Great Big World Out There

frustrated

I spent this morning trying to find the things my grandma needed from the boxes of her stuff piled in my garage.  Grandma got moved to a nursing home yesterday, to the great suprise of her entire family.  The hospital called my sister because she works there to ask if they should arrange transport or if we would.

Umm. She's moving? What?

Questions to grandma told us that yes, she'd been told but she didn't think it would actually happen.  So she didn't bother saying anything to any of us. We were all there on Sunday, my dad was there Monday night. They moved her Tuesday.

OY.

So I spent the majority of my day getting things together for Grandma.  Took forever to get the stuff out of her boxes. For my family? Packed her stuff in boxes so huge I find it very difficult to move them. They filled those boxes FULL.  Of clothes. Of hangers. Hangers in every box. That you can't just move easily.

I hate hangers after this morning. Also, my grandma had a lot of clothes. Many of which she hasn't worn in years. She still has grandpa's ties.

After I got the stuff out, washed, dried I was off to Leduc to deliver the stuff, spend some time with grandma and head to the city for a farewell lunch.  

I didn't make it to Grandma's before the lunch, just headed straight to the city.  Had lunch (which was lovely) then since I was most of the way downtown I did some camera shopping for work. I have some good cameras in mind. If we have the money to do that I will be very happy with those cameras, as should the other people using them.  

While I was there I replaced my purse camera, since I smashed my previous one on a rock while climbing down a mountain. Side note: my blistered heels finally had recovered sufficiently to wear my hiking boots again - so since I was schlepping around today I decided to wear them - dang those boots are comfortable and supportive to my sore ankle.  The funny thing about the camera smashing - I smashed it, the battery compartment popped open and I thought, damn, now my camera won't work. I smushed the battery back in, turned on the camera, it worked, I prompty FORGOT ANY OF THAT HAD HAPPENED.

Then I went to the county fair on the island a few days later and the camera kept crapping out, freezing, I'd take out the battery and it would work again.  I could not for the life of me figure out why that was happening. Someone asked to see my dork pictures (another dork, naturally) and I said I would try but the camera was mostly buggered. I had no idea why the camera was not working. (I am such an idiot).

About 12 hours later I was doing something else entirely when I suddenly remembered smashing the camera against a rock.

Huh. That could explain the buggeriness of the camera.

I replaced the smashed camera today. Is pretty and charging as we speak. Yay!

***

After I did the camera thing I headed out to the west end to sign up for some diving lessons. My discover scuba event on Sept 11. I actually asked if anyone has ever died because I am kind of terrified. I got a weird look and umm, no. 

Good to know. One needs to ask, right?  So that's good.  

Then I had to shop for Grandma. Then I spent a while with Grandma. Then I had to do more Grandma shopping. She decided she's going to make more Smiles. I could explain that, but DEAR LORD I cannot. She announced her retirement from the making of smiles, she was done, blah blah the end. 

Until tonight when she told me she needed new stuff for making smiles. She also told me, with a great deal of pride and excitement in her voice, that maybe she COULD walk again.  WOW. 

That warmed the cockles of my cold dead heart, I gotta say. Been in a funk for about a week so now there's something nice to look forward to. Grandma walking around on her own again? That'd be amazing. 

With that, my tired cold dead heart needs to go to bed before I pass out. Been kind of dizzy all evening. Can't eat anything without feeling sick. Not eating makes me woozy, then I eat something stupid because it is there, then I feel sick, and I don't eat. 

Did you know there is wheat flour in licorice?

ME NEITHER.  I learned this today and I must say, my cold dead heart became a little colder and a little more dead. I was deflated. 

Still am deflated. Except when I think of grandma walking around on her own again. Too amazing.  If she can do it.  If she does, I need to fly the plane I jump out of or something.  How do you top what she's managed to do? Really.

wondering

I have a plan. I'm signing up for a scuba discovery course held on Sept 11.  I was going to wait until October to do this but that only because I'm basically terrified of doing it. 

