Drivin' and Flyin'

It was perfect. So, incredibly perfect.

Over the mountains, and through the desert

We got up at 8:30 on Saturday morning... I think I fit about five hours of sleep in there... we checked email and that sort of thing (free Internet!), went to breakfast at the Denny's with the hidden sign, and then started off for Yuma, AZ, where my little brother is stationed with the Marines. It took us 2 and 1/2 hours to drive... the mountain pass goes up to roughly 4,100 feet and then comes back down to sea level in the desert on the other side. It was smooth sailing pretty much all the way. I had used a car rental business that didn't let you take the car out of state (I had been planning on my brother joining us in San Diego) so we parked in a church parking lot in "Winterhaven, CA", two miles from Yuma, which, judging by the size of the town (one deserted street) probably had a population of 20.

Winterhaven, where we parked:

My brother came and picked us up at 1, and we headed directly for lunch at In & Out, which I had never had before. Their hamburgers came with tomatoes, a thick slice of onion and lettuce and their special sauce. A far cry from Mc'yD's. We saw a military antiques store (across from the base - had all sorts of WWI - WWII uniforms, swords, rifles, accessories, genuine McClellan saddles... but we only had a minute; the owner was closing down. Across a side street from this was a horse stable (odd location, right across from a Marine Corps Air Station) hmm. But we got to pet a very cute young horse that kept trying to nibble us. :) He was sort of forward. lol

We then took a look at his new post exchange (PX) and his new room on base. It was after watching the trailer for "The Blind Side" on his computer that we decided to go see it. So we took off for the mall and got there in time. It was a beautiful movie! Believe it or not, it wasn't a sports movie. At least it didn't act like one. A big part of this True story was the football, but they didn't have the annoying trappings of a generic sports movie. It was all about the relationship this family had with this down-and-out boy. Very good!

Afterwords, we went to Outback Steakhouse (and had to wait for a bit for a table). We had good conversation, and much to our surprise, a generous customer paid for half our dinner because my brother was (obviously, because of his hair cut) active duty. That was a neat surprise.

We then went to his room, watched a couple silly episodes of the TV show "Arrested Development" and then we had to go. At nine o'clock he took us back to our car and we took off for our motel. It was a great eight hours with my brother... it was needed. We got safely to the motel about 11 PM, and boy, did we sleep well!

We drove I-8 West this morning to I-5, and took the exit we had yesterday that went right to the car rental place. The van was there, ready to go, and we were off to the airport in minutes! They had vastly better service in the morning! :) All the airports had free Wi-Fi, so email and Facebook could be checked. But mostly we played Phase 10. A good pass-time. Our first flight (we had a connection in Sacramento) was so crowded we had to sit apart. I ended up next to a black WWII veteran (wow) and we talked the entire time! He was with Transportation in the Army/Air Force during the occupation of Germany from 1945-1949. He had so many stories... mostly about the German family he became friends with. I don't think I've ever had such a good flight. He joked about talking my ear off... lol! I so didn't mind. :)


So here I am at home. We got back in the middle of my Grandma's 96th birthday party (glad we made part of it!) I thought I'd get to bed early tonight, as tomorrow is going to be awful (it's always proportioned evenly against how good the weekend was - and this is going to be catastrophic), but of course, I first put away the stuff from the trip, then read the first chapter in a book that came in the mail (an interesting new theory about another level of meaning in the Narnia books from a C.S. Lewis scholar), and then watched a short movie with my parents. So what is new? I'm going to bed at 11:30. :)

'Night.
Jp

What Can I Say?

It's difficult to convey how wonderful today was.

We had two flights today with a short layover in Oakland. Got to see San Francisco and Alcatraz when we took off for the second flight... the first flight only had roughly 40 people on it, so it was very comfortable with lots of room. This was my first time on Southwest, and I was pretty impressed with their service.

After waiting about a half-hour for our rental car pickup (we were given a bright blue PT Cruiser), we drove north on I-5 to La Jolla (la hoy-a) and got there around 3:30. We were looking for dinner... and we didn't know exactly where to go. I knew I wanted to go to the beach to see the sea lions, so I'm very glad we passed up Subway (which was the first thing we saw) and kept driving until we found a very hip street right near the beach-front park. We ate at "The Crab Catcher" which had been rated in the sky magazine I read on the way down as one of the best seafood places in the country. Well, they were right! Not only were some dishes half price because it was during "happy hour", but it was so good! I had crab nachos and a fish taco and Meg and I shared some cheesy bread. She had calamari and a fish taco. I don't normally like calamari, but I tried a piece or two of it, and it was excellent.

