I think of Santa Clara County as mostly urban/suburban. After all, it's home to one of the 10 largest cities in the country (San Jose) and one of the world's largest and most vibrant economies (the Silicon Valley). However, it's also a place of amazing beauty and unexpected wilderness areas

As part of my continuing birthday celebration, yesterday I went on an organized hike to Coyote Ridge, operated by the Silicon Valley Land Conservancy. Coyote Ridge is hardly untouched wilderness; it's adjacent to a garbage dump and the 101 freeway, and it's been thoroughly invaded by exogenous plants and animals. Even so, just 20 miles from downtown San Jose, it provides habitat for all kinds of fauna, including badgers, coyote. elk and eagles, and many rare flowers that grow in its serpentine soil.

Fortunately for me, today the wildflowers were at their peak. It's hard to capture the beauty of California ablaze with wildflowers, but take a look at these Flickr photos nonetheless. As you will see, I love California poppies!

I've mentioned before that I've found vegetarian restaurants in some pretty obscure locations, such as the five-star restaurant in Murphys and the raw restaurant in a Las Vegas mini-mall miles from the Strip. This weekend, using my typical technique of investigating vegetarian restaurant lists, we discovered another surprising find.

Pizza Plaza (6211 Shattuck Ave Oakland, CA) is an all-vegetarian pizza joint--and winner of a Best of Veg 2007 award in the vegan pizza category--in a most unlikely neighborhood in North Oakland. Perhaps its location isn't too unexpected as it's near the border of Berkeley, home to numerous excellent vegetarian options. However, like many parts of Oakland, this particular stretch of Shattuck is hardly confidence-inspiring. As we pulled up amidst the boarded-up shops and modest residential and commercial buildings, we looked at each other and wondered if this was a wise choice.

Our confidence didn't improve when we walked into the restaurant and saw 4 plastic tables, a large pizza counter, some wood beads "separating" the eating area from a storage area, and a leftover "Happy New Year" sign over the counter. Even worse, we were the only customers to be found on a Sunday afternoon at noon. What in the world had we gotten ourselves into?

My confidence turned around when our friend started chatting with the proprietors, a lovely couple from Sudan who fled the strife in Sudan looking for a better life. The husband is a microbiologist but when he arrived in the US, he started working in pizza joints to pay the bills. Eventually, as a vegetarian, he decided to start up a vegetarian pizza joint.

The menu offers a host of attractive options. They divide the menu into vegetarian and vegan, offering the most extensive list of vegan pizzas I can recall seeing. They offer other interesting items, including a vegan spaghetti with "meat" sauce and a vegan ceasar's salad with grilled vegan chicken. They even carry Maggie Mudd ice cream among other vegan desserts.

We ordered four "slices" of different vegan pizzas listed on the menu (each $6). Each "slice" was about 4x6 inches and cut diagonally into two. It was enough to satisfy most lunchtime appetites. The pizza crust was a sturdy whole wheat crust that I thought was tasty, the "cheese" was lightly sprinkled over each slice and pretty realistic, and the various mock meats were well integrated. However, the tomato sauce wasn't especially flavorful, and in the end I thought all four menu items tasted about the same. Taste-wise, I'd grade the pizzas as a "B"--competent but not spectacular.

If you're in Oakland and looking for something different, or if you're a vegan with a hankering for an old-fashioned pizza joint, definitely check this place out for a take-out lunch. (I would not go here after dark, and it's not well set up for eating in). As for us, I'd go back in the right situation; but if I'm coming from the Peninsula, chances are I'm going to drive a little further to some of our Berkeley favorites.

Some other reviews:
* BAVeg
* Yelp
* HappyCow

I don't think anyone knows exactly what's going to happen due to global warming, so the AP article on global warming's impact on California is more speculation than science. On the plus side, we can anticipate that global warming will extend our tanning season even longer. On the minus side, rising seas should inundate important and expensive parts of the state. Typically, we "joke" (in a macabre way) about inland areas of California becoming new beachfront property when the big earthquake hits and parts of coastal California drop into the sea (a la Superman I), but global warming could get us there first.

