Point Defiance Park

I wanted to do a hike I hadn't done before, so this morning I went to Point Defiance Park in Tacoma.  I've never had a reason to go to Tacoma before - Seattle's ugly neighbor to the South - but this might be it, since this was a good hike.  Lots of parking, dedicated hiking paths which are well maintained and well signposted, a decent length 4.5 mile undulating loop trail, nice paths through old growth forest and views over Puget Sound  (I think I might have seen a whale - if it wasn't a whale, it was a bunch of seals feeding on some fish).  And I didn't even do all the side trips I could have - historical sites, gardens, and beach access were all easily reached from the loop trail, and the park also has a zoo, an aquarium and museums.
 

Spencer Island Natural Wildlife Reserve (Again)

I started a New Year's Resolution early today - to go out for a hike every day I'm not working, come rain or shine unless the weather is truly treacherous.  So today I went to Spencer Island Natural Wildfire Reserve for the first time in - searching blog - just over 2 years.  Not quite sure why I go there - it's right by the freeway so you have traffic noise, it's next to a waste treatment facility so the smell can be disgusting and half the island is set aside for hunting and I am no fan of guns or hunting.  But it's easy to get to - half an hour drive north - it's a flat and unbusy 4 mile hike, and the birdlife is amazingly abundant - loads of ducks in the water, loads of songbirds in the brush, and loads of birds of prey - including a brief glimpse of a huge bald eagle - perched in the trees.
  

Stir Crazy

Note to self - if you're not going back to England for Christmas, then at least make some plans to get out and go away for a few days.  The weather here has sucked over the Christmas period - wet and windy - and I am spending way too much time staying in with limited human interaction.  Not good.  Not healthy.  At least I've managed to free up space on my DVR.... 

Made in Britain

So, the Royal Mail produced a D-Day stamp featuring American troops landing in Indonesia.  Not on D-Day.  Not insulting or disrespectful at all.

Wall

As much as I don't like a government shutdown, I am totally with the Democrats in refusing to allow Trump to squander all this money on building a stupid, pointless wall with Mexico.  Let Trump fester in the White House for as long as the shutdown lasts, sending out his petty whiny tweets.  What a pathetic man-baby he is.  I'm not totally against taking steps to improve border security, but building a useless f*cking expensive wall does not help.  I honestly wouldn't be surprised if we get to see the PR disaster that is Trump on vacation playing golf, whilst the Secret Service that are protecting him are not getting paid.  Mind you, this shutdown is not exactly doing my stock investments any favors - so hope things get sorted out quickly in the new year.  Trump's entire presidency has taken the stock market on a roller coaster ride - it's a big concern that we might be on the verge of a massive bear market.  My company's stock price has dropped about 25% in the last 6 months - that is not good.

Christmas Songs

My favorite Christmas song - in actuality an anti-war song.

Christmas Films

I watched 2 classic Christmas movies today - Home Alone and Die Hard.  Home Alone - where to start, so many observations.  I'm mainly struck by how huge the house is, how all the parts with John Candy could've and should've been cut, and how incredibly implausible everything is.  But hey, I guess that is part of the magic of the film.  Die Hard is just a bona fide action classic.  Love the cocaine douchebag guy, the ridiculous secondary characters (Argyle!), and maybe one of movie's best ever villains in Hans Gruber.

24 Days of Christmas: Days 21-24

Instead of writing a long diatribe about having to work yesterday (Sunday) and today (Christmas Eve) whilst not feeling well - that Japanese food last week has really done a number on me -  I'll just take this opportunity to wish you a Merry Christmas!

Rugger

One of the American sports channels has been showing a lot of rugby recently - showing one or two English premiership games a weekend, not live but a full replay later in the day.  Which is fine by me, since I DVR and watch them later anyway.  And they're even showing some of the European games.  I enjoy watching a game of rugby on telly a lot more than watching a game of American football.  And I think it's a good sport to watch in person as well.  I think if I was back in England, I would want to be a season ticket holder at whatever club is nearest to me.  And if I was coming back for Christmas, I would definitely want to watch "The Big Game" at Twickenham.  But who is my team?  There is Bath - who I saw play a couple of times when I studied there.  Is it Leicester - who I also saw play a couple of times when I studied there?  Or is it Harlequins - the "local" side when I come back to the UK?  I honestly don't know, but I think I do need to pledge my allegiance to somebody.   

Man City 2-3 Palace

Well, I didn't see that coming.  A great result, including a great goal.  I had the fortune to be able to watch the game live on TV here, and when Palace were 2-1 up and even 3-1 up, I wasn't confident that they would hold on for the victory.  So that was a pleasant, if tense, surprise.  According to some dubious statistical modeling that I saw, Palace had a 2% chance of winning.  Screw statistics.  We'll probably go ahead and lose to Cardiff on Boxing Day now.

24 Days of Christmas: Days 16-20

What happens when you have a really busy day, and it looks like you might have to work full days on Christmas Eve Eve (despite it being a Sunday) and Christmas Eve?  You get some more photos of some crappy Lego models.  Sorry.

No Outage

Another windstorm hit our region today, leaving 300,000 without power.  I was absolutely positive that I would come home to find I had no power - the outage map indicated that a tree had brought down a power line near me - but miraculously I came home to find my Christmas lights on and no indications that I had ever had a power cut.  A Christmas miracle indeed.

Peaks and Troughs

I’ve had the good and the bad at work over the last few days.  The good – I got a small gift card as a sign of appreciation for the work I’m currently doing, but more significantly I also found out that I will be getting a promotion in the new year.  Nice.  A bit overdue, but should hopefully make for a decent annual bonus and salary bump. The bad – went for a holiday lunch today, but unfortunately it was to a Japanese restaurant.  I am not a fan of Japanese cuisine, but I got outvoted so I went along anyway.   Bad idea.  I’d already woken up today with an upset stomach, and the weird Japanese food that I picked out did not go down well.  At all.  To the extent that I was vomiting and had diarrhea this afternoon.  At work.  I don’t like going to Number 2’s in my office toilet at the best of times, so this was absolutely horrific.  And I’ve got loads of work to do at the moment, so it wasn’t like I could just go home mid-afternoon.  This is why I don’t go to Japanese restaurants, and never will again.

