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local picks All day long...

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Jun 30, 2008 Mon

We are letting the picture size creep up, again. We were trying to keep the width at 800, but with so many now having screen resolution of 1000 and higher... please say something if these are too wide for your monitor?

Ev and Jordan stepping out - Ann sees them off~

Seen while walking: Mt. Baker

A heavily and well nailed telephone pole. It's on a popular corner for flyers...

The building with the foam formed concrete walls is taking shape. Stick roof and tin studs.

At the saturday market~~

Scootering

dog (Leo)

dog training

Shadow guys waving. Reflected in the Skagit River - where our travels took us this morning.

The river is running pretty high and fast, due to snow melt in the mountains.

The bridge used to rotate to allow river traffic to pass - no longer.

A floating log, reminiscent of an indian war canoe - what must the underwater part look like, to carry so much of the log above the surface?

Hidden danger?

Thanks to daughter Ambie, a fun, though rather challenging game -

Jun 28, 2008 Sat

It's summer! The thermometer climbed to near eighty degrees yesterday and may go higher today or tomorrow. Hasn't been this hot an this date since the year 2000. Can you say, 'Global Warming?' Unless the administration has managed to raise the temperature along with the cost of oil...

This kind of weather makes it hard to stay indoors. Out here, we wait patiently for many months for this time of blue skies and warm weather. Here in the backyard, is Ann - tying horsetail bunches, in preparation for drying to make tea. How interesting that two of our worst 'weeds', dandelions and horsetail, have such powerful medicinal value.

Thanks to TJ for sending along this 'signage'. I failed to notice, at first, what was odd about it~~ do you?

Always good to know ahead of time...

Jun 26, 2008 Thu

Our local highways are posted: Left Lane for Passing Only. Even so, there is often some clueless driver going ten under and pacing a car in the right hand lane, bottlenecking the whole road. That's when this would come in handy~

Evie was in the local paper, discussing her summer goals...

Possibly sending the wrong message?

Leo, one of our Toy Fox pups, was chewing on the edge of our swell patio mat. I placed a bag of dirt over the corner he was working on, as a deterrent. Right...

Comparing the relative slimness of the 750 UZ and the Stylus 1030~ forgetting to focus, it would seem...

On the right, the Dzign video camera (now over two years old) - which was serving as a pocket still camera up til now. It only shot very low resolution stills - less than two megapixel - VS the 10 MP Stylus.

Thanks to Don -
Placing loaded rail cars on a bridge during a flood to hold it in place - is not a fail safe fix.

Might be subject to debate~?

Some good news!

We had purchased a refurbished printer, at about a third the cost of the same model new. It didn't take long to observe that it didn't want to feed the paper correctly, every time. OK, it was jamming the feed, more often than not. And then, more often than that. This was extremely discouraging, as you might imagine. We were trying to tell ourselves that the problem was due to the machine sitting unused for awhile, and that with more use it would begin to work the way it should. Our stock in this position was increased by having purchased additional ink cartridges, which - as one might surmise - cost more than the machine itself.

Sadly, the feed jamming problem was, we were finally forced to admit, not getting better. It was to the point of facing up to admitting defeat - and buying another printer. Simply write off the whole thing as a bad deal. Along with that, the notion of 'buying refurbished' was taking a terrific beating.

So - buy the same model? At least be able to use the dang ink?

Tinkering, while thinking of unplugging it - we realized something - namely, it never failed to feed when printing a 'test' page directly from the printer, itself. It failed when printing from the computer. We had merely plugged this printer in and turned it on, Windows recognized it, and we started trying to print - using whatever driver was available in the Window's repertoire. This morning we went to the printer (Samsung) website and downloaded the latest driver - lo and behold - it has printed fine since then.

How close we came to writing off the whole thing! The moral? Sometimes apparent hardware problems are actually software shortcomings. Always make sure you have the latest drivers.

Yes - that's almost four and a half bucks a gallon... the first hundred dollar tank is just around the corner.

Jun 25, 2008 Wed

Ann has surprised me with another camera. You may recall that she gave me my trusty Olympus 750 for Valentines Day several years ago, and it remains my top of the line digital camera. However, she knew I was jealous of her tiny pocket camera, which the 750 is definitely not. Thus, the arrival of a Stylus 1030, another of the Olympus family. Here are a couple of the pictures taken with it on the first day ~~

Herownself

Getting the bad news~

Could happen...

