Just Call Me Pollyanna

I went dancing with my awesome husband last night at the annual Halloween dance a few hundred friends attend every year. We spent a good part of the day helping with set-up and stayed to help clean up. The DJ kept playing classic rock & roll while we were folding chairs and tearing down the decorations. It was such good music that, at times, we dropped the cleaning and continued to dance.  It's weird how one can get a 2nd wind when John Cougar Mellencamp is belting out "Hurt So Good". 

Yesterday, I had an idea for today's blog post  but I ditched it soon after we got home from the dance last night.  The topic was going to be about how hateful we've become in this country. I decided I didn't want to spend my entire Sunday thinking like that. The truth is I really like being a Pollyanna  and I make no apologies for it. 

I read a post my very good high school friend wrote this week and couldn't quite push it out of my mind. She had an experience she shared eloquently on her blog and it reminded me of how precious every waking moment is. I'd rather talk about love than hate any day of the week.

Having said that .....

Where am I going with this? I've got stuff to say about the hateful things going on in this country but it makes me feel "down-to-the ground" sad to think about it. I've decided to sit on it for a while and mull it over. When I write about it, I want it to be thoughtful and for it to come from a loving place.

In the meantime, if you are reading this I hope you have a warm roof over your head, food enough to keep you and your family from being hungry,  enough money in your pocket so you don't have to worry where your next meal is coming from, peeps who love you and a sense of hope that things will be alright.

love, Pollyanna

Mt. Rainier from another view

"Today is your day! Your mountain is waiting. So ... get on your way."  ~ Dr. Seuss

We took what was probably my last ride of the season yesterday. We traveled a road we had not been on before. I saw deer, hawks, feral kitty cats, turkeys, and Mt. Rainier from a different place.

It was a cool ride. Yeah, it was fun but it was really cool, as in cold.

I'm so glad I didn't miss seeing this beautiful view!

A City So Nice They Named It Twice

"Our senses are indeed our doors and windows on this world, in a very real sense the key to the unlocking of meaning and the wellspring of creativity." ~ Jean Houston

We drove to Walla Walla, WA and  stopped at Pioneer Park Aviary to say hello to the birds.  We inadvertently drove through the Whitman College campus.  The campus is b-e-a-u-t-i-f-u-l! Any student would be lucky to attend school there just for the walk through the gorgeous grounds in between classes. 

We drove right past this open window and headed to the bird park but I couldn't leave Walla Walla without backtracking to snap a photo of it. I noticed after I got home that the vines have actually overgrown the parts of the windows that don't open. 

I'm not sure how many times we have been to Walla Walla but every time we go, I see something different. We parked downtown and walked up one side of the street and down the other. There are wine tasting places all along main street along with bistros and sidewalk cafes. I thought it was interesting that people were actually sitting outside eating lunch as the weather is turning colder. It was a beautiful fall day.  Here are a few of my other favorite photos from the trip. Hope you enjoy.

 

Thai Food To Die For

I mentioned to my husband yesterday while on a road trip that I have been in a writing slump for a couple of weeks now. He suggested I look up "writer's slump" and do some writing about it.  Nah.  Who cares? Not me.  And, probably not you either.

We headed to The Dalles, Oregon early in the day with one goal in mind: to visit the Salvation Army thrift store without the constraints of time or having our dog with us. In the past, we have only spent 15 or 20 minutes in this store and discovered they have so many treasures it left us wanting to come back. Yesterday was a perfect day to do it.

Armed with a thermos of coffee, cash hot out of the ATM, and the camera we headed down the road. The above photo is the only one I shot. I must be having "photo slump" too because he practically had to pry me out of the car to take it.

The real treasure of the day, besides the really sweet, heavy cotton sweater I found for $3.49, was Montira's Thai Cuisine.  If you are a local person reading this blog and you love Thai food as much as we do, you should put this on your "places to eat before I die" list.   My recommendation is the Pumpkin Curry but I suspect you wouldn't be disappointed with anything you order there.  I regret I didn't take my camera into the restaurant to snap a quick one of the beautiful presentation. It would not have done justice to how wonderful it tasted.  We will be going back.

love, susan

Calling All Cow Lovers

We went out for a motorcyle ride today and this is the only photo I took.

