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Ok, so first we have The Avengers, then we have Sherlock. I mean, ok, this series has existed for a while, we even had the first season on the hard drive pretty much since it came out, but I didn't actually sit down and watch it till last month. And then I was like

OMG

and immediately acquired season 2.

Anyway Reg and I really liked the RDJ movies, which is probably why he got the BBC show in the first place, but these are ... different. And yet the same. Probably most people doing a version of Sherlock after 1965 make it slightly funny with a big HoYay subtext, right? So I'm not going to get all into a description, since I'm probably the last person to have watched it, but basically it's Sherlock in the present day. It has a little bit of a CSI feel* but he's still smarter than everyone else in the room, and a bit ruder. It's not precisely that's he's a sociopath or autistic - he just never really developed his emotional levels, so (like most humans) assumes everyone else will react sort of like he does.

In addition to reading the first two books of The Hunger Games last year, I also read a couple of Raymond Chandler books - The Big Sleep and The Long Goodbye. The first book didn't impress me when I picked it up in college, but I've seen the movie a couple times and kind of love it, although that's mainly b/c of the star power. But the plot is so utterly complicated for no reason, sort of like the precursor to a spy novel, but um, not as interesting, not as much at stake.

Which is why The Long Goodbye is much more appealing. Marlowe himself has more at stake than actually solving the mystery - I've always preferred that sort of detective story. I mean, I usually am not interested in detective stories, but if I'm going to read something without homoerotic subtext, the detective himself ought to be in danger. Ok, sure, he's sort of in danger in the first book, but it just is too abstract. Whereas he pretty much starts out pissing off cops and ending up in jail in this one. And he rants a lot more, in a very cynical way that I find appealing.

And yeah, before watching the movie of the book The Hunger Games, I bought Mockingjay. It's not as appealing as the first two books - I felt it was really limited this time by being only Katniss' viewpoint, because the whole revolution thing is kind of bloody awesome as hell, but we barely get to see or hear any of it. I was especially interested in the treatment of other former winners, the way they are more or less turned into slaves for the Capitol. So, lots of interesting ideas that are limited by the first-person narrator. I think a Haymitch 1st-person book would be completely great.

The movie impressed me a lot. I mean, obviously they couldn't go 100% book, but having just reread the story last week, I think they did an amazingly faithful adaptation. That's not always a good thing, I mean, I feel keeping the spirit faithful is more important than the words/situations, but it was pretty impressive the way they brought things to life. Reg had pulled out Battle Royale after getting this movie, for a good reason. Obviously it's similar, but less... ridiculous. The soundtrack/score is rather subdued, and things don't feel larger-than-life (except at the Capitol, where they're supposed to). It's more like The Handmaid's Tale. The violence is glossed over a lot, since it's PG-13, and I feel that could have been addressed more, but oh well.

And I really really liked the Gamemaker POVs. They're like software designers, not evil, just really proud of their work. Having read the books, I thought President Snow was a little too expository, but I guess for the movie audience that didn't, that's ok. I'm not sure if I liked him being so Santa-Claus looking, I wanted him to look more like Hugo Weaving I guess, but oh well.

Current Music: Matthew Dear - Fighting is Futile

The pictures.

When we got up it was still really cold and gross - it actually had rained last night. Reg's back hurt, and we weren't terribly hungry, so we just packed up, had shitty motel coffee and honey bun, and left. (As an aside, I don't get how motel coffee is so awful. Usually it's like motor oil and you have to add like six little things of creamer to get it to a drinkable consistency, but this time they actually added water, so it was more like... tea.)

But seriously the coffee was doing nothing for me, so when we got to Port Orford, we stopped at a diner - it was called Paradise Cafe, but it was a diner, trust me. We were the only people at 1pm (it closed at 2pm) that weren't high school students, ok. That is the mark of a good place. I absolutely try not to stop at tourist places if I can avoid it, just like I enjoy being the only white person in Asian or Mexican places. Anthony Bourdain, I salute you again. But yeah, this food took 20 minutes and was the most delicious diner food I've tasted outside of the South. Seriously, the Pancake Corral is pretty good, but Paradise Cafe lived up to it's name, let me tell you. (It was also across from a Mormon church, oddly enough). If you're ever down the 101 that way, check it out.

