2017-11-19 20:48
Friday was a pretty exciting day. Hamilton is coming to Portland for a two-week run March 20-April 8, and tickets went on sale at 10:00 a.m. I had my doubts that I’d be able to snag an… Read More
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Mark My Words… – Peace, Love And Wordiness. Blog
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Peace, Love and Wordiness.
2017-11-12 16:11
Last Monday night, we stayed up late for a concert at the Aladdin Theater in Portland. It was a touring production called Beatles vs. Stones, in which a pair of dueling tribute bands paying… Read More
2017-11-05 16:23
Lost in all the moving hubbub was the fact that Audrey bought her first car a few weekends ago.
Let’s just pretend I’m not old enough to have two kids with driver’s license… Read More
2017-11-03 00:50
I am standing on a bluff in the Badlands, looking over a sprawling prairie so vast it appears endless. A towering cumulonimbus cloud blots out the sun as it advances across the plains in a s… Read More
2017-10-29 18:53
Cats weren’t meant to be kept in bags, so I’m going to let this one out now and share a bit o’ news with y’all:
Tara and I are moving to Rapid City, South Dakota next… Read More
2017-10-14 21:12
You know how sometimes, occasionally, once in a blue moon, I have a tendency to stick my foot in my mouth and end up in an awkward situation?
Oh, boy. A couple of days ago really took the ca… Read More
2017-10-09 02:46
The timing of our trip was pretty fortuitous. Yesterday was devoted to exploring the Black Hills, and the weather could not have been more perfect: sunshine, a deep blue cloudless sky, and a… Read More
2017-10-08 05:09
Before our South Dakota trip, I had one goal: to see a buffalo up close.
Also, to eat buffalo. That part was easy enough: I ended up having buffalo, in one form or another, for breakfast, lu… Read More
2017-10-07 04:48
After a long day of driving – emphasis on long, because holy shit, did you know that Montana is huge?! – we arrived in Rapid City a little before 9:00 this evening. We actually w… Read More
2017-10-05 01:24
When I woke up this morning, I realized that exactly one year ago today, I met Bruce Springsteen. 365 days later, it still seems surreal. Happy Bruce-iversary to me!
Sadly, everybody must ha… Read More
2017-09-26 00:00
I have a bad habit of not checking trail conditions before setting out on a hike. Had I done so, I’d have known before we drove 2+ hours on Saturday that our destination, the… Read More
2017-09-17 16:59
Time flies, huh?! Autumn is nearly upon us, and all I can say is, it’s about damn time. This hot, dry, smoky summer has been one for the ages, and I don’t mean that in a good way… Read More
2017-09-04 16:28
5:30 Sunday morning we were lying in bed, awake, because…well, we’re freaks, I guess. There’s no other logical explanation.
In any case, our alarm was set for 6:00 a.m. an… Read More
2017-08-23 18:59
Is planning a vacation seven years in advance overdoing it? I hope not, because I’ve already got my sights set on a future road trip. My destination? Bloomington, Indiana. April 8, 202… Read More
2017-08-20 17:39
24 hours to go until the Great Eclipse, and I’m pretty excited!
I’ve read some people grumbling about the hype and how they’re sick and tired of hearing about it, but I fig… Read More
2017-08-06 18:51
Do you think it’s rude (or weird) to order iced tea, but ask them to “hold the ice”?
This was the dilemma I encountered last week. I ordered an iced tea from the coffee sho… Read More
2017-07-31 01:30
Camping: it’s not for the faint of heart. The funny thing is, I always figured it would be a bear that posed the greatest danger to my well-being. Turns out it was the (not-so) mighty… Read More
2017-07-24 03:12
Hey, remember that longtime fear I’ve had about getting eaten by a bear? I knew I was right to worry. (If you don’t click on the link, I listed a bunch of random facts… Read More
2017-07-21 01:33
It’s nice to have one food you are so good at making, you become “known” for it. People expect it whenever they come over for dinner. They ask for the recipe but, if it tru… Read More
2017-07-07 00:00
We were hanging out at McMenamin’s on the Columbia a few days ago, enjoying a late lunch with Tara’s friend Betsy before dropping her off at the airport, when Tara discovered a F… Read More
2017-06-30 22:00
We were watching MasterChef last night, and at one point Christina Tosi, one of the judges, started choking and coughing after tasting one contestant’s scrambled eggs, which she declar… Read More
2017-06-27 00:00
We went to an anti-Trump rally disguised as a rock concert Saturday night. And it was great.
