Conclusions of Variety A Personal Blog on my happenings and thoughts

Whale Watching and another D&D round tablePosted by cczernia on January 26th, 2010

A few weekends ago Stephanie took me out on a date night. We went whale watching. This was my third time whale watching and probably the best as we saw lots of whales. At one point they even came up about 20ft from the boat on the side we were standing. It was a lot of fun as I enjoy being out on the water.

After whale watching we went to a restaurant called Solare that was nice. The best thing about it was they had little tomatoes in the bread.

This last weekend I did another Dungeons and Dragons round table meetup that was just as successful as the first one. This time we charged $5 so it didn’t cost us anything and we were able to have a raffle for some nice dice. Everyone had a blast and it was good advertising for Condor con in late February in which I’m in charge of games.

San FranciscoPosted by cczernia on October 20th, 2009

Over the past few days Stephanie and I went up to San Francisco to explore the city and hang out. We flew in Thursday afternoon and after and Bart trip and quick walk we were at the Hotel Mark Twain. The Hotel was really nice but was on the edge of the Tenderloin. We quickly discovered that if we walked down we went into the bad part of town but if we walked up we were in the shopping distract.

After getting checked in and relaxing for a bit we took a long walk to Haight/Ashbury area for dinner and to listen to a reading by Sarah Vowel who is a regular on the radio program “This American Life.”

On Friday we head out early to meet our friends Jonathan and Michelle for Alcatraz. The four of us headed over on the boat, hooked up to the portable listening device and got to explore and by explore I mean go where the man told us to.

Later Stephanie and I hopped on the Bart to Berkeley where we had lunch at Chez Panisse, a famous restaurant for foodies.

After the restaurant we met up with my parents and their old friends, Anne and Bill who I had known since I was six and can remember playing with their kids. We had a great time catching up, drinking beer and having all six of us squeeze into a medium sized sedan/taxi with Stephanie sitting on my lap and Anne on my dad’s. Anne couldn’t stop laughing and most of us were cracking up by the absurdity of the situation. Somehow we made it back to my parent hotel which was a short walk back to ours.

On Saturday we had breakfast with my parents. We then went to the farmers market at the Ferry Building. After we met up with Jonathan and Michelle to tour China Town and grab some Dim Sum for lunch. To completely wear us out we went to the SFMOMA, the modern art museum. After that we were exhausted and decided to stay in and watch baseball.

Sunday was geek day. Stephanie and I grabbed some breakfast and then we went our separate ways. I went down to Oakland where I met Jonathan and my other friend Erik (San Diegan who was working in San Francisco at the same, this trip was full of weird coincidences). We went to the big game store “End Game” and much gaming goodness was bought.

But that wasn’t enough for us so we headed down to Games of Berkeley and a third game store that I can’t remember the name. We then proceeded to beer and sandwiches and finished the geekiness off with a riveting game of Talisman.

After we had to bring the women back in so the three of us met up with Michelle and Stephanie at a pizzeria.

Overall a great trip. I recommend San Francisco to anyone, just walk up, not down.

Wine Tasting and Gateway 09Posted by cczernia on September 13th, 2009

Last weekend Stephanie and I went up to Temecula for the weekend for some wine-tasting. We stayed at the Temecula Creek Inn which was around $230 a night. The most either of us had spent on a hotel room and neither of us was impressed. The room was nice but nothing special. We could have easily got the equivalent at another hotel and probably for $100 less.

While up there we went to Old Town farmers market and had breakfast from a restaurant in San Diego that set up a tent there. Later we drove out to South Coast Wineries and used up a bunch of wine-tasting tickets that my parents left us from a previous trip. We had a nice lunch and bought a few bottles of wine. Apparently, Kenny G was playing there that night.

The evening was spent back in Old Town where we did some more wine/cheese tasting and then had dinner at a Mexican place. Overall, a great little weekend getaway.

During Labor Day weekend I went to Gateway gaming convention up in LA. I had a lot more fun than I did at the previous one. I started off with a game of Zombie Cinema and then ran my Song of Ice and Fire rpg which went really well. That evening was Heroquest which was ok but the GM ran a dungeon crawl with an open, not tactical system which I didn’t care for.

Sunday was all Spirit of the Century starting with me running a game with a time hopping pulp game. I than played in a planetary romance mars game which was a lot of fun as the GM played up the romance.

Pride Parade 09Posted by cczernia on July 20th, 2009

Last Saturday Stephanie and I walked in the San Diego 2009 Gay Pride Parade. Stephanie’s company, Cox Cable, is a big supporter of gay rights and had a truck with water and sunscreen lotion to hand out to the crowd. There were a a lot of volunteers plus we had are celebrities Sam the Cooking Guy, and Ongina.

We got to the location Cox was setting up at around 9:15 and had to wait until 11:30until we actually started moving. During that time we helped out a lot but it was mostly a lot of waiting around. When we started Stephanie was pulling a wagon full of water and I was passing them out. All the Cox volunteers were so eager to move that we started passing out water at a rapid rate. We had almost passed it all out 1/4 the way down. Half way through we ran out of water and just walked and waved.

Overall it was a lot of fun. The crowd was enthusiastic and the other floats were great. I think next year I want to view the parade instead of being part of it.

Hyphen-Con and WeddingPosted by cczernia on April 20th, 2009

Last few weekends have been a lot of fun. A few weeks ago was the fifth rpg-sandiego meet (hyphen-con). This is our local game day where a bunch of us get together and play rpgs all day. We had some great games going and our biggest turnout around 23 people. I got to play in an original D&D (1974 White Box) game where we were sent out to hunt some dark elves but in classic D&D style everyone died. Later I played Transhuman Space, a game set about 100 years in the future where AI and uplifted creatures are fairly common.

