16 May 2007

a sensitive flower

well this is my 99th post. 99 holds a special place in my heart so i wanted to make this a good post. let's see.

1. i haven't finished writing up about my alaska trip, nor have i sent out any alaska postcards.

2. i haven't finished writing up about my peru trip either, nor have i sent out any peru postcards. which reminds me, the postcards we sent *from* peru still don't seem to have made it to the US. hmm we sent them at the end of march. hmm.

3. i have been involved in numerous yard and garden activities since i returned home from alaska and peru. they include, but are not limited to:
  • mowing the grass with both riding and push mowers
  • weed whacking
  • trimming weeds around gardens, apple trees, and grape vines (by hand)
  • edging the patio/driveway/sidewalk (with a spade edger thing)(michael helped)
  • hauling brush to the sidewalk
  • loading brush into the truck in the rain
  • bringing the brush to the burn piles
  • burning the burn piles (pretty dang fun, and kinda hot)
  • stacking new brush into a new burn pile for next year
  • throwing sequoia cones
  • cleaning off the tree house
  • setting up the hammock
  • digging a trench along the back fence for a new fence to go in - which required moving a ton of "valuable" items out of the way, including old studded tires, wheels for a VW bug, plates of glass, shards of broken glass, a basketball hoop, old toys and dolls buried under years of sequoia needles, small rocks, large rocks, old chunks of bricks and/or cement, various metal poles, as well as a bunch of old fence that i cut off the old fence posts
  • helping michael put in the new fence
  • preparing the soil in the garden
  • planting the garden
  • watering the garden
  • watching the garden grow
  • cutting blackberries back
  • removing ivy from trees
  • playing with the cats
  • sitting on the bench...

4. about a month or so ago i found a running partner. she's great. we run at about the same speed. the initial reason for my contacting her was because i was trying to get in shape for the rugby game...basically i just didn't want to be COMPLETELY out of shape for the game, which it turned out i wasn't. we have been going to different parks every week and i'm getting to see a little more of the town which i think is a good thing.

5. 2.5 weeks ago michael and i spent 2 days cutting and chopping firewood for next winter. some people say that when you go firewooding, it warms you twice - once when you cut it, and once when you burn it. i agree, but i think it actually warms you 5 times. once to move it / set it up to get it ready to cut/chop, once to actually cut/chop it, once to throw it in the back of the truck, once to unload it off the truck, and once to stack it once it's in the woodshed.

6. 2 weeks ago i broke out with this weird rash. we thought at first it was food allergy, but it lasted for 3-4 days and kept moving around. then we thought it was laundry detergent allergy, but we use free and clear and no fabric softener or other additives and i kept getting the rash in new places even with clothes i hadn't washed with this detergent. so, with consensus from my mother, we decided it was a virus. a weird creepy virus. which just proves how sensitive i really am.

7. 3 days after the weird skin virus, i got a stomach/intestinal virus. isn't life just special?

8. the lewisias are still flowering in the rock garden, and i took some photos, since they are flowers and maybe less sensitive than i.






9. i just got back from davis california where i had the most amazing visit. here's what happened, in a not-so-nutshell:

thursday -

  • mike dropped me off at the airport in portland
  • laurel picked me up at the airport in sacramento (although she was at terminal A waiting for me, while i was looking for her in terminal B where i landed).
  • went to laurel's house, drank tea, met quiz the cat.

friday -

  • got up early and walked to the light rail station, took it to downtown sacramento, then caught the bus to davis. all went smoothly.
  • upon arrival in davis, i walked around, reminescing about old times.
  • walked past my old house.
  • heard the fire engines.
  • had a burrito bowl at chipotle (rice, chicken, salsa, cheese, sour cream, guac). sooooo good.
  • visited with wes from myspace, who works at bizarro world. caught up on life.
  • went to central park. went to campus. sat under trees and just stared at the sky.
  • met up with my rookie mendivil, went to nims' house and played with the guinea pigs (bridgette o'malley and tiffany amber williams o'malley)
  • met up with laurel for dinner at fuji (fuji chefs sushi and roll, california roll, philadelphia roll, deep fried sweet potato roll, smoke salmon). sooooo good. probably ate too much wasabi.
  • walked around davis. went to the coop. saw matt smith. checked out soap, burts bees, facial products, alcohol, chocolate and tea.
  • went back to laurels house.

saturday -

  • laurel and i drove to davis.
  • had crepes at crepeville (cheddar, onion, avocado, cream cheese). sooooo good.
  • walked around the farmers market and almost told some little ballerinas that they would never be princesses in real life, they would be drones just like us. bought some pistachios.
  • went to the alumni rugby game. we were the first ones there, even after getting lost going to the field. got to see happy which totally rocked. well seeing everyone pretty much rocked.
  • the alumni kicked a** at the game, though some of the new players are pretty dang good.



i'm the one with tape on my head and green socks.

