Last night I had dinner with Mathew and his Ex. We talked about going up to Mathew's cabin this weekend. Right now, I'm going to see Cirque Du Soleil (with Steven and C2) on Saturday. I was planning on going to the ocean on Sunday, but Mathew pointed out that the ocean is always cold. His cabin and lake Chilan will be hot.

We ran into Steven at the restaurant. Steven said he had been to that restaurant 8 times in the past two weeks. We chatted briefly, then Steven had to leave to sit with the rest of his party.

Afterwards I went home and played with the big-mother-printer. I finally got the ink refils for it. I printed out a few large photos and panoramas. Very nice.

Last night I watched two episodes of the new Star Trek, "Star Trek: Enterprise" It's a lame show. They really don't know how to generate excitement. Always putting the lead character in danger-- not exciting. You know he'll be back next week. Slowly reading numbers off the speedometer, "4.7.... 4.8.... 4.9..."-- Not exciting.

Now that I think about it, the show wasn't even science fiction. Nothing happened on either episode that couldn't happen on earth, right now.

I think Cor and his latest boyfriend broke up last night. At around midnight they got out of bed. I heard the boyfriend say "He just controls you." He left shortly afterwards.

I have almost no recollection of what I did on Monday. This is why I keep a journal. I remember grocery shopping and talking with Cor. I may have watched TV, which would explain my memory gap.

Tuesday I went to the annual company meeting. We didn't have a bad year. Profit was up about 9%. Not bad considering we are in a recession. After the meeting, C5 and I toured the product fair together. It was fun talking to him. He wants to set me up with a friend of his. The friend lives in SF but may be moving back to Seattle.

When I got back to work, Steven had emailed me. He said he met a nice man that lives in Vancouver, who would also be great for me. Steven and I ended up having dinner that evening.

I vented to Steven about my dating situation. The guys I want are attached, not interested or on the rebound. They guys I'm being set up with live a long ways away. He offered some sympathy. But, he's in love with a man who lives in Victoria (a $100, 3 hour ferry ride away)

Steven just bought a house close to me. So, we are going to get to be able to see each more often. Right now he has very few friends in Seattle. His boyfriend lives in Victoria and he often travels for work. So making friends in Seattle has been difficult. He's looking forward to going to a movie with a friend on the spur of the moment-- things like that.

Speaking of friends, I haven't talked to Mathew for a few days. Usually we email each other a few times a day. I've emailed him a copule of times on Monday and Tuesday, but haven't heard back from him.

Quiet day yesterday. I cleaned the house a bit. In the afternoon I hung around at Victor's Coffee for and worked.

In the evening, I went to a BBQ at Lisa's. Lisa works with Bruce on a TV show. It's a movie review show. Lisa also manages a Video Rental Store. Most of the people at the BBQ were movie buffs-- most of the conversation revolved around movies. It's a very different crowd that what I'm used to. At one point, one of the movie buffs, who works at the Video Store with Lisa said "I dream of earning $30,000.00 a year" Then there was a short conversation on living with $15,000 to $20,000 a year. I kept my mouth shut the whole time. I earn six figures and I didn't want them to know.

Later on, Bruce, C3, Lisa and I tried to play a game of "Truth, Dare, Kiss, Command or Promise." It ended up being lame. We all picked "Truth" But, we're all fairly mature and honest people (Either that or we are all very good liars) so the truths ended up being boring.

Hmm. Maybe there is 4th man on my "List of men I'd marry in a heart-beat"

Last nights party was the ususal fit bearish crowd. There were also a few people from out of town. Cor mentioned that at least 200 people were invited. There were at least 100 people at the party.

At the party I ran into Brent and Sean. Brent and Sean have been together for years. I've always thought they would be together forever. But, last night they said they just broke up. They are going to try and stay friends.

I've always really liked Brent. Now that he's available I'm going to pay more attention. He'll be on the rebound for a while, so I have to keep some distance. But, in a few months I'll ask him out.

Last night I had dinner with C2 and Cor. C2 and Cor are closer than I realized. They had lunch together on Thursday. C2 knows who Cor is currently dating. I don't

I had breakfast with C2 at Van's. Afterwards he went home to pack. He has to move out by the end of the month. I spent most of the day hanging around with Cor. Cor and I are going to a private party tonight. For the party, Cor had to find the perfect sunglasses to go with his new image (He shaved his head) We drove around Redmond and stopped at about half a dozen different places before he gave up.

He's heading out the door now. I'm going to show up later. Around 10 pm

I had lunch with Ryan today. He gave me the tour of his new company, Cranky Pants Games It sounds like things are going well with them.

I had dinner with Hugh. It was nice. Not great. Not love at first site. But still, Hugh is a nice man.