It turns out that right outside the restaurant (there was a fabulous view of the bay) was a walking trail right out on the little cliffs above the ocean. The first thing I saw was all the pelicans... and the other water birds... and then we saw all the sea lions! My! There were a lot of them! We walked back to the car to get my camera and our coats:


And some of the animals:




And us (yes, those are hundreds of sea birds sitting on the cliff behind us):


The light was soon fading... so we figured our way back to I-5 after a bit of guessing, and went straight to Balboa Park. We changed into our play clothes and went to The Prado restaurant and had my favorite salad: mixed greens with avocado, cucumber and tomato. That only took a minute and then we crossed the street and picked up the tickets for the play "Lost in Yonkers" by Neil Simon. What a show! It was about a grown up, German-Jewish family that could barely get along with each other in 1940's New York. It was both hilarious and touching... a real treat. All the actors were quite superior.

Ms. Naughton played an aunt who had a speech problem: she couldn't finish a sentence without sucking in air and becoming quite unintelligible... which was so silly. She spoke with a shrill voice and looked exactly like Betty Roberts. And do I mean exactly! Long brown hair nicely done up in a simple '40's style and pretty, period dresses.

Meg had the thought to ask the house manager to get a message to Ms. Naughton asking her if she would meet us afterwords out front of the theater... so we waited after all had left, and soon a big, black car came to a stop on the street by the theater and I saw a figure coming at us, waving! She was so very friendly, and spoke to us about the play, how hard it was to speak while sucking in air... lol... and about Seattle (she was wearing a hat from Seattle!) and about Remember WENN. She had been to Linda's site, and was glad to hear it was still up and going... she very much wanted to do an out-of-station scene and talked about how they thought Queens could be similar to side streets in Pittsburgh... she said she didn't have a favorite episode, but asked me mine... she said she thought very much like Betty about who Betty should have been with (she said it depended on what episode they were doing :) and she seemed to like the idea of Doug and Betty... LOL! She said she was in California doing a musical when she heard of the cancellation, and that she heard it from Hugh. She also mentioned that she only had a few episodes on TAPE. Sigh. Yeah. VHS. Oh, she also said she had a lot of fun doing the Casablanca episode... making everything look different on the same set and getting to play Ingrid Bergman. :)

















Tomorrow we're driving to go see my brother in Yuma.
I'm beyond happy. :)
Jp

Away We Go

I just realized I haven't posted practically all week... where does the time go?

Hmm, how did things go? Well, Tuesday morning I went for a mile run in the morning (35 degrees) and I teared up it was so cold and I had a bit of flem in my lungs all day. That night was our family Bible/prayer time... I'm liking that we do that now... and afterwords we watched a film made in 2008 about a Marine who escorted a dead Marine to his hometown for burial. It was very touching and well made. And as an added bonus, JBL appeared in it as a Marine general! I wanted to see it anyway... :) It was really neat, because the Marine who actually experienced this in 2004 wrote the screenplay; so whatever things that might be odd if it was a piece of fiction were quite memorable, because it was real. It was called "Taking Chance".

Wednesday I got a package in the mail! And so that night we stuck in 'Mr. Lucky' from 1943. I loved the 'Mr. Comstock' gag (lol). It did have rather serious bits along with the comedy. I don't remember saying "thanks" yet, Mike, so "Thank you!" It was really sweet of you to send that so fast. :)

I thought today was going to drag, for tomorrow we fly. But it really flew by... I was very busy all day long. Even forgot to print of the boarding passes and had to go back to do it. Right after work I went to Jazzercise... (it's quite near work... maybe 2 miles) and I loved doing it then. I don't think I'll mind doing this every week. I liked the turkey sandwich I made at lunch so much that I made it for dinner too! Yum! Big slices of tomato with some turkey, cheese and onion.

So tomorrow is the travel day, and the night of the play. I really hope my brother decides to come out to see us! Here's wishing you a wonderful Friday, and we'll see if I come by on Saturday.

Cheers!
Jp

All Alone!

Well, after a solid weekend of noise, it doesn't feel bad at all, even if it won't last very long.