Even casual Pink Floyd fans should know that Roger Waters is one of the most political and outspo… Read More
2017-06-18 16:07
I want to start off by saying that I love the Pacific Northwest. This should be obvious to anybody who has ever read my blog. It’s been my home for almost 23 years now, and I always fi… Read More
2017-06-04 17:39
We had the longest, most hilarious debate at work on Friday. It all started when I walked with Sarah to the post office. There was one of those bells on the counter that said “ring f… Read More
2017-05-29 16:50
For the past month, I’ve been binge-watching a little show called “Curb Your Enthusiasm” (though my definition of “binge-watching” probably differs from yours;… Read More
2017-05-21 15:38
It’s been a pretty decent weekend. Friday evening we finally got to sit out on the deck, where we played cards, drank stuff with booze in it, and listened to records. These are our go… Read More
2017-05-17 18:59
The Tape Face show on Friday night turned out to be lots of fun. Well, fun in retrospect, because throughout the performance I was paranoid I was going to be yanked onstage and humiliated, l… Read More
2017-05-13 00:19
Alexa told me it was National Limerick Day this morning. In honor of the occasion, I responded to every work order that came across my desk with a comment written as a limerick. For exa… Read More
2017-05-07 17:03
It’s been a pretty full weekend so far. I’m trying to downshift today, but still have some errands to run. Which is fine, because I get antsy just sitting around the apartment an… Read More
2017-04-26 00:00
I took an online IQ test a few days ago. It was a link I stumbled across on Facebook so, you know, totally legit. I ended up scoring in the Genius category, so I naturally assumed the whole… Read More
2017-04-12 00:10
I think it’s weird whenever I come across one of those CAPTCHAs designed to thwart spam and I am asked to check a box stating that I’m not a robot. Because inevitably I click the… Read More
2017-04-10 00:06
Quite unexpectedly, I finished my novel this afternoon. I still don’t think it’s sunk in yet.
As you may recall, I began writing “Dream Sailors” four years ago. Soon… Read More
2017-04-04 00:15
I feel like an extra in a Portlandia sketch, because I’ve got my own egg guy now.
This all began last week when a coworker arrived with a carton of farm fresh eggs. She said she h… Read More
2017-03-26 16:23
I just finished reading my 5th book of the year! I know that isn’t a huge number to a lot of people, but for me it’s pretty good and puts me on track to blow my modest Goodreads… Read More
2017-03-12 18:14
Lately, whenever we go out to eat, Tara cringes. Because it usually ends up being a party of three: me, her, and my camera. Like many people, I’m sort-of obsessed with photographing my… Read More
2017-02-26 18:58
I have famously gone on record as being anti-umbrella. Living in the Pacific Northwest, using an umbrella is frowned upon by the locals. It’s just not “cool.” One of the su… Read More
2017-02-19 00:11
February is simply flying by! I’d better recap before it disappears.
Valentine’s Day was super low key. Sappy sucker that I am, I gave Tara a card in the morning. She admitt… Read More
2017-02-12 16:57
The low growl of a diesel engine rumbles to life and then idles, the steady deep-throated purr of a cat. Footsteps echo across a dock, rubber on wood, followed by the metallic clang of cargo… Read More
2017-01-30 01:23
I was watching the news earlier and they were showing a woman who was 104 years old pushing a cart through the grocery store, and marveling over the fact that at such an advan… Read More
2017-01-20 04:03
We spend one-third of our lives at work. So it stands to reason that we should make our workspaces cozy and inviting, no? With that in mind, I decided to spruce up my own 12’x12′… Read More
2017-01-11 23:21
This morning we called my dad, put him on speakerphone, and sang “Happy Birthday.” Which would have been great, had it actually been his birthday.