The weekend after Hyphen-Con Stephanie and I went to go see the Padres beat the Giant which was fun. We got free Adrien Gonzales t-shirts.

Last weekend was Joe’s wedding. I flew out to Ft. Lauderdale on Thursday and Joe stayed at my hotel so he wouldn’t see the bride, Kelly. We stayed up late a drank beer so he would be ready to go the next day. Luckily we woke up without too much trouble and got some breakfast. The rest of the day was all wedding which was fun. The Friday after we went on the water taxi and looked at the swank houses and yahts and then ate at a nice restaurant in down town. We finished off the evening drinking in their suite.

Final FrontierPosted by cczernia on January 4th, 2009

On Friday a couple friends and I went to the Star Trek Exhibition at the Air and Space Museum at Balboa Park. It was a lot of fun and as you can see had replicas of the original Enterprise bridge and the transporter room. If also had a lot of great costumes and models. The exhibits were also in rooms next to a Next Generation hallway. It didn’t have the interactivity of the Star Trek Experience in Las Vegas but was still a lot of fun.

Later that night we got some dinner then roleplayed until 3 in morning. Overall a great geek holiday!

Karaoke and ChristmasPosted by cczernia on December 30th, 2008

A few weeks back we decided to have a December birthday for Stephanie and my two friends Erik and Andy. We went to the same karaoke we place I went back in spring. It was just as much fun this time around as it was last time. The highlight for me was when I tried to sing “Jump Around” an early 90’s rap song. I was fumbling over the words as they were going too fast but Stephanie picked up the second mike and started rapping in sync with the words. Apparently she had memorized the song when she was younger.

We had a nice Christmas. On Christmas we went and saw a live performance of “Xanadu” based off the 1980 movie with Olivia Newton-John and featured lots of glitter and people on rollerskates. I was skeptical at first but it was hysterical apparently a parody of itself.

A few days after Christmas we went to see “A Chinese New Year.” It was a production of traditional Chinese singing and dancing with vibrant costumes, acrobatic stunts, and beautiful dancing. They even had mock dancing battles of the Monkey King and Mulan.

So, we went a little less traditional this year replacing Uncle Scrooge with a roller disco and the Nutcracker with girls dancing with chopsticks.

Thanksgiving 08 : PortlandPosted by cczernia on November 30th, 2008

For thanksgiving I went to Portland to visit my family. My brother and his wife live up there along with an aunt and uncle. It was a good time with dinner at my aunt and uncle’s place on Wednesday night. Thursday we had dinner at a nice restaurant. On Saturday we went to Powell’s, a huge used bookstore that was amazing. We spent 45min there and I probably could have spent another hour at least. Next time I’m bring an extra suitcase.

On Saturday my parents left and we spent the time with just my brother and his wife. My brother and I visited a few game stores and we then picked up Stephanie and had lunch at a nice French place. We then went on a tram in downtown Portland up to Oregon Health Science University.

Overall a fun trip and Portland is a beautiful city. I look forward to going up again and maybe visiting some of the mountains as we only saw Mt St Helens and Horn on the flight.

Comic Con 08Posted by cczernia on July 28th, 2008

Comiccon was a lot of fun this year as it always is. I went from Wednesday night to Saturday. I usually arrived sometime between 12-1 and left around 7pm. Some great panels were “Torchwood”, “Doctor Who”, “Joss Whedon: Dr. Horrible’s Sing Along Blog”, “Dollhouse”, “Spaced”, and the best was “Battlestar Galactica” which was moderated by Kevin Smith.

I also attended the opening of “The Gamers: Dorkness Rising” which is a movie about roleplayers. I geeked out at this one and absolutely loved the movie.

One of my D&D teens. Kids got taste

Me and the Suicide Girls

Battlestar Galactica panel with Kevin Smith

New York CityPosted by cczernia on June 24th, 2008

Last week Stephanie and I went to New York city. I guess this was our honeymoon in the since that people kept asking us what we were going to do for it so we told them New York.

We had a fun trip though we ran into a few snags including getting dumped on Saturday evening. I can’t remember the last time it rained that hard. Stephanie came prepared with emergency ponchos but they did not help as it rained so hard in the three blocks from the subway station to our hotel that I might as well not have been wearing it.

Also, on the trip back we got stuck on the plane for four hours before it took off. As a result we missed our flight in Atlanta and had to stay the night.

The rest of the trip was a lot of fun. We arrived late at night and got some sandwiches at a deli. We seemed to make a habit of late dinners and catching restaurants before they closed. Our hotel room was tiny and on the 5th floor with no elevator. One night we got back and I was exhausted. The clerk asked which room number we were in and I replied “Hi, my name is Chris.” I really can’t explain it.

We did the typical touristy stuff including Statue of Liberty, Ellis Island, Empire State Building and Central Park. We also did some shopping including specialty soap shop, specialty spice shop, specialty gaming shop which had a great selection of roleplaying games and was a block away from the Empire State Building. We also saw the Met Baseball and August: Osage County which won the Tony Award for best play three days later. We visited the Cooper Hewitt museum of design and the Sex Museum of sex. We had some great eats including a giant peanut butter cookie, Italian Food, Pizza, and sandwiches.

Our last full day there we took the train to Poughkeepsie NY where my highschool friend Tim picked us up and took us to his house where we met his wife. We had a good time and went canoeing, played with the dogs, lawn bowling and hung out in his backyard.

Overall, a great trip. Not sure I could live in NY as I love the city and the subway but the whether is a little crazy.

More pics can be found here.