Hugh and I went to Angelino's for dinner. Mathew was supposed to go to Angelino's also, for dinner with a different friend. He called and said he wouldn't be there. He didn't want Hugh or I to feel like we were being spied on.

Mathew also asked me if I was nervous about my date.

That's weird. Mathew and his Ex really want to hook Hugh and I up. They are quietly pulling strings to get us to like each other. They've been raving about Hugh for over a week now. Acting like he's one of the hottest men around.

I'll just go slow. I don't want to jerk Hugh around. But, I don't want to dissapoint Mat and his Ex.

I bought a printer. Not just any printer. I bought a huge, wide, enormous printer. It's 4 feet tall, 5 feet wide, two feet deep. It can print photo quality images up to 42 inches wide.

I've been looking for a new printer. My old printer prints color weird and can't handle large paper. I was going to buy a normal consumer printer that could handle 13x19. I mentioned my search to C2. He said he delt with several companies that resale hardware from expired leases, belly-up dot com's and the like. He asked what models that I would be intersted in.I told him. He mentioned that it would be easier for him to find the bigger printers. I gave him the go-ahead.

The next day, he got back to me. He could get me a used HP DesignJet 500 (New Retail $2500.00) for $500.00 cash plus I had to get him a copy of the software I work on. We agreed.

Well, the printer showed up today. When C2 told me at arrived, he was laughing. He said it was huge.

"How huge?" I asked.

"Huge. Bigger than a couple of midgets."

Well, it is. It's about the same size as a love seat. Most important, it prints beautiful large pictures. But, I still laugh everytime I look at it.

Lunch with C5 went well. We talked, told a few strories and then went back to work.

Other than that, I've just been working. At the end of every day, I don't want to think-- too much work. Although, my project is getting close to completion.

I exchanged email with Hugh-- the friend of Mathew that I'm having dinner with on Thursday. Sorry John, I'm not going to post pics of him. Not yet atleast.

Tonight I had dinner with Mathew and his ex. Mathew says that he wants to have dinner alone with me, but his ex keeps inviting hiimself along. I'm not sure what's going on. I'll let them work it out.

They are setting me up with a friend of theirs. The friend is supposed to be a very nice guy. They emailed me some photos and the friend is cute, but he's got the goofy gay grin-- a minus for me. Also, I keep getting big sales pitch from them-- the friend is so nice, I'm sure to like him, I'll be suprized by what a great guy he is, everyone thinks he's handsom.

We're having dinner on Thursday.

I hope I'm not too jaded.

I was thinking about this-- there are three men in Seattle, whom, if they asked me to marry them, I'd say yes in a heart beat. Harry is one of them of course. But, Harry doesn't want to have anything to do with me. Then there is C5. I'm having lunch with C5 tomorrow, but it's just lunch. C5 is dating someone. Finally, there is Terry. But, like C5, Terry is has been with someone for the past year. I haven't seen terry since last winter.

I hope I'm not attracted to unavailable men.

I'm tired. C2 and I went for a long bicycle ride this afternoon. It was fun even though Seattle has a lot of big hills. We cycled up to the Tall Ships on lake union. Originally we wanted to go on the Tall Ships, but the lineup was over an hour. So, we took some pictures and then left.

In September C2 is moving in with IR. We had dinner with IR and the current room mate, T. It was a good dinner. IR and T both like formal dining. When I put my bread on my dinner plate, IR corrected me and showed me the bread plate.

C2 isn't big on formatlity I wonder how he and IR will get along.

IR and T warned C2 about all the odd things that happen at IR's house. A 300lbs shut in lives next door. The neighbour across the street often watches IR and T have dinner. Another neighbourhood family are secular Jews who can only talk to Jewish people.

IR and T claim that IR's house has a ghost. They see or hear it about once a month. They wanted to warn C2 in advance. IR didn't warn T about the ghost before T moved in. T ended up being kind of freeked the first time he saw it. But, the ghost is harmless, so T is fine with it now.

I'm not sure that I believe in ghosts.

Some of the photo's from last weekend's road trip at http://home1.gte.net/res0ci8w/index.htm

Not all the photos are there yet. I'm still learning how to get photo shop to make websites.

This building, is the bathroom that cost a million dollars. This is the view from the bathroom

Friday night I went to the Eagle. I ran into Brian. We chatted for a while. Things are going good with him.

Saturday I worked out and Kayaked on Lake Samamaish. In the evening, I had dinner wtih C2 at the Broadway Grill. Afterwards we went to the Cuff.

I ran into Harry at the Cuff. This is the first time I've seen him since he stopped returning my calls. I'm not sure what happened. When he walked in, he pointed me out to someone. I walked by him later on and we said "Hello" but not much else.

