Susie's Meanderings

Update

Well, after over a year of temping at the same company, they've finally made an honest woman out of me and hired me permanently. I must say if you'd told me ten years ago that I would one day live my life running sql queries and making them pretty in Excel... well to tell the truth, I wouldn't have known what either of those things were. Remarkably, I really enjoy it, and am in the process of pursuing my MCDBA. (I realized one week into my C# class that I am definitively NOT cut out to be a developer - I liked making the pretty user interface, but had NO idea how to make the code do anything with it).
As to the cats - they have what can best be described as an armed truce, and occasionally run elaborate running battles with lots of dramatic standing on the hind legs and batting each other, only to curl up in their respective spots in the kitty tower. No pictures yet.

Removing Comments

Well, it's that time of year again when I have to decide if I want to renew my domain name again. I think I do, though I've become terribly lackadaisacal about posting.
However, the opportunity has come up at work to do a little minor web design (very simple, just updating a style sheet, but apparently our web team was unwilling to take it on, so I volunteered), so it seems like it would be useful to have something to practice on.
In the meantime, I'm taking away the ability to comment until I have the time and energy to figure out how to keep the comment spam away. I've already locked it down to only recent posts, but now they seem to be waiting like vultures for a new post, which discourages me even further. So, most of you know how to email me anyway, and I'd like to hear from you, and should I ever stop working 50 hour weeks and attending 8 hours of class, maybe I'll bring the comments back.

December

Oh, I'm really letting things go here. The truth is, I have a soul destroying job that depresses me to write about, and most of last month I was stretching myself to drive to Bellevue twice a week for the highlight of the week, my A+ Certification class. There we tore apart computers (without having a friendly help desk person on the other end of the line), programmed in DOS, learned to count in binary and hex.. what fun was mine! As a side effect (I like to think of it as extra credit voluntary homework) I upgraded my video card (Age of Empires has never looked so good), changed my power supply, upgraded my memory and got an external hard drive. I repossessed my old 1997 era laptop, which maxes out at 96 MB of RAM and am trying to decide if it's worth keeping it just to practice in DOS...
So I had a busy little November, and now that it's December, I'm supposed to be studying for the certification exam. Just 500 pages more to read and a few hours of practice tests left to go.
However, Hawaii is in two weeks, so maybe I'll get some pictures up then.,.

New Toy

I've been having some issues with thermometers lately. I've been watching a lot of cooking shows, and Alton is always bringing out his trusty thermometer, but all they do for me is stubbornly refuse to tell me that my roast is done.
So it was with some trepidation that I allowed a wireless digital thermometer to fall into my cart at Costco. It stayed in its giant clamshell for two days, patiently awaiting my attention. Finally, I threw one of those frozen lasagnes in the oven (the kind that pretends to be all bubbly and hot on the outside while remaining frozen on the inside) and decided this would be the perfect test for my new toy.
The directions were not promising. It wasn't at all clear, (except to my common sense) whether I was supposed to leave the probe in the meat the whole time, and should the transmitter go in the oven with the meat too? Or was I supposed to let the little metal wire leading from probe to transmitter break the seal of my oven? Being that the transmitter is largely made of plastic, I deduced it probably didn't want to go in the oven.
Long story short, I am utterly charmed by my new toy. I left the probe in the lasagne, strung the wire gently out the oven door, and placed the transmitter on the counter, then walked away, hand unit tucked under my arm. Then from the comfort of my couch, I could monitor the progress of my lasagne. It made a cheerful chirp when it was 5 degrees away from done, and a more determined one a few minutes later. End result? Perfectly done lasagne,and no leaping up from the couch every five minutes to monitor its progress. Total control, and I didn't have to lift a finger.

Back Trouble

I was lifting a 2 oz saucer out of my dishwasher yesterday when out of the blue my back seized up, and within 30 minutes I was paralyzed with pain, unable to move faster than an excruciating shuffle across the living room. My cat finds this fascinating. He is sure I'm stalking some unseen monster and slinks along at my side, looking up at me every so often to be sure he's on the right track, and usually plants himself squarely in the spot where my next footfall is planned.

Today, after much determined standing on my feet, I became mobile enough to foray out to Target and Walgreens in search of a suitable heating pad. Some perverse devil has stocked both of these stores so that all the back pain remedies are on the lowest shelf, thus anyone with back pain has absolutely no chance of reaching them. I did, with great determination, wrest a heating pad off its shelf, but had to leave behind the intriguing "Icy Hot Velcro Back wrap" since one trip to the lower shelf was all I had in me.

Pushing the Boundaries of Office

At work I'm creating a document with a large number of codes, and I'm indexing it, which leads to a great deal of what the spell checker deems "errors". I have auto-spell check on, because it's boring work, and I make a lot of mistakes. The document is almost 100 pages, and the other day, I reached a new low. A message popped up my screen telling me that I had too many spelling errors for Word to be able to continue tracking them, and if I wanted to spell check, I'd have to go back up to tools and do it manually. Who knew spell check had a capacity. I'll tell you though, I also managed to make a formula in excel so long that it filled up the cell, and I had to distribute it across 3 columns. Each day is more exciting than the last.

Sourdough

Well, the first loaf of bread has already been devoured, and I made the mistake of looking at Cook's Illustrated to see how sourdough should really be made. One would never know that pioneers and gold miners made sourdough successfully every day out on the trail without having a baking stone, an instant read thermometer, a dough scraper, and a refrigerator in which to proof the dough. According to their recipe there's another 48 hours between me and a loaf of bread. Sigh. All I can say is there must have been some hungry miners in the 1800s.
In other news, I rather precipitately signed myself up for a 5 k run two weeks from now. Keep in mind I've been almost totally sedentary for the last 6 months, but today I did manage to run all three miles (very slowly) on the treadmill. I'm not sure I want to do it again any time soon, but all my little insomnia issues should be solved today.

Kitchenaid Delight

I have been wanting a Kitchenaid mixer for years. Finally, they went on sale and I brought one home. I really had been wanting one of the pretty lime green ones (or pink, or orange, or navy blue) but I couldn't see spending the extra $100 for a slightly bigger bowl and 25 extra watts of power. So my sturdy little white mixer sat, completely unused, for two weeks on my counter. I faithfully bought butter for cookies, and used it instead in waffles, but today, finally, it entered active duty. I had a little sourdough left from making pancakes, so out came the dough hook, and a very nice loaf of bread resulted (not very sour, but then the sourdough was only 24 hours old...), I was so delighted with how easy that was that I cranked out a batch of oatmeal chocolate chip cookies. Between that and dinner, I actually ran out of room in my oven. It was very exciting.

Running Again

Wow, so it's been about 6 months, or more, since I've done any serious running at all. All that time at a desk job, not even having to walk across 1/4 mile of ship to get my dinner and it was time to take it up again. I let myslef believe that a couple of easy sessions on the elliptical walker last week was enough warm up to face the 2 mile treadmill. The first 1/4 mile I was pretty sure somebody was stabbing my knees with knives, but that feeling went away once the oxygen deprivation kicked in....anyway, I did run a total of two miles, just not all together in a row. I guess that 5k is going to have to wait a little while.

Pot Roast

Okay, crock pot Pot roast - very tasty, and I discovered, much to my delight, that it is not necessary to brown the meat. OH and I've discovered a new and delightful restaurant up in Mill Creek... Azul, which has $3 appetizers for happy hour, and they're very very yummy. This alone would be enough, but they also have an excellent selection of microbrews on tap.
Not much other news to impart. My most exciting travel plans in the future look to be Cedar Rapids for two weeks in the fall. No more jetting off to Europe at a moment's notice.

New Restaurant

Okay, I should start my mentioning that the crock pot fajitas were not an unqualified success. Very tasty, yes, but the texture was all wrong. A bit like pot roast fajitas. Not that it stopped me from having seconds. And then I mixed up the leftovers with a little BBQ sauce, on a french roll with swiss cheese in the toaster oven. VERY tasty.
I'd also like to mention that I found a new good restaurant in a very surprising location. I should begin by saying that I was driving from Oregon to Seattle this weekend, and the traffic was atrocious. I mean 5 mph through Chehalis, Centralia and Lacey. Not your usual bad traffic. So , by Lacey my sister and I were getting a bit hungry, and the traffic was at a dead stop, and on the highway sign, we saw a place called "A Bit of Europe". Needless to say, we were intrigued. We drove the required mile off the highway, and well, let me just say they had the best goulash I've ever eaten, in or out of Hungary. I wanted to lick the plate. And the medallions of pork with brandied cream sauce... yummy. I won't even mention the chocolate cake with a chocolate mousse filling and ganache for icing. I will say I dreamed that night that I was sitting inside a giant dumpling covered in gravy ....
So anyway, if you ever find yourself in Lacey... this is a huge giant step above McDonalds.

