"Bunch of savages in this town"

Okay so I have a posting hiatus and then have a fun weekend and post three times to share it...apparently 3 times the charm...and now I have to invoke a quote from Clerks.

We've had a theft in the family.

Joe called me today from REI where he was buying a new tube for his bike on his way home from work; he needed a ride....and not due to a flat tire. "bunch of savages in this town." The employees at REI say there's a guy that does this a lot. He clips the cable (yes yes we know...we've already heard the lament of the cable bike lock, don't rub it in) and leaves the bike he rode at the scene of the crime Joe's K2 was traded for a battered red Raleigh (Nesquick Chocolate milk bottle included in the water bottle receptacle).

Ugh. Blast and Damn. And Blast again.

It's like we're alcoholics or something

Beer on Saturday. Wine on Sunday. Follow the Yellow Brick Road...

Okay, so not only did we hang out at the 5th Quadrant on Saturday afternoon sampling seasonal beers, we got into the whole seasonal beer mindset. Unfortunately we were unable to really go for it that afternoon, so we, while taking advantage of subsidized CFL's at the local FM we went a bit beyond the season and grabbed some of the available winter ales: Fish Tales Winterfish, Deschutes Jubilale & Bridgeport's Ebeneezer. We got one bottle of each and went in that order, splitting them as we carved pumpkins, until I realized that I'm just not ready for winter ales yet. I'm pining for pumpkin beer. I did however enjoy the Winterfish as it was a tribute to other hoppy winter ales that I have enjoyed.

On Sunday, we took advantage of the beautiful fall weather to head out into the western wine area. We now realize that we will have to come to grips with Pinot Noir. I understood it was popular, but I had no idea. We visited two wineries before timing forced us back into town for a meeting. There were four Pinot Noir's between them, and we skipped a winery on the way that did only Pinot Noir.

The scenery was beautiful to take in, all the foliage turning...especially the vines. Plus it was 70 degrees, how could you not want to frolic in post season vineyards? Yes frolic. Plus pretty much all the wines we tasted were excellent.

We did make a pitstop in SW on the way home to check out a greater beer selection...it's amazing how even single bottle purchases add up :) We did find a little more variety in Pumpkin Ales, but it seems like everyone is ready for winter ales already. I suppose that's nothing to complain about.

Nubbin & Cow

Heh Heh...who names their pumpkins? Apparently we do and we think we're rather funny.

I love going out for pumpkins. I can only remember going a couple times as a kid...but I think that the fun is really when you're an adult acting like a kid...and being glad that you can actually carry the pumpkin you picked, rather than having to roll it back to the car. So, for me the novelty of picking out pumpkins from a patch is in a renaissance. I love it. This year we picked the oddest shaped ones we could find it seems. They've been sitting on our little garden window for the past week, unaware of their fate.

We carved them last night. A disappointing amount of pumpkin seeds, but fun with knives and fire and shutter speeds more than made up for it.

Chowda

On Saturday Joe and I went to check out the New Old Lompoc (5th Quadrant) and the Chowda Challenge benefit. The season completely forgetting itself, gave sunshine and warmth enough take advantage of the ample outdoor seating and leave coats behind. For $5 each we received a tray of 12 tasters of different New England style, Portland produced Chowders...with the proceeds going to the leukemia & lymphoma society (pretty cool). They had live music, seasonal beers for $3 a pint (with the hoppiest lager I've ever tasted) and this crazy balloon hat guy running around dressing everyone in some pretty creative balloon hats.

