"The internet is a place where absolutely nothing happens. You need to take advantage of that." ~ Strong Bad

This weekend Kerry and I went back up to her parents' clinic to give them more help. My main job was to take photos of the place and their work for promotional purposes. Actually, I thought that was my only job and packed accordingly. I didn't realize there was also a fair amount of yard work to do. I found myself getting very familiar with a Stihl weed whacker (fortunately, a very good one). Then Kerry hit a rock and broke the lawn tractor pretty thoroughly, so I got to take a break to relive my glory days from so long ago of being an engineer and fixed it.

We've been enjoying fresh cherries from the front yard this past week. The tree was there when I moved in, but half dead. For two years, it did nothing but produce a few blooms. Then last year it surprised me with a small handful of cherries. Now it seems to have decided it's a bona fide fruit tree. I would estimate there's several pounds on it. The cherries are mild, but sweet.

Also on the topic of cheap surprises that came with the house, Comcast cut off the analog transmission of half their channels today. We still get Jeopardy, reruns of Star Trek: The Next Generation, and the Spanish soap opera channel (Telemundo), but it looks like there will be no more History Channel unless we get a digital converter box.

I leave tomorrow morning for MI Camp.

I'm done climbing mountains for at least a short while, but still keeping reasonably busy when I'm not job searching.

Last weekend I joined Kerry in running the Drop Top 10k race in Hillsboro. She ran it last year and talked me into it this year. It was probably the furthest I've ever run without a rest (I was lazy in high school track). My training wasn't exactly ideal; In addition to sporadic soccer and hiking, I ran the Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday before the race. Obviously there was a lot of room for improvement, but I did make my goals for the run: finish time less than 55 minutes and placing in the top third of my age group. My final placing was 120th out of 753, with a time of 52:13. That was 6/21 in my age division. Kerry finished 380th and improved on her time from last year by 7 minutes.

Of course, there's little better way to recover from a long run than by playing a soccer game. I was genuinely surprised that I had little trouble running most of the game. I guess I was fully limbered up from the race. We tied 1-1.

Kerry and I also went to Newport last weekend, which we'd been planning to do for some time. The main reason was to visit the aquarium. It's not a remarkably large facility, but it's perhaps the best I've been to in terms of the quality of exhibits, development of theme (it's devoted to the Pacific Coast), and friendly, informative staff. We also dropped by the Yaquina Head lighthouse and the Devil's Punchbowl. The latter is a unique tidal pool connected to the ocean by a cave that supposedly froths dramatically at high tide. We were there around low tide.

Today was my last soccer game for the season. We won 3-1.

Climbing Mt Saint Helens started as a tentative idea when I first heard climbing permits for the season were available. After some discussion, Joe and I decided it would make a great training climb the week before summitting Mt. Adams again with his friends. However, with the road/snow situation at Adams even worse than at St. Helens, the plan changed to Mt. Hood.

Although the elevation gain is slightly less, Hood is decidedly more challenging than the other two, with all of its routes being steeper and more rugged. Crampons and a climbing harness for roping up are highly recommended even for the easy route. However, when I went to rent these items the day before, I was completely surprised to be refused rental of either. Both shops I tried said my boots weren't stiff enough, which was a surprise to everyone in our party using crampons with similar boots. Both shops also said renting climbing harnesses was a safety liability...wait, what? It's a liability to provide customers with equipment that will make them safer??? Oh well. Good snow could mitigate the need for crampons, and we planned to make a simple harness out of webbing. If all else failed, I could stop short of the summit.

Joe and I spent the night at my sister's cabin, then headed up to Timberline Lodge at 3 AM Saturday morning to meet his friends. It was raining, but the clouds cleared as we reached the 5800' starting elevation. Getting out of the car at Timberline was a shock as we were hit with frigid 30 mph winds. That definitely put a damper on my optimism, but as we started moving and warmed up, I felt ready for anything.

We roped up at the "Hogsback" near "Devil's Kitchen," an actively venting fumarole that seasoned the stopover with a strong sulfur smell. Although there were relatively few climbers on the mountain for a June weekend, steps were well-packed in the snow, making the final steep pitch easy without crampons. The seven of us went up in two rope teams.

At the top, there was a very narrow and somewhat treacherous steep-sided ridge to traverse to reach the actual summit at 11,239 feet. From there, the view was equally as stunning, but in a different manner, as St. Helens' gaping crater.



The trip down was basically uneventful for our group, although a group behind had a member slip and have to arrest at least twice. We took a long break while un-roping, and then began the long trek back. Unfortunately, I was being too conservative with my water and started to get dehydrated, which I didn't recover from despite drinking hard as soon as I recognized this. I reached the bottom with a miserable headache and nausea that prevented me from keeping ibuprofen and gatorade down. A nap at the cabin returned me to normal, however, which felt almost euphoric in comparison.

All-in-all it was an outstanding climb. My pictures could have turned out better, as it's hard to pick the ideal settings for the contrast of dark rock and climbers against sunlit snow, but I guess that's motivation to do it again some day.

