Waiting, the Odd Juan Out and wiii pain...

Tonight I met my friend Annika for dinner - Annika of living-and-traveling-all-over-the-world-who-I-visited-in-Egypt fame. We hadn't been able to get together in her nearly two weeks home because the snow stranded her in Edmonds and then pushed us up against the holidays. We (me, her and her friend Claire) met at La Carta in Ballard - possibly the BEST Mexican food ever - at least in Seattle. And there was a wait - there is always a wait. Even on a Tuesday night. We waited for 45 minutes but that wasn't the part that made us crazy - it was all of the people lolly-gagging, sitting at their tables, with their checks paid when there were 20+ people waiting for seats in the very busy, tiny Mexican restaurant. The three of us tried the "stair down" and even though of going and asking someone if they were about to leave (when they clearly weren't.) It took us less time to eat dinner than it did to get seated (of course by that time we were so hungry.) Rude. Really.

In spite of all that, we a had a great but brief time getting caught up and I was thrilled to be on her "short list" of people she visited with while home. It's hard. The first time she came back from living in Jordan she tried to see everyone. And I could relate - you have two hour visits with 7 different people each day - just skimming the surface of their lives. It is much nicer and just easier to manage when you can spend more quality of time with people. And that's how you end up NOT telling people you're home - because it's impossible to see them all. So you see some on one trip home and others on another trip. It's just better that way. But it's always nice to be on the "short list".

Last night, I created some wiipeople. Before Lara had gotten the memory card, I just selected different "people" for different sports and gave them different names. Juan and Padro were my characters for tennis - doubles. They were a pretty kick butt pair (and Padro was pretty strong in the front) so yesterday, before getting started I got to "create" Juan and Padro. It was silly and fun. And when you play other games like "find the two look alikes" you find yourself shouting "Juan and Padro!" "Maya and Aisha!" "Joulee!" Wiii people. Cute.

I was at work this morning when I realized that my arm was sort. I tried to think of what it could be from (swimming? carrying groceries? carrying my bag weird?) and the only conclusion was "wiii pain". Yes, I had wiii arm, tennis elbow, whatever from bowling, playing tennis and shooting UFOs. Of course, I found that hilarious and had to tell everyone about it.

*pictures of Rebecca's twins! Look how cute they are! And they're real!

Medium speed, rolling towards the sun, wiiiiiiii

This weekend I braved the malls in the desperate need to get a new swimsuit. After 8 years of sporadic use, it has given out over three months of more consistent swimming. Luckily, Pygmy directed me to a shop to shortcut all the craziness of the malls but it was close enough - and I got sucked into the vortex of the mall. It was completely overwhelming, as it always is, even not during the holidays. The funny ironic piece is I swung by Pygmy's house on Monday to check on it - she left me a wonderful Christmas present - a gift certificate to Sylvia's - where I had just bought my swimsuit.

(In the amidst all of the weekend insanity and jumping in and out of stores, Lara decided to get a Wii. And she didn't find any in the chaos on Saturday but managed to stumble on one at The Fred on Sunday - much like how she found the Wii for the family we adopted for work. It's been fun! Now I don't have to wait to go home to Cleveland to play wii bowl, or tennis. Woot!)

And thankfully the days are getting longer - the kitty friend hung out in the sun to prove how much they loved the sun. Kitty friends are good for things like that. They're also good at getting in the way when you go to throw a wii bowling ball. You don't expect kitties to lay down and roll around in the bowling alley - even the one in your home.

Ohio Winters...

That's what Nataliedee.com calls this image... except it could have been Seattle Winters, or Portland Winters, or anywhere else in the northern part of the US this winter - though the warm temperatures have melted the snow in both places... which is fine. The holidays are almost over...

The perfect turkey, a little dancing and getting back to work...

Yesterday, I might have made the best turkey in the three years that I've been making turkeys. It was a combo of things that made it delicious. I used a dry rub from eatingwell.com, an article from the magazine and of course my Joy of Cooking that I got a few year's ago. But what really made it work was the meat thermometer that I bought this past Thanksgiving. It's really amazing how you can get the turkey to come out just right - with the help of basting, turning and a thermometer(!) Everyone's dishes were fantastic. We had arranged carpools to get Katie out of the Central District (she miraculously ended up catching a bus which got her to Greenwood.) Lara made green bean casserole with fresh beans and cream of portobello. Dani made a fantastic berry cobbler and used real potatoes in the cheesy potato dish. (Katie bought pumpkin cheesecake from the store, but it was still tasty!) Everything was delicious and it was just the perfect amount of company and food to make it a wonderful evening with stranded peeps.

