Warrior Dash

The Warrior Dash was a blast! A little cold and rainy, but the obstacles weren't bad and they broke up the run!

I should use this for my next Firewise presentation!

Jana and her turkey leg!


Just a little muddy



Why am I the only one wearing horns?


Post race, pre beer


Trying to catch up to Randy!




Hell Run is next on October 1st!

Are you a Warrior?

Just a couple of months until the Warrior Dash so I guess I better get in shape for it. The warrior dash is an 11 obstacle 3.55 mile course.

Went on a painful run this morning (primarily due to not taking care of myself at all last week) The dogs had fun though. Tonight: push-ups and sit-ups. We need to get our chin-up bar put up!

Adventures in volunteering....

All I can say is that I was asked to volunteer my time for a socially conscious project and was scolded for not doing more! I promised to do some prototypes, was well on my way to finishing them in the allotted time, then scolded for not being able to coordinate the entire project because the founder did not understand the technology. Not what I signed up for. Why do people take advantage of volunteer efforts? It was such a good project, I was doing what I promised, but apparently not enough. I'm not saying that people should not volunteer, but even when volunteering check everything out before accepting. One email from the project founder stated that she thought I was putting my husband, family and real job ahead of her project and I totally agree that I was. Is that so bad? Another email came to me with the following statement:

"I knew the right people with the right combination of skills were out there, so I made a declaration to the universe to send the individuals needed to be a part of this groundbreaking work".

Really, you couldn't have told me this before I signed on? Huh--I find it hard to believe that the universe sent me--but on the other hand, wouldn't putting that I was "sent from the universe" really make by resume stand out in a crowd!

I really like this map...

The quarter is more than halfway through. I'll be happy when I can get some assemblence of my life back. In the meantime--check out this map.

Computer Cartography

Looks like I'll be teaching at Central this winter. It's a Computer Cartography class to teach more about the elements of designing maps--rather than just GIS analysis. I've come across some pretty amazing maps as I've prepared for the class. This one's pretty interesting when you look at how map projections skew our thought process!

Train Concert Maryhill Winery

Went to the Maryhill Winery to the Train concert last weekend.

Beautiful venue and a great concert.

Thought I'd share just a little of it with you!

YourLUME | A Bucket List of Adventures, Travel and Experiences

YourLUME A Bucket List of Adventures, Travel and Experiences

Just started as a contributing writer to the website YourLume.com. They've picked up 5 of my stories so far. the first one took a long time to write, but I think I'm back in the swing of things! Pretty soon I'm going to run out of stories, so I'll have to start traveling more!

Jana and Jorge's wedding

We were fortunate to be invited to our friends Jana and Jorge's wedding in Playa Del Carmen, Mexico. We flew into Cancun on Monday & the wedding was Wednesday evening. A really great wedding full of fun, dancing (salsa lessons) great food and of course a margarita or two!

The beach! My favorite towel animal!

We even managed to get a dive in on Tuesday.

After...............

Here are a couple of "after" pictures of the deck. freshly stained, new steps, built in benches, a new privacy wall and we built in the BBQ and used some extra granite we had. I thought it would be a lot harder to cut the granite, but is was really easy to do!

First whales of the year!

Leaving the island last Sunday we saw the first gray whales of the year! two were travelling together just off the SE point of the island. It was such a beautiful weekend that we decided to sand and stain the deck--yes it is February, but it was 58 degrees! Now its almost done and we can enjoy it. The previous owner had put some sort of diesel/linseed oil concoction on the deck that turned it a really dark brown color. We sanded and stained it with a transparent Mountain gray stain. Next time over we'll do the trim work and install corner benches and a privacy wall. Pretty soon we won't have anything else to do to the house.

It's February float time! Usually when we tell people we are going to float the Yakima at this time of year, we receive some odd looks. The annual Peace and Gourmet float is in its 40th (and unfortunately final) year. This year it was a very mild day and the warmer temperatures made it even more fun. We made our usual sushi--and Mike also made some miso soup to go along
with it this time.



Everything was wonderful. Mike by the espresso maker--and I don't know what Jodi, Luc and Shirley are looking at in the other picture! A little backgournd on the float can be read a this link http://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=860&dat=19910109&id=RU8QAAAAIBAJ&sjid=II8DAAAAIBAJ&pg=4392,774151..
Needless to say, it was fantastic. I think the lime scallops were my favorite.

Last weekend we took advantage of the snow to head out to Blewett Pass and snowshoe. Hildy and Chloes' first experience with fairly deep snow. We had to stick to a track made by another snowshoer because the dogs kept falling in up to their necks!



Our picnic rock and the dogs hoping for treats

Squirrel!

Afterwards, we went up to Leavenworth for my favorite beer--Blind Pig and to the Cheesemonger's shop.



And our project from last week's island visit. We had old oak glass topped tables, so we stained them dark, made boxes under the galss and are in the process of filling them up with shells.

Happy New Year

Make a Smilebox greeting

Christmas at the island

Waited all day for a break in the rain. The dogs didn't even want to go outside!


A much better evening--Chloe even went for a swim! Hard to believe how rough this can get!
Hope everyone had a Merry Christmas. We're off to Olympia next weekend!

Christmas Shopping 2009

Randy and I went to Bellevue and stayed the night in order to finish up our Christmas shopping. Think we are all done! Here are a couple of cool things we found though:


Juice pack to extend my Iphone battery and a golf cart heater for those chilly Hat Island golf games and....



The coolest infrared heater for the island - safe to use indoors, in the garage, shop, cabin, or just about anywhere that you want effective, comfortable heat. The heat is not whisked away on a breeze because the light rays are unaffected by the wind.

Anyway--we had a great time Went to Earl's and Ruth Chris for Happy Hour and Joey's for dinner. And the $100 certificate from the Westin was a nice bonus for shopping!

Everglades and Key West

What a great vacation we just returned from. Nothing like leaving 80+ degrees and returning to 1 degree. Oh well, that's why we travel in the winter.

It's really hard to see, but there are two manatees in the picture above. The larger white blob in the Mom and there is a smaller blob to the left of her that is her baby. They were really fun to watch. I think we saw a total of about 8 manatees.

Randy is sneaking up on two Wood Storks in this picture. We saw all kinds of wading birds--Great Egrets, Snowy Egret, Tri-colored Herons, Great Blue Herons, and Roseate Spoonbills. Most just from the window of the car! Its was amazing.

In this picture there are two alligators, a couple of Herons, an Anahinga, and an egret. We noticed a cottonmouth snake in the bushes in front of us as we took the picture.

Our favorite beach (Fort Zachary Taylor State Park), our favorite pastime, and a final sunset. Wish I was still there!

Veteran's Day

On Veteran's Day I decided to look at some of my military pictures. It seems I didn't take a lot of them, but here are a few that document some of my time! In honor of the season, here's one flying Santa into the base for Christmas in Germany. In actuality it was a pretty crappy weather day--so I kinda hovered him in!

Next is a picture when I was Platoon Leader in Ft Rucker Alabama. This is most of the flight company.

FLY ARMY!

Here is one from my Company Change of Command. I was Company Commander of Charlie Company. We taught both Basic and Advanced Combat Skills to future aviators.

And, not to forget Korea, I spent some time with the Neutral Nations Committe (comprised of Swiss, Swedish and Polish Officers). Here I am near the DMZ.