Jun 23, 2008 Mon

Ann put on her Baker's Hat yesterday and produced enough Pasty's to feed us for two days and still put several in the freezer. These are made from Ye' ol' Cornish Recipe - meat, potatoes, rutabagas and onion as the main ingredients.

Ann's theory of pie dough - make plenty. Enough left over for a couple strawberry/rhubarb pies...

A huge concert outdoors - camping for thousands~

Came the rain...      shades of Woodstock

Our living presence in space is growing -

After the addition of the latest module from Japan~~

This has proven to be a very handy bit of software - it's free - and called, Goldwave and I've been using it for several years now (finally coughing up the 24 dollars to get rid of the nag screen). It allows one to record on the computer digitally in stereo from an analog source (record player, tape machine, microphone). Old magnetic or vinyl recordings can be cleaned up (as in, digitally remastered) and saved in several formats - the popular choice being MP3.

What might this woman (Ann) be doing? It looks like she's removing several board feet from this cedar tree~~

Jun 22, 2008 Sun

Let the summer begin!

We haven't been able to raise anyone at the Tagboard website? We think they aren't home on weekends.

Ann traveled with the Northwest Indian College traditional plants group to the Snoqualmie Forest lands near the Cedar River watershed, there to learn more about the native ways of using (what used to be) nature's abundance. Very few white people ever get to remove a strip of bark from a cedar tree. This would be later used for weaving baskets, etc. It doesn't kill the tree to remove these strips.

Part of the group -- Ann is second from the right, and took the balance of these pictures.

This area was logged out in the 1920s and replanted, so the growth you see is about 90 years old.

Frog went a'courting...

Boat oops~~ A video relating to the accident may be found HERE

Coming soon to a neighborhood near you.

Evelyn is painting faces and other body areas at the St. Merryfest.

Questions and answers -- thanks to Jeroen~

The Matrix - a movie we enjoyed a lot~~

Jun 18, 2008 Wed

Sure would be great if you sent along some pictures, links, or something like that?!

What were we doing four years ago , at this time? Evelyn was graduating into middle school~~
Seen here with Ivey - The Saab was new to us.

I was patching the faring on a used 1981 Honda Goldwing, that we rode for a year or so, before finding the Shadow that now sits in the shed.

They are having a damp time of it, back in Cedar Rapids Iowa, The town where my Dad was born, in 1925. Hasn't been flooding like this since then...

Much midwest flooding - thanks to Jack. For the photo, of course -- taken from the tracks, where the elevation is slightly more forgiving than it was by the trailer.

Jun 17, 2008 Tue

Happy Birthday to son, Brett Alan - (on the 16th, actually)

According to the rules, one doesn't drive the train into water more than 4 inches over the rails. Another of those  rules designed to protect the company, since we regularly drove through water deep enough that one could not see the rails. The water has to be a couple feet deep to short out the traction motors.

It is common practice to place railroad cars loaded with stones or gravel on a bridge during a flood. The idea is to keep the bridge from washing out or floating away. That's what you see in the photo below. As of the 13th, the bridge was still in place, though underwater.

Here you see the conductor (a woman, you might note) on the 'front porch' -- inspecting the rail ahead of the engine. Thanks to Jack.

Heritage: space shuttle, I am your father~

Invitation to the Northwest Indian College graduation ceremonies, where Ann received her latest honors, mentioned below.

Happy Father's Day ~~

Jun 15, 2008 Sun

First Father's Day for Eric and Gideon -

When I say, pictures added daily - I guess that doesn't mean they get posted daily. I could make excuses, busy time of year, the weather has been nice -- but the truth of the matter is -- I've just been lazy.

We did make it up to the Saturday market on the scooter. Fresh bread and cheese and coffee, sitting in the sun. Some fresh veggies for the larder.

We rode out to Dick's place and the first thing we noticed was a deer in his front yard... which soon took off - right down the middle of the road. Cell phone pix by Ann~

Ann (who already has a Masters in education) was allowed to walk with two of her students in the Northwest Indian College graduation ceremonies, since she has completed the requirements for an Associates degree in chemical dependency.