After eating ourselves silly and watching Wall-e (super cute) - we headed off to Neighbors for Thursday night dancing - even on Christmas night. It took a while for the DJ to warm up and even longer for the crowd to gather. It was a really good time - I went home exhausted from standing on my feet and eating all day.

Today I went to work - though we technically had it off - to get out of the house. Since the snow storm started last Thursday, I've only actually made it to work one day - Tuesday. Like a million other people in the Puget Sound, I had cabin fever,bed sores from getting enough sleep for once, and wanted to be doing something more than just eat, watch movies, and trump through the snow (though it wasn't that bad.) I managed to work for a couple of hours and skip around downtown during lunch. I was thrilled to see so many people downtown. I had been angry with the city when I actually made it to work on Tuesday because of all the snow on the streets - tons of it. Very little signs of snow plows, no shovels, or anything. In such a crappy economy, it's important for the city to support your downtown. (Coming from a city with very little "downtown" life - you need to have a vibrant downtown. It draws people to the city. It's a very positive characteristic). I was happy to skip around in the rain and see all of the people out... even if I was at work.

Another snow day, Random ingredients, snow bound orphans

I told my ED (executive director) yesterday that if it was snowing when I woke up this morning I wasn't coming to work - she said she wasn't coming in at all. I woke up at 7 a.m., looked out onto the porch and went back to bed - it was pouring down snow.

Yesterday after work, I went, for the second time, to the Burlesque Nutcracker with Puja, Mona, Megan, Josh and Lara. It was great as it was last year - however this time we had ROCK STAR seating because we got there so early. It was charming, sexy, elegant, wonderful and super creative - and something I would love to do - if I had the time and money (it's pricey to learn). I know burlesque is going to be the second career after derby of Drew Blood and even Megan is considering it. It's one of those empowering, positive body image, with athleticism and creativity that is much like derby. (I often call derby athletes performing burlesque on wheels.) And I always enjoy this production - I enjoyed my company, dinner and tasty beverages even more.

After getting up later, Lara and I figured out what we would be cooking for our snow bound orphans (Derika, Dani and perhaps Arson Annie) and came up with plenty of vegetarian delights for Dani - a delicious veggie/root roast. With list in hand, we trumped down to the grocery store in the slushy snow where a million other people were trying to get groceries for the holidays. On our list for the veggie roast was sherry - which I've never bought before and don't know what else I would use it for. That's the thing about the holidays, you end up acquiring herbs and spices that you only use one time a year - if that. (Luckily, the Ballard Market has a bulk spice and nut section - just not for things like sherry.) Sherry evokes a strange emotion in me - I can't quite say I'm conformable with it. I had a friend whose mother was an alcoholic and when she ran out of all other alcohol she would drink the cooking sherry, rice wine, whatever she could fine - which I find utterly disgusting and a sign of complete desperation. So now I have a bottle of sherry. I hope I can find additional uses for it.

The snow has turned to rain - as I type this blog. I put a snowman back together on my way home from the store (picture) - his eyes, nose and mouth had fallen off. I'm meeting a friend for a tasty beverage at 4:30 p.m. and am taking Pygmy and family to the airport at 10:30 p.m. I'm making cranberry relish (cranberries, orange, Cinnamon stick) and the crust for the veggie roast. I might watch Hedwig later on. It's going to be a great rainy snow day.

How long you (suckers) been here, Spades, Veggie Chili

This morning as I was getting ready, my ED called an said if I could make it to work then great but if not, what couldn't wait another day (as it had waited 3 days already.) I was getting dressed - I was ready to give it a try. I wondered out to my bus stop at about 8 a.m. (I was not going to risk driving my 10-pound car into downtown Seattle only to get it stuck there.) After waiting for about 25 minutes (getting a coffee, watching cars with chains on their tires and trucks go by at a snails pace) with about 35 people, some cheery sap came by - How long have you all been waiting?! "Someone mumbled 1 hour and ten minutes... You need to let us who have been waiting the longest, have seats on the bus... grumble grumble grumble. Crabby. Crabby. Crabby." Me and a couple other people decided getting on a bus with 35 crabby people was not the best way to go to work - or to go to work at all and headed back home.