Downhill

I’ve been thinking a lot about my mortality recently - and watching yesterday's film has probably just exacerbated that.  I know, not exactly getting into the festive spirit!  But I'm just more aware of the increasing number of signs that I’m getting older.  From being oblivious to modern music trends, to suffering from various physical and mental ailments.  I’m sure more and more grammatical errors are creeping into these blog entries (I’m NOT counting Americanisms!), no matter how many times I might read them over before I post!  The last 2 or 3 weeks have been rough – I’ve had to take a sick day, and work through a number of other days where I wanted to take a sick day but had timeline commitments so couldn’t afford to miss work.  I've been suffering a lot of migraines recently, and I’m fairly sure that this is associated with elevated blood pressure.  I think I can get a handle on it when I eat healthily and get regular exercise, but that isn’t something I’ve been particularly good at recently.  I've also not been sleeping well, not helped by the fact that I’m increasingly having to empty my bladder in the middle of the night.  Also I’ve become quite obsessed with my appearance.  My hair is increasingly graying, but for quite a number of years I’ve had this very obvious grey patch.  Someone commented that it looks like a bald spot.  And now I can’t be sure whether there is some truth to that or whether the grey hair makes it look worse than it really is.  I can’t stop staring and fretting about it now every time I look in the mirror.  This might be the last time I cut my hair this short.  And everything is only going to get worse as I get older… oh boy.

They Will Not Grow Old

Went to the cinema this afternoon to watch the Peter Jackson documentary They Will Not Grow Old.  I think it aired on BBC over the Armistice weekend, but not in the US - and this was one of only 2 days on which they are showing it at cinemas, so I thought I'd go watch it on the big screen in 3D.  And it was good - though I still think impossible to try to humanize an inhumane war.  I'm not sure whether the 3D really worked - I think it added a little bit too much artificiality to the film.  At the screening we also got an extra 30 minute behind the scenes look at how they made the film - and it kind of revealed a lot of the subjectivity that went into colorizing the film, adding sound, etc.  But I liked the intimacy that the film gave to the war, and some of the people who took part (and probably died) in it.  The actual interviews that made up the commentary would be really interesting by themselves, but in combination with the video footage it does make for an important historical document of one of the saddest chapters of the 20th century.

24 Days of Christmas: Days 9-15

Some of these are getting weird.

Thar She Blows

Woke up today to inspect the damage from last night's storm, and look what I found:

Yes, that is a large branch that just missed causing any structural damage and is hanging perilously on the power lines into my house.    It was tantalizingly out of reach when I leaned out of the bathroom window, but I have the advantage of my landlord next door - who was able to bring out his ladder, climb up onto the roof and get rid of it.  So much damage from this first windstorm of the season - my garden has got loads of bits of tree everywhere.  And on a drive through the neighborhood, it was clear that a lot of stuff had come down everywhere, including some big trees - lots of remains from clearing debris from the roads overnight and today, and the traffic lights were still not working.  Another storm due tomorrow - but rain rather than wind.

Windstorm

My power has just come back on after having been out all evening.  I bought a load of candles just a few weekends ago, so already got good use out of them.  First big windstorm of the season - it knocked out power for more than 100,000 homes apparently, including everyone in my neighborhood.  I think I was a lucky one to have power back already - I'm just looking at the online outage map and there still seem to be loads of people nearby without power, with lots of downed trees knocking down power lines.  Made for an interesting drive home - none of the lights were on at any intersections, and loads of tree debris on the road.  I'm probably going to have to spend time tomorrow clearing my patio/deck and driveway of all the crap that's come down.  This is why I purchased my leaf-blower.

Work Outings

I skipped the main office Christmas party this year – which was last week and too much effort to go to.  However, I did attend today’s department Christmas outing.  Normally they bring food in, but today was better because we had some reservations at a local bar.  And it was a bar with lots of games – so was able to play pool (and show off my newly developed skills thanks to owning my own table!), play some arcade games and do surprisingly well at that throw lots of basketballs into a basket game.  Only had 3 or 4 drinks, but that was still way too many for a lightweight like me – especially on a weekday lunchtime.  So, as you can imagine, didn’t manage to do much work this afternoon!  It wasn’t a proper Christmas meal, but still nice to have a carvery and a decent meal.  The same thing happens every time we go out as a department – everyone goes there, have their food, then most people will head back to work or home (specifically the Chinese contingent), leaving the actual more sociable people (and me) to hang around chatting and drinking.  That is the best bit – it’s just a shame it doesn’t happen more often… however, 2 more holiday lunches next week.

Brexigeddon

I’ve been watching the Brexit chaos unfold from afar, and what a glorious train wreck it is.  A welcome distraction from whatever temper tantrum President Trump is having now.  What should happen – and what the Conservative party will never do – is have another Brexit referendum.  I think it is perfectly justifiable to do this based on how close the vote was and the lack of information/misinformation at the time of the previous referendum, and what we know now on the actual details and consequences of leaving the EU.  I have to believe that as long as there isn’t any more undue online Russian interference, the people would vote to stay this time.  Thereby avoiding all this nonsense.  But nope, the people in charge are determined to see this through no matter the short and long-term cost and damage to a once glorious nation.  I’ll just continue to watch the Pound exchange rate plummet – and wait for the inevitable hard exit on 29 March next year and subsequent societal collapse.

Seahawks

After Seattle Seahawks' Monday Night Football win, they apparently have a 99% chance of making the playoffs.  Which makes the local fans round here even more insufferable.  Considering they started the season so badly, this can be considered something of a major surprise.  Unfortunately, or fortunately depending on who you ask, they happen to be in the same division as the 11-2 LA Rams so they will only be a wildcard team at best and probably won't have any home games in the playoffs.  I'm so sad for the local fans (sarcasm).  I'm still conflicted about whether to support the LA Chargers or not, who happen to be a good team this year.  Wouldn't it be ironic if they won it all whilst they were in LA, something they couldn't do in San Diego and even though nobody wants them in LA.  I don't think I can ever forgive the ownership and the NFL for deserting San Diego.

Company News

My company announced today a new chairman and CEO.  The current guy is stepping down at the end of the year, so things should get interesting quickly next year.  The uncertainty about who is going to lead our company is now replaced by uncertainty over what direction the new guy wants to take us in.  And I think he got poached for a LOT of money from a rival (I saw $30 million+ on one website), so I hope it is worth it (as long as the stock price goes up, I'll be happy!).  Let the carnage begin.

