Musings

I'm reading Amy Tan's nonfiction book, "The Opposite of Fate: A Book of Musings" right now. I'm not even halfway through the first chapter, and already I'm laughing out loud. This book is not a comedy -- it's a collection of writings about her life and inspirations. She just captures the essence of the Chinese mama so well that I can't help but laugh in appreciation.

Through this book, Amy Tan has provided me with my new favorite quote. It's a common Chinese saying that her mother used to tell her when she was whining: "Fang pi bu-cho, cho pi bu-fang". The approximate translation is "There's more power in silence". I like this quote for two reasons:

• It is very similar to one of my favorite quotes of all time, attributed to Abraham Lincoln. I learned it from my dad: "Tis better to be silent and be thought a fool, than to speak and remove all doubt."


• It makes a universally wise statement in a very Chinese way. Those of you who understand Mandarin can understand see why this quote makes me laugh.

As I'm writing this, I'm having trouble figuring out how best to phrase my thoughts. I feel uncomfortable saying that I appreciate the essence of the Chinese mama, for I am of Taiwanese descent. However, it seems to me that it would be too broad to describe it as an "Asian thing". Perhaps Vietnamese and Korean and Japanese mothers are similar -- I simply don't know because I wasn't raised by one. What I do know is that when I read books about Chinese thought and culture, I see my own mother and her thoughts and culture reflected. So even though China and Taiwan are vastly different politically, it is difficult for me to negotiate the lines of separation culturally. And even as I struggle with this, I know that a lot of people out there will have no idea what I'm talking about.

Instead of thinking too deeply on this, I will leave you with a couple pictures. The first is of Cowboy, chewing a tennis ball on Tilly's porch. The second was taken during our Mason Lake hike this past weekend. I wanted to show you just how steep the avalanche chute was -- you can see the angle of the slope behind me. This was when Margaret and I decided it was time to turn around. We'd made it about 1/3 of the way across the chute and realized that one false step would send us on an uncontrollable slide down the mountain. (As always, click on an image if you'd like to see a larger version.)

Koala Tea Towels & More

The first weekend of Spring 2006 was a busy one for us! We started Friday night with dinner at Phuket before heading to Beast's housewarming party. It was a night full of Aussie fun, including homemade sausage rolls, great quotes and a nightcap at Ozzie's. Margaret and I agreed on our favorite quote from the night: "You burned my koala tea towels, you b*stard!" That was Beast, after one of his buddies accidentally set his tea towels on a hot burner. Also, Dave made a gallant effort to challenge me in my paparazzi-ness. Good effort! But no chance.




Saturday was spent doing errands and yard work. Cowboy got to spend most of the day with his best dog-buddy Tilly. She lives next door and they play together every day. While he and Tilly were playing in Tilly's yard, Chris was destroying ours. He got rid of the creepy sandbox and all of the weeds and ivy around the base of the tree. It's amazing how much better the yard looks now -- it's a clean slate instead of an overgrown jungle. In addition to the yard work, Chris enlisted the help of Finn and Joel to cut down the random antenna pole that was attached to the side of our house. He lured them over with promises of beer and basketball, and instead had them hard at work on top of our roof.

Saturday night, we headed to the Triple Door for Point B's anniversary celebration. They really know how to throw a party! The meal was catered by Wild Ginger (yes, the same place we went for our Seattle wedding reception dinner), they had a Bubble Room and Point B-Tini Room, and Hit Explosion played all night. We got to catch up with Reyn & Amy, Susie & Justin, Kyle & Sarah, Kirby & Cammie, Mark B...and we even talked to a few people who aren't ex-Accenturites! It was a lot of fun and Amy and I thoroughly enjoyed hanging out in the "make-out room" with the other wives.



Today, Margaret and I attempted to hike to Mason Lake while Chris continued to unleash his fury on the backyard. I say we "attempted" because we never made it to the lake, and I don't think we were anywhere near it. We followed a trail through the snow, but it seems that the trail-blazer lost the actual trail and was just trying to find a way up the mountain. After a couple hours of hiking up some seriously steep switchbacks, we found ourselves crossing a very sketchy avalanche chute. It was steep enough that we actually got vertigo if we looked downhill. Apparently, that was where everyone else who'd followed the tracks decided to turn around (including the person who made the tracks in the first place), so we followed suit. So the hike turned into a bit more backcountry than we were expecting, but it was still a good day. Cowboy had a great time, especially when he found something disgusting to roll in. That little caper resulted in freshly-bathed Cowboy later in the evening.