Today at work was totally blah. It's been hard to focus and get back into it. Mondays often are that way... I need to stop having such a good time on weekends. :)

I've just had a bite to eat by myself, and I think I'm gonna take a shower and read the Bible. I'm dying for both of them.

Jp

Over the Weekend and Through the Woods...

Except I live at Grandmother's house (from my niece and nephew's perspective).

Saturday was weird. I woke up about 7, and immediately tried to get the tickets for this weekend coming up, as that's what I had thought about as I went to sleep. It scared me pretty bad, actually, because I couldn't get any... and the ticket office didn't open til noon. Meg and I have plane tickets to go to San Diego this Friday afternoon... it's to see Ms. Naughton in another '40's era play (Lost in Yonkers). We're hopefully going to be seeing my brother as well, so it should be a great time. So, needless to say, I was worried! But I had to wait until I could talk to someone after noon.

So I went to Jazzercise for the first time in a few months, and I felt a bit sore the rest of the day. (Sunday was worse! :) I haven't been going in the mornings because I'm always too tired. I almost did do it on Wednesday last week, but I didn't want a barrage of questions as to why I've been a lazy bum for 3 months. Early morning classes only have about 10-20 people, so the teacher would notice if I came back. And there really isn't enough time to do it and get to work on time; it made it that much harder to get motivated. So I decided to compromise. I'm planning on going on Saturday mornings (8:30am) and Thursday nights (5:30), since that's a night when my parents are busy and I wouldn't be missed at dinner.

When I got back home it was only 10am, so I had breakfast with Mom and then finished reading the Bluejacket's Manuel. Can't believe I made it all the way through in less than a year! Wow... all 600 pages of it. There were a couple slow spots, but generally speaking, I was very interested. I am pretty excited for this change.

So noon-thirty rolled around and I was able to secure a couple tickets to Friday's performance. Whew! I really didn't feel like doing anything the rest of the day... I was tired and beginning to get sore from jumping around that morning. I watched "Persuasion" (1995) live on Netflix. It started slow, but I didn't mind. And the ending was really lovely. And then it was time to chat... and I really liked that. Meg stayed up late with me, baking cakes. :)

I slept in, Sunday morning; didn't get up til 11 or so. Everyone started gathering after a bit and then we sat down to some lunch. We then had cake right away, and then began a very long show in the living room: film slides on my parents projector... pictures from when they got married in 1977 up until 1988... right after my little brother was born. It was then that my Dad got a camcorder and all our family pictures went into motion. It was a lovely way to celebrate Mom's birthday. Many of those I don't remember seeing... and it was a lot of fun to see my parents when they were about my age right now. It helps you see things in a new light. Also mixed in there were many shots from trips to Tuscarora in north Minnesota. I think my parents went there every year ever since they got married up until my grandparents moved in 1994... so 17 years. I was only around for 11 of them. We'd spend up to a month there every fall. What an experience we had! We, as kids, took all that hiking, boating, canoeing, fishing and camping for granted. Wow, how blessed we have been.

Gee, that show lasted about 6 hours... we went through 3 boxes with 6 reels in each one. So much fun. Soon after that everyone went their separate ways, so Mom and Dad and I took in 'The Awful Truth' (1937). Mom and I were L'ingOL all the way through, and Mom doesn't LOL at movies very often. It was very, very funny. Such fun.

Jp

A Very Fishy Friday

Hello, again. :)

I got off of work a little early on Friday in order to go out with my parents to Red Lobster for my Mom's 60th on Sunday. We feasted together... I had a new dish (an appetizer, actually) of cold shrimp with delicious diced tomatoes and spice on buttered, toasted french bread along with a side of a couple crab legs... wow! that was good. We went early so I could make it in time to my monthly meeting with my recruiter at 1400, and it worked out perfectly. We weren't rushed at all... Oh! And we saw those ducks outside the Olive Garden next door to R.L. again! All eleven of them! LOL! Five mommies and six daddies, diligently patrolling outside the O.G. front door, in what looks like hopes of leftovers from exiting customers... lol

Once back at home (around 4) I read a bit more in the Bluejacket's and by then it was time for a snack of leftovers... including some tilapia Mom had made the day before. Very fishy, indeed.

For our evening enjoyment, we watched 'Reveille with Beverly' from 1943; a rousing, fun, radio movie... :) I loved it... playing records and talking like the band was right there... good memories.

Oh, and here's an article about the WASP's from Friday's Seattle Times.

