A lovely October weekend

We went up to my parents' house in Glenoma, Washington for the weekend. On Saturday afternoon, we took a drive up to see the new Jackson Visitor Center at Mount Rainier National Park. The fall colors, yellow, orange, and red contrasted nicely with the dark evergreen trees. Approaching the park, we ran into clouds and fog, but just before arriving at Paradise, we got above the clouds into sunshine, and blue sky, with the grandeur of Mt. Rainier looming above us.

We picked some pears and kiwis to have fresh fruit to eat.

Friday will be Halloween, probably my least favorite holiday of the year. Celebrating witches, ghosts, etc., just bothers me as a Christian. We'll just stay home with the outside lights turned off.

One week from tomorrow is election day. I'm so tired of the negative attack ads, so I'll be glad for it to end, though I know that I'll be glued to the TV on November 4, with my laptop active, watching the election returns. Hopefully, President Obama will be a refreshing change from the current occupant of the White House, but he'll have his hands full with the economy, wars, and foreign crises. I don't know why anyone would want the job!

October is half over.

We spent yesterday organizing our garage. We bought some shelves at Costco allowing us to more easily store and stack boxes. We moved some boxes out of our house into the garage and they are still more easily accessible.

Tomorrow is my daughter Selita's last high school volleyball game. Their season hasn't be that good, but they did tie for first in a tournament at Walla Walla University.

Next weekend, we're going up to visit my parents in Glenoma, Washington.

Two weeks from tomorrow is the election. The mudslinging going on is appalling. I'll be glad to have it over with, at least for a couple of years.

Another week is almost over

It's Friday, October 10. Stock prices on Wall Street continue to drop. Our friend Les was laid off from his job on Tuesday. I'm glad that I'm not real close to retirement; at the rate things are going, I'll have to wait until I'm 80!

I find it hard to believe that there are still one in four Americans who approve of the abysmal job that Bush is doing as President. Only a little over three more weeks and we'll have a new President-elect. Either of the major party candidates will be a big improvement over Bush, but I'm hoping that the polls are accurate and that Barack Obama will be our next president.

Tonight and tomorrow, Joy is attending a Women of Faith conference at the Rose Garden with some of her lady friends. James and I have multimedia duty tomorrow at Pleasant Valley Church.

On Sunday, we're going to do some more organizing of our garage.

October is here

Last weekend, we went over to Pacific City on the beach to see my brother and sister-in-law, visiting from Tennessee. The weather was absolutely marvelous, with not a cloud in the sky. We were staying in house directly on the beach, taking a long walk on Saturday afternoon and having a fire on the beach.

This weekend, the weather is much different. It has been cloudy, windy and rainy, so far. Tomorrow is supposed to be nicer--hopefully. Joy and I are planning on going up to Bagby Hot Springs to soak in the hot water. That'll be our second hot water soak; last evening, we went to Portland Tub and Tan and spent an hour in a romantic pool of water.

Only one more month until the election. I can't wait until it's over with; I'm tired of all of the mud slinging that's going on. I feel sorry for whoever wins. Bush is leaving his successor a terrible situation, what with Iraq, the financial situation, etc. I'm still upset that I am having to help pay for the bad business decisions of multi-millionaires on Wall Street. I am glad that my congressman, Earl Blumenauer, and one of Oregon's senators, Ron Wyden, were brave enough to face their party leaders and the president and vote against the package. Already, today, I'm hearing rumors of more bailouts to follow. My children and grandchildren are going to have to pay for this bailout and the war in Iraq, and that's just plain wrong!

I'm up in Redmond, Washington

I'm in Redmond at the Redmond Marriott Town Center hotel for the Pacific Northwest Software Symposium. Yesterday's sessions were interesting. I learned much more about SOA and the Java Messaging Service (JMS). The speaker for my sessions was Mark Richards. The keynote speaker last night was Jared Richardson (Jared's blog). Jared's speech on Career 2.0 was humorous, but good. I'm going to have to follow some of his suggestions. I already do "sanity hacking", using PHP/MySQL/Python/etc. at home to keep up my skill set, and learn new skills, beyond the Java that I use at work. Today, I'm planning on attending seminars about the Google Web Toolkit taught by David Geary, and Java Regular Expressions by Neal Ford.

This afternoon, Joy is coming up here with our friends Les & Keri to go see The Phantom of the Opera at The Paramount Theatre. We're planning on going out to eat before hand, and it gives Joy an excuse to dress me up in a suit and tie. Oh, well, when Joy's happy, I'm happy!

A new baby elephant

On Saturday, we went to Oregon Zoo to see Samudra, the baby elephant that was born on August 23. He was sleeping when we were there, but still cute. They have a new frog exhibit, which Joy liked, being the frog lover that she is.

On Saturday night, our son John was at a friend's house. He was planning on taking a fishing trip with them yesterday; however, he was out playing tag in the woods in the dark Saturday night and collided with a tree, ending up with a broken nose.