Of the 12 chowders at least 4 were in the "if I ordered this at a restaraunt I'd go hungry" category, some were very creative...almost to the point where we looked up to verify..."did you taste nutmeg in #4?" But the one that caught my heart was chock full of salty goodness and had huge clams in it. Which is weird. Because I usually do not like clams. At all. I spent many a weekend in my youth on beaches in the Puget Sound digging for clams, which, when were cooked at home repulsed me and restaraunt clams did little to convince me otherwise. So I generally eat around clams when I get chowder, because I like the creamy chowder, but eating the clams usually reveals the gritty, sandy, rubbery, chewy underbelly of the soup. I know. I know. But yesterday I ate many a clam, and although they have not completely won me over, I now know that at least sometimes they taste good. In fact, they were rather filling and between a pint of beer and half of each taster I was set. The results are to be posted sometime soon...so we'll see what we ate, who made it and whether we have "good taste."

...and some side notes...
(1) for those of you not raised by New Englanders it's chowda.
There are some audio studies at the end that should help anyone wanting to improve on dropping their r's (cough, Freed, cough cough...and Matt who is probably inadvertently developing one as we speak :) )
(2) When performing a spell check, "Puget" is checked as "puked" which brings a little smile to my face.
(3) I know it seems odd to use the words "beach" and "Puget Sound" in the same sentence, but, should these words be used within the same sentence, beach should be read as "rocks" and "gravel"
(4) While my brother and I used garden shovels to capture unwitting clams my Dad sat on the beach shucking oysters. He generally used a knife etc etc. But I've seen him and my Uncle walking along the beach sampling the oysters as they go. Using whatever means necessary. I can show you an excellent technique using a 1987 Plymouth Voyager valet key. Mmmmm Oysters on the half shell.

What are the chances?

While shelving in Math/Science/Nature yesterday a book on probability fell on me off the top shelf. Twice.

Heh heh heh.

...end of summer

Today might very well have been Joe's and my last "summer" day off together, as the ball has started rolling in his job court and mine has deflated (ha ha). We woke up this morning and spontaneously decided to drive up to see Mount St. Helens.


...and now I wanna climb it. Looking at the Southeastern side today, Joe and I started contemplating the potential ease...not so much climbing but more hiking (not easy hiking...but certainly not climbing...no gear necessary). Since the explosion 26 years ago removed about 2ooo feet from the mountain, it seems a like a good mountain for 'virgins.'
So now I'm looking into that for the end of next summer...after recovering from STP. The official climbing site seems to support our hypothesis, it looks like a one day, up the mountain, down again hike; about 4,500 feet in 5 miles. Sweet.

Unemployed...wha???

There's nothing like no work and all play. Once you get over the storming out of bars crying about your inflated/deflating ego blah blah blah phase it's all downhill.

So, not to make life sound fabulous, but let me just recount the last few days...




Monday was a good biking tour of the riverside esplanade...where, once again the sweet smell of blackberries assaulted the senses...I have yet to bike anywhere in this town that hasn't had at least a stretch of that absolutely fabulous aroma that the berries are putting off in this hot weather.
--on a side note, we had a good discussion of how to go about training for the STP and I got to veer off the trail and into downtown to stop at REI for some recreational shorts (with butt cushions...oh yeah, picture it). I'm also starting to lean more towards the idea of a "half-on" road bike instead of the hybrids/commuters I was considering earlier this year. I say "half-on" as in not "full-on" because I am still really attracted to the straight bar style instead of the drop down. I'm also attracted to the idea of having a job so I can purchase a new bike. Soon, maybe. (Also, biking downtown is fun for a few reasons, none of which include catching the spray from someone's windshield wiper cleaning fluid).