There is no time to waste. I can do many things, but refusing to do something because it scares me is no excuse.  So I'll go to work early tomorrow so I can head over to the dive shop after work and get myself signed up.  I don't have to play Sept 11.  I have the whole day to go be scared to death and figure out if I can actually do this scuba thing.

If I can (and I am determined to conquer this) I'll sign up for the online book training.  Then some private lessons.  

***

I've been playing music very loudly all evening to try to drown the thoughts in my head.  It isn't working. I even uncovered the piano to get some peace. No dice. But I am a bit more prepared for Sunday. I am preoccupied. 

I cannot go hiking this weekend since I had to take 5 x-strength advil to stop the pain in my back.  My ankle aches.  My back pain is just at bay - stop the drugs and I'm back to the struggle again.

I cannot tell you how tired I am of the pain. The random, capricious nature of it. How can I climb a mountain one week and days later be felled by turning a corner. While walking on a level hardwood floor? It makes one think that perhaps I should not be doing death defying stunts if walking through my home can mess me up.

I may have said it before, but my motto going forward is to live life like you mean it.  If it gets me into trouble, so be it. Hurting is better than feeling nothing at all.

Or so I say while the advil is doing its magical work. 

With that I will go to bed before the pain comes back and I have no hope of sleeping. 

how bittersweet this would taste

I was up before the sun this morning. I got up at 6am. Now I am depressed. I'm not ready for winter.

****

I spent my day at work playing with data. I've been playing with data for days. Weeks. Months. I never seem to make any progress. Just when I think I've really accomplished something I find that I have to go back to the beginning and start all over again.

That being said, I am reminded of something I saw in Australia outside a coffee shop - a sign that read, 'Occasionally what you have to do is go back to the beginning and see everything in a new way.'

So that's what I'm doing then. I keep going back to the beginning to see everything new.  I'd like to do that less often than every time I start working with the data. Possibly make some progress.  Ahhh. Progress. How I covet that.

***

Neither here nor there, but I nearly sent my grandma a text message just now. Heavens above, I wonder what would have happened if I hadn't noticed I had the wrong name.  Heh. I wonder if she can even get texts? I should try sending one from her phone next time I visit. It'd be funny if nothing else. Or I could actually teach her how to text. It could be hilarious. 

***

Speaking of something funny - here's another pavarotti and friends oldie but goodie.  Oh how that makes me giggle. So awesome, so 90s. Therefore, perfect.  Now I need to go do some stuff. I have a pile of juice that needs to become jam.  I have a pile of juice that needs to be put into jars until I have time to make it into jam. Or jelly, I suppose.  Further updates as events warrant.

***

The other night I was talking to my sister. I think I'd just gotten home from my trip down to Lethbridge.  I'd had dinner with my cousins and was basically exhausted. It ocurred to me at some point that I needed to send someone a message. So I started looking for my phone. Couldn't find it anywhere. Looked on the washer/dryer, the kitchen counter, my night stand, the desk. Wandered over the house looking for the phone.

Eventually I realized it was in my hand. I was using it to talk to my sister. 

WOW. I didn't think I was that much of a ditz. 

***

I hid another geocache this afternoon. I was looking for one in a ravine near where some other cousins used to live. I have vague memories of going sledding there as a kid.  Couldn't find the cache so I decided the area needed another one. I had one to hand so I hid it in a tree. Near where someone I know lives, someone who is sort of interested in geocaching so we'll see if he decides to find it.  I might have to send him a message to let him know when it has been posted.

I'm a nerd like that.

***

I made jelly tonight.  Here's the process from start to finish, starting with the juicing of the cherries:

 

 Then juiced cherries:

The juice!

The juice, sugar and pectin in a pot:

My ultra dorky night light next to my stove:

Jelly in Jars:

Me: No picture, but rest assured that I am pleased with myself. Kind of embarassed about the nightlight. Hoping the jelly sets properly. Do with this information what you will.