Lisa and I celebrated our 10 year anniversary in Mendocino, my favorite tourist destination of all time. Great scenery, great food, lots to do. This time, we stayed at the MacCallum House right in town, which turned out to be a disappointment. See my Epinions review of our stay at the MacCallum House. Read my other reviews about Mendocino:

* Mendocino Overview
* Mendocino Headlands State Park
* Russian Gulch State Park
* Jughandle State Reserve
* Hendy Woods State Park
* Montgomery Woods State Reserve

This trip we tried Cafe Beaujolais for the first time. It doesn't try hard to cater much to vegetarians, so I wouldn't recommend it on that basis. However, the two options we found were both excellent. The bread was terrific too. We went for lunch, and I think that's a much better value than dinner. Two odd facts: (1) the floor noticeably slopes, so it's like eating in a mystery house; (2) at our lunch, we were the youngest couple there by at least a decade--at my age, this doesn't happen very often any more.

We also went back to Mendocino Cafe, one of my all-time favorite restaurants. I like it because it's casual and fun with terrific food. However, I was disappointed to learn that some of the putatively vegetarian dishes have undisclosed fish sauce in them. Ask before you order!

Finally, we were blown away to discover the Living Light Culinary Arts Institute in Fort Bragg, which bills itself as "the premier organic raw vegan school in the world." Who knew that Fort Bragg could support a major raw foods cooking school? They have a cafe as part of the school, so we were thrilled to try it out. I'm usually not a big fan of raw foods restaurants; I find them overpriced and typically not very tasty. This place definitely wasn't cheap, but I thought it served the best raw food dishes I've had. I thoroughly enjoyed everything we tried. I think Fort Bragg gets unfairly overshadowed by Mendocino, but the Living Light Cafe is yet another reason to spend some time there.

Gary Rivlin in the NYT has a terrific article entitled "In Silicon Valley, Millionaires Who Don’t Feel Rich." The article discusses how a few million dollars of net worth doesn't go as far as they used to, especially in the Silicon Valley where there are tens of thousands of millionaires and perhaps you're not really rich (at least, compared to your peers) until you hit 9 figure net worth. It says:

Silicon Valley offers an unusual twist on keeping up with the Joneses. The venture capitalist two doors down might own a Cessna Citation X private jet. The father of your 8-year-old’s best friend, who has not worked for two years, drives a bright yellow Ferrari.

This is no joke. At my wife's former company, which had created hundreds of millionaire-employees, the talk at company parties often involved each person's personal jet. Those of us who didn't own private jets were awkwardly unable to participate in the conversation.

A side consequence of this competition, and the inflated housing prices, is that there are comparatively few single income families where we live. In turn, it's hard to arrange playdates during the middle of the week, and "mommy-and-me" classes frequently are more like "nanny-and-me" classes.

My wife and I expressly discussed these issues before we decided to move back to the Silicon Valley. Not only were we planning to live on a single salary in one of the most expensive housing markets in the world, but it's an academic salary at that, effectively ensuring that we would never be able to keep pace with our neighbors. This doesn't bother me in the least--it's a choice my wife and I made knowingly and for the right reasons--but I'm dreading the day when my kids start asking questions about why their classmates are doing things that we simply can't afford to do. Then again, like the birds-and-bees discussion (another conversation I dread), it will present a powerful opportunity to teach our kids some essential life lessons.

I have three main criteria for a great local hiking park: interesting enough to warrant multiple visits, reasonably quick to drive to, and no entry/parking fee. A number of parks along the 280 meet these criteria, but three stand out as my favorites:

* Edgewood Park
* Arastradero Preserve
* Wunderlich Park

Wunderlich Park makes the list for one major reason--only about 10 minutes up Woodside Road (Highway 84) from the 280, it's one of the most convenient ways to access a redwood forest. It's also nice because it offers a few nice panoramas of the Bay and has a number of great loop trails that get the blood flowing without being painfully steep. One other plus: below the Meadows, most of the trails are well-shaded, so this park is a good choice even when it's too warm for more exposed trails. Trails are well-maintained and signed, and there are free maps at the parking lot, so it's very hard to get lost.