Oops.
So we were a day off. In… Read More
2017-01-08 23:40
It has been cold AF here lately.
If you don’t know the meaning of AF, you’re not hip to the lingo. (The fact that I used the phrase “hip to the lingo” probably indica… Read More
2016-12-29 16:16
Funny how quickly we fall into old habits, huh? Like not posting blog entries?
In my defense, there have been many distractions over the past ten days. Such as:
Christmas.
Food and drinks… Read More
2016-12-20 02:07
Hard to believe that Christmas will be nothing but a memory in less than one week!
Friday night was our company Christmas party, and we had a grand ol’ time. At least I assum… Read More
2016-12-12 02:18
Audrey bought a sweater for our cat today. Suffice it to say, she was not a fan of playing dress-up. Poor Sydney. You can practically see “you shitty humans” written all over her… Read More
2016-12-05 01:35
Tara and I drove into Portland yesterday to pick up a few things (an $11.45 bag of Jacobsen sea salt, a bottle of Wild Roots Marionberry infused vodka, a package of smoked steelhead trout &n&hell…Read More
2016-12-01 01:15
Happy last day of November! If you participated in NaNoWriMo, I hope you hit your word goal.
I, for one, am glad it’s over. NaNoWriMo was harder than I imagined it would be. 50,000 wor… Read More
2016-11-30 01:15
When I got to work this morning, I told my coworkers how happy I was to be back in the office. They assumed I was joking, but I was deadly serious. I feel like I’ve been cooped up for… Read More
2016-11-29 01:21
I have a new favorite word in my vocabulary. That word is several. It’s a simple word, really. Merriam-Webster defines it as “an indefinite number; more than two and fe… Read More
2016-11-28 03:31
I woke up this morning dismayed that the long holiday weekend was already coming to an end. It’s amazing how quickly the days fly by, huh? But I’m not ready to go back to wo… Read More
2016-11-27 03:39
When I’ve talked about the plot of my new novel, a lot of people say, “Oh – like Inception!” And while both stories center around dreaming, that’s the only… Read More
2016-11-26 00:46
Originally we’d hoped to take advantage of the long holiday weekend and embark upon a mini getaway today, possibly to check out the Painted Hills of Oregon before holing up in Pendleto… Read More
2016-11-25 02:47
Happy Thanksgiving!
Pretty laid back day for us today. For the first time in years, we did not host. We did not go anywhere, either. It ended up just being me, Tara, and Audrey – but t… Read More
2016-11-24 01:31
Thanksgiving Eve! Can you believe it?
Work productivity always takes a hit the day before a long holiday weekend, and today was no exception. I may have contributed to that just a little by… Read More
2016-11-23 01:45
Or, how to traumatize your kids for life.
Word Count Today: 1,109.
Total Word Count: 36,645 Read More
2016-11-22 01:30
Last Spring, WordPress informed me that they had secured the rights to oversee and operate the sale and registration of a new series of top-level domains, .blog. Anybody would be free to pur… Read More
2016-11-21 04:36
Random thought: SNL is killin’ it this season. Even after the election.Especially after the election.
Over the past few days, I’ve learned an awful lot about the American legal s… Read More
2016-11-20 04:58
Today was a good day.