So, after getting home from our biking journey we chanced on the idea of going camping on Tuesday. So we got out the "granola" books and picked a couple of places. We finally settled on a coastal hiking and camping experience and set off mid-morning yesterday.
Ah, nature. Sort of. We picked a camping spot that had a hike from the campground proper, or so we thought, and ended up having to drive a bit further to get to the trailhead instead. So far, no big deal. We pulled up to the marked area and found an entourage...I thought the hike must be more popular than we had estimated for mid-week. We parked on the side of the road and headed up to the parking lot where we found, a couple of RV's, 3 or 4 fifteen foot trucks, a caterer, some lunch tables (complete with salt and pepper shakers) camera rigs and about 60 or 70 people standing around looking important. Uh?
A Kia car commercial was being filmed. I had no idea it took that many people to film a 1 minute blip of a car driving through wooded roads. Although it was kind of cool to see the camera rigged SUV that was doing the filming. Oh well. Five miles of hiking along the coast and back and they were still there. I think we passed 4 or 5 different guys with walkie talkies stationed at different parts of the road on the way back to our campsite and they had positioned a flagger a few miles beyond to control traffic.
So, when you see it, know that somewhere tramping around in the woods, we were there. mwahahaha. And fucking gorgeous. Absolutely beautiful to hike around in. We even got little "toe facials" (yes I know that makes no sense) from squelching along the muddy trail in sandals.
The whole bit of this camping trip was to finally have the opportunity to use some of our new toys. Our sleek backpacking tent, therma-rest pads, removable handle lightweight pots, and so on. nerds. I know I know. Shut up. We got a real kick out of lighting the fire with a flint strike too heh heh heh. And other than the crazy boys that showed up in the middle of the night, quite loudly and longly and (truth be told) to much amusement and heckling (amongst ourselves) from our half-asleep state, it was quite a lovely night. Besides, when we woke up with rain this morning I peeked my head out to get a glimpse of the new arrivals only to find that karma is a real bitch. They had not brought a rain fly for their tent. Ah.... They had grudgingly packed up and shipped out before we even had the gumption to sit-up in our tent. Which is awesome by the way...no rain problems here, although we probably could have set the fly up better/tighter, bah...bygones.

I also enjoyed our "brown-bagged" wine. It was lovely to sit and sip as we sat by the fire, eating dinner, then later as we watched the sunset over the ocean and then finally in the tent playing rummy and getting sleepy.

...and the sunset...

This morning after we had sufficiently woken up, we took a long walk on the beach with a mug of tea and then came back, took down the camp and headed into town where we sampled and purchased some excellent local cheeses on our way home.

Hop Madness

There is nothing like walking into a room that looks like this:Upon the recommendation of Andy, who could not himself attend, we spent the better part of yesterday at a hops and brewing event properly called Hop Madness. Oh my goodness.
It was a fair sized gathering of people who brought many different homebrews to share and different shapes and sizes of equipment to brew with on-site.
But before sampling too many beers, we were taken down the street to the hop farm that had provided the Willamette, Cascade, Magnum and Crystal hops to brew with. Ah, what a site to see:
...and then down the road to the processing area...

Where the vines are strung up and whisked away to be separated from the hops-

Fresh hops on their way to being dried out-

Drying out-

Big kid ball pen- (don't worry all of these hops are going to AB) -

Happy Hop head :)Joe did a front flip into the hops and emerged covered in yellow stickiness.

The baler (kind of looks like a drug operation might)

So I figured this was pretty much the highlight of my being there and prepared to settle down with a book and drink another beer or two while Joe brewed and hung out with the other brewers. People are too damn friendly. We were recruited to help pick the fresh hops off the vine for the brewers...I never knew just how sticky these suckers could be and they have little tiny pricklies on the vines so, it doesn't hurt (actually you can't even feel it) to touch the vine, but at the end of the day it looks like a miniature swordsman hacked up your arms and legs.
So I hung out with the die hard hops enthusiasts for awhile and then on the 20 foot walk back to our stuff, to get water and a snack and sit down with a book, I was delayed by about 2 hours as I was taken around the rest of the campsite to taste other peoples beers and be recruited by various homebrew clubs in the Pacific Northwest. Stringent competition let me tell you.Joe mostly stayed close to the brew as the afternoon went on. Andy was kind enough to lend us his mobile brewing apparatus so Joe could partake of the fresh hop brewing. We should have a fine pale soon. It was going so strong this morning I thought the bubble noises were the shower dripping. It was so loud I got up to turn it off.