My favorite hike is to start on the Alambique Trail and take it to the Alambique Flat, a terrific redwood grove that meanders up a quiet canyon. As second growth redwood forests go, Alambique Flat is as good as it gets. It's a perfect spot for lunch or quiet contemplation. I then continue to the Meadows, which isn't very meadow-like but does offer good mountain views. From the Meadows, I continue down the Bear Gulch Trail through Redwood Flat and back to the parking lot. This is a great 6 mile loop trail offering lots of redwoods, bay views and mountain views, plus some good exercise.

As a variation, at Redwood Flat, turn along the Redwood Trail (which exits the redwoods disappointingly quickly) and go to Salamander Flat, where there's a small and not especially attractive reservoir. I then take the Madrone Trail (which has more redwoods than the Redwood Trail) back to the Bear Gulch Trail. This adds a little extra exercise and variation to the trip.

Another variation is to continue from the Meadows up to Skyline. I must confess that this doesn't do it for me. After the Meadows, the trail follows a relatively boring fire road. It's satisfying to reach Skyline, but the ennui usually isn't worth it.

Instead of going up the Alambique Trail, an alternative is to hike up Bear Gulch Trail to Redwood Flat (3 miles RT). This portion of the Bear Gulch Trail goes through many redwood groves, making this a great redwood experience. At Redwood Flat, you can turn around and retrace your steps, or make a small loop by going to Salamander Flat and taking the Madrone Trail back to Bear Gulch Trail.

A few other things to consider:
* this park is popular with horses, so watch your step. On the plus side, no mountain bikes!
* even though it's well-shaded, always bring plenty of water
* at peak times (i.e., weekend mornings) the parking lot can be full
* Bear Gulch Trail follows Bear Gulch Road, so it will get a little road noise. Alambique Trail follows Woodside Road for the first mile or so; it gets a lot of motorcycle and truck noise. As with most parks on the east side of the Santa Cruz Mountains, it also gets a fair amount of airplane noise from planes heading to SFO or the local San Carlos/Palo Alto airports.

The official park website and a map of the park.

Everyone loves rankings, so here is the 2007 ranking of the best services in Mountain View. I think in general this list is very good, but of course we could quibble--our favorite burritos are from Bueno Bueno; we think Garden Fresh (a cherished institution in our pre-Milwaukee days) has slipped; and I've never understood the big fuss over Amber India. But other conclusions are spot-on: Amarin for Thai food (ask for the special/separate vegetarian menu), and Hobee's for breakfast. Good stuff.

There are brewing concerns about the intrusiveness of the proposals floating around in the California legislature, sparked most visibly by the proposal to ban parental spanking of children. Some critics are calling some of these proposals "Nanny Bills" because they reflect a legislative paternalism; like citizens need a legislative nanny looking over their shoulders. (Nanny-ism was also referenced in this NYT article about requiring walkers to remove their iPod earbuds before crossing the street.)

Not having walked in their shoes, I must confess that I just don't understand what goes through the mind of legislators. However, as an academic and affected citizen, I remain a little frustrated that legislators don't seem to appreciate their role as experimenters where each passed law becomes a social experiment--but unfortunately usually the experiment is conducted trial-by-error. (Cf. Brandeis' defense of federalism because states can act as laboratories of experimentation). As a "scientific" experimentation process, our current legislative system has at least 3 intrinsic but fatal problems:

1) There is often little or no scientific basis underlying the initiatives. Instead, the rhetoric usually relies on anecdotes, intuition and ulterior agendas. But on many questions that legislatures seek to address, there is a rich scientific literature on the question that legislators should consult before making proposals. For example, academics have studied the pros and cons of spanking children. What do they say?