Last Comic Standing

Okay, an old friend of mine from college has a chance to be voted back on to the final show of Last Comic Standing, so if you feel like it, you can vote for him here:

1. Click on http://www.nbc.com/Last_Comic_Standing/voting/
2. Scroll down, and pick Josh Wolf
3. Fill in your name and click Vote

And I promise to write more about me soon. Still recovering from my two day trip to Amsterdam, after which, surprise surprise, I was selected by US Customs for special screening. Remarkably, they didn't believe me that I'd only bought chocolate.

No excuse

I'm in the process of uploading the long since promised tulip pictures. The problem in the end, is that they were on my laptop, which never even gets turned on anymore while I'm at home, since, until 9:30 this evening, I only had a single DSL connection, and the effort of plugging and unplugging my various computers to upload a few pictures was just too great. Today, however, glory be, I found a wireless linksys router for an amount I was willing to pay for it, and said goodbye to my days of tripping over the 40 foot phone cord that has been strung across my living room. It was touch and go for a while, since my cable modem and router shared an ip address, and so there was some conflict apparently as to who my computer was speaking to. That and it needed a firmware upgrade, and I had to clone the MAC address of my PC etc etc, so it was a good four hours of troubleshooting to set up my "one button, easy touch, no set up " linksys router, and I suspect without all the good IP Address and Subnetting training I received from Marr at BMGF, I'd have long since flung the router against the wall . Now, however, I have that satisfied feeling of having wrestled a thorny problem to the ground without, I might add, any assistance from tech support. (execpt what I found online). It's good, because the tech support guys at work have started talking to me like I might not understand words of more than one syllable, and they use that excessively patient tone of voice...so I was wondering if my skills were really dwindling....Anyway, tulip pics to follow soon.

Factory Tours Daily

Today I finally got to meet with the guys in charge of our warehouse to talk about training, and as a side benefit, I got a tour of the factory where we make all sorts of neat things, and then I got to see the warehousing process from Receiving to Shipping. I love factory tours, and I particularly love factory tours that directly impinge on my work. It's sort of like a Richard Scarry book come to life, only with people rather than worms and cats.

Welcome Back

One of the joys of having Netflix is rediscovering TV from my childhood that's been seemingly unavailable for years. Most recently, "Welcome Back Kotter" has arrived on my doorstep, and it breaks my heart to say it, but it's not as good as I remember. Granted, I was probably 10 the last time I saw it, and not very discerning... but was tv really so bad in the 70's? Corny jokes? Wooden scripts? Am I going to be similarly saddened if they ever finally release the Bionic Woman and the 6 Million Dollar Man on DVD? Still, I get a strange comfort out of watching them all (even if I do fall asleep 10 minutes in...). Gilligan's Island, here I come.

Horsen Men

So today I was on a small mission to find toy soldiers. (It's a very long and not very interesting story why) so I went to Fred Meyer in the toy section, and the closest I could come up with was plastic dinosaurs. So I asked the guy stocking the section (who was about 20, maybe) and he smiled the beatific smile, like I'd asked for the quaintest thing imaginable, and searched his memory and said "Oh, like those green ones who can't move? I know what you mean." but they didn't have them, though he described them in great detail to those who would know.
So, have they really fallen by the wayside? Are toys so sophisticated now that little green army men don't do it for us anymore?

"Sleep Deprivity"

So I'm sitting at my desk at work, and overhear somebody utter the phrase "Sleep Deprivity", and I'm wondering if it's related to "depravity" in any way. Because "Sleep Depravity" might be worth commenting on.
And don't get me started on the grammar errors that run rampant through our existing training materials (including an on-line course that everyone has to take). Doesn't anyone know how to use apostrophes anymore?
Okay, grammar rant is over. Work is fun and getting more interesting, and may, just may, take me to Europe next month. I'll keep you all posted.

Eagle Snacks

I just saw one of my bald eagles plunge down into the lake right in front of me, not 30 feet away. It wasn't like in the nature films where they nip down, delicately grasp their prey, and loft back up. This one plunged in, sat like a duck in the water for a minute, looking sort of frustrated, then sort of slowly pulled himself up and out and flew off across the lake. Still, it was pretty amazing.
Meanwhile, the sparrows are having a much easier time of it. The pile of seed I left for them doesn't go swimming off at the last second.

Just like a grown-up

Well, I'm starting to get settled in. Now I've graduated to making little Visio charts populated with multi-colored people to illustrate for everyone how we're going create and save documents for the project I'm working on. It could have just as easily been addressed in a four line email, but to cater to the hungry paper beast that lives in the office, I've also made a bulleted word document (out of what was a 10 paragraph piece of horrific density) to further enlighten the process. I think my role could best be described as "herd dog" or "organizer" (and it comes as a great surprise to me that I had any talent for organization at all), while I wait for the information to arrive which will allow me to get on with the business of designing lessons.
Meanwhile, I've engaged a simulated personal trainer to put me through my paces when I come home. It's highly entertaining, and if I work out lots, I can unlock new backgrounds and music for my workouts. It's like a video game without the guilt.

New Job!!!

Well, it's official. I'm not going back to sea (at least, not before October) because I'm once again gainfully employed. Now as to the details... well, I'm hoping that will all become more clear on Monday when I start. If anyone has read Citizen Girl... my parents say my description of the interview sounds like it's straight out of that book. Hopefully it won't end the same way however... all I know is it involves training and project management, so I'm spending my weekend with my head buried in "Microsoft Project, Step by Step", at 7 chapters a day, I should finish just in time. But the best part is the project rolls out in Europe and beyond this summer, and I "might have to travel". Yee haw! And here I thought I was bored with the roving life. Silly me.

Tax Time

Wow, it took a whole day, but my taxes are winging their way electronically to the IRS as I type. My enthusiasm for the project improved when I realized I was going to get a refund. Viva TurboTax! It was actually kind of fun, poring over my receipts, trying to remember... was Sydney this year, or the year before? Did Tahiti really straddle the New Year? Where is Stavanger? I even found one receipt written entirely in Thai.

There goes the neighborhood

The birds have returned with a vengeance. Though I live on the edge of a lake, apparently I still live in the city, because this morning a horde of English sparrows found my little deck, and looked as shocked as a group of sinners who'd found their way to the pearly gates. Next thing I know, the pigeons will find me, and I'll be hosting a mini Piazza San Marco out of my storage closet. Still, there's no such thing as bad publicity, and today the wrens and chickadees and juncos are all flocking in to be part of the crowd. I'd post pictures, but they all seem to be attuned to the sound of my camera turning on, and fly away at the least provocation.

Memeola

Okay, Jeanne has tagged me, and I must obey. And for an interesting discussion of memes, here's meme central

Four jobs I’ve had:
1) Waitress
2) High School Teacher
3) Administrative Assistant
4) Computer Trainer (that kind of counts as two...)

Four movies I can watch over and over:
1) Moonstruck
2) the Baz Luhrman Romeo and Juliet
3) Sabrina (the one with Audrey Hepburn and Humphrey Bogart)
4) Anchorman

Four places I’ve lived:
1) Liverpool
2) Paris
3) Dallas
4) Seattle

Four TV shows I love :
1) CSI
2) 30 minute meals
3) Numbers (how does one make a backwards s?)
4) My name is Earl

Four places I’ve vacationed:
1) Hawaii
2) Venice
3) Kenya
4) Bandon

Four of my favorite foods:
1) Stinky cheese
2) Chocolate (the darker the better)
3) My Mom's pie (any kind, she makes the best in the world)
4) all forms of bread and cheese (pizza, grilled cheese sandwiches, quesadillas...)

Four sites I visit daily:
1) Flickr
2) Cooksillustrated.com
3) Neopets (only so I can stay current with my nieces and nephews, who email me there...really, it's not the games)
4) Aaron's Liberry..what can I say? He comes first in the alphabet...and he makes me laugh.

