Day 72

Went to Happy Hour at Lynn & Michael's with Diane, Nancy C., Angie, and Lenni. Had a nice time.

Made dinner for Sean and Paul. Angie, Jim, and Kim joined us and we watched Turok and Monster Squad. It is important for Sean's development to understand that Wolfman has nards.

Let Sean stay up very late. I am a rebel.

Started Dragon Sea by Frank Pope. It is about archaeologists fight to recover artifacts from a 15th century sunken Vietnamese trade ship. It is slow going so far, but it sounds interesting.

Spoke with Burke.

Today was great!

Day 71

Went to Ballard with Grandma for Special Grandma & Quiana Day. We shopped and had lunch... and then dessert twice. Cupcake Royal and MooBerry yogurt. It was really fun. I found a cookie cutter in the shape of the Enterprise and drooled all over it, but it was too expensive for a cookie cutter.

I'm Sean/dogs/house sitting for Brad. Had to run to Mel's to let her dogs out as Jess' car is not working. I just got my car back (hooray!).

Then I almost forgot to turn my alarm clock off and had to run down to Seattle in the middle of the night.

Spoke with Jess, Mel, Paul, Megan, and Steve (who is quite ill).

Today was exhausting but awesome!

Day 70

Moved car from Jeff's to Andy's.

Had Sparta's at Brad's, just the 4 of us for Brad's birthday. Gave him The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins.

Finished The Man Who Smiled. It was great; I might check out more mysteries by the same author.

Spoke with Grandma.

Day 69

Spent the morning trying to get my car into a shop. Jeff's Auto on 99 was able to take me and let me know that I had a number of small things wrong, plus I am due for some routine maintenance so I let them go ahead with that. Luckily one of the parts was still under warranty ($400 saved) from my other shop (Andy's), so they will fix that for free when Jeff's gets done with the other things tomorrow.

Jeff's figured out the problem with my car hesitating before shifting gears and I am super excited to drive around in a working vehicle... even if it costs me another $500. If I can stall buying a new car until January of 2011 I can have all my student loans paid off, as well as my 30th birthday trip, and have a good down payment saved up. I think that can be done since my car has 125,000 miles on it currently and on average this vehicle runs to over 200,000. So if I drive about 15,000 miles a year, which is average, this whole scheme may pan out.

Had dinner with Michael and Lynn and attended the second NG Live! lecture of the year with Robert Ballard, an underwater explorer and generally awesome guy. He discovered ship wrecks in the oxygen-deprived waters of the Black Sea that were 1500 years old and you can still see the tool marks in the wood. Amazing.

Afterwards, Lynn & Michael dropped me off at Brad and Cynthia's and I borrowed one of their cars.

Almost finished with The Man Who Smiled, but was exhausted and needed to go to sleep.

I didn't call anyone today.

Day 68

Worked a very long day full of meetings with clients etc. On my way home a mysterious light in the shape of a battery came on in my car and all I could think was 'now what'. My car sounded Cuisinarty, so that's no good.

Scarfed dinner and mooched a ride to the Stube with Andy. Chris showed late, and then Jennifer and her spouse showed up with their friend James(?) who either has no English or is super super shy. Had a nice time.

Read more of the Man Who Smiled, I hope to finish it soon and move onto the HUGE stack on my bookshelf.

Spoke with Amber, Czabrina, and Bonnie.

Day 67

Grandma called at 9 am to make sure I was alive. Apparently she called me ten times yesterday, but didn't leave a voicemail and was convinced I was mouldering somewhere.

Watched Batman Beyond disk one until Andy reminded me that it was sunny. Had cupcakes with Andy at the lake.

Went with Brad, Cynthia and Sean to Hawaiian Breeze for dinner. Afterwards Brad and I watched Invasion. It was just ok. I think it could have been better written.

Spoke with Grandma & Steve.

Day 66

Watched Viva Pinata and Skunk Fu.