I was taking my time sorting through my pictures before writing about climbing Mount Saint Helens. We made it up and down without much trouble, although I did get a little bit of sunburn despite liberal use of sunscreen.

Having gotten back from my cousin's wedding around 11, still needing to pack, and having trouble falling asleep due to the heat, it took a lot of enthusiasm to wake up at 4 AM after only 3 hours of sleep. Joe, Matt, Diana, and I all piled into my car and made it to the trailhead by 6:45. I added an extra couple hundred yards onto my hike for the day when I realized I'd forgotten my sunglasses at the car.

There were no major challenges on the way up, aside from the snow being a little soggy in places. We reached the rim after about 5 hours. The view is utterly amazing. The pictures barely begin to do it justice, but even in person it's hard to truly grasp the scale of the 2100 foot deep crater and 1300 foot tall lava dome. From the point where we met the rim, it was roughly another 200 feet and 1/4 mile traverse to reach the actual summit, where we broke out the beers. Cinder Cone Red Ale was the beer of choice for this one.



We spent about two hours at the rim, enjoying the view, snapping pictures, watching steam rise from the still warm lava dome, listening to the near-continuous sound of rocks falling inside the crater, and wondering how the snow cornices that dangle over the edge don't simply collapse into the crater. After that, we glissaded and hiked back down, drove home, and slept well.

I should be sleeping but it's really hot in my room, so I'm typing this while I cool down just a little bit more. I got back from a cousin's wedding just long enough ago to pack for morning. Tomorrow I'm joining my brother and friends Matt and Diana to climb Mt. St. Helens. Because of snow, the road to the main route up Monitor Ridge is closed, so we'll be going up Worm Flows instead. This starts roughly 1000 feet lower and 2 miles further back. The total climb should be about 5500 hundred feet and 12 miles roundtrip. That's definitely better than the ~18 miles and 7700 feet of Mt. Adams last year, but still a serious workout.

Friday afternoon I headed out into the Gorge for a short warm-up/boot-softening hike up to Angel's Rest. I was short on time and wanted to push myself, so I did the 1880 foot, 2.3 mile hike up in 45 minutes. That time makes me pretty comfortable with tomorrow, when we'll be moving about half that speed.

Afterward Kerry, my housemate Jeff, and I went to the "Zoo Brew" beer festival. It was mildly fun, but there honestly wasn't much diversity in the beers to sample. Also, as Jeff put pointed out, "It would be a lot more fun if we actually got to drink with the animals." The animal exhibits were mostly closed.

The last bit of excitement is another development in my stellar acting career. I picked up a one-day gig as an extra for a Harrison Ford and Brendan Fraser movie. It was an 11.5 hour day. In the end, I think I might be visible from behind in the distance for about 3 seconds, but it will at least make the movie worth watching once, and a paycheck is a paycheck.

Tuesday's soccer game was a really close 4-5 loss. We traded the lead multiple times, but in the end, our highest scoring game of the season still didn't turn into a win.

Kerry and I took advantage of the weather this week to take a short hike out to the Warrior Rock lighthouse on Sauvie Island. That is to say, we went on a cloudy day, so the crowds that are typical for the island were absent. While we were poking around the lighthouse (which is rather ugly as far as lighthouses go), a sea lion surprised us by popping up about 25 yards offshore. He was fishing in the eddies that swirl around the rock. Every few minutes he'd pop up, take three breaths, then go back down.

As we were starting to walk away, he came up quite a bit further from shore, thrashing about. He'd caught a salmon and was using the thrashing to pull off bite-sized chunks. He was a messy eater, and a pair of bald eagles came in to clean up afterward. All-in-all, it was a very good outing.

The next bit of amusement was growler party at my house last night. A growler is a half gallon beer bottle which you can get filled up at accomodating pubs. The idea is everyone brings a growler of beer they like to share. We went the extra mile by watching the Strange Brew, which is sort of a Canadian equivalent to Wayne's World.

I also bought another camera lens this week. Before anyone criticizes, I'm aware I have more camera gear than I legitimately need. I had no intent to buy anything, especially anything partially redundant to what I already own, but when I saw the specs and price on this 1985-vintage Vivitar lens, I was curious. After doing some research on it, I couldn't pass it up. The modern equivalent costs about 10 times as much. Although the Vivitar is probably 10 times harder to use, I'd wager it's optically just as good.

Soccer this week was a 0-3 loss with me playing keeper. I did have a couple saves, but obviously not enough, and the game was further soured by losing a player to injury.

I still haven't gotten a response from Boeing. Meanwhile, the search continues.

I forgot last time to share the epicnitude (real word...look it up) of my latest soccer game. My knee was still sore from the previous soccer game, so I decided I wasn't going to play. I spent the first half at Brandon's house for a get-together he was having featuring a Mossyrock (Irish?) stout, then headed out to watch the second half. However, we were playing a man short, so I suited up to play as a slow-moving distraction and fill the field while avoiding other players. Meanwhile, the other team was also playing a man short, so since I was clearly moving slow, they tended not to mark me very well. End result: the gimp made an unguarded run into the corner and scored. We won 3-1.