Best of the Year Lists

It's that time of year when all these best of the year lists come out - the ten best films of 2018, the ten best tv shows of 2018, the ten best video games of 2018, etc etc.  What I'm struck by is just how clueless I am when it comes to modern music - I see these lists of the best songs of 2018 or the best albums of 2018, and I don't recognize any of them.  Or if I do recognize the name of the artist, it's not because of their music but because they've made the pop culture news for some other stupid reason like a twitter feud with a beloved celebrity.  Low, Janelle Monae, Idles, Kacey Musgraves, Mitski, Cardi B, Pusha T, Kamasi Washington, Christine and the Queens, Tirzah.  I have absolutely no idea what any of these artists sound like - and almost all of them I've never even heard of before - and yet they all have albums that are currently mentioned the most on music critics top ten lists for 2018.  Absolutely no clue.  Does that say something about me?  Does that say something about who and how we listen to music nowadays?  Does music just absolutely suck nowadays? 

24 Days of Christmas: Days 3-8

Day 3

Day 4

Day 5

Day 6

Day 7

Day 8

Refrigerated Food

I read yet another online article today about food storage.  And, yet again, that keeping certain foods in a refrigerator isn't a good idea or even necessary.  The list of these foods included:

Bananas, bread, melons, peppers, pineapples, tomatoes, pears, beans, eggs

Some of these I was aware of - and have to tried to make certain other family members also aware of - but some of these I am not.  I definitely keep more fruit and veg in my fridge than apparently I need to - but just like certain family members, I'm probably not going to change my bad habits.

When you have a bad day ...

... sometimes you just need the soothing tones of Bob Ross to make the world better again.

Print Media

Print media is gradually dying, and it is starting to reflect in their really poor customer service.  I’ve got issues with Time magazine now, a magazine which I’ve subscribed to ever since a subscription was gifted to me a while ago (thank you if it was from you, definitely one of the better gifts I’ve got!).  I hadn’t received this week’s issue, and I went online to check my account and it says it has expired.  What?  Even though the box for automatic renewal is checked.  I have contacted customer service, but haven’t heard anything back yet.  I remember I previously contacted them to complain about why my automatic annual subscription was so much more than what I’ve seen online for the same subscription – and only got back a nonsensical reply from someone whose first language was clearly not English.  I wonder if they’ve interpreted that to mean that I want to cancel my account.  God knows.  What a pain in the ass.

Tire Pressures

New cars have lots of flashy safety features – but not all of them are good.  I’ve already expressed my displeasure with the lane assist system on my car which occasional causes my steering to veer away suddenly and frighteningly even though I’m perfectly in my lane.  Another feature that gets on my nerves is the tire pressure warning system.  We’ve had some colder weather recently, and not for the first time when the temperature has dropped my tire pressure warning light has come on.  So I checked the tire pressures this morning, which were good enough, then re-calibrated the tire pressure warning system.  But I have no doubts that it will come on again the next time there is a drop in temperature.  I don’t need this system to come on every time the temperature gets a bit colder (even though colder temperature does cause a slight but not significant decrease in tire pressure), I only want it to come on when I have a puncture and a tire is actually going down.  However, I don’t think the system is even good enough to tell you which tire it is if a problem like that ever happens.  For all the bells and whistles on new cars, they are a long way from perfect – which I think makes the advent of self-driving cars still a long way away.  And I miss having a CD player in my car.

Christmas Decorations

I wish there was a fixed date when you are supposed to put up and take down Christmas decorations – I’m never quite sure when to do mine.  Unofficially here, it’s the Thanksgiving weekend (though the Christmas tv ads start airing almost immediately after Halloween!).  But this year, Thanksgiving was way too early.  So I put up my decorations this weekend – but even that feels kind of early, so although they’re up I haven’t turned anything on yet.  Compared to some of the excessively gaudy and tasteless displays that other household have round here (not to say expensive, some of their electric bills must be shocking), my decorations are really pitiable.  But then, I don’t really need to try since you can’t see my house from the road and the decorations are really only for my own pleasure and benefit (plus a few of my immediate neighbors).  Nonetheless, I wish my decorations were classier and a bit more refined than they are – and I should make better use of my surroundings, I could hang some lights on some of the trees outside my house and that would be really pretty.  But instead I shall make do with what I have – and maybe get some better quality Christmas decor on sale in January. 

24 Days of Christmas: Days 1-2

Day 1

Day 2

Palace 2-0 Burnley

That feels like an important win.  Breaks a run of 8 games without victory.  Finally won a home game.  And all against a fellow bottom dweller.  I only saw brief highlights of the game, but by all accounts played well and deserved it.  Hopefully can build on this, and string together a few more good results (starting with Brighton on Tuesday) to go with the good performances.

Empire

I used to subscribe to Empire Magazine, even when I moved to the US.  But I stopped subscribing and I stopped reading it a while ago – for lots of reasons: I no longer go to the cinema regularly, it seemed like the quality of the magazine had deteriorated with a high turnover of editors, and the expense and lag for when I received the magazine in the US was too much.  But even so, I like to keep an eye out for their end of year issue and particularly their list of the best movies of the year.  But having just seen the list this year, I am officially and totally done with the magazine.  When a supposedly credible film magazine ranks Avengers: Infinity War as the best film of 2018, that is the straw that breaks the camel’s back.  There is NO WAY that this is the best film of the year, it isn’t even a particularly good film.  No wonder print media is dying, this is a disgusting slap in the face for film aficionados who might actually still consider subscribing to your magazine.  Who makes this kind of decision?  I feel vindicated for no longer reading your crappy magazine.

Every Cloud Has A Silver Lining

It’s that time of year when either everyone is busy or coming down with something, so couldn’t find anybody to play table tennis with me this afternoon.  So decided to go out for a stroll, and fortuitously timed it for a spectacular sunset over Lake Union.  Nice.

Traffic

The commute to and from work has been absolutely horrific since Thanksgiving.  Has it historically always been this bad?  I have no idea - but I think the wet weather is not helping.  At least it hasn't been cold yet, which makes it even worse.  But with the higher volume of traffic comes a higher volume of bad drivers, and I am very prone to road rage.  I've definitely exchanged a few hand gestures with some other drivers over the last few days.  I may not be a particularly great driver, but at least I know how to stop at a stop sign and to signal when I change lanes or make a turn.  Apparently that isn't something they teach at American driving school.  I read somewhere that Seattle drivers are considered to be some of the worst in the country - that comes as absolutely no surprise to me.  Thank god we don't have that many roundabouts round here - I've seen drivers go round them the wrong way, they just don't have a clue.   

