happy belated anniversary

yesterday was our 1-year anniversary of moving from california to oregon. am i still happy with that decision? see my obama post as metaphorical preview of coming paragraphs.

my job may be a little busier than i'd like -- although obviously i have enough time to write this today! - but at least i have a job. if i'd stayed in california, as a mediocre developer, i'm sure i would have been laid off. instead i'm on a team where my skillz pass for superior. go mediocrity! and, go occasional time for writing at mostly-mellow workplace.

and though i need to work on making more friends, at least we have a pretty friendly crew here. my writing group is pretty cool too, and speaking of words, hope to hit wordstock this weekend. if nothing else, this town is a fan of words. as you might imagine, that warms my heart a wee bit.

one of the main reasons we moved up was to be closer to my parents. now my mom is a lot closer than i'd anticipated - and that is going fine, thank you - but obviously with heartwrenching results. in the fallout from that, my dad has written me and min off as being untrustworthy and, i'm sure, a host of unflattering things he won't say to our face but directs to my sister and mother via email. classy. also classy is his attempt to woo other women while still trying to get my mom back. quite the prize, he is.

otherwise life is mostly the same, i'd guess, as it would've been in california...except that almost every day i go outside, i am stunned at all the beauty around me. not that i didn't ever note beauty in the sparkling smogopolis of san jose, but in addition to the air, there's just all the green, orange, blue, and (yes) rainbow of colors that perpetually surround us.

so yeah. color me happy to be home again.

in lieu of more interesting content

i admonish you to stop and smell whatever's blooming nearby, just like my girl.

enough with the writing already

here's a more general update, in case you were bored. although i will say, since there's still no work to be done here, i started actual *writing* yesterday and i'm already wondering if i should start on a different section. =p

saturday was the 11th anniversary of when min and i got hitched up in missoula (approximately 2/3 of the way across the photo). there was a lot more snow that day, which made it all the more surreal when we immediately vacationed in heat-wave stricken southern california. was about 90 degrees all week, i think. a nice little blur, though.

anyway, as often seems to be the case as we get older, we didn't do much smooshy stuff on the actual day, but min felt better sunday. we had some Time To Ourselves in the morning, then took off for (brief) jaunts in two parks, one of which had a rabbit, which is one of our little mascots. we took a scenic route to the surprisingly steep second park, and upon changing elevation a mere 50 feet or so, realized, wouldn't it be great to ditch and just go get lunch?

so we went to marcos, which i have glorified here before, and had a very tasty lunch, followed by a drive down to salem. we visited with my parents for a few hours, discussing all nature of reality shows, religion, health, and science fiction. all in all, a pretty typical parental conversation. then some dinner, where they treated us (happy anniversary/st patrick's!) to way too much food at mcgrath's.

incidentally, those of you who believe in prayer/good vibery, feel free to send some to my dad. a week and a half ago, he was hospitalized for cellulitis [mild ick]. they gave him some SuperAntibiotics -- this is after two weeks at home on pedestrian antibiotics -- and sent him home a few days later. apparently, the infection was not really gone. his left leg is all angry again, fever, the whole nine yards, so my mom's taking him back to the ER today. their doctor tried a few additional things last week but said if that didn't work, he might lose his leg. i'm guessing this is because my dad has diabetes and this, among other things, but suffice to say, this is a bit of an uphill battle, so again, feel free to radiate the good energy towards the tiny hamlet of salem, oregon, particular nexus of my dad.

with that, i'm going out for lunch because i screwed up the one i brought with me. and in case you're wondering, no i don't have a french press yet, thanks!

so i don't seem quite so neurotic

today we had a really great day. looked for a great place to see a classy easter concert (think symphony) but no luck. so we made our own easter celebration by getting Whatever We Wanted at whole foods for a picnic lunch, which we then took to henry cowell over in felton.

incidentally i am sad to report that the a&w that used to be on hwy 9 is now a chinese restaurant. i like chinese, but a&w! dying breed.

anyway, we had a great time. yum yum yummy food followed by a walk among the redwoods and along the river. pearl loooves being in nature, maybe as much as i do, and so a couple of times we would run ahead and then run back to min. because if you're outside, hello, you have to run sometimes because you're so happy.

later there was carrot cake and toffee crunch (!) cookies. i'll try to flickr the couple pics i took today. those of you who've seen my recent shots will know that they look best in the thumbnail view. click to see blurry versions! but still, it lets me remember the moment, so i'm grateful for the geek appliance just the same.

at home tonight there was puttering followed by a very tasty dinner involving one of my favorite vegetables while watching some dr. katz on dvd. hot damn that show is still funny.

ok 'night, intarweb.