Call for Change

This is really a brilliant way to help the center and the left and the working poor and minorities and the middle class and pretty much anyone who is NOT a right-wing wingnut get control of our government. If you have a cell phone, a calling plan with free evening minutes and an internet connection then you can help out. Follow the link above and get involved.

And if you actually followed the link from my page and signed up to make calls, comment on your experience below. I want to hear the stories.

Happy Birthday MOM!!!!!!

She can't read this because her computer is broken, but yesterday was my mom's birthday.

Happy birthday mom!!!!!

Pea soup

Thick fog the last two mornings here in Bridge City. I had fun riding to work in the wet white cloudy stuff.

My lies killed the pumpkin

Apparently I was lying about posting pictures of pumpkin carving. Clearly I have not made it a priority. And the universe has punished me. My pumpkin, my beautiful orange gourdly masterpiece collapsed in on itself yesterday. -sigh-

I really will post pics soon. Promise.

Ratcheting it up

Sue took me out to Broughton Bluff on Sunday morning, just according to plan. We warmed up on a fun route (I'm not sure the name) that Sue thinks is a 5.8. The route has a funny side pull crux that lands you in a kind of "hands-free" pod. You have one or two balance moves (depending on your height) and then pull yourself up to what feels like a staircase. A great warm up route.

Then Sue put me on Classic Crack. Classic Crack is evil. Incarnate. Made manifest in rock. I barely made it up the route and take a short rest. Then I throw myself at Red Eye a few hundred times. I scramble up Red Eye, but I wore myself out on Classic Crack. Even with the rest, I have a hard time holding onto Red Eye's very positive handholds. I like the route but I just need to go up it when I have more energy. which means I have to get better at crack climbing. Which means fighting evil on it's own terms, i.e. climbing Classic Crack.

Pumpkin patch

Despite beautiful weather here in Portland, I worked on Saturday. Once Macforce closed up, Dev and I headed over to Woodsy's place for her annual pumpkin carving party. We carved some pretty cool pumpkins this year, especially considering how we waited to the last minute for our pumpkin purchase and pattern selection. I'll post pics sometime tonight. Don't blame me if you get nightmares though! -grin-

Still truckin along

I'm ambling through this week soooooo slowly. I have to work tomorrow (Saturday) and that always stretches the week just a little bit. Luckily, weekends at Macforce stay relatively low key. And the day generally passes quickly.

Still.

It *is* work after all. And the weather turned nice just in time for the weekend. Even though I'll be indoors all day Saturday, I'll get a little climbing in Sunday morning. Sue will be taking me out to Brought Bluff for some quick routes in the morning prior to Nate's return from California (at least that's the plan). And then I have all Sunday afternoon to spend with Dev.

At least that's the plan. -wink-

Whether the Tempest

A sonnet by Bobby Joel Warren
Dedicated to, well, she knows who she is.

Whether the Tempest

The hardest gales present the direst choice:
Confront their onslaught, risking ruins wrack,
Or heed the hurricanes high volume voice,
And flee forth wisely from its fierce attack.

The lightnings lance can cause the mast to crack,
Or swells unsound ships sink beneath the waves.
The faint of heart or humour, driven back,
Succumb to slumber in their sodden graves.

Yet raging storms the strong and firm man braves,
And, resolute, the wild winds will withstand.
Relenting not he wins the eye that saves,
Or fills his sails with gusts and gains the land.

To tame the tempest one must to her bind,
In meeting both of body and of mind.

Current reading project

So I finally have some momentum on a reading project that I started after watching the movie The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. For those not familiar with the movie, The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen takes place in the late Victorian era. Characters from 19th century literature all co-exist in the same world simultaneously; so Dr Jekyll can meet Captain Nemo and Dr Moriarty can plague the world freely after the death of Sherlock Holmes. Wikipedia has a fairly in-depth article here for those wanting a more comprehensive review.

After seeing the movie, I decided I wanted to read the source material for the main characters. I purchased Oscar Wilde's Picture of Dorian Gray and tried to start reading it a couple of years ago. Wilde's wit was a loss for me for over a year because professional reading took too much of my time and attention for me to focus on pleasure reading. I picked the book up about a week ago and sped through it, apparently I'm in a better place for sardonic, cynical commentary on British "Society."

