Category: Slice of Life

Victory at Last

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Cedar Park, 2016
Photo info: FUJIFILM X100T, 23mm, f/7.1, 1/125 sec, ISO1000
 Cedar Park, 2016

こんばんは！

Tonight, Koa’s team had another baseball game and they finally won! 😊 Their team is actually pretty good, but the competition is really tough this year. Tonight’s game was very exciting, with Koa’s team coming from behind to score two runs in the bottom of the final inning to win 8-7. Koa did well, with one walk and he caught two fly balls – one at second base, and one in center field. Plus he is much more aggressive at the plate, swinging at more pitches and getting hits. ⚾️

As you can see from the photo, it was another beautiful evening, with a warm wind blowing and incredible clouds and color. 🌆 A big storm is approaching, and should hit us around midnight tonight… just an hour or so from now! The weather forecast called for thunder and possible hail, so I pulled my Odyssey into the garage for the night, just in case. Better safe than sorry! ⚡

It’s a short week here in the US, because Friday is “Good Friday”, before Easter 🐰, which is a work holiday. However, tomorrow is going to be super busy! I have non-stop meetings from 10am until 5pm which means the only work I will be able to do is from 8am until 10am. Not a whole lot of time to get things done.

But once we make it through tomorrow, it’s a three-day weekend! Woohoo!

おやすみなさい！ -B Barron Fujimoto

Pizza time 🍕

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Cedar Park, 2016
Photo info: FUJIFILM X100T, 23mm, f/2.5, 1/125 sec, ISO5000
 Cedar Park, 2016

こんばんは！

Tonight Mariko made a small pizza as part of our dinner (along with pasta and salad). She is perfecting her pizza dough, and this evening’s pizza was baked in a cast-iron pan in the oven. It turned out great! Our only complaint was that there wasn’t enough of it. 🍴

I can’t wait to try more of the pizza she will make… she’s still experimenting, which is good news for us because all the pizzas she has made have been delicious.

In other news, today my new Chromebook arrived and I have been getting acquainted with it. In fact, I am typing this post using it. The keyboard on this Acer Chromebook 11 is wonderful. Super comfy and the keys are spaced just right. The trackpad is fantastic as well, and I love the multi-touch gestures, especially the three-finger swipe to switch between browser tabs. It’s a really cool effect! Early this evening, I tried out the webcam on a Google Hangouts call with my brother and it worked well. I think this laptop is going to work out just fine!

Right now it’s pretty vanilla-looking, but I have ordered some stickers to put on it, so I’ll take some photos of it for a later post. Speaking of looks, the Acer is not the sleekest machine out there. In fact I am a little disappointed… I thought it would have nicer curves. It’s kind of ugly… it reminds me of the original Kindle. The plastic is really cheap too! But you know, for $165, it’s a pretty great machine. Fast, quiet (no fan, so it’s silent), and the battery lasts about 10 hours.

But I’ll post a more comprehensive review about it later, because it’s now getting very late here! Take care!

おやすみなさい！

-B Barron Fujimoto

Beautiful evening

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Cedar Park, 2016
Photo info: FUJIFILM X100T, 23mm, f/5.6, 1/90 sec, ISO6400
 Cedar Park, 2016

こんばんは！Good evening!

As you can see from the photo, we enjoyed a beautiful night at the ballpark. ⚾️ Koa had a baseball game, and although they lost, they played great and had a lot of fun. Koa had a strong single and stole two bases. Plus he had a put out at second base, then pitched an inning, striking out two batters. I am so proud!

I really like the team he is on this season. Actually, I am happy with all the teams he has been on, but he is learning a lot more technique and his confidence is growing more this season than last. And I also enjoy the games quite a bit more than I used to. I don’t worry about them winning or losing, but as long as they try hard, enjoy the game, and improve… that’s good enough for me.

By the way, I am finally adjusted to the daylight savings time shift. It only took a week! 😝

おやすみなさい！ -B Barron Fujimoto

 

End of Spring Break

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Cedar Park, 2016
Photo info: FUJIFILM X100T, 23mm, f/5, 1/15 sec, ISO3200
 Cedar Park, 2016

こんばんは！ Good evening! How was your Sunday? It’s the end of Spring Break for the kids and that means that the week of sleeping late every morning is over. So, I am hoping that Koa goes to bed soon! (Bay is already in bed and his lights are off)

A couple days ago, the weather turned chilly again, which was a huge surprise to me. I thought we were already into Summer weather! Come to think of it, today is the first day of Spring. That’s great, because I don’t like Winter or the cold. Bring on the heat already!

Today I did a lot of research on new Chromebooks because the laptop I use to write this blog every evening has a hardware problem and is super-slow, and sometimes will just crash in the middle of whatever I am doing. Luckily WordPress does a pretty good job of auto-saving so I haven’t lost too much work. But the computer boots up so slowly that I think it is time for me to find a new laptop.

So… I decided on an Acer Chromebook 11 laptop. I want something that is simple, has good battery life, and a good keyboard. I don’t need a lot of horsepower since I will not be using it for any photo editing or gaming. Just WordPress, Netflix, YouTube and general browsing and the Chromebook should be perfect for those. Also, the price that I found was nice… just $165! That’s a $15 price drop from yesterday…

As you may know, I have been trying to simplify my life and declutter. This new laptop is so minimal, that I am really looking forward to using it! Just like my X100T makes me work within its limitations, I am wondering if the Chromebook will have a similar effect. We’ll see!

Today’s photo is of a new lens that Mariko bought for her camera. It’s the highly-regarded Fujinon 35mm F/2.0 WR lens. It’s really nice because the focus is fast and silent, the aperture ring feels great, and it’s a lot smaller than the 18-55mm zoom. Plus the image quality is excellent and it has a certain look to the images that Mariko really likes. It’s definitely a keeper lens!

Well, I better get to bed. It’s past my usual time!

おやすみなさい！ -B Barron Fujimoto

Kaiju Nite 6

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Cedar Park, 2016
Photo info: FUJIFILM X100T, 23mm, f/5, 1/30 sec, ISO3200
 Cedar Park, 2016

こんばんは！

Hi everyone. It’s late… 11:45 PM here, and I will write this quickly because I am so sleepy. Tonight we had some good friends over for “Kaiju Nite 6”. We like to watch Kaiju (giant monster) movies every half-year or so, and this was our sixth get-together. Previous themes have been Godzilla, Gamera, Mothra, etc, but tonight’s theme was Tokusatsu TV, with television episodes ranging from 1966-1973. We watched Ultraman, Iron King, Kikaida, Kamen Rider, and others, plus Mikey brought over toys and lyrics sheets so we could sing along to all the tv show themes. It was a lot of fun! And as always, the food and drink selections were delicious.

But, I am fading fast so I will end this here…

おやすみなさい！

-B Barron Fujimoto