 ***

Had another lovely conversation with my geocaching cousins. It's weird to be the teacher at something I've only been doing for 6 weeks. I think I'm ready for a bit of a break, to be honest. I'll find something cool to do this weekend close to home because really, I need to work on my yard. If I have to get a tractor over here myself, I'm doing some work with dirt and wood and STUFF.  It is time.  I need to remember to take some GPS measurements of my trenches so I can find them in the future. This just ocurred to me but it seems a good idea.  I would go do that now but it is dark outside. Only 9:30.  

Sigh. Winter, it cometh. I am not ready.

Anyway. I've given up on my flowers. Too tired to care that they are dried out and ugly.  The plumber never showed yet so I haven't got any outside water outlets.  Might have to give them a call tomorrow to see what's up. Maybe he forgot where I live?  

With that, I'm done. 

***
ETA: BALLS! Was just walking down my hallway, made to turn right to come back to my bedroom and tweaked my back. HURTS LIKE HELL NOW. So. Hot bath to soothe aching muscles? Various lotions and potions and pain killers so I can sleep. Damnation. No hiking for me I guess. 

title: someone like you, Adele

it's not enough just to make the list

So, the kids go back to school this week. University starts next week.  That means... the fall STUFF will be starting soon too! It's like second new year, really.

I want to learn to swim. I want to learn to dive. These are both on my 40x40 list (added a new item!) and I only have a few years to get stuff done.

NOW IS THE TIME.

I'm thinking I will do Saturday morning lessons, I have a friend lined up to go learn how to swim with me and it will be awesome. Or maybe Thursday night would be better. I have travel planned on weekends. Such a hard life I lead.

The diving part I'm not so sure about.  It kind of terrifies me, to be honest. I've looked up the local dive shop in Edmonton and figured out I can do a discovery type event in October, then if I don't die of fear and can actually breathe underwater, I can do the full training in November. The weekend of my birthday. Doesn't that seem fitting? If only I could find a friend who would be similarly interested in learning how to dive with me.  

Is this a sign I need more adventurous friends? Or am I possibly just crazy?

Next on the list is getting on a discovery flight so I can try flying, then signing up for some lessons. I'm not in a huge hurry for that part. It's expensive. I need to pay as I go and I am ok with it taking a while.

The diving thing I want to get done before I go to Hawaii at New Years. Will get another thing off my 40x40 list! I can do the first part of the training in Edmonton and then finish with the open water certifcation in Hawaii. HOW COOL IS THAT! AM EXCITED.

My excitement may have something to do with the excellent beer I'm drinking.  It's called Lazy Mutt and naturally I applied my wine buying schematic to this particular beer purchase: funny name=the booze I will drink.

Always a pleasure when it turns out to be a good wine/beer/boxed alcoholic beverage. If not, at least it had a funny name.

****

I somehow cannot remember what I did today. I went to church. That was nice. Then I collected my mom's juicing pot so I could get juice from the two buckets of cherries I had festering in my fridge. It was covered in dust so it needed a good wash.  Then a quick run to Tim Horton's. Then a visit with my grandma. That was nice too. I hid a geocache somewhere in there too. 

Then I think I bought groceries. Canadian Tire for jam jar lids. Rona for geocache building accessories. OH! I went to the Co-op this morning and totally found the best geocache hiding thingie. I am excited about that AND a total dork. Naturally. 

I came home and built my new geocache. Juiced the fruit. Swept the garage floor. Went out to hide a geocache in honor of my favorite nephew. Washed some clothes. Hung some clothes up. Cleaned up my suitcases. Mostly. Put away my groceries. Fidgeted with the air conditioning (am either too hot or too cold, I cannot find the happy place. Is stupid to put on a sweater because your air conditioning is too cold at work, EVEN DUMBER AT YOUR HOUSE WHERE YOU HAVE THE POWER TO CHANGE IT).

