Family Diary

July to December 2001

December 31, 2001: The morning was sunny, and we started the day with long walk in the neighborhood. After some phone calls, we drove to Santa Cruz. There it was cloudy and cool. Our lunch place on the wharf was crowded and cold. So we drove to downtown. It took a while to find parking, because most of the downtown area was closed to cars for a New Year's party. We had lunch at the Irish Pub, and took many photos of the colorful streets afterwards. We arrived back in Cupertino before 3pm, just in time to phone our relatives in Europe for New Year's wishes. Then we helped prepare for the teenager's New Year's party at our house.

December 30, 2001: Before beakfasr, we phoned one of our parents in Europe for a birthday. After the 11am mass at QofA, we had lunch at a Japanese restaurant. In the afternoon a local immigrant from Europe visited us for afternoon coffee and cake (for a distant birthday celebration) and dinner with Ben and Ruth.

December 28, 2001: In the morning of this rainy day, we handled some personal paperwork. Diether also had to continue on a manuscript and manuscript review. In the early afternoon, we went to our bank in Palo Alto for some business. In the evening, we had dinner with good friends in Cupertino.

December 27, 2001: After breakfast and some more work around the house, like insulating some of the pipes for cold weather, we had lunch. We decided to leave in the early afternoon, because rain had been predicted by the weather service. We decided to take a detour on the way home, to explore some of San Benito County. We drove through King City to Bitterwater. From there we turned north past the Pinnacles National Monument to Paicines. From there, we took the Panoche Road to the pass. We returned to Cupertino via Hollister and arrived at around 7pm.

December 26, 2001: In the morning we left for our country place in the Greenfield area. We arrived there around noon, and had problems with our sesame lock at the gate. After lunch we lubricated the lock and were able to open it. As the temporary water system (see earlier reports), still works fine, we had some time to walk around to check for a good place for the tank. It had rained there a lot, and the ground was muddy. Therefore, we also could not drive to the higher section of the land. Some water was running in the creek. A sycamore tree had fallen, and we retrieved some of the wood by cutting it with our chainsaw. In the evening, we heated the cabin with a log, made from wax and sawdust.

December 25, 2001: We went to the 9am Christmas mass at QofA. For Christmas Day we had exspected more than only about 150 people. After calling relatives in Europe, we had lunch, followed by some office work and preparations for Christmas dinner with friends at our house.

December 23, 2001: We had lunch on on the wharf in Santa Cruz. Free holiday parking tempted us to stop for some additional Christmas shopping in downtown. In the evening, we enjoyed a red wine tasting party at a friends house in Los Altos.

December 24, 2001: After some last minute food and gift shopping in the morning, some friends from Southern California stopped by the house for the afternoon. In the evening, we celebrated Christmas eve with the children, Ben and Ruth, in the German tradition by sharing dinner, and exchanging gifts. Later in the evening a friend of Ben joined us, and we played some poker. Jutta won.

December 21&22, 2001: On Friday on the way to work Diether noticed a higher temperature reading for the Jeep Cherokee. In the evening he stopped at a gas station to buy fuel and some coolant fluid. On 680 the engine temperature rose more and more all the way into the red zone of the temperature gage. He took the Saratoga ave exit of 280, stopped the car at the intersection of Saratoga and Kiely, and phoned Jutta. He bought a warm coffee at the Hofbrau restaurant, while waiting for Jutta to pick him up in the Wrangler. In light traffic we got home quicly and had dinner with Ben and Ruth, who helped to spculate, what was wrong with the car. After dinner Jutta phoned the CSAA to inquire, who long it would take to get towing service. The answer of 0 to 30 minutes sounded good, and we drove to the stranded car to get another 0 to 30 minutes estimate. When after 45 minutes no tow truck had arrived, we phoned again to find out, that it would take another 90 minutes or so to get help. Disgusted we canceled the call, and returned home. In the night our teenage car experts visited the disabled car for an assessment, and to push it into an illegal parking spot away from the road. The assessment was not conclusive, and shortly after 9am on Saturday, we drove to the car again to get it towed home. This time the estimate was up to 45 minutes and the truck showed up after 15. An interesting fixture for 4 wheel drive cars was installed quickly, and within about an hour after leaving home, the Cherokee was parked in front of our house. Ben and friends will try to repair the damage on the old car; if it cannot be repaired easily, we will put it out of service after more than 180000 miles.