Reg took over then, but he was not driving very well, so I asked if he was ok, and no, he wasn't, and then he fell asleep. So I took over, again, and god it was gorgeous, I swear as soon as we crossed the state line the clouds and fogs and mist were gone. I found this amusing, as it's the opposite on I-5. But yeah, I put on Pure Phase and Ladies and Gentlemen We Are Floating In Space and drove along the Oregon coastline on US-101 and it was brilliant, I swear on J. Spaceman and Terrence McKenna, totally brilliant.

The only problem - once again - the speed limit was 55. People were generally going 60-65 unless the road was curvy at least. But, well, the road is always curvy. Spaceman kept me sane till the albums ended, at which point it was 6pm and I was going to AK every tourist I saw. Stopped at one of the last public beaches before the road to Portland. It was a lovely balmy 65F nearly all day, the wind kept it from being truly pleasant, but really, I couldn't have asked for much more out of that day, aside from no idiots on the road. Unfortunately we started hitting more populous areas at 5pm - rush hour. I was really getting pissed off by the time we took 18 to Portland. It seemed like people were driving even slower than they had on 101.

Reg woke up a bit, but not enough to drive. He put on some hip-hop, and that got us almost to I-5. I bought some cloves just before the exit, for $5.35. I was very excited. Of course Reg's normal Camels were $4.30. Boy, it's a good thing we don't live in Oregon. I guess the income tax would kill us. (OR has no sales tax, but does have income tax, and the reverse is true of WA.) I played my favorite remix of "Somebody That I Used To Know" and some other mixes to get us out of Portland and into oh wonderful 70mph WASHINGTON. I stopped to pee in Woodland, and decided it was time for Butt Rock.

(If you haven't seen Hesher or are wondering what Butt Rock is, think Skid Row and Guns'n'Roses.)

The playlist began with "Don't Fear the Reaper." Then Styx - Come Sail Away, which Reg and I actually sang along rather beautifully to. Then "I Remember You", "Rag Doll", "Once Bitten Twice Shy", "Here I Go Again", "Mr. Brownstone", "Hot Girls In Love", "Good Times Bad Times", "Mother", Vanilla Fudge's "You Keep Me Hangin' On", "Paradise City", "Freebird", and "The Seeker."

And then we stopped at a rest stop after Tacoma and I told Reg that I drove over 550 miles and smoked 3 cloves and HE WAS DRIVING HOME.

He played some Eminem+late 90s crossover stuff, like, Linkin Park with Eminem, or Marilyn Manson with Eminem. Really weird, but pretty energizing.

So that was that!

And I still haven't seen Cannon Beach.

Current Music: Starfuckers, Inc

This is better than one long entry, right?

We got back feeling rather exhausted, and chilled, since the weather in Oakland was about 20F hotter than in the Mission District (it hadn't been sunny for very long either). So we put on warmer clothes, set up our tent in the backyard, and tried to relax. Steve and Ry and the kids were at the circus, so it was nice and quiet for a while. I was re-reading I, Lucifer since I'd finished all the Curse Worker books twice, as well as the other books I'd checked out from the library. I'd eaten a ton at the wedding party, so I didn't want to eat too early, but I was starting to feel weak.

I decided I needed a drink, texted Steve before remembering to check the fridge. Steve does a liquor club once a month, so I knew SOMETHING would be there, and I was rewarded with Stoli Gold. (I don't go out much, so if I do, I try to order only Stoli.) I mixed myself a drink after sipping it. Of course when Steve got home, he brought out his rye and rum collection. "I like this one, it sort of has a plastic taste."

We had dinner at Radish, a small restaurant that feels trendy yet homey. I'm not sure how they do that. Probably because the food isn't very expensive (because of small portions) and amazingly delicious. So yeah, there was that, pulled pork sandwich for me, fried chicken strips for Reg, really tasty. I showed Steve that if he checked in on Foursquare, he'd get a free beer, so that happened. (Reg and I had, this whole trip, been Foursquare/Twittering (I also had a few Tumblr posts) everywhere we went.)