So that was pretty much my day. Spent half an hour on the phone with my cousin, planning geocaching dorkery for the next several weeks/months, etc. She's going to take me to the caches in Mexico. CANNOT WAIT. 

***

Kind of planning a hiking trip for this coming weekend. I'm just not sure I can do the hike and be back in time to play for my church service on Sunday morning. If I can find someone to do the service for me I'll go hiking. If not, I guess I won't go hiking this weekend. Can't go the next weekend since I'm going to the football game. After that it might snow. That would not be cool. Or I guess the real problem is that it would be too cool. So there you go. Not doing that hike unless I do it this weekend.

***

Sigh. Beer is gone. Time to take a bath and go to bed, I suppose. 

***
Holy schlamoley. Both of the caches I hid today were posted already. I cannot tell you how pleased I am. Now I just have to find the perfect spot for my next cache (it is awesome) and then I will go off and hide it.  Time to sleep and I am not remotely sleepy. 

Of course.

Shouldn't have checked my email but it dinged. I am powerless in the face of an email ding. This is why the computer has to move out of my bedroom.  Also why I usually turn off email dings. I haven't bothered figuring out how to turn off the ding on this computer. But I probably should. Anyway. Enough stalling. Time for bed!

i hate writing titles so this time I won't

I had such a lovely day today. I started out with a little gentle geocaching. I had this grand plan - I'm close to 300 finds and I want 300 to be something worthy of the number. There's a cache near the church where my mom attended as she grew up. I had the fun of going to a baby shower there today - so my grand plan was to find enough caches to get me to 299 and have that be my 300.

I didn't find enough caches because I didn't get going early enough to make it happen. I'd forgotten I needed to pick up some stuff for my mom's printer, a gift bag for my gift and my morning tea/breakfast stop at Tims.  There just wasn't time for enough geocaching.

So naturally, being a dorky sort of person, I started thinking about how I could make 300 cool. I don't remember what my #200 was. (I just looked it up. It was near where I was having supper one night a couple of weeks ago). I don't have a solid plan for #300 yet. I have a hmm, 'might be fun to climb another mountain' kind of plan going on in my head.  This coming weekend is a long weekend. I just need to see if I can get someone to play for me next Sunday and I might go climb a mountain next Saturday. You know. For fun.

Or I'll lame out and do something cool for #400. If one can be cool when one is geocaching.

***

Tomorrow I have to make jam out of some cherries I got to pick at my cousins farm this afternoon. I forgot to put them in my fridge until just now so I'm hoping they aren't all manky by tomorrow morning. I am not making jam tonight. Can't. Don't have any pectin that's any good right now.

If I were clever I'd go buy some cucumbers at a farmers market this week and make some pickles too. I feel very domestic even thinking about all the cooking I'm going to do.

***

Even cooler today, I got to hold a week old baby. Cole is the son of my first cousin once removed, so that makes Cole my first cousin twice removed. Isn't he cute? Aren't I clever for knowing the cousin removed stuff?

I look like an idiot because I'd just had my mom take my picture and my aunts gave me crap for not smiling. I then told them about how my grandmother, she of the 'I want a cellphone' at 95 ilk, who once told me I should never smile and show all my teeth. I was 5. I took her at her word.  I was impressionable! I couldn't help it. Best way to get a smiling photo of me is to make me laugh and snap a picture. 

Really.

To give a comparison, here's what I looked like in the first picture:

See!  I look stupid in both pictures.  On the bright side, I got one heck of a laugh at my 'don't show your teeth when you smile' story.  My mom was dumbfounded. I guess I never told her that story.  The upshot of the whole thing is, be careful what you tell a 5 year old. It can scar them for life. Or make them look like me!

Yikes.

 

on the road again

I kind of fell off the whole writing bandwagon last week. Amazing how quickly I lose my will to write, and how hard it is to keep going when you've stopped.