After walking to the post office, Lara (the University closed - they NEVER close) and I decided to head to The Fred. We hopped in the car and pulled out around the narrow corner of the building and promptly got stuck. With the spade (really, it was like an edging shovel) that was available by our managers apartment, we realized we weren't interested in digging out the entire drive to the street with this garden tool that you would use to plant trees. So I dug out the parking spot and we pushed the car back into it's spot. That ended that adventure.

I invited a couple of my friends whose flight had been canceled (with no chance of being rescheduled until Friday) over for veggie chili. Derika's flight to Florida was canceled and Dani couldn't get back to Detroit - which was the most upsetting. I invited them over for Jesus' birthday dinner and other things to try and cheer them up. I have many friends heading out of Seattle for family visits and warm getaways that may not be able to do so. They've canceled 70% of flights. But I have a 13-pound turkey and some great veggies dishes for anyone who needs a place to eat.

Late minute addition...

You have to read this article about salting Seattle streets - which we don't do here. You would think in a city full of such intelligent people we could come up with SOME effective solution:

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2008551284_snowcleanup23m.html

What's a Safety Dance?!

Is what Suzi said to me when I tried to rally some of the 20 people who had braved the blizzard for the Dance Dance Party. It was a great showing considering the city was mostly shut down -and my phone had been buzzing with texts from people saying they weren't going to make it to the party because of the weather. My friend Indy picked us up in her 4 wheel drive and a crew of us headed down to a nearly deserted Seattle. It was good times - sock swap for my teammates who came a little early and dancing for the rest of the time. Lara did a great job DJing and I was thrilled at everyone who braved the weather. Most people wore red - a few dressed up as firemen to put out the fire. The music kept us dancing til about 12:30 a.m. when people started to leave to brave the trip back home. (A link to picture from the party are below - it's like 150 pictures of the 20 of us who were there.)

http://www.flickr.com/photos/67749380@N00/sets/72157611511430828/

Today the hills of Seattle were converted in to sledding runs, as kids and skiers too advantage of the fact that most of streets were not safe to drive. It was a beautiful morning. I woke up early when Indy, who had stayed over, got up to get ready for the Seahawks game. I called Pygmy and she, Lucie (Pyglette), Lara and I decided to meet for breakfast up on Phinney Ridge. It was a such a beautiful walk though it took forever in this crazy Midwestern-like snow storm. People were out sledding, skiing, walking their dogs. Kids were building little snowmens. Cars were being dug out - and not.

On the way back, we sledded down a hill with Lucie who was just happy to be outside. It started snowing again and didn't stop until 9:30 p.m. It was perfect day to stay home, take a cat nap (with the cats). It stopped snowing around 10 p.m. and we ran to the grocery store to stock up on a couple of things. I was told to use my best judgement getting to work tomorrow... which means... if the bus is running, I'll give it a go. If not, I'm not going to drive my car in just to get it stuck downtown. There is plenty of work to do but I don't want to end up like Megan - walking home 5 miles.

(There are pictures to the snowy adventures below.)

http://www.flickr.com/photos/67749380@N00/sets/72157611442620247/

Snowpocalypse...

The way they're talking about the weather you would think the world is coming to an end. Or it's just really miserable out considering the entire county as 27 snow plows (I heard on the news) and at least 8 of them are dedicated to Snoqualmie Pass across the Cascades. I called a friend of mine who was out driving and she said, "The roads are fine. They're now worse than they were this morning." And the storm is going so fast that it may not snow be able to stick for long. But I don't blame Seattleites like I use to when I first moved here - I mean who wants to drive down hills that make you uncomfortable even when they're dry on a sunny day? Add a layer of ice and snow and you're playing bumper cars down the hill. Also, when you don't know how to drive on these hills in such weather, why would you? I appreciate people staying home during such weather. That leaves more room for crazy midwesterners.

It's either Jesus or the weather - one of them usually ruins December birthdays...