Sunset on the brewers

Fishes, Fire and Four Wheels

Well...I just wanted to go with an "F" theme, but it was really only two wheels, each.
On Tuesday we went and spent a colossal fortune of $.12 each on Comet Goldfish (and a water cleaner) for our outdoor pond.
On Tuesday we had ten fish.
On Wednesday we had nine fish.
Today we have eight.
I'm hoping at least some will survive the weekend for our visitors...
I wanted to name them all "Buttons" for Pat, however, that was overruled, but one will defintely be Buttons, once they stop dying.The cats took no delight in being shown water, they refused to look in it, frantically clinging to me thinking they were about to get an outdoor bath. I thought they'd love watching the fish, but they can't get over the water. So I'm hoping to get some excitement out of Howie. The fish are fun to watch, we created a little hiding spot for them out of bricks, in case they need to protect themselves...of course that limits our viewing to watching them race for cover.

Also, we enjoyed our first real fire in our outdoor fireplace. We scrounged up the crap wood that was littering the back and side yard and made a sacrifice to the brick behemoth. It was warm and put me in the mood for marshmallows, so I broke them out and Joe scrounged for a cooking utensil. We had several toasted marshmallows via coat hanger and spent a lovely evening cleaning up the backyard and sneaking up on the fish. I derived much pleasure from the burning of a couple gallons of the fallen apples of which we probably have about 50 or 60 gallons of at this point. Plus, the sounds of sizzling and popping and the aroma were much better than the cries of Joe and the smell of burning shoelaces. Using your foot to move burning wood only seems like a good idea.

To start out the day though, we took a short loop around the Island that is quickly becoming one of my favorite places outside the city limits. It was a 12 mile road loop that was pretty much flat, which was perfect for riding one handed, as we had filled the other hand with blackberries. The smell of blackberries permeated the majority of the ride and made it irresistible to stop and pluck a few, er...many.

A sidenote from OBF...

...and reminiscing on funny quotes from Toph.

The 6 month reign of "Wildlife preserves?...what you mean like jam?" is over. At OBF a fellow beer enthusiast gave us all a little trivia when he asked if we knew which state had the fewest breweries in the U.S. Of course we guessed Utah...but we were wrong.

Mississippi, to which Toph replied, "Well, they are M-I-S-S-I-N-G Out"

Eh...it loses a little on the screen, but it's still the new champion.

Eat, Drink and be Berry

We have entered a land where fruit is plentiful and rains from the skies....Well when Joe's throwing it at my exposed back to get a paintball effect.
We set off a few days ago to seek out blackberries. Joe had a stop on the side of the road and sneak around and fill our buckets sort of plan in mind...however, most of the bushes we came by were in residential areas. So we scrapped that plan and went a beautiful U pick site where we picked and sampled the glories of marionberries, blueberries and the seasons remaining raspberries.
On our way back, we spotted a park that was surrounded by blackberry bushes, so we stopped off and grabbed some containers and went for it. There were berries everywhere. We just kept picking, I actually started to feel a bit greedy and then I started to wonder why there were so many berries present...why weren't other people picking them? Were they sprayed routinely with pesticides? Had there been some radiation exposure, or toxic waste spill? Was it against the law? Did the locals know something that we didn't? I mentioned this to Joe, so we decided to consult the state parks sign on our way out.
Door number 3 - Under state park regulations, you are not cut or destroy or pick the fruit or plants. Whoops! Suddenly I imagined a great hulking pile of abandoned blackberries at the foot of the sign from others who had made our same mistake. Our forbidden fruit however has been picked free of debris, rinsed and bagged and is residing comfortably in our freezer.

OBF

I must admit that a strong selling point for moving sooner rather than later was to be able to comfortably partake in this event. It was worth it.