Except when you're drinking wine. I realized I had a bottle that wasn't finished on my cupboard. That would not do so I'm finishing it.  This could prove interesting for any storytelling I may do tonight.

***

Way back in May I got an email at work asking for volunteers to work at the food bank sometime this summer. We were being granted work time to go do this. I've always kind of wondered what happens at the food bank so I signed up.  Then I promptly forgot all about it.  Until a month ago? Maybe? I got a meeting invite to go work at the foodbank. I sighed, because now I am busy and I didn't think I had the time to do it.  But I'd agreed to it, so I signed up for an afternoon of food banking.

Today was the day.  It was illuminating.  We were a group of 9, and we did the first stage of hamper preparation. All the staples, basically. Beans, mac&cheese, soup, cereal, vegetable/fruit, condiments and some kind of cracker/cookie.  We filled 20 pallets of these boxes, a combination of 1, 2 and 3 person hampers.  We worked hard.  For many of the people I was working with, it was their first time doing manual labour at work in years.

I was amused by that.  They were excited to not be behind a computer screen! I would be excited to stay behind one for more than 2 days at a time.  I know my time is coming, the travel is nearly over.  We're leaving on our penultimate overnight data collection trip tomorrow morning.  

I am thrilled.  And drinking red wine to celebrate.  

***

So I spent Saturday in Seattle, attending the Geocaching Block Party. It was fun! It was hot. I got one heck of a sunburn.  I bought dorky souvenirs, made my way through various dorky challenges and generally enjoyed the heck out of myself.  I bought some stuff at Target and Walmart on my way back to Vancouver - and despite being over my customs limit by about $400, my customs officer just told me to have a nice evening.

I love when that happens. That is why I don't lie about my total.  Even though I am often tempted.  Weird that he didn't ask if I had alcohol or tobacco.  I had some tobacco but no booze.  Too heavy for my suitcase.  

***

Friday I spent the morning working and after my class was over I decided to hop on the ferry to Whidbey Island.  The hotel I was staying at is right next to the ferry. I'd stayed there last year enroute to my Alaskan cruise so I knew the area.  We just hadn't had the time to cross on the ferry.  I hopped on the ferry with no idea where I was going, what I might do when I got there, or how i might get around other than by foot.  

Well, I wouldn't say I had no plan for when I got over there.  I'd packed a laptop in my backpack so I could achieve a webcam cache using the ferry cameras.  That was pretty cool. Then I found out that the busses at the ferry terminal will take you around the island for free.  Turns out there was a county fair on the island last weekend, and the bus stopped right outside the gate.

So, without any planning, I ended up at the island county fair.  It was awesome.  There were weird bits of art, strange paintings, preserves, pies, photography, sewing, quilts, pigs, sheep, cats (as a 4H project?), dogs, horses and, mostly oddly, 'creatures' made out of vegetables.  You haven't lived til you've seen a pterodactyl made out of a zuchinni and red pepper.  I was going to take pictures but my camera met with an accident - odd, I didn't remember until just now why it wasn't working.

I was coming down the mountain on Wednesday, making my way down a particularly precarious rock formation when I slipped and my camera went flying. The battery compartment hit rock, popped open and I had to put it back together.  I'd forgotten that happened.

That would be why my camera wasn't working. YOu'd think I would remember that.  Let us just be thankful that it wasn't the fancy pants SLR that I smashed against rock. The most amazing thing is that it would work at all after such abuse.

Hmm. What else have I done lately?

My nephew's birthday was Sunday. He had a lovely time. I did too. I was tired though - didn't get home until after 1230am, then up at sparrows fart to play for my sister in church.  Then she needed help putting things together, buying groceries, collecting various bowls and containers from my house. So I helped with that. Didn't go home until after 9. 

It was lovely. I was invited on a trip to Mexico in January - which sounds lovely but I'll be going to Atlanta with any luck then so that won't work. 