Cheapskate

I’ve just found out that one of the websites I frequent on a daily basis is moving to a digital subscription service.  I don’t care how relatively cheap it might be to subscribe - $5 a month or whatever – I absolutely refuse to pay to read news articles (in this case, culture/entertainment news) on the internet.  The Seattle Times – the best, and only, daily paper here - also works on a subscription service, and I hate the fact that I can’t go online to read it’s local news stories for free.  Yes, yes, the internet is killing journalism blah blah blah, but there are plenty of other ways to create income from online content without resorting to charging the consumer – I’m no fan of digital ads, but I appreciate their necessity.  So once again I will have to find an inferior website to fulfill my entertainment news fix.  Tragic.   

Nonsensical

I don't know whose stupid idea it was to have a deadline for a deliverable on the Monday after the 4 day Thanksgiving holiday weekend, but such are the joys of working at my company.  I had completed all my tasks well before Thanksgiving, but naturally was busy today working on a load of updates requested by other people because they had left their review of my work until the very last possible moment.  Utterly predictable, utterly frustrating.  I've actually been working really hard recently, and I think I've done more than enough to earn a promotion at the end of the year.  If I don't get it, I will really not be happy.  At all.

Quote

"It will be a fight that is blow for blow, with each of us trying to get the upper hand, trying to impose our will on the other guy."

What is being talking about?  Boxing?  Nope.  MMA?  Nope.  The World Chess Championship?  Well of course.  Something that I wouldn't have even known about if it wasn't for the fact that one of the competitors is an American.  Apparently they've drawn 11 straight games so far.  Thrilling stuff I'm sure.


I'm trying to keep politics out of this blog, but what a disgrace that a big climate change report got released on Black Friday afternoon by the Trump government.  A classic holiday news dump, despite the important and dire information it contained.  Apparently Fox News spent an entire 30 seconds of it's coverage on it.  When you have Republican Senators saying stuff like "We know that our climate is changing.  Our climate always changes and we see those ebbs and flows through time.", you see how little these people care about our planet, which is shameful and repugnant.   

Forrest Gump

I was watching Forrest Gump today, and I reached a somewhat controversial conclusion - I really like it.  It may have been very successful and won lots of Oscars, including Best Picture, but time has not been kind and it is kind of critically reviled now.  But I find it extremely watchable - though whether it is better than Pulp Fiction or Shawshank Redemption, both of which came out at a similar time, is extremely debatable.  But drop your cynicism and just enjoy it for what it is.  Definitely one of those films that if you're channel hopping and you come across it, as I did, you're happy.

Winter Storm Warning

Today is the Apple Cup - the college (American) football rivalry game between the University of Washington (go Huskies) and Washington State University (go Cougars).  Check out the conditions they are playing in:

This is my state!  No snow or winter conditions where I am though, just rain.  This is being played in Pullman in East Washington, and it looks bad.  I wouldn't want to be a University of Washington fan braving the mountain passes to get to and from the game - apparently there have been lots of spin-outs in the icy and snowy conditions at the higher elevations.  I think the passes may even be currently closed due to the number of accidents.  Nasty. 

Happy Thanksgiving

... more like Happy Nopantsgiving, as I didn't do much today.  However, I did have a roast turkey dinner with all it's trimmings - thanks to a trip to the supermarket yesterday where I unexpectedly found a prepared meal I could buy, rather than having to actually cook a whole turkey for myself.  Lazy.  I feel like a cheat, so I might go all out on cooking a whole Christmas dinner for myself.  Wishful thinking perhaps!

One of America's Great Mysteries

... why are there so many country music award shows?  The Academy of Country Music Awards, the Country Music Association Awards, the Country Music Television Awards - just to name a few.  For a genre of music that absolutely blows, that is way too much. 

Monday Night Football

Normally I don't bother watching the Monday Night (American) Football game - the game starts when I'm still at work, and it normally features one or two mediocre teams.  Yesterday was an exception - it featured the 2 teams with the best records (both 9-1), and was a really high-scoring shootout with about a thousand lead changes, ending with a victory for the Los Angeles Rams over the Kansas City Chiefs by a score of 54-51.  Entertaining?  Yes.  Will both these teams reach the playoffs?  Yes.  Will either team win the Superbowl?  I'm saying it now - no.  Offense wins regular season games, defense wins championships.  And as you can tell from the score, neither team has any defense to speak of.

Wettest Day of the Year

"Statistically", today is supposed to be the wettest day of the year in Seattle.  And what was the weather like today?  Naturally, clear and sunny and absolutely no rain.  So go suck that statistics.  But apparently we have a wet and windy Thanksgiving in store later this week.  I had vague plans to go up to Canada for Thanksgiving, but I doubt that will happen.  And that's not just due to the weather, but I've been working so hard recently that I just want to do nothing but chill out for a few days.

American History

I've watched or recorded a number of documentaries recently on various aspects of US history that I am not overly familiar with - think things like Watergate, Jonestown, the Wild West, the history of the FBI, Bill Clinton's presidency.  Even a documentary called A Murder in Mansfield - which randomly caught my attention for obvious reasons, but was actually a really interesting look at family and grief.  I think it's coincidental that these documentaries are all airing around now - but it is kind of weird that there are so many of them currently.  Perhaps it is enlightening to see that we haven't learnt any lessons from the past when we look at the present.   

Takeout

My oven went kaput yesterday evening.  Or to be more precise, the keypad on the oven stopped working and I couldn't turn it on or change the settings.  The kind of thing that I would have to fix myself if I ever owned my own place - but when I had a look at the electrics I didn't have a clue what to do - but thankfully I don't own my own place so I could ask somebody else to take a look.  So whilst my landlord tries to jerry-rig a fix, to avoid shelling out on a whole new oven/stove unit, I am not able to do any cooking (minus what I can microwave).  So eating out or getting takeout it shall be for the time being (I've been promised it won't be for long!).

England 3-0 USA

Goddammit, not a single person said anything to me about the game and the result.  Even though we cruised to a comfortable victory.  I think the casual soccer fan here cares more about whichever Premier League side they arbitrarily choose to support than they do about their national side.  Probably for the best, because they suck - and it's one of the few sports Americans can't claim to be the best in the world at.  It probably didn't help that the Seahawks were also playing a Thursday night game, so that's where most people's attention was at round here.  I didn't mind, as it made the commute home significantly better than a normal Thursday night!   

The Perfect Christmas Present

Yes, this is apparently for real.  And yes, I have ordered one.  I’ll say it is for my nephew or niece, but really it is for me.

Bottom

I'm clearly on some kind of 90's British TV comedy kick at the moment, just been watching some clips from Bottom.  The perfect childish blend of violence, profanity and fart jokes for the teenage me - no wonder I loved it.