I was born in a blizzard in West (By God) Virginia on December 20th - 1973. To say I'm use to the snow is an understatement. I was born LOVING the snow. And I was born with it interfering with my celebrations - which is often why I don't often celebrate it. It's either the weather or Jesus and all the parties associated with Jesus and other secular holidays that you tend to skip birthdays. And I don't mind. But my friends want me to do something - which is flattering and fun - but sometimes you run into problems. Pygmy made a funny comment this morning, "You know Michelle, there are really very few snowstorms in Seattle - but oddly since you've been here, we've had one each year." Funny. Ha ha. My first party in Seattle was the "Black OUT Party" - power was out in most of the city - but we still had a party where people came. Last year I just drinks and that was fine. This year I'm throwing a dance dance party and getting a blizzard. Bew.

I have die-hard friends who plan on making it out. It will be a good time even if there are only a few of us to celebrate along with Jesus and the snow.

Snow day #2

Today was day 2 of my snow days. It was, again, delightful to sleep in with kitty friends curled at my feet. It was a sparkly beautiful day. I ran a few errands in the morning, walked down to my favorite shop, Laura Bee, with a coffee in one hand and the other out for balance. The sidewalks were sheets of ice and so I walked on the tree lawns - which everyone else was doing too. After my errands, I went for a swim. But clearly many, many other people had the same idea - it was kind of a zoo in the pool. I came home for a 2 hour conference call on budgets (bleh). Soon after the call ended, the sun was covered by clouds it became super cold in my apartment. Buses slid of the roads (and hung precariously over I-5); my friends make it home in less time; and many people took the day off - keeping the roads relatively clear.

I worked on making "fire" for my "When there is nothing left to burn you have to set yourself on fire" dance dance party. (The theme has to do with surviving two fires and making my own "third time is a charm and completely harmless" fire - dance party.) I am making little candy favors covered in tissue paper to help decorate the space. I'm looking forward to the dance dance party even though it's suppose to start snowing again Saturday night. I know my friends will make it out and "burn the place down."

Disco inferno baby!

*photos of snow friends that I met along my stroll this morning... the fire to keep the party warm.

Finally a snow day!

It was like a snow globe outside my window this morning when I got a call from work saying that we shouldn't be coming in. I let out a cheer and crawled back into bed! Pygmy called me for she wasn't going to work and I made plans to meet up with her later. I eventually got up late - I SO needed today. I needed a day of no plans and nothing to do. No time to fill it up crammed packed. No one expecting me anywhere. Just to relax. And that's all I did. I relaxed. I went out to lunch with Lara and took a stroll around a VERY snowy Ballard. Roads were closed. Sock stores were open. It was a beautiful day. Cold, snowy and nowhere to be. We canceled practice because the roads were so icy and everywhere in the Puget Sound region you need to go up or down a hill to get out of your community. Ballard is pretty even where I live but go more than 500 feet from my apartment and you have steep hills up towards Phinney Ridge or a gradual hill down into the city of Seattle - a killer hill down towards 99 to get to any freeway. And you know, there's like 3 plows in the entire county that aren't working on the pass over the Cascades...

It took Mona 3 hours to go about 3 miles to work this morning. Another friend of mine is stuck at the drug store she works at because it's at the top of a VERY steep hill in Magnolia. (I hate driving this hill on a perfectly clear summer day.) She's most likely going to spend the night at a co-workers house because the buses can't get there and she has to be back at 8:30 a.m. (and it took her about 2.5 hours to get to work this morning.) Yikes.

I had dinner with Pygmy, Jon, Lucie and Lara. Lucie opened some "little people" toys that she wanted. We ate pizza and drank some beers. Heading home, it's COLD - 25 degrees and windy, with ice covered roads. (Ballard got 6" or so, Arlington - 25miles north - got 2'.) Driving at 10 mphs, I was thrilled. And even more thrilled that I was told was told that there would be not work tomorrow too! Two snow days in a row! I'm so excited. How much fun is this?!

photo - a "road closed sign" leading up 65th towards Phinney Ridge...

No snow day.

Not even one flurry fell on Seattle. A "snow shadow" (much like the "rain shadow" that makes Sequim so popular for retired folks) cast by the Olympic Mountains pushed the storm to the North of us - Everett, Marysville, Bellingham - and to the South of us - Tacoma and Olympia. I waited all day - kind of like in middle school - for the teacher to say "you're going home early". But it never happened and two people on staff were out today to stay home with kids whose schools had been closed in anticipation. We didn't have practice because of the roads in Everett.

So disappointing.

But so reminiscent of middle school - waiting for snowy days.

Snow Day!

