive equipments in the future when I become a better photographer. Now, if I can only coax my wife into a willing subject as well. 🙂

Katelyn spotted the moon outside her window while we drove home from dinner tonite. The sky just cleared up after pouring rain the entire day.

Katelyn: “The moon Mommy. It’s a crescent moon. It’s pretty!”
Mommy: “Yes, it’s very pretty”
Katelyn: “Daddy, the moon is following me!”
Daddy: “It is?”
Katelyn: “Yeah! It’s following me. Why is it following me?”
Daddy: “The moon always follows who it likes the best. So I think the moon must likes you the best!”
Katelyn: “Yeah, the moon likes me because it keeps following me”

At this point I smiled because the conversation reminded me of the time when my parents told us the same thing when my sister and I asked them the same questions while playing in the park one night. I must have been a few years older than Katelyn because my sister must have been around Katelyn’s age. That was so many years ago.

We spent this past Christmas in Lake Tahoe with our parents, my sister’s and my uncle’s family. The 3+ families crammed into a nice cozy cabin we rented for a few days– crowded but fortunately all relatives got along. If you’re ever looking to rent a cabin in south Lake Tahoe, I highly recommend the place we rented from this lady; conveniently located, clean, roomy and rental is very reasonable. Had I not with kids, I would normally prefer a more rustic place though :). Good thing, I bought one of those cargo boxes that go on the roof on my Dad’s van. By head count, we had 14 and we even lugged most of the kids’ presents with us. Luckily everybody & everything fit into the 2 mini vans.

It didn’t snow at the lake basin when we got there, so I was disappointed for the kids. But we all woke up to a snowfall the morning after xmas with the kids (and the adults) jumped for joy in excitement. A white after-xmas! Everyday, we hit the snow parks. The older kids were hitting the slopes non-stop. Even the toddlers and one grandma braved the snow and snow-tubed with the rest of us. The grandmas, my uncle & my niece had not seen snow before, so it was especially exciting for them.

I bought a new camera lens in preparation for the trip, figuring there’d be photo opportunity aplenty in Tahoe. But with so much things going on, I didn’t get to take as many photographs as I had hoped for. A few photos I did get with the new Tamron lens, I was impressed. The new lens performed well in low light condition and was sharp overall; it’s extremely sharp at aperture of F/8!

Our last morning there, I got up before dawn, packed my equipment and head out to Emerald Bay, figuring it would my last opportunity for some nice pictures of the lake at sunrise. I hiked through the woods in the dark, with gusty winds and heavy rain/snow. Good thing my new camera back pack is water-repellent. Last time I hiked in the dark was at Bryce Canons in Utah with Suzanne. More than once I thought: “man, I hope these pictures will be worth it!” Well, they weren’t. The rain, snow and wind mitigated my efforts– I could only get in a few shots (most of them not very usable). I did got one that Suzanne really liked.

Our drive home by was interesting, through a heavy snow storm. With chains on, we were crawling about 15 MPH through the mountains. The kids didn’t mind that we were driving slowly, getting a kick out of the snow storm. It was sure pretty!

Here’s the photo gallery from the trip:/trips/tahoexmas05

I was testing my new lens the other night by taking random shots with low light conditions. I took this quick shot of Allison without flashing. The only light source was our table lamp. Considering that I had to bump the ISO up till 1600, the noise level is remarkably low. This random shot turned out to be one of my favorite shots of Allison. I just love her composure and in general how this shot turned out.

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This past Friday, the preschoolers put on a holiday show by singing a slew of christmas songs. Well, I may be biased but it has got to be the cutest show I ever seen. Katelyn loves singing, but we were afraid that an audience might make her shy so Suzanne encouraged Katelyn to sing the songs out loud. Turns out that wouldn’t be a problem.

When we arrived at the classroom, the children were sitting and preparing for the program. We waved at Katelyn and she excitedly waved back at us. She wore her Santa’s Helper dress Suzanne recently got for her. I was relieved to see Katelyn seemed happy, knowing that at least she wasn’t too uncomfortable to perform. The parents filled in with each ready with a camera or camcorder. The cameras flashed the children almost non-stop— the parents turned paparazzi! I have to admit that I probably was the one who took the most shots but I minimized the flashes as not to startle them during their performance. (checkout the December monthly gallery for some of pics).