Paul picked me up and we watched all 5 Best Picture nominated movies in a row in Kent. It was awesome, but I was exhausted when I got home.

Day 65

Picked up the soundtrack to Once. Now I'm all new-cd-boke. (New cd crazy!). It is fantastic.

Had a date. You can put that guy on the official Not Going to Happen List.

Made bacon muffins with Steve and listened to CD's and watched Skittles commercials on Youtube.

Read more of The Man Who Smiled. Finished last month's NG.

Spoke with Melody, Amber, & Paul.

Day 64

Worked late again. Then my tutoring student stood me up.

My usual gas station "filled" my tank with just over 15 gallons of gas, which would be fine, except my car only holds 15 gallons and was a quarter full when I pulled up. Tomorrow I have to call the manager and complain. Yippee.

Picked up Mike Doughty's new CD, Golden Delicious. It was pretty good, but I'm not in love with it immediately. Less guitar and rock and more electronic than his last.

Cut my hand open pretty bad on some junk mail. Set off my smoke detector. And went to bed early to prevent any further incidents.

Spoke with Mom and Steve.

Read a nice chunk of The Man Who Smiled and I like it better every day.

Day 63

Worked late and dropped by the bank on the way home.

Made eggplant parm and dicked around on the internet. I had meant to clean, but ended up puttering around the house.

Watched Law & Order and read more of The Man Who Smiled.

Spoke with Bonnie and Steve. Bonnie had just returned from her honeymoon to discover that none of her wedding pictures had turned out. Very sad.

Day 62

Worked two short shifts to take care of Theo, which means two extra long days ahead of me. He was much improved though. I wish I could have remained more calm, but his stress made me feel so terrible. I'm so relieved that his parents are back.

Was supposed to watch the Nova special about Chimps with Steve and Addy, but was so exhausted that I just stayed home to clean and get organized for the rest of the week. It was really nice to be home.

I watched Reaper and random Discovery Chanel while organizing stuff.

Spoke with Grandma & Steve.

Read some more of last month's NG and more of The Man Who Smiled.

Day 61

Theo woke me at 6 am. I puttered around until 8 am and was able to make a vet appointment for 2:30.

Finished Flood Summer. I highly recommend reading it. Read more of The Man Who Smiled.

Met Monica for lunch at Chanterelle in downtown Edmonds and walked through the little shops.

Took Theo to the vet where he got cortisone shots and even more pain killer in addition to muscle relaxers.

Theo was too stoned to know when to get up to pee and refused to or couldn't walk without being picked up and put on his feet.

Steve came over and we watched junk TV while he graded and I dozed. Went to Herfy's for take out and I made cinnamon rolls.

Went to bed very early, but snuck in some reading time for The World Without Us, Alan Weisman's vaguely preachy book about nature reclaiming the Earth after the demise of humans. I kind of dislike the tone of the book. I feel like it is anti-people rather than pro-nature.
I am a person constantly in awe of complexity of human creations. I also love nature and the wonder of its design. For me seeing the complexity of human creations is a reflection of the complexity of God's creations. I just think that the works of man are fantastic and worthy of my awe as well.

Spoke with Grandma, Lynn, & Cynthia.

Today was exhausting.

Day 60

Theo woke me up crying at 7. He was lame in his rear leg, so I gave him an asprin; but it didn't help, so I gave him his spinal meds. Which didn't help either. He could barely walk and could not lie down.

Didn't get a hold of his parents (who also were not sure) until late that evening so I spent the day fretting.

Ron and Czabrina dropped by and briefly chatted, but I was so anxious about Theo, I'm sure I was not good company.

Amber was in town and dropped in for Chinese take out and dog-related fretting. After she left I settled down to watch TV, but Life After People was on, so I gave Andy a call to let him know. He correctly recognized that I was upset and came over to help if he could.

I fell asleep with Theo on the floor at 1ish after he finally collapsed from exhaustion at 12ish. At 3 or so I got up and went to bed.