December 15&16, 2001: On Saturday we decided to drive to Half Moon Bay to have lunch in the harbour area. There we selected the Half Moon Bay Brewing Company to eat in a pleasant setting. After lunch we walked along the coast. Unfortunately some of the food caused stomach problems for Jutta, and we had to interrupt the walk abruptly. After a stop in downtown HMB we returned home to Cupertino. After mass at QofA on Sunday morning, we drove to Santa Cruz. We had lunch on the board walk at Gilberts. We were lucky to see some large sailing ships on the Monterey Bay. We returned home in the early afternoon.

December 08, 2001: After lunch at the Bar and Grill in Davenport, we drove north on highway 1 to a sandy beach for some beach walking on a cloudy day. The clouds and the afternoon sun created a special scenery. On the way home, we drove by the UCSC, and via highway 9 to Felton, before joining 17 in Scott's Valley.

December 01, 2001: After breakfast on a rainy day Diether and Jutta drove to San Francisco to shop for some Christmas presents and to have lunch at a small French restaurant. Diether also took many photos of the streets of San Francisco in the rain. We concluded the visit to the city with a coffee and buying a French magazine

November 23&24, 2001: For most companies the day after Thanksgiving day is a holiday. We (Diether and Jutta) drove to our cabin in Greenfield to enjoy a sunny afternoon on the hill above the cabin. After dinner we played BlackJack and our rules of Poker. Diether won the Poker, Jutta the BJ. In the early morning it started to rain. By the time we got up at 8:30 more than two inches of rain had fallen. The mud on the hill had become a problem for turning one of the valves of the backup water system. We decided to pack and return to the SF Bay Area. The rain stopped for loading the car, and we made it out easily. The driveway was not very muddy. The rain had turned to showers, and we stopped many times to take photos of the area. When we saw one of the Monterey County winery signs, we decided to drive to the Scheid winery for a wine tasting. We stopped at the Dennys in Salinas for lunch and arrived in Cupertino in the early afternoon.

November 22, 2001, Thanksgiving Day: This year we (Diether, Jutta, Ben, and Ruth) celebrated Thanksgiving at the house of Ruth's parents. The guests came from many parts of the world.

November 17&18, 2001:Diether and Jutta drive to the cabin in Greenfield. They had not been there in a long time because of other commitments like Diether's travels. They found, that mice have taken over the furnace for the central heating. Cleaning out the accessible parts and running the heater on high for a while addressed the problem. For the evening they uses a wax-log in the stove for comfortable heat. The backup water system (see below) worked remarkably well. They spent a pleasant afternoon talking, reading, cleaning out and compacting some old glass bottles, and performing some other small chores. After a light pancake dinner they went to bed. In the night Jutta watched the meteor shower from the bed through the bedroom windows, and saw several dozen shooting stars. Diether did not put his glasses on. After breakfast on Sunday morning, they talked to one of the neighbors for a few minutes before returning to Cupertino. On Sunday evening, Diether and Jutta went to the house of some local friends, followed by a great dinner with the friends at a Palo Alto restaurant.

November 11, 2001:Diether, Jutta, and Ben have lunch and dessert in Santa Cruz. Ruth has to work. In the evening Diether and Jutta have dinner with friends at a Indian vegetarian restaurant in Sunnyvale.

November 10, 2001:Diether participated in a local conference in Oakland all day. This is the 3rd weekend in a row with business reponsibilities. Diether and Jutta look forward to finding a weekend for a trip to the weekend retreat. Welcome rain starts in the afternoon.