Next up, King Solomon's Mines by M Haggard Rider (it's waiting for me at the library).

What did you do last weekend?

While I partied in Chicago with the in-laws, my buddy Nate climbed two summits in Washington state. Killer weekend. Oh how I wish I could have gone! Except for the sleeping outside with no tent when it snowed a little. Egads.

Anyway, check out the pictures.

Radio silence

I'm much worse at this blogging thing than I should be. Five minutes a day is all it takes right? -grin-

I'll break uyp all the fun stuff from the past week into a series of posts for easier reading. Dev left for Chivcago last Tuesday (10/3). I took off for Chicago on Friday night. I had a fun weekend kicking around with Devon's Chicago crew. I got back Sunday night and crawled into bed. And then this week has entailed much dog-walking and house-cleaning. So enough excuses. That's what I've been doing. Makes for great television. -grin-

Celebrate good times

Oh yeah! The party is funded!

So now we just need democracy and happiness to attend. Now let's see. Where did we leave their number...

Oh yeah! We need to call late 2000. October-ish. You know, before the neo-cons stole the election, shattered the peace, lost a major city to a hurricane and spent our country's budgetary surplus.

I *swear* do-dos run this country!

Good wind-down weekend

I spent this entire weekend taking it easy.

Dev and I had dinner with two of our friends from the dog park, Matt and Tommy. They treated us to a great fish dinner with some delicious mashed potatoes and lots of really good white wine. We stayed late into the evening talking about cool trips they've taken and watching bad video content on YouTube.

Dev and I lolly-gagged on Saturday morning. Got up late. Wandered over to the dog park with the poochies. Strolled slowly. Enjoyed the sunny morning. Took a slow hot shower. Had a nice, big cup of hot coffee. Then I went out for a short climbing trip to Rocky Butte (close in Portland) with my buddies Tom and Nat and Tasha. We all had low key energy and climbed casual for a bit (except for Tasha who forgot her shoes and was a good sport about belaying us). And hung out for a bit. And then split about 3:30 pm for home. Satisfying without overdoing it.

Dev went to a baby shower for our friend Stacey. She seemed to have a good time but the details are hazy for me (since I wasn't there) -grin-

She got home and we headed out the door one more time. We needed to pay our farewells to Jason (my former co-worker) and his girlfriend Lucy - this will be their last weekend in Portland. We stopped at Nicholas' Restaurant and grabbed some mezza plates and pita bread on the way. Unemployment (temporary) agrees with Jason. He seemed really at ease in a way that I rarely saw while he was working at MacForce. And Lucy was a gracious host as usual, even with packing boxes and disarrayed furniture strewn about the place. Dev and I are gonna miss those guys. But between Scott and Ann, and Jason and Lucy, and Jess and Julie, we won't have any reason not to spend time in Seattle.

Dev and I kept it low key today too. We tromped out the door mid-morning to cheer a pair of friends who ran in the Portland Marathon today. And then we biked over to the grocery store for provisioning. We got to soak up some of the last sun of the season before Portland turns rainy for 6 months. We kinda bopped along on our bikes rather than riding arrow-straight with purpose-driven pedaling to our destination.

Dev had to work for a little while this afternoon and I spent a few hours on stripping paint off of cabinet doors (in between other chores like mowing the lawn). And now we are getting ready to have friends over for an informal dinner of mediteranean chicken and assorted other goodies.

When I type it all up, it sounds like a lot. But this weekend just flowed along without hurry or intensity. A nice end to the summer season.

All quiet on the David front

I've been quiet this last week because I've been busy. -grin-

My partner in crime and fellow service tech, Jason Wolford, had his last day on Friday of last week. He's going to Seattle, or someplace known as "not here." I know that his girl, Lucy, scored a great gig in Seattle. A dream job even. That does not mean that he gets to pull up stakes and follow her (does it?). Especially when we were just getting on a heavy roll here at Macforce. I mean we were really running strong. But he gave all that up. -sigh-

This week has been busy at work. My boss Sean has been helping out and carrying a lot of the load with me. And, I might add, in addition to his regular set of job duties (if I were feeling charitable). -grin- But I've still had to keep my head down and march double time to keep up.

