San Diego Fires

Back in May 2014 there was another round of fires in San Diego.

I missed the one in 2003 being away at UCLA.

I also missed the one in 2007 being away in England.

I had never experienced the panic, rush, fear, and adrenaline of the fires before…but this time was too close for comfort. The closest fire started at the golf course to the East of my backyard. Then burned North and West and then South and then West again… basically just perfectly around my house by one block!

My coworker came into my office at work and said “dude there’s a fire up near your house I think,” and I just kind of brushed him off. Then he was like, “it’s right by my friend’s house off at the corner of ___ and ___.”

I was like, “uh, that is one block from my house. Shut down for me I’m done for the day!”

And I sped home.

The view from my front door!

Good to know I evacuated the most important items first right…?

Well that fire got put out by the evening and I snuck back to my condo even though it was closed off. I ran around to friends homes to send them picture texts that their homes were standing. Some of their houses had very very close calls!

Anyway, ultimately I had a new appreciation for firefighters and their work, and really what mattered in life. My surfboards.

The view of another fire from my balcony that night.

Tons of Weddings

2014 was another year of weddings (yes I know I’m late…shaddup)

Aside from averaging approximately 8-10 weddings annually for the past six years, this one was special due to my brother and a couple of close friends getting married. Yes. You read that correctly. And yes, 8-10 friends hemorrhaging my bank account every year is quite painful and time consuming.

But worth it.

Some engagement photo shoot thing I went to

Some wedding thing I went to

Here’s to many more weddings in 2015!!… happy hemmoraghing…

*whimper*

Scotty’s Birthday

As you may or may not know, I help out at a homeless outreach group in Carlsbad called Fill-A-Belly every Tuesday night.

The happiest guy at Fill-A-Belly

He’s such a cool dude and always polite to everybody he talks to. He’s got the happiest smile when he talks to people as well. He’s so cool that I’ve done this Acrostic for him:

S ometimes he is so
C ool that I can’t even
O pen my mouth to tell you how
T otally rad he is.
T otally.
Y es he rad.

Man. Those kinds of poems were a lot easier when I was a kid. That took me about five minutes to write.

Birthday boys get to cut in line.

Building Houses

Remember how I went down to Tijuana last December to build houses for families in need? No?

Well, this past weekend I went down to Tecate to help put the finishing touches on a few houses for some more families. Every time I head down there, it really opens my eyes to the differences in living standards compared to back home in the states. We complain about the internet being slow, traffic, and the fact that we cannot believe a sports team or famous celebrity did something which we have no control over.

Once on the other side of the U.S./Mexico border, the concerns become whether they have clean water (or water at all) to drink, enough food, or a suitable place for their kids to live. Anyway, being in the construction industry, I like to help out in whatever way I can to make sure families have a good shelter to raise their kids.

Here are some pictures of the day:

Mixing it up

I met some cool people on this trip and it was my first time out in Tecate, BC. It felt like the same as if I drove for half an hour east of anywhere in San Diego except that I saw Mexicans everywhere instead of white people.

Later that night, I swung over to some friend’s house and we went down to the Soda Bar to see the talented Damien Jurado and his magnificent green cardigan.

And it was also fun because my friend and I saw a guy we thought we recognized. We soon realized that he played in a band that we watched last year at the Casbah. His name was Jon Kruger of River City and I went up to introduce myself and he was such a dude! Great nice guy and fun to talk to for a bit. I mean, you don’t see that many people around that look like him:

Front and center.

Anyway, great weekend. Even better long weekend coming up with a big adventure planned so stay tuned.

Until next time, Cheers!

The Greatest Day In Facebook History

Workout Challenge

At the beginning of this year, I felt compelled to do a workout challenge.

I usually don’t care for this but I had around 4-5 friends around the new year tell me that they were going to do a new workout/resolution. They were going to use supplements. They were going to work out almost everyday. And they all wanted my advice on how to achieve their physical goals.

Okay.

My advice:

1. Don’t use supplements.
2. Eat right.
3. Change your workout and implement some HIIT

None of them liked hearing that. Why? Because supplements are a way to get results easier and quicker. Because they wanted to have soda or a few drinks during the week and eat In-N-Out every once in a while. Because they didn’t know any new workouts and did not want to do HIIT because HIIT workouts suck.