Thanks to Jarvis, for these 'some interesting, some disturbing, some baffling' useless facts~~
>> In chess, there are 169,518,829,100,544,000,000,000,000,000 ways to play the first ten moves.
>> It only takes 7 pounds of pressure to rip your ear off.
>> $26 billion in ransom has been paid out in the U.S. in the past 20 years.
>> You use more calories eating celery than there are in the celery itself.
>> On average, there are 178 sesame seeds on each McDonalds BigMac bun.
>> There are 1 million ants for every person in the world.
>> Odds of being killed by a dog - 1 in 700,000. >> Odds of dying while in the bath tub - 1 in 1 million. >> Odds of being killed by space debris - 1 in 5 billion. >> Odds of being killed by poisoning - 1 in 86,000. >> Odds of being killed by freezing - 1 in 3 million. >> Odds of being killed by lightning - 1 in 2 million. >> Odds of being killed in a car crash - 1 in 5,000. >> Odds of being killed in a tornado - 1 in 2 million. >> Odds of being killed by falling out of bed - 1 in 2 million. >> Odds of being killed in a plane crash -1 in 25 million.
>> If you played all of the Beatles' singles and albums that came out between 1962 and 1970 back to back, it would only last for 10 hours and 33 minutes.
>> Termites eat through wood 2 times faster when listening to rock music.
>> The Apollo 11 only had 20 seconds of fuel when it landed.
>> 13 people are killed each year by vending machine's falling on them.
>> There is a 1/4 pound of salt in every gallon of seawater.
>> About 1/3 of American adults are at least 20% above their recommended weight.
>> The average talker sprays about 300 microscopic saliva droplets per minute, about 2.5 droplets per word.
>> The average smell weighs 760 nanograms.
>> The Earth experiences 50,000 earthquakes each year.
>> Skin temperature does not go much above 95 degrees even on the hottest days.
>> 314 Americans had buttock lift surgery in 1994.
>> Annual growth of WWW traffic is 314,000%.
>> Experts at Intel say that microprocessor speed will double every 18 months for at least 10 years.
>> The Earth's revolution time increases .0001 seconds annually.
>> Driving at 75 miles (121 km) per hour, it would take 258 days to drive around one of Saturn's rings.
>> Driving 55 miles (88 km) per hour instead of 65 miles (105 km) per hour increases your car mileage by about 15%.
>> Airbags explode at 200 miles (322 km) per hour.
>> If we had the same mortality rate now as in 1900, more than half the people in the world today would not be alive.
>> 1/3 of all cancers are sun related.
>> The average person flexes the joints in their finger 24 million times during a lifetime.
>> There are more than 1,000 chemicals in a cup of coffee.
>> It would take 7 billion particles of fog to fill a teaspoon.
>> The average iceberg weighs 20 million tons.

Very large continent...

Jun 11, 2008 Wed

We watch the pump prices with a kind of weird/morbid fascination - and compare:

As we bemoan the slow pace at which spring approaches, we might also appreciate the fact that our weather stays pretty mild, overall - nothing like this:

Owning pets carries a certain amount of responsibility, and making sure they get their exercise is one of them. Here, the proper method to employ when walking your fish...

Further mappage~

Speaking of ballet - which we will~~ some creative advertising

Finally, some political incorrectness - get ready for the 2008 Olympics - speak Chinese

Ballet Recital Weekend - months of practice pay off!
This photo of Evelyn was used on the advertising poster this year, as well as on the program shown here~~

Jun 09, 2008 Mon

It is always so hard to pick recital pictures -- we will reduce these in size after a few days.
Barbara, Evelyn and Debra

Ann and I with herself~~

Evie, Blair and Ivey

Evelyn's character was represented as being one half alive, and the other half dead, or less alive...

Blair, Evelyn, Danika and Ivey - a small celebration after the final performance on Sunday.

The concept of, 'new to us', would describe the fun we've been having driving the fanciest car either of us have ever owned. Also, the newest, at only seven years old. Perhaps we'll touch on this some more a bit later.

Ann, behind the wheel. Discernible in the background, our other two vehicles - my 1995 Saab (117,000 miles) and the 1997 Toyota light duty pick-up (147,000 miles). Both were purchased used.

It is entirely possible that our days of buying brand-new cars are over. The last time I bought a brand-new vehicle was 20 years ago. I think I've only bought three cars brand-new, total. Before that 1989 Prelude, another 20 years had passed since I bought the other two -- a '69 Mercury Monterey (for which I traded in a 1967 Austin Healey -- bad choice) followed by a 1971 Mercury Cougar, which turned out to be a lemon with more electrical problems than you could shake a stick at. For the first six months, the dealer had it more than I did -- turned out to have the wrong wiring harness installed throughout, amongst other things.