Reg and I wanted to go dancing on Saturday. I figured that it being San Francisco, that wouldn't be hard to accomplish, so I asked Erik (whose LJ name I forget, along with his North Dakotan heritage) what was going on. Nothing I'd heard of, of course, but DJ Garth at Public Works back room for $5 before 11 sounded great. Unfortunately we didn't get in before 11, but what can you do? "It's a vacation," Reg kept saying, and I even paid for coat check (since it was now 55F).

Now, I haven't gone dancing since I was trying to pick up boys at Electric Tea Garden in 2009, but I've been to a lot of shows, seen a lot of DJs, big names, smaller names, there's never a guarantee that a DJ will be fantastic. DJ Garth was. He didn't play a single track I knew (which I fully anticipated), but every track made me want to dance. At 11:15pm it was still a bit of a mellow groove, which he slowly, track by track, song by song, sped up. Ninety minutes later, it was a LOT more crowded, but we found the A/C vents, and were dancing our asses off.

Just before 2am I was starting to hurt. Spending the day in the car, then dancing for the first time in three years, well. We went over to Erik's for a bit - his rental is about as amazing as Steve's place, both are classic SF townhouses - before going back to the car and driving back to Steve's. We had the rockstar parking right in front, at least, but it was so bloody cold and windy.

I had tried to get Travis to come out dancing with us, since the DJ was so sick, but he'd already gone to bed. But both he and Erik said they'd come to brunch with us. I didn't wake up till nearly 10am, which sounds late, but I fell asleep around 4am. We decided on the Pork Store, one of the few places I remember going in SF before, although I did get lost on the way. But we got there - both Travis and Erik beat us - and were seated reasonably quick. Pretty good greasy spoon fare, if you like that sort of thing, and boy, do I ever. Do. I. Ever. I caught up with Travis, tried to get him to watch Sherlock, and devoured my delicious cheesy egg sandwich and half my hashbrowns.

And that was about it for San Fran. Travis came by to check out Steve's place - they hadn't seen each other in a couple months either - and then Reg and I packed the car, hugged everyone, and headed to the Golden Gate Bridge. Along with the rest of the Bay Area, apparently, it took bloody forever. The weather cleared up the second you got on the bridge, but none of the dumb tourists could see shit from it. Oh how we laughed.

I took over driving around Santa Rosa, and then we thought about staying in the Redwoods, but camping spots were $35. "We could get a hotel for $70 and shower," I exclaimed. Plus, the weather turned crap, so we stopped after about 350 miles in Eureka, CA. (Not Yreka.) Yeah, we decided to take 101 back. We figured if we weren't making good enough time on Monday, we could skip over to I-5. But for Sunday night, we got takeout Chinese (I do NOT understand how every shitty small town we stop in has better fried rice than almost anywhere outside the International District) and turned in early. (The motel was actually $67 with tax.)

Current Music: The Fragile Disc 2

When I was in high school, I figured I'd go to school in Texas. I applied to schools outside of Texas, of course, but you know. Small town girl. I was still in the top 5% of my class at nerd school, so I figured I'd stick to a small pond. And then I got a huge financial aid package to Duke University, so much so that I only would have to pay for about one year's tuition. Which, you know, was still more than in-state tuition for all four years. But my friend Dale, who was attending said school, pointed out that Duke would open a lot of doors for jobs afterwards, and paying off the loans would be a cinch. (I won't point out the flaw in his plan right now, since I was planning to major in Computer Science - and in fact I'd probably be all paid off if not for all those layoffs. At least I paid off my car.)

So, of course that changed my life irrevocably, opened my mind about 75% more than it ever had been before. I don't think college is for everyone, but for people in the 80th percentile and above, it's a rather essential experience, and I feel private schools tend to enrich this experience more.

Which is funny for me to say, since I thought Duke was the most inane environment ever. Fortunately my freshman year I had a roommate, Ana, who felt the exact same way. Duke is one of those rare beasts, a party school for academics. It was a world-class education, for sure, but every weekend you could go to five different mixers and get wasted off keg beer and stumble into bed and then have a lovely Walk Of Shame. Oh, yeah, and apparently there's a BASKETBALL TEAM!

