A Walk in the Park

After my first morning walk in Irvine, Andrew told me there was a nice park nearby that I might enjoy. The next day, Melissa and the boys took me there for a picnic. I have walked there every morning since then.

The park is only a couple blocks past Albertsons and takes about ten minutes to get there. I wouldn't have believed it existed in this congested college community.

William R. Mason Regional Park is 345 acres that was once part of a vast 100,000 acre rancho. It has a baseball field, sand volleyball courts, playgrounds, pavilions and picnic areas, an amphitheater, a 9-acre lake, 123 acres of wilderness/natural area, and Strawberry Farms golf course. There are hiking and biking trails that traverse the park. I only saw a small portion of it, but it was a beautiful place to spend a half hour or so each day.

I took my camera with me today to preserve and share some of its beauty.

Why I Fly...

Yesterday morning I was working from my home computer. In the evening I finished up my work from my laptop in Sunny California. That is one great benefit of airplane travel. Air travel provides a savings in time, gasoline and wear and tear on both my car and my body, well maybe not my body.

This morning I discovered another reason why I fly.

I try to take a morning walk as often as possible, five to six days a week usually. I try to walk even when I am visiting the kids. I am a bit nervous the first day whether I will remember the route and get home safely. In Vegas Brian's mom gave me a little map of the streets that I could take to get in my two miles and make it back home fairly easily. No problem. Their neighborhood was pretty "square". Maybe not quite like Utah's simply amazing grid system but not bad.

Here is one of my walking routes at home.

Pretty simple, and as you can see, the directions are pretty straightforward also.

This walk takes about 35 minutes. Now Irvine is a different story!! I had been to Albertsons grocery store near Andrew's place on a previous visit and thought this would be a good direction to take my walk this morning. Here is a map of the area. (The path marked in blue was where I traveled.)

By the time I got to Albertsons I had expended less than 10 minutes of my planned 40 minutes so I decided to keep going a bit longer before heading back. Even though the streets around there are all named after colleges and universities instead of north, east, south or west something, I figured if I just did my own type of grid calculations, I could get back okay. I did a 90 degree turn and kept going. Four 90 degrees with approximate equal distances in between would bring you back to the beginning, right? Well, I don't think there is one straight street in Irvine, nor are there any 90 degree corners. In spite of that, I did make it back to Campus Drive , which is the street that Albertson's is on. I then turned right on Campus drive and thought I would soon be back at Andrew's apartment. I walked a few blocks and didn't see any familiar landmarks. I saw a lot more businesses that I hadn't noticed before. I thought I had done a pretty good job of noticing which streets I took along the way--except for the VERY FIRST STREET. After wandering a route that looked something like this...

I decided I was lost. That was hard to admit. My thoughts then turned to wondering what Andrew and Melissa were doing and thinking about my being gone so long. My half hour walk had now been stretched to over two hours.

Did I mention that I didn't take my phone with me? Since I was walking so early, I thought no one would be calling me this time of morning. That was my first mistake. After spending some time looking for a business establishment that would be open at 8:30 on Saturday morning, I finally found someone who would let me use their phone book AND phone. I called Andrew and Melissa. As I surmised, I was not really that far from home. Melissa told me that I had to go up Campus Drive to California Avenue and turn right. That was the street that intersected Campus Drive back by Albertsons. One 90 degree turn in the RIGHT direction and I was headed home. 2 1/2 hours and 6+ miles after I began my walk, Andrew found me wandering along Verano Place trying to find the laundromat that was right outside their apartment. I decided then and there that I would have been in REALLY BIG TROUBLE if I had driven to Irvine from Utah. I doubt that I would be here yet!

Baby Girl Leishman--Taylor Rain

Here are some pictures of Taylor Rain Leishman and Company. Taylor was born August 27, 2008 at 10:35 p.m. in Logan, Utah. She weighed 6 lb. 14 oz. and was 19 1/2 inches long. She has lots of long black hair and the prettiest eyes with long eyelashes. Shane and Sonia are tickled pink. I have never seen so much pink in Sonia's house before. In the hospital it seemed that the staff put mostly blue blankets on Taylor, and Sonia was actually questioning where the pink was!








Taylor's Grandpa and Grandma Leishman and the Leishman aunts and uncles and cousins and Kaden had their family Labor Day campout this weekend. Even though some of them had the chance to see Taylor before they went, they came over as soon as they got home Sunday from camping so they could hold Taylor. Then they went home and cleaned up and came over a couple hours later to help celebrate Kaden's 9th birthday. Taylor was passed around again and everyone enjoyed holding her.

See more pictures.