Ok, so this is a pretty difficult post to write, but since so many of you are loyal and regular readers and expect frequent posts, I feel like I have to explain why there may not be many posts for a while. And I don't know how long that "while" is going to be.

This weekend, my cameras (yes, that is plural) and my laptop were stolen out of the trunk of my car. The details of this theft are not really exciting, but crux of it is, whoever did it was a professional and got very very lucky.

So I don't have a method to take pictures or a way to store them. The worst of it is all of the photos that I've taken, including those I've shared with you are gone. I will be honest when I say that my spirit has been crushed by this and it will take a while to recover that as well as my equipment.

I will keep you posted as best I can and hopefully I'll be up and running eventually. Sorry for the very down post, but I think it is only fair to let my "fans" know why the blog will be slow. Thanks for your support - if it weren't for you, I wouldn't have the blog at all and i would really have nothing to show for the past two years.

This weekend I went on an overnight sail to Poulsbo, WA, which is on the Kitsap Peninsula, west of Seattle, on the other side of Puget Sound. I went with three other girls. The goal here was to have some sailing practice without having to rely upon "male assistance," which was accomplished. I think I can pretty much tack like a pro now and I even drove the boat for a while. There was some fun "girl time" as well, of course. Involving lots of great food, wine and stories. And a little silliness. On of the girls brought finger puppets, to which I took an instant liking. Please note how the giraffe looks high and the panda is clearly seasick.







We were on Cricket, my usual boat. We slept on the boat as well- something I haven't done in over a decade. In the picture below, you can see quarters are pretty tight, but we made it work. I slept on the green bench on the right. We also have a pretty nifty galley, complete with a stove that swings when the boat moves so that the stuff you are cooking doesn't land on the floor.




At Poulsbo, quite coincidentally, there was a Midsummer's Festival. This is apparently something that is very big among the Scandinavian countries. Poulsbo has a very solid Norwegian heritage, so there was a lot going on. Vikings were camping out in the town park, there were dances and almost everybody was in costume. You could almost believe you had just sailed to Norway rather than just across the Sound.

Well, it is sailing season again. Our first race was last week. Here is some video taken by the sponsor of the race. This gives you a good idea of what it is like to sail in the Sound. Our boat is the one with a green cricket on the spinnaker.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=erPgS6-eFww

Last week, I went to Les Schwab to get a tire patched. While doing so, I saw a poster advertising something that had my fledgling inner redneck giddy with anticipation. The Demming Logging Show. A LOGGING show...essentially, Lumberjack Olympics. AWESOME. I knew what I was doing on Sunday. Whoo.





I really had no idea what to expect except for lots of sawing and chopping... and it definitely didn't disappoint. In addition to the "logger arena" where all the contests took place, there were venders and logger related exhibits. I really can't think of a better place to bring boys (of any age) to. Even if they got bored of what was happening in the arena (not likely), they can wander around the grounds looking at every truck imaginable. All boys love trucks.




What happens in the "arena" is definitely what most people come for. The contests are very exciting and sometimes downright impressive. I mean, you could just smell the testosterone.






And as the day wore on, shirts got removed. Always a plus in my book.





There was even a charity auction. I know you are dying to know what got auctioned off at a logging show, so i'll show you... Large amounts of FIREWOOD. Some of it chopped up already, some of it... not. I was impressed that people had room for this merchandise on their properties. Average price for this much wood? $900. Trucks not included.




The highlight of the afternoon was the "Hot Saws" competition. The goall here is simple: to cut through a 30 inch log the fastest with a chainsaw. The rules here are also very simple: you can attach ANY engine you like to the saw, but only two peole can hold it while it is being used to cut the log. There wer saws powered by Toyota corollas, snowmobiles, Harley Davidsons... you get the drift. The winning cut clocked in at 1.2 seconds. I'm sorry I don't have video, I didn't have the best vantage point. But take my word on this, it was as awesome as it sounds.