The thing is, we traveled a route today that was really beautiful but not very picturesque. We rode over a mountain pass and ended up at about 4,200 feet but it never cooled down. Everything was dry and the landscape  was blonde.  I couldn't bring myself to pull the camera out to take photos of endless rolling hills of dry wheat. I loved the ride though! I especially loved the stop we made where Gene took off his boots and socks and laid in the grass to cool off. I loved laying next to him under a tree and just feeling so grateful for the sprinkler on the park grass. The slight wind blew a mist over us that was truly life-saving.

The reason I took this particular photo is that I read on my son's blog recently that he really likes cows. I think it's uncanny because I really like them too although my son and I have never been around them much, being raised in Alaska. He lives somewhere else now and I wonder if he sees many cows there.  These are things I think of when I'm riding. You would too if you rode where we rode today. Oh gosh, an idea for another post: things I think of while riding. You wouldn't even believe the things that go through my mind while I should be carefully scanning both sides of the rode for deer and cows. 

Back to cows.  I think it's their beautiful, soft eyes that attracts cow-lovers.  I've heard some people say cows are stupid. I'm not sure why anyone would say that about a cow. I've noticed while out riding that cows are smart enough to go stand under a tree for shade when it's hella hot. I've also been witness to mama cows crying non-stop for hours when they are separated from their calves. They're smart enough to go with the rest of the herd. I think I'll mention all these things the next time I hear someone bad-mouthing cows.

love, susan 

365 Day Project

I've been racking my brain trying to come up with a 365 day project. I watched as a whole lot of people started theirs last January.  I know I could have jumped on the band wagon and started a project anytime but decided to wait until this January 1 ... because ... well ... I'm a little OCD.  

I follow a really cool blog called 365 Less Things.  I wish I had thought of that. The woman who writes this blog posts a photo of one item she is shedding every single day.  My hat is off to her. Her blog was responsible for helping me separate myself from my old clarinet from high school. I tried to have it refurbished but it would have cost a couple hundred dollars to get it into working shape. I sold it to a nice lady at my yard sale for $5 this summer. I said "good riddance" to it as she drove out of my driveway.

I could do a 365 photo project but I don't want to. I want to do something different. What is it ... what is it??? 

All ideas will be entertained!

Plan of the Day

POD.  That's code for Plan of the Day at my current, temp job. Everyone meets at 6:45 a.m. in the file room for a short meeting to plan what direction we're going as a team. Pretty cool idea, me thinks. Sometimes there isn't any plan but just a few minutes to "check-in" as human beings. 

Week or so ago, one of the women in my office told us at the POD that her brother had received a phone call on Saturday night to get on a plane to Seattle (I think?) because someone had died and they had a set of lungs to transplant to him. I'm sure that wasn't in his plan of the day when he woke up. I checked with her last week and he's recovering famously. I get goosebumps just thinking about it. 

This morning I woke up and decided I needed to start sitting in front of my light box again. For those who don't know me, I suffer from Seasonal Affective Disorder. I won't bore you with all the details of SAD except to tell you that it sucks and it's just something I live with and try to manage without medications by sitting in front of a special light box for at least 30 to 45 minutes daily. I think the fact that I slept 12 hours on Friday caused my husband to take his life in his own hands by asking if I had started to sit in front of the light yet.  My reaction was the best indicator that it is time. I got very defensive about it. That's my sign. 

So my plan of the day when I woke this morning at 4:00 a.m. was to clear off my desk and fire that baby up. I got a letter written to my good pen pal in Katy, Texas and then proceeded to hit the treadmill.  It turned out to be a fabulous day.

Do you have a POD when you wake up?  Do tell!

love, susan

Farmer Talk

Alberta peaches.  That's what the farmer guy said these are.  I wouldn't know an Alberta peach from an O'Henry.  But I know now that our farmer (I like calling him our farmer)  told us today that he has a different variety of peaches "coming on" about every two weeks.  Coming on, in farmer speak, means the fruit is ready to pick.

We drove out in the country about 20 miles from home to buy two boxes of peaches at a surprisingly low price of $16 a box. It felt like stealing.  A co-worker told me where to find our farmer and I reveled in driving out not only to get the peaches but to shoot the breeze with him for a short time. He wore a baseball cap and spit chew on the ground every once in awhile as he told us a bit about his business and the fishing trip he took to the coast last weekend. 

