Raincharm’s Weblog

It feels like winter in my head.
It is finally acting like winter in the forecast as well. At least a northwest winter. Rain. Coldish.

At work we are down a person, and there is training going on that reduces the number available for customers further. The training is just for a few days. But I am not in the training, I am supposed to be working.

It must be spring because a lot of the summer projects are walking in the door. Which means I spent the afternoon at the front counter. I have not had a front counter day in a long time. But I was just not in the mood.

Put a smile on your face and it shows in your voice. I don’t know if any of the customers caught on, but when I had 2 people in my office, one on the intercom and a joke about a previous non-joking e-mail about routing the weekly newspapers correctly led me to say, “Yes, one of the day’s irritants,” I think I may have hurt the feelings of one of those in my office.

Grrrrrr. I was not targeting anyone in particular, just my mood and the day.

I have been less than good about keeping up posting for the past few days.
Part of it was mood, but most of it was lack of energy upon finishing whatever else was on the menu for the day.

There is this “race” thing on Sunday coming up. Really a jog/run, or more likely for me a jog/walk. It is to celebrate St. Patrick’s Day and raise money for something (can’t remember what off the top of my head).  I have been making a two week effort to get to a point where there will be more jog than walk for me. With mixed results.

I know I can go a mile without stopping, but will she? Hills seem to have a fairly big impact on my mind’s ability to keep going. I just know the world will not end if I stop and walk a bit, and my brain is good at allowing me to do just that. I try to get to the, “it will be over sooner if you just keep moving,” point of view, but the immediate relief at moving to a walking pace generally wins out.

Three more training days, so it will all be over soon regardless. Saturday is a travel day, so rest the day before. Except for the old daylight savings thingie, which means we lose an hour of sleep. Love spring, hate to spring forward.

I am eating peanut butter toast. Creamy I believe.

I started the morning attempting to do some running, with mixed success.
Next week I have signed up to do a 5K (3 mile) St. Patrick’s Day run. This is a follow-up to my Jingle Bell 5K in December. 3 months should be more than enough to get ready. NOT.

I have been able to run for more than a mile, most of the time, and did almost 2 miles Friday evening. This morning the plan was to start from home, run to a track, do 1 – 1-1/2 miles at the track, buy some eggs (supermarket next door), and walk home. The run to the track (~1/2 mile) started OK, but much of it is an upward incline, and about a block before the track I was losing steam. Since there was no one around to chastise me – I walked – to the track. Once at the track I ran “My one damn mile.” That is what I called it. I decided I could limit myself to just one, since I had many other things to do this morning.

After finishing the plodding One Damn Mile, I walked a lap (1/4 mile) and then did 3 more laps walking the curves and running the straights. Off to the market, and home again, home again, jiggity-jig.

Back to peanut butter. Yesterday, before our walk to Red Robin (see prior post), we were trying to cover up a blister Carl had developed the previous day. He wanted to pop it (yes we know you are not supposed to pop, but …). So out with a needle and find a match. Very old school. Matches, where are the matches.

Into a high cupboard, towards the back – a jar with several matchbooks, some more than 25 years old, from our Colorado days. We reminisced a bit, and then Carlos noted the jar. It was a peanut butter jar. Lots of people store things in peanut butter jars. We have many around the house with various collections of toys.

This jar was a Skippy Super Chunk variety, and it is glass.

The original Red Robin restaurant is closing.

Current Red Robin

Red Robin is a restaurant chain that started with one place in Seattle. It’s sign says open since 1949. Apparently it was more of a bar than a restaurant until the early ’70s. When we first moved to Seattle in the early ’80s there were two that we knew of, the original and a branch at Northgate. We would go there every now and then. It turned out to be a good place to go with the kids. We still go every now and then, mostly at the original.

We have noticed several things about the original – most notably the steep parking lot. It is dropping from street level down to the ship canal, and they never did anything to make it easier to navigate. The canal and the University Bridge can be seen from the restaurant, and we watch the bridge go up and down (it’s a drawbridge). Lately we have taken to walking to the restaurant, about a mile from our house, and don’t have to deal with parking.

When they announced the original was closing we knew we had to go one more time. If only to get a picture of their original sign – which is inside the restaurant now. It has the Red Robin, if in a slightly earlier version, and he is smoking.

The Original Red Robin

 Since the newspaper article came out, the original has been packed.
We went for an “early” dinner, around 4:30, and had to wait 20 minutes to get a table. But everyone was there for the one last experience, so we waited. It was a nice walk down, a beautiful day, and a good thing to do.

And on their door they had a sign posted that said.
“Don’t cry because it’s over. Smile because it happened.”
                                                      Theodor Geisel

A Haiku form for Julie

Talented
Engineers are OK?!?
Thrive

Charity
Travel, Garden, Cuisine
Energy

Dance
Seahawks, Cars – fast, Wii
Laugh

Nikki, Rick
Mother, Sister, Friends
Love

Julie

We lost a good one at work today.

