Ghost town hunting and weekend catch-up

Friday we went on our ghost town hunt. It wasn't totally what we were expecting, but there were some interesting highlights from the trip: seeing and photographing Multnomah Falls in the fog, lots of pretty changing-color trees, gorgeous views of Hood, Adams, and St. Helens, and just being outside in the crisp fall air. The ghost towns we wanted to explore weren't what they were cracked up to be because they were all on private property. That prevented us from doing some hands-on exploring, but Marc got lots of nice pictures. When we got back in town we met up with some of the guys from work at Buffalo Wild Wings for some happy hour action.

Saturday was relatively uneventful. We shopped all over town for new skiing/boarding jackets. I finally chose a light purple Burton jacket and picked up some new pants. Marc bought a coat, but in true form, wasn't sure it was what he wanted, so we went back today to buy another. He'll wear them around for awhile and then decide what to return. Marc is a coat and jacket whore. I keep threatening him that I'm going to enact a law that for every coat he buys, he has to donate or sell two that he already has. Now all we have to do is pray for good snow this year.

Today we visited Aaron and Robyn and their newborn twin sons, Logan and Zachary. They were very quiet babies--at least for the hour that we were there. My attitude toward babies is more and more like my attitude toward dogs. I love them, but I'm really glad when they belong to someone else. It's fun holding a baby, but I'll pass on the feeding, diapering, cleaning, etc. Aaron and Robyn are very happy, and I just know that they're going to be wonderful parents. Too bad we've lost our greatest game-playing buddies though.

All of my current ebay auctions ended today, so I've been busy this afternoon and evening getting stuff prepped to send out. I only sold half of the stuff I put up, but I netted about $180, so I think it was worth it. Now I'll have to decide if I want to relist anything or just donate it all away.

Another long weekend

A friend of ours was looking for some people to do some exploring--old mines, power stations, trails, etc--in southern Washington this Friday. Marc said to me, "Too bad you have to work." That sounded like a challenge. I asked on Wednesday for the day off on Friday, and I received. Score. So tomorrow we'll be out and about, hopefully seeing some cool stuff, and surely seeing lots of pretty autumn leaves. At least we don't have 20 inches of snow on the ground, like in Denver.

I'm always on the lookout for funny t-shirts. I recently got Marc a Meh shirt, and I picked up Pluto Replies. In the Think Geek newsletter I got today, I about L'ed MAO at this one. I just may have to get it.

In diet news, I'm a mere 4 pounds away from my goal weight. We have just over 3 weeks until we finish the BFL program, so I'll have to work a little harder these final weeks. Even if I don't make it to my goal, it's still nice just feeling healthier and being thinner than I've been in awhile.

Increasing my Dorkiness

I became a bit more of a nerd today. I got a Nintendo DS Lite. Amazingly, my parents have had one of these for several months now. I researched them awhile ago but resisted getting one. Then we saw a commercial the other night, and it renewed my interest. After watching a few sell on ebay for more than it would cost to buy it in a store, I figured there weren't any smoking deals to be had. I was at Fred Meyer for some other random crap I needed today, and I stopped in to see if they had the DS. They did. Plus, they had a buy 2 get 1 free deal on some games I wanted. I couldn't pass it up. It seems like a pretty nifty little machine, and it will certainly come in handy on our plane ride to Maui in a mere 30 days (and counting...).

Stupid questions

Okay, I'm a fan of the Extreme Home Makeover show. It's cool to see what the design team comes up with, and the family always seems to be a deserving one. Ty Pennington asks some really stupid questions, though. Take last night's episode. Here's a family with something like 7 daughters. They also had a son who had some kind of cancer and died when he was 8, I think. The details don't matter for the purpose of this blog. Anyway, whenever they start talking about "Jimmy boy," the parents and sisters cry. Here comes Ty with the stupid (paraphrased) question: "Does it make you sad to think about Jimmy?" or something absurd like that.

Gimme a break.

Of course the family is sad about the child being dead. Why would someone even ask that question? I don't know the answer, other than to think that someone, somewhere thinks it makes for good TV. Bah.

Catching up

I turned 29 this past Wednesday. In a way it was nice being away from home with a bunch of strangers who didn't know it was my birthday. No one was able to make a big deal out of it. But let me back up.

My second day in Santa Monica, we got out of class early, at 4:45. I changed quickly and went for a big walk--first down to the pier, then down Main St. past where we ate dinner the first night. I went down to the beach there and walked the rest of the way back north in the sand. Talk about a workout. Except for the 10 minutes that I sat down and talked to Marc, I was walking the entire time. I had planned to stop for dinner somewhere along the way, but by the end, I didn't want to get caught in the dark by myself. I went back and ordered room service.