November 05 to 07, 2001:Diether makes another try to go on the business trip on the same flight as a day before. This time the flight is not cancelled, he completes the business, and returns on Wednesday night with only 40 mins delay.

November 04, 2001:At 7am Jutta drives Diether to the SJ airport for a business trip. The flight is cancelled, and she picks him up again at noon to spend the rest of the day with the family.

November 03, 2001:Ben and his DeAnza class cook and sell hamburgers at the DeAnza College flea market to raise funds for the class. After taking some photos of the event, Jutta and Diether drive to Santa Cruz for lunch and to watch and take photos of surfers.

October 31, 2001, Halloween:Diether and Jutta have a friend over for dinner, and they hand out treats to local children.

October 27 to 30, 2001:Diether was out of town on a business trip (WV).

October 21, 2001:Ben and Ruth invited Jutta and Diether for breakfast at their favorite pancake place in Cupertino.

October 20, 2001:For Jutta's birthday, Diether and her had lunch in Santa Cruz. In the evening friends joined for a birthday dinner.(Password protected photos of the event will shown for a while on the Family Events page of the website. Use the Return to Homepage link on the bottom of the page for a link to Family Events. Email us for the password.)

October 6 to 13, 2001:Diether and Jutta had a vacation in Northwestern Nevada. They releaxed, enjoying beautiful desert and mountain countryside. (Photos of the trip will be available for several weeks through the HIRES PHOTOS link above. A scanned trip report will be placed there shortly.)

September 27 to October 01, 2001:Diether travelled to Europe for his mother's birthday party on Saturday. (Password protected photos of the event will shown for a while on the Family Events page of the website. Use the Return to Homepage link on the bottom of the page for a link to Family Events. Email us for the password.)

September 22&23, 2001:On Saturday Diether and Jutta worked around the house, after dinner thay had a beer at Paul and Eddys. On Sunday morning they went to church at Queen of the Apostles in San Jose, followed by lunch in Santa Cruz. After watching the beach festival they returned to Cupertino for some homework interrupted by dinner at Ruth's house.

September 21, 2001:Diether had to drive to San Francisco on business in the morning; therefore Jutta picked up Ben and Ruth at the airport from their return flight from Europe.

September 19, 2001: Jutta had changed the flight for Ben and Ruth to come back from Europe a day early to make sure, they would not miss college classes because of flight disruptions. The European relatives could not find a hotel for them close to the airport, therefore Diether and Jutta used the Internet and the phone late at night in California to book a hotel in Europe close to Frankfurt.

September 15&16, 2001:Diether and Jutta spent the weekend at their retreat for some quiet hours. They spent Saturday afternoon and early Sunday morning in the beautiful surroundings of the east side of the coastal mountain range.

September 11, 2001: At 7am PST in the morning the phone rang in Diether's and Jutta's bedroom. Ben was calling from Europe to tell about the terrorist attack on our country.

September 8&9, 2001: With Ben and Ruth vacationing with relatives and friends in Europe, Diether and Jutta drove to Greenfield for the weekend to perform some more checks on the water system to locate potential sites on the hill for a water tank. They pumped water up to the "big oak level". On Sunday they found two stray cows walking by the cabin towards the hill. They reported the observation to a neighbor, who keeps many animals, and enjoyed a good conversation with his family. They returned to the Bay Area late on Sunday night.

September 1 to 3, 2001, Labor Day weekend: On Saturday Diether and Jutta performed some homework, and some shopping. In the evening they prepared dinner for a party with Ben a few of his friends. On Sunday they got up late, and drove to Santa Cruz around noon to have lunch on the wharf. After lunch, they gave up their parking spot to look for one closer to the beach without success. Therefore Diether stayed in the car, while Jutta went swimming. Then they stopped downtown for some coffee and cake. They returned to the Bay Area on highway 17 through some slow traffic, caused by a small brush fire next to the southbound lanes. Ben got tied up on his way to Santa Cruz with a friend in the southbound lanes, and saw Diether and Jutta drive by. The friend phoned them on the cellphone. It took them 90 minutes for a normal 30 min drive. In the evening Jutta and Diether attended service at Queen of the Apostles, followed by dinner at the Hamasushi Japanese restaurant. On Monday morning, Diether and Jutta performed some homework, interrupted by 3 hours in Santa Cruz for swimming (Jutta only) and lunch.