***

Nearly done my wine. Nearly 10pm. Nearly time for me to get to bed. I haven't packed for a couple days away. Haven't talked to my cousin about coming in to feed my furry feline. Haven't washed the dishes or changed the litter box.  

I guess I'll have to do that in the morning.  I have contracted with several online free wakeup call services to assure myself that I will in fact wake up.  My alarm clock stopped working a while back. My cell phone has mysteriously stopped announcing callers. It'll vibrate if on that setting, but it won't make any noise. I do not know why.  

I filled out a new phone request today. We'll see how long that takes to get done.  I think I am getting a white one. Why not? Maybe it'll even work with geocaching. Heh.  

With that, I am done.

So true!

I still have this dream. Not as often, but too often for comfort.  See more funny comics at the source here:  http://xkcd.com/557/

 

climb every mountain...

I had appointed today, the day in the middle of the week, when I would have enough done to take the time for a hike before I have to sit in on a training thing during prime hiking hours for the next couple of days.  Not complaining about that - I am excited about this training session.  

So where did I go hiking? Mt. Margaret trail.  It's apparently an easy mountain climb with little risk of death  -1 YDS rating. I didn't look that up until just now.  Good thing I didn't.  Might have stayed home.

So I chose to break in my new hiking boots by climbing a mountain. I knew this would hurt my feet,that it was basically stupid but I was ok with that.  I was still surprised by the quality of blisters I created on my heels. They're festive.  And ouchy.

I'd chosen this hike for a particular reason - the oldest extant geocache was at the summit of the mountain. I'm a big enough dork that I wanted to go for it.  So last night I downloaded the caches to my GPS.

OR SO I THOUGHT.

I stopped at McDonalds in North Bend, WA to get some gluten free food (hashbrowns! smoothie!) and decided to see if there was a cache nearby. To get warmed up on, you know. Imagine my horror when I realized the nearest cache was 40 km away. I must not have transferred the caches to my GPS. Could have sworn I did. DAMMIT.

So I went to the Safeway down the road, used their free wifi and my ipod touch to get the cache coordinates - wrote them on a piece of paper and then had to type them into my gps to find the caches.

OY. I started climbing that bloody mountain, got about 1/4 of the way up and thought I would die. I was thankful for the caches every few hundred metres so I had an excuse to sit down and rest. I'm in decent shape, but clearly I need to work on the whole 'climb a mountain without wanting to die' level of fitness. I AM NOT THERE RIGHT NOW. BUT DAMMIT I SOON WILL BE.

I learned it is impossible to walk past fellow hikers on a mountain without having a conversation. People are cool.  I took a lot of rests going up the mountain. I wasn't in any rush. By the time I was 2/3 of the way to the top, I was feeling pretty tired. 

(side note: been texting with the nice young man who taught me about geocaching as I type this. He's jealous that I am going to the big dork convention in Seattle. I'm bewildered that I keep finding these events by accident. So I'll get him and our summer student a little something from geocaching dork central while I'm there.).

I climbed all the way to the top of the mountain. There was snow at the top. Amazing. When I got over the crest of the mountain I saw a sight that blew my mind. There were trees in the way but still amazing. A sight most people never get to see.

That made me happy.  Then I checked my GPS and realized that I was 300m away from the geocache I'd come to see. I had to bushwhack across the mountain until I reached ground zero. Then I couldn't find the damn thing. I looked high.  I looked low. I had been in email contact with our summer student - coaching him through some stuff (while climbing a mountain).  I wasn't sure if I had the coordinates correct - I'd written them down on a piece of paper. I eventually asked him to email me the coordinates, then finally the damn pictures of what the area around the cache should look like.

I must have looked up there for 30 minutes. My GPS was all over the place. Couldn't get an accuracy better than 8 or 9 meters. MAKE ME CRAZY.  Finally found the thing by accident, then back down the mountain. Which was oddly harder than going up since I had to be careful not to fall on my face. Time I got down the mountain I was pretty much finished. Done. Spent. Complete. Took my boots off and gleefully put on my sandals. I'd been up on the mountain for 5 hours.  