I originally balked at the idea of attending more than one or two days, however, spreading many excellent beers over three of the four days of the festival was helpful in many ways. More beers, better memory retention and zero hangovers. The weather was perfect, if even a little cold towards the end of the night.

Obviously this post has been in limbo for a few days...I wanted to find my list of beers.

So notable beers (er... for me) are as follows:

- IPA's -
- Pliny the Elder (really a double) from Russian River --when they ran out on Saturday Freed actually let out a cry of anguish so loud I thought the entire tent would turn to find its source.
- Hazell Dell IPA from (you guessed it) Hazel Dell
- West Coast IPA from Green Flash - I went back for this one twice (oh yeah)

- Pales -
- Double Dry Hopped Pale from Boundary Bay
- Powderfinger Rye from Big Time

I was going to go through a few more styles...but only a few stand out so those are:

- Other -
- Ned (Flanders style Red) from Rock Bottom - had the smell of a good red wine, the most unique beer I tasted all weekend
- Sirius Ale (Imperial Cream Ale) Laguanitas

...and of course there were many beers that I have had before that I had to restrain myself from trying in the first two days so I could experience new ones:
- Summer Solstice Cream Ale from Anderson Valley (hot moving day beer)
- Hop Rod Rye from Bear Republic
- Old Rasputin Russian Imperial Stout from North Coast
- Proletariat Red from New Old Lompoc
- Pike IPA from Pike Brewing Co.

Alright alright, now I can recycle my list which is all messy and has stains on it from some precarious chili rice snacks...

Crime Scene

This picture is actually from the salmon hatchery on the Gorge. But it looks like a chalk outline from a murder scene...and it made me chuckle.

Colorfast?

An observation:

I noticed that the large magnet "ribbons" that people have placed on their cars have a tendency to fade.

The yellow "Support our Troops" ribbons have all faded to white. Perhaps it's a sign?

In case you were wondering...

It takes about the same amount of time to listen to the Tool album Aenima as it does to watch the apartment building across the lot try to burn itself to the ground.
Sorry I woke you Toph.

But in all seriousness the apartment building closest to us [which is across from us] had shrubbery catch fire (the day after fireworks...I just don't understand) tonight. We can't sleep. The 3 engines, 2 trucks and supplementary SUV's blaring and flashing their lights are a bit sobering. We had been playing a nice game of rummy and sharing a bottle of Viognier; the screen doors letting in all manner of apartment ambiance and I heard someone outside say something had caught on fire...we have had at least 3 false alarms in our building alone...kids pulling the alarm...blah blah blah...I stood up and saw one floor of the apartment directly across from us ablaze. I reached for the phone and Joe reached for our orange bucket. He went to stifle the fire (barefoot and boxers I might add) and I called 911. For all the bad things I've said about the loud, raucous, obnoxious apartment dwellers in our complex (who may have possibly started it--three cars sped off from the scene...cue bad mystery music) at least 5 or 6 guys rallied grabbing buckets, large bowls and locating extinguishers whether personal or apartment supplied to put out the flames. In fact I was feeling a bit silly about having called the fire department because they had calmed the 30 foot flames so well. Until the roof caught fire. Joe said it was like trick candles, watching the shrubbery go out and the wall catch on. Indeed, I had a hard time explaining to the fire department the proximity of the bushes..."how close to the building?" " ZERO FEET! The wall is about to be on fire." And so it was, Joe says the entire wall burst into flames.

So the Tool album ended an hour ago and the lights are still flashing. The flames have been quelled, the dueling chainsaws lulling us into...well, further alertness; both Joe and I were called outside to talk with the "inspector" and the wine is gone. How depressing. 8 days to go until we're out of here...and two apartments crisped. I mean really fried. I know I'm being a bit tongue and cheek but...

