Raincharm’s Weblog

Happy birthday to the front row, second from the left. Shown here with her family.
I always associate mom’s birthday with the first day of spring. Spring flowers. And gardening is a passion. It all fits.

So, here are our current spring flowers.

With a plastic flamingo butt.
And the bats heralding another activity that starts in the spring.

It sounds as though mom and the local family will celebrate mom’s birthday this weekend with a dinner out. We also have a celebration planned and will raise a glass to one who raised me. (And this will not be at the caucus. I think they frown on toasts. But maybe not toast, it is in the morning after all.)

Our first ride from the U-link station. Crowded, but not uncomfortable. Faster than the bus, except for the hall hour walk to the station. Next weekend the bus routes change and there will be a pretty direct run from our block to the station. We have not figured out the bus stops on the station end yet.

And this should not reduce our walks to downtown, we have always had a bus option.

As crowded as the light rail was, the UW campus was more crowded. Not with students, but with families and lots of folks with cameras. The cherry blossoms seemed to be the draw.

Rainier in the distance.

We did make it downtown, wandered a bit, and then ate our salad during the pre-game warm up.

Good game to watch, but some poor calls let the other team win.

This is the day after the time change that I have chosen to lounge. It is a week after the change, but who’s counting.

The change did provide some good evening walk opportunities, so I really should not complain. And we found a new set of steps to climb.

One evenings travels provided this view of Mt. Rainier.

It’s towards the right, disguised as a cloud. ( This was taken from the second highest spot in Seattle.)

The next evening was a wander.

Communing with nature.

Wondering at the sheer number of cedars in a very small space directly above a wall.

Spring showers.

A different sort of selfie. I bet we won’t be able to repeat this picture within five years. Any building less than three stories is destined to be torn down and replaced with mixed use at five to eight stories. This particular example is only one block from the light rail station under construction, and currently being used as the construction office for apartments being built just west of this sight.

Construction of the bikeway on Roosevelt has begun. Parking on the west side of Roosevelt is on its way out. (I have been told the City decided not to move some of the displaced parking in front of our house, but have not received anything in writing.)

Enough for now. Time to change my morning view.

Today’s excitement will include christening the new light rail station at Husky stadium, on the way to and from a Sounder’s game. The neighborhood bus routes all change next weekend.

Real Change.
A local newspaper that is put out by and for the local down on their luck folks.
Also part of the Bernie campaign slogan.

It rained this weekend, but that is par for the course. The added attraction was the wind.

Saturday we walked to a birthday party. It was slightly wet. We did the Seattle thing. Wrapped the wrapped present in a plastic bag inside a carrying bag and set out. We took an umbrella, but the wet never progressed beyond a heavy drizzle, so the umbrella stayed closed.

We recently rediscovered this set of bridges across some ravines. They keep you off of the highly vertical gravel path (unless that’s what you are after) and away from the busy roads.

The highlight was the party. Our job turned out to be holding the 6-month old brother of the four year old honoree. It was a Frozen party, but not over-emphasized.

The second cake was made by a friend.

The wind on Sunday kept us in the house, away from trees. There were two trips out to the backyard to reset the tarps. MORE BRICKS.

We spent some time watching the NCAA selection show for March Madness. Not that we follow college basketball all that closely, but it is a family thing to draw teams and see who comes out the champion. Ashlan has the inside track with three of the four number one seeds.

Tried to get to bed a little early. Too bad our alarm is on my cellphone. Otherwise I might have been able to squeeze in a few more hours of sleep because we did lose power last night. Blinking clocks. But it could not have been for too long as Carl’s cpap machine was still on when we woke up.

Onward. How many non-reset clocks will confuse me today.

I had no real idea what to expect, but we both enjoyed this Sondheim effort. And I learned some history in the process.

We also learned that the combination of heavy rain and a Justin Beiber concert make for extremely heavy traffic. Luckily, we tend to leave enough time to wander a bit before a show, so we arrived in plenty of time.

Carl arrived back from Phoenix with five baseballs and a suitcase full of stories. He manages to meet all sorts of folks on these junkets; fans, players and lots of coaches. His own season is still a few months away, but less than a month to opening day.

Baseball season that is. Between then and now there are more openings that will impact our daily activities.

1. Starting work on a dedicated bike lane on the busy street at the end of our block. This will block a lane during construction and permanently remove hall of the existing parking. And move our bus stop one block.

2.  The new university light rail station is opening in a bit more than a week. We have a free ticket to ride on opening day, and a soccer game downtown. Only decision should be whether to walk the mile to the station or figure a bus route.

3. The week after the light rail station opens most of the buses we use to get downtown change to go to the new station. We are going to have to reeducate ourselves.

4. April 2nd is a day we can walk across the new 520 bridge span. Before it opens to traffic. Hope for no rain.

It has been several days. I had intended to blog. I intended to keep leaving on time ish. I obviously have not blogged. I am at 89 hours for two weeks with one day to go. So a mixed bag.

Things I found amusing over the past week plus.

I was on a phone call, really on hold most of the time. Working on things waiting for a person to help change my credit card number on an account that automatically paid three days after the card had been frozen and one day before the new card arrived. After ten minutes on the phone I tried to hang my cell phone up on the desk phone set.