This one owner Saturn was bought and serviced at the same dealer from which we purchased it - Why did we buy a Saturn? It was the first car we ran across that met our shopping expectations in terms of: Price, mileage and appearance. The only shopping criteria we gave up was manual transmission.

At one time or another, we have owned relatively fancy automobiles, I suppose. Lincoln, Jaguar, Cadillac -- a couple Oldsmobile StarFire convertibles!

All purchased within a few years of their date of manufacture, with relatively low mileage. In those days, American cars with American engines weren't expected to run over 80,000 miles without dismantling and replacing certain key components -- piston rings, at a minimum. As long as you had it apart, you may as well do a little work on the crankshaft and bearings, too.

But they did have power windows and power seats, air conditioning and decent radios. To say nothing of, big block 'Detroit Iron' horse power, for which one paid, extra and dearly. Anymore, what used to be considered luxury items are standard, and the fancy models have features never imagined -- heated seats, windows and mirrors...

So, for Ann and I to get a glimpse of how the other half lives, we need merely purchase a slightly used vehicle. Okay, it's not a Lexus or a BMW, but those gently used leather seats (heated!) feel pretty good - and the sound system is amazing...

The Saab is a pretty sophisticated car for its age. Certainly, one of the nicer it has been my pleasure to drive - even back in '95, automotive (at least Saab) computers were pretty fancy, and the technology overall is impressive. So, stepping up six years has revealed similar improvements in design -- safety, especially. Whereas the Saab does have dual airbags, the Saturn boasts side airbags as well, along with structural improvements that are truly space-age. I was happy to note disc brakes all around. This is a pretty cool car, even if it ain't new.

Which reminds me of a comment that Frances made when dad purchased a used Honda Accord that had a driver's side airbag. Their previous vehicle had none, and dual (passenger-side) airbags were a brand-new concept.

"Honey, this car has a driver's side airbag -- what do you say to that?"

"I'll drive." Of course, made all the more humorous if one recalls that Frances has been totally blind since the age of seven...

the original 'Malfunction Junction'

A month of shopping produces a gently used, one owner Saturn (2001) as a third vehicle for our soon to be three driver family. We decided to keep Ann's 150,000 mile 12 year old Toyota truck - too valuable for those trips to the dump, general hauling, etc. - but getting a tad worn looking for everyday use. Runs great, of course.

Jun 07, 2008 Sat

This is heritage - perhaps a bit harder to see...
Assembly, I am your 'parent' ~~

So - it is possible to halt the arrow of time, after all...

Numbers so large that it is hard to imagine them...

A few more numbers~

We are trying to remain open-minded. We are so not ready...

Jun 04, 2008 Wed

Someone we know saw this critter up close and personal. See more, here~~

Hull maintenance...

Remit is back~~

Thanks to 'Mi~~  Who noticed the sun peeking through.

Point of view -- a fast and fun opportunity - biology or physics? take this quiz

We did, with the following results:

Thanks to Jack - sunrise from the cab~

So far this month it has been neither warm nor dry, the last two days, especially. I had occasion to drive to Bellingham (45 minutes each leg) and back in a downpour. The Saab is a great car to drive in the rain, which is a bit unusual for a convertible. It doesn't leak, and the car handles well on wet pavement. One must actually work at it a bit to get the front wheels to hydroplane. It doesn't hurt that the wiper blades are new.

We have had ample opportunity to observe the rain barrels in action. The recently added overflow works well. We never imagined how little time/rain it takes to fill up two 55 gallon drums! We thought days or perhaps even weeks, when in fact it only takes a few hours. Perhaps it will be different when summer truly arrives? Sooner or later each year the grass becomes dormant for lack of water. I suppose the next modification for the rain barrel system will be some sort of pump. Gravity alone will draw the water all the way to the alley, but it doesn't exit the hose with much velocity -- certainly not enough to operate the sprinkler. In years past, we have let the grass go dormant until fall. During this time the lawnmower gets a rest. So, we have mixed feelings about keeping it green, even using 'free' rainwater. The water flows with enough alacrity to water all the flowers in the backyard. Since it is uphill to the alley and the water must travel through 65 feet of hose, watering the raised beds beyond the back fence is stretching the limits of our gravity operated system -- even though we placed the rain barrels just under the gutter. The addition of a small pump would help us put this free water to good use, perhaps?

Jun 01, 2008 Sun

Welcome to June blogging - the month where it is going to finally get HOT and sunny.

Waiting for the sun to come from behind the clouds...

Yours truly, turning 63.