Four places I would rather be right now:

1) Bora Bora
2) London
3) Venice
4) Paris

and I can't tag anyone, because everyone else has been taken....

Wired

So I came back from my daily hour at the library to discover the lovely UPS man had delivered my DSL Modem. Yipee! So I trudged through the (apparently required) CD assisted set-up, which included lots and lots of flash video showing me how to un-plug my phone from the wall, insert a filter, and plug my phone back into it....it has further added all sorts of toolbars to Internet explorer (though not, I'm pleased to note, to Firefox) and now I'm surfing happily, AND the birds have decided to take pity on me and return to the deck to partake of my seedy largesse.

Bird Boycott

So I went home for a few days, and neglected to leave food out for the birds who have been crowding my deck in a feeding frenzy. I did leave a perfectly nice bird feeder up for them, but unfortunately, it got a little clogged in the rain, and since then, the birds won't have anything to do with me, even though I've all but coated my little deck in seed.
Anyway, I'm back at the library (which I have to say, is a very active and lively library...it's always a trick to find parking here), since my neighbor, who was so generously sharing his/her wireless internet, has decided to cease his/her generosity to the world at large. Sigh. My DSL is supposed to arrive Friday, and then what will I do for entertainment.

Still Moving

Well, now that I've ensured Ikea will stay in business for another 5 years, I'm mostly moved in. My couch is set up for optimum lake views, I finally have phone service after 23 minutes on hold with Verizon (yes, I timed it.. I was going to hang up after 20 minutes but then my mug of coffee spilled all over the counter, in the drawers below, and under the refrigerator, and while I was cleaning that up, the service rep answered the phone. ) So in 5 -7 days I should be able to check my email from the comfort of my own home. Oh, and I saw a bald eagle in the tree next to my apartment yesterday.

Digs Part II - Moving Day

So here it is, not even 2:00, and I'm done with my move. The nice moving van came an hour early, the nice men with hand trucks did all the heavy lifting, and now it's all over but the sorting. Much to my surprise, I had 21 boxes stored in my sister's attic (I had airily told the movers "about 7 boxes"), which all had to be moved down to ground level so the movers could whisk them away. I'm pretty sure I don't need or want any of it, being as it's been 2 years since I've even looked at it, but one never knows. Now I'm back at my sister's house, having a last peek at the internet ( my connection isn't likely to be up for a few days) and "shopping" in her Costco surplus for staples. I love my family.

New Digs!

So I've been in Seattle for two days, and already I've got a new apartment. I went out just to see what might be in the neighborhood, and I took my Mom along, because she's good at seeing the flaws my kind eye is eager to gloss over and I figured she'd keep me from making a precipitate decision. But we found one on the lake (my balcony is a mere 20 feet from the waters edge...) complete with cheeping birds and she was sold. There wasn't even a token protest. So tomorrow I go down to sign the papers, and Thursday the movers are coming to extract my paltry belongings from my sister's house. So finally, once again I'm available for book clubs and barbecues and pumpkin carvings. Yay. Housewarming at my place soon.

Banned in Abu Dhabi

I just got this email from my friend who's living in the UAE. I always thought my pictures were pretty inoffensive, but it just goes to show, you never know... maybe it's just all of Flickr that's banned...
"You are going to be so proud!! I was looking at your website and saw the blog for the gingerbread house, so I clicked on the link to the photo of the gummy bear outpost, and the site was blocked!! As in, the UAE censors who block sites they deem inappropriate for viewing by your regular Muslim Joe have found your photos of the gingerbread orgy to be an offense to the moral fiber of the residents of this country. Is that the biggest hoot on record or what?!?"

I've never been offensive to the moral fiber of an entire country before. It's pretty exciting.

Sunbreak!

So there I was, sitting at my computer, chatting with one of my friends, and the sun came out! Clear blue skies, little puffy clouds...it was glorious. I had to cut my chat short so I could go out for a run (since I suspected the sun was only good for about an hour). When I ventured outside I discovered the squirrels had been gnawing on their feeder because I hadn't been out to fill it that morning (sigh), but the run was glorious. Everyone was out with their happy dogs, little newts ran across my path, steam rose from the fields...and sure enough, as I finished, the clouds began to loom on the horizon, sliding insidiously in to renew the rain. So Brenda - I'd love a little sunshine shop right about now.

Power Outage

So after a month of relentless drizzle, finally the weather got up enough energy to do something really interesting, and just as I was about to go downstairs and happily ensconce myself in the latest offering from Netflix last night, the lights went out. Being that the wind had blown all the clouds away, it was a glorious moonlit night, and we went out for a walk up on our hill to see how much of the town was knocked out ( a lot of it). It's funny how much light the houses usually cast, because without them, the moonlight was almost as bright as day, and certainly cast a sharper shadow than the sun has bothered to do this last month.
Anyway, obviously the power is back, and the rain has returned. The forecast for this week - rain, showers, rain, rain, cloudy, showers. Sigh.

Sigh...

I've been taking a lot of the free time I have at home to sort through my old childhood books - most of which (almost my entire Nancy Drew collection) are going to get passed on to people who can appreciate them... but this caused me to remember a book I had loved much, and could only get in the library, because even 20 years ago, it was pretty well out of date. The internet is a miracle though, because in a delightful ironic twist, I was not only able to find a copy of this book online, I'm pretty sure I got the VERY copy I used to check out of the library so faithfully, since it was a library copy, sold by a local used book store. I couldn't wait to settle in to this bit of nostalgia... but as so often happens, you just can't go home again. It turns out to be an awful book - bad writing, silly plot, wooden characters...my imagination must have made up for a lot in those days.

New Year

The candy canes weren't appropriate anymore, so it's back to the pansies. In other news.. despite the fact that it's been raining non-stop here for a week, the floodwaters in the Willamette have receded (though it made for a very impressive walk by the river this weekend, where the opposite bank of the river had become a mid-channel island. I have a new squirrel visiting the feeder, a little tiny red one, so that now at lunch our back deck is beginning to look like a wildlife refuge with two types of squirrels and flocks of birds. I'm beginning to think I need to find a job...

Christmas Tree Shopping

Christmas Tree Farm, originally uploaded by SusieQ36.

Squirrel Wars

My mom has this bird feeder, intended for the use of cute little song birds, but mostly it's ruled by the jays and the squirrels. I like the squirrels, so I bought them some hazelnuts, but after a day of this, the jays would lie in wait for me, and fly in like a squadron and clean out the bird feeder of nuts before the squirrels were even awake. So, I bought a squirrel feeder... it's a little wooden box with a lid that has a plastic window that slides out so that one can clean the feeder...

Day 1: Squirrel feeder utterly ignored by the squirrels, while the jays make ever more desperate attempts to get to the hazelnuts they can see so clearly behind the plastic barrier.

Day 2: See above

Day 3: A grendel has arrived in the night and utterly cleaned out the feeder - we suspect a raccoon, but the squirrels spend the day visiting and using the feeder as intended. A few entertaining moments are spent watching new squirrels learn their way into the feeder. One finds his way in accidentally, then grabs the feeder with both hands and shakes it when he can't remember how he did it before.

Day 4: One of the squirrels learns to remove the plastic slider and toss it disdainfully into the garden below so that he can lie down in the food and scoop it into his mouth. The jays are delighted. I spend the day running down into the garden and refilling the feeder.

Day 5: I put a rubberband around the feeder over the sliding panel. The squirrel rolls his eyes at me as he pushes it aside to remove the panel and toss it into the garden.

Day 6: Tired of the whole slider game, the squirrels chew off just the side of the feeder that holds the slider in place, and toss the slider into the garden. Dad spends the morning in his workshop, reconstructing the side and adding a lock. The squirrels haven't touched it since...

Christmas Cards

In a great fit of organization (largely spurred on by boredom and lots of advertising pressure from Shutterfly and Ofoto - whose new Kodak name I can never remember), I actually decided to do Christmas cards this year, and carefully designed them up in Photoshop, and for once, I actually have them all in the mail before Christmas (actually there's a big stack of them waiting for stamps, but they'll be in the mail tomorrow). And once again I have papercuts all over my tongue and I'm ready to throw my printer out the window. I always think it will be fun and easy to do a mail merge and print all my envelopes, even though long experience with printing envelopes should have taught me otherwise. In the time I spent trying to figure out how to make my printer print in the right place (it insisted on pretending I was centering the envelope in the printer tray, even though I was clearly putting the envelopes in the envelope tray) I could have hand addressed fifty envelopes. So for anyone who thinks mail merged envelopes are cold and impersonal... I can assure you I have lots of strong personal feelings about them right now....