2) There is usually no explicit mechanism to measure the effectiveness of the experiment. Occasionally, laws are passed that delegate efficacy oversight to an administrative agency (for example, Congress asked the FTC for a report on the efficacy of CAN-SPAM), but this is the exception rather than the rule, and we have little evidence that legislatures heed the feedback they get from their "scientific" monitoring mechanisms (as opposed to other mechanisms, like popularity with constituencies or lobbying mechanisms).

3) There are very weak mechanisms to end failed experiments. Legislatures do occasionally repeal laws and more frequently tinker with the laws, but a lot of laws get passed and then left alone forever.

I can offer one possible solution to correct the experimentation process used by legislators: we could require legislators to follow a more rigorous scientific method--form hypotheses, do the research, and then conduct tests to measure the efficacy of various solutions. Unfortunately, this isn't realistic. Legislators aren't trained scientists, and legislatures are lousy venues to debate scientific merits. Yet, knowing that legislators are experimenting without following accepted scientific methods, we should hold them more accountable when they ignore the available literature in preference for their own intuition.

For many years, California has seen more in-migration instead of out-migration except in periods of economic downturn. But recently, California has seen net out-migration despite relatively good economic times. See the Mercury News story. There are a variety of possible explanations, although the relatively high cost of living here is a primary suspect. There's no question that living in CA has a premium attached to it; but depending on what a person is looking for, it may be worth every penny.

Californians are wimps when it comes to weather. Low temperatures are dipping into the 30s at night (which is unseasonably cold), and this produces lead stories in the local paper that "It's Balmier in Buffalo." I'm still able to remember the many, many days in Milwaukee when I was thrilled that the HIGH temperature reached the 30s, so you're not going to hear any complaints from me!

Half Moon Bay is our local pumpkin-picking capital. There are at least a dozen pumpkin farms in the area, most of them straddling Highway 92 as it heads west towards the ocean. These farms range from no-frills pick-your-own farmstands to Lemos Farm, a pumpkin stand on steroids that is closer to amusement park than agriculture. (Lemos Farm is also responsible for causing the near-gridlock on Highway 92 during pumpkin season).

Based on a recommendation from Sunset Magazine, we bypassed all of the options on hectic Highway 92 and went 5 miles south of the 92/1 intersection to Bob's Pumpkin Farm. What a terrific destination! It had all of the standard elements of a pumpkin patch--a hay bale pyramid, a few farm animals, a decent corn maze and lots of varieties of pumpkins and accessories like corn stalks. Bob's also had a great produce stand with farm-fresh fruits and veggies. But what really distinguished Bob's was its setting--it's on the east side of Highway 1, with uninterrupted 180 degree vistas of the Pacific Ocean less than a mile away. This stretch of the coast can be foggy regularly, but on the day we went, we were blessed with 70 degrees and sunny weather right along the coast. There may be nothing more enjoyable than picking pumpkins in shorts and t-shirts while gazing at the million dollar views of the Pacific Ocean where ever you look. Recommended.

(See some photos we took at the farm).

It seems like there were 1,001 disclosures made in our disclosure package when we bought our house, and yet not one of them mentioned the risk of squirrel attacks. (Cuesta Park is less than a mile from our house).

UPDATE: The squirrels are facing the ultimate retribution for chomping on the 4 year old boy. FWIW, we're staying away from Cuesta Park for now.

UPDATE 2: The city has brought in the squirrel-crusher.

By Eric Goldman

The Washington Post runs an article entitled Silicon Valley's Golden Past Tarnished by Latest Probes, a retrospective/catch-up on the evolution of Silicon Valley ethics, with quick stops in round-tripping, stock option backdating and the HP scandal. As we've repeatedly learned, hero worship cannot withstand scrutiny, even in the Silicon Valley.