And then I was gone all last weekend with no internet access. Yay! Of course that limited my ability to post news and happenings.

And then there've been household chores to do (I had to pay for the weekend off from chores somehow!).

And I'm going through a friend's sonnets and editing them for him. Maybe he'll do me the honor of letting me post his work here for perusal. Bobby did a good job crafting them and I'd like it if he showed them off a little bit.

So that's that. More soon.

Update

I thinned out the photos from last weekend. I tried to reduce the number of pics so that the non-climbers wouldn't get bored, but I tried to leave enough images to give a sense of flow between shots.

Tell me if I missed the mark. And enjoy the pictures.

Outstanding weekend

I spent the weekend camping and rock climbing with my friends Jon, Nate and Sue out at Smith Rock State Park. I did some sport (or bolted) climbing for the first time ever this weekend. And I spent some time on some slightly harder routes than I have tried climbing before. As usual, the rock humbled me on more than one occasion, but the effort paid off many times over. I've posted pictures, though only a few are of me *and* I went a little crazy on the flip-book style sequence for some of the pictures.

Yay! Activist Judges!

Turns out that another Judge has denied the Bush Administration its preference in handling important national matters. This time a judge reinstated Clinton era roadless rules for National Forest areas. Hopefully this judgement will stand and keep our national treasures from being logged and mined into oblivion.

How is this still ok?

Virginia Senator Allen (of the "Macaca" comment fame) has said some dismaying things in the last few days, as per article all over the blogoshpere. But this link to kos's posting of the the Council for Concerned Conservatives (or KKK's) list of principles really scares me.

I really don't know how it is okay for one of our congressmen to seek out a picture with the leaders of a group who adhere to backwards sentiments like this:

"We also oppose all efforts to mix the races of mankind, to promote non-white races over the European-American people through so-called "affirmative action" and similar measures, to destroy or denigrate the European-American heritage, including the heritage of the Southern people, and to force the integration of the races [...]"

Once again, I hope Allen fries. I hope he and all his ilk fry.

The enemy of my enemy is my friend?

This chart over at Daily Kos poses an interesting question; are our "allies" really our allies? Or are they like the enabling spouse of an alcoholic bully, constantly telling us how we really are a good person. That they still love us even if we drank too much and acted the ass last night. That the foreigner down the street provoked us and deserved what he got.

I'm gonna stop that analogy before it gets *too* creepy.


cheers!

Hidden away

Nate and Sue took me out climbing Sunday (yesterday) to a little crag hidden away and not yet well known in the portland area. (Don't ask me for directions - they swore me to secrecy.)

Nate and Sue, their friends Aaron and Bill, and I all tromped down to this set of rocks that looks just marvelous. I only climbed three routes the whole day. The first route was apparently rated a 5.10b - and I only climb 5.9 right now. But Sue was very patient with me; she belayed me, yelled encouragement and provided great advice. I reached the anchors after what seemed like an eternity, but I *did* reach them.

I don't remember what the second route ranks, but I did get about two thirds of the way up before a slightly overhung arete stymied me. I threw myself at that section 18 times and just could not get past the bulge. I've replayed it in my head a lot in the last day and I look forward to trying that section again.

My last route of the day weighed in at a 5.4. It certainly felt a lot scarier than 5.4 and the top of the route had a strangely set up top out arrangement. Once at the top of the route, the climber needs to place an anchor in a crack system. Then the climber moves up a short and easy overhang onto a "plank" of stone. The climber then needs to edge left past a large pine tree and then has a nice large ledge with two bolted anchors in the wall. So Nate went up first, set the protection and got to the anchors.

He then belayed me from the top of the route. I apparently forgot everything I know about climbing gracefully on the way up. I never came close to falling or losing my grip, but I certainly did not climb with grace or precision. Then we rappelled down to the base and packed up and tromped on back out to the car.

I spent a lot of time taking pictures of everyone else climbing. I forgot to hand off the camera to someone else when my turn to climb rolled around. Thus, no pictures of me climbing. Next time.

I'm heading to Smith Rock this coming weekend to do some climbing, so I'll try to get some good shots of the landscape and of me climbing. I promise. To try.

cheers!