Ana and I avoided most of this by getting into raves, and the film society. Technically I never belonged officially to the film club, but I went to most of the movies and a couple of the meetings. We also got apartment housing as soon as was humanly possible. Sometimes we were at odds, as I was even more tactless and filthy then, but I tried to learn how to be a good friend from her. We had a group - the Dudez - us, Clark, Holger, Sitar, Norman, and Fara. The latter two were more peripheral members, but they did participate in many important Dudez events. (Fara transferred after her freshman year, but she was still an honorary Dude. Technically the group didn't even form until our Junior year, since most of the members are two years younger than we are.)

We had our fun by mocking the sacred ideals held by the student body - mainly, basketball. I did attend a few games after some long study sessions, and Ana and I hit an 80s night that some frat held, but mostly it was movie watching and subversion. This was helped greatly by Clark's hearse. We even threw our own party, but people only danced to crappy hip-hop. The road trip to New Orleans was classic, though, and after we graduated, I still lived in the area and kept hanging out with the Dudez. I even flew to see Ana and Morrissey and learned to ski! When Holger did a semester abroad in Argentina, we flew down to meet him during his break. And when they finally all graduated, we had a European tour. Good times.

I fell out of touch after moving out west, but Facebook means you sort of know who's married and who has a kid. So this weekend, I finally got to meet Ana's long-term boyfriend (and baby-daddy), Joseph. So this Saturday, we woke up early, showered, put on our finery for their wedding, and drove to a nature preserve in Oakland. (All relevant pics here.) Ana had come out looking at UW for graduate school, but instead she went to Vermont. Another life-changing moment, as she met Joseph there! The man who introduced them, Benjy, chatted with Reg while I put Ana's makeup on. They had already had a proper ceremony in Croatia, but this legal part was for his family, and well, the USA. I got to sign as a witness and all. The "ceremony"/announcement went fast, as her 18-month-old Thomas had to be held the entire time.

It was a gorgeous day, although a bit on the hot side. We were just under a ridge, which was nice and breezy, but where the wedding party sat was just low enough to get hardly any sort of breeze. So we drank lots of nice ginger limeade and hibiscus lemonade, made small talk, chatted with people we hadn't seen in years, and watched the bride and groom dance to a traditional music before the caterer finally finished grilling the meat. Everyone fell upon the food happily, as it was quite delicious. Everything was really lovely, and I was glad to see Ana happily paired off at last. I mean, she'd been happy before I saw her, but you know. Makes it real. That's what the wedding was for, I suppose, to make it real to society. And, as I tactlessly pointed out, to save their son from bastardry.

Current Music: The Fragile

All pictures here. Some in the entry.

Driving to San Francisco is cheaper than flying, certainly, for more than one person. Even this weekend I spend under $300 on gas. Even solo I think I might have spent more than that on a Virgin ticket.

Wall anyhoo. Reg started the driving just after 10am, and as usual the traffic on I-5 south was ridiculous till you got to Olympia. This is about 65 miles from Seattle, and the capitol of Washington, so I can only assume that there are weirdos who live in Seattle and commute to their government jobs in Olympia. I cannot conceive of this, as I have just moved to Bellevue to be closer to my job. I also don't care much about politics, since nothing I care about is being addressed.

Such as the extremely low speed limits in Oregon. I don't get this. In WA and CA, on a nice stretch of interstate, the speed limit is 70. Which is great, I love cruising at 77mph. It's a good speed, doesn't burn too much gas (we averaged around 400mpt), and when the speed limit is 70, you still get people passing you. So that's great. Whereas in Oregon, the fastest you can legally go ANYWHERE is 65mph. Now, people are still going 75mph, but not as many. A ticket for 5 over is not the same as a ticket for 15 over, right? That's fairly standard, right? So there are a significant number of people who don't go over the speed limit at all. This wasn't as widespread on I-5, fortunately. It was fairly easy to go 70mph on the long stretches, even when it was only 2 lanes. And of course you can always burn some gas on the uphill truck lanes to pass old farts.

Reg fell asleep when I put on Girl Talk's All Day, which I had stuck in my head thanks to perich. That got me through the worst of Oregon, all the way to Grant's Pass. We didn't switch again till the first rest stop in California, mainly because of an accident. Also, construction. MOTHER FUCKING INTERSTATE FIVE DOWN TO ONE LANE EACH WAY. During a summer Friday. You can't do this shit at night, assholes?