It turns out that Santa Clara University has a strong women's soccer team. The San Jose Mercury News ran a lengthy story on its successes--the women's soccer team "has reached the national semifinals 10 times, won an NCAA title, visited the White House and been featured in the movie Bend It Like Beckham." Coach Smith tried to explain his success by describing the special approaches to coaching a woman's team, which I'm offering up without comment:

Tactically, technically, physically, there isn't much difference between coaching men and women....But psychologically, there's a huge difference. With guys, it's `How can I get mine?' With women, it's `Is the chemistry right? Are we happy?' Women are much more concerned with each member of the group being happy and healthy, and they want to do what they can to make it right"....Guys don't care about [feedback], but with women, it's critical. If a kid is having a bad day, I want to know it so I'm not as critical of them, or so we can talk before practice. They need to know that you care, that you're aware of their family and personal life.

Lisa and I took a quick 18 hour get-a-way to San Francisco this weekend. This finally gave us time to check out the Farmer's Market at the Ferry Building, reputed to be one of the best in the country. It was amazing! There must have been over a hundred vendors there, selling all kinds of produce, flowers, dairy, baked goods, meats, condiments and other goodies.

We got some things we had never seen before, like an "Israeli melon" (I'm not sure if it was a Galia or an Ogen melon) that was like an aromatic honeydew, and a Pink Pearl apple with pink flesh and a sweet-tart flavor (this was a big hit with our nieces). We loaded up on fruits (red grapes, green grapes, white nectarines, golden Pippin apples, red and yellow raspberries, dried kiwi) and vegetables (radishes, pineapple heirloom tomatoes, English peas, sugar snap peas, onion sprouts, sprouted peas, cherry tomatoes, basil) and other yummies (goat cheese, baba ganoush, pesto, hummus, tofu jerky). The selection really was overwhelming, but despite the competition, the prices weren't that cheap. Lisa won't even tell me how much we spent (I don't think I want to know). Nevertheless, there really is nothing like fresh-from-the-farm produce, and there are few places like California where just about everything can be grown locally.

I recently posted some initial thoughts about California living based on my first couple of weeks as a repatriated Californian. Some further observations from the past few weeks:

* In Milwaukee, the local paper ran a traffic column once a week. The San Jose Mercury News runs a traffic column every day. It's that important.

(Admittedly, I can't complain too much. My commute is routinely less than 20 minutes, and I've hit bad traffic only a couple of times).

* My office has no air conditioning. It would have never occurred to me to ask about air conditioning--I just assumed that every law school building in the US has AC. Sadly, no. The good news is that AC is needed in Santa Clara only a few weeks out of the year. The bad news is that the last couple of weeks have been hot and sweaty. My fingers keep slipping off the keyboard....

* In Milwaukee, we had a 3/4 acre lot. It was so large and wooded that I couldn't see my neighbors. More importantly, I couldn't smell my neighbors. In Mountain View, we have a generous (by CA standards) 0.2 acre lot. Nevertheless, I can see my neighbors on all sides...and smell them too. The neighbor behind us (i.e. upwind) fires up the grill every Saturday and Sunday afternoon. The last few weekends haven't been too bad because we've kept the windows closed and blasted the AC. But otherwise, when I open up the window in my home office on the weekends, as I sit at the keyboard, all I can think is....TERIYAKI CHICKEN. Talk about a nuisance, especially for a vegetarian.

* In Milwaukee, people experienced general malaise in late January and February as the omnipresent cold and darkness took its toll. I've been told that in California, people experience a similar malaise in mid-December and mid-April...when property taxes are due. Property tax due dates are like days of reckoning--have we been good enough savers during the year to stash away the cash to write a check large enough to feed a small city in China? I for one am panicking already.

* BTW, I never shared the final stat--our Mountain View house was exactly 5X more expensive than the sales price on our Milwaukee house. And, get this--the seller of our Mountain View house had benefited from 3 decades of Prop. 13, so our property taxes are over 10X what he was paying. No wonder why everyone in Mountain View was so excited to see us--we just dramatically increased the tax rolls!