So at our staff meeting today, the Executive Director said, "We are supposed to have a really snowy night and if it's too bad - we can close the office tomorrow. I want you all to be safe." There was a pause, and then people chimed in, "Oh, I can walk to work.... I have too much to do. I can walk too... as long as the buses are running..." I looked at one of the attorneys across the table and laughed, "We're being offered a snow day and here we are trying to come into work." It was hilarious. Of course, by the end of the day I didn't want there to be work. I would LOVE to have a snow day. So much snow that we have to close the offices and conference call in our meeting... so far there's not a flake falling from the sky. It looks like I'll be going in anyway.

Jet City to change their tryouts from tomorrow night to tonight (and swapping a practice) in anticipation of this terrible storm so I got an unexpected night off! I thought of going to a swim class but instead made dinner, vacuum and watched the "Biggest Looser" - which I really like. (I'm a sap for people changing their lives and taking control of something that often times makes them feel so bad. Plus, as a moderate exercise junkie, I totally understand how great it is to exercise and feel better about yourself.) I'm writing some holidays cards, hanging out with kitties and just having an "anticipated snow night".

So the day will start ok, with freezing rain and snow by the afternoon. It sounds like fun times. I'm looking forward to a snow day... eventually.

Falling off the band wagon....

It's not even "the holidays" yet and I fell off the band wagon lately - I hadn't been to swimming in almost two weeks; I had been eating out a lot because of holiday parties, out of town guests, surprise visits, a late night stresser, a "tasty beverage", left over holiday cookies, Santa Skate, whatever. And then your sugar and salt consumption raises and all you want is sugar and salt and you find yourself not eating your packed lunch but going out for Thai foods - when you have a perfectly good salad that you just packed that morning in the fridge. And you feel it. Blah. Slow, tired, sugar crashing.

So today, I pulled my body out of the mire of "holiday sloth and other yuck" and climbed back on the "I need to eat healthy and treat my body well" wagon. I ate my delicious homemade salad and had a cup of ginger, carrot soup. I made turkey tacos at home tonight and joined Heidi for a swim (after I bossed her into it- she didn't want to go out into the cold. Yes,even Midwesterners think it's cold. When you move to Seattle, you trade in 10 sweaters for a guitar and a recycle bin.) We did go out for a beer afterwards - which is what we do - but it was ok. It was only one - and some humas. I hope I can hang on for a little while - it definitely helps you get thru the holidays.

It feels like Michigan...

Puja mumbled as Mona sped out of the parking lot of the Skate Deck tonight after participating in Santa Skate. We both agreed. It is freezing - hovering in the 20's - it feels more like Michigan than Washington. It's some of the coldest weather we've experienced in decades.

This morning when I got up to go to Rec League, it was freezing with not a single person on the street. It's amazing how the same weather that you experience in Cleveland - which doesn't make you think twice - causes you to change your mind 4 times. Deciding to go, not to go, to go, not to go and in the end you go and only 4 other souls braved the frozen streets and bright, sparkly, cold day to skate. Crazy.

Tonight at the 3rd annual Santa Skate, skaters, friends and family got dressed up, braved the cold and be jolly. We skated, enjoyed a potluck and raised $650+ for a woman's shelter (!). We had a very amusing "white elephant" gift exchange in which my swap was taken - I had hoped to hold on to my first swap (skulls and cross bone ice cube tray and toast band aids!) for the first season of SNL. It's always funny the few gifts that everyone wants -homemade things are always the most coveted. It was a fun evening. Even if it was as cold as Michigan.

A perfect Saturday...

So I called Faye at 7 a.m. to figure out what we were all going to do.... the passes were snowy and required snow tires, chains if you were bigger. There were delays expected. So as a group of 9, we went to 14 Carat to eat breakfast at a more reasonable 9 a.m. deciding to scratch the Leavenworth trip and headed to Snoqualmie Falls - Twin Peaks fame - just in the foothills of the Cascades. We piled into cars (Nick, Faye's husband, curled up to sleep after an evening on at the hospital), Lara, Gavin and I were crammed in the back. It was a fun group of mostly coworkers (Faye, Sara, Gavin, Yuka) and some other friends. It was a beautiful drive as the snow was starting to come down the mountains - above the clouds it was white and below it was still green - kind of like a giant paint roller.