Jp

Dear Friends and Good Food

My friend Julie was free Wednesday night. She's taking off Friday for her last two semesters of her degree from a college in Florida. It was much like what we did our last time together last year... played cards, had dinner, went to B&N for her to pick up a book for the flight. Oh, did we laugh and talk... I think I was a little slap happy... and it was very fun. I had come directly from a long workday (and had to sit in traffic a bit to get to her house) , so I was pretty tired. On the other hand, I rarely find it difficult to be silly with Julie. :) What a dear friend! And then back at home I had a very good talk with Mike... both a serious and a silly one. What a dear friend you are!

I found that in staying up late, I was able to get up easier than I had been able to all week (when I tried to get to bed an hour or more earlier than normal). I suppose my body is on some sort of clock, and I wasn't helping anything by messing up the schedule.

Today we had a celebratory lunch at work... for being the best department at our plant for straightening up our area and doing the most process improvement. We had Thai food... it was really quite tasty! I had the "special" which was a noodle dish, rice and very mild green curry sauce with chicken, soup and some egg rolls. Very nice... along with having a fun time with my coworkers. Goodness, we can be funny sometimes! And our youngest member of our team is leaving in a couple weeks... that will be sad.

Tonight we watched 'My Man Godfrey'... and I loved Mr. Powell, but the movie itself was a little odd. Strange storyline, and an off-kilter ending.

Wow, it's time for bed now. 'Night, night.

Jp

How the Wind Blows

Monday was such a long day. It was torture to return to work on such a beautiful, sunny day, as I left my Mom and sister home as I left to go back after lunch. I could see bits of snow on the distant Cascades under a bright blue sky. There was a fresh breeze that made it about 60 degrees (I might be able to get used to all the browns of January if they are all days like this) It was dreary work, scanning my dozen books for the rest of the day... it was so refreshing to return home... and Mom had tacos for dinner! :)

It had rained on Sunday, so the air was so clean and fragrant all day Monday. Today, again we had stiff breezes all day long. It was still about 60 degrees, and every second I was outside was wonderful. I even drove home with my windows open!

Tonight, Dad & Mom and I had a lovely time finishing Colossians and discussing a question my friend asked me on Sunday. We then prayed for our family and for gracious communication, as it says in the beginning of chapter four, that it always be with grace and "salt" or truth. There seem to be a lot of verses about keeping a watch on what you say... James, Jude, Proverbs, Colossians... just off the top of my head.

After a couple hymns, we all watched the 1956 TV special of "Cinderella" with Julie Andrews. Becky had lent me her copy... and as an extra, they have a snippet of the Ed Sullivan show on which Rogers & Hammerstein appeared to perform a song from the production to promote it, as it was going to be on the next week... ah, advertising in the old days. :)

If only.
Jp

Relaxing Day

It was, as Sundays should be.

I hung out with my dear friend Becky all day... we went out to our favorite Thai restaurant, and near the Southcenter Mall we went to Barnes&Noble, then returned to her place, watched a movie, talked, and then decided we were hungry again. Upon inquiry, her roommate said the closest Panera Bread was just a couple miles away in downtown Bellevue (one I hadn't been to before) and we had a lovely time. I got an anthology of poetry at B&N... I want to be familiar with the great ones and decide if I like them or not. I didn't wake up this morning until 11:30 or so... and I'm off to bed right away, so I *might* make it to Jazzercise in the morning (for the first time in a few months). We'll see.

Jp

LOL! A spelling suggestion for "Panera" was Panzer... Heh!
"You vant flat bread? Do ya?"

WENN It's In Mind...

Goodness! There has been quite a discussion about Episode 1 going on on WENNlist on Yahoo! (we're doing a re-watch of the series). Folks were wondering about how Betty found out about the contest, and about broadcasting range... so I drew from my vast knowledge of season 1 (lol) to answer questions about which cities they could reach:

Those references from "Hilary Booth, RN" are for cities that they don't normally get to broadcast to... Wilmington (NC) on the East Coast and Biloxi (MS) on the Gulf Coast... "coast to coast" in "ten cities" lol! But Adrian Carr made that happen somehow.

In episode 4, Victor offhandedly mentions to Grace that they can be heard as far north as Hackensack (NJ), but I'm pretty sure that he meant as far north as Hackensack *is from NYC* (where they knew each other before)... which looks like about 10 miles. It was his usual, silly, quiet humor that made him so lovable.