The program began and Katelyn started singing on top of her lungs. Actually, she yelled out the lyrics. Very quickly, the entire thing became a shouting match between the kids trying to outdo each other. Suzanne & I just looked at each other surprised & amused. Not exactly the type of renditition we encouraged her, but it was so funny the way the Katelyn strains her neck and screams out each song. We didn’t mean to ask her to yell out the songs. But Katelyn sang/yelled every word of very songs, not missing a single beat. She was so cute, all of the kids were.

The singing lasted a good 20 minutes. My favorite was when they sang It Must Be Santa. After the singing, Santa came for a visit and all the kids got to sit in his lap. When Santa asked what she wants for Christmas, Katelyn blurted out: “I want walkie-talkies!” Well, that was a different wish for sure. 🙂 I had no idea where she got the idea of wanting a pair of walkie-talkies.

Well, we certainly enjoyed Katelyn’s first ever performance. She was wonderful, demonstrated that she can follow instructions, memorize lyrics, work as part of a group and perform in front of a crowd. She definitely made me a very proud Daddy that day. And I’m already looking forward to her performances in her coming school years. Chalk this up as one of those pleasures of being a dad!

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Weather getting colder, malls getting crowdier, workplace getting quieter, my spending increasing… must be that time of the year. Merry xmas everybody! 🙂

We promised the kids photos with Santa, so Katelyn was very excited all weekend long. The line was rather long, but we managed to get to the mall early so we didn’t have to wait very long. I tried to coax Allison into it by giving her a view of Santa and told her of the goodies she’s going get from Santa. This santa looks pretty authentic, real white beard & everything. When it was our turn, Katelyn ran straight up to Santa’s lap. On the other hand, Allison just bursted into tears and screamed when I tried to put her in Santa’s lap. Oh well, next year for Allison I guess…

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So after gorging all the Thanksgiving food moms slaving hours over, what are some nice things we can do for all the sweet moms out there holiday? How about these to 10 things to do for mom’s PC this Thanksgiving? Easy stuffs and sounds like a good idea to me.

Well, the Lams are heading down to sunny L.A. for Thanksgiving. The kids will get to visit their aunties, cousins & grandmas. My mom doesn’t use a computer so I guess I’ll do them for my sister’s PC instead…

Have a safe & happy Thanksgiving everyone.

I had 3 people inquire about my Lasik experience this week, so I figure I’d blog about it. Hopefully, my experience help these people in their decision making process. Warning: some may be grossed out…

I first heard about it when I attended a talk on Lasik on campus when I was a UCLA undergrad. Then about 6 years ago, I had Lasik done. Back then, I was playing a lot of basketball and started to scuba dive. Contacts were giving me a daily case of dry eyes after staring at computers all day long. Plus, my wedding was coming. I was debating it for a year or two, after all this was an elective surgery. Heck, how was I going to build software being blind?

My friend Jake got his done and recommended his surgeon Dr. Ghana in Long Beach. I called the office and was satisfied with the information they gave me on Dr. Ghana. She checked out but I was still wary that she wasn’t local. At the time, Lasik was all the rage and was expensive. Then, I heard on radio about a "sale" this Canadian company was offering. That’s right, special of the day–eye surgery on sale on aisle 9. 🙂 A lot of people think I make this up when I tell them about this "sale." By chance, I found that Dr. Ghana was affiliated with the company. I wasn’t shopping for cheap deals, but everything kinda came together. Perfect! I decided to do it and go under the knife (in this case, the laser).

Suzanne & I flew down for the weekend. We stayed at this one dark and sleazy motel in Long Beach, the worst I’ve ever been to. I was nervous the night before the surgery. To help us relax, we took a nice drive down to Huntington Beach and had a great dinner at a Thai restaurant. We then visit my sister in Orange County before turning in for the big day ahead.