I still feel regret when it comes to Harry. I wish things would work between us. But, I don't think it's in the cards.

Last night my brain kind of gave out. It hurt to think or concentrate. I went home at 7:30pm (Only a 10 hour day) ate dinner and then drove to a theater and saw Minority Report It's a good movie.

Today at work, we made tie-died T-Shirts. I guess the whole team is stressing out, and they wanted to do something fun to relax us.

I've been working a lot. I got home after 10pm on both Tuesday and Wednesday.

We have a big deadline a week from today. Crunch time. I hate it when work gets like this. Especially when the weather is as beautiful as it is now.

I got sick yesterday so I went home from work and slept. It was also Mathew's birthday. So in the evening, I had dinner with him.

We've been pooling the photos from our road trip. There are hundreds of them. This has to be the most over photographed road trip I have ever been on.

In addition to the road trip photos, Cor put some other photos on my hard drive that he needs copied to CD. After he did this, he wrote C2 and I, "Between you guys, please do not distribute or make any comments to anyone on the folder “My Art and Furniture”. That can bring problems for me…Thanks,"

Of course C2 and I immediatly made a copy of the folder. I didn't see anything incriminating. Just pictures of art and furniture.

I've had an incredible weekend. I went on a road trip with Mathew, Cor and C3. We left Saturday morning, spent Saturday evening at Mathew's cabin, and came back on Sunday. I'll put some photos up shortly.

So much happened. If I listed everything I did, I would ramble on and on and on-- and then we hiked here, and then we saw this, and then we ate there, and the we saw that, and then we talked about something...

We did a few short hikes on the way up, including a stop off at the $3,000,000.00 dollar rest stop that caused a scandal in WA a few years ago. It was a beautiful rest stop.

Mathew's cabin-- Mathew always let on his cabin was in pretty rough shape. But, it's not. It looks like he just moved in and hasn't unpacked yet-- it's looked like that for the past 2 years. If he unpacked, it would be a good log cabin. It was full of really nice stuff; leather sofas, nice mattresses, expensive stereos, good art, a machine shop, computers. Mathew said it's the leftovers from his past, straight life. He hasn't bothered to sort through it yet.

It didn't matter that the cabin was full of stuff-- we hauled some mattresses outdoors and slept under the stars. The Perseid Meteor Shower is starting. We didn't see many shooting stars though, only about a dozen.

Sunday morning we swam and had a picnic at Chilan Falls. Cor lied on the beach and tanned. C2, Mathew and I swam up river a bit, found a private cove and skinny dipped.

When we drove back we had a late lunch in Leavenworth. Leavenworth is a tourist trap town where every building looks Bavarian. It was Cor's first time though Leavenworth, so he had a good laugh.

I'm just happy now.

Tonight I had dinner with C2, T&J, Mathew and Cor at Siam's. Good conversation. Cor got a call half way through dinner-- some guy called him up to say that he loved Cor. Cor got the guy to repeat it so that I could here it. Whatever.

Today I got an Infrared filter for my camera. I'm going to try taking some infra-red photos this weekend. I'm looking forward to that.

Mathew, C2 and I are going east of the mountains this weekend, We'll spend Saturday night at Mathew's cabin. We are also hoping to see the Perseid Meteor Showers, but it may be too early. It doesn't peak till the 12th.

Tonight I had dinner at the 5 spot with Steven. Things are going well with him. He can't see his BF this weekend, so he my come along with Mat, C2 and I.

This should be a fun weekend.

Today I got my new Canadian passport. I lost my old passport over a year ago. It's kind of wierd. Two weeks ago, before the green card and the passport, if I wanted to quit my job I would have had to leave Seattle and move back to Cananda. Because I didn't have a valid passport, flying around the U.S. was a pain. Traveling to Cananda and then re-entering the U.S. was a no-no

Now that I have both a green card, and a passport, I can travel and work anywhere in Canada and the U.S.

I see doors opening up. Maybe I'll go to Vancouver this weekend.

Wednesday night I played hockey. We lost 5 to 3. We played well. We were down 4-3 with 30 seconds left. We pulled our goalie, but they manged to get the puck around us to score.

Wednesday was the last night of regular season play. Playoffs start next week. Even though we are last place, we play in the playoffs. It's just not likely that we will win.

Mathew is back. Tonight I had dinner with he and his ex.

I've known for a while that Mathew doesn't like his mother. I found out tonight that he never calls her "mom." He only refers to her by her first name.

Over dinner, it became clear that Mathew is keeping many secrets from me. His ex started to tell me a story about a woman friend, but Mathew cut him off, stressing it was personal information and if he wanted me to know, he would tell me. From the sounds of it, before the ex was cut off, Mathew has been married three times. Not just the two times I know of. It sounds like Mathew is still married to his 3rd wife.