WNYW carried their signal in the before mentioned episode 13... but they were out of range of New York usually... (thank goodness!) lol

And I know Scott mentions a Philadelphia station that could carry WEEP's signal after the fiasco in "Two for the Price of One" in season 3.

Either a station around Elkhart (maybe Chicago?) carried their signal, or the contest was advertised on the radio or in a newspaper or magazine. They were pretty conclusively out of range. I wonder if Elkhart had any kind of radio station?

and from before:

About the station's broadcasting range... according to episode 13, it's 70 miles... http://rememberwenncharacters.org/Quotes.php#1-13 ...LOL

What good old fun!
Jp

Time for Bed

After work today, during which I was greatly encouraged about our future and new employees (a load off my shoulders), I came home to a snack, looked about on eBay for more of those tin knights I love (it's been on my mind since I made that Facebook album) and found a couple more. After this, I realized I was very tired and lay down on the couch for 2 and a half hours. Had dinner with Mom and the FC after I woke up, and I told them about my strange dreams about a detective, meeting my friends from years ago, aspects from one of the Tintin comic books all on location at my old church during a Christmas play. ? Who knows. I think my mind was somewhere in deep center field.

Anyway, for a while now, ever since that Tom Cruise movie about Operation Valkyrie came out, I've wanted to watch the documentary about the real thing; so I watched it tonight on Netflix. It's pretty well done. Lots of b/w and color footage that I've never seen before, and now I know what happened in detail and who Stauffenberg was. I had no idea before; interesting stuff.

Okay... it's time for more sleep.
Jp

One More Day

It wasn't as hard to get out of bed this morning as I thought it was going to be. I was tired, of course, but I've been going at it rather well all day. I haven't been drearily tired until just about now... :)

It was my coworker Nicole's birthday today... we went out to Coho's again, and I had the same as Tavia... a halibut sandwich with grilled onions and tomatoes and yummy sauce! and I had a salad instead of fries and a cup of my very favorite seafood bisque. Sigh. So good.

On the way back to work we were talking about our experiences with road rage... Nicole's boyfriend has had trouble getting to anxious about bad drivers in the past (once when I rode with him and Nicole over to Seattle after work for band in 2007) and she recalled that after he had yelled rather colorful language at someone who had cut him off, I commented that the other driver was indeed something of "a diddle-head". We all had a grand laugh... I had forgotten that had happened... lol.

Gosh, after work and a bite to eat, Mom had to go pick up Meg from her teaching job in Auburn (45 minutes away) because she can't drive with the new meds she has to take for her ear infection, so I volunteered to go along with her. This allowed us to bypass tons of traffic in Bellevue and Renton, so I'm glad I did. It ended up taking us two whole hours to pick everyone up and get home again. What an evening! And I did enjoy talking with Mom all alone on the way down... very nice indeed.

I think it's time for bed pretty soon!
Jp

Late Night Out

After work last evening, I rushed home for a quick baked potato dinner before running off to catch a bus to downtown Seattle. My friend and her three brothers and I were all going to see Switchfoot in concert for their new album's tour "Hello, Hurricane". I took a bus because I had to go alone and I didn't feel like parking downtown. So Mom dropped me at a Park & Ride just this side of Lake Washington and I got a bus that took me all the way downtown. We had to go through the tunnel under the convention center that I had never been through before... I've never had to take a bus there before.

I was the first of our group to arrive, but I was still quite a ways from the door in line, the line wrapping half-way around the block. I picked out Chaya's oldest brother as he was trying to find the end of the line. Hadn't seen him since, I don't know... when I was a teenager or before... yikes! After a moment, her youngest brother got dropped off, and after we made it inside (and suffered through the opening act) her other younger brother arrived. Chaya had to take care of a dog she was dog-sitting, and got there right when it started. Oh, my gosh! What a fun one.

The band started with the first song on their new album, and Jon, the lead singer was standing on a railing just behind us when it began - like ten feet away. Whoa. That surprised me! We were in sorta the back of the room on the floor away from the stage. There weren't any chairs... so gosh, I stood up quite a while. They played through their entire album, straight through for an hour! And it was outstanding! They sounded even better than they did at the last one I went to, a year or two ago. Jon played guitar, piano and harmonica and absolutely nailed the songs. Wow.

So right after going straight through the album, they played ten more songs... their best from five of their previous albums...