I love music.
I never know which artist I am listening to, or the name of the piece.

Not quite true, I can pick out the beatles and groups from my youth. But I have never had the facility for remembering which group is which and goes with what sound. I recognize the names, know the tunes, but could never match them together.

I think it is because I liked many different genres, my roommates always had the larger music collection, and I listened along for the ride.

Carlos knows many different artists, names of band members, little bits of knowledge that he shares on occasion. One of his favorite games with me is to ask who is singing. If I guess correctly, usually based on an internal initial guess, it is cause for note. Sometimes I get a bit irritated, but it is just one of those little games people who have been together for a long time play.

Tonight I mentally guessed Dave Matthews at the first question, but did not answer. (It was Dave) Was I right or wrong since I didn’t put the answer out there for all to hear? About 1/2 hour later I was sure the sound was the same and that is how I answered the question, “sounds the same.” There were several other songs in between the two Daves. I recognized the Indigo Girls, others not so much.

This is really neither here nor there, kind of like how I feel tonight.

I have enough trouble keeping track of what year it is, what month it is, and don’t generally worry about what day it is. Part of my seasonal confusion has to do with what I learned as a child, and what I see as an adult.

All together now, “April showers bring May flowers.”

And the follow-up, “What, do May flowers bring?” (see bottom of post for the answer if you don’t know it already)

So when the flowers appear it should be May.
This picture is from just outside our front stoop, an area that is shaded most of the day.

February Flowers!

Since this is not the state I grew up in, I will give the ditty a months grace. March showers bring April Flowers.
But come on. It is not April, it is not even March. It is still February! These daffodils may not be completely open yet, but there are plenty around that are fully open.

So for 2010 – January showers bring February flowers.
My brain is going to be hard pressed to figure out the time of year in 2010.
It looks like it’s going to be a long Spring.
And rumor has it that this summer is going to be wetter than average, so Spring may last until next Fall or Winter.

But, I am not really complaining too loudly. The Spring Olympics were wonderful, and we did not have to contend with any major snowfall in the lowlands this winter. That almost makes up for last year.

Of course the school Districts all shortened their winter and spring breaks so they would be sure to have enough days to cover snow days without adding days and being in session until July. I’ll bet none of them shorten the school year because they did not need to use any snow days.

Speaking of the Olympics – two more events; 50 km cross-country race and Gold/Silver medal round for USA/Canada. “USA, USA, USA, USA.” And how about them Canadians. “Own the Podium!” They seem to have taken that to heart, winning more gold medals than any other country, and that is without the Men’s Hockey potential. Red Mittens, Red Mittens, Red Mittens. (Part of their Own the Podium marketing campaign.) That’s 12 EST, 3 PST (I don’t really remember if we are in PDT or PST, so adjust accordingly) for you sport’s or Olympic’s fans. And they are making such a big deal that we all get to see it, “LIVE IN ALL TIME ZONES.” It only took 2 weeks to figure out that it is possible to broadcast a west coast event live to the west coast. Slow learners at NBC.

Answer to the question above: Pilgrims.
Hey, if you did not know this already, it’s a joke from elementary school.
Actually I would have answered furniture. We had Mayflower move our belongings from Grand Rapids to Ann Arbor when I was 4 years old. I remember distinctly the big Mayflower boxes that we got to play in, down in the basement. That is, until I cut my knee on a metal support strip and had to go to the hospital to get stitches.

We jump started the car last night and drove around for a very short while.
This morning it was out of juice, again.
So we decided it was time to visit the Toyota dealership and determine whether we just did not charge the battery long enough, or if it is time for a new battery. The car is at about 90,000 miles, so maybe it is due.
They are busy (surprised?) and did not have an appointment available for us today, but we decided to chance a squeeze in and went today.
At the worst they will have it tomorrow and look at it on Monday morning. But I wouldn’t want to drive it around and chance not being able to start it up again, so it might as well be with them.

The jump starting was more routine since we did not put the car down at the bottom of the driveway. But we did need to borrow our neighbor’s driveway to get close enough for 1 set of cables to reach. And speaking of cables, trying to get contact in the fuse box requires a small pincher end. The Mazda cables are too big. The Prius cables are in the back end lower storage, and the back end will not open. I did manage to open it from the inside, and get to the cables. It was not as tight a fit as I thought is was going to be in the end. But still, if you were out on the road with a loaded car it would be a trick.

We took this opportunity to get a walk in, from the car dealer. About 5 miles, maybe more. I last did this walk on July 27, 2009. It was over 100 degrees that day. Today was more like 50 and raining. Still, a good walk. We treated ourselves to Starbucks on the way.

And by reality we mean work.
It has been a sometimes slow (reading soooo many e-mails) and sometimes fast (I need it by 2 PM, and can’t help that you were not here when I brought it in several days ago).