Oh yeah, driving on I-5 in August - I'd never done this before, and for the first time I hit the highest point on I-5 (Siskiyou Summit, 4310ft) and could see things. Including a big ol' thunderhead and Mount Shasta! (Reg had switched back in CA.) And it was hot, so hot, and we don't have a working air conditioner in our car right now. 105F baybe. It was only 90F in the car probably, but still. We were feeling rather crazed, Reg was hitting 100mph while we blasted New Order - as long as we weren't hitting the stupid fucking one lane restrictions. But going around tight mountain curves and weaving in and out of traffic with 3ft between you and big ass semis is something that typically makes me nervous. By the time we stopped for gas in Red Bluff, I thought I was going to have a heart attack. Instead I had a cigarette and took lots of pictures of the sunset.

Boy, if I thought Reg was going fast BEFORE sunset... (see the blur?)

But of course that last stretch, when you get onto the highway bypassing Sacramento and going by Vacaville, is insanely long and boring. I mean, oh my God, long long long. We blasted "Blinded by the Light" and "Nobody 'Cept You", then "The '59 Sound" since we hadn't cried enough. (I am not ashamed that these songs make me tear up. Reg mentioned our friend Jeremy and I just lost it.) We kept thinking the city lights we were seeing were SF, but no. I got super excited when I saw a carpool lane, though. "STUFF WHITE PEOPLE LIKE!" I announced to Reg.

The toll on the bridge was $6, and it was so horribly inefficient. For those of you who don't live around here, there are two bridges to Seattle, I-90 and SR-520. They turned the latter into a toll road, but it took an extra year to get a "fast track" system for ALL cars. That is to say, if you don't have the pass (here it's called Good To Go!), they just send you a bill after a few trips. There's little cameras, you see, that take a picture of the front of your car if you don't have the special pass. Either way, there's no stopping, no booths, no difference between the old bridge and the new bridge, except you can see a sort of purple light as you approach the eastside/leave Evergreen Point.

Whereas in SF - and probably every other expensive toll bridge where you can't just throw change into a basket - you have to stop and wait for the guy to walk across to another booth to GET CHANGE. Because obviously at 9pm on a FRIDAY NIGHT no one will be going into SF without exact change! For fuck's sake, California. Stay classy.

Blargh. Finally off 80 and onto US 101, which you almost immediately get off to turn onto Valencia. Friday night traffic was abysmal, of course. Took us forever to get off 101. I was texting Steve like mad, all excited to see him. He warned us that his street specifically might be a hassle, since Mr. Woody Allen is filming a couple of scenes there for his new movie. Not the whole film, mind, just a few scenes. Parking was nonexistant, so after we blocked a driveway unloading our crap, I paid a nice foreign gentleman to park the car for the night. He charged us more than he charged Ry, but what can you do? It's a vacation, and we had free rooms.

Steve's new townhouse (thanks to the largess of his mother) is amazing. Legitimately a hundred years old, three stories - they rent the second one to pay for most of the mortgage. When we got there, just before 11pm, the kids were asleep so we just put our stuff on the couch, put on warmer clothes (it was forty degrees cooler, no shit) and went out for a couple drinks and food. We stopped at the Phoenix - great burgers, but super crowded, unsurprisingly. We then stopped at the Hideout, which sort of reminded me of the Hideout in Seattle, but without art. (I almost never leave the Mission when I'm with Steve.)

By then it was almost 1am, and we were all exhausted. Thus ended day one.

Current Music: Year Zero

oh yes, give it to me, forgotten god of my Youth!

In all seriousness I didn't think With Teeth was so great, so I ignored Trent till The Slip, which was awesome.

I am of the age that pretty hate machine was the soundtrack to my teenage misery, so I feel I must repent this week. Only NIN in the car!

Current Location: Bellevue, Felix Terry Swistak Dr NE, Felix Terry Swistak Dr NE

See that pointy bit up there? I think that's 2008, least that's what the scale made me assume. There are many reasons not to vote for Obama*, but driving up America's debt isn't one of them, actually.**

* There have been very few policy changes since 2001 in general. Some, like abortion being legal, are good; others, like the Patriot Act, are not so good. But I'd vote for Dubya before a professed Mormon. At least I know he's done drugs!