  • the social afterwards was OK but many people had already left by then. *shrug* ate a hamburger with ketchup. lots of ketchup.
  • got a ride to bomie's house, then got a ride from laurel.
  • we went to jamba juice (berry lime sublime). sooooo good. (she had caribbean passion -super - which turned out to be just slightly too much)
  • walked around safeway, petco, big 5 sports
  • met laurels friend at dos coyotes for pre-dinner (chips and guacamole). sooooo good.
  • on our way to woodstocks for my real dinner with rugby people, happy texted me that she wasn't coming back to davis for any late night partying. i was super bummed, but detoured my trip to woodstocks to a trip to the train station, where i promptly bought a ticket and headed to san francisco!
  • amtrak to richmond, bart to 24th and mission, shelley found me there and we went to her home in SF.
  • stayed up late talking about everything.

sunday -

  • woke up leisurely. had walnut bread toast from liberty cafe.
  • walked to downtown bernal, saw signs for a moving sale.
  • went to the moving sale and scavenged their cd collection. some kinda good stuff in there.
  • shelley wanted to preview the cds so she had the people bring out their boombox and i dj'ed.
  • i walked away with 12 cds, including: tori amos (boys for pele), arrested development (3 years, 5 months, 2 days in the life of...), michelle branch (the spirit room), eels (beautiful freak), jesus jones (doubt), midnight oil (diesel on dust), moody blues (legend of a band), new radicals (maybe you've been brainwashed too), smashing pumpkins (siamese dream), u2 (pop), a few mixes (gap's favorite songs album fall 2005, the 70's original nbc motion picture soundtrack)...
  • she got some kids books for her nephew in alaska, and 5 cds, including some french reggae, french house, right said fred "i'm too sexy" single, something else i can't remember, and our favorite, shaun cassidy (greatest hits).
  • returned our new purchases to shelley's house, then walked to the mission.
  • on our way we found a secret stairwell, as well as a mini park. how can you beat that?
  • went to taqueria can-cun (black bean vegetarian burrito w/1/2 avocado). sooooo good.
  • spent one of my "where's george" dollar bills there (valencia and mission).
  • walked valencia, stopped at a few random stores just to look at random things, some weird stuff, some pricy weird stuff, books, etc.
  • walked to mission dolores park, otherwise known as "playa dolores", got a good view of the city from there.
  • walked to safeway, bought milk. horizon organic whole milk. sooooo good.
  • walked back to shelley's, drank some milk and ate chocolate.
  • walked up to bernal hill and checked out the city view from there. about 20 fire trucks, ambulances, police cars, other emergency vehicles were all converging on this one building that didn't even look like anything was happening. i figured it might have been a drill just to see response time.
  • walked back to shelleys. watered her garden. took out trash, recyclables, compost.
  • went to sleep.

monday -

  • woke up early, attempting to leave the house at 645.
  • left actually at 700.
  • no traffic leaving the city, listening to some of her fine cd purchases on the way, we arrived in davis around 830.
  • after driving around for awhile looking for parking we decided to just pay and park in the pay lot.
  • went to the growth chamber and started bagging up plants for autoclaving.
  • put some plants in the autoclave.
  • fast-walked over to wellman where the seminar was, shelley went in, i did not.
  • went to the MU (bagel and odwalla). sooooo good. and called ingo.
  • met up with ingo and went to mishkas.
  • ate and chatted. checked my email and checked in for my flight.
  • called my friend jane (from ely NV) who was in rancho cordova (en route to san jose, and then ely) who was coming to davis...and we could meet for lunch after my dentist appt.
  • went to the dentist.
  • met up with ingo again, went to the arboretum / arboretorium / arboridium
  • saw the turtles sunning themselves. sooooo good.
  • went back to borders cause i had to go to the bathroom. picked up a copy of sports illustrated where MY rookie is in a rugby picture on page 22 of the may 14th issue. no article, just the picture. but still.
  • began walking again when jane called and said she was in davis.
  • met up at redrum burger, had a turkey burger and fries, and a milkshake, met her gecko named boo, and caught up on the past 7 months. it was great.
  • jane left and ingo and i had to move his car.
  • went back to mishkas (thai iced tea). sooooo good.
  • got a phone call, not sure who it was at first, but it was LEKA.
  • walked to campus, met her at the library, went over and sat by the arboretum and talked and talked. about rugby, life, and everything else we could think of.
  • she went to class, we went over to plant path to see if i could find shelley, to get her keys, to get my stuff out of her car.
  • went to the growth chamber room, she wasn't there.
  • went by the outside of the lab, shannon l. came out into the hallway, we chatted.
  • i went into to lab on the other side, didn't see shelley, did see andrea, and we talked awhile.
  • she walked down to the growth chamber room to open the door to see if shelley was in there. no luck.
  • walked back up to the third floor, where we found shelley in the computer lab.
  • got her keys, got my stuff, called laurel who was heading to starbucks. i could meet her there.
  • returned to the computer lab where she was still printing things.
  • hung out awhile.
  • went to meet laurel and her friend molly. had a drink. talked more. shelley came over.
  • said bye to laurel, then gave shelley a ride over toward campus, then said bye to shelley.
  • got emotional.
  • went to ingo's to get the dogs. they were cute and didn't try to bite my leg or hand off. dakota even drooled on me. thanks!
  • went to the airport. said bye to ingo.
  • got on the plane, flew back, mike picked me up, we drove to salem, then got my car and drove back to corvallis.


me and ingo..............................me and jane

the end.

in retrospect it might have been cool to have a gps with me and running the whole time, just so i could put a map up here of all the places i went. but you get the idea. i was pretty much on the move for 4 straight days. it was awesome!!

here's my garden. in future posts i plan to show it's progress with time. i might also post some other things having to do with the yard. viva el 99!