(Note to the hater comments about supplements that I will be receiving:
I don’t disagree with the use of supplements. I just personally did not see the need to use them myself. Ever. Supplements can be used for recovery or rehab efficiently and safely if that is what you want to do.)

I also told my friends that it would only take 6 weeks to get your body into really great shape. None of them believed me. So I pulled out my 6 week workout from high school and college (moderately tweaked) and told them that I was going to do it and show them that it just takes hard work and eating right to achieve whatever they wanted to achieve in terms of physical goals they may have for themselves.

Pre-Challenge:

March 3, 2013

Weight: 165LB
Strength Training: 1-2 hours/week
Cardio Training: 0 hours/week
Workout Routine: Light DBs to maintain soft and beautiful love handles
Farmer Tan: Pathetic. Barely noticeable.

I created a workout spreadsheet and stuck to it very strictly.

Now here’s the thing.

I stopped the challenge at 4 weeks. Why? Because I felt I have proved my point to my friends at just four weeks… and I have strong urges to eat In-N-Out again.

Some things I ate:
– Chicken
– Spinach
– Hard boiled eggs
– Chocolate Milk
– Avocados
– Nuts & Granola
– Whole wheat everything (pasta/breads)
– Lots of fruits and vegetables

Some things I did:
– Heavy squats
– Heavy power cleans
– Box jumps
– Full field sprints
– Dead lifts
– Hang cleans
– Lots of abs
– More sprinting

Here are the results:

April 1, 2013

Weight: 165LB
Strength Training: 2-3 hours/week
HIIT Training: 2 hours/week
Workout Routine: I won’t give specifics but it sucked in a good way
Farmer Tan: Amazing! Eye catching!

I spent about an average of one more hour a week lifting which is not a lot of extra time at the gym and did sprints at a local high school for one hour during the week and one hour on Saturday morning. While I did not gain or lose any weight, my body was able to push more weight.

I used to rep 185LB on bench 10x. Now I can rep 215LB about 10x.
I used to rep 215LB on squat 10x. Now I can rep 265LB about 10x.
I used to throw up after sprinting but now I can sprint without messing up a high school field.
I used to destroy my shins on the box jump quick reps but now I can do pretty much nonstop on the 40″ platform

I cut the challenge short at 4 weeks for two reasons.

1. Because I feel the results I got were good enough to prove my point. If you are looking to get into shape, you really only need just the right workout and the right diet. If you have more time than I do, you will probably get better results at the end of your workout period. In college, I had so much free time that I could do strength training for 5-6 hours a week and HIIT about 3-4 hours a week. Needless to say, I was a physical specimen back then…*cough

2. I saw better results in my workout of 1 month than some of my friends had in 4 months.

I’ll be more than happy to answer questions if you had any but in the meantime…

Workout Challenge complete! (as I am currently eating a bag of potato chips. mmmmm)

Padres Game

Last night I went to the Padres vs Dodgers game with a couple of visiting UK pals because they have never seen a baseball game before in their lives.

They loved it because…

Dodgers pitcher Greinke breaks his collar bone

and

and

but not this

An old shirtless guy wearing a Mexican wrestling mask and holding on to a shake weight in the Gaslap at midnight.

Scott & Heather McGhee

The wedding took place in Valley Center. If you don’t know where that is, head north from San Diego towards hick towns, then after you feel like you can go no further, turn east and drive until you cannot handle it anymore. That is where Valley Center is.

Everybody dressed up nicely for this afternoon wedding at a barn/winery/middle-of-nowhere venue.

At one point in the wedding, the person performing the ceremony said, “Scott and Heather, turn to everybody and say hi”

Scott: “hi guys”

The ceremony was well done. And by well done, I mean like how you cook a steak…very long and hot. Everybody was sweating and shifting around in the sun which is probably why everybody cheered so loud when they finally kissed and we could get up from our seats.

I also snuck a few shots while the official photographers were setting everybody up for pictures.

I tried moving a little further to the side so Scott wouldn’t be distracted. Did not work.

Did not work for Heather either.

Her sisters B and J are my top clients in the exclusively small and elite modeling agency that I run. If you ever want to book one of them for an appearance, please give me a call at 999-Nevermind.