Wednesday (my unknown b-day) we got out of class really early--4:00--because our teacher thought it was 5:00. Six of us from class decided to meet at 5:00 to go down to the pier together and get some dinner. We wandered around and decided on Rusty's Surf Ranch (with Good Eats!) where most of us got seafood. It lived up to the huge neon sign hanging on the inside wall. As we were eating dinner, we started seeing lots of trucks filled with lighting equipment driving down the pier and hooking up wires. Then we saw trailers pulling up to the beachfront parking lot. Turns out they were getting ready to film an episode of What About Brian. We joked about going down there and trying to get on the show as extras, but we didn't follow through.

After dinner, we stopped in a little English pub. They were getting ready to start some kind of trivia contest. I knew I wasn't going to stay awake much longer, so I cut out early with another classmate who was also ready to go back to the hotel. We found out the next morning that wherever the other 3 went after the pub, they sat down at a bar next to Damon Wayans. I'm not a huge celebrity-nut, but it would have been cool to see someone famous and be able to come home and say so. I guess I'll have to settle for my teacher having a strong resemblance to French Stewart.

So my birthday was uneventful, which is okay. On Thursday, we had a half day of class and then a 4 hour exam. I only spent 3 hours on it. Once I get through something like that, it doesn't do me much good to keep rehashing it. I'll find out in a couple of weeks whether I passed. The airport shuttle picked me up a little earlier than scheduled, but the 5 mile trip took over an hour in weekday rush hour traffic. I got to the airport, made my way towards my gate, and noticed that there was a Portland flight scheduled to leave in about 2 minutes. I interrupted the gate attendants to ask if I could possibly hop on that flight instead of waiting another 2 hours, but I was denied. If I had been just a couple of minutes earlier, they could have put me on it. Bummer. United has the coolest, nerdiest thing now, though. At least on the bigger planes like the 757 I was on, they broadcast the conversations between the pilots and control towers on one of the airplane's radio stations. The true nerd that I am, I listened to them the whole flight. It was pretty neat.

Friday was a recoup day. We slept in really late, then went to see Flags of our Fathers, which was really good. Then we cleaned the house. Fun! Saturday we caught up with my cousin TR at Saturday Market and tagged along with him to the Zoo. We tried to go to Henry's for dinner, but that failed because it was so freaking crowded--too bad they didn't still have the outside seating set up. We ended up at PF Changs instead, which I felt bad about because it wasn't a uniquely NW experience for TR. Then we headed to the Cornelius Pass Roadhouse for after-dinner drinks. I was pooped by the time we got home, but it was worth it for a fun day.

Sunday turned into an ebay day for me. I got pictures taken and descriptions written for tons of crap in my closet that I don't wear. Hopefully most of it will sell. Anything that doesn't, I'll donate to get rid of. It feels good to purge old stuff every once in awhile. That consumed several hours, and besides changing for my workout, I didn't ever change out of my PJs. Lazy day.

I think that gets us all caught up. It's been an eventful week!

Santa Monica

I'm in Santa Monica for a few days. I'm taking a Six Sigma class. It's pretty cool so far, which is a good way to feel after the first day.

Tonight most of my class walked to Enterprise Fish Co. for dinner. It was AWESOME. Neat restaurant. We sat outside on the patio, where some weird movies were being projected onto the back brick wall. Funky place!

I haven't had much opportunity to wander around yet. Hopefully, I'll get to do that tomorrow after class. We'll see. All I really want is to get down to the pier and to the beach. I love the feel of sand between my toes.

The cat fights continue, busy days ahead, and finding cousins

The stupid cats are still fighting, but I think we're making progress. Most of the time we leave our bedroom door open so that Manga can come and go as she pleases. Usually when she comes downstairs, everything's fine. She doesn't necessarily respond to Miji's growls, which used to be the root cause. When they do fight, Miji actually stands her ground and fights back instead of running away and hiding. But after reading my Pam Johnson-Bennet books, I've learned not to react positively during or after a fight--including the cuddling that I immediately tend towards when the cats are upset. So now, when the cats fight, I "speak firmly" to them. With the nice weather we've been having, we had the back door open this afternoon. Considering that I can just about throw a feather at every house within site (yes, our lots are small), if any neighbors were outside when the girls started a fight, I'm sure they found my small explosion to be quite humorous... as long as they didn't think I was talking to a child. Poor Max runs and hides every time the girls go at it though. Poor, scared baby cat.

The next few days are gonna be busy. Yesterday I got a bunch of travel-sized toiletries (and my Ziplock quart baggie to put them in) for my trip to Santa Monica on Sunday. I have to get laundry done and pick out business casual clothes for next week to get packed. (Business casual? You mean not everyone wears jeans, t-shirts, and flip flops to work like I do?) Plus, I need to finish going through my closet and drawers for the Great Exchange at Laura's this Saturday. And I need a pedicure. Yes, need.

