I wonder if I should look into what kind of schooling is required in order to make jewelry. B.W. does it, and it looks like fun. Also, she makes enough with her jewelry business to support her and her husband. They have a nice house and car and all that, so obviously it's lucrative. Hmmm...

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Okay, so I should write about the trip!

First off, I have to ask: When was the last time anyone took a plane that actually took off and landed on time? I personally can't remember the last time it happened to me. Traveling by plane used to be fun for me, but lately all it does is annoy. But, enough complaining!

The trip was super. We flew to Seattle first, and stayed with B & C. Slept on a lumpy futon. The weather was gloriously sunny but cold. We took a tour of an old streamlined boat called the Kalakala that some guy is remodeling. It was amazing--it was a gorgeous ship once, and now it's kind of a wreck, but this guy is doggedly working to remodel it. There's a website for it at: http://www.kalakala.org/

We played kickball with B & C's friends the day before we left. That was a blast. I hadn't played kickball since I was in grade school. These people have been getting together every Sunday to play, and they wear costumes and stuff. It's total fun, and no one cares if you suck. C. hurt his finger, and we thought it was jammed. It was bent a little funny but it didn't hurt, so he kept playing. The next day I was very, very sore. Oh, it is a terrible thing to realize you are out of shape.

We rented a car and drove to Bellingham, WA, next. We stayed with M & B and mostly just hung out. Slept on a futon in a very cold room with something like 18 small blankets. C. and B. got along great, as I expected. I LOVE their kid. He is 6 months old now, and he is whip-smart. He's a terrific kid. M & B's house was terribly cold. C. was getting more and more worried about his finger, and went to a walk-in clinic. The Dr. said C. broke a tendon in his finger and put a splint on him, poor guy. He has to wear it for six weeks and he's hating it.

Bellingham is okay, but I wouldn't say we loved it. M & B, however, are the most wonderful folks. M. gave us some Canadian money for Vancouver. She rocks so hard. Love you, M.

Then we drove to Vancouver BC and stayed in an old hotel. Slept in a king-size hotel bed (I didn't run into C. once all night. Kind of like sleeping alone. Weird.) with lumpy, lumpy pillows. At this time, my muscles were still sore, and I was starting to get a cold too. We bought a huge bottle of apple cider vinegar and some vitamins and tylenol and I took a hot bath. I felt better, but still not 100%. We wandered around Vancouver, trying to find some cool record stores. We didn't really find any. I wanted to do some shopping for shoes and clothes (because of the cheap exchange rate), but for some reason we couldn't seem to get our shit together to figure out where stuff was. I blame the fact that I was sick, since all I needed to do was look in a stupid phone book. I couldn't even think of that at the time, and that is pretty dumb. The one thing that was cool was we went to this massive, beautiful park where they had a huge beach area and a great view of the mountains, and we wandered around there. We figured out later that right about then was when the earthquake hit, but we didn't feel a thing. I have to say, I was almost disappointed. Is that weird?

After Vancouver, we drove back to Seattle, returned the rental car, and went to the Amtrak station. Right outside of the Amtrak station was some pretty impressive-looking earthquake damage--some of the brick buildings had crumbled a bit, and some bricks had landed on the parked cars below. We had seen that exact scene on the news in Vancouver the night before, so that was kind of exciting. Unfortunately, we found that the buildings were not the only things that sustained damage--the Amtrak trains were not running, and therefore we were not able to take a train to Portland. I was terribly disappointed. I've never taken a train, and probably won't now because C. and I felt that Amtrak handled the situation very poorly. They put us on a bus to Portland. Needless to say, it *sucked*. A bus just does not take the place of a train. But anyway, we made it to Portland intact, so I guess it could have been worse.

Portland was super-cool too. I still had the cold during this time, but still had fun. M.W. & B.W. are great hosts. Slept in a very, very comfy bed that almost made me cry with joy. They took us everywhere they possibly could in the few days we were there. We saw: a beautiful Japanese garden, the beach where Haystack Rock is located (yes Haystack Rock from "The Goonies"!), and an *awesome* Japanese super-store where we bought a ton of great Japanese candy and books and toys. I found a bunch of Tare Panda stuff. Tare (pronounced "tar-ay") Panda is this cool squishy panda character that is super-popular in Japan right now. Kogepan is also neat-o. He's a little bit of over-baked bread with a dark personality. Both are much cooler than Hello Kitty. Here's a fan site for Tare Panda (it's kind of tempermental, sorry):

http://www.tare-panda.com/

On our last night in Portland, we went to a dinner party given by some friends of M.W. and B.W. We drank a non-wormwood version of Absinthe. I had never had it before, and hated the taste, but it was GREAT for getting drunk! All of the fun, none of the tired-ness. B.W. and I got drunk on it, and just talked and talked for hours. It was the most alert I'd ever felt while drunk. If only the taste was better, I would drink nothing but that stuff (at parties, that is).

I did something at that party that I've never done, and I still can't believe I did it. One of the women who was throwing the party was one of those people who just runs around at parties basically screaming, "Hey! Look at me! Hey! Look what I'm doing! Hey, listen to me! Look! Look!" She was nice, but at the same time her obnoxious behavior was overwhelming. To top it off, she was pretty, so she would probably have had plenty of attention even if she wasn't screaming for it. So at some point for some unknown reason, she took off her shirt and put on this little tube top. It was really ridiculous. She left the stretchy black top she was originally wearing on a chair near the door. When we were getting ready to go and I had my coat on, I spotted the shirt. The room was really dimly lit and no one was looking, so I put her shirt in my coat pocket and left with it. Why? I don't know. I'm not proud of this, by the way. When I found the shirt in the morning and remembered what I'd done, I was shocked at my own behavior. What's wrong with me?? I've never really done something like that before. And there's not much I can do about it now. I have the shirt. Throw it away? I don't know. For now, it's hanging in my closet. I hope no one reading this thinks I really suck. But then, I guess I'd deserve that.

The next day, we got on a plane with our thousand-pound suitcases and flew home. The cat was very happy to see us.

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...And that's the long form of the vacation story. I don't think it's too boring. But I should stop blathering now.

Bye