The final event was a tug of war between the loggers and kids. When I heard that the kids ALWAYS win, I was totally shocked. The oldest kid is maybe 8. You can see from the video, that there is no way that the loggers were letting the kids win.

This weekend I sang Karaoke for the first time ever.  In public.  For those of you who know me really well, you know that I can't sing to save my life, so my doing so in front of other people must come as a shock.  I must assure you that I was completely sober.  I have no idea what came over me.  I guess following up some ACDC with a show tune was just too hard to resist.  Are there photos of this experience?  No.  Video?  HELL no.  But I do have a picture of this bar patron.  It is classic Seattle.  Not only is is acceptable to bring your dog INTO a bar, but giving her a seat AT the bar is even better.

Tonight... tonight I had a very "Seattle" milestone. I WON a trivia night. I showed up without a team - that was not exactly the plan, there was a last minute cancellation, but because the "theme" was "travel," I figured that even if I was forced to play alone, I would not embarrass myself. As it turns out, there were two other people looking for a team and the three of us proved to be formidable.

I knew it was going to be a special night when I could fill out half of the photo round on my own. I had been to most of them. Same with identifying the cities that went with three letter airport codes. We hadn't even had any questions yet.

The questions that catapulted us to first place:

• What ancient wonder is near Siem Reap? Ankor Wat. Hello, I know this.. i was just there.

• What team won the 2007 Ruby world cup? South Africa. Yup, just came from there too.

• What countries do the victoria falls straddle? That would be Zambia and Zimbabwe. One point each. Whoo.

• And there was a quote about travel and you had to know who said it. I couldn't believe i knew it was Mark Twain, i was on FIRE.  Who would have thunk that being an English major would turn out to be so helpful.
  

I was so excited that we won. Our team won 35 bucks total. Paid for my dinner. And if that didn't cause me to ride high enough, one of my teammates thought i was a student at UW. it was a great night.

This morning I was a volunteer pancake flipper for the monthly pancake breakfast at the Swedish Cultural Center. And boy am i POOPED. There were over a thousand people who came.. each visitor gets 5 pancakes... so that is well over 5000 pancakes. I wasn't alone, obviously, there were 6 of us fryers..t one time anyways, who could flip. I really wish that I had video of me doing this, or at least a picture, but there was no time for any of that. There is a bit of a learning curve with swedish pancake flipping. And folding. I have never cooked so fast and for so long. But it was really cool learning something new from "the real deal."

This week I discovered one of my favorite hikes in WA. It completely demonstrates how awesome the forests are in these parts. The following videos show exactly why hiking in the PNW is sooo cool. And literally. Right now, this area has a "heat advisory" (for 90 degree weather), but when hiking in forests around here, you would never know, the trees keep the temperature so low. And when there is running water near by (you can hear it in the videos), you can feel the cool air coming off the water. Even when the water is over a football field away.







And at the end of the hike, is one of the tallest waterfalls in the state:



When I arrived at the trailhead, I ran into a couple of hikers who had just finished and asked them how long it took them. After assuring me that there was no way that I was going to get "caught" by sundown, one of them says, "Do you have a camera? The waterfall is THE most amazing waterfall i've EVER seen!"

I didn't have the heart to tell her that no matter what, they weren't going to be the most amazing falls i've ever seen. Been there, done that.

Wow, the ocean suddenly sounds SO much louder....

Inspired by my recent safari, I tried my hand at a little bird watching around Seattle. I found quite a view birds, many of them very pretty, all of them not very patient posers. The only flying organism I got a shot of was a dragonfly:



The most memorable part of the experience for me was the fact that it looked like it snowed all over the reserve. I had never seen what large amount of cottonwood could do, but it was very impressive. There was so much "fuzz" that you could have had "cotton ball" fights.