Back to School

Day 2 of my Dreamweaver class. Thanks to KB and his insistent prodding about CSS, I'm not completely lost, and in fact, it's doing a marvelous job of pulling things together for me that I've always been confused about. Of course, now my site's due for a complete overhaul, but I'm waiting until I learn about slices first, which I think might be tomorrow.
Anyway, Im armed with my yellow highlighter that has a little post-it flag holder, and thanks to the Sushi place across the way, I now have two free golf calendars (2 lunches = 2 calendars) so I have an extra if anyone wants one. :)

Assimilation

Apparently a week in the fog is all it takes for me to be fully assimilated to lack of sunshine. I was up at 6:30 this morning to begin the drive to Oregon in the dark and the fog, and I actually couldn't tell you when the sun came up, since the only difference was that it was moderately easier to see my coffee cup in the drink holder. As we approached Oregon, though, the fog burned off and the sun shone brilliantly, right into my eyes. My niece (far more assimilated than me) hid from it under her blanket, and I squinted and rolled the window down to combat the burning rays of the sun. Funny to think that just a week ago I was chasing the sun...

Winter

Well, I've spent my week in Seattle, and I'm pretty sure the fog hasn't lifted the entire time I've been here. I keep assuring myself that the sun is still up there somewhere, but it doesn't seem very likely. Anyway, having just gotten the timing belt on my car changed (which should have happened 10,000 miles ago), I'm now ready to drive down to Oregon for the holidays. Thankfully, my brother-in-law noticed one of my headlights was out, and spent the next half hour fixing it for me. It was news to me that one didn't have to change out the entire headlight, but just a tiny little (and remarkably expensive, if you have a japanese car) bulb.

Shopping

Funny how the most mundane tasks are fun again when they're not a part of your normal existence. Yesterday I went to the grocery store and wandered dazed up and down the aisles. It's not that I haven't been to a grocery store recently, but this is the first time in a while I could buy anything I wanted, without having to think first if it could be heated up in a hot pot or stored in my tiny refrigerator. I'm even enjoying doing laundry, because I don't have to watch the clock lest somebody throw my still damp clothes out onto the floor because they need a dryer. I'm trying to enjoy doing dishes, but it's not really working for me yet.

Leaving the Sea

Well, it's done. I've told the office I'm not coming back to another ship (at least, not immediately, I'm not burning any bridges here). So I have two and a half weeks of glorious martinin nights and sunny days before it's back to the cold and grey of the Northwest winter. I'm actually pretty excited about it. I've already signed up for a 3 day Dreamweaver class in Portland, and we'll see where life takes me from there. If anyone has any brilliant ideas, I'm all ears. I'd like a job where I don't have to be nice to anyone I don't like....
Meanwhile, I'm back in St Thomas, frittering the day away in the internet bar again, along with all the musicians from the ship, who like it here because nobody hassles them about downloading music. The weather (despite what you might be hearing about hurricane Wilma) is glorious here, so I may find some time to go lie by the pool yet today. I just bought a new bikini (God only knows what I'll do with it in Seattle), in St Maarten, so I need to at least cut the tags off it and introduce it to the sun.

Stalking the Perfect Hollandaise

The other day I made macaroons, which left me with some very nice free range bought from the farmer egg yolks, which I absolutely could not put down the drain. Being as we were having salmon that night, it occurred to me I might attempt the hitherto unsurmountable prospect of hollandaise... or more specifically, mousseline, which is the same thing, only with whipped cream added at the end to make it more fluffy. As it happened, it turned out perfectly (much to my surprise and delight), which meant that the next time we had salmon, I had to make it again, which led, naturally, to another batch of macaroons....I just didn't want you all to think that I had slipped forever into the world of Neopets, never to be heard from again....Incidentally, cold mousseline goes very nicely over cold leftover salmon...

The Hazards of Visiting Family

Yesterday my niece asked for help with her Neopet, and being totally unfamiliar with the species, I decided the best way to help her would be to have one of my own. Turns out they're moderately addictive. I don't recommend them to anyone.
I was going to put a picture of mine here, but the code they gave me doesn't seem to work, and after my run this morning, my brain just doesn't want to work on the problem.

A gadget for each hand and one on my hip

I think I've finally reached gadget saturation point,.I went for my run this morning with a pedometer to track my mileage, an mp3 player (which, thank goodness, has a stopwatch, so that eliminated the 4th gadget) and a cell phone, in case I sprained my ankle and had to call my parents to come get me. I seem to remember a time when I went out for a run with nothing but my watch.

Snake Run

Had a really nice run this morning, but it turned out to be a little hot, since the snakes were hogging all the shade on the trail. Actually, it was just one little snake, sitting aggressively in the middle of the path, and after I got over squealing and leaping around, I think it might have decided to find a quieter place for its aggression, since it was gone when I came back. Nonetheless, you didn't catch me running in any shade all the way home, since in my running delerium, I wasn't entirely which patch of shade harbored the beast (which was at least 8 inches in length, if not 9). Meanwhile, Mom and I are going down to sign up for a 5k run this Sunday. Wish me luck.

Why I Love Summer in Oregon

From the farmer's market....

First Day Home

To be fair, it's really my second day home, but the first day was lost to the delerium of jet lag and the renewal of my acquaintance with high speed internet.
However, today started with a bowl of Cheerios and fresh blueberries, followed by a nice long run which didn't involve heaving decks or steering around strolling couples. In fact, it smelled delightfully of sun warmed blackberries. A little shopping with Mom, where we explored the only Italian deli in town (where I could choose from "imported or domestic" prosciutto, sliced by a rather glazed teenager) It's no Livornese prosciutto, but it will suffice. A little cooking, lots of nice coffee and the perfect gin and tonic rounded out my day.

Naples

I may not have gotten to eat at my favorite pizza place in the world today (as it is, alas, Sunday), but I made up for it by having 4 of my favorite coffees, and still a really nice meal of shrimp and mushroom pasta (and when I say shrimp, I mean shrimp in the singular, still complete with his little jacket and head and appendages - actually, large prawn would be more accurate). It was a huge plate and I was convinced I wouldn't even try to finish it, and indeed, halfway through I was sort of piling it all in a corner to make it look like I'd eaten more (and to make room for the de-braining of the shrimp), but somehow my fork kept diving into the pasta until it was all gone. It was something about the way the mushrooms had taken on the consistency of delicately coddled eggs. I don't think I"ll be hungry for hours to come, but when I am, I have some fresh buffalo mozarella waiting for me....

Attacking the My Documents Beast

I'm rapidly counting down my last few days of sloth before it's time to go back to "work". I spent yesterday in Portland with my nieces again. I had intended to bring my new computer with me and load it up with software, but ran into such issues that it became clear I was going to need to reinstall the operating system (partly because it came out of the factory with a ridiculously small c: drive partition). So I gave up in disgust and went out to watch my niece play in the back yard. It was a glorious hot sunny day, and before long it became clear to me that sitting up was no longer an option, and I stretched out on the grass and fell asleep, like a cat napping in the sun.
Today, now that I'm faced with backing up all my data from the laptop prior to the great disk re-organization, I decided to tackle the "My Documents" folder on my big computer, where I discovered to my horror, not just duplicates of files, but quadricates and quinticates of files, all safely tucked away in folders bearing names that had no relation to their contents. Anyway, I think the beast has been tamed, and I'm just crossing my fingers that I haven't tossed anything of merit. I did find some nice Windows Haiku buried away though, that must have been circulating on the internet a while ago.

Back to Work

For those of you who are interested in my movements for the next four months, I've finally (after three weeks of utter sloth) updated my calendar let me know if you see any glaring errors. And no, I'm not entirely certain where Flaam is.

Susie's Big Day out

Today I got up at the ungodly hour of 7:00 (earlier than I've seen the light of day in about 3 weeks) to drive all the way up to Portland to get my hair cut (KB, I meant to call you for dinner, but my sister-in-law and the girls got prior claim). I've been going to the same guy since I was a teenager, and my mother pointed out to me, that of all the appointments I had to make (eye doctor, dentist, etc) this vacation, the only one that came to pass was with my hairdresser.
Anyway, it was an excuse to get out of sweats and put on real clothes, drive a car (another thing I haven't done much of lately), listen to my own music, and I ate at McDonalds and Starbucks. (Since I try not to eat at those places when I'm out of the country AND I knew my sister in law would be feeding me whole grain rice noodles for dinner), and when I got my coffee, the girl behind the counter wished me happy Friday, and I realized it's been almost two years since weekends had any meaning for me at all. Funny life.