I read more Flood Summer and it is awesome. I can't believe that it is not in every library.

I spoke with Grandma, Brad, Janette, Bruke, Melody, Addy & Steve.

Today was a terrible day.

Day 59

Watched cartoons and This Old House while cleaning. Had Dutch babies and bacon for brunch.

Ran by Fred Meyer's to pick up a gift and also bought some random jewelry and more socks. Picked up and started Trenton Lee Stewart's Flood Summer, which the library got on loan from some college in CA.

Started Theo sitting.

Attended dinner party at Leigh's. Chris, Andy, Mairead, Ramesh, were there in addition to three new people: Dave, Kristina, and Bethany(?). We played Trivial Pursuit and it was uhm... boring.

Day 58

Made it almost a whole day at work.

Went to Taste of India with Andy, then chased it with Trophy Cupcakes at Green Lake. And then since my house was messy and he didn't want to return home we had tea at the difficult to pronounce tea house in Wallingford.

Spoke with Steve, Mel, & Burke.

Day 57

Went into work late today and took care of some serious business. Feeling a bit better, maybe I'll be well by tomorrow.

Stopped by the library and comic book store. Got take out from Pastry Cafe.

Read comics, The Man Who Smiled and watched TV (Daily Show, Colbert Robert, & This Old House).

Spoke with Steve and Amber.

Day 56

Woke up, felt crappy, but less crappy than before. Watched a disk of season one of Heroes. Then watched the movie Himalaya, which was awesome and had yaks in it (yay!).

Slept and read more of The Man Who Smiled. I'm finally getting into it.

Ordered tickets for Marjane Satrapi lecture in April.

Watched about 4 Law & Orders and fell asleep for the night.

Spoke with Grandma, Steve, and Jim.

Day 55

Had a huge breakdown with FedEx after they kinda screwed around with me and the long and short of it is that I'm sick and tired and I had four commitments and FedEx was making it really hard to fulfill them today. I cannot handle not fulfilling my commitments and promises, that is just not how I am. And now I am that crazy person who cries on the phone to 1-800-goFedex.



Anyway, I slept all morning and then after FedEx finally delivered my package I dropped bread from Bonnie's wedding at the food bank and they were super excited. Then I fed Mel's gerbils and stopped by the office.



I finished Kabul Beauty School and it was amazing, and I highly recommend this awesome piece of non-fiction. It tells the story of a Michigan woman who travels to Kabul and discovers that her talents as a hairdresser can change the lives of women in Afghanistan.



I watched some random TV and started Henning Mankell's The Man Who Smiled.



Spoke with Amber, Jim, and Mom.

Day 54

Had to get up early to help my boss with meeting set-up, then I scooted out to a doctor's appointment. He told me I didn't have strep throat, but didn't know what I had. He recommended bed-rest, water, and ibuprofen.

I took care of some important projects at work, then scurried home. My throat and ears hurt a lot and I feel kind of pitiful. I feel really bad that I've been missing so much work.

Started Deborah Rodriguezes' Kabul Beauty School. Very good. Finished watching season three of Dr. Who and All Passion Spent. But mostly I slept all day.

Spoke with Steve, Jim, and Grandma (who called twice, but once was to tell me that Martha Stewart likes bacon).

Day 53

Got up early to pick up a few things for Bonnie's wedding, most notably her dress.

Met up with Bonnie, Dani, Janette, and Tawni and we worked on each other's hair. Jeff showed up and we loaded all of the beverages into Bonnie's truck and headed for the chapel.

At the chapel we all worked hard setting up the reception hall and before you knew it it was time for us to have the ceremony.

It went pretty well and Bonnie was much more zen than I feared I would be due to the various complications. At one point they thought that they had lost a grand in traveler's checks... but found them later. Bonnie and Jeff had some choice relatives that were quite exhausting as well, but maybe they are well practiced at putting up with them?