Yesterday, we had a 50th birthday party for our friend Les. He was totally surprised. Joy made him a birthday cake with a golf theme.

Next weekend, we're going to see The Phantom of the Opera with Les & Keri at the Paramount Theatre in Seattle. It should be a fun time.

September is here--August is gone

It was a quiet Labor Day weekend at home. We worked on organizing the garage, relaxed, and watched movies.

Friday evening, we watched Doctor Zhivago. It's been many years since I've seen it, so it was somewhat different than I remembered.

On Sunday evening, we went to Mt. Hood Theatre with our friends Les and Keri to watch a double feature, Hancock and Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. Both were fun, if not exactly Oscar contenders.

Yesterday afternoon, we watched Airplane and The Italian Job on DVD. We've gotten several of these older movies recently at bargain prices.

I'm glad that Hurricane Gustav has turned out to be less destructive than it could have been, but I still feel sorry for people that have lost their home and possessions due to it. After Katrina, I'd have been moving to higher ground, myself!

We've been keeping up pretty good in our diet and workout regimen, going to the gym almost every day, even if just for the swimming pool and sauna.

We've joined a fitness club

Yesterday, in an attempt for Joy and I to get in better shape, we joined the new LA Fitness club down the street from our house. It's only been open a little over a week. It has racquetball, swimming pool, weights, cardio equipment, a basketball court, classes, a hot tub, saunas, you name it. We plan to go there at least three times a week, so that we can get trimmer and healthier; since Joy won't be getting off work until about 5 in the afternoon, I may stop on my way home to exercise sometimes. Joy's first day at her new job was tiring for her, so we went and swam a couple of laps and soaked in the hot tub last evening.

On Wednesday, our youngest son, John began his freshman year at Portland Adventist Academy. We just hope that he really applies himself.

James and I have multimedia duty tomorrow at PVC.

Another hot stretch in Portland

For the last week (until this morning, actually), it has been pretty hot for Portland. Thursday through Saturday all got to 103 degrees Fahrenheit here. Yesterday it was about 90. Finally, today is much cooler, only in the 70s. On Saturday we went over to the coast to beat the heat. It was foggy and drizzly right at the beach, but that felt good after the hot temperatures here. The worst part was the traffic. It seemed like everyone from the valley had gone over the coast range to join us in escaping the heat!

Joy just got the news about a new job that she is going to be starting this Thursday. Her previous job at PAES ended due to insufficient children in her classroom. At Mt. Tabor, she'll be getting more hours plus benefits, a double blessing. Also, her primary job will be watching babies, her favorite age group.

We've been paying attention to Michael Phelps record run of gold medals at the 2008 Olympics in Beijing, China. Pretty awesome. I can't even imagine eating 12000 calories a day! He doesn't look like he has an ounce of fat on his body. Maybe I need to start swimming.

Yesterday, I had a Dr. Who marathon with my friend John. I record several episodes on my DVR and then we watch them together a couple of times a year. The last few shows were some of the best that I've ever watched.

August already

Wow, it's already August 7. Time is sure flying.

John, our youngest son, is down in California, visiting with his cousin Justin. While he's there, they will go to Six Flags Discovery Kingdom. He'll get to ride some real roller coasters! He'll fly back by himself on Southwest Airlines, another new experience for him.

This weekend, we're planning to go the Oregon Zoo and enjoy seeing the animals.

We're all sore...

We had another busy weekend. On Saturday, we got together with Joy's family. Joy's Uncle Rod, who she hadn't seen since she was a little girl, was there visiting from Montana. Her sister Julie was up from California, and with her sisters from Vernonia and Vancouver, along with their kids, it was a full, loud, and lively meeting. Saturday evening, we went up to Vancouver so that I could work on Janie's computer. I installed a router and got everything working, while we watched My Mom's New Boyfriend.

Yesterday, we finished emptying our storage unit. That's why we're sore! We're still unpacking and organizing the boxes, but it is nice to see the light at the end of the tunnel. Hopefully, we won't need to move again for a long time!

A nice, but busy weekend

On Saturday, we went to Camp Meeting at the Gladstone Park Conference Center. It was a nice day, warm, but not hot. We ate lunch with our good friends Les & Keri and their children and grand children. We listened to inspirational music and good talks by Robert Quintana, the pastor of the Frederick, Maryland SDA Church. After the evening meeting, True!mprov had a performance that had everyone laughing hard.

Yesterday, we emptied most of our storage unit. We did enough that we should be completely out in a single U-Haul truck load next Sunday.

Another Friday

It's been a short work week, after our mini-vacation last week. We're still unpacking boxes from our storage unit.

Tomorrow, we're going to the 2008 Oregon Camp Meeting at Gladstone to be with our friends and enjoy music and fellowship.

We're in the process of getting a kitten for the family.