Last night I decided that I wanted to have more friends than Marc on MySpace. I don't know why. I hit a goldmine with the cousins I have on my dad's side of the family--that's the result of him having seven siblings who all got married and had kids. I also found some of my oldest friends from Louisville. So for now, I'm winning the unofficial "number of friends" contest. Yay!

Banged

For the past couple of years, I've gotten my hair cut at a barber shop or a cheap-o place like Great Clips. Generally I don't do anything fancy with my hair, so it just made sense to avoid paying $35 at a salon. Then I had a string of really bad haircuts, and I called it quits on the cheap places. A couple months ago, I made an appointment at the salon I went to when I first moved out here and got what I called bangs--though they were really more like short layers that didn't quite tuck behind my ears.

Today I took it a step further. I'd have to look back at some of my freshman year high school pictures to be sure, but I'm relatively positive that I have not had bangs since I used a curling iron and lots of hairspray on them in junior high. That streak has ended. And it's VERY strange to have bangs again. Now I'll have to get a picture taken so that I can have you vote on whether I should start growing them out immediately or keep them.

On another note, I'm very uncomfortable with what's going to happen in 12 days. I'm going to make the final lap of my 20s. When I was younger, I really didn't care how old I was. My birthdays weren't huge occasions--I didn't dread them or eagerly await them. As the years go by, I'm leaning more toward the dread side though. What makes this coming birthday even worse is that I'll spend it alone in Santa Monica, in the middle of a training class that I've been informed will involve assignments and group meetings each night. Fun, fun. At least this year, I'll know not to be tricked into a surprise party under the guise of giving our friends an in-house demonstration of our vacuum cleaner.

On another completely unrelated note, I'm getting into the Halloween spirit this year. My mom sent my first wedding dress to me to use as my costume. (Thanks to the diet we're on, it fits really well again.) I'm gonna be a corpse bride. Originally I thought of this before the movie, so I don't know if I'm going to be THE corpse bride or just some random dead bride. Either way, it should be fun. We usually have a costume contest at work where they give away gift certificates and stuff. I'll do my best to win something.

I think we are broke now

All three cats went to the vet today. Max went in this morning to be neutered, and the girls went in at 2:00 for shots. After the surgery, microchip, rabies shots, distemper shots, prescription for Max's ear drops, and prescription for Prozac for both girls, we were out several hundred dollars. Nevermind the cat drenched in her own pee that we got to bring home, too (Manga).

But here's the interesting development of the day. When I met up with Marc at the vet before the girls got their shots, I walked into an exam room where both girls were wandering around. TOGETHER. Not growling too much or fighting at all. I was amazed. When we brought them all home, we let them all out of their carriers downstairs. Miji went immediately to the window sill behind the blinds. Manga went upstairs to try to get into our bedroom, but we didn't let her in. Eventually she came back downstairs. We had her down here for a couple of hours, and though she did growl and hiss a lot--especially when Max was within sight--she didn't start any fights. Progress. Finally. They're still gonna take the Prozac though.

Things that are too good to be true

There are some things that sound awesome that will just never happen. Consider:

1. Winning the Powerball. Or even Scratch-Its. No matter how often or how much I play, I never win anything significant. I think I need to move to Kansas or Iowa--people there seem to win Powerball jackpots a lot recently, even if they are *only* $15 million.

2. Those "free" laptops, iPods, $500 gift cards, Xboxes, __fill in the blank with whatever you might want__. This one might be a little more attainable than winning the Powerball, but the pain and suffering you have to go through to cash in is rarely worth it, unless you're obsessive about canceling trial memberships and you don't care if your credit gets pulled for a bunch of new credit cards.

3. Three cats in my house that get along. For christsake. We've had Max the kitten for, what, 8 weeks now. He gets along with our other two girls separately just fine, but the two girls STILL freak out on each other. Manga's still locked up in our room, with baby gates in the door so that she won't get out and Miji won't get in. Max can climb them though. This leads into...

4. A decent night's sleep. I sleep with a big body pillow. I love it. Manga has realized this and claimed it as her bed during the day when we're not in the room. This is problematic at night when, because she's a cat, the pillow supposedly is still her bed. I swear, I had to shove/push/throw/drop her off of my head/arm/chest/side so many times last night that I can't count them.

5. Pumpkin ice cream. Oh, wait. That's not too good to be true. It exists. There's a local grocery store here that carries Snowqualmie brand of pumpkin ice cream this time of year, which far surpasses anything made by Breyer's, Dreyer's, or any other mass produced ice cream. However, it may as well be too good to be true during the week when it's not our free day. I managed to make a pint of it last the whole month of September since we could only eat it on Saturdays. That's just unheard of from me. One pint of ice cream in the house for a month? That's crazy talk.