I recently returned to a place that I visited during my first few weeks after my move to Seattle. I remember thinking it was beautiful the first time, but also from that spot, I should have been able to see mountains and the city. So I went back to see if the view could be improved at all. All I have to say is, if you don't play golf, a place like this will make you want to start.

Over Memorial weekend, Seattle Center hosted the annual NW Folklife Festival. It is a festival of culture - and all kinds. International, domestic, alternative, the whole gammet. If it exists, it was there. It was so busy, i couldn't believe that Seattle actually had so many inhabitants:





Doesn't that fountain look like fun? I've featured it here before. This weekend I actually went into it myself. No pictures or video of that, unfortunately.

But I do have video of a guy dancing with scarves. The reason why this is entertaining and video worthy is that it demonstrates a large part of the essence of the festival. People are encouraged to express themselves wherever and however. So literally, all over the grounds, people set up instruments, dance platforms, amps, whatever so that they can perform. And if somebody feels like giving money for doing so, great.



Here are some of my favorite shots that give a good idea of the characters you can find at folklife. Here are the hulahoopers that are just about everywhere. Please note the kid who is hulaing a hoop that is twice as tall as he is.



And an example of seattle punk. Mohawks are definitely making a comeback:



Below is a good example of the diversity of Seattle in one photo - A woman dressed in 17th century costume in front of a group of punk rockers.



And finally, accessorizing as only a Seattlelite can. And yes, it is real.

Also over Memorial Day weekend, I crossed another thing off my list. I went to my first ever monster truck rally. Betcha didn't know that it was on my list. Well, since moving out here, I've become aware of the "little inner redneck" that is apparently in anybody who is American born. And what do you know, that little redneck wanted to check out monster trucks.

Truthfully, the monster trucks themselves were cool, but not as cool as the rest of it. I really couldn't believe how excited I got about things getting destroyed or potentially getting smashed. For example, here is a clip of "roll overs." The purpose of this event is to see how many times a car can roll over. It doesn't matter if the car doesn't drive after it is done rolling over. Or if the driver is OK for that matter.




Then there are the school bus races. Now, this promised to be very exciting, because this race had "intersections." As in, instead of just going around a track in circles, the buses make a figure 8 within the track. Now, logic would indicate that there should be some serious smashing going on, but disappointingly, not. The buses kept SLOWING down before an intersection.. hello, there is no slowing down in racing! I had never been to a motor race before and even i knew that!! And don't worry, no kids are in the buses.



I think my favorite event was the boat races. Essentially, cars race around a figure 8 with boats dragging behind them. The last car with any part of the boat still attached to it, wins.

Memorial Day weekend was one of the most gorgeous stretch of 3 days in a row I've had in Seattle in a very long time. Not wanting to waste a minute of this precious weather, I headed out to take a look at Mt. Baker, which is about 3 hours NE of the city. Up until now, I'd only been able to see it from the city and was very interested in seeing it up close finally. It didn't disappoint.





And since the weather continued to be so favorable, the decision was made to proceed even further east onto Washington Pass. This was the last of the mountain passes in WA that I had yet to go through and it represented the farthest east I had been in the state so far. It was absolutely spectacular.



The views just got better and better the farther down the pass. Just as we were about to head down the other side, the traffic came to a complete stop. As in parked. Apparently, an avalanche had fallen across the road and was being cleared by a single front end loader. It was about 50 feet wide and high enough to bury a car. The estimated wait time was about an hour. People just got out of their cars and started drinking. Note the GORGEOUS view we had of where we were stopped, as well as the "all natural" beer coolers that were used during the makeshift tailgate:

Our last stop was at Victoria Falls. Since it was the end of the wet season, the falls were very very full and powerful. What this meant was, we could see very little of them because, well, while in any of the viewing areas, you were actually IN the falls. Which was actually kind of cool... and very wet. VERY wet. We had a chance to see them from a helicopter, which did give a better perspective.










Here are videos of what the viewing areas were like. Sorry that one video is "vertical." If i knew how to rotate it, i would.