Looking over the last few months of my blog, I see that my life is in a cycle. I work a lot during the week (and don't write at all) On weekends I do something interesting and worth writing about.

This weekend was the same.

Saturday night, RO, Matt, Beef and I went to see the Rat City Roller Girls. It was fun. My friend Jen got into a fight while playing. She ended up spraining her leg. She'll be ok though.

Sunday was Pride. It was packed. RO and I decided to skip most of the parade (Gay Pride parades are long and boring) we toured the booths. Mac and Joe were at the gay yatch club booth.

After the festival, RO and I went to C.C.'s for drinks. RO get very drunk. I had fun watching him.

I had a great weekend. On Saturday RO, Matt and I went to the Fremont Fair and Solsitce Parade.

The weather was perfect on Sunday-- sunnay and warm. RO and I went to the Washington Brewfest and sampled much great beer. Afterwards we swam for a while at Newcastle Beach. The water was cold, but the sun quickly warmed you up when you got out of the lake.

What's good is a parade without streakers? 

Robots 

Dancers at the Solstice Day Parade. 

Art Car at the Freemont Solistice Day Parade. The fish and lobster are those novelity singing machines from a few years back. They all sing in unison as well as say things like "Please step away from the car" 

C2 in Iraq writes...

B,
Thank you for the email. I'm glad you got the money. Remember, keep the
25,000 new dinar bills but please, just freely give away the other stuff.
That's about the bes trinket you can get here. Hmm, what have I been up to?
Well, I got accused of harrassment and there's been an investigation and
I've discoved the seedy underbelly of the beast. There the veneer of KBR
corporate where 'everyone is valued' and then there's reallity of
backstabbing, lying and manipulation. The boss's secratery across the
hallway is fucking a couple of subcontractors and there are booze parties on
regular basis. The bitch who accused me of harrassment just got back from a
psych exam she's got a history doing weird stuff. It's a regular Payton
Place!! But let's put things in perspective, Michael Jackson has been
acquited on all charges!!! Yea!!!

So this time next month or so I'll be heading out of here on my break. My
plan is to drag you back along the way where we're going to go someplace and
see part of the world you've never seen. I've got to do some planning but
I'm thinking we'll do the trip in August sometime. How does that sound? All
that you have to do is pay your part of the way, keep up with me and I'll
put everything else together. Have you ever been to:
Berlin?
Istanbul?
Egypt?
Jordan?
and I know you haven't been to Dubai.

Overall, things are going....'fine.'

Last weekend RO and I went to Port Orchard with Mac and Joe for a Yatch club event.

Thursday night RO and Mac left for Port Orchard M&J's boat. Joe and I drove up on Friday evening. It was a fun weekend. The Yatch club people are nice, though there is a bit of a money-show-off thing with them. Mind you, you don't spend $100,000.00 on a boat to tell people to stay away-- being a boater is a social thing.

RO and I talked about buying a boat. We decided not to. I'd rather put the $100,000.00 into a cabin in the mountains or on the ocean.

Not that I have $100,000.00 to spend.

Docks 

Port Orchard 

Last weekend RO and I worked on the house. We did a lot of work-- power washed all the decks, weed whacked the back yard, fixed and filled cracks and crevacies.

I also bought a blower. I really like the blower. In 45 minutes RO blew the crap off the roof, cleaned out the gutters, the walk ways and the deck. That used to be an all day chore.

The power washed deckss look great. Like new.

It was a weird week. On Tuesday I got a very big bonus for a special work project that I volunteered for. On Wednesday management canceled that project. So, I have mixed feelings.. They wanted to make it clear that they appreciated my efforts even though they were no longer needed.

Clamming on the Hood Canal 

Lake Cushman 

New Truck 

The gang went camping at Lake Cushman. The weather was perfect-- sunny and warm.

Friday RO and I hiked along the staircase rapids.

Saturday we went clamming. I've never clammed before. It's a lot of work. We were looking for certain types of clams (the tender ones) so we let many go. Mac was a good guide.

Clams are filter feeders so their digest tracts are full of sand. To get the sand out you soak the clams in salt water and corn meal for a day or so. The clams eat the corn meal an expel the sand.

Sunday we want kayaking on Lake Cushman.

In the evening we had clam appetizer and clam luinguini. Yum!