Socal weddings = taco stand. I started crying with happiness until the Delta Bravo next to me dropped the spoon into the green salsa and got spiciness all over my tie.

My brand new polished dancing dress shoes were ruined by the dirt.

Sometimes the middle of nowhere is beautiful

After dinner, the DJ put some good tunes on and while I hesitated at first, we all ended up dancing for quite some time further ruining my nice shoes. But it was a lot of fun spending time with them and our other friends to celebrate this special day.

Can you tell why I love this picture so much?

Heather and Scott. Exit.

Rancho Bernardo Inn Rehearsal Dinner

A couple of weeks ago, my friends asked me to help take pictures of their rehearsal dinner.

As a friend I said, “okay sure.”

The dinner was located at the Rancho Bernardo Inn and I was able to get some test shots of my brand new 85MM/1.4 before their wedding the next day.

I’ve never really been asked to take pictures at an event so I was a bit nervous. I usually prefer taking pictures of scenery and nature instead of people because… well… people can be ugly at times and nature is always beautiful.

But anyway, the only reason I agreed was because both of my friends getting married were beautiful people. So ugliness was not a factor.

Here are some pictures of the night:

At one point Mrs. McGhee pointed to the corner of the field and said, “Johnny look! There’s a bunny! Can you please take a picture of it!? It’s so cute!”

“Sure thing”

Scott’s parents

“Oh hey, let’s get married!”

Heather’s uncle speaking. “So then I threw eleven year old Heather into the pool while she was still wearing her Sunday best, then I pile drived the other sister, and elbow locked the last one…”

Heather’s dad speaking. “No sex. Only kissing.”

The best picture I took all night

After dinner, we went to lounge around the hotel. The friends I hung out with were mostly from Minnesota and they kept updating me on UCLA’s humiliating loss to Minnesota throughout the night. What good friends.

The Minnesota crew.

I got sleepy around 10:30PM and decided to head out. Needed to get some good rest for a morning of surfing before the wedding. I felt pretty comfortable with the new 85MM lens and couldn’t wait to try it out for the wedding.

Happy New Year!…

I know I’m super late but that’s because I’ve been neglecting this blog… not really at first but then I realized that I was intentionally avoiding any posts.

Why?

I have no idea. Maybe I’m just not as motivated as before to write things. Maybe I’m getting too busy. Or worse, maybe I’m not funny anymore. Or was I even funny to begin with?

I’m going to regurgitate a lot of information and updates in this post to catch you up on the life happenings of Johnny Sideburns since the previous adventure. Hang on, here we go!

Mid-December I went down to Tijuana to help build some houses for some families who needed a house. While we did not completely finish it, we did build all of the frames for the room and plan on coming back to finish the work!

I also went to a Christmas concert featuring Future of Forestry. I finally was able to see them live and it was a good show and I loved it and just realized that I sound like a 16 year old groupie girl…

I had Christmas Dinner with friends at Fill-A-Belly. The entire place was so well decorated and everybody was in good spirits and it will definitely be a night that I remember for a while.

Serving our Carlsbad guests

So rad to see little helpers!

Cheers! Everybody was happy.

I hosted a Post-Christmas dinner this year at my place. I invited friends who were not able to go home and see their families on the holidays and wanted them to just come over and eat a good meal…Turducken!

We also had some of this

And this

And this

We had a White Elephant Bad Gift exchange…where we exchanged junk

The scariest gift of the night! We named him Fishducken.

I took my dad to his first American football game when then UCLA Bruins played the Baylor Bears at the Holiday Bowl. Yea, let’s not talk about the end result but I had a great time with my dad. Especially when he was cheering at every tackle like it was the game winning play!

I went down to TJ again last weekend but to an orphanage to play with kids all day. They were a bunch of fun.

They were obsessed with jump roping because they all got jump ropes for Christmas

Playing Monopoly, the worst game on planet earth. I think the little girl agrees

This was one of the ways Joanna said “I love you”

I learned two spanish words that day. “Capuche” means to let them ride on your shoulders. “Caballito” means slave carrier.

This was the second way she told me she loved me…

This is yo tocando la guitara para los ninos

Life has been good as you can see.

2013 is off to a great start. There are already a bunch of adventures that await us!

Until next time. Cheers!