Tri-Valley, the med of California

We've been doing a little research on our new location. Our postal address is Dublin California, Zipcode 94568, but actually we're closer to Pleasanton. Both towns are part of the Tri-Valley, a triangle shaped valley in the East Bay of the San Franciso Bay Area, consisting of the Amador, Livermore and San Ramon valleys. We're blessed with a Mediterainean-like climate which in turn makes the valleys home to many working vineyards, most in the Livermore area. Other than the towns of Dublin and Pleasanton, Tri-Valley also has Danville, Livermore, San Ramon and the newly established gate-town of Blackhawk. We're about 30 miles east of San Francisco and we do know the way to San Jose!

Our apartment block is more or less in the centre of the Tri-Valley, right where the three valleys meet. The towns of Blackhawk, Danville and San Ramon are to our north, Dublin to our west, Pleasanton to the south and Livermore to the east. The Tri-Valley is surrounded by the Diablo mountain range, which in itself is part of the California Coast ranges, themselves part of the much larger Pacific Coast Range.

Don't ask about earthquakes! Oh you did! Right then. Everyone's heard of the San Andreas fault, which runs almost the length of California, and right through the Bay Area. The San Andreas Fault is the sliding boundary between the Pacific Plate and the North American Plate. It slices California in two from Cape Mendocino to the Mexican border. San Diego, Los Angeles and Big Sur are on the Pacific Plate. San Francisco, Sacramento and the Sierra Nevada are on the North American Plate. And despite San Francisco’s legendary 1906 earthquake, the San Andreas Fault does not go through the city. Look at a map and you'll find it runs pretty much down the west side of the Bay, and since we're way over on the East Bay, the other side of the East Bay Hills, you'd think we'd be OK. But you'd be wrong. You see, the San Andreas is just a cover for a whole fault system. In our local area there are more than 20 individual faults making up the San Andreas fault system, see the main ones in the diagram below.



The light blue fault is what everyone calls the San Andreas Fault, but our apartment lies almost slap bang at the top of the orange fault, the Calaveras Fault. Don't be too concerned however, since a major 'quake has not occurred on the Calaveras fault in recorded history, the last moderate tremble, mag 5.6, occurred near Alum rock, more or less 25 miles due south of us, on Oct 30th 2007.

In general, the sun shines, there is little or no cloud, and not much rain. Sunrise is never earlier than 5:30 (June) and no later than than 7:10 (Mar & October - daylight savings changeover), while sunset is between 5pm and 9pm. Average daily temperatures range from 8C in Dec and Jan to 24C in July. During the summer months we rarely have more than 2 days of rain, but this increases to an average 9 days/month in Dec and Jan.

Hopefully, that gives y'all an overview of our geography.

Until next time....

Pete & Lynda

Our Credit Crunch

I know we were told, and we did listen, but not being able to purchase stuff because we have no credit rating is getting pretty stressful. It shouldn't matter of course since we have enough real cash, but sometimes, well that's just not enough for some businesses. Take AT&T, or at&t as it wishes to be now known, eschewing the niceties of capitalisation (note: no z). Now, Lynda and I are well known geeks, not at all technophobic, and we love spending our evenings playing with new electronic toys (no sniggering at the back!). We'd love to spend our hard-earned cash with at&t for one (to start with) of those beautiful iPhone 3Gs. Just think of it, being on-line all the time, tweeting, FB-ing, blogging, using Google maps, e-mailing, etc., from just about anywhere where there is a 3G signal, and guess what, unlike the UK, we do have good 3G signals all around us, except in the hills of course, 'natch. But no, Apple have signed an exclusivity deal with at&t, and the iPhone is only available on at&t's subscription service, and at&t won't let us subscribe because we don't have a credit rating, so we're stuck with pay-as-you-go 'phones. at&t blame Equifax.

And how about this! We would like to save, yes save money with a bank. Not borrow money, no, save money. We can't, because we don't have a credit rating. This bank is HSBC, who we bank with in the UK. Arggggggggggggghhhhhhhh! HSBC blame Equifax.

We cannot get a credit card, because we have no credit rating. We blame Equifax.

It will get better we are told, in about 3 months when the credit agencies (Equifax) have caught up with us.

I am off to bang my head against a 4-pack of Sam Smith's Old Pale Ale - available at a Bevmo! near you.

Hooking Up

Forgive me, it's been 11 days since my last post... how many Hail Marys!?

We've hooked up with some old IBM friends: Dan in downtown Palo Alto, Graham in Lafayette and DMT in Santa Barbara.