Good work news today. I got a big bonus for my work on a special project. The bonus hit my at the right time-- a week after I bought the new truck.

So I had a rather full weekend.

Friday night I had a surprize birthday party. A few of us were going to go to Siams, but just before we left, all these people showed up. It was fun.

Saturday... Sigh. Saturday I got into an accident. I was t-boned at an intersection. No one was hurt, but my truck will probably be written off.

Saturday evening RO and I went to see the Rat City Roller Girls. We had a blast. The place was packed. They need to work on the timing a little-- the half time was more than an hour long.

Sunday I bought a new truck. I did some research and consumer reports, I test drove an Avalanche, an F-150 and a Tundra. I didn't like the F-150, which is odd condsidering I've been driving one for the past 8 years. I think it didn't feel new. If I'm going to drive a new truck, I'd like it to feel new.

I really liked the Avalanche. It looked nice and was practicle for me.

At the end of the day I tried a Tundra. The only reason I tried Toyota was their great maintenance record. The Tundra I tried was fully loaded. What was odd is that a Fully loaded F-150 is about $50,000.00 while a fully loaded Tundra was $14,000.00 less. The seats were very comfortable, it drove well, and you could see and feel the quality. All the knobs and levers felt solid and moved smooth and precisely.

So I got one. It's silver, king cab, 4x4, leather with heated captain's seats.

I am 35 today. I am officially middle aged. I'm not old yet, but I can't pretend that I'm young either.

I got old gifts. Steven got me a nice new set of dishes. RO got me new sheets for the bed.

RO also got me three guppies to join the beta in the fish tank. RO doesn't really know about mixing fish. One of the guppies is already dead. Another is missing. The beta enjoys hunting them.

Friday night Vic came down from Vancouver Island, Steven, Vic, RO and I had dinner at a new restaurant in old Renton- the Red House. It was a great find. I'll go back again. I'm starting to figure out why old Renton has so many great restaurants. One man, Gino, will open up a new restaurant and manage and be its chef for a few years-- until it develops a name. Then he'll sell the restaurant and do the samething over again. Gino is responsible for three of the five great restaurants in old Renton. The Red House is his latest venture.

Saturday morning we ran errands. Saturday afternoon we went for a short walk on Cougar Mountain. After that we we drove over to Andrew's Bay and spent to spend the night with Mac and Joe on their boat.

It was a good evening. The weather was perfect. RO and I slept on the upper deck under a canvas roof. That was fine for most of the night. It started to rain at about 3 in the morning-- just a gentle shower. Mac came out, pulled out a tarp and threw it over our sleeping bag.

It was very peacful until about six in the morning. Then the wind picked up. The rain started comming in from the side. At about seven I felt a few drops around my feet. I got up to see where the water was coming from. As I sat up RO said "Don't Move!" He got up and carefully gathered the tarp, pulled it over to the side and dumped gallons of rain water off the tarp and back into the lake. He said about 3 gallons of water had pooled on the tarp between us.

We were all up by 8am. We hung around, drank coffee ate a little and the left for land.

Sunday afternoon RO and I helped Jen move a washer and dryer-- at first it sounded like a simple favor. Jen recently seperated from her boyfriend and she needed a washer and dryer for her condo. She bought a used one and needed help moving it. We picked the washer and dryer up and drove to her place down town. It was a little awkward manouvering the washer in her appartment but we managed. Then we tried to hook the washer up-- the washer had a 3 prong plug. Her condo had a 4 prong outlet. Sigh. We headed over to Home Depot to get a new plug. Bad timing; a Mariners game got out at the same time. (Mariners won 5-4 over Boston) The Mariers traffic made our little 2 mile trip take over an hour.

Fortunatly the conversion from 3 prong to 4 prong was easy. Everything was colour coded. The washer/dryer worked fine after we plugged it in.

To return the favor, Jen gave RO and I two tickets to see the Rat City Roller Girls!

Sunday evening was the Survivor Potluck final. Matt, Sandy and Potsy came over. Steven hung around a bit, but he was feeling sick.

About a week ago Steven gave me four tylonol with codeine pill. (Available over the counter in Canada) I used one for a headache I was having, and put the other three on a plate in the center of the dining room table.

About Thursday of last week, someone took one of the pills. Now today, another pill is missing.

I wonder who is going to take the last pill. Or is that like taking the last candy from the bowl? I don't know my pill stealing etiquette.