RO and I went to the Boeing surplus store over the weekend. Boeing surplus is surreal. There are endless bins of oddities that you'd never realize were needed to build jets.

You can buy old laptops computers by the pallet. Bins and bins of drill bits, some of the 2 or 3 inches thick, large aluminum sheets, reemers, sonofiers (what the heck is a sonofier?) casters, instructional videos, hand carts, binders and much much more.

Some of their old desks and drafting tables look like a bureaucracy gone haywire. They had a desk on hydraulics that could turn anyway. Another desk had a precision magnifying glass attached.

I didn't buy anything. But, it is a junk collectors paradise.

Had a maintenance weekend. RO and I did chores around the house. Mowed the lawn, moved furniture, cleaned out gutters.

Saturday night we watched Nine Dead Gay Guys. It's not bad for a corny gay comedy. It's very amorale. I think it tries to mock movies that have a moral-of-the-story. At the end there is a moment where the characters realize that it's possible to have sex because you love someone, not because you are paying them, or you are in a dark room.

Today RO and I started a batch of black berry wine. We'll see how that turns out. We picked all the berries our self. This will be the first wine we did, from start to end, without a kit.

The bugs...

Last weekend when we were driving back from Wenathee we drove through a large cloud of bugs.

At first it was gross-- six or seven bugs quickly splatted on the windshield. Then it was kind of funny and weird-- more bugs kept colliding with the windshield. After a minute of bug death, it stopped being funny and was just creapy. How many bugs where there? How long before they stopped hitting the truck? Has anyone ever had an accident because they couldn't see through bug crud?

It stopped after about 5 minutes. I tried to clean the bugs off with the wipers, but they just smeard the bugs.

Steven has moved out. He's got a great townhouse over in West Seattle. I'll miss him. He was a great room mate and a better friend.

He's already jokingly asked me when I was moving to West Seattle. It would be nice-- West Seattle is a better place to live than where I live, Renton. West Seattle has many great restaurants and stores within walking distance. Renton-- you drive everywhere. West Seattle has Alki Beach

As nice as West Seattle is, you pay for it. My commute would be over an hour one way. Real-estate prices in West Seattle are sky high. And as nice as Alki Beach or the clubs and restaurants are, I wouldn't use them every day. Instead, I can drive to them regularly when I go and visit my best friend at his great now townhouse.

For the weekend, RO, Matt and I headed east to Twisp. I slept over at Matt's family cabin. Saturday night we went to the Okanogan Fair and watched the Rodeo. Matt's cousin was the Fair Queen.

They are different in Okanogan. The normal people are the same as normal people everywhere. It's the fringe people that are different. In Seattle, the fringies are very left wing. Around Okanogan, the fringe people are very right wing.

The announcer at the Okanogan Fair Rodeo told a very ruthless, right wing, poor taste joke, over the P.A system to hundreds of people. It suprized me. Matt's cousin told me to not worry-- the annoucer was a local nut that everyone ingored. His opinions weren't the norm.

C2 in Iraq writes:

It's good to hear from you. Yes, it's fall here too. I think today may have been the first day when the temperature didn't get over 100. Yes, Jack Frost and pumpkins are right around the corner!

Vic was in town. Vic is in the navy and may be redeployed to Louisiana. Steven has mixed feelings about this. Vic could be gone for months. At the same time, Louisiana needs all the help it can get.

Yesterday RO and I hiked up to the bathing rocks by Snoqualmie Pass. Very nice.

I'm starting to get a lot of comment spam. For that reason I've had to turn on the image verification thingy. No big issue since this blog doesn't get many comments, and those that do comment are smart enough to figure it out.

Ro, Mac, Joe, Behr and his BF drove up to Port Ludlow on Saturday. It's a beutiful small town. Really just a marina, many vacation properties and the stores needed to support them. As Seattle gets larger, many of these old lumber towns are converting them selves to weekend vacation destinations. Port Ludlow is one of them and they are doing a good job.