6 Months

 A bad day at work was redeemed by learning that the new, and last, series of Game of Thrones will be on in less than 6 months time.  At last, thank god.  I read a load of interesting fan theories on this last season - I won't list them here for spoilers sake, since I think some of them will probably come to pass, but inevitably I don't expect all the loose strands to be neatly resolved so I must manage expectations.  However knowing how Game of Thrones doesn't care for a happy ending, I expect the White Walkers to win the Great War.

World War I Movies

What with it being Veteran's Day today - not a company holiday so I had to go into work, which is kind of disrespectful - plus the 100 year anniversary of the end of World War I yesterday, it got me thinking about World War I movies.  Why hasn't Hollywood embraced this genre?  There have been plenty of World War II movies, but no decent World War I movies that I can think of in my lifetime - even though there are so many great stories to be had.  In fact, the only classic World War I movie that I've seen that I can think of is Lawrence of Arabia.  But that is over 55 years old.  When I think of World War I in television and films, only the last Blackadder series comes to mind - though I'm sure there might have been a few others.  But I don't and can't understand why there hasn't been a recent big budget big picture concerning World War I - is it really because America's entry into the war was late and less meaningful than for the Second World War?  Shame.  I'll stick to the books for the time being - I want to read All Quiet on the Western Front, supposedly the greatest war novel of all time but somehow has passed me by.

Accents

In much the same way that I sometimes don't notice or don't recognize different American accents, Americans don't have a clue about the different British accents.  Even worse, most of the people I work with don't have English as their first language - so even struggle with distinguishing my accent from an American one.  I'm never going to develop an American accent, though my vocabulary has definitely become Americanized.  But when teaching some friends about different British accents, my go to is to tell them to look up British comedy clips from the 90's.  For example, "Scousers" "Calm Down".  Classic.

Feeling My Age

For the last few days, I have been suffering from one ailment or another.  A lingering cough, fatigue from the lack of a decent night's sleep, a weak bladder, digestive issues, a bad back, and now a bad shoulder.  Is this the new norm when you get older - a continuous conveyor belt of things going wrong with your body?  That sucks.

I still hate meetings

Nothing worse than a tedious early morning teleconference.  I had one today at 8.30am.  This means that I need to wake up and leave home extremely early in order to avoid traffic (I was in the office by 7am).  I’m tired and irritable anyway with the amount of work on my plate at the moment, and I don’t need to waste my time attending pointless meetings.  And this was definitely one of them – it was so bad, I couldn’t help “resting my eyes” at my desk.  I’m not sure if a room was set up to have the meeting as a videoconference, but I was always going to call in from my desk since I didn’t want to be seen on camera being unable to mask my boredom.  And I could actually try to get on with some proper work if I’m at my desk.  This month has started busy at work, and will continue to keep me busy through to Thanksgiving.  Not fun but rather now than during summer or when I have some proper vacation planned! 

Nomovember

So much for Movember.  Having left it untouched for a week, I shaved off my mustache – if you could call the bum fluff on the top of my lip that – yesterday.  It looked like the kind of growth you see on Hispanic teenage boys, or elderly Hispanic women.  I was embarrassed by it, and hated going into work with it – so it had to go.  I feel great shame in my inability to grow decent stubble and facial hair – does that make me less of a man?  I think I was probably just being too impatient – I think I needed to give it more than just a week for it to grow in properly, but I just couldn’t get past the straggly phase.   Probably the saddest thing was that not a single person commented on what was there – it was obvious I was trying to do something, so was it that bad that people were embarrassed to say anything?  I doubt I’ll try this again, so we’ll never know.  Here is a very unflattering close up photo of the mess before I shaved it off:

Tremendous Success

If you thought the last 2 years were bad for American politics, just wait for the next 2 years.  With a Democratic House of Representatives, expect even more conflict and division.  I think the “blue wave” should have and could have been a lot bigger than it actually was, and send a proper message to Trump.  But it wasn’t, more of a “blue splash”, just going to show how even more divided and polarized the country is.  Especially since there are practically no moderate Republicans left in the Republican Party – this means an even more right-wing agenda, that will be continuously blocked by the Democratic House.  I find it interesting that Trump has already issued threats and warnings about being investigated – a somewhat redundant threat since he is already being investigated (and as a write this, I read that Jeff Sessions the Attorney General has been fired – so expect developments on the FBI probe front).  And his “wish” that Democrats and Republicans should set aside partisanship to work together is just absurd – these are two parties going in the opposite directions with increasingly limited mutual interests, and most of that is due to him, his rhetoric and his actions.  I despair for America.  And of course, Big Oil and Big Soda won both initiatives in our state – no surprise given the huge amounts of money they spent campaigning.  Capitalism always beats democracy.

The Tipping Point

We had another “celebrity” talking at work today – not quite as high profile as previous guests like Elton John, this was Malcolm Gladwell.  Who I’m not sure many of you even know who he is.  Someone I know as an author and whom I’ve heard on several podcasts, and I think came up with the 10,000 hours thing for how long it takes for someone to become good at something (which is why I’m not good at anything!) amongst other things.  I’m trying to remember if I’ve read one of his books –I have a feeling I have, but a long time ago.  I enjoyed the conversation, maybe because I find the kind of topics that were discussed, things like sociology, psychology and statistics, very interesting – and he is a good thinker and a good communicator.  Definitely makes me want to revisit one of his bestsellers, or maybe give his podcast a listen.  Kind of odd to have this talk on the day of the mid-term elections, but whatever.  I shall not be following the election coverage tonight... the fact that anyone from the Republican Party gets elected at all is profoundly depressing.   

Job Harmonization

Today, my job title changed – I am now a Manager (I used to be an Associate Manager).  However, only my job title has changed.  My job scope, responsibilities and more importantly my salary have not changed.  The decision was made to upgrade a load of our job titles to supposedly become more in line with industry standards.  Kind of unnecessary in my opinion, and the timing to do it just before the end of the year is kind of weird, but it is what it is – and so long as it doesn’t impact my chances of getting a promotion at the end of the year (which would now be a promotion to Senior Manager!) then I don’t really care.  Apparently there is a good chance I might get a promotion – I know they are discussing it within our department leadership meetings at the moment, and I think my manager is pushing quite hard for me getting one (there are only a limited number they are allowed to give out, so it sounds like a bit of a dog fight to get one approved).  However, she mentioned that my previous manager was passive aggressively casting doubts on whether I’ve done enough to earn a promotion – which comes as no surprise, since it doesn’t make her look so great as a manager.  I haven’t made many good decisions when it comes to my professional life over the last 5-10 years, but pushing hard to not have her as my manager was by far one of the best things I’ve done – I was never going to get a promotion under her.  B*tch.

