Green Card

I went for my "Adjustment of Status Initial Interview", otherwise known as the Green Card interview, today. This is indeed the time, like the movie, when one takes along photos of oneself with one's spouse in all sorts of places over the years, and one gets told if one's marriage is real or not.

And then, if you and your loved one can provide suitable proof that you're both gainfully employed and appropriately immunized, you can move on to the next hurdle: weeding out the Nazis, the polygamists, the Communists, the prostitutes, the drug traffickers, those unpunished undertakers of moral turpitude, and anybody intending to engage in "any activity a purpose of which is opposition to, or the control or overthrow of, the Government of the United States, by force, violence, or other unlawful means". Oh yes, you have to swear under oath that you're not an evildoer; they take this stuff pretty seriously.

We went through questions about how we met, when we got married, why we chose Healdsburg for our nuptials, and what out plans are as a couple. We produced birth certificates, marriage certificates, degree certificates and junior school gymnastics certificates. Passports and pictures; tax returns and tenancy agreements; forms and pro-formas. I-130, I-485, I-693, I-797, I-94.

And don't forget Supplemental form to I-693.

After all of this, believe it or not, our interviewer says that he wants to approve the Green Card application but can't because his computer system is down. Instead, he's going to formally mark our case as "pending further review" and approve it later on. Accordingly, he presents a piece of paper with a multiple choice form where "Further Review" is checked, along with the box "Your case has been continued for the reason(s) checked below". Failed at the final hurdle! Aaargh!

Luckily, the attorney (thanks Jennifer) points out that in such limbo I can't travel, and perhaps he can help a bit more, so the guy goes away to see what he can do. Half an hour later, he comes back with another piece of paper, similarly officially marked "I-485 Adjustment of Status Interview Results"---and again with two boxes checked. This time, though, they're labeled "Your case has been continued for the reason(s) checked below" and "Congratulations, your adjustment of status has been approved".

OK, so not quite the emphatic and conclusive result I was hoping for... but I do at least somewhat expect the Green Card to show up in the mail in the next few weeks. Hurrah!

In other news, I took this in the Mission a while back:

Bradley

It's been a while since I posted, so I thought I'd break the silence by uploading a photo. This was taken a couple of years ago up at Wendy's parents' house. That's my nephew!

Escaping the crowds

Day 8 in Santorini was pretty much the last day of the honeymoon: we were due off the island on a 7am flight the next morning. Faced with a crowded and crazy Fira, we decided to hike over to the next place to the south, Pyrgos.

Pyrgos is on a hill. It's five miles from Fira. It was 100°F. We were very sweaty when we arrived.

Pyrgos, though, as it turns out, is a very lovely little village with some beautiful buildings. It was super-quiet, exactly as you'd expect a little Greek village to be in the middle of a summer day. We wandered around for a little while, visited the tiny monastery, had a coffee in the village square, and then a little lunch in a tavern on the way back to Fira. All the way we were steeling ourselves for the anticipated horrific impact of the return.

It wasn't as bad as all that. We snuck back to the hotel, skulked for a while, and again escaped the town to Firostefani for dinner. Here's a photo from the way to the Kasteli in Pyrgos:

Wrong town, dufus

Day 7 in Santorini was time to move to Fira, the main town on the island. We'd planned some time in a separate town to get a feel for other areas of the island, but we were both reluctant to leave Oia. When the time came, it was the standard hostage-exchange scenario: this time with the Canaves Hotel Oia handing us over to the Cosmopolitan Suites Fira. It went without a hitch.

Fira was a bit crazy. We'd become so accustomed to the laid-back, relatively quiet, oh-so-civilized Oia that an insanely tourist filled commerce-a-palooza was a bit of a shock to the system. Fira was definitely that and more. We'd been given a tip that "Nick's Tavern" was the place to go, a hidden and authentic gem, so we had a bit of a look around for that... but after an hour or so of wandering we gave up and settled for "Nick the Greek's Bar" for a snack and a drink. After that we retired to the hotel---to regroup and to settle on a strategy to enjoy ourselves in this frazzled town.

The hotel was actually very nice indeed. Right in the center of Fira, so very handy, but very small and somehow secluded. Our room was fabulous, the pool was lovely, the view superb (astonishingly untrammeled by hordes of tourists), and the setting very picturesque. We skulked there for the rest of the day.

In the evening we went out for dinner and tried to head away from the crowds. North of Fira is the much smaller town of Firostefani, a short walk away; we ended up in an Italian restaurant having the most superb pizza for what might have been 1,000 miles or more. For those planning travels, note for your records that this was the very same restaurant described by some dimwitted online reviewer as "under the windmill at the top end of town" in Oia. Wrong frickin' town, englishchris. Thanks for wasting our time the other night.

I took this at the hotel. Nice place.