Awakening, from Oh, Gravity!
Gone, from The Beautiful Letdown
This is Your Life, from The Beautiful Letdown
Oh, Gravity!
Chem 6A, from their first
Only Hope, from New Way to be Human
Dare You to Move, from The Beautiful Letdown
Stars, from Nothing is Sound
The Shadow Proves the Sunshine, from Nothing is Sound
and Meant to Live, from The Beautiful Letdown

... which lasted for another 3/4 hour! But it felt like just a few minutes!
The place was sold out, and it was rather cozy in there... I was a little afraid at times that the big guy jumping up and down next to me might land on my foot... but he never did. :)

My friend drove me home afterwards, and I got in bed around midnight-thirty.
Ah, what a time! It was so beautiful.

As for today, it was busy at work, and I've been rather tired... lol.

I'm finishing this post at about 10PM, and we just finished watching South Pacific. Wow, how funny it is!

Jp

God of Our Yesterdays

When we were in the darkest night
And wondered if our eyes would ever see the light
You were there, Lord
When we were in the stormy gale
And wondered if we'd ever live in peace again
You were there, Lord, in the struggle, in the fight
You were there all the time

We praise You - the God of our yesterdays
We praise You - the God who is here today
We praise You - our God as tomorrow comes

So whatever lies ahead
Whatever roads our grateful hearts will come to tread
You'll be there, Lord
We will fix our eyes on You
And know that there is grace enough to see us through
You'll be there, Lord, in the struggle, in the fight
You'll be there all the time

We praise You - the God of our yesterdays
We praise You - the God who is here today
We praise You - our God as tomorrow comes
We thank you - for grace in our yesterdays
We thank you - for peace in our hearts
We thank you - for joy, as tomorrow comes
We will trust you, God

You're always closer than we know
Always more involved and in control
We will trust our lives to You -
The One who was and is and is to come

--------------------------------------------

We sang this in church today... I thought it was swell!

Yesterday, we took down our lights and Christmas tree... and I missed my window lights today! After all that though, I took a good long nap, woke up when everyone was gone, took myself out to dinner with a Christmas gift card to Outback (and switched between reading Mere Christianity and watching the Cowboys/Eagles game, since I was sitting at the bar) and had the pasta and chicken, except this time with a lobster sauce added... yum! During chat I watched "36 Hours"... twice. LOL (the family came home at the end the first time through...)

Today I obviously went to church :) It was a new series going through Malachi... and he was talking about how pastors ought to act. It was harder for him to preach than for us to listen to. He did say that for those people who have been turned off from Christianity by a bad pastor should realize that God hates their behavior too, and that he has promised to take care of it... and to not use that as an excuse to reject God... interesting thought, since so many people have been turned off that way.

After lunch with the family today, and after hanging out a bit, I went for a 10 mile bike ride on the Sammamish River Trail. Took me about 50 minutes... Upon returning home, my sister and her family soon took off and we stuck in "War of the Worlds" (1953) for my first time through it. My gosh! They do look like street lights! My eldest sister thought this when she was terrified by it when she was five... precisely my niece's age now... :) I loved it! It was very entertaining... unlike the *tiny* bits I've seen of the new one.

Okay... it's another week now.

Jp

One More From Wednesday

Jp

Since Then

After going to bed late Wednesday night, I got up pretty much on time for work. I was pretty much shot (tired) all day long. All I could think of was showering and sleeping. Thankfully, I was also pretty busy catching up all the incoming stuff from the last two days. That night we watched the next episode of Foyle's War (the first one I had seen live on TV back in... was that 2008? How the time flies!) And since the BCS title game was on after we were done watching Foyle, we watched the last five minutes or so (the part where Alabama was only ahead by 3 points and then had about 3 interceptions and a recovery and killed *evil* Texas (lol) in the last moments). I then promptly went to sleep.

Unfortunately, Friday morning I decided to sleep for "15 more minutes" after my alarm went off. I was then awakened by my boss calling my cell phone... :) It all worked out in the end. I just had to work until 1PM instead of noon. I did feel rested though. :) Work was again busy, but I pretty much cleaned off the stuff from this week.

The rest of the day I spent with Julie again. We had breakfast for lunch, played cards, looked through and copied my 350 pictures from our 2-day excursion, watched "Holiday" with Cary Grant and then promptly left for the theater where we and her brother took in "Invictus" with Morgan Freeman and Matt Damon. I had almost no idea about Nelson Mandela, so it was very informative as well as entertaining.