So the big day came, I got on the operating room. The assistants put on a weird clamp contraption to open my eye lids. It wasn’t painful but was the most uncomfortable part of the entire operation. All the while, I kept myself amused by thinking of the scene in Stanley Kubrick’s Clockwork Orange where Alex got these contraptions strapped on his eyes as well. I am sure it didn’t look that bad as the movie…

Once my eye lids were "peeled" wide open, an operating knife came down and partially sliced open my cornea. The doctor then opened the cornea flap to expose the inner tissue. At this time the laser started to burn away a layer of the tissue. No anesthetics was used so I am totally awake and saw everything. My vision was blurred after the incision, but I could make out a red laser that came down on my eye. The next thing I remember is the smell of burnt tissue– I was BBQ’ed… 🙂 The laser only operated for a few seconds, the doctor then put the cornea flap back. It still amazes me to this day that no stitches were required (they were necessary in the early years). That was it, one eye done, all within a few minutes. They repeated the process for the second eye.

After a few minutes, I was told to get up. The doctor asked me tell her the time. My jaw probably dropped when I saw the clock on the wall with perfect vision. The doctor tested out my vision later and declared that I have 20/20 vision. Well, that hadn’t happen since I was in 7th grade. I spent the rest of the day recovering. I remember it was really uncomfortable. Actually, it was painful. My eyes felt dry despite repeated eye drops, felt as if there were sands in my eyes. I was especially sensitive to bright light for a few days. 

The next few days, I began to feel like a new man. The best thing is to wake up in the morning and not reaching for my glasses. It was great playing ball without contacts and it was better still when I went scuba diving without them! I did suffer a minor side effect. My 20/20 vision developed the common halo & glare effect at night. These effects are described on this page. The problem was pronounced the first few months after the surgery, but got progressively better over the years. To this day, I still see slight halos but they are now a lot more subtle. But I’ve grown used to it and it doesn’t bother me at all. I am not even conscious of it anymore. Heck, it makes things look prettier at night. I’d have to pay good $$ to get a halo filter like this for my camera. 🙂

The surgery really paid for itself– no more contacts, glasses and cleaning solutions. I think it’s great. Like any surgeries there are exception cases with with horror stories like this one. Jake’s wife had a severe case of dry eyes for a good few months! But these are exceptional cases.

If you live an active lifestyle, I’d recommend it. I’m glad I had mine. But obviously, do your research if you decide to go through it. Two main things you should look for: an experienced surgeon and up-to-date equipment. The equipment keeps improving and gets more precise. The operation is so automated, I almost say the equipment is more important than the doctor. I’ve heard that the machine can cut the cornea with a laser instead of a knife. But do look for a doctor with tens of thousands of operations, referals are best. Ask about the potential side effects like halos and glare. I’d expect the newer machines to minimize some of these side effects. Finally, ask about follow-up care.

And of course, doesn’t hurt to ask if they have a sale either. 🙂

Halloween is always one fun event the kids look forward to. This year both of the girls dressed up as Minnie Mouse. We took them to Great America (an amusement park) for the Nickelodeon halloween parade. Suzanne & Betty then took the girls for a quick round of trick-or-treating, after which they, of course, gorged on the candies they worked so hard for!

Check out the October pics:monthly/october_2005

The Planetarium @ De Anza College is putting on a laser light show this month. It has been ages since the last time I caught a laser show so I figured it would be fun for the family. But Suzanne felt like going to bed early with Allison, so I took Katelyn with me to catch the 8:30 show. It was Katelyn’s first laser light show. She was excited about it and, the whole day, she kept reminding me that I had promised to take her.

The sound system was great, I enjoyed the music; but the laser show wasn’t as impressive as I had imagined. The whole show felt so 80’ish, I can almost swear that some of the sequences were the same I saw years ago. For example, the star wars dog-fight sequence that seemed awefully familiar to me. Even the music was mostly 80’s (they were playing Major Tom for example). Space was the theme of the show.

Katelyn was enjoying the show at first but the show lasts a bit too long for her. She got antsy and lost interest in the end. She particularly like some of the sequences with space and animal characters. The show ended on a high note with a very entertaining sequence about the Milky Way galaxy. The song was pretty cool (it sounds like one of those funny Monty Python’s). I should’ve brought my camera. A slow exposure of the laser light dancing might be very interesting.

All in all, it was a fun evening outing for just daughter and father.