Amazing.

Then a stop in North Bend for some supper. A trip to the Lynnwood Target and Kohls (coupon expired today).  I lost my drivers license in Target (long story about how that happened. Essentially my mom and my friend Val are right, not closing my purse or leaving things hanging around means eventually you'll lose things). Got the license back pretty quickly when I visited customer service. 

So here's what happened. I left my purse in the hotel room and carried my wallet in my dork sack up the mountain (dork sack contained various hiking... stuff and geocachng stuff.  I went into target because I wanted to go to Kohls, but I had hiked in the heat of the day up a mountain and I was not smelling as fresh as I had when I stepped from the shower this morning. New tshirt, deodorant and I was good to go.  After target I wanted to hit up this place called world market. As I was leaving I realized that my drivers license window was.... empty. (ominous music). 

FUCK.

I checked the car, nothing. I went back to world market. NOTHING.

Back to Target.  I retraced my steps until I was going past the customer service desk. Stopped to ask if anyone had found a drivers license and voila! He was handing me my license before I'd even finished my request. The target dude asked if I'd heard the announcement - umm. No. Had left the store before I realized it was missing.  

I have kind of a manly girl wallet. It's so full of junk right now (work receipts, 2 currencies, and assortment of gift cards) that it doesn't close properly. Because it doesn't close properly, the bit with the DL window kind of just hangs out and can apparently lose whatever is inside it.

Sigh.

So I got it back.  Then I got to go to Kohls (exciting because I had a 20% off coupon). Don't ever pay full price at Kohls - it's not worth it. Kind of like shopping at Bass - their stuff is only a deal if it is 80% off. Which tells me it was too expensive to begin with.

Anyway.  I got back to my hotel and did a bit of work. Started writing this entry. Watching some HGTV show because it is the only channel that doesn't annoy the crap out of me. How I miss my satellite TV and PVR.  I've had a lovely bath as well. Soaked my aching bones and scrubbed the trail dust (and smell) off myself.  Took my dirty clothes out of my backpack and DAMN. No wonder I drank 2L of water on the trail. I was sweaty. Gotta find a laundry at the hotel tomorrow night. I bought laundry soap at Target.

I have a dreadful headache - perhaps dehydrated? Been drinking like crazy.  Time for bed. Time to turn off the phone too. Been chatting for nearly 2 hours.  Heh. Feel young with all this texting.

Who cares if I feel young or not. I CLIMBED A MOUNTAIN TODAY!

carrying on

So yesterday, when I was crossing the border, I inadvertently lied.  The border guard asked me when I'd last visited the US. I thought back quickly, and said, umm, March?

Sort of true. I'd forgotten my trip to New York in June. Whoops. She didn't question me, and I didn't remember until I was pulling away. I resisted the urge to go back and say, umm, sorry. I was wrong. She'd already let me into the country.

She had a lot of questions though. Where was I staying? Who did I know there? Why did I pick that place? What did I do for a living? I told the truth - wanted a cheap place, by the water, not in Seattle proper and this place seemed to fit the bill. I almost asked her if Edmonds (where I am) was so terrible. I refrained. Don't anger the crossing guards. That's my motto.  I classed up my occupation a bit when she asked about that. Poultry just sounds more official than chicken. I use chicken when I want to be funny.  After all, it's funny to say that you work with chickens.

Turns out, I picked pretty well.  I had to go on a breakfast hunt this morning because hotel breakfasts are the stuff of horror for someone suffering from a severe and sudden inability to eat anything with gluten in it. I'd been doing so well with the cheating until I got sick last week - now even the smell of waffles or pancakes cooking, bread baking is enough to turn my stomach.  I ate a burger yesterday (as I may have mentioned) and I felt awful the whole rest of the day.  So. Fine. After a week I can get the message - no more gluten for me for a while.  Sad, because I passed a fabulous looking bakery in downtown Edmonds this morning on my walking tour to find gluten free breakfast and large vats of caffeine.  Found a Starbucks, which just seemed out of place next to all the mom&pop shops lining the main street.  Edmonds is a nifty spot.  