And there are tribulations that nobody should have to bear.
I am not in the middle.
But sometimes it might be easier to be in the middle.
No, that is absolutely not true, I could not bear to be in the middle, and even getting near the sun would be too hot.
Those that can handle that location, are.
I am hovering in an outer orbit, ready to listen when spoken to.

And then there are the daily irritants that we all get here and there.
A dead battery.
Apparently when you leave a Prius alone for too long, it pines for its master.
Sending out little electronic signals, looking for a key.
And then it gets tired. And stops sending out signals. And goes to sleep.

Luckily we found out it was dead on a grocery run, not when running out the door to work.
Also luckily, my carpooler was able to pool me in.
Further he brought his charger and long jumper cables with him.
After work (we couldn’t be late!) we tried connecting the charger.
Only in a Prius the little starter battery is in the back, and you can’t open the door when the battery is really dead.
The jump-starter location is on a fuse panel. But that is too far from the battery for the charger to do the job.
So we resorted to a good old fashioned jump-start.
Except the Prius was nose-down in our dungeon driveway, and even the long cables were not long enough to reach.
So we actually enlisted Carl as a cable minder and strung two sets of cables together.
I am sure this is a no-no, but the good news is that it worked and nobody got hurt. (And I don’t think the car got hurt either.)
This battery is not the big drive the car battery, it is the run the starter, radio, lights, etc 12-volt battery.
It came on with no real effort … once we had it all set up.
Kind of like painting all set up and very little painting.

The Olympics have not been fully left behind. I watched the 1st period of the US vs Finland Hockey game at lunch today. Now we are watching the delayed broadcast of today’s other events. Last night we had to stay up almost to midnight to see the Women’s Free skate. This is Prime Time?? Don’t get me started.

Because in the end, it just means I had to stay up a little later than usual.

Today was the end of our Vancouver Olympic Games Adventure.
We started by getting up at a rather leisurely pace.
Then off to a restaurant on the 99B-Line that was our primary bus to and from campus.
We were fully packed and carrying all of our gear on this jaunt.

We arrived about 9:30 AM at the restaurant and walked in. The door was unlocked.
A very nice woman approached and told us they did not open until 10 AM, and they were only just setting up the kitchen. She did say they could get some coffee on. Then a nice man poked his head out and said he could start cooking, so figuring we had a full 2 hours until the train-bus left, we stayed.

Breakfast was quite good, but it was a bit after 10:30 when we left. Ashlan assured us we did not have to do any fancy check-in for the train-bus and we let her be the tour guide.
The 99 B-Line continued to carry us toward central Vancouver. The 99 B-line is named so because it has very few stops, and like most of Vancouver’s buses they are fairly efficient at getting people on and off. However, at one stop, we stopped. For several minutes. Still not sure why, but eventually we were underway again.
Reaching Main Street we changed to the No. 3 that would take us to the train station. It took a few minutes, and several stops later we were there.

It was about 11:10, with the train-bus scheduled to leave at 11:30. Close, but OK.

We approached the bus, the driver said, “3?” We indicated only 2, and he loaded our luggage, made sure we had passports, and motioned for us to board. I did manage a hug for Ashlan, but did not manage to dig for my wallet and leave her a bit of Canadian cash. We boarded, sat, and the bus moved.

I think Amtrak just sells as many tickets as they can for the train-bus, and adds buses as they fill up. There was a second bus at the station, and it followed us on the route down.

The first stop is the border. There is a special bus customs area, but you have to wait for the buses in front of you to clear. After 15-20 minutes a bus we could not see was done we were in position to watch the routine for a Greyhound bus. There were suddenly about 7 border patrol surrounding a bus bay containing a cardboard box. They looked at it for some time. After several minutes and much discussion, one of the patrol produced a box cutter, and opened the mysterious box. It contained another box, made of wood (from our vantage point it looked like wood). Our driver said the Greyhound driver had apparently not made sure his bus was clear before boarding passengers, and nobody claimed the box. After their review of the contents it was reloaded into the bus, and everybody went on their way.

Our bus then unloaded, and into to station. Declarations reviewed. The man said, “Didn’t you get any mittens?” I indicated the part where I had listed the mittens, and he explained that, “Everybody has mittens!”

Red Mittens of the 2010 Vancouver Olympics

That was that. No searching for my sunglasses that mimicked multi-tools for the Olympic venue x-ray machines. No other questions, just mittens. Back on the bus. The ride went really quickly. After some bird watching I read a paper, and then a book.

Home is home. Little food, but we raided the freezer. Mail is being sorted and recycled. There are a few bills and other pieces that need attention.

All in all this vacation is declared a success. 
We got to go the Olympics!
Ashlan survived a week of us visiting.
We got to know Vancouver a bit, after having done mostly hit-and-run visits over the last 2-1/2 years.
We all understand curling. The rules at least, if not the subtle strategy. We all agree it is a bit like bowling. Almost everybody can do it, but it takes work to be good. 
WE GOT TO GO TO THE OLYMPICS!!!

Thanks Ashlan.