After a trip to Pet Daddy to clean Cowboy up, we had our first BBQ of the year. Finn and Joel dropped by to enjoy some steaks -- it was the least we could do after coercing them into the antenna project yesterday. It was nice to have them over and to start the BBQ season. I'm looking forward to the sunnier days ahead of us!

Still Life and Momos

Chris and I saw the Roy Lichtenstein exhibit at the Henry Art Gallery tonight. It was Chris' first experience with pop art and my first view of Lichtenstein's entire body of work. Wow. I had no idea that Lichtenstein experimented with so many different artistic styles. It was really amazing to see how he could distill each style to its core and reinvent it in his own way. Two of my favorite pieces from this exhibit were "Still Life with Windmill" (at left) and "Tel Aviv Museum Mural" (below).

After an enjoyable stroll through the gallery and a surprise visit with Emily (who was there for a lecture), Chris capped off the evening by going through an emergency exit and setting off the security alarms. I sure hope they let us come back after that stunt -- there's a Maya Lin exhibit I want to see in May.

We topped off our cultural and criminal activities with a delicious Himalayan dinner at The Himalayan Sherpa Restaurant on the Ave. It's been awhile since I spent time in the U District, so it was fun to walk around and see what's changed. The main things I noticed are that there's a lot more pho (yay!) and my favorite little Italian restaurant is gone (boo!). I don't even know what the restaurant was called, but it's been replaced by a place called Kai's Bistro and Lounge. It didn't look like Kai's offers the same aria-singing waitresses, unfortunately.

We had a fun evening and I'm looking forward to taking Chris to more galleries. In the future, however, I will keep a closer eye on him when we are near emergency exits.

Bumper stickers

Bumper stickers seem to be popular amongst a particular group of people. Often, you will see just about every political or activist statement possible plastered all over the back of a car. I like to read them, paint a mental picture of who I think would display that particular set of messages, then pass them to see if I was right. It's a good way to pass time while commuting.

Today, I was behind a car that had only one bumper sticker. It said, "Lottery: A tax on people who can't do math". OK...that's a cute statement. But does anyone really feel strongly enough about lotteries to place a bumper sticker about them on their nice shiny Volvo? Especially if it's their only bumper sticker? Did they evaluate all of the possible bumper stickers out there, see that one, and say, "Yes! That's it! That's SO me!"?

My mom only had one bumper sticker on her car when I was growing up, but it was more of a public service announcement. "Don't follow me...I'm lost too." Now that makes sense.

The Dog Days of March

The ultimate achievement of Corndog Day eluded us. The Triple-Double (10 corndogs, 100 tater tots, 10 beers) was not in the cards for any of us. I think the St. Patrick's Day/Corndog Day double-whammy set us all back. Tristan came the closest -- he closed out the Tater Tot and Beer categories, but fell 3 dogs shy of the goal. However, this year Foster Farms sent jumbo corndogs instead of the regular size, so I think Tristan's consumption of 7 jumbo corndogs should count for something.

To make up for Friday's and Saturday's festivities, we went on a snowshoe hike to Talapus Lake today. It's normally a pretty quick hike, but since the road wasn't plowed we had to hike to the trailhead as well. Cowboy wore his dog pack for the first time, and he quickly forgot he had it on and behaved in his normal crazed-pup-in-the-snow manner. He picked up a new game as well: he rolls over on his side/back and kicks in the snow to push himself down the hill. It's funny enough when it does it well, but it's hilarious when he miscalculates and flips himself over a snow bank head first.

To Kells and back

Since today is National Corndog Day, does that mean that St. Patrick's Day was Corndog Eve? If so, we celebrated Corndog Eve to the hilt - with Guinness, corned beef sandwiches, and green to spare. We spent the evening at Kells, socializing with friends, listening to music and toasting all things Irish. In honor of the wearing of the green, I decided to take all of my pictures in the green color-select mode (i.e. black and white with green all over). It was tricky to calibrate the exact shade of green that would pick up the most color, so I experimented throughout the night and ended up with a pretty good collection of shots. As for the rest of the evening's details, I'll let the pictures speak for themselves...