I had a great time and got to know some really cool people. There is something about a do-it-yourself wedding that brings the people who care about the bride and groom together. In particular Niki, Jess, and Taylor turned out to be really cool. As per usual I gave my phone number to some dude at the wedding that I am not interested in, which I fear is becoming a wedding tradition.

Spoke with Steve and grandma today.

Today was exhausting and my sore throat was terrible, but overall today was really good.

Day 52

Scrambled into the hair dresser's nice and early and got a cute new haircut and then went a little bananas at the mall.

After that I fetched the linnens for Bonnie's wedding and ran over to Brad's to do some odd three weeks of laundry. When I arrived I could tell that they had left in a great hurry. It turns out that Melanie's dog Greta had had a stroke while at the kennel and that they had had to put her down.

Brad and I watched a cheesey Japanese movie, Kibakichi, and then I dropped the linnens off at Bonnie and Jeff's.

After that I met up with Addy for sushi.

Today was a rough day.

Day 51

Work is still quite stressful, but I was able to scoot out early to run errands for Bonnie's Bachelorette Party. I got extremely motion sick in the car and was quite concerned. I think I may be having some kind of ear problem.

Attended the Bachelorette Party and it was very fun. It was a passion party, which isn't my kind of thing, but I was able to meet a few more of Bonnie's friends, Tay, Jess, and Stephanie in particular, who were really fun girls.

I won the guess the candies in the jar game, so good on me.

Day 50

Ran all over worrying about a very important project at work.

Drove to Marysville for Bonnie and Jeff's rehearsal dinner. Rehearsal went well, the dinner was fun. I asked Bonnie's mother if she was excited about the wedding and she said, 'no.' Weird.

Almost ran out of gas on the way home due to construction.

Talked to Mom and Megan.

Day 49

Had a very busy day at work.

Dropped by the library and then had dinner with Jim at Grinders. We retired to my place to watch Lost, but got caught up in serious conversation.

Spoke with Addy, Mom, Brad, Auntie, and Megan.

Reading this month's NG (Black Pharaohs).

Day 48

My first nearly full day of work.

Had a Fat Tuesday themed dinner with Michael and Lynn. Then we went to the first National Geographic Live! lecture of the year, at Benaroya Hall. The speaker was Wade Davis, a cultural anthropologist who spoke about the loss of cultures due to the force of outside elements (rather than personal choice). Amazing.

Came home to check out the anticipated Super Tuesday results. Obama and Clinton tied and McCain in the lead for the GOP. Interesting. I am still undecided.

Today was an intellectually stimulating day.

Day 47

Stopped into work for a couple of hours and then went home.

Made a quick chili and watched a bunch of Dr. Who, season three, whilst dropping in and out of sleep. Still feeling quite crummy.

Finished Ghost. It was good, but could have been compacted a great deal. I think that also would have benefited the story.

Spoke to Grandma and Steve.

Day 46

Was supposed to attend a Super Bowl party but simply didn't feel well enough.

Slept most of the morning, till Mebbie called. Made food, watched the rest of the second season of the new Dr. Who and some of the first season of Batman the Animated series, but fell asleep again.

Chris dropped by with a new TV (he had a spare one which was much nicer than mine). Let me know that a homeless guy was sleeping in my stairwell. It's pretty cold so I think I won't say anything to the manager, but I think I will use the back door all the same.

I think I talked to a few more people, but I can't recall who.

Day 45

Slept through most of my cartoons. My cough seems to have transferred to congestion, which is fine with me.

Watched junk TV all day. Attempted to watch Pulse and Slings and Arrows and was not interested in either.

Addy joined me for dinner and then Chris joined me to watch Stardust, which was amazing. Absolutley aweseome in every sense.

Passed out.

Day 44

Started to feel a little better- was able to read even.

Paul popped in with groceries, DVD's and much needed conversation. We had dinner and then Paul recognized the onset of unconsciousness and left.