Lessons to learn . . .

Today we learned two important lessons, so we'll share them with you. We got on the road early today, around 8, and buzzed along smoothly . . . up to a point where we were about 80 miles from the California border. At that point the large overhead electronic board flashed at us
"I-5 closed 70 miles ahead due to
blizzard conditions in California."

Completely taken aback, we puzzled over how to proceed – stop at the closure point and wait it out, or find an alternate route, or . . .

When we got a few more miles on down the road, at Grants Pass, OR, we stopped and made inquiries of a) the tourist information folks, b) the attendant at the gas station, c) the on-line traffic advisories from ODOT which carried dire warnings of the requirements of chains on all four wheels, d) the 511 reports on highways.

We finally decided to try the apparent alternate route, down Hwy 199 to the coast at Crescent City, CA thence on down the coast. After just a short distance (13 miles) down this route we came to another sign – WRECK AHEAD – after which we came upon a long line of stopped vehicles. Two boys walking up the road told us that a semi had hit a van, leaving the van in the ditch and the semi stretched across the road. After about an hour, a deputy sheriff came by and said that it would be at least an hour before things were cleared.

We decided to head back and go on down the original route, which to our great surprise and frustration (but not disappointment) was open, clear and totally unmarked by further signs of closure or chains or anything else. Look at the first picture below to see the awful conditions we faced.


Lesson #1: Your life gets messed up when you get bad information, and it's darn near impossible to tell whether the information you get is good or bad.

We're now in Orland, CA at the Old Orchard RV Park, quietly enjoying a wine (Clara) and a Scotch (me). The trip was uneventful, actually over the whole day, except for the misdirection of the bad information.

We did get to pass by Mt. Shasta and got a beautiful view of it, together with a couple nice pictures.

Lesson #2: The output from Photoshop is heavily influenced by the character of the surroundings left after you've cropped off a part of a picture. Armchair philosophers can rephrase this and really go to town, starting from "What you see is heavily influenced by the circumstances in which you confront it . . . "




Here you can see three photos, the second one cropped from the first -- but note that its coloration and its character have changed without any action other than cropping -- and the third cropped from the second.

On The Road Again . . .

Monday morning we woke up to . . . SNOW . . . yet again . . . it's b-a-a-a-c-k . . . so we got ready to leave . . .

Actually we were already planning to leave on Tuesday, but we hadn't planned to be so eager to leave! On Tuesday as we were heading south from Seattle, it was even worse -- snow and fog! But traffic moved along carefully and steadily (for the most part, with only an occasional spot of congestion.)

At the moment we are ensconced in the Salem Campground, just behind Home Depot in Salem, OR on the shore of Lake Detroit, which we cannot even see from our campsite . . .

Our plan is to head straight to Baja for a short while, then up to Vegas; later back down to Tucson -- all the while visiting friends along the way. We'll work in a visit to Death Valley while it's relatively cool there, and later get to some of the Parks in Utah -- Bryce, Zion, etc., with a due date back home of May 20ish.

January 20, 2009

The Three Faces of Snow

This year
has brought
us the most
snow we've
ever seen in
Seattle –
even the
old-timers
cannot
recall
this much.






First, there's the "Fun" face of snow – making snowmen, sledding, throwing snowballs . . .









Then there's the "Artistic" face of snow – the trees look splendid with their snow jackets on . . .











But then there's the "God, I Hate This" face of snow – scraping snow off of your windshield, trying to navigate the streets . . .

Holiday in Victoria

On the Saturday after Christmas, we decided to brave the snow and head for a holiday in Victoria with our friends Diane and Mary. The weather cooperated (by not getting worse) and we arrived after our ferry ride to find three times as much snow in Victoria as we had left behind in Seattle.

We took along some wine for a special wine tasting, looking forward to other wine tastings as well as some superb food.
In this first photo you can see the glasses arranged for the tasting, each with a colored sticker matching one of the four bottles in the tasting. The point of the tasting was to rate quality vs price, so there was a wide range in price – from $3.50 to $25 in one case, from $8 to $40 in another.
The testing hypothesis was that non-experts would pick exactly backwards – our results were mixed – I probably did the poorest, Clara slightly better, Diane and Mary better still (but they've had a wine tasting class – right!) In three nights we had tastings of Malbec, Zinfandel and Petit Sirah, with the Petit Sirah being everyone's choice as best varietal that we tasted!

One afternoon we went over to a cidery – a place that only makes cider, hard of course, but in an amazing variety of flavors and textures, ranging all the way from an ultra-dry aperitif to a
lush dessert.













Another fun aspect of our visit was the wildlife viewing, watching the birds come to their feeding stations. But the pictures I got were of the squirrels pirating the bird's feed – at both of the stations.










Of course, the ultimate highlight of our visit was Diane's "Baltimore Dinner" – an elegant presentation featuring lobster salad and crab-stuffed shrimp. We were so busy enjoying this luscious feast that we forgot to get any pictures!!

How Time Flies!

We now have a budding Little Leaguer, who's learned quite a lot about baseball, likes to play catcher, and is often in center field because he has a strong arm and accurate throw. He is so lucky in that he wound up with a coach who wants to TEACH the kids about the game and to ENJOY the experience regardless of the score. Anyway, from this series of pictures you'll see how time flies!

Mother's Day 2008

We had a great time yesterday and thought we would share some of it with you – we hope that you had a very good day, too!

After church (for Clara and me) and a late breakfast followed by some baseball practice (for Lesley and Leo) we moved on to an early afternoon brunch – Glenn put together and fried some of his "crab-and-smoked-trout-cakes," Clara fixed some asparagus, Lesley made some cous cous, and Leo took the pictures (and also made cards for his Mom and Grandma.)

And, of course, there was champagne – what would Mother's Day be without it?

We finished up with a chocolate tasting – some single-source cacao chocolate that we picked up over in Issaquah a couple weeks ago, after going to a quilt show over there.