Unfortunate to see the swim news this morning that the Belmont Plaza swim complex in Long Beach is being closed as seismically unsafe.  I cheered for Cal at the Pac-10 swimming championships back in 2005, and thought it was a very impressive site.  I know the economy is still rough, especially for large capital projects, but I really hope someone can step up and put something comparable here in Southern Cal.

The annual Crew Classic in Mission Bay is in a little over a week.

In previous years I would’ve been all excited by now.  Cute rowers and alumni fanboy stuff, all with great snacks.  Now the finals are in the morning instead of after lunch, and the demon alcohol is banished to special areas by Nanny Diego.  Last year I missed the finals while waiting for Randy to fly home from a judging gig, and this year I’m just kinda feeling ‘meh’ about the whole thing.  I’ll probably go, but having trouble getting excited about it, and probably open to other offers (hint, hint).

Things haven’t actually been slow, just too busy to post here.  Spending more time playing on Facebook, and spent too much time this month cleaning up a hack attack on my server that completely shut down the photo gallery and messed up a lot of other things.  Law work and holiday preparations and Cal cheering and the supreme purpose of my life, i.e, holding Diego’s leash and gushing over at his ability to sniff and poop have also kept me away from here.

Spent the morning in La Jolla interviewing high school seniors for the Cal Alumni Association’s Leadership Scholarship.  This is the one that’s not just about academic excellence, or sports accomplishments, because we’re talking about Berkeley and everyone is academically and/or athletically outstanding, but demonstrated leadership potential.  Not going to talk about the five I interviewed other to say they’re all amazing kids well-qualified to rule the world at some point in the not too distant future.

Just dropping a note about the interview parameters and the hilarity of political correctness and willful ignorance.  When the interviewers arrived we were told to primarily stick to the official questions, but that we could do some chit-chat as a warm-up as long as we didn’t get into politics or personal issues.  Nodding our heads like good little sheep, we quickly scan the first application: intern for a city councilman, founder of his high school’s Straight-Gay Alliance, blah, blah, blah.  Fortunately there’s a two page limit.

Uh, miss, so are we allowed to ask him about his resumé or not?

Time once again for an alumni fanboy weekend, courtesy of the San Diego Crew Classic.

Time to hang with Cal alumni, time to watch Cal Crew kick ass, time to snap some pics both for here and the local alumni website.

Feel free to browse the galleries and enjoy some fuzzy retrospective moments until the real event starts this weekend.

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

[via]

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.