Flowers

This is my favorite time of year to come home, and here's why.....(incidentally, I resized these pictures with Picasa - way less labor intensive than Adobe...)

The Quiet Life

I use this term loosely, since the weekend involved three of my nieces, all under 10, visiting for the weekend. It was really a lot of fun to see them, and it broke up the routine a little. I spent most of the weekend cooking really elaborate dinners, since it means I get excused from all sorts of chores that I don't like. Chicken and dumplings (starting with a whole chicken carcass), Shrimp Scampi, (peeled and deveined 3 pounds of shrimp, and we ate it ALL) and today the crowning glory: Lamb Korma, Naan, Saffron Rice, Chana Dal and Potato Saag. I think I used an entire head of garlic today....but it was yummy. Though I must say, making the Naan was a bit of an adventure, which required a fully hot oven PLUS a fully hot broiler, and me slapping dough onto hot trays and moving them between the ovens. Add in three little girls scampering around the kitchen... well, it was an adventure.

Gems from the past

As I write, I'm working on my big computer, the monster workhorse that is now (gasp) over two years old and starting to hum a bit. Next to it sits my brand new laptop, shiny and pretty and sooo lightweight. It's also on, because I'm transferring all the pictures I took last contract to the big monster. Not sure why exactly, they both have roughly the same hard drive space. The desktop just SEEMS bigger. Meanwhile, tucked in a box in the corner is my first ever laptop, which I bought in 1991, and somehow, through 10 different addresses, I still have the manuals. It contains such gems as "Using DOS commands", and "What is a Directory?". The computer itself has a blazing 16MHz processor, and 640KB of RAM (upgradeable to 1MB!) and an inconceivable 20 MB hard drive. Unfortunately, I've lost the power cord, so all the mystery and nostalgia buried therein are lost to me. Not that I remember the DOS commands anyway.

Sloth Continued...

Well, not utter sloth, since my parents had booked tickets for Ashland this weekend. Still suffering from jet lag, I poured myself into the car at 7:45 on a Friday morning, grabbed a pillow and blanket, and slept blissfully throughout the 4 hour drive. We arrived just in time for the first play (The Philanderer - Shaw) which was good, though some of the characters suffered from overacting... a nap followed, and a very nice Italian dinner (Il Giardino), and immediately on to another play (Room Service ... very well acted). The next day was really the perfect day - up not too early for breakfast, then a nice quiet morning in the bookstore, followed by a lunch of tapas, and another play (this one an experimental one written precisely for the two actors who played in it - interesting, very well acted, but the script, well, was a little lacking). Naptime again, lovely french dinner with good wine, followed by an August Wilson play which was by far the best of the lot. Well acted, good script, not conducive to good and restful sleep, but I caught up on the long and rainy drive home. All in all, what more could one ask from a weekend?
Oh, and in the spirit of KB my motel had - not free wireless - but free high speed internet nonetheless. Pretty impressive for your standard, run of the mill, outside corridor motor hotel from the 70's.

Starbuck's Again

Well, no pictures because I didn't bring my computer into town today, but there's some nice video of me sliding down the ice slide at the Antartic Center. Today found me having another Starbuck's breakfast, but their drip coffee machine was broken, so I had to have a latte. All I want is a decent cup of drip coffee these days, because lattes are a dime a dozen in the mess. We took the cable car up to the top of a hill in Wellington today, and walked down through the botanical gardens - only to discover we were on entirely the wrong side of town and had to walk back up the hill to catch the cable car back down again. Still, it's a gorgeous day, and that made room for our lunch at the Balti House.

Whirlwind Visit

One might think, given that I am only home for four days (leaving, now, in 5 hours) that my parents might take pity on me and let me lie like a sloth on the couch, catching up on all the back issues of the New Yorker. But no. Wednesday was the inevitable circuit weights class with Dad, which left me feeling roughly like I'd been beaten with a large stick. Though Dad assures me if I only weren't so lazy in my normal life, it wouldn't hurt so much. Not to be left out, the next day Mom was waiting for her turn . I pled exhaustion and pain, but was assured that a run was "just the thing" for my sore muslces. And to be fair, it was a really lovely run.
So now I'm almost all packed, just anticipating the next oh, 20 hours of travel that lie ahead. I have a stack of good books, and am trying very hard to make my Mp3 player speak to my computer before we leave. They seem to be on the outs with each other today.

Home Again

After some 20 hours of travel, I am once again back in the lovely Northwest. I have to say, I waited all day for the sun to rise, and it never really seemed to happen. Not that I don't appreciate the misty grey skies and jewel green of the moss, but it's not exactly the shades of turquoise and sunlight that my eye has become accustomed to. On the other hand, my Mom is spoiling me rotten, because I'm only home for 4 days, and there's been no time for my encroaching laundry to work on her nerves yet. Incidentally, I'm pretty certain my Mom makes the best blueberry pie in the entire world.

Quick Link

For all you former and current teachers out there. A good friend of mine has just put together a website meant to link teachers who want to work internationally with schools that are looking for them. You can post a profile for free. Anyway, here's the link

www.globalteachingjobs.co.uk

Best Laid Plans

The storage unit is clean and swept, my boxes carefully tucked, not as I expected, in my mother's closets, but my sister's attic. I have said goodbye to the niece and nephews (after having gone to see The Incredibles with them, which I highly recommend) and after an alternately foggy and sunny drive with my parents in the big station wagon loaded to the ears with suitcases and more boxes, I am once again at home.

Goodbye books

My whole life I've been surrounded by books - shelves upon shelves in the living room, stacks in my bedroom, entire libraries in the basement... so culling my entire book collection to 3 treasured boxes is a bit draining. On the other hand, reduced as I was to getting rid of the really treasured hardbacks, I actually made some decent money off the books at Half Price. Mind you, I spent it all again in the time it took them to price my books, but at least I've reduced the overall total. My sister in law said it best, she keeps the books she liked, not because she's going to read them again, but because she likes to look at them and remember reading them. I'm afraid I won't have any memories next time I have a house with a bookcase.

Wrestling the Storage Unit

I've finally come to the inescapable conclusion that it's costing me more to store my collection of low end Ikea furniture than it would to get rid of it all and buy it fresh again a few months down the line. My long suffering mother has agreed to take the few (24 as it turns out) small boxes that remain, and I have spent the week pawing through my worldly belongings, weighing it all in the balance. I'm ashamed to say that even after ruthless culling, I still seem to to have a disproportionate number of books (5 boxes, plus random empty spaces in the kitchen and junk boxes), that I am completely unwilling to part with.
Also, many thanks to K.B. again, for his help in the never-ending fight against blog spam. I know you're all desperate to comment on my old posts, but from now on you will have to content yourself with the more recent ones, as all comments on posts older than 7 days have been closed.

Back in the Cold Northwest

I spent the first 5 hours of my day trying to think of a good reason to get out of my pyjamas, and couldn't really think of one. Eventually the siren call of Target lured me out of my apathy, and I braved the drizzling mist to spend a happy hour in the bastion of American consumerism. I'm delighted to see how many tv series have appeared on DVD in my absence, and am seriously considering whether I need to add the first season of Northern Exposure to my collection. I think it will be particularly appropriate to bring with me to Tahiti.
Meanwhile it's three days to Halloween and the kids have their costumes all ready - Halloween in the Northwest is always such a balancing act of finding a costume you want to wear that's also warm enough that you don't have to wear your winter coat trick or treating. My youngest nephew has such a scary mask that he refuses to sleep in the same room with it. Can't say as I blame him. I still haven't discovered the stash of Halloween candy, but it's only a matter of time.