I again hit the sack right after getting home at 10:30, ignoring my messy room and my new netbook that had just arrived in the mail! Yes, I was very tired. But this morning I woke up at 4 am for some reason... there were stupid dreams that I was happily avoiding... and ever since I've set up the Internet and copied over the right files. And right now I'm typing on it... I love it!

I might have to indulge in a nap today. Crazy week!

Jp

Wednesday, January 6th

I'm finally catching up!

We woke up about 8:15 after only staying up til 11 or so. That night, upon request, Julie recounted for me the story of the Twilight Saga as as good substitute for our regular scary story when we sleep over. It was fitting, I suppose, since we were staying in the town where the "saga" was set - Forks, WA.

The plan for the day began with packing up, eating cereal I bought at the grocery store the night before and driving south on the Hwy 101 loop around the peninsula. Not 1 minute on the road and we stopped off at the Logging Museum that had a truck parked outside that was similar to the one the main character had in the 'saga'. She wanted a picture, and I took a picture of her taking a picture. :) Back on the road again, we stuck in an episode or three of "Our Miss Brooks", which Julie was slightly familiar with. In just under an hour we ended up at the Hoh Rain Forest - one of the world's only temperate rain forests. I had put us on a tight schedule, as we needed to get back home in time for my monthly Navy meeting. But that still gave us over an hour in the rain forest. We walked the "Hall of Mosses" trail, and it was a cathedral of green. I was overcome with how beautiful the hanging mosses and fallen trees were... I walked with my mouth agape.

We had noticed a stinky smell as we crossed the river starting the trail, and when we returned, I finally noticed what it was. On the bottom of the river I saw the jaw of a dead salmon resting near the bridge. And upon a little careful investigation, we found many more... some exposed to the air. Although sad, I've always been fascinated by the salmon life-cycle, so I was very glad to see what we did.

As we were coming down the trail to return, we saw some splashing down in the river. After a moment, Julie spotted the cause... three river otters playing together. Neither of us had seen them in the wild before, so it capped a perfect trip to the rain forest. Although known for its substantial rainfall, we happened to visit on a sunny day. The low-lying clouds were illuminated by a golden sun.

Back on the road, we stopped for gas as soon as we could (for the first time this trip) at an old-style gas pump which had to be studied before being used :) Soon after this we came to an overlook on the ocean with a giant cliff. We got pretty darn near the edge and I took a couple pictures. The drive was long, but very pretty. We circled the Olympic mountains and observed a lake... we drove for four hours after the rain forest. We headed east after Aberdeen and went up I-5 through Olympia and Tacoma and I-405 through Renton and Bellevue all the way home. We unpacked the car and freshened up before heading back to Bellevue for my Navy meeting. That was an hour and a half, and then we came home for dinner, a game of Phase 10, a game of Spite & Malice, and then we all watched "Lady on a Train" before I took Julie home. What a day, again!

Jp

On the Go

Ooh, is today fun! My friend Julie and I took off from her place a little after nine this morning. I was a few minutes late, but it ended up not mattering... the ferry took off at ten after ten, and there's no rushing the ferry!

Last night I dreamed all about going on a trip somewhere and forgetting to bring anything at all beyond my camera and a pair of socks. I woke up, thank goodness, and got ready rather quickly, doing everything in the last minute.

It was a lovely drive from Kingston to Forks... about 3 hours. There were towering firs with thick, brilliant green moss and low-lying clouds and a greenish-blue lake. We saw two bald eagles in trees right next to the road as we passed by the lake. One was right next to a turn out, so we stopped and took pictures of him. Golly, he was majestic. [click on the picture to see him up close.]

We got to town right around 1 o'clock and after checking in at the motel (which is very cozy, as they claim) and eating our snacks, we headed out to La Push on the coast to walk on the beach. It was misting while we were out, but it was great to smell the sea and look at the huge waves crashing and pick up interesting beach stuff. Julie found a dead purple starfish that was very neat... but also very smelly. :) We walked up and down the beach and pretty soon we were covered with salty spray and misty rain. And we saw another bald eagle, in flight this time! A bit more back up the road, we stopped at a trailhead for "Second Beach". The trail was so muddy! I held on to the legs of my pants to help them not get soaked. When we got to the beach, the tide was very high, so the only thing to walk on was the stacks of very slick logs strewn about. I only slipped once or twice... but not detrimentally.