Ammoudi Again

Day 6 in Santorini was our last full day in Oia, and we decided on another trip to the beach. We made it to the bay of Ammoudi by about lunchtime, and had another dip in the med before getting a snack at a cafe by the sea. The waiter was from Slovenia, spoke perfect Greek and broken English, wore aviators and a pink straw Stetson, but served a mean retsina. I took this snap of Wendy while we waited for our salted fish.

Musée d'Orsay

Day 5 in Santorini we didn't really do much. Here's a picture from 13½ years ago by way of consolation. I always liked this shot.

Well done, nature

Day 4 in Santorini we decided to go down to sea level and check out the med. We'd been out for dinner the night before and bumped into a couple from Sheffield ("a little town in the north of England; you probably wouldn't have heard of it"), both of whom heartily recommended the Bay of Ammoudi at the northern tip of the island. We figured we'd give it a go.

A reminder for those following along at home but not quite as well as you should: Oia is 700-1,000ft above sea level, atop cliffs looking over the sea. That means that to get down to the sea you need to find a way down those cliffs... and waddyaknow they have a whole bunch of rocky steps leading down to Ammoudi beach. Perfect for keeping most of the hoi-polloi away; also perfect, as it turned out, for those wanting an intense quadricep workout.

We swam in the med down at the bottom, which was... howdoyousay... invigorating. After splashing around for a while we got some lunch (and a bottle of lovely retsina) to fuel our climb back up to town-level again, which gave us just enough time to head back to the hotel, change, and come back out to see the sunset

Santorini is famous for sunsets, of which you can find about 90,000 pictures on Google. We were expecting quite the spectacle, then, and it was indeed rather lovely. Oddest of odd things, though: when the last glimmer of orange sun had disappeared beyond the horizon, the crowd which had gathered to watch erupted in spontaneous applause. Applauding sunsets? Congratulating nature on a job well done? Do these people clap at flowers, cheer trees and give standing ovations to majestic mountain ranges?

All very unexpected. I took this photo on the way to the great event.

Hostages in Oia

Day 3 in Santorini was our time to depart the Katikies Hotel and head on to the Canaves. We loved the first hotel so much by now that we waited until the very last minute to leave, reading by the pool until early evening.

When time came to finally depart, the hotel staff asked us about our "onward travel plans" and if they could assist: taxi, boat, plane, whatever. We explained that we would probably be fine under our own power since we were going just to the Canaves up the road. "Oh! In that case let us call them and have them send their bellboys to collect you and your luggage!"

There followed a terse telephone call in Greek, and then two bellboys from the first hotel turning up in the lobby and taking us and our bags to the street. By the time we got there, already there were two smartly dressed figures dressed about ten yards away... waiting. Wendy and I were pointed in their direction, and encouraged to walk with our bags the few steps towards them. Just like a hostage exchange, with orders barked in a foreign language we were passed from the custody of camp Katikies to camp Canaves.

The Canaves folk were very hospitable captors, though. We got a lovely mini-suite setup with (actually rather perilous) a stepladder from the main room to the bedroom above. Again a little balcony, this time looking onto the sea but also the town of Oia clinging to the cliffs. Wendy took this photo of me that evening:

A Greecey Breakfast

We woke up on day 2 of the honeymoon to a wonderful breakfast served on the balcony outside our room. Overlooking the Santorini caldera, and essentially a large mediterranean lagoon, it was a gloriously luxurious start to the day.

After breakfast begun what soon became the pattern of the vacation: reading by the pool, a little swim, a little walk, lunch, a longer walk, another swim, more reading, nap, a quick swim, shower, dinner, quick walk, bed. In that order.

Oh, and then wake up and have a delicious Greecey breakfast looking at the sea.

It's a long way to Santorini

It's a long way to Santorini. No, really. According to Google Earth, it's 6,930 miles as the crow flies from San Francisco (SFO) to Thira (JTR). That's one seriously dedicated crow! Somewhat surprisingly, stopping off in London (LHR) and Athens (ATH) takes you a mere 69 miles out of your way, for a total of 6,999 miles (clearly the Greeks and the Romans knew how to position their cities for optimal air travel from the West Coast). But enough said; it took us a while to get there.

On arrival, though, awesomeness. Sunday morning at 7.40am we arrived at the Katikies Hotel in Oia at the north tip of the island. We expected a roll of the eyes and a gruesome wait---after 15 hours of traveling---for a 4pm check-in or whatever. Not so! Sparkling wine, breakfast by the pool, a tour of the hotel, and imminent room-readiness were what in fact greeted us. We couldn't have been happier.

It's quite the place. Santorini rises out of the sea atop 700-foot cliffs, and the towns cling to the edges of the island spilling down said cliffs like a viscous liquid. The Katikies is very much a "spilling down the cliff" hotel, with 95 steps from our room (a little way down the cliff) to the lobby (higher up the cliff) and another 15 steps up to the streets of Oia. Makes for a great infinity pool, though, and some nice photos.

