volcanos are scary

I live in a state that has these… You know, because a little ol' mountain can go from looking like this one day… …to looking like this the next. And when this one decides to go all kablooy… …they say it could cause one of these. YIKES! Since moving here I have had to add earthquakes, volcanoes and tsunamis to my list of what one might call irrational fears. This list also includes tornadoes, public restrooms, touching raw chicken, and clowns (especially clowns). But let’s stick to volcanoes shall we. The town we live in is built in the path of the Osceola Mudflow (look it up) so if Mt Rainier decides to blow its top we are pretty much toast. They say there is no evidence of an imminent eruption…but that does not mean that it won’t happen. This is the same reason I am all sorts of leery about going to Yellowstone. Sure it is beautiful, has an amazing array of wildlife, and let’s not forget about Old Faithful…and oh yeah it is also a SUPER VOLCANO. That is like a regular volcano times a gazillion. And while they say there is no evidence of an imminent eruption there either, the irrational fear kicks in that if I get anywhere near it…BLAM-O! We could then kiss a big chunk Wyoming, Montana, and Idaho goodbye. My sister and her family live in Idaho. I don’t think that I could live with the fact that me going to Yellowstone caused them to be blown up. Granted I would have been blown up too…but you get my drift. Now here is the funny part. I am not a lover of anything having to do with science. I only took the minimum required amount of science classes in school so I could make room in my schedule for more art classes. Husband is totally into science (he went to a nerdy engineering school and everything) and once asked me if I were to choose a science-y type of job what would I choose. Do you know what I said? VOLCANOLOGY!!! My reason…because lava is sooooo cool looking and I want to take pictures of it and poke at it with sticks. Anyway…seeing as Husband and I blew our wad on our first day in Oregon, it left us with the second day of our trip wide open. Day one was more about things I wanted to do so I left the activities of day two up to Husband. He chose going to see Mt St Helens. YEAH!!! We stopped at the visitors center first and watched the 13 minute video about the eruption…very informative. Did you know that Harry Truman was killed in the blast? At first I was like ‘wow, why weren’t we taught in school?’ One would think that learning that the 33rd president of the United States was killed by a Volcano was an interesting bit of history. Then ones' husband reminds you that Harry Truman the president died in 1972 and that the Harry Truman that was killed in the eruption was just a man that happened to have the same name of said president. Because we were there in the winter we were not able to go up to the Johnston Ridge Observatory. One of the rangers at the visitors center told us the best place to get a good look at the mountain this time of year was at the Clearwater Viewpoint. We hopped in the truck and headed in that direction. We got lucky, just a few minutes after I snapped the last photo the clouds moved in and surrounded the top of the mountain. Husband wants to go back in the summer so we can get up close to the mountain. I figure that I got this close and nothing catastrophic happened so why not.

we went to Oregon

We get told all the time about all the beautiful places to see and cool things to do in the great state of Washington. Husband had a bunch of use or lose time to use up, so we decided to take a few days in between Christmas and New Years to go to beautiful places and do cool things. We decided to drive down to the Oregon coast. When there are so many things to do here in Washington, why would we drive down to Oregon? The answer is simple…Goonies was not filmed in Washington. (Don't worry...this is not a Goonies super fan post) It was just going to be a quick two day trip and there were only three things I wanted to do, go to Astoria and Cannon Beach (Goonies), then head down to Tillamook to eat cheese. We got to Astoria, grabbed a quick bite to eat, and drove around to see the Jail and the Walsh house. I did not take any pictures in town because I am lazy and there was no parking. Plus I mostly wanted to take pictures of the ocean. While driving down the northern Oregon coast you will come upon a different beach every few miles. The first one we stopped at was Seaside, a fun little resort town. We were surprised to find so many people on the beach on a Monday in December. I am sure this place is crazy in the summer…and that you don’t find people dressed like this: We then hopped back in the truck and drove down to Cannon Beach. I was excited to see Haystack Rock (yeah that’s right I was excited about seeing a rock). It was a beautiful day…warm and sunny. We spent about two hours walking on the beach, me snapping a million photos and Husband complaining about me taking so many pictures. Back in the truck and a few more stops to look at the pretty view… Then to Tillamook for cheese and ice cream. ROCKY ROAD! While I never saw a cow in Tillamook, I know they are there somewhere. The whole town smells like Greeley (those from Colorado know what I am talking about). We ended up doing all the things we had planned to do over the two days in the first day. That left us with nothing to do the next day. So as we drove towards the hotel in Portland we mulled over options for the next day. Tommorows post...Volcanos and why they scare the crap out of me!