It was a very early morning yesterday due to dropping two buddies at the airport for a five am flight to Spring Training. So I got to work very early too. Not the earliest person though. That’s our maintenance man’s time. I went to the kitchen for coffee and there was one pot made and two more in line. I helped myself to a cup and poured the second pot through. About 15 minutes later, Rex is at my door complaining that he just spent several minutes in the kitchen trying to remember when he had poured the second pot.

We have seen two shows in the interim. Both quite good. First up was the Women’s Chorus. A fun show. Special guests were Dos Fallopia. They are local but tour nationally. If you get a chance to see their slightly irreverent show I would recommend making the effort.

The second show was a Side by Side concert with the Garfield High School orchestras and the Seattle Symphony. We saw these when Rey was at Garfield. Usually in the high school gym. This year it was in Benaroya Hall! The occasion was to celebrate Marcus Tsutakawa’s 30th year at Garfield. His first year he had 19 students. Now there are 280 between the two orchestras, and they are quite good.

Spring has sprung, and in moments of not rain I try to walk at lunch. A few pictures from the last two days.

All for now. Coffee beckons.

It is 5:24 and I am going home.
I have not stayed really late at all this week.
Okay, I think it is about four days later than when I started the post.  And, I actually had 1 hour under the expected 80 for two weeks. Of course I did take two afternoons off to find people to help with our backyard.

The first result has been to add more smothering cardboard around the edges to try to limit weed seeds from polluting the neighborhood. As the landscape planner said, “A blank slate!” And identified our blue spruce as an ohmy spruce. ( I do know that name is incorrect, but it does start with the oh my sound. She said they teach the name that way because the end of the branches turn up as if reaching for the sky and exclaiming, “oh my!”

We also spent an evening with some members of the Rocket, Carl’s old softball team. Conversations included catching up with each other’s kids and retirements. The kids can be traced from their birth in team pictures.

Tonight is the first soccer game of the year. It is a Concacaf tournament game rather than an MLS league game. Against a team from Mexico. And I had to scrape the windshield this morning. Could be cold, but I don’t think rain is in the forecast. That and the new decree that they do not provide printed tickets. Instead you load the ticket on your phone and use their app at the gate. What could possibly go wrong?

I am expecting long lines. And pray you don’t have a dead battery. There is an option to print out a large piece of paper at home as an alternative. And if I got mad at my ticket partner I could use her ticket as well.(They all show up.)

Seattle in Winter

As I took the picture the rain increased.

February showers bring crocuses and flooding. And pitchers and catchers.

Fitting that the shadows above are from bats that gave their all in seasons past.

I returned from work on time today and it was still light, a little less than more, when I pulled into the driveway. Carl acquiesced to a walk. He wanted to run some short stretches. About 90 feet at a time. With that goal in mind we headed for the local high school, which has a track. It does not have lights however. When we arrived there were a few others on the field. The soccer players soon departed with the last light. They were replaced in even greater numbers by runners. Runners that ran more than 90 feet at a time.

With the tower crane for the light rail station twisting to and fro we departed. Almost stopped at Pies and Pints for dinner, but decided to head home as we had food in the refrigerator for at least three dinners.

Carl is in the kitchen cooking, and I will end this blog so I can watch the Real Madrid vs Roma game from earlier today.

Which brings up another point. The Sounders, the local team, is not only not providing paper tickets this year, they are not providing the cards that were used for the last few years. This year you have to use their app on your phone. The only alternative is to print out an entire sheet of paper for each ticket. God forbid your battery dies.

Yesterday afternoon I tried to call Carl on the calculator. Usually I try to calculate on the phone. And yes, I do have a calculator app.

This morning I walked out and closed the door. I had my coffee, but no keys. Monday I had the keys but no coffee. Since there was nothing to stop me leaving on Monday, Carl got to enjoy the coffee. This morning was not as easy as the car requires the key to start. (Not required to drive however. Story from another day.) Carl had gone back to bed and his phone was in the dining room. Wasn’t sure whether he would hear the doorbell, and the upstairs landline phone died about a year ago.

Luckily we have a spare key in a realtor type box on the back deck. Very handy with out of town guests. And when you lock yourself out. Of course you need to correctly remember the code to access the key. After four tries I realized which number was wrong and was able to get to the key that allowed me to get to my keys.

I have used the wrong code several times. I think I should change the code to match my memory.

Our public outreach person telecommutes every other Friday. It provides an opportunity for uninterrupted focus. But it is also fraught with potential downsides when you are not there in person to accept deliveries.

I did not telecommute on Wednesday afternoon, but I did skip out on work. The first part of my time off included meeting with a landscape professional. He had some good ideas to expand our starting sketch, but thought having a real plan would be helpful. He provided a recommendation for a designer as he did not have the time to both design and implement. One step forward though, and some ideas on things to do to prepare for future work. And it is right in my area of expertise. Smothering more weeds and digging out dying plants and a bit of pruning.

The second benefit of being home early was going to a behind the scenes event at the Burke Museum. Literally into the storage areas.

There were several docents and researchers around to share their knowledge of the collections from spiders and butterflies to an Egyptian mummy (in a wedding dress bag) to poop dissection to dinosaurs and textiles.
One item caught our eye in particular. A bit of a totem. A killer whale in storage.

The docent noted that he thought the fin had been taller originally.

Later in our wandering we came across this picture of the whale in situ.

Just a bit taller.
Another person in the area said the original had been outside of the Museum for a while and a replica was now in its place.

I think this height is still a bit shy of the original.

It was a wonderful way to spend a few hours.