** Not that the President actually has that much of anything to do with increasing the deficit or revenue (the latter of which hasn't really gone up).

On a slightly different note, I'll quote Bill Hicks, even though it has nothing to do with the GDP, but everything to do with America:

"They say we're losing the War on Drugs. You know what that means? The drug users are winning! And we're all fucked up on drugs!"

I realized around 9/11 that I had to stop giving a shit about political things or else I'd be walking around crying all the time - also my boyfriend at the time was very pro-war and it made me sick if I talked to him about it. So, although I believe very strongly in my political views (that is, I think I'm right and anyone who disagrees is wrong), I don't actually care about them. Kind of like believing such and such movie is the greatest of all time and anyone who disagrees is an asshole, doesn't mean you'd shoot somebody over it, right?

The War On (some) Drugs is pretty much the only thing I allow myself to get pissed about, and even then it's only in small doses, otherwise I seriously would be crying all the time. Since our last three presidents were admitted drug users but apparently think it's not ok for anyone else to get high. And my representative, whom I wrote in 2002, wrote back saying that crime and drugs were linked so pot shouldn't be legalized.

::bangs head against the wall::

Things are better in some ways for some people compared to 2002, for sure. More places are allowing medical pot co-ops - although they still get raided. In Seattle you are literally more likely to get a ticket for jaywalking than for smoking weed in public. (I have met people with tickets for the former, but not the latter. In fact I had a dealer friend get out of jailtime, because the cop who caught him with a bunch of baggies, let him play rock-paper-scissors and he won.) So around here, and probably Cali, things are not so bad. As long as you don't catch the attentions of the feds, of course.

... ok this went off into a rant about Olympic athletes, and I don't even care about the Olympics, although I care more than I care about soccer or American football, but the point is, I don't give a shit if people do drugs, I care that ours and other governments give it a huge stigma and kick people out of the Olympics, not to mention the whole locking people up thing.

But seriously? Pot is hardly a performance enhancing drug. I guess if they did a double blind study of student athletes on and off Marinol, that would prove it, but I do think a small puff or two does take the edge off enough for you not to feel nervous. But so would half a shot of vodka. (I'm not an athlete, I just like hiking and skiing.) Whereas a cup of coffee might sharpen you up for the ~~old ultra-violence~~ er competition. I'd put these drugs in the same class, mostly harmless.

After a couple of years, no kidding, of only reading fanfic pretty much, I've started reading again. Reg held me down at gunpoint and forced me to read Malcolm Gladwell's books - we did Outliers audio last year on road trips, and then Blink and The Tipping Point. Good stuff, although I'd prefer to read them if they were twice as long/in depth.

And then some hiking books, Trail Tested and Chris Townsend's and a couple others on Kindle, 75 Scrambles from the library, and a Mt. Rainier book with like 200 trails.

Finally some youth fantasy books, got through The Curse Workers trilogy last night (although I'm sure more are coming) by Holly Black, that was rather enjoyable. Mobsters+con artists+magic, what's not to love? I'd read Tithe when it first came out, and the two sequels this week. Read the first three books in the Seven Realms series from the library too, definitely gripping.

Beyond cutting my hair, I've also been reading about ski touring. I've been jealous of people on Turns All Year for ages, and I think this year I'm finally gonna do it. Since I'm not that great a skier, and refuse to learn telemark, I'm going to stick with a cross country system, although maybe with a slightly fatter ski than they tend to recommend. Sites on the internet sell XC touring setups for around $300 including boots, poles, skis and bindings - right now they run a bit cheaper since it's off-season, naturally, but I gotta talk to a real person to make sure this is what I want.

The new ski-snowshoe hybrids are interesting too, but I think that can wait till I get more skillz. As can a Dynafit boot, since they tend to be 5x more expensive than a XC boot. Yes, AT stuff is better for downhill control, but I'm not going to be going downhill at more than say resort-rated blue run angles. I actually bought two out-of-print books about places to do this kind of stuff, and a cursory Google shows that the places I'm interested in still exist. How cool would it be to do the Hog Loppet, or the Mt. Tahoma huts? I always thought it would be super expensive to get into, but for under $300 (not counting lessons, sigh) I'm down. Cheaper than replacing Reg's downhill ski boots!