It was chilly but pleasant walk down to the falls. We hung out there for a while before heading over to the town of Snoqualmie which was involved in lumber and hops (yum) in the past. We went into the "Curiosity Shop" which was filled with the crap that "curiosity shops" have been filled with since I was a kid. The strange key change, the paddle and ball, little tchotcke things, all priced up with a 50% sticker on it. We hung out there for awhile laughing then headed over to the Snoqualmie Brewery for a tasty beverage. We headed back to Seattle leaving the snow behind - where it was getting much colder. A quick nap later, we all showed up at the Harvard Exit in Capital Hill to see "Slumdog Millionaire" which was a FANTASTIC movie. I loved it! Lara and I had sushi - yum! - (the rest of the gang headed to parties or went home) and came back to Ballard to big, fat fluffy snow flakes. Gavin texted me his delight in the snow as he headed off to a party. It was truly an perfect Saturday.

First snowstorm of the season....

You would think the Soviets were planning an emanate attack; the auto bail out was going to fail (hmmmm); or it was the first snow storm of the season the way the news stations are acting tonight. (Maybe it was like that when I was growing up - I don't seem to remember.) Tomorrow I'm suppose to go to Leavenworth with some friends for fun winter Bavarian Christmas town (how fun!) However, I'm more concerned with the thousands of other people on the road than I am about my Minnesotan friends who will be driving. It could turn into nothing. (I went camping over Labor Day on the coast - thus sea star tattoos - on a weekend that was supposed to be ALL rain and it was just fine.) It could turn out to be to be quite an adventure. *sigh* I can't wait. Either way, I'm excited for Saturday - for it to finally be the weekend.

BTW - it has been a super mild winter so far.

Wiiiiiiiiil.... what a great day!

Today my work was one of the organizations where you could participate in "Call in Gay" organized by "Impact for Change." One of our colleagues go us signed up right away so that we were the first organization listed on the website. We had 15+ volunteers about 70% who were new the my organization . (The stress in getting ready for the day was rather intense as I was having data problems and my associate was out very sick.) We spent 7 hours handing writing notes to about 2,000 donors and supporters in holiday cards. People were laughing, joking, telling stories, getting out rage. Komo Television came to shoot the event and the Gay City News. It was so much fun - and exhausting. It was great to be a part of such a fun day and a great community event.

I went home wiped out only to head off to Bombers tryouts - yes - I'm trying out for the travel team again for next year. I thought long and hard about it but in the end, I thought I would give it another year and work hard to manage and juggle all of the other expectations I have for myself. Mona Agony picked me up and it was one of those nights I was just "on". Jammers were getting t-ed up and I took them down. I couldn't take out the bigger blockers but I had them completely distracted. My "team" (we called our selves the "environmentalists" because we had the green pennies) was playing great together - we had surprisingly good offense when we needed it and held the jammers most of the the rest of the time with tons of "second efforts". It was one of those nights where you give each other high-fives when you roll off the floor. "Hell yeah" and super fun. What a great way to end a very long and stressful week - thus far!

After practice I checked my phone and Lara texted to say "I got you a wii!" I was like "what?!" Here's the back story: my work "adopted a family" from the YWCA for the holidays. Our chosen family is a single woman who has tween girls. We voluntarily ask staff to donate money to the project. We read the list of things they wanted "pajamas, puzzles, a jacket however we would give up all of our individual gifts if we could get a Wii to play together as a family." Well, I was a huge advocate of the wii seeing it is one of the few things that all the Johnsons can organize around from younger in-laws to a mother in a wheelchair (who often handily beats me at wii bowling.) So Laurie, the volunteer coordinator, and I lobbied for the Wii. Everyone signed on to the idea and then we became the type people who trample people to death. Laurie would spent a couple of hours on the phone trying to find a store with it - Best Buy and Target being the most popular options. (Lara had said she had seen evidence of a Wii at the Fred so we added it to our short list.) We signed up to drive the car various days so that we could make lunch time trips to find one. We called and plotted for the last week. You would have thought it was a Tickle-me-Elmo in the 1990's.

Tonight Lara went to The Fred for some light bulbs and looked in the electronics and said loud enough to her dad's whose in town visiting "oh I guess they don't have them." A store clerk over heard her and said, "Are you looking for the wii? Go to the electronics checkout. I think there is one up there." She went to up there and they had just gotten a shipment! VICTORY! She bought one for me take to work! And I can't even WAIT to take it to work tomorrow and surprise everyone! Especially Laurie - who worked hard all day today to make "Call in Gay" so successful.