August 26 to 31, 2001: On Sunday shortly before noon, Diether and Jutta drove to Diether's office in San Jose to pick up a poster for a conference. The poster had been completed by a co-worker the night before. After stopping at home, they drove to San Francisco, where they first had lunch in North Beach. From their lunch table on the street, they noticed signs advertising a change from the new economy "The Wall Street Journal, Barrons" back to the old economy "Greek Food, Falafaels". After lunch, they drove to the site of the conference to pick up Diether's registration materials, and to set up the poster, minus some last minute data from another co-worker. They returned in time for dinner at home. From Monday through Thursday, Diether was commuting to the conference from Cupertino by car, leaving early in the morning and returning in the evening. The "early bird special" in a garage close to the meeting made parking affordable at 9 dollars per day. The conference was very interesting. On Friday, Diether returned to work in the office.

August 25, 2001: Because of a conference, starting on Sunday, Diether and Jutta stayed in the Bay Area. On Saturday, they enjoyed the beach and downtown in Santa Cruz.

August 18&19, 2001: Diether and Jutta spent the weekend in their Greenfield cabin. They continued to work on the back-up water system - the only water source for the cabin right now. It took a number of tries to make the system reliable - it becomes very tiring to climb the hill frequently to adjust the flow of water into the cabin. After the system was installed to their satisfaction, they looked for ways to relocate the water tank, presently sitting next to the cabin below the floor level, to a point on the hill, where a secondary pump will not be needed. They selected an area on the hill under a large oak tree. This area is accessible by car, and only about 400 feet from the closest well water pipe. Next time, they will test the setup with some hoses, before arranging for the movement of the 2500 gal water tank.

August 16, 2001: Jutta, Ben, his friend Curtis and a relative drove to San Francisco in the open Wrangler to enjoy the city.

August 11&12, 2001: Diether and Jutta had a cold, and stayed in Cupertino for the weekend. They enjoyed the green backyard of their home, walked in the neighborhood, and took some pictures. On Sunday, they tried to return a bottle of wine to the Pichetti winery, and to cancel their subscription. After receiving information at the winwery on how to cancel the membership, they walked some local trails. Some deer walked across the trail, and Diether shot a photo.

August 3, 2001: Ben needed dental surgery to have all of his wisdom teeths removed. The procedure was performed in the late morning. He did quite well. He was fine for dinner at home with Diether, Jutta, Ruth, and three friends, DJ, Susan, and Curtiss. Despite the loss of the wisdom-teeths, he discussed sophisticated physics.

July 27 thru 29, 2001: At about 1pm on Friday, Jutta, Ben, and Ruth joined Diether at his workplace for lunch. There is an excellent cafteria. After lunch, Diether finished some small office tasks. He had taken vacation for the afternoon, and the four drove from the Milpitas area in two cars to Lake Tahoe. Traffic was extremely heavy on 680 and 580 all the way to 5. Because of the dense traffic on 5, they decided to take 99 and 88, instead of 5 and 50. With a small two-way radio in each of the cars the communication about changes in driving plans was very easy, except for Ben's and Ruth's unit running out of battery. On 88, they stopped for an outdoors dinner at the Silver Lake resort. They arrived at their South Lake Tahoe hotel at about 8:30pm. After checking into their rooms, they had drinks and ice-cream at the bar of a restaurant in walking distance from the Valhalla hotel. On Saturday they enjoyed the Tahoe beach in the morning and late afternoon, and an excursion to Virginia City for sightseeing and lunch. All four rode in Ben's car driven by him. He is an excellent driver. After dinner at the close-by restaurant, Diether and Jutta went to bed for the night, while Ben and Ruth visited on of the nearby casinos. On Sunday morning Diether and Jutta walked the beach. After checking out of their rooms at 11am, all four had lunch at a Dennys at the western end of South Lake Tahoe. From there, Ben and Ruth went North on 89 to see Emerald Bay, experience 45 minutes of stop and go traffic into Tahoe City, and to show some favorite places in Kings Beach to Ruth. They returned to the Bay Area on Interstate 80. Diether and Jutta returned on 50, first sitting in stop and go traffic for 30 minutes between Tahoe and Myers. They interrupted the return trip with a 45 minute hike along a Sierra creek. About 4 hours after Diether and Jutta arrived in Cupertino, Ben and Ruth came home. They had phoned from Sacramento, and taken 80 through San Francisco.