A great mini-vacation

On Friday, Joy and I drove up to Anacortes, Washington to celebrate our first anniversary. After checking into our motel, the Cap Sante Inn, we went down to see Deception Pass. It was very picturesque, with the blue water and sky contrasting with the green of the trees and grass.

On Saturday morning, we boarded the Washington State Ferries MV Chelan, taking us from Anacortes through the beautiful San Juan Islands to Syndey, British Columbia. We took a shuttle to Butchart Gardens. We spent several hours wondering through the grounds, taking hundreds of pictures of the flowers, trees, and scenery. We took a double decker bus back to Sydney and did some shopping for an hour before going back to the ferry terminal. We took the evening ferry back to Anacortes stopping at Friday Harbor along the way. As we travelled, Mt. Baker glowed with the evening sun.

Sunday, we went up to North Cascades National Park, a two hour drive. Awesome mountains, forests, lakes, rivers and gorges surrounded us. For dinner, we went to the Swinomish Northern Lights Casino.

Yesterday, we drove back home, going up to Mount St. Helens National Volcanic Monument along the way. We were tired, but happy when we got home.

A Long Weekend Off

It was nice to have a three day weekend off. Friday, we went to Sellwood Park with a bunch of friends from our church. After getting home, John lit off fireworks in celebration of July 4. On Saturday we had a potluck lunch with the same group of friends. The weather was on the cool side, but still very enjoyable.

Yesterday, we moved several van loads of boxes from our storage unit into our house. We plan to move most of our boxes that way and then we should have a pretty simple move of the big items; probably a single truck load.

This is a short work week again--Yeah! Joy and I are going up to Anacortes and Victoria to celebrate our 1st anniversary July 11 - July 14.

Last day of June

It is hard to believe that 2008 is half way over already! Time seems to be flying.

It was a very hot weekend for Portland. On Saturday, it got to 100 degrees here, which is much higher than our normal summer temperatures of the 80s. The forecast is for it to be more moderate through the next week. On Saturday evening, we watched The Other Boleyn Girl with our friends Les & Keri. It was an interesting, but not very historically accurate movie. Last night we watched Fools Gold, a cute movie.

Joy and I attended a credit repair seminar over the weekend by Jim Longacre, the creator of the recreditpair Credit Education Software. We're going to use the methods that we learned to improve our credit rating and hopefully be able to get a newer vehicle to replace our old Ford van and its 14 mpg.

This is a short work week, since Friday is July 4th.

A nice weekend in Oregon.

James and I had Multimedia Duty Sabbath morning at PVC. There was a strawberry shortcake feed between 1st and 2nd services--Yummy! For the afternoon, we joined some friends from church in a picnic at Sellwood Park. It was comfortable under the trees, eating, visiting, and watching some baseball being played.

Yesterday, we did more unpacking, getting the kitchen, the office, and the living room into better shape. In the evening, we watched a couple of DVD movies on our new 42" Toshiba LCD TV; even without Blu-ray, the quality of picture is dramatically better. Jumper was exciting, but required a total suspension of disbelief, at least for me; of course, many movies have that effect to me. The Bucket List was a good, wholesome film that made me value life and relationships. Of the two, The Bucket List is the only one that I'd consider buying.

Finished with the move

We're all moved out of our apartment into our house. There are still lots of boxes to unpack, but it is nice to have the extra space to live in.

Yesterday morning, I watched Tiger Woods win the 2008 US Open playoff. Both players did well, but I've been a Tiger Woods fan since his first Master's victory, back in 1997.

Today, I participated in the Firefox 3 Download Day, trying to set a record for the most downloads in a 24 hour period. I've been using Firefox as my primary browser for years. The extra speed from version 3 is appreciated.

Father's Day Weekend

It's going to a busy, and not too fun, Father's Day. We're moving on Sunday into a rental house. It will be nice to have lots more room, but moving is on my top 10 worst list.

The last weekend has been busy with graduations. On Thursday, John graduated from 8th grade at PAES on Sunday, Vainiaku graduated from 12th grade at PAA. Now, John is a freshman at PAA, while Selita is a senior there.

Gas prices keep shooting up. At one of the stations that I drive past on the way to work, a gallon of gas went up 5 cents in the nine hours that I was at work. I know that I'm driving a lot less now than I had in the past!

June is starting

It's going to a busy week. Thursday is both Joy's birthday and John's graduation day from Portland Adventist Elementary School. After John graduates, his 8th grade class is having two parties, lasting all night long! Because of all of this activity, we'll probably celebrate Joy's birthday on Friday.

On Sunday, Vainiaku will be graduating from Portland Adventist Academy. Knowing that I have a daughter going to college in the fall makes me feel old!

In between all of these items, we're also packing, getting ready to move into a rental house. It will only be about a mile from our apartment, so that part won't be too bad. It will be nice to have twice as much space to live in, along with a garage, so we won't have to keep our rented storage unit.