Yeah!

Tornadoes...

December is not usually the time you write about tornadoes. You write about the bad-sweater-Throttle-Rocket-holiday-dance-dance-party where you drank a little too much and danced way too hard but had such a good time you'd do it all again. You write about sitting on the floor and sending holiday cards and being completely envious of Honey's card that has a stamp with HER on it (and now you want your own stamps - roller girl stamps - or new-tattoo bee stamps.) In December you write about all of the droves of people downtown who were holiday shopping and the crazies out with their huge "you're going to hell signs" in the midst of barely cheerful, economically stressed crowds. But I want to tell a story about tornadoes.

The Discovery Channel has a series called "storm chasers" and they're a bunch of SUPER nerds chasing tornadoes across the Midwest and south central US - which I've seen about 3 or 4 episodes and the finale is tonight. I've not really been in any tornadoes in my life. When I was a kid, we had one or two touch down in Geauga County. I snuck into the basement in Denver a few times because of tornadoes that came screaming out of the mountains. I was terrified to take showers in the summertime fearing I would be in the shower when a tornado came (and somehow my family would fail to let me know.)

However, in 2000 when I had returned from the Peace Corps, my mother and I were driving across the Midwest heading in to Denver during the early summer. I had been back for maybe two weeks and we were heading to Jen's wedding. We had stopped in Iowa for an evening but had been pretty much been driving less than leisurely to get to Denver quickly.

We were on I-80 in western Nebraska before it turns down into Colorado. My mom had one of her favorite CDs in and we were rocking out through the terrible rain/lightening storm. Then it suddenly stopped raining. It became that eerie quiet - the sky was filled with dust and debris. Just then, I realized that cars were pulling over to the rest stops. There were hardly any cars on the freeway. I ejected the CD and found the lowest frequency on the FM station to grab the public radio station. By this point all of the cars were off the freeway minus us and an 18 wheeler. There was no place to pull off (all the rest stations were full) and yes, a tornado had touched down just north of I-80. I was looking at the map, looking at the town and the distance to the town we had just passed. Maybe 15 miles. Maybe less. I look at my mom and she looked at me. Gun it - one of us mumbled and my mom took off as fast as she could, passing the 18 wheeler. It was very scary.

And the show reminds me of driving in tornadoes... maybe I should tell the story about driving in blizzards... but we would need snow which we don't have - nor do the mountains.

Socks!

I got this pair of socks when I was out with my friends Kristen and Weedy a couple of weeks ago. I was looking for a good excuse to wear them and found one today - I went to a World AIDS Day Luncheon and have a reception tonight (before heading off to a board meeting and practice.) They were only $12 and with a bright green button down and a black skirt - they are absolutely fabulous!

Stone age art and Bees!

There was a cnn.com article today that was about how some anthropologists found some stone age statuettes at some site in Russia. Stone age carvings. One was of a woman. I guess I'm always impressed by things like these. We're very creative animals and have been creating things for a very long time - like it's part of being human - the creating part. It's neat.

I'm thinking my next tattoo might be of bees. Why bees? They can't swim in the ocean? True. Very very true. You have an ocean theme on your body - they wouldn't fit in. True also. But I did have a dream about one side of my body covered in ocean tattoos and the other in mountain tattoos (and I woke up completely freaked out.) My friend Sara Problem got huge bees on her very injured shoulder where she had surgery. They're great bees.

I love the thought of bees - just a few bumblers swarming around - maybe a few on my shoulder, one on my arm. Buzzing. Bees are great. I was allergic to them as a kid but grew out of the allergy. Bees are more than just little stingers - they're an amazing part of our lives and many of us don't even realize it. Without bees, we would only have potatoes and carrots to eat (which is NOT fine by me.) We would be without all of those wonderful flowering fruits (and some things people consider vegetables but are really fruits): tomatoes, melons (water, honey dew, cantaloupe), strawberries, blueberries, bananas, cucumbers, peas, beans, squashes, pears, apples, cranberries, everything beautiful and tasty. Bees make honey. They live in organized colonies. They have a queen. (I like to shop at Laura Bee.) I could go on and on. And we're at this terrifying spot in time - they're dying off in droves because of a terrible autoimmune disease - colony collapse disorder.

Bees bring beautiful things to our lives. We need bees. They're great. That's why I'm thinking of getting bees.