We had all our rain for the year in one go and now it's dry enough for whatever caused this. I have nothing nice to say about the weather and its calamity. At least everyone got out. I was so astounded that for all our false alarms no ONE had pulled the fire alarm that while I was one the phone with 911 I screamed for someone to pull the one for the building. We all like to think we did our part. Turns out 6 people called 911, that makes me happy. The last time I called 911 I got put on hold. (of course it was in Los Angeles, during rush hour, in 1997...ask Toph he was there).

Sitting in a car can be exhausting

...actually that pretty much sums it up. A few long drives and many days touring the city trying to figure out where we are (mostly me...it will take years before I can figure it out, I'm sure) and where we can live...and who will employ us.

When we weren't sitting in the car becoming one with the seats, we did have the opportunity to hang out with Andy and Michelle (who graciously gave us a guided tour and sustained us with excellent food) and to go hiking up in the Gorge area. Simply beautiful.

And given a 9-hour drive back south to reflect, I can now assess some interesting points about moving.

• Being close enough to drive to a wedding the same day it is held (good)
• Mountains... (very good)
  
• Neighborhoods and crime areas come in "pockets" (hmmmmm)
• Close proximity to good friends (very very good)
• Close proximity to good beer (very good)
  
• Being in a relaxed city where people smile and say hello as they pass you on the street (mostly good)
  
• Being in a relaxed city where returning phone calls can be done in the 11th hour (bad)
  

Pretty much everything came down to the end of the wire and the only thing that is certain is that there will be a roof over our heads. For that I am thankful.

...and blah blah blah came home and started the process of deconstructing.

there is more to say, it involves a beautiful windy wedding, a bit of interviewing, a long-awaited DVD :) (well worth it) and this past June - 2 years and counting for us.

Another knot :)

I'll take a wake up call with news like that anytime :) Congrats to Toph & Jess

In the Hog's Head

Taking advantage of the bridge from the park, we also popped into Old Town, and finally were able to sit down and have a pint at the Hog’s Head (which keeps random hours). Highlights of the brewpub included: the pints of IPA we enjoyed, the otherworldly feeling of the woody, dusty, basement setting, the dollar bills immortalized and push-pinned to the ceiling (and the two Brits with the story).

There was a couple already at the bar when we arrived who, in the best of possible worlds, were quite obviously loaded. As I was taking this picture, the female half said I had to get her dollar in the photo because there was a story behind it…She said that she had pinned it there last year when she and the gentleman with her were having a secret affair; and now she’s pinning another one up because they’re no longer a clandestine couple, but happily unattached from their formers and with each other. They spent the better part of the next half hour making fun of each others ring tone song purchases and being boisterously loud and in love. It was quite funny. (and of course...I have no idea which dollar bill it was or if it is even featured in the photo).

...and the waters receded...

After some months under water, the park and bike trail near our place has finally reached flood free status. We’ve been casually observing the water level as it has receded, passing by once or twice a week to see its progress, and were finally rewarded last weekend. We were shocked. In fact, we were so shocked that the vehicle barricade was removed that Joe almost had a head-on collision with a senior center transport shuttle on its way out of the park.

The park itself looks as though it weathered the flood quite well; it has taken on the aroma of a muddy tidal area (for those who know it…think Dyes Inlet), and the paved road looked like land in the final stages of desertification, but the grasses were lush and long and the trails clear.

Before and After:

Flooded: taken 01/12/2006

Er...not flooded: taken 05/20/2006

Not the best before and after shots, because it's been so long since I took the first ones...but you get the main idea ( (1) flooded road (2) the flood waters were up to almost 6 feet high against the park ranger building-you can still see the dirt and grime line from where the flood waters stopped on the road the and the building).

The first time we came to the park, back in November (pre-flood), I fell in love with the huge trees, so while Joe hunkered down to study in the grass, I ran around with my camera trying to capture the trees…most of my shots were done with my film SLR (black & white film) and are still in the camera (5 more shots on the roll), but I also snapped a few with the digi…mostly just enjoying the pictorial quality of Joe’s relaxed manner and the relatively quiet (for a Saturday) day.