I know that everyone has their secrets. But, I don't like proof of it being shoved in my face. Now, when I listen to Mathew, instead of thinking "What is Mathew saying?" I'll think "What does Mathew want me to think? What is he hiding?" I don't like being cynical like that.

Mathew and his ex want to hook me up with a friend of theirs. I briefly met the friend last Friday, but I don't remember what he looks like. Apparently the friend is a really nice guy and has a great body. We'll see.

I worked late tonight, ate left overs, worked out and surfed the web

Two fun places to go... Strong Bad's Email and Shockwave

The spool of floss is dead. Long live the spool. Ten years ago, when I was a student living in Toronto, I bought a very large spool of floss. I have finally used the last piece of the floss. I'm kind of glad. Toward the end, the waxed threat had sort of melted together and you really had to pull at it to get it loose.

Yeah, I'm having one of those days.

I haven't heard from Mathew. I think he's hiding at his cabin up in Winthop. Last week he was stressing out and talking about quiting his job. I'm going to go to his cabin this weekend to see if he wants to chat.

Cor is back. He's spent the past week in Miami, selling his house. He told me about some of his Miami conquests. He also mentioned that he doesn't like Seattle-- not exciting enough for him.

I went out to the Cuff tonight. I ran into C6, and his ex J. At seperate times, both C6 and J asked me out. This puts me in an awkward position. C6 and J had a very bad breakup and they still are not talking to each other. If I went out with one, the other would take it as an insult. This is a shame, because both I like both of them.

Right now I don't think I should go out with either of them. I should wait until things cool. That could be a year or more.

Friday night, C2, Bruce and I had dinner at Siams. Afterwards, I went to the Cuff, and to the Eagle. I ran into very few people that I knew.

Satuday was a do nothing sort of day. I bought groceries, farted around on the computer, worked out and made dinner. C2 came over for diner and we watched "Black Hawk Down"

C2 is going through a lot of stress right now. His life is going ok, but some friends and family are crumbling. His father's marriage is breaking up and his father is broke-- lost a lot of money in the stock market. C2's brother was just commited to a mental institution.

Also, B, a good friend of C2's, has been detained twice in the past week. Last Saturday, B went out drinking. Rather than drive home, B slept in her van. Some police came across her, charged here some sort of drinking charges and brough her to jail. B called C2 at about 6 in the morning and got him to pick her up.

Then last Thursday, B got really drunk (B has a drinking problem) and decided to tell her therapist and another friend that she was going to commit suicide. The therapist called the cops. The cops entered B's house and draged here off to the hospital. C2 said that B had sort of slit her wrists-- it was more like a cat had repeatadly scratched her wrists, than she actually slit them. B called C2 at around midnight and asked him to get her out of the hospital. He tried, but the hospital wouldn't release her till the next morning.

As far as C2 is concerned B has no plans to kill herself. She just wants attention. I think that B needs to stop drinking and start going to A.A.

C2 has decided to not answer the phone after 11pm and before 8am. No good can come of it.

I had lunch with C5 today. He drove. When he dropped me off, I gave him a quick peck on the cheek. Later I got this email from him...

Barry,

Thanks again for a great lunch -- I always enjoy talking to you. If I seemed a little taken back in the car just before you got out, it was because I didn't expect it. I wish I had because I would have reciprocated :-) (remind me next time to lighten up)

Looking forward to our next lunch...

Now C5 is dating someone. I don't know how serious it is. But still, I'm attracted to C5. For now, I'll just put effort into getting to know him better. If things stick between C5 and BF, then I'll have a good friend. If they don't... I cross that bridge when I get there.

Another Candian I work with, who was approved for a green gard 5 months after me, also got his green card yesterday. It's like someone at the INS said "Let's do the state of Washington today."

I got my green card! I'm a Canadian. I've been in the U.S. on a work visa. For the past 5 years have been trying to get my green card.

Today when I checked my mail-- there it was.

Now I can quit my job and I don't have to flee the country. I don't think I'll do that yet, but it's nice to have options.

I'll still can't vote, but hey, there are worse things.

Bleah. Played hockey tonight. We lost. I don't know what the score was. But it wasn't close.

Only half the team showed up. Some friends of a team-mate had their equipment, so we let them play. That gaves us 3 men on the bench. To play a good game you need at least 5 men on the bench. Eight is even better. With only 3 spares you get tired out very quickly.

Then, two of our players got game misconducts and had to leave the ice. That left us with one man on the bench.

We tried to slow the game down whenever possible, but it was just so easy for the other team to skate fast and tire us out.