Christmas 1988

I was just reminiscing about getting Operation Wolf for my Spectrum on Christmas Day (Christmas 1988 apparently - jeez 30 years ago!), and subsequently completing it on Christmas Day.  Oh to be a youth again!  Classic game, I miss the simplicity and playability of games from that generation.

 

Coyotes

I actually saw some coyotes today.  About 3 or 4 of them ran down beside my house, down my driveway and out of view.  I'm not sure how common that is to see them during the day - admittedly it was a dark, rainy and depressing day, but still.  Didn't have nearly enough time to grab my phone and take a photo - it was only by chance that I saw them because I was doing some vacuuming downstairs and caught the movement through the window.  Another exciting weekend day spent doing housework...   

Cornhole

I am easily annoyed by things.  As absolutely nobody who knows me would be surprised by.  And I’ve got a new one at work.  My cube window looks out onto another building perpendicular to my building, and contains a different company to mine.  From where I sit, I can just shift my eyes above my computer monitor and look directly into one of their breakrooms.  There is a coffee machine I can see, plus some tables and chairs where they sometimes have lunch or occasionally look like they hold meetings.  This has never been a problem to me until last week, when they inexplicably set up a game of “cornhole” in their breakroom right by the window.  For the uninitiated, “cornhole” is a basic game where players take turns throwing bean bags into a raised hole.  A classic beach or lawn game – I think they normally have it set up at our company summer picnic.  The problem is that it is SO distracting when I’m trying to work and they are playing their stupid game, and the movement of these fricking bean bags being thrown around keeps on taking my attention away from my monitor.  I could shut my blinds, but I shouldn’t have to.  So it’s been driving me crazy – and it’s not like I can just tell them to stop.  I have just Macgyvered a bit of a fix – I’ve taped some bits of paper to the bottom of my blind to try and block my view of their window.  So let’s see how long that lasts for, before I ask to relocate to a different cube!

Movember

Do I do it?  Do I attempt to grow out a mustache for Movember?  I think I might give it a go - although it might not go well.  My facial hair growth is patchy at best, and I have no desire to spend loads of time on facial hair grooming.  I give it a week before I can't take it any more and have to shave it off. 

Happy Halloween

Although I saw some groups of trick and treaters in my neighborhood on the way home today, no one called at my house.  This is the advantage of living at the edge of my neighborhood, hidden from the road and where there isn't a sidewalk.  I didn't even need to pretend I wasn't home.  However, it looked like I wasn't home anyway since I was suffering from a power outage most of this evening.  I wasn't even sure I would be able to write and post this blog.  All my neighbors looked like they had power, so I think it was just me affected.  And so very worried that it might be ages until it got fixed - but fortunately heard them working on the poles on the road outside my place not too long after I had reported the outage, and the power has just come back on.  So that's a relief.  However, it became abundantly clear that I am totally inadequately prepared for losing power in the future for any length of time - I need to buy some candles and suchlike. 

Wasteful Expenditure

Since getting my PS4, I've hardly used it for playing games on.  At all.  So that's been several years.  Yet here I am having just bought 2 new games - God of War, and Red Dead Redemption 2.  Why?  Perhaps I got sold on the rave reviews they've both been getting.  Perhaps I've seen too many ads for both games and I'm a sucker.  Perhaps it's because I've been talking video games recently with a few guys at work.  Either way, I hope these games don't just collect dust on the shelf.  But I also hope I don't end up spending every spare hour I've got vegging out on my sofa playing these games.  But hey, I guess I'm doing that anyway watching films and telly!   

Choke Artist

Another table tennis match today.  Another classic choke job from me against my nemesis – I lost a lot of points early, and could never recover.  Anxious, tightened up, couldn’t play with power or precision.  Totally disappointing, utterly predictable.  Our team lost anyway regardless of my result (though I certainly didn’t help), so once again I maintain my sad record of having never won any kind of trophy in sports.  Extremely dispiriting.  I think I need to buy myself a participation trophy or something.  Getting very down on myself, this could be a long week.  It certainly won’t involve playing any more table tennis – I need a break from it.

I recorded the Spurs-Man City game and watched it this evening, 3 observations: (1) I really like Man City's purple/orange kit, (2) American football has absolutely ruined the Wembley pitch, (3) Spurs will not challenge for the title this year.

Palace 2-2 Arsenal

Not a bad result against a team in form, but still have my concerns about Palace.  Despite 2 penalties today, not scoring enough - and if you don't score you won't win.  And a bit of a brutal stretch of games coming up - Chelsea, Spurs and Man United.  I don't see many points there, and the distinct possibility of Palace slipping into the bottom 3.  Fortunately there are plenty of other bad teams in the Premier League, but this season looks like its going to turn into another fraught relegation struggle.  I remain worried.

A New Low

This is the kind of sh*t that they've started airing in ad breaks now:

Unbelievable.

Bohemian Rhapsody

I've seen the trailers for Bohemian Rhapsody and got excited at the possibility of going to the cinema to watch it and sing along with the rest of the audience to all the classic tunes.  And then the early reviews have come in.  To put it politely, they are mixed.  Not much to the film apart from the music and apparently great portrayal of Freddie Mercury.  So I suspect I won't bother going.  Indeed, I haven't been to the cinema for ages - I can't even remember the last time I went out to watch a film.  There was a time when I used to go every week.  Now, I am much more inclined to watch a film at home unless it is really recommended to see it on a big IMAX screen.  But with the over-saturation of superhero and franchise movies, there really isn't much worth watching nowadays.  Which is a real shame.     

Old Dog

I encountered an expression that I had never heard before in my 40+ years of existence until today – camel case.  “The practice of writing compound words or phrases such that each work or abbreviation in the middle of the phrase begins with a capital letter, with no intervening spaces or punctuation”.  So the next time you write “iPhone”, you can say that this is an example of camel case.  You can thank me later.