Mommy Boot Camp

I am not a morning runner. If I run before ten, my whole body protests for the rest of the day. However, with temperatures hovering in the high nineties the choice is morning or not at all. Fortunately I'm still jet lagged enough that my body thinks 6 am is sleeping in egregiously. Being home with my parents, not running is not an option. So this morning at 7 my mom is up making a pot of coffee and feeding me toast so we can be out for our run no later than eight, and as I'm standing miserably over my coffee, my father comes cheerily in to see if I want to join him for weight training this afternoon. Being as I haven't remotely exercised in the last three weeks, I begged for an extension until Friday, but I can see they're dissapointed in me. However, the run was lovely - it's glorious to be back at Bald Hill, running on a nice long path that stretches for miles ahead of me. It was a little too hot even at 8 though, so tomorrow we start at 7.

Wonder Woman

As part of my reindoctrination to land life, I accompanied my sister to Costco today, where naturally I paid a visit to the DVD section. There, lying innocuosly amongst the many mundanities, lay a lone copy of the first season of Wonder Woman. It literally leapt into my hand (I kid you not, ask the lady who was standing next to me). Daily viewings of Wonder Woman were part of the fabric of my childhood. Apparently, it was part of the fabric of the checkout girl's childhood too, as we had quite a lively discussion about playing Wonder Woman when we were little girls (except she said the version she watched had been dubbed into Korean). Now I just wish they'd come out with the Bionic Woman, and Shazaam and Isis.

Copenhagen

I'm finding Copenhagen as chilly and windy as ever this trip, but it's always nice to get to come see the family. Yesterday was my niece's confirmation, which means a big party with lots of wine and interesting conversation and good food. Mind you, much of the conversation was in Danish, and being as my Danish is limited to "mother, father and potato" I missed some of the more entertaining parts of the speeches, but I had very congenial dining companions, and as we worked our way through the wine, everyone's English became much better. Tomorrow we've promised the kids a trip to Tivoli, where I haven't been since I was a child. I think I'm as excited as they are.

Luggage Madhouse

Those heady days of sleeping in and grazing out of the kitchen have come to an aprubt end, yesterday began a whirlwind of shopping and packing (3 malls in two days), and once again, my suitcases are far too heavy to be brought on an international flight, much less dragged around the streets of Paris, Copenhagen and Venice. Mind you, I could put out the travel humidifier, travel hair dryer and others, but what would be the fun of that? I just bought a bigger purse so I could fit more in my carry on.

Home Again

Back in Seattle and for the moment I'm enjoying a day of not having to live to anyone's schedule. There are no classes looming, no 7:30 dinner , nothing but free time looming in front of me for the day. Mind you, that free time will have to be tempered with a certain amount of frantic unpacking and sorting of my clothes for my next departure on Thursday but for the moment I'm reveling in the fact that if I want a snack I only have to wander up two flights of stairs to the kitchen, rather than undertake a 10 minute trek to the buffet.
Had a lovely day in Ketchikan, glorious sun, good coffee and a refreshing change from Mexico.

Busy week

Oh, this doesn't bode well for keeping up with my blog on the ship. I'm not even there yet and already I've let 5 days go by. I plead lots of babysitting sick children, and I'm working on getting a page of Tahiti photos together (and Kris, I'm maybe going to try to use CSS for this) before I go. If anyone knows a better way to resize 67 pictures into thumbnails than one at a time in photoshop, I would love to know it. I know, there's automate batch, but that makes thumbnails that are 20k. It will be too late to help me now (the pictures are already resized) but it would be useful for future reference.
Spent a long and glorious day shopping with my sister, now I have to completely repack my suitcases for next week. 4 days and counting.

Conquering Witham Hill

As long as I can remember, the "Witham Hill Run" has loomed mythic in my consciousness. It's about a 4 mile run , and you can choose to run a gentle uphill the whole way, ending with a steep and glorious downhill, or you can attack the steeps at the beginning (3/4 of a mile of cliff-like slog) and have gentle and glorious downhill the rest of the way home. This is the run my mother did at the peak of her fitness when training for marathons. I always regarded it with horror - and in my mind it grew to a 15 mile loop uphill all the way. But today I was looking for a nice little 4 miler that was different from my usual. I figured if I got the uphill out of the way at the beginning the rest would be doable, and I could always peel out early and take the short loop home. What I did going up the hill barely qualifies as running, but once I got to the top (and then, the second heartbreaking little rise at the top of the top), the rest was, indeed, cake, complimented by the only sun we'd seen all day. (I seem to have come to an arrangement with the weather gods - they provide a little sun in the afternoon, and I go run in it). Now I'm wondering why I never did that run before (never mind that the times in my life that I could actually run 4 miles, much less uphill, have been few).

Family Boot Camp II

Despite the fact that my father is recovering from pnuemonia, and my mother from babysitting last weekend, they still seem to have time and energy to drag me out to their respective classes - today was Circuit Weights with Dad - I'm not sure if much compares with the experience of being in a run down old gym at the university surrounded by frail 60 year olds, all of whom can bench press about double what I can. Follow this with an icy shower (there's a sign indicating that maintenance is aware of the problem and working on it) - and a very nice lunch - then coffee - where I run into parents of friends I haven't seen since high school (of course, said friend is now a highly successful pediatrician and I'm ... playing for a living?) - then a nice walk home (for which the sun kindly appeared) to struggle with my taxes. Ugh. Self employment is expensive.

Ikea

What is a stay in Seattle without a trip to Ikea? Somehow, I managed to convince my sister not to bring her three children along for the trip (I think they were having a play date, or something) and it was a remarkably calm experience. I'm so used to controlling the cart with one hand while removing my nephew from the pillow bin with another that I hardly knew what to do with myself. In the end, I don't really need anything at Ikea - being as I don't have a house to fill right now, but I did get some great magnets for sticking things to the wall on my next ship. So I think I managed the impossible - getting out of Ikea for under $10.

Too stupid for lipstick.

Apparently I look dumber than I am. Today I was shopping for lip gloss at the Lancome counter, and I got momentarily distracted by some lipstick that had similar packaging. It was very clearly a different product, being as it was a completely different color, and said very clearly "cheek and lip tint" as opposed to "lip gloss", but I was curious about it, so I asked the salesman "and what about this?" and he said "Oh no, honey, don't look at that, it will just confuse you.". The day I get confused by lipstick is the day I need to stop shopping, so I persisted, and he impatiently said "That's a DIFFERENT product, you don't want to look at that!" So evidently, I'm not to be trusted with lipstick.

5 year old Karate

A day of total sloth today, aside from the inevitable laundry and dishes. Afternoon was spent huddled under a quilt reading and trying to keep my hands from freezing, then evening saw me watching my niece and nephews' Karate class. The youngest has a hard time keeping his obi tied, but he's very cute when he's concentrating - and when he couldn't figure out what he was supposed to do, he'd just pirouette until someone called him back in line.
Now it's just me and the parrots again, at the computer. Fred is developing a Pavlovian response to me and my laptop. Now he bounds across the cage every time he sees me, but his affection is purely material. If no peanuts are forthcoming he huffs away in disgust and watches me with a beady I, lest I make any moves toward the peanut bag.

Quiet Weekend

I was planning on a nice quiet weekend, with lots of time for quiet contemplation, picking up toys (without having them reappear mysteriously on the floor when I turn my back), uninterrupted tv watching, and perhaps a couple quiet runs, but, as it happens, my sister's family didn't make it to their cabin in the woods, due to a missing pair of snow boots. So instead my weekend involved "Open Swim" at the Y with family and assorted friends, play dates, homework dates, cooking endless pancake breakfasts (and yes, I did make cinnamon apples, for those of you who have sampled my pancake breakfasts). Somehow, we also found ourselves at Costco both Saturday and Sunday - which is a bad and dangerous place. We were actually on our way out the door today without having bought anything, when my sister made the mistake of calling home, and it turned out we needed milk. Once the milk was in the cart, the floodgates opened, and next thing we know, jumbo bags of shrimp, books, flats of croissants are all leaping into the cart. Has anyone ever walked out of Costco empty handed?

Storage

Things I discovered while sorting through my storage unit today:
1) I have too many books
2) Everything I need is in the unlabelled box at the bottom of the stack in the far corner of the unit.
3) I don't have as much stuff as I thought I did. Or it's all at my parents' house. My parents are convinced they ARE my storage unit. (Mom- you'll be pleased to know, I have a little extra room and I'll be taking some of my stuff out of your garage soon.)
4) Even though I labelled all my boxes on three sides (except for the above mentioned), my movers apparently mastered the art of turning them all so that the unlabelled side faces out.
5) Bring WD-40 for your lock

This is for Katie

So see Katie - I'm thinking of you, bored out of your mind in your training. I wish I had something significant and witty to relay, but I'm afraid I spent the morning helping my sister jump start her car, then went to the U district, had some coffee and a newspaper at Starbucks (I know, I know, I should be supporting the local coffee shops), then over to Bellevue mall, where I surprised myself by being quite restrained. I only bought shampoo. (well, and assorted other Aveda products). So I'm afraid my life is quite unblogworthy at the moment. My apologies to all. Does anyone know any "interesting adjectives"? My niece is bogged down in her homework.