Last night RO baby-sat Steven's brother's kid's-- two of them, aged 8 and 9.

We played Halo 2 for a while. They were very excited-- "I don't think we are allowed to play that! That's for teens! Halo is rated mature! Is Halo ok for me?"

I told them there parents wouldn't know if they didn't tell them.

We played a very safe version of Halo, bascially driving around and ramming into each other; bumper cars.

After that, the 8 yo wanted to see my sword. I have a real sword that I keep as art. I pulled it out so they could touch it. They were delighted and scared at the same time. They ran behind the sofa and didn't want to get near it. Everything they know about swords comes from movies-- if you touch the blade, your finger will get cut off. It was hilarious. I just held it and they were amazed.

Of course, when their parents get back, what do they say? "We played Halo2! I didn't think we could play it because it's rated mature! Bob's parents won't let him play Halo! They have a real sword! I touched it!"

Arghhh!

I'm going to write about the rain in Seattle. I feel kind of whiny doing so, since my friend Tommy has just been through Hurricane Katrina, but what the heck.

The summer droubt is comming to and end. Last night it poured down. As luck would have it, my gutters plugged up over the summer. RO and I stook out in the rain and worked to unblock everything.

After that, we wanted to relax in the hot tub. By then the rain had stopped, but, there was so much rain in the trees, that it sounded like it was raining for at least 30 minutes after. It was weird. Away from the trees-- no rain. Under the trees-- rain.

RO and I went to the Muckleshoot Casino last night. We were in the area and wanted to do something different-- go to a good all you can eat buffet!

While we were in line for the buffet, RO playing black jack. He ended up winning over $100.00. Nice-- that paid for dinner, drinks, and a good cigar.

While I was finishing my cigar RO gambled some more. He ended up loosing more than he won. When he was down to his last $40.00, he gave me a $20.00 ticket. He wanted to play nickel slots with me. I was lucky. I ended up winning $100.00.

At the end of the night we were only down about $100.00. A fair price for dinner, drinks and entertainment.

I'm sure that's what the casino wants us to believe.

I'm also reviving Binge and purge-- where I review restaurants you normally wouldn't eat at.

I can only do this because I have the stomach of steel.

I've started posting pictures at http://rooktook.blogspot.com/

I amazed at the amount of comment spam that I got.

Friday we saw Red Eye. It's a very good, tight little thriller.

Saturday, RO, Matt, Sandy and I went camping on the coast in the Hoh rain forest. Matt and Sandy are still constantly bickering.

Still, the ocean and the rain forest were beautiful.

The Ameriquest Blimp is in town. It's been flying over head about twice a day for a week.

Blimp! 

RO has a cat. The cat has personality and is spoiled. If the cat sees the bottom of hs bowl, he thinks something is wrong, and starts bugging RO.

I've been working a lot. My whole team has. I'm getting email with them from 10pm at night and 7am in the morning.

We have a big deadline this Tuesday.

back to work.

A co-worker emailed the theam that he "Wrote his bike into work" His manager responded

Dear Bike:

I wanted to thank you today for taking me to work. Together we jump up curbs, dodge SUVs, buzz by mothers with baby carriages and frighten elderly pedestrians. I will always cherish our long rides in the sunset and in the morning fog --- and we’ll always have Paris…

But my gratitude and love comes with some concerns as well. As much as I enjoy spending time with you, you frequently leave me sore – especially on my... well, you know…

A softer touch would help us spend many more intimate years together.

Your rider,
XYXYX

C2 is back from Iraq for a couple of weeks. From talking to him, I think he's happy over there. He likes the structure that comes from working under the military.

His alergies went away in Iraq and have returned in Seattle.

He and I are want to go to Turkey in October. The gang is trying to talk us out of it. RO does like the idea of me going to someplace unsafe. I'm going to go though.