Spray Park (my pics) is one of the highest altitude meadows (aka "parks") at Mount Rainier National Park, less than two hours drive from the Seattle Metro area. Because of this, the flowers tend to appear late-July to early-August, and some of the snowfields at the edge between Spray and Seattle Parks don't ever melt out. It's not officially on the Wonderland Trail, but some people hike it instead as it is far more picturesque. Our loop was from Mowich Lake going to Spray Park, then up to where the WT meets the Carbon River, then back up the WT along Carbon River and Ipsut Creek up to Ipsut Pass, and back to Mowich Lake again. We started at 4900', went up to 6400', then down down down to 3200', then the next day down to 2400', and then UP UP UP to 5100'. Phew.

Pics:

It was sunny at first...

But the clouds moved in.

Same thing happened Sunday!

And then...

Oh well. If you do the WT in August and/or good weather at Mowich Lake, go via Spray Park. Otherwise just go north via Ipsut and burn out the miles.
( Read more... )

So I watched Thor Tuesday night and The Avengers last night.

god.

damn.

I haven't had such a lovely villian crush in years.

I mean, ok, there's the Dexter crush, but he's sort of a hero, right?

Um, yeah, Buffy's Spike/James Marsters was the last one, and that show ended in '03? Yikes.

There's something so spicy about a villian crush.

It's like men who fuck crazy chicks, right? You just know they'll be fantastic in the sack. (Well, ok, at least you hope they will be.)

We were going to do Rampart Ridge at MRNP, but timing being what it was, settled for camping on a forest road on the way to the Summit Lake trailhead. It's about 2.5 miles each way, but the last .75 miles were entirely snow-covered. I was pretty sore the next day, and immediately bought gaiters.

Reg's pics here.

Mine here.

There are about 10 separate places where it's ok to leave your car overnight in the Quincy Wildlife Preserve, and I wanted to check out Dusty Lake first, if it had been taken, we'd try another. But at 7:30pm Friday there weren't any cars parked there, so we set up camp as the sun went down. Fell asleep pretty early and woke up around 8am - we hadn't bothered to put on the tent fly so it was still relatively cool. I told Reg we needed to get up early to hike to the lake proper (we were technically camped at the trailhead) before it got too hot.

So we did, about 3/4 of a mile to the lake. It was a really lovely day, and the lake was gorgeous. I washed my feet in it when we got there, 'cos Dusty Lake is aptly named. And I forgot to bring an extra pair of socks, since except for the hike and night I was wearing sandals. After a while at the lake we headed back, and then other people started showing up. Actually, after we started dinner Friday night, some couple showed up to go fishing. They must have left around midnight, just before the cop showed up asking about automatic weapon fire. (We'd heard it earlier but I thought it was fireworks.) But yeah, apparently you hear gunfire all the livelong day out there anyway, but we definitely heard some automatic weapon fire while at the lake too.

After our little hike we set up a blanket for shade till about 4pm, during which time about four cars and trucks came to do the lake hike. It was 92F in the shade, I could not believe people were hiking in that weather, but oh well. I was too lay to walk to the outhouse every time I had to pee, so I went to find a rocky area out of site, and I found someone's old tent and camp chair. (We'd also forgotten to pack our camp chairs.) Reg grabbed the chair and fixed it up and we kept trading off sitting in it.

At around 6pm we started the fire for dinner, and then it started to rain. Seemed to stop for a minute, then BOOM again woah. I fortunately had brought my rain pants and jacket, so I made our hot dogs and everything in the driving thunderstorm. It was still about 80F but felt a lot cooler, since I had to run to the tent to get my clothes. And after the rain stopped, it was 8pm and still relatively cloudy, so it didn't really feel very warm.