PS Happy Birthday KT

Back in Seattle

Will it never cease raining? I had one of those drives yesterday up from Portland (where I had an excellent lunch with KB ) where you can never see more than 10 feet in front of you due to the road spray, and everyone around is going 70 and weaving in and out of traffic. Now I'm sitting quietly in my sister's basement, flanked on either side by a parrot (who does a very credible imitation of the kids yelling at each other) and a cockatiel who is desperate for attention. In the afternoon you can add my nephew, either beating me with his Lincoln logs, or demonstrating how his Bionicles look in every possible permutation of their beings. "See , here he is with his gold mask". It's all vastly entertaining, and I'm pretty sure I've read an entire library of children's books in the last 3 days, but I won't say I'm not looking forward to the myriad of coffee dates I have lined up this afternoon (Yay, Michelle and Katie!).

Running on Bald Hill

3 miles. 27 mins 55 secs. Wahoo! (Not a land speed record, I know, but fast for me.)

Returning to my Childhood

The latest project my father has devised for my entertainment is taking his entire collection of vinyl analog music and transferring it to digital on my capacious hard drive. I have to admit, this is something I've been biding my time waiting to do until I could either get my computer to my parents house (done) or convince my father to upgrade from his 4 year old Windows ME machine (no hope). So anyway, we spent the weekend finding the appropriate wiring ( a ten minute trip to Radio Shack), and digging through the old vinyl records. I'm ashamed to say, I've almost forgotten how a record player works. It feels so foreign, holding this huge clunky disk, cleaning it off, cleaning off the needle, and then actually having to wait for the whole lp to play while it records. And this was the real surprise - having to turn the record over halfway through the album. I'd actually forgotten we ever did that. It all seems like a very cumbersome practice. On the other hand, we've dug out records that haven't been played in 30 years, and I found a whole stack of 45's from my childhood (45's!) . It makes me wonder what the equivalent for kids today will be. Will they sort through their old MP3 players, deleting files and laughing when they run across a song they haven't thought of in 15 years?

Don't tempt the sun gods

Today, when we returned from our 3 mile bird walk in the pouring rain, my mother said "If it clears up this afternoon, maybe we can go for a run." Confident in the rain, I said, "Mom, if it clears up this afternoon, I WILL go running." This was followed by one of the most impressive downpours I've ever seen in Oregon, rain mixed with hail and crazy wind, black skies and not a trace of sun. I became complacent, but clearly the skies were just emptying themselves in response to my challenge, because the afternoon developed clear, beautiful and sunny, and I had my first run since I've gotten off the ship. I must say, it's very strange running in a place where the ground isn't heaving underneath my feet, and when I got to the hill at the end, I kept waiting for it to make it's inevitable downturn, and deep in my psyche was the thought, "this is a huge wave, when are we going to stop climbing it?". Then, just as I walked the last 100 yards to my home, the skies opened up and it began raining again.

Family Boot Camp

No danger of me getting fat and lazy here at home. The first day back, my mother tried to entice me out the door for a run (no dice, I was still far too sore from my climb, no to mention my shoes were still caked in mud), the following day an intense yoga class with lots of standing poses, which caught in all the remaining muscles which weren't already sore. (yes, I know I mentioned it yesterday too) Today was family swim at 4:30, Mom, Dad and I down at the lap pool. I did my 10 laps of crawl, 5 of something slower, and Dad helpfully pointed out that with just 3 more laps I would have swum half a mile, so back into the fray with me. This morning my mother demanded my shoes so she could knock the mud off them. So much for that excuse, as soon as they're dry, it's back to running for me.

Lazy Days..

As though my days weren't already lazy... today I was up at 7:00 for no good reason except that I could smell coffee brewing. Had real scrambled eggs for breakfast, then puttered at doing laundry. At 11:00, Mom dragged me out the door for a grueling yoga class (she's threatening running tomorrow), and the afternoon was frittered away in lunch and unpacking. The highlight of my day was buying compressed air for my computer, which has gathered an obscenely thick layer of dust in my absence. It's so strange, going from a place where you're in constant contact with hundreds of people, to suddenly seeing precisely two people that you know every day. It's nice, having a little peace and quiet, but I'm feeling a rather profound sense of disconnect. On the other hand, my website is about to get some much needed attention.

Fakarava

No excuses for my lack of postings except sheer laziness and an excess of Christmas cheer. Last port day in Papeete was a Carnival of sorts (I'm told it was sort of the equivalent of Mardi Gras, but if so, it was a very tame Mardi Gras)- so everything was crazy and loud everywhere, and we had to bring the ship into the cargo port, so no email. Still, we managed to make it out for the parade and lots of beer that night. Since then, it's been a party every night on board, each one hosted by a different department, so we've been all over the ship. Today was a lovely day spent on the "metal beach" otherwise known as the sundeck, with a large fruit punch in hand, battling dehydration. It's strange to think that somewhere right now it's cold and drizzly.

Rescued! Out of the jaws of death!

In the throes of moving today, I was forced to throw away my plants. It made me very sad, because they have all gamely survived two years of abuse and neglect, and come through heartily, and it really didn't seem fair for them to end their days in the dumpster. I casually mentioned to Pete in the van on the way in from the parking lot that they had a nice plant in the guard shack, and he said that Calvin had a real green thumb, and we came to the conclusion that perhaps Calvin would like my plants. However, in the heat of the moving moment, I became overwhelmed and sent Ross away with my plants (since I couldn't bear to throw them away myself). Then, 3 hours later, I get a call from Calvin, wondering if I have any plants for him. I threw down the phone, raced up to the dumpster and dove in (not very deep, the plants were all resting on top). I set some of them to the side, and carried two down. When I returned, the garbage truck was in place emptying the dumpster. 5 minutes later and the plants would have been gone forever. Instead, they will now reside happily at the guard shack here at the foundation, under the tender ministrations of Calvin and the security team.

Stuff

I'm so tired of my stuff. In the past week I've handled every object that I own, and have been forced to think about its usefulness now, its sentimental value, and its potential for future usefulness. I'm ready to drag it all out to the dumpster and light it on fire. It reminds me of the movie "The Mission" where to atone for his sins, Robert DeNiro has to carry all his worldly possessions on his back up some huge steep muddy hill, and he keeps dropping it and having to go back for it. My greatest fear is that in the afterlife all the stuff that I've ever owned will have to be accounted for. Ugh.

Alarm Clock

My alarm clock went off at 6:30 this morning, because, in almost three years of travel, I've never figured out how to turn it off for the weekend (partly because I'm afraid if I do turn it off, I won't remember to reset it for Monday morning). And I was so relieved, because I realized that after this trip I will no longer live by the tyranny of that 6:30 am alarm that, as far as my body is concerned, is really ringing at 3:30, or 4:30 am, because I never get to stay in one time zone long enough to adjust to where I am. I may be moving forward into a travelling life. but for almost 3 whole months I my body gets to stay in one place.
On the other hand, I was a little sad this weekend. I had to install a NIC in my last library because "I was the only one in the whole town who knew how", and it sort of brought me full circle back to my first week at the Foundation, when Erin sat us down with the pull apart computer and said "who wants to pull out this NIC?" and I was terrified. Then, on Friday, there I am, both hands fearlessly inside a working computer, while my librarians stood by and said "How terrifying, I could never do that."

Playing Tourist

MY cousin from New York has arrived for the weekend, and yesterday my sister, my cousin and I spent the day prowling all over downtown Seattle playing tourist. There was some big thing going on down there, with all the local merchants offering pony rides and sand castle building in the hopes of attracting shoppers downtown. As near as I could tell, it was effective, as it was nearly impossible to move anywhere we went. We also managed a trip to REI, coffee at (of course) Starbucks, Pike Place Market (where we waited long enough to see a fish thrown and went on our way) a matinee showing of "Pirates of the Carribean" - which I loved - but then, I had low expectations going in, and it was easy to surpass them, and dinner at the Icon grill, which, I"m pretty sure, makes the best Mac and Cheese in the entire world. I'd post pictures, but I haven't gotten my camera plugged in since I got back from Iowa, and besides, it's raining.