Day 1 we rather just hung around and took it all in. Honeymoon style.

Spent the weekend in New York, with Wendy a grateful guest at Craig and Hannah's wedding. Had a fantastic time, met new friends, and got a whole bunch of photos.

We had a lovely walk up Potrero this morning. We went to Aperto for brunch.

Busy weekend. We went to the Farmers' Market,

Wendy got a new haircut

and we bought flowers

Just posted another set of photos---this time from yesterday's walk in the Mission. What a super-colorful place we live in.

I found this pretty amazing: a video showing Walmart's spread across the States.

This weekend I was "tagged" by my mother, believe it or not. For the record, here are the rules:

• Link to the person that tagged you (in my case Sue)
• Post the rules on your blog
• Write six random things about you in a blog post
• Tag six people in your post. Let each person know they are tagged by leaving a comment on their blog
• Let the tagger know your entry is up

the fourth of which I shall eschew in the true spirit of the shy and retiring isaach.com.

Six random things, though, I can't resist:

1. A couple of weeks ago I gave a presentation through a Japanese interpreter
2. I've been married for six months
3. I'm a non-immigrant non-permanent resident of the United States
4. I listen to Any Questions whenever I can
5. I'm a fan of the phonejacker
6. I have hypertrophic cardiomyopathy

In other news, I took this photo yesterday:

Wendy and I went to the Cesar Chavez parade yesterday. Or rather, we stood outside our house and watched it go by. A parade in the Mission wouldn't be complete without lowriders, and this one didn't disappoint. I took this photo:

Did you know...? I share stuff on Google Reader and you can

• read it too; or
• subscribe to a feed of it

I'm really proud of this one:

As if by magic, no sooner do I put a new Photoset on Flickr than the same shows up in the portfolio section of the site. I swear it's almost supernatural. As well as taking those lovely pictures in Yosemite last weekend, I also snapped this one from up on Billy Goat Hill not long ago:

So not only is the migration to Flickr now very much underway, I've spent a sad and lonely wifeless weekend hooking up the portfolio section of the site to Flickr as well. Javascripty RESTful goodness, people! What with the Python class I took at work last week, I've spent more time coding in the last few days than in the previous few quarters. I don't think I miss it.

Here's one I took, gosh, nearly six years ago. Now excitingly revitalized in Web 2.0 stylee:

OK, so I've finally decided on Flickr for photos. Finally. This time for real. I'm putting everything up there, including recent pics from Skipalooza.

OK, so waking up at 5.30am facing a 750-mile drive home isn't the most pleasant thing ever. But the experience? Especially for a Brit like me (in England you pretty much couldn't drive that far in a straight line without ending up in the sea) it's pretty breathtaking.

Departure from Park City, UT, 6.15am. Sunrise in Salt Lake City, UT (40-mile mark). Breakfast in Wendover, NV, just over the state line (150-mile mark). Gas in Elko, NV (260-mile mark). Quick stop in Mill City, NV (population 28, 410-mile mark), followed by lunch in Truckee, CA (580-mile mark) and more gas. Arrive home in San Francisco (766-mile mark) at 5.45pm local time, about 13 hours after we began.

And the whole way---across mountains and salt flats and praries and deserts and more mountains and rocky valleys and barren hills and finally to lush and glorious Northern California; the hugest and most unimaginable vast expanse of it---you simply cannot fail to be in awe of the pioneers who made the journey over months rather than hours, with no idea of what they might find. The romance and intensity is palpable.

Even being back here in San Francisco for just a few hours, though, I can fully appreciate why they were happy to settle here.

On vacation at the moment. Still switching. Still twittering. Now posting photos on flickr:

www.flickr.com

I've bought a Mac! W00t!

I'll be back here a lot, but see also my new blog Switchy McSwitchenstein.

I've been wanting to post for a while the reading which Andrea did at our wedding. It's from Corelli's Mandolin:

Love is a temporary madness. It erupts like an earthquake and then subsides. And when it subsides you have to make a decision. You have to work out whether your roots have become so entwined together that it is inconceivable that you should ever part. Because this is what love is. Love is not breathlessness, it is not excitement, it is not the promulgation of promises of eternal passion. That is just being in love which any of us can convince ourselves we are. Love itself is what is left over when being in love has burned away, and this is both an art and a fortunate accident. Your mother and I had it, we had roots that grew towards each other underground, and when all the pretty blossom had fallen from our branches we found that we were one tree and not two.

I've been madly busy (sort of) migrating my portfolio section to Picasa Web Albums. So far I've done

• London Eye
• Matt's Flat
• Home
• Autumn
• Hyde Park
• Fireworks
• Denver Buildings
• Borough Market
• Botanical Gardens
• More Botanics
• Cars
• Denver Abstracts
• Sedona

with more to come! Stay tuned.