So we fell asleep really early and woke up at 7am. Well, I did, Reg didn't wake up for two more hours. It was 78F in the shade, felt really nice so I read while sitting in the duct-taped chair. Someone rode up in a dune buggy ORV type thang, kids around our age (or I guess mid-20s) from near Seattle after Reg got up. He chatted with them while I packed our stuff up. (Reg had packed everything Friday, so I did this chore Sunday.) I finally finished cleaning the tent out and went for my daypack, where I thought I'd left my trip tunes/CD rom. Unfortunately it was in my main bag, so I had to dig in there. Fortunately it was in a jewel case so quite easy to find. I put on Neon Bible by Arcade Fire, which let me assure you is superb driving music for the desert.

The weather was even nicer Sunday than Saturday, but we could see the Cascades starting around Ellensburg, covered in clouds. And lo and behold it began drizzling just past Snoqualmie Ski Area. Then around North Bend (my first and only pee stop on 90) it just really started coming down. Well, not really that bad, but gross enough that I pulled on my wool hoodie. The McDonald's was packed, so I ran to the Taco Time to pee. No line at all there, whew. Franz Ferdinand started on my CD as we got back on 90, and not long afterwards we were home in the 62F overcast 98004. Dammit.

More pics here.

Current Music: Pink Floyd - Shine on You Crazy Diamond II

I took sunset pics at various beach parks around the east side of Lake Washington:

Meydenbauer sunset pics

Chism Beach sunset pics

and

Bellevue botanical gardens pics, cos I walked 2 miles to get there.

I wanna go. It's been a while since I've been to a music event with no glowstix.

It was going to rain at night so we figured sleeping in the car at the trailhead would be the best bet. We drove along 405 to the Woodinville exit, to Monroe to US2. Traffic was terrible on 405 but the rest was pretty much a breeze. We stopped at the 59er Diner in Coles Corner for dinner, then drove the last couple miles to the Lower Chiwaukum Creek trailhead. Settled in after folding the backseat down, alas Reg is too tall to really be comfy in there, but oh well.

We woke up when the car started to heat up, around 7, but after opening the trunk a touch we went back to sleep. I got up before 9am though, and watched as other hikers started arriving. Mostly day hikers but there were a few with loaded backpacks. The weather was better Saturday and got even better Sunday, but Reg had plans that night so we wanted to get back early.

Pics here. We didn't go terrifically far, what with the time constraint and all. But I marked our hike on my smartphone, and we walk a LOT faster than we used to. Granted it was an easy trail, but the weather was just above 60F and Reg was in a short-sleeve shirt and tennis shoes. We went about 2 miles up and then decided the clouds were descending too rapidly. But we gained 1387ft with an average speed of 2.45mph (that's including a 15 minute break), going 3.8 miles in 90 minutes. Well, downhill was fast, about 4.2mph. Next time should rock.

Current Music: The Who - Baba O'Riley

2012-05-26_32 Originally uploaded by lauralhb.

And other photos taken in Vancouver, BC.

setlist:

Hey jane
Lord let it rain on me
Heading for the top
Walkin with jesus
Oh baby
Electric mainline
Soul on fire
I am what i am
Ladies &gentlemen we are floating in space
MARY
Stay with me
She kissed me and it felt like a hit
Come together
Encore: So Long You Pretty Thing
Cop SHOOT COP

Total time was just under 150 minutes. The Rickshaw had a nice setup for shows except for 2 things: airflow and more than two speakers. I guess that's fine for singer/songwriters, but normally I need earplugs during a concert.

But whatever, the dehydration headache that lasted 36 hours afterwards was worth it. Reg said he'd never seen Spaceman so active. The nice thing about seeing a show outside of Seattle is people dance and clap and scream. The crowd yelled and clapped the whole pre-encore duration, and Spaceman actually clapped with us after the 20 minute "Cop Shoot Cop."

Pics and more Vancouver impressions next.

Current Location: Redmond, NE 36th St, 15660

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Laural Hill

July 2017

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I've even raped and killed a mountain panda in the hills of Shaanxi.

But these perks are beyond the point.

Recent Entries

fandom attack

pop it up

the end of the journey

oh well, only 30 more thousand words

A Weeding!

Driving though OR and CA

(no subject)

to be fair

CHAMPIONS do.

reading

snow dreams

spray park loop

fangirling with the rest of the girls on the internet

summit lake

Dusty Lake camping trip

some pics

well do you, do you do you wanna