Xenodocheionology

Gretchen pointed out, and I see she is correct, that my titles seem to group in an alphabetical pattern. I'm sure that bears examining, but I determined it was time to leave the W's behind and move on to the Xes. Yikes, I found this fantastic site: Forthright's Phrontistery which has lists and lists of unusual words. Today's title means "love of hotels" and seemed appropriate for my current lifestyle, though I have to say, I don't love the hotel I'm in tonight. The word is not in Webster's online, but it is in the Dictionary of Difficult Words, at any rate, a Google search renders all sorts of interesting results. I recommend it.
So, it's my last night in Iowa until next week- I've really had a very pleasant time . It's so green and hazy here. The drive back to Cedar Rapids tonight was almost idyllic. As the librarian described the road "Once you get on it you can see all the way from the top of the county to the bottom" and she was absolutely right. It was the most amazing road. So my apologies Kim and Jenna - it turns out that Iowa is not half bad. :)

Eels!

Was up at the crack of dawn this morning snorkeling with my parents. Saw at least one eel (looks just like a snake when it's swimming around) and a big sea turtle.What a way to start the day. Very refreshing, but now I'm completely exhausted and useless for the rest of the day. However, there is a handy little internet cafe just down from the office. Perhaps I'll post some pictures later this week....

The sun is shining

The sun is shining, my headache is gone, and Susie is happy once more. No more whining this week. I promise. Went to see Lyle Lovett at the pier last night, and it all could not have been more perfect. The sun was out, and little sailboats bobbed behind Lyle's head in time to the music. As all one could really see of them was their pointy mast and rigging, they rather put me in mind of happy little sharks, but that's a whole nother story. My only complaint, and I don't mean to sound like an old grump here, was the people around me who wanted to carry on conversations at the top of their voices. I kid you not, they could be heard over the music (which was more than amply loud) from 10 feet away, and it was the most banal chit chat of the "Let's do my hair tomorrow" variety. I mean, I don't think people need to maintain a library like silence at an outdoor concert, but when Lyle (or anyone) is singing, I'd just as soon not be hearing about the mundanities of their lives. But I promised no more whining.

Success!

Success! I have acquired Harry Potter (at the very same Barnes and Noble that told me I couldn't have one unless I had pre-ordered, and then murmured surreptitiously, "come back tomorrow morning",) this is after I checked out the rumor that it was stacked to the ceilings at Walmart (it was at one time, but when I got there, all they had was the $30 book on tape - not suitable for the plane on Wednesday really). So with utter hopelessness (and rapidly dropping blood sugar, thanks to my donut lunch), I returned to Barnes and Noble, where a scant stack of 20 remained. And, to my surprise and delight, it was selling, not for the $30 suggested retail price, but the near bargain basement price of $17.99. Yay! So what did I read after dinner? "HTML for the WWW" which covers such gripping topics as "Markup: Elements, Attributes and Values" and "The Doctype and Standards vs Quirks Mode". What has become of me?

Rain... Rain...

It's raining torrentially here in MA today, honest to goodness soaking wet rain, so I'm glad I opted for the Cliff Walk yesterday. Today I was forced to get my exercise in the mall, which turned out to be FAR more expensive than parking in Newport. But on the other hand, I've made a little contribution to the economy of Taunton, Ma. I wasn't able to acquire a copy of Harry Potter - but the lady told me to come back tomorrow morning - not likely to happen I guess, being as I'm expected to work for a living. I consoled myself with a copy of "HTML for the World Wide Web, with XHTML and CSS" which Erin highly recommended to me the other day. They're far too grumpy here at the stores. I'm amazed anyone stays in business around here. However, it's amazing what a Chocolate Kreme Filled donut and iced coffee from Dunkin Donuts will do to improve one's mood.

A Walk by the Sea

Just back from the cliff walk in Newport. It's not the Oregon coast, like I was sort of half expecting, but it was nice. I was actually a little grumpy when I got there (partly cause I had to pay $10 to park in the lot at the beginning of the cliff walk, as all the street parking was taken, and I was seriously questioning whether any walk, no matter how famous, was worth $10). I trotted along the path, passing people right and left (as I was trying to combine exercise with sightseeing) and got a good eyeful of Steph's aforementioned red tide. I'm not sure I'd want to eat anything that came out of water that color.... but a 4 mile walk does wonders for one's mood, and I was not at all grumpy when I got back to my car, particularly since the threatening rain held off until I was within ten feet of the car. And in the end, I can now add Rhode Island to my list of visited states. Now I'm off to buy Harry Potter.

Elephants Upstairs

So here's a sign that I've been on the road too long. Keep in mind, that when I stay in hotels, I usually try to get the top floor. Here in my apartment, I have a rather loud upstairs neighbor, who likes to grind espresso at 11pm and then pace the floor over my bed until oh, 1 or 2 am. Usually, I'm fully aware of who this is, and why I'm hearing footsteps. But the last two nights, as I am awoken from my slumber by my neighbor's caffeinated wanderings, my first thought has been "that's weird, I'm on the top floor, why do I keep hearing footsteps above me, is someone on the roof?'

Kenya

What a glorious weekend for weather. Ross and I spent it judiciously, finding time to walk around Green Lake (along with half of Seattle), and the next day an afternoon of Putt Putt (somehow we got there in the middle of a birthday party, which was great for my game, suddenly I was the best player on a course of 10 year olds) and gadget shopping. And best of all, I acquired a new scanner, which means lots more pics for my site. I've been refurbishing my travels page, and it has a few photos from my trip to Kenya a few years ago (I've been dying to scan them ever since I ruined all 6 rolls by writing on the backs of the pictures in gold gel pen, then stacking them up while the ink was wet). Look for more as the days go by, as I've only scanned one roll of 7.

Bono

Home again, and of course, awake ridiculously early but with my usual post trip migraine that makes me want to stay in bed all day. However, today Bono was at the foundation early, and accompanied by bagels, so I dragged myself across the street for the occasion. And it was well worth it, as usual, we the trainers commandeered the comfy chairs (which in this case, were near the front). I never understand why more people don't do that. Anyway, he was very witty and unassuming, I'm sure my fellow trainer bloggers will do him better justice than I can. OH, and I FINALLY linked to Ruth and Erin.

Putt Putt

Kind of a fun day today. Ross and Kristy and I headed out around noon for a little putt putt golf ( a sport at which I do NOT excel - though I did get one hole in one today, to balance out all the other holes that took me way over the limit of allowed strokes.. but that's a whole nother story). We finished up with a little trampoline dunk shot - I'm not really sure how to describe this, except that it involves a trampoline with a divider in the middle, and two people trying to make baskets over each other's heads while bouncing on the trampoline. It's ridiculous fun, and utterly exhausting. We returned to the hotel, where a giant tour bus was blocking the entrance , and a little judicious questioning of the valet discovered that the bus belonged to REO Speedwagon! Imagine, all this time I was rubbing elbows with the band at happy hour and breakfast, and I never had any idea that fame was walking in my midst (though the bleached blond 50 year olds in the lobby really should have clued me in). I then headed out for a happy two hours in Barnes and Noble, where I contemplated books on Web design, and CSS, and HTML, but couldn't bring myself to fork over the required $40. Does anyone else find it ironic that computers, which were supposed to spell the death of the written word, have instead spawned bookshelves of 500 page tomes?

Welfleet is Cool...

Ever since I got on the road I have become quite the slacker re my blog. I am loving Massachusetts though. Ross and I spent all weekend walking the Freedom trail (which was great on Saturday, and remarkably cold on Sunday). Actually, on Saturday we got sidetracked in the Quincy market and ended up drinking Sangria all afternoon, and then I went to the Discovery store and got these fabbo inflatable travel speakers for my MP3 player. I have some great new Louie pictures though, because my library was very indulgent, and let him come in and play with their computers and stuffed animals. I fully intend to post them soon, but, well, I'm just too lazy. I want to go lie on the couch and watch Food TV until its time for CSI. Time enough for new pictures some other day. Anyway, Wellfleet is my new favorite town in the US, and definitely has the coolest library I've been to in a really long time.