We met up with our friend Chris at McMenamin’s Grand Lodge in Forest Grove in the morning. It had been a few months since we last saw her, so we had a lot of drin… Read More
2016-11-19 06:25
What a great way to spend a Monday night. Records, alcohol, candles, and lava lamps. It’s cold and windy outside, but cozy and warm in our apartment. A close game of… Read More
2016-11-18 03:44
This morning at work, we were talking about Thanksgiving and one of my teammates forwarded a story about the Butterball Turkey Talk Line. For 35 years this enterprising group of Butterb… Read More
2016-11-17 03:38
I was shopping for groceries after work today, when it suddenly dawned on me that Thanksgiving is barely a week away. For a split second, I panicked. There was nothing Thanksgiving-related o… Read More
2016-11-16 02:42
Today was a very productive writing day. I dashed out over 2,000 words for the first time since Day 1. I have reached a crucial scene in my novel that is fun to write and the words… Read More
2016-11-14 02:34
My parents emailed today from New Zealand. Or make that tomorrow, since they are 19 hours in the future. (I’ve been trying to figure out how to use this to my advantage, e.g., foo… Read More
2016-11-13 02:16
Today has been a very good day. After a leisurely morning, Tara and I took a walk through the park and stopped into WinCo to pick up a few things we needed for dinner. Then we headed to Rega… Read More
2016-11-12 04:57
We woke up this morning in the guest room of my mother-in-law’s apartment in Bothell. Peering through the blinds, we were greeted with an amazing sunrise just beginning to crest the ho… Read More
2016-11-11 01:30
As much as I’ve talked about NaNoWriMo, I’ve focused a lot on the novel itself but have devoted very little time to the actual writing of said novel. And it’s that writing… Read More
2016-11-10 01:01
My parents are currently on a cruise halfway around the world, hopefully oblivious to all this ridiculousness. I am not sure when they’ll have access to email again – it may not… Read More
2016-11-09 03:27
68 today in Portland. Really?! Feels like September. But at least it looks like November.
Word Count Today: 867.
Total Word Count: 18,105 Read More
2016-11-08 03:05
I think I might be suffering from Elvis overkill.
I was writing another Elvis scene this evening while listening to Elvis on Spotify and researching the Elvis Suite at Hartland Mansion… Read More
2016-11-07 03:26
I have no idea what inspired me to make a big pot of homemade gumbo this evening.
The short answer is: I was craving it. But I don’t know why, because I have zero ties to New Orleans… Read More
2016-11-06 01:58
I slept like a rock last night. One of my favorite features on the Fitbit is the sleep tracker, which measures how long you sleep each night, including periods of restlessness and number of… Read More
2016-11-05 01:40
This week flew by. Not surprising, considering I only worked three days. Our orders picked up a little today, so we were a bit busier.
I’m just excited that Tara will be back tomorrow!… Read More
2016-11-04 00:25
I found out today my favorite thrift store, Value Village, is closing unexpectedly in just nine days. A Dodge dealership bought the building the thrift store had been leasing… Read More
2016-11-03 04:52
So I’ve decided to try something new. Something bold. I daresay, something dangerous. Since I’ve committed to NaNoWriMo and will be writing every day, I thought it might be helpf… Read More
2016-11-01 07:01
It’s the stroke of midnight on November 1, and I have officially kicked off NaNoWriMo. In style, I might add. I am holed up in a vintage trailer on the Washington coast, with my favori… Read More
2016-10-24 01:28
Last week was a weird one in Ye Olde Office. First off, it was “no-fly week,” which meant a complete ban on insects in the workplace.
OK, it actually meant our sales guys weren&r&hell…Read More
2016-10-16 14:55
This past week, my coworkers decided it would be fun to keep a running tally of all our puns. Team Content is pretty witty, and I’m always down for a friendly competition, so… Read More
2016-10-06 00:05
I can sum up the most surreal ten seconds of my life in a single photograph captured for posterity:
I don’t even know where to begin. How often does one get the opportu… Read More
2016-10-01 03:23
A couple of weeks ago, my Fitbit Charge broke. Oddly enough, this was exactly one year to the day that I got it (easy to remember, as it was an anniversary gift from Tara). It still wor… Read More
2016-09-23 02:11
Earlier this week I was telling Deb at work that I’d read in a Vanity Fair article that Bruce Springsteen did not hire a ghostwriter to help pen his new autobiography; instead, every w… Read More
2016-09-15 16:39
My ongoing battle with telemarketers continues.