My hotel, down by the water, not such a nifty spot but it is adequate for my purposes.  I'm here til Thursday.  Then I'm off to Mukilteo for a couple of days.  Changing my flight home since my nephew's birthday party is on Sunday, not Saturday.  Yay!

Have I mentioned how much I like netflix? I can have a movie playing on the spare laptop while I am ferreting out the problems with a data set so huge and bulky and disorganized it would scare just about anybody.  I work best with distractions around me.  I don't know why that is.

Anyway.  I'm going to type in this entry throughout the day.  We'll see what else I can say by the end of the evening.  

****

 I'm a bit of a geocaching nerd. May have mentioned that.  I found out after I got here that the headquarters for geocaching is in the Seattle area.  There's a geocache there, but you need to make an appointment to visit. So I duly sent my request in for an appointment.

Only to get a response back saying it was too bad I couldn't come to the event on Saturday. Heh. I'd already decided to change my flight back to something that is not stupid o'clock on Saturday morning, and since I have to call to change the flight (thanks, westjet for making that so easy on me) I haven't actually changed it yet. So instead of coming back at 5, I'll come back at 7.  Then I can be a geo dork in Seattle.

How do I keep randomly showing up for these things? This is the second time it has happened to me. 

I've turned my hotel tv into a second monitor - took a bit of doing, too. I keep getting an error message but I can work around it. Mostly. 

I spent an hour on the phone with tech support tonight trying to figure out why I couldn't log into my email. I have this fancy *thing* that has a changing access code, you have a permanent pin and you put this all into the login page and normally you get it.

Tonight i could not. Wouldn't be a problem except I promised one of our producers that I would send some data in his direction today. 

Major fail. Eventually the tech dude had to escalate me to some other tech dude, I expect I will be getting a phone call from someone tomorrow. 

I'm having someone email me the file I need tomorrow. It'll be quicker.

***

I have a plan for tomorrow. A hike in the morning/early afternoon, a bit of shopping and then more work. Already at my customs limit. What else is new? Although I just realized I am not sure what the customs limit is for the timeframe I am gone. Huh. $400. So I'm still ok. Yay!

 

 

translation

I just spent a couple of minutes looking up different ways to say I'm tired. I was going to use greek, german, ukrainian, chinese or possibly dutch.

Then I decided I was just too tired and I didn't bother.

***

I got myself to my hotel today. I worked at my data stuff for quite a while, but I have much left to do. It's hard to concentrate when you feel physical pain from tiredness.  At what point does the tiredness become more than just being tired?

I don't think I am there, but it might be just a ferry ride away.

***

Tomorrow I am sticking myself in my not-so-terrible hotel room for the day to beat my data into further submission.  I've scouted out a good running route for the morning and I'll have to swing by a restaurant other than the hotel breakfast because gluten is really bad for me right now. I cannot tell you how dreadful I feel after making the mistake of eating a burger for lunch.  I still feel sick and terrible 12 hours later.

That's messed up. 

I dashed out to target this evening because a) I could and b)I didn't pack a swimsuit.Hotel has swimming pool and ocean is next door. I also needed a cable to hook tv to laptop so I can be an uberdork and multi-screen my statistical issues.  Got some stuff for my angry stomach too. I should probably hit the computer for another hour or so since I've gotten a good start on things, but i don't think I can manage to stay awake.

***

That's all for now. I will say I randomly managed to find an interesting spot to park myself for the next couple of days.  I'm heading back to a lovely spot I stayed in last year at the end of the week - if only so I can eat an amazing meal at the restaurant next door to the hotel. 

Or maybe I'll change my mind and go somewhere else. I'm flakey that way.  Now I must go to bed. I'm knackered.