(I'm not thinking of these bees, but Natalie Dee has funny bees.)

How I learned to sew....

I came home from a work event tonight about surrogacy (what a tough issue and there's still no clear answer) spent. I had hoped to get to practice but I was running too late and was too spent to do anything but head home on a raining Tuesday night. I needed to go home and do some things around the apartment, get laundry done, clean-up. (Lara's dad is coming to visit for a few days and I needed to get my crafty mess put away.)

I had purchased a plastic box to put my fabric in - the scraps and various pieces had outgrown the bankers box. I have a smaller thread box that always needs to be sorted after each project. It holds about 30 or 40 spools of thread. A majority of them are from the 1970's and are hand-me-downs from my mother. They're stamped "35 cents" and have old golden labels that are peeling off. A majority are in a varying shade of red. There are others 1970's colors - peach, mint green, pale yellow, pink and plastic black. There are a few brighter colors from my samba days like lily pad green, bright turquoise and metallic thread. An even smaller plastic box holds "sewing stuff" - seam ripper, Velcro circles, hooks and eyes, glue gun, iron cleaner (white wax candle to clean your iron), buttons and zippers. These smaller things were organized earlier in my sewing career.

I learned to sew in 8th grade when I had to take a half year of "home economics" - or at least I learned how to sew a stuff animal and some basic stitches. Then when I called the Peace Corps and tired to join (also in 8th grade) they suggested that I join my local 4-H. Unfortunately, my local 4-H was all about sewing. I didn't want to sew. If I was going to do 4-H I wanted to deal with animals (which I didn't have) or something else - not sewing - which was such a sill, girly thing.

In the midst of our second year of the samba group, I got a call from one of the seamstresses. She said "You having a sewing machine don't you?" I said no, but my mother did. 4 hours later I had a sewing machine and enough fabric to make 4 - 7' penguin puppets for our parade in a week. It was a near miracle. And since then, I've been sewing - tons. I rarely use a pattern and I'll be damned if I can make anything that I can wear to work but I can make penguin puppets, helmet panties, Judy Jetson skirts and other terribly sparkly, glittery, shiny, stretchy useful things.

What happens when you're not paying attention...

I went to "The Fred" (Fred Myers) after swimming with Heidi and Olga (Andrea) tonight. It took me a long time to get into a rhythm (I ate dinner right after work because I was freaking starving) and swimming with turkey dinner in my belly made it a bit hard. The Fred was super quiet comparatively - for any week night. The after Thanksgiving folks weren't there and the regular shoppers were probably home having spent all of their money. Nothing was on sale that had been on sale before. There were some things that made me laugh in this empty - like this woman was in the sock section and her boyfriend was trying to find the watch whose alarm was beeping. As soon as he identified it and turned it off another one went off in a different section of the jewelry section. When I was in the cheese/dairy area, an older man walked by and said "The socks make the outfit" which made me laugh because I was dressed utterly ridiculously.

The Fred is located in the more industrial section of Ballard - down in the docks area - where small industries reside. In this area there are a lot of RVs. People live in these RVs year round. One guy's RV looked like it had been broken into and trashed the other day but looked more or less put back together by tonight. I see a lot of "vehicle homes" in Ballard - vans, trucks, RVs, Winnebago, etc. And you can easily tell that they're homes - stuff to the gills with people's possessions - flags, towels, cardboard - covering the windows. And they all stay in the general area - very rarely moving. I think people can more easily live in cars in more temperate areas like Seattle. There are a lot of "vehicle homes" by the Safeway. (Maybe the police leave people alone in the more industrial section.) But if you're not paying attention, you'd never notice them because they just look like cars parked on the sides of the road...

Today was the 20th Anniversary of "World AIDS Day". And if you weren't paying attention, you would have missed it. It didn't make the front pages of any of my papers. It didn't show up on CNN.com. I was told NRP spoke of it - but I saw no ribbons - or heard any conversation about it. AIDS itself is much older than the day created to foster awareness around it. But what is there to talk about? The news is pretty bleak - though there have been some improvement in antiretroviral drugs - no one is any closer to vaccines or cures. The disease is ranging out of control in some parts of the world, creating orphans, economic stress, and dispair. Are people tired of hearing about it? Is there nothing to be done - besides to keep trying, keep supporting, keep creating awareness? Today was World AIDS Day but even if you were paying attention, you might have missed it.