Team Winded/Team Full of Wind

A ping pong update.  We started a Ryder Cup style tournament this week, and I played my first game today.  If I’m the #2 seed at work, then I played probably the #4 seed.  And after a rocky start where I dropped the first game, managed to power through and win my match 3-1.  Giving “Team Wind” (not my choice, awful name) a 2-0 lead on Day 1 of the tournament.  I believe I’ll be playing next on Monday.  Although ultimately it is the result that matters, very disappointed with how I played.  My style of play – aggressive and a power game – allows only for a small margin of error, which quickly becomes a liability when I tighten up under pressure – as I am sadly prone to do, particularly with people watching.  I suffer from glossophobia -  a fear of public speaking - and this is very much an adjacent phobia and symptom to that.  I don’t know why I get so anxious, but I do.  And this has manifested itself in so many aspects of my life, particularly my social life – so it should come as no surprise that it affects my ping pong game in a tight and well fought match.  I’m a crowd-pleaser and I don’t want to play conservatively, so I do go for a lot of winners - I think people like watching me play because I am prone to outrageously good and outrageously bad shots, and a lot of muttering and swearing under my breath (and sometimes not under my breath!).   

Dreamin'

Well, I didn’t win the $1.6 billion jackpot on today’s lottery drawing.  Which is disappointing.  I guess I’m going into work tomorrow.

Smooth

I hope to make better use of my kitchen appliances.  I bought a rice cooker about a year ago, and haven’t used it once.  Now I’ve just bought a blender, and I hope this won’t go unused for a year.  I don’t think it will, mainly because I want to start using it to make fruit smoothies.  Now I just need to find the right combination of ingredients to make the ideal smoothie for me – some combination of bananas, strawberries, mixed berries, milk, yogurt, a couple of scoops of vanilla ice cream, ice, …?  My first attempt made with some fruit I happened to have in my fridge didn’t taste all that great – but there seem to be about a billion different recipes on the internet, so I just need to start buying the ingredients and testing some of them out.

Britain Today

What is Britain today?  Is it the hundreds of thousands of people who marched in London demanding another Brexit referendum?  Or is it the racist white guy who refused to sit next to an elderly black woman on a flight?  I hope it's the former, but I suspect it is really the latter. 

Sick

It's been a rough week - I caught what I thought was just a cold last weekend, but may actually have been something more serious.  At various times this week I've experienced at least one of these symptoms: sore throat, congestion, fever, fatigue, tickly cough, chesty cough, headache.  It was so bad that I had to actually use one of my sick days on Monday for real, rather than for "mental exhaustion".  (And yes, as well as a set number of vacation days during a year, we also have a set number of sick days we're allowed to take during a year...).  The irony is that I caught this virus during one of the best Octobers we've ever had in the Seattle area - not much rain, plenty of sun, and unseasonably high temperatures.  And another irony is that I had a flu shot scheduled on Thursday - which may or may not have made a difference, since I'm feeling a lot better now than I did at the start of the week.  And yet another irony is that despite my poor health, I played my table tennis nemesis this week and played the best I think I've ever played and trounced him.  Sadly I've probably peaked too early, since we've got a tournament next week...       

Drop, Cover and Hold On

In the most ridiculous waste of time yet at work, we had an earthquake drill today.  The fire alarm came on, and we had to kneel and crouch under our desk for a minute until the alarm went off (and the simulated earthquake had finished) and we could evacuate the building.  The chances of an earthquake happening here in reality are minuscule at best, so this exercise was utterly stupid and pointless.  I probably failed the drill as well.  If you can believe this, everyone in the office has been supplied an emergency supply pack in the unlikely event of such a disaster.  I forgot to grab mine from under my desk as I evacuated the building.  Without my emergency supply pack, I wouldn’t have survived the carnage and subsequent zombie apocalypse.  Oh no.  What makes it worse – an actual state, national and international “Great ShakeOut Earthquake Drill” was conducted yesterday.  So I have no idea why we did ours a day after everyone else.  Naturally, if we actually do have a serious earthquake in the next few years then I take back all my criticism.  But unlike when I lived in California, I’ve never even noticed or felt an earthquake tremor in my entire time in the Pacific NW.

Career Goals

A recent panel discussion at work by some members of senior management have confirmed my belief that I will never become a part of senior management myself.  And that is through choice.  They talked a lot about challenging yourself, embracing change, speaking up, don’t be afraid to do different things, working hard, etc. in order to succeed in the workplace.  I don’t want to do any of that.  I’m in my comfort zone, and I am very reluctant to leave it.  I earn a decent wage in a job that I am rarely challenged in, and which has been for the last few years relatively stress-free.  I’m in no way proactive – I just get on with what I’m asked to do in a quiet and efficient manner, and be done with it.  There is the chance that I might get promoted at the end of this year – on the one hand this is something that I think is long overdue, but on the other hand this could jeopardize my current contentedness with work.  I don’t want more managerial responsibilities – I currently don’t have anyone reporting to me (permanent or contractors), and that is so preferable because I then only have work responsibilities to worry about.  That might change.  But at least I now have a manager who has known me for a while, and I think actually respects me because she knows I do a good job of everything I’m asked to do.  More than that, I think she knows that I left this company before because I was pushed too hard – something which is only partially true, there were also a lot of other reasons why I left – so I don’t think she will put too much on my plate.  Which is fine by me.  Hopefully it will stay like this for a while (I STRONGLY suspect it won’t, at some point I know I’ll get dragged into something that is demanding and stressful and time-consuming) which is why I haven’t been looking into other job opportunities recently.  But I think if things do take a turn for the worse and I want to get out, I am much more inclined to take a sabbatical rather than go straight into a new job – a chance to decompress, to travel, to enjoy life and some totally pressure-free time on my own terms with no responsibilities.  I suspect I won’t live to enjoy a long and healthy retirement, so I’d rather do retirement type things whilst I still can.  But for the moment I’m happy to be in my comfortable job saving up money for whenever I might need it.

State Initiatives

With the mid-term elections, also come a bunch of state initiatives that Washingtonians have to vote on.  And there are some interesting ones.  A carbon tax (the first in the nation) - and naturally "big oil" are spending enormous amounts of money on attack ads to stop this initiative passing.  I hope they fail.  A soda tax - actually an initiative to BLOCK future soda taxes after one was passed in Seattle.  Naturally, "big soda" are spending enormous amounts of money to get this initiative to pass.  Although I drink way too much soda, I'm not proud about this so I'm not averse to this tax.  An initiative to increase gun regulations - something any rational person should support.  And an initiative to improve police training and make it easier to prosecute police officers in negligent shootings.  Which seems sensible - despite my misgivings about what an increasingly difficult job that is to do well.  Another reason to want to become a citizen, so that I can actually have my vote on stuff like this (although I've never voted for anything in my life ever before!). 