July 22, 2001: After the 9AM mass at Queen of Apostles church, Diether, Jutta, and their friends drove to Santa Cruz, where they had lunch on the pier, watched surfers close to the lighthouse, and ended the trip with coffee in a downtown cafe. They returned at about 5:30PM for some quiet time with the children at the house in Cupertino, to organize the digital photos from the weekend, to prepare the website entries, and to shop for and cook dinner.

July 21, 2001: Jutta, Diether, and their friends decided to go to San Francisco. They walked in the Embarcadero area, and had lunch at Alioto's on the bay (Fishermen's Wharf). After lunch they drove to the Coit Tower, and enjoyed the view, followed by parking on Lombard Street, and a walk to the church Peter and Paul on Washington Square, where a wedding was in progress. Then they watched some artists on Washington Square, and then they had some coffee in a street cafe. From there two-and-one-half hours after parking, they returned to the car, happy to find, that it had not been ticketed in a 2 hour parking zone. After driving down the winding stretch of Lombard, Diether found a shortcut to highway 1, but missed the left turn. Therefore they continued to the Pacific Ocean, and ended the trip with a walk on the beach. From there they returned to Cupertino for a good dinner.

July 20, 2001: Two friends from Germany arrived at the Cupertino house in the evening. Diether, Jutta, Ben, Curtis, and the friends had dinner, and talked a lot. The planning for the weekend was deferred to Saturday morning.

July 14&15, 2001: Diether and Jutta drove to Greenfiled in two cars, because they had to take material to build a shelter for the back-up water bag. Even though it was relatively mild (temperatures in the low to mid 80s), it was a major task to carry all of the materials up the hill to put them together there. In the evening the work was completed. After dinner and a quiet restful night, they enjoyed the high part of the property, before returning to their home in Cupertino in the late afternoon. The drive took more than three hours, because of stop-and-go traffic on 101 all the way from Salinas to Sout San Jose.

July 8, 2001: Ruth, Ben, and their parents had lunch in Los Gatos to celebrate Ruth's birthday. In the afternoon the children had to perform homework for their photography class, while Diether and Jutta relaxed at home.

July 7, 2001: On this Saturday Diether and Jutta decided to spend the day in San Francisco. They parked the car in an opportunistic way in the North Beach and Fishermen's Wharf area to avoid the expensive fees of the parking garages. They first had lunch at "The Steps of Rome", and then walked close to the Maritime Museum, followed by a cafe latte and some biscotti back in North Beach. On their return they stopped at a Pizza place on Van Ness to take care of Diether's latte. They ate dinner at home in Cupertino.

July 4, 2001: This year's July 4th Independence Day holiday was on a Wednesday. Therefore Diether and Jutta decided not to celebrate it at the fireworks in Kings City, but rather to stay in Cupertino. After enjoying the beach and the downtown of Santa Cruz, they had dinner at home, followed by an observation of the De Anza and other fireworks from the bleachers of Monta Vista High School (MVHS).

(For the other parts of the family news click:(recent diary,Jan-Jun2001,Oct-Dec2000, Jul-Sep 2000, Jan-Jun 2000, 1999, 1998)

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