August | 2026 | Raincharm's Weblog

Archive for August, 2026

Weeds and more

August 6, 2026

I really should remember to take before pictures when I am doing work where progress is visible. But I didn’t, so all you get is an after. I also did some general between house weeding, including a rather large blackberry vine removal. It will come back, I could not get enough of the root.

I also paid for a certified copy of my grandmother’s birth certificate. I’m not sure I will need it, but I had requested it a few months ago – and they did their work. The cost was presented in Candian dollars, and I paid with a credit card. Seeing the actual amount charged it appears the exchange rate is about 70 percent!

Carl took his friend Chris hitting with the old and then older guys. Chris qualifies as old, but not older. It sounded like he had a good time, but may need an ice bath later. Especially after 3 hours in the car on his drive south.

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Smoke in your eyes

August 5, 2026

We are not in or near the Washington fires, but still close enough for the smoke to have arrived. Tuesday night’s block party was postponed due to the air quality index. It will likely happen on Friday, but we are going to the Mariners game that day. Yesterday and today we largely kept the windows closed to limit the smell indoors. It has been coming and going, and we hope it really goes soon.

This has been the only damper on a visit from Carl’s college roommate.

They have managed to get to a Mariner game, an Aquasox game, and generally hanging out. We did take a long walk this morning. Up the long incline to the Maple Leaf neighborhood, home to Macrina bakery and a hardware store.

I have been busily watching the first three years of Ted Lasso in preparation for Season 4. One episode from Season 3 to go.

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Little Free Amusements

August 3, 2026

We took a walk yesterday, again. This time we paralleled Green Lake for a while. If I find a little free library, I often stop to browse.

This time it wasn’t so much what was in the library as the library itself.

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Old News and New Neighbors

August 1, 2026

Old news: Mariners lose, again. But that was so yesterday, they won today. We were at the loss, not the win.

Yesterday wasn’t a total loss, we got a good walk in before the game. It was a beautiful day so we took light rail to the north downtown station (Westlake), and walked through the Pike Place Market, down to the waterfront, and along the waterfront to the stadiums. And finally to the line to get into the game. The perk of this line waiting was watching the Blue Angels. It was a much better view than from our back yard.

New Neighbors: Today almost everything was different. The Mariners won and the Blue Angels were grounded (wind). We did take a long walk, this time to a community center for a birthday party.

Our neighbor, S, turned one. Our neighbors, the parents, are from southern India. In their culture, the first birthday is a big celebration, like a wedding. And the parents and S did stand together with a cake and each fed each other small pieces. S was more interested in the knife than in eating cake. It was a fun gathering with other neighbors, good food, and cake. The food included pizza with Indian toppings, such as tandoori chicken pizza.