YouTube

I've never seen YouTube down, but I was wondering why an error was appearing on one of my blogs from a few days ago where I had included a video.  And yes, YouTube really is down as I write this.  Must be something major.  I have been watching way too many YouTube videos recently - most of them stupid and pointless - so this is not necessarily a bad thing.  Perhaps that will stop me watching car crash videos at work right before I drive home.  Not recommended.   

New Blu-Ray

I don't buy many Blu-rays nowadays, but got this one recently for a good price - a show I've never even seen, but which comes highly recommended and I've been told I should like (I subscribe to a podcast of one of the creators).

Seahawks in London

No photos added to yesterday's blog yet - sorry.  I managed to catch quite a nasty cold today from yesterday's excursions, so I didn't feel like doing much of anything today.

Just a quick comment about the Seattle Seahawks playing in London for the first time.  Nothing to say about the game itself - an easy win against an inept Raiders team.  But if you're a Seahawks fan, it was probably easier to get a ticket for that game than any of their home games which are always sold out - which is probably why, from what little I saw of the game, that the crowd was very pro-Seahawks.  And whenever they play a game in London, the coverage here was about as patronizing on British stereotypes as you would expect - think stupid English accents and pretending to drink tea.  And even worse was that all the local news teams had a reporter in London - making for some excruciatingly amateurish reports about Britain and British people.  Let's hope they don't go out there again anytime soon - I don't think they will, because it's a long way away and there would be uproar if the Seahawks lost out on yet another home game.

Ebey's Landing

It was a nice day today so got up early,  drove up to Whidbey Island and did a coastal hike at Ebey's Landing National Historic Reserve.  This has been a hike on my radar for sometime, but for whatever reason I had never done it before.  And that's a shame, because this was a good one.  About 6 miles, with great views over the water throughout, it is a loop that you go up and along a bluff (with a detour to some early settlement buildings and a cemetery) and come back along the shoreline.  That shoreline hike back with the sun beating down on you and heavy going through the sand was surprisingly tough, but at least I had the entire beach almost entirely to myself - if I do this hike again, I'll make sure I time it for low tide!

I'll add some photos to this post tomorrow.     

Earworm

This song popped up in my streaming music channel last weekend, and I can't stop listening to it and I can't get it out of my head.

I have absolutely no idea why I didn't encounter this song in 2009 when it first came out, or since.  And I must have heard it on some TV show, film or trailer at some point.  It's damn good - so I'm a bit disappointed I didn't know it before this week.  But perhaps that says more about my increasingly dated music tastes than anything else. 

Trumpaganda

This is my last blog entry about politics until after the mid-term elections.  I just can't and don't want to follow the news anymore - what is happening in American politics is nothing less than depressing and mortifying.  If America continues to vote for Trump and the Republican Party, then I despair.  And, in all honesty, I'm not sure I want to live in a country like this.  That pushes me in one of two directions - to leave the US, or to become a US citizen with the right to vote.  The latter is something I have been giving a LOT of thought to recently... if only I lived somewhere where my vote would actually make a difference, thank you libtard Washington State.

EOY

Looks like I’m going to be busy at work through the rest of the year – particularly next month.  So my blog entries may become a lot more concise!  It’s a good job that I don’t have big plans for Thanksgiving or Christmas yet – if I go anywhere, it won’t be far since I can’t be that long away from work.  I probably wasn’t going to come back to the UK this Christmas, and this more or less settles it that I won’t – I don’t mind, it was only a few months ago when I was back (although it feels like a long time ago!).  And I’ve definitely left it too late to get a good price on a flight (I’ve only been looking at Virgin Atlantic prices – not even considering British Airways anymore!).  Do I get a discounted price if I have an emotional support squirrel?!  But although I might be busy – what I’m working on is not particularly challenging, just time-consuming.  Which is disappointing – I feel like I am lacking some serious mental stimulation.  Yet another example of how horribly misused and underused I am here.  If I want to challenge myself and the way my profession is going, I should probably learn a new language - Mandarin Chinese…

New Fall TV Season

We are now into Week 2 or Week 3 of the new fall TV season - and I don't think there is a single new TV show that I am watching.  Not a single one.  I am watching new seasons of old shows, but nothing new.  No wonder people are cutting the cable with the sheer amount of mediocrity on network television.  And no wonder viewing numbers are markedly down on all shows.  The only decent stuff coming out now seems to be on subscription or streaming services.  If it wasn't for sports, I would cut the cable now.  And with live sports streaming services increasingly a thing, even that is not a deterrent any more...

The Greatest Speech Ever Made

So much for being a film aficionado.  Until this weekend, I had (a) never heard Charlie Chaplin actually speak and (b) never heard this famous speech.  For a speech that comes from a film nearly 80 years old, it is remarkably relevant still today.

  

Bosch

I've become totally addicted to the TV series Bosch, watching it on Amazon.  I've watched all 4 seasons - 40 episodes, each about 45 minutes to 1 hour - over the last month, and I'm totally up to date now and looking forward to Season 5 next year.  I'm not really sure why I like it - it's not a particularly special or original detective show.  But it is reliably enjoyable and doesn't require deep concentration, which makes it very easily consumed.  Perhaps I've reached that age where I start to enjoy shows more that I can switch my brain off to.  Which is unfortunate.   

Petty

I was paying my bills today, and noticed that I had an additional charge on my trash collection bill for "An extra bag, bin or can".  I have NEVER left anything for collection that didn't fit in my bins, so I have absolutely no idea where this came from.  It was only an extra $5, but I don't want to pay this so let's see what they say to my e-mail about it.  There has been an occasion before where I noticed somebody left some of their rubbish in my bins - it looked like construction stuff, so some a-hole builder dumped their stuff in my bins overnight.  I guess that could have happened again - and if it didn't fit in the bins then that might have caused the charge.  But I shouldn't have to pay for that.  If anything, they should pay me for picking up all the litter that gets left by the road outside my place. 

Yet more photos of Lake Union

Since it was a grey, wet, miserable day today, here are a few photos from a sunset walk around Lake Union yesterday whilst waiting for the commute time from work to home to come down to a reasonable time (I've started having to leave later and later...)

End of Summer

Yesterday was the first day that I thought about turning on my heating again - so, sadly, that is officially the end of summer.  I managed to resist, but it's even colder tonight so I might have to welcome back enormous heating bills again soon.  It even snowed over the mountain passes this week - this doesn't seem indicative of the long term forecast of a weak to moderate El Nino this winter, which should mean drier and warmer conditions.