I've created a new category for this blog, "California Living." This is the analogue to my "Life in Wisconsin" category, which I haven't officially retired but isn't likely to see a lot of posts.

To kick off the new category, some observations about my first two weeks as a repatriated Caliifornian:

* California is more "all-American" than Wisconsin. Let me provide 2 data points in support:

- We expected that Wisconsin would epitomize the stereotype of friendly people who welcome new neighbors with tuna casseroles or baked goods. Instead, when we relocated to Wisconsin, most of our neighbors ignored us. This isn't a criticism, but it surprised us a little. In contrast, in our new home in Mountain View, we've had 3 different neighbors ply us with baked treats, and at least a half-dozen neighbors have dropped by our home unannounced just to welcome us to the neighborhood.

- On Independence Day, we went to my sister/brother-in-law's neighborhood in Palo Alto. There, the neighborhood organized a "parade" of sorts. The parade's theme was "Fun with Food," so everyone in the neighborhood came out with various costumes festooned with food items (like the person wearing a box of Cheerios on her head). A fire truck (with lights flashing) led the parade and was followed by a marching band made up of neighborhood volunteers, which was followed by a volunteer flag team. Then, there were homemade floats, kids on bikes/skateboards/scooters, pets in costumes and people just marching. There were people on stilts, people walking while juggling, kids being pulled in wagons, and lots of red, white and blue. Very few people actually watched the parade from the sidewalks; just about everyone (including us) marched along. The parade then ended in the local park, where the BBQs were smoking and serving up a lunch of burgers, chips and watermelon. Then, it was time for the games--sack race, three-legged race, water balloon toss, etc. What could be more all-American than this? But, in the heart of the Silicon Valley!

(Speaking of which, my son ate like an all-American yesterday. He plowed through popcorn, potato chips, 2 big slices of watermelon (with juice dribbling down his chin onto his shirt), and 2 juicy plums (ditto). Then, he complained of a tummyache. You would think he would have known better because he’s read the Very Hungry Caterpillar many times!)

* On the subject of neighborhoods, I think of Silicon Valley as filled with lots of people in transition who are constantly moving in and out. So imagine my surprise when I learned that at least 3 of my immediate neighbors are the original owners of their homes (42 years!), another neighbor inherited the home from his parents, and we bought the home from the estate of a person who was an original owner. And the neighbors across the street have been there 25 years. So instead of being a revolving-door community, we've moved into a community that is way more stable than I could have ever imagined (and with even less turnover than our neighborhood in Wisconsin).

* In California, the newspaper headline reads: Technologists figure out how to bypass China's Internet firewall. In Wisconsin, the typical Internet-related headline was: more predators found online! (there were at least a half-dozen front-page articles on that topic in the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel during my 4 years there).

* Google/Earthlink are building the infrastructure to offer free wireless service throughout Mountain View. In practice, this means that every 4th or 5th street light has a little box with 2 antennae on it. Unfortunately, the network isn't live yet, but I can't wait to get some free wireless Internet access! (yes, I am aware of the privacy concerns, but hey--AT&T is providing our DSL service. Need I say more?)

* Our local park has beautiful trees--Palm trees, Oak trees and (my favorite) Redwoods. The amazing thing is--all of these trees are right next to each other. It's like having 3 ecosystems, ranging from desert to chaparral to rain forest, within the span of 50 feet.

* In the past two weeks, we've eaten at a vegan Chinese restaurant (Garden Fresh, about 2 miles from our house), an all-vegetarian Indian restaurant (Udupi Palace, which is absolutely terrific), and an Ethiopian restaurant (Zeni in San Jose). Interestingly, the latter 2 restaurants cater to strong ethnic communities; my wife and I were conspicuous minorities when we went.

* Not a single Calfornian has yet commented on my standard attire of Tevas with white socks.