I love country folks. They keep it real. When I asked him if he had a webpage, he was kind enough to not laugh at me.  Silly me.  What farmer needs a webpage when they have the same customers coming back to buy their fruit for years and years.  As we were leaving, he said, "be sure to keep my number". I said, "you're going into my 'contacts'", but I'm not sure he knew what I meant. I thought about telling him that he'd be on my blog page tonight but decided I just needed to keep our relationship simple. He grows the fruit, I drive out to buy it.  Love that.

Not all the peaches are ripe enough to use yet so I picked out the ready ones and they are now freezer jam. Earlier today, I threw together a peach crisp for Gene. He has lost so much weight since I've been watching my diet that it's scaring me. 

I think tomorrow I will make a peach pie and then decide what to do with the rest of them. We'll be having some peach smoothies and maybe a fruit pizza before the week is over. 

Everything's just peachy!  love, susan

 

Life is a Beach - Part Two

Anyone remember Charlie's Angels?

My head is still at the beach.  That's the beauty of a nice little vacation. It's not like I have to come back to the same old grind right away. Don't tell my boss.

Pictures help. I will probably go through my beach pictures 50 times and try to keep alive the things that mean the most to me. 

Short on time today but here are a few more of my favorites from the weekend.

Enjoy.

The Happiest Place on Earth

We just returned from another world. The beach. We spent about 48 hours there and it took me a little while to come down to earth when we arrived home yesterday. 

There is something special that happens when family and friends gather at Cape Lookout on the Oregon coast. It's like nothing else matters for a while. No television, no bad news, no rushing traffic. Only the sound of the ocean and smell of bbq hamburgers and bacon. Dogs running with reckless abandon. They say that Disneyland is the happiest place on earth but I would argue that point. 

Fog on Saturday morning

When we arrived on Friday it was a shock to the system to get out of the car to foggy, cold dampness. We knew the forecast for mid 80's the next day could change in a heartbeat. But it didn't. We woke up Saturday to a bit of fog but we spotted blue skies in our early morning walk at low tide and it turned out to be another perfect day.

After breakfast, we headed from camp to spend the day playing badminton and chasing Frisbees for hours. There was only love.  The kids, our grand kids and their neighbors/best friends, were transported to another world too as there was no fighting and no tears. Only fun and laughter and a very competitive game of badminton. 

After spending the day in the sand, we marched back to camp to bbq and rest for a minute. After dinner, we headed back down to take a long walk during low tide and to watch the sun set. 

Cousins. Friends. A dog. And miles of beach.

It does not get better than this.

Settling back into camp after the long walk, we roasted marshmallows and sat down to write a few new camp songs. Ghost stories were left untold this year. Perhaps we've outgrown them. Watch for "On the Beach" and "Free the Wang" on YouTube. We expect they will go viral.  Not.

Waking up Sunday morning was bittersweet. It was the end of a lovely weekend but for me it was the continuing realization that weekends like these are ones our grand kids are going to remember forever.

Yeah, it took me a few hours to bring my head back here to reality. On the trip home, we turned on the radio and heard some snippets of the memorial of 9/11. I turned it off. I wasn't ready to come back yet. 

Back to the real world.

love, susan

Five Minute Post

Yes, that is snow behind the flowers! Photo shot at Mt. Rainier

Ten hour days are kicking my butt but I'm determined to squeeze every bit of the minutes I have to accomplish what I can.

One of the women I work with is a single mom with 5 children. She told me yesterady she is also taking 3 classes. I admire people who can squeeze the life out of everyday. Talking with her made me feel kind of like a slacker. 

I never made it on the treadmill yesterday so I decided this morning I had to get back to some multi-tasking. While the coffee is brewing, I cleaned up the kitchen. I poured my coffee and sat down to check my email and FB. Told myself I'm gonna write a quick post while I enjoy my coffee and then hit the treadmill for 30 minutes.  The walking really boosts my energy level so I need to do it.

Hope you have a fabulous Wednesday.  Don't forget to stop and smell the roses flowers.

love, susan