just checking in

We are half way through the month of January and I thought I might as well update the ol’ blog. You know before my mom gets on my case about how I haven’t updated in a while and she thought I was going to write about our little trip to Oregon and so forth. (The Oregon post is coming…maybe tomorrow…with pictures and everything.) It is not that I don’t have anything to write about (sorta) it is just that I have not felt like writing. Maybe because I am too busy feeling sorry for myself. Well maybe feeling sorry for myself isn’t the right way to put it. Maybe a better way to put it is that I am full of selfish emotions. I guess that is kinda the same thing. I can’t really put into words the way I am feeling. I feel full of rage, yet empty and sad at the same time. I run through the gamut of emotions several times a day. They come and go so quickly that I don’t really deal with them, they aren’t complete emotions. I am all tied up in knots. So what has me all frazzled? One word…Deployment. Husband’s. We have known for a while that he would be deploying. It’s not like we got a phone call saying “SURPRISE!!! You’re deploying”. But we had dates and we had a mindset for those dates. Then a few days before Christmas Husband finds out that that date has been moved up (okay so I guess it is kinda like SURPRISE!!! You’re deploying”) and all of a sudden we are on fast forward. There is so much we have to do and take care of and get in order in a much shorter amount of time. Although I know it is happening the reality has yet to hit me. It creeps up behind me, taps me on the shoulder, and then runs away before I can turn around. Whenever we talk about serious things like getting a will in order I get all deer in the headlights and my brain makes that robot-y shut down noise. Once it starts back up I start to think about all the things he will miss out on. Birthdays, his brother’s wedding, our first anniversary, Christmas…you know all the things we should be celebrating together. I am pretty selfish about my time with Husband and it is killing me that he is going to be gone for such an extended period of time. Okay need to wrap this up because I am starting to get weepy and I don’t feel like dealing with that right now. I just want to say that I am very proud of my husband.

2009

2009 is going out the same way it came in…like a kick in the crotch. I wanted to do a cool photo montage of the past year, but what should have been easy has turned into a Herculean task. So instead you get a generic recap… Moved to Washington Snowiest winter in WA in 15 years Saw the Space Needle Lost my health insurance Lost my job Start looking for job Watched the Mariners play baseball inside Will it ever stop raining Abe and Christy got engaged Went to El Paso to visit family Went to Denver to visit friends Got engaged Got to see the Blue Angles Ate some salmon that didn’t make me gag Still no job Tracy came to visit It stopped raining…driest summer in WA in 60 years Hottest summer on record in WA Got to sail on a Naval Destroyer My sister and niece came to visit and we… Drove Forks and… Saw Depeche Mode My mom and aunt came to visit Job…nope Jenn came to visit Got to play with Jenn’s fancy cameras Saw orcas in the wild Saw the Broncos play the Seahawks Got my own fancy camera Developed an iPhone addiction Went to Colorado for Jeff and Nicole’s wedding Eloped while we where there Met Elena in person It started raining again Got health insurance Still haven’t found a job Ran out of money Changed my last name Spent my first holidays away from family Found out Husband is deploying 3 months earlier Saw Avatar Drove to Oregon Saw where Goonies was filmed Had a warm sunny day at the beach in December Went to Tillamook and ate cheese and ice cream Still unemployed and living in Washington I am not sad to see the year end and am optimistic that next year will be better. But in the mean time I would just like to say that 2009 can suck it.

so much more than just a candy cane

One of my favorite things to find in my stocking Christmas morning were those huge candy cane sticks. It has been years since I had one...or thought about them for that matter. I came across them in the store the other day and all the childhood memories of running down the stairs on Christmas morning to see what Santa had brought flooded back. And because I needed to keep my sugar buzz going I would work on this thing the whole day. It was important to get it into just the right shape...you know just in case I had to shank a certain sister for getting too close to my new Barbie. MERRY CHRISTMAS!