For this week's game, our keeper was late. That's been happening a lot, but he's a good enough keeper that it almost balances out. I started in goal until he showed up. Unfortunately, I underestimated a perfectly-placed but relatively slow-moving free kick that just barely brushed my fingertips as I backpedaled and went into the upper corner. After our keeper arrived, however, I mostly made up for my mistake by delivering an almost perfect assist on a run down the right side. We tied 1-1.

Then this last weekend, I went home for two days, wished Mom a happy mother's day, and found myself unexpectedly at a McMenamin's brewfest. I normally don't think of McMenamin's as having a very broad selection of beers, but it's merely that they don't serve all of them at all their restaurants. It ended up being a really good time, even though I had to delay driving home for a while.

Then I capped off the weekend by heading up to Mt. Hood to see my sister's new cabin and go skiing. The skiing was mediocre, but it was free to celebrate the unusually long season, and the cabin is really cool. It's going to be a serious let down if I don't get to use it because I end up taking a job out-of-state.

Captain Jack, by the way, is one of the former skippers of the steamboat. Now he mostly watches and BS's while the rest of us work.

After having survived, not swine flu, but strep throat, I spent this weekend helping Kerry move into a new place.

My throat started getting sore about the time I last posted an update. At that point it was just irritation, but by Monday it was bad enough that I didn't even want to eat breakfast. I talked to a nurse I know who recommended I bite the bullet and go see a doctor. I had a good string going of avoiding those people. The last time was my track physical in high school, which was eight years ago.

I went to Providence Immediate Care center, largely because they aren't snobbish about things like insurance and appointments. The 10-minute strep test came back negative, but the nurse-practitioner I saw (because going "to the doctor" no longer means you'll see a doctor) prescribed antibiotics anyways, since that test is unreliable.

The next day I was starving, which I assumed was due to not eating much the day before. That turned into two days of constant hunger pangs, which weren't actually hunger, but a side-effect of the antibiotics killing needed stomach bacteria. At that point I found out, no thanks to the documentation or the nurse-practitioner, that yogurt is an effective solution to that side-effect.

So with that in remission, I spent Saturday and Sunday helping Kerry move. She owns an incredible amount of stuff, but we got it mostly done. It was also her birthday, and her parents came down to take her to dinner and brought their truck to handle the big stuff.

And lastly, I squeezed getting a CPR certification into the weekend.

We got to have a mini-adventure last night. Kerry, several other friends, and I all went to a Portland Beavers baseball game. The Beavers won 3-0, but we left at 2-0 at the top of the 8th because it was getting cold and not much was happening.

As we were walking back to the car, there was a man standing by the car next to mine, acting funny. I figured he was either locked out of his own car, or looking for unlocked cars, but then he turns around, waves with both hands and says "How's it going!" Now I figure he's just another one of Portland's fine nuts. I can just wait for him to ask for change, say no, and be gone.

However, he then proceeds to tell us how the guy who own's that car was a racist and beat up a friend of his, so he was pissed and was "f-ing up his car," (mirror was broken, antenna was "in a Z" as Kerry put it, a few dents) and when the guy got back he was going to beat him up and then call him an ambulance.

Naturally, this was a little more than I expected, so aside from unlocking my car so my friends could get in, I wasn't immediately sure what to do. I started out by just telling him he wasn't handling the situation the right way, to which he responded maybe instead of just beating him up, he should stab the guy. Great! I asked him if he had a knife (no) and if he was drunk ("a little buzzed"). That had me a little more confident, so I told him to go home. He still seemed to think he had a good plan, so I told him succinctly he needed to go home. At that point, he got discouraged and wandered off. We called 9-1-1 and let them know the story, just in case he came back after we left.

The main excitement this week besides that was Saturday's soccer game. We tied 1-1, so it was an improvement over previous games. Towards the end, a guy mistook my leg for the ball and drilled me in the thigh. I don't think he could possibly have kicked me harder. I was definitely limping the next day and my knee is still sore from it.

I had a phone interview with Boeing today. The position was for an instrumentation engineer on the P-8 Poseidon program. I've never done a phone interview before (and never really been fond of phones to begin with), so I wasn't quite sure what to expect. The interview probably could have gone smoother, although there were no major hiccoughs. I guess I'll just have to wait and see what they think. I've got a few other irons in the fire besides that one.

A major downside of the position is that it's not actually located in Renton like I was hoping. It starts out at that location, then shifts full-time to a naval air station in Maryland for the duration of the program. That means it requires relocating twice, the second time being to a state that borders Washington DC.

My first soccer game for the spring season was last Sunday. It was going great for most of the game. We had a one point lead well into the second half and were clearly holding an advantage over the other team in ball control when somehow it all fell apart. We gave up three goals in about 10 minutes. What a disaster.