Dan and I worked on IEEE 802.5 architecture together when we were both working in Raleigh, NC. His family are plugged into the Bay Area music scene, he plays mandolin and horns, son Julian drums and wife Claudia violin, all for different ensembles; maybe it'll give me the push I need to get back performing?

I got together with Graham in a Danville pub after a pick-up game of soccer, (him not me), the old boy still looks fit and is still enthusiastic about his football, so much so that he's just got an MBA from Liverpool Uni specialising in football administration, so look out for a resurgence in football in Northern California! Graham and I also met while we were both on assignment in Raleigh. The weeked before last, he invited us up to his lakeside property for a spot of jet skiing, lazing about and drinking. Now that IS the way to relax into a weekend. Several attempts at doubling up with Lynda on a jet-ski resulted in us being dumped ceremoniously in the lake, but I did manage to get a good circuit on my own. Watched the sun disappear over the Lakeside mountains while glugging Californian micro brewery ales. Need to decide if I'm too old to take up footy again.

Drove down to Santa Barbara last Friday to stay with DMT and Barbara. DMT is my mentor cocktail-wise, Lynda swears by his Cosmos. We both worked for IBM in Croydon in the bad old days, he in telephony and me in performance management, and we discovered a mutual liking for ale. I picked up a few tips on the art of the Cocktail, did some wine and beer tasting in Santa Barbara itself, and rounded off with the all-American Breakfast at Cody's on Sunday morning. Took us 5 hours for the 310 miles from SB to home, up US 101 to San Jose and 680 home, maybe a bit slower than I5, but a much nicer drive.

I've been having fun reading bed-time stories for the grand children across t'interweb. I've chosen Roald Dahl's Fantastic Mr Fox and I'm currently at Chapter 8. Thanks to Facebook and our new Flip cam-corder, it's really easy to post short, nearly HD videos on to FB. Now, how can I make money at this?

Some good and some bad, NB incomplete lists:

Bad: companies cold calling on the telephone via automated call systems; road discipline; parochialism, the bureaucratic civil service and "little Hitlers", talk radio, biscuits, bars (expensive), food from service stations, lock-in culture masquerading as marketing, california taxes,

Good: weather, store opening hours, postal delivery, internet speed, cheap liquor, wine & lager (except in bars), Trader Joe's, Ranch 99 (availability of asian food stuffs), food in general, magazines, Border's, Bagels - proper bagels, kitchen shops, gas (petrol) price, geography

So far, so good. Missing all the usual things (people, ale), but enjoying the good (see above) stuff.

Until next time...

P & L

So far so good

Still got about a month or two to wait for our shipment (PC, dining room table bed, books, CDs Vinyl, scanner, music system etc), so it does feel a bit like camping here. But things improved yesterday - Pete bought a small Altec Lansing speaker system to plug into the noble NC10 netbook. This, with the much improved internet connection from Comcast (so much better than BT) has revolutionised our evenings. We've listened to "I'm sorry I Haven't a Clue", the Paul Jones RnB show, the Bob Harris's Country show, the News and Pete experienced a truly execrable right-on PC comedy on R4 by Shappi Khorsandi. Maybe we don't need a tele?

We're gradually getting used to apartment living, we especially like having the pool on-site, and the fact that it's relatively empty; we've haven't tried the gym yet, but it's likely we'll have to soon, before Pete's latest jeans purchase (still a trim 36" waist) gives way to a 38". And then there's the TV theatre where we can play our DVDs, so long as , we suspect, they are region compliant. Pete feels a rant coming on here, but he'll leave to his ranting blog (http://box57.blogspot.com).

On the food and wine front, we really are ahead of the game. PF Chang's is a better local chinese than any of the Fleet ones were, our local winery's restaurant (Wente in Livermore) is really v good, we'd rate it up there with Chez Bruce, and our local fast food Mexican ("Baja Fresh") is exceptional for a fast food restaurant. And we've got a local "Trader Joes" and "Ranch 99", our local Asian supermarket. Still mastering eating at home, so far we've had one failure featuring a portugese sausage!

While Lynda works, Pete expected he'd be in Borders or Barnes & Noble for coffee and a free read of the mags, books etc., but so far he's shopped, laundried and played on the NC10. We'll see what next week brings.

Just taken delivery of a FLIP minoHD, so if you're lucky, or even if you're not, we might be posting small but perfectly formed videos on t'interweb thingy.

Missing you all, and do come and visit, we'll tell you when the spare bed arrives.

P & L in the USA