summer is half over, but my beer mug is half full

Rob and PC4301. My job is still going well, which I am really grateful for. The last few jobs I had in Michgan had their own perks (especially Audio Designs a few months before it imploded), but I'm glad to be doing the white-collar bit again... like I'm meant to.


Recently we took a 1.5 hour drive out to Jim Haley's (Melissa's co-worker) cabin about 15 miles around Rockport State Park. Jim Haley is a mean, crouchety, old dude with no sense of humor. Just kidding; Jim and his wife are awesome. They invite co-workers and their families every year for a BBQ. It's really beautiful up there in the Cascades. Their place is near the Skagit River which you can hear bubbling by, underneath a million-and-one, 50'-80' tall, redwood-sequoia-whatever-they-ares. Here's Melis enjoying her surroundings with a beer and a burger. You can see Jim in the background, he's the Santa Claus-lookin' dude in red.


We love our view. We're always worrying that developers are going to build condominiums right in front of us... as they inevitably will. So we're trying to enjoy it while we've got it. If you click on the image you can see some gliders/para-sailers a mile or two out.


Trevor, Krista, and their dog long-pee Louie came to the BBQ. Krista works with Melis at The Herald and Trevor studying to be a nurse and training for a 7000 ft two day climb up Mount Rainer... And Louie can pee for a real long time. They live in Everett about 10 blocks away from us. It's been real cool getting to know 'em.


Juding from the lighting on these pictures you might not know it, but we got ourselves a new camera. The Olympus 720SW, it's pocketsize-small at 3.6" wide X .75" deep, sports 7.0 megapix, can be droppped from 5ft without "internal damage", take pictures up to 10ft underwater, digital image stabilization, and other cool stuff. Now I need to figure out how to use it.


This summer really has been killer. After living out in Washington for over a year and a half, Melis and I are pretty well connected to life out here. We're still working on the house and are about ready to move forward with the backyard plans in 2-3 weeks. The garage has become a little tricky what with the city regulations, but things will work out one way or the other. Oh yeah, I did the STP (Seattle to Portland) bike ride, which was SO MUCH FUN!!! I'll post more about that and other stuff later. A few weeks back we saw Pearl Jam at The Gorge with our esteemd associates Sarah and Andy who moved out here from Boston. My Uncle Pat and Aunt Sharon also reacently moved out here from California. These are the guys who I always brag about because they've got the greatest BBQ in the world. The Greatest. And they're opening a restaurant up here. More later.