What fun! What a day! We then returned to town, stopped by the grocery store, crashed for a second in our room and then went out to eat at a nearby pizza place. We had Italian sausage with mushrooms and the nicest, thickest mozzarella cheese I've ever had. And right now we're taking a break and relaxing before we do more relaxing by watching Libeled Lady again! Yay!

Oh, what fun!
Jp

[ps... not only did we watch Libeled Lady... but I also brought along Double Wedding... at the risk of being redundant, we watched that too! I don't think I've ever seen such slapstick before... lol]

In the Mean Time

Well, there just hasn't been a lot to say about life lately...

I spent a ton of time over the weekend straightening out my picture folders on my laptop. They were still piled up from my photography class, as well as regular life as well. I never had the gumption to fix it until now. I realized that none of them were backed up... and what it would be like if suddenly my laptop didn't work, or got stolen or broken. It would be all of my art out the window. So I'm backing everything up; I did everything but one giant folder yesterday... so I'm almost done.

In other computer news, I purchased a netbook on Saturday. It's an Acer Aspire One (2.5 lbs) with a 10 inch screen, 6 hours of battery life, 160 GB's of space and a 1 GB hard drive. It will be ideal for trips (which I tend to take every now and then :) and I have a hope that I *might* be allowed to take it along when deployed in a few years. We'll see about that... nonetheless, it was a good investment. I got it for the same price as the one in the store that has half the battery power (I love the Internet!).

And today was my first day back at work! I had been putting off a project last month, and I all but completed it today, spending 7 out of my 9 hours on it. :) It was really odd to be back, especially the part about getting up a quarter after 0600. I stayed up quite late with my pictures last night, so I might not last very long tonight. At least I hope so. But it will be just fine, as tomorrow and the next day I'm taking off of work to spend time with a very good friend who is on break from school in Florida. We're going for a car trip to the peninsula.

1 day on, 2 days off, diddle, diddle, dumpling, my son John.

Jp

Happy New Decade!

Welcome to 2010 everyone! ...the year of big changes.

Everything has been pretty steady for me since graduating in 2006. Everything but Zac moving out and my getting a best friend last year. But this year, there promises to be many changes for especially my sister and I and our parents.

To prepare to greet the new year yesterday (after I had done enough lazing around in the morning) I did some clean up in my room and did a little laundry, washing my bed and doing a load of towels for Mom. At 5 o'clock I went to my friend Becky's house in Bellevue and chatted and had a wonderful dinner with her and our friends (most of the same group from Sunday night). Then a couple hours later, the family was going over to my soon-to-be brother-in-law's house for snacks and hanging out. I was going to go home and get on chat, but my sister lent me her laptop and I got on about a quarter to 9. The rest of the party soon broke away to play games of UNO and Hearts and Yahtzee, but they didn't mind me talking to my friends. :)

At Midnight, they turned on the Space Needle show. This year they played classic music to accompany it! Including one of the dances from the Nutcracker and a new version of 'Somewhere Over the Rainbow'. It was also the first New Year that somebody hugged me as it changed over :) We all clinked fake wine glasses, most people having either white or red Welches grape juice, but me having orange juice. And as it turns out, I felt a sore throat coming on.

It actually made me wake up a couple times last night, as I truly have a sore throat now. I didn't wake up for good til a bit after 11 am (which is a good sleep-in by my standards), and there's been a little drippy stuff in my throat all day, but not too bad.

After two eggs scrambled for breakfast, I went out shopping to Michael's and Fred Meyer's to get a few things... a frame, a new model to work on (I got an SR-71 Blackbird, scale 1/48 for half price with a coupon! I've always wanted to do that one...) at Michael's, and a thumb drive and some new tops at Fred's.

Upon returning, I played and beat Dad at Backgammon and had some freezer pizza with the family as we watched the final Thin Man movie and the movie after it, "Libeled Lady", with the same fun couple starring in it. So much fun! I always dread the dirge of dramas where the hero wins the lady's heart, and then his scheme runs a muck, and then they patch everything up in the end... Myrna Loy kept her head throughout the film and made it gloriously fun.

And I'm off to have my seventh cup of orange juice... Try some doctor? What? You've had a sore throat all week? It's the perfect remedy... I hear. :)

Jp