I don’t know why they love to bother me so much. It’s as though I won some sort of lottery where the grand prize is daily har… Read More
2016-09-04 22:04
Recently, Tara and I were in an upscale grocery store in NE Portland. She’d grabbed several pricey bars of dark chocolate and, suddenly worried that she might be spending too much mone… Read More
2016-08-30 01:48
Cooking is like a poem.
There’s a certain rhythm and grace to the prep work. Chopping, slicing, and dicing; the alternating short and long cuts a sort of iambic pentameter in the kitch… Read More
2016-08-20 03:46
Today turned into a fun day.
There’s a guy at work named Zach who is very much a hippie at heart. Even more so than me. He’s the dude who goes to Burning Man every year, spends h… Read More
2016-08-17 01:13
This past weekend, Tara and I went hiking.
Which seems to be a recurring theme in my life these days. I have gone hiking every weekend for the past month. Maybe in a past life… Read More
2016-08-07 17:12
I am sad to report that my last-minute campaign during Washington’s primary last week was unsuccessful. I lost my bid to become the Evergreen State’s newest Commissione… Read More
2016-08-03 00:32
I have, in the past, lamented over the fact that technology is taking over the world. I’ve mentioned how I wish we could go back in time to those carefree days where a “smartphon… Read More
2016-08-03 00:32
I have, in the past, lamented over the fact that technology is taking over the world. I’ve mentioned how I wish we could go back in time to those carefree days where a “smartphon… Read More
2016-07-26 01:49
I may have finally learned how to beat telemarketers at their own game. Just tell ’em you’re dead.
One day last week, I got a call from a Nigerian prince telling me I’… Read More
2016-07-15 01:26
I was out walking on my lunch hour yesterday, phone in hand, which I was checking periodically. There is nothing unusual about this; I often look at my phone while walking, either to tr… Read More
2016-07-10 14:54
Living in the Pacific Northwest, there isn’t a lot of variation in the weather. A typical January day looks like this:
Peek outside in March, and you’re liable to see this:
Cur… Read More
2016-06-29 00:15
Last night I was getting a haircut, and there were banners on the salon walls promoting Shark Week. [Weirdest marketing tie-in ever, by the way. Makes about as much sense as seeing an a… Read More
2016-06-19 16:07
If you had told me a week ago that I would be walking through the forest on my lunch hour listening to show tunes, I’d have said you were nuts.
But Friday afternoon I found myself doin… Read More
2016-06-14 15:51
I have recently been informed that the period is dead.
RIP, period. We hardly knew ye.
Actually, we knew ye for a good long time, but you are as obsolete as rotary telephones and dial-up mod… Read More
2016-06-09 00:15
I was browsing my local thrift store last weekend and came across a Betamax player. I don’t think I’d ever actually seen one before. I picked it up, marveling over its simpl… Read More
2016-05-30 15:42
I’ve never been a good sick person. Then again, if you talk to most women, they’d say the same thing about the men in their lives. So really, I’m just perpetuating the ster… Read More
2016-05-26 00:07
Last month, I took a day off work to go hiking. It was my birthday, and I wanted to commune with nature instead of dealing with an overflowing In Box.
[My In Box is virtual these days… Read More
2016-05-19 00:15
Last night, we added another great classic rock concert to our ever-expanding list when we saw The Who (finally) rock Portland’s Moda Center for their Hits 50! tour. It’s actuall… Read More
2016-05-12 00:20
A few weeks ago, I stopped into my local State Farm office to steal a cup of coffee. You might recall me talking about it here. But that was merely the tip of the iceberg. Immediately afterw… Read More
2016-05-05 00:20
A few days ago, a Groupon offer popped up on my phone that was too irresistible to pass up. Portland Magazine was offering a great deal – two years for the price of one. Since my curre… Read More
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