Dream Cycle

As I ride home from work, I find myself daydreaming that I either work at a different company or live in a different neighborhood. My daydreams are not a result of any unhappiness with my current job and home (in fact, I am very happy with both). It's much more basic: I'm dreaming of a shorter and flatter bike route. I start off thinking, "I wonder if I could work from the King Street office during the summer?" then move on to "Boy, if I worked at Adobe, I wouldn't even have to go over Dexter," and "Gosh, what if I still lived at my old place in lower Queen Anne?" By the time I make it to Wallingford, I'm reduced to, "We could live there, or there, or there..."

Of course, my daydreams are interrupted with my regular rant of "Why in the world did they put the bicycle route on Dexter? Why start at sea level and ride two miles up a hill, just to ride back down the other side and end up back at sea level? What was the point of that?"

Once I finally make it home, I'm happy again.

Mural Begone

There's a psychedelic mural (intricately-detailed parrot included) that graces most of the eastern side of our backyard. It's painted on the side of the neighbor's garage. We're not sure if the neighbor did it to torture us, or if the neighbor doesn't even know about it (since it faces into our yard) and the previous owners did it in a misguided attempt to brighten up the yard. Regardless, it's large, bright, and not exactly to our taste.

In addition, our backyard used to feature an overgrown garden, a boulder field, and a sketchy-looking wooden sandbox. Last month, Chris removed every last plant, weed, rock, and grain of sand in order to start over. This weekend, he got back to work and turned our little mural-burdened dry strip of dirt into a soon-to-be backyard oasis! We're hoping the bamboo lives up to its reputation and immediately takes over the entire wall of the garage (bye bye mural!). Now there's just one more patch of backyard to work on, plus the front yard, the front garden, and our Leaning Garage of Seattle. But that stuff can wait -- the important thing is that the mural is well on its way to being reduced to nothing more than flashes of color glimpsed between the stands of bamboo. Yay Chris!

The Jungle	The Desert	The Oasis
May 2005	April 2006	May 2006

Otter Falls

Today was an overcast, yet dry, day in Seattle, so Margaret, Chris and I headed to the mountains to find the rain. After all, what's Memorial Day weekend in Seattle without rain? And boy, did we find it. It rained the entire time we were hiking -- all 6 hours of it. We started off with a nice steep "warm-up lap" before we got on the correct trail because I took a wrong turn (note: Margaret has known me for 12 years...hasn't she figured out by now not to follow me when hiking??). We picked our way across overflowing creeks. We scrambled over mud and rock slides. Cowboy realized he was more afraid of getting left behind than of rushing water, and braved his way across the creeks. We reached one of the more impressive waterfalls I've seen in a long time and were amazed that it's not better known (granted, we did have to ford several streams and climb off-trail through the woods to find it). We slogged our way back to the trailhead, turned the heat all the way up in the car, then made our way to the North Bend Bar & Grill to drip by the fire and fill up with prime rib and mashed potatos. All in all, it was a great (albeit wet) day!

Over the hill(s)

In my years of cycling here in Seattle, there have been two routes that have consistently filled me with dread. When I was a grad student pedaling from UW to Wallingford, it was the Wallingford hill. When I was an architect commuting from Pioneer Square to Fremont, it was the Dexter hill. Now that I'm old(er) and out of shape, what do I have to contend with during my bicycle commute from Sodo? Yep, the Dexter hill...followed immediately by the Wallingford hill. For good measure, throw in a couple shorter (but steeper) hills as I ride through downtown and Greenlake. I just keep reminding myself:

This...is...making...me...stronger

I do have to admit, though, it's a lot easier now that I got the derailer fixed on my bike. Last week (before it was fixed) I was standing up to power my way up a ridiculously steep hill when I tried to downshift. I immediately popped into the highest gear my bike has (21), came to a complete standstill, and tipped over. Very graceful.

One leapin' Cowboy

One of the funniest things I've seen in a long time is watching Cowboy wear his new booties. Yes, he's got booties. I want to take him for longer bike rides, but it tears up his paws. So I got him some snazzy "Ruff Wear" high-endurance booties to protect him. They fasten onto his paws with snug velcro straps, so there's no way he's taking them off unless he chews them off. So far, I've only put them on his front paws -- but that was funny enough to keep us entertained for awhile. At first he tip-toes around, trying not to put any weight on his front paws. If you call him, he LEAPS into the air...trying to jump right out of the booties, I assume. I tried to get pictures of it, but I couldn't. He was too erratic, bouncing all over the living room and skidding into the furniture. And I was laughing too hard. Poor boy.

Next step: Doggles.

Take that, bridge

We Beat the Bridge this morning. I'm sore.

Sunny days and long walks

One of the great things about Seattle is that spring and summer days are not only sunny, but also ridiculously long. It doesn't get dark until well after 9pm, so I have plenty of time to exhaust Cowboy on long walks. This week we enjoyed the 80 degree weather by taking our Greenlake-Gasworks-Fremont loop in the evenings, followed by Cowboy collapsing in a panting heap on the floor once we get home. Later, he's like a little kid who wants to stay up past his bedtime but just can't keep his eyes open (or like a grown Wenmei who would really like to stay awake during those 8-hr meetings, but...).

Notice in the pictures that I am being a responsible law-abiding dog owner by keeping Cowboy on a leash. The law says nothing about having to keep the owner on the other end of the leash, however.

Two bits

No pictures this time, just two bits of news:

1. We got kayaks! We're so excited. We spend so much money renting kayaks every summer that we finally decided to get our own. We bought them through the boat share program at the Moss Bay Rowing Club. The only downside is that we have to paddle from South Lake Union to get to the Cut...so we'll be needing an hour or so headstart if you want us to meet you in Lake Washington.

2. We finally decided on our honeymoon! We'll start off hiking hut-to-hut in the Bernese Alps (Switzerland), and follow it up by boating along the Dalmation coast (Croatia). We'll end with a few days in Venice (no dog breeds associated with that particular area). I know that this trip was not included in the list of ideas I posted awhile ago, but they satisfy our strict criteria: mountains, beaches, sunshine, no civil unrest.

Pippin

We saw "Pippin" at the 5th Avenue Theater tonight. I bought the tickets through work, and we didn't know where our seats were until we got there. The usher sent us right down front to the FIRST row. 4' from the stage. "Reach out and touch someone" distance. Well within "flying sweat" range. It was actually unnerving to be so close, looking the actors in the eye as they sang and danced. Nonetheless, it was really really neat.

I've been spending so much time with the opera that I'd almost forgotten how much I love musical theater.

dis.trac.tions

Our tulip garden


Backstage at Macbeth


Happy trails to Mark & Rebecca


Cinco de Mayo



Baxter's birthday party