The Commuting Experiment, Day Three

We left about the same time as yesterday - unfortunately, I had forgotten that we DESPERATELY needed gas in the Cruiser, which threw a bit of a wrench in things. Enough so that Janene totally missed her bus - and since she had to leave work at 3:30 this afternoon to get up to Kenmore in enough time to get home before people showed up at our house, I took her in because a) it was my fault, b) it really helped her out, and c) it was an unusual day, time-wise.

It's looking pretty much like tomorrow we'll be working from home, as Janene has a "nasty" survey that she must get done by day's end and she'll (I think) be less distracted here than at the office. Which means that a) I won't have to get up at the butt crack of dawn, and b) I won't have to get up at the butt crack of dawn.

Tonight Grandma Cec and Grandpa Harry came out to see the house with my parents, and then we all went up to the Country Club in Mill Creek for dinner - which was, of course, excellent.

Now we're home - Janene's in bed reading and falling asleep, and I'm blogging when I should be trying to get her stuff for tomorrow working. Problem being that I need to call IT at Children's Hospital to get the token up and running, so that she can tunnel in.

And if you don't know what any of that means, it probably looks really funny!

Anyway, I can't believe how tired I am at 10:15 - something about shifting my hours all to earlier to bed, earlier to rise. So far I'm tired and poor, and not healthy / wealthy / or particularly wise. If I was wise I'd be in bed right now, instead of writing this amazingly stupid blog entry.

Ho Hum.

Day 2 of our Commute Experiment

So we left 4 minutes later today than yesterday - at 6:34am. Having only 2 days worth of data for the morning commute, it's hard to say if that 4 minutes was really an extra 12+ minutes, or if yesterday was simply an abnormally light day.

Janene missed her bus this morning, but was able to catch one just as we arrived at the Park and Ride in Kenmore. It's great, actually, that she can miss a bus or two and still not wait that long. The PROBLEM is that by missing her bus this morning, she missed her transfer at the other end - so she'll have to wait down there and will get to work later. Bummer on a day that she has very little actual work time due to meetings and such.

Damn Proud.

I got an email from Don Cunningham, my dad-in-law, first thing this morning that really got me thinking. It got me thinking about America, and the things I take for granted. It made me see red at all the a-holes that stand in the street protesting our involvement around the World - and putting down our troops and their sacrifices. I've included the email below (I DON'T know if it's legit or not, as it states - however, I think it's still valuable and true). And I realize, I'm DAMN proud to be an American. I may not be able to carry a gun to defend our country - I have to rely on others for that. But I sure as hell appreciate those that do. And I (personally) LOATHE those that take this country not only for granted but that whine and complain about how unfair things are, and how poor [insert name] isn't getting a fair shake in this world.

You know what? Life is hard. Nobody said it would be easy. Nobody said you'd get what you want. Here in America, our lives are BLESSED. We DON'T worry about getting on a bus in the morning for fear of a bomber. We DON'T have an entire nation starving to death or living in our own filth (I'm not saying that people aren't starving or living in poor conditions - but that's another rant...). I AM saying SHUT UP and STOP WHINING. We could have nothing. We could live in filth, or be starving, or not have a roof over our heads (much less a beautiful home built in 1900 that has character oozing out of every pore, and happens to be in one of our favorite towns in Washington...), or clothes on our back. We could be scrounging for every meal, every breath.

This is a poem being sent from a Marine to his Dad. For those who take the time to read it, you'll see a letter from him to his Dad at the bottom. It makes you truly thankful for not only the Marines, but ALL of our troops.

THE MARINE
We all came together,

Both young and old

To fight for our freedom,

To stand and be bold.

In the midst of all evil,

We stand our ground,

And we protect our country

From all terror around.

Peace and not war,

Is what some people say.

But I'll give my life,

So you can live the American way.

I give you the right

To talk of your peace.

To stand in your groups,

and protest in our streets.

But still I fight on,

I don't bitch, I don't whine.

I'm just one of the people

Who is doing your time.

I'm harder than nails,

Stronger than any machine.

I'm the immortal soldier,

I'm a U.S. MARINE!

So stand in my shoes,

And leave from your home.

Fight for the people who hate you,

With the protests they've shown.

Fight for the stranger,

Fight for the young.

So they all may have,

The greatest freedom you've won.

Fight for the sick,

Fight for the poor

Fight for the cripple,

Who lives next door.

But when your time comes,

Do what I've done.

For if you stand up for freedom,

You'll stand when the fight's done.

By: Corporal Aaron M. Gilbert, US Marine CorpsUSS SAIPAN, PERSIAN GULF

March 23, 2003
Hey Dad,

Do me a favor and label this "The Marine" and send it to everybody on your email list. Even leave this letter in it. I want this rolling all over the US; I want every home reading it. Every eye seeing it. And every heart to feel it. So can you please send this for! me? I would but my email time isn't that long and I don't have much time anyway. You know what Dad? I wondered what it would be like to truly understand what JFK said in His inaugural speech.

"When the time comes to lay down my life for my country, I do not cower from this responsibility. I welcome it."

Well, now I know. And I do. Dad, I welcome the opportunity to do what I do. Even though I have left behind a beautiful wife, and I will miss the birth of our first born child, I would do it 70 times over to fight for the place that God has made for my home. I love you all and I miss you very much. I wish I could be there when Sandi has our baby, but tell her that I love her, and Lord willing, I will be coming home soon. Give Mom a great big hug from me and give one to yourself too.

Aaron

FREEDOM isn't FREE ... someone pays for you and me.

A very strange little link.

From a friend, I at least got quite a chuckle... http://notice.ytmnd.com/

In other news, what a sweet day today has been. I got the media room set up (had to have a TV for the Comcast guy to test the connection - and good thing, too, as the outside cable didn't work and had to be replaced), so we now have music throughout the house...nice!

Been sitting here since then working on store stuff, and realizing JUST how far behind I am on things. Oye - gonna be a late several nights.

The NICE part about the day has been the wonderful, warm sun and the choo-choo of the train off in the distance. It's starting to overcast up now, but that's ok - it has been a good day.

Thanks for the move!

What a weekend!

The move went quite well, I think. Well, about as expected, I suppose. Nobody got seriously injured (other than being out of shape and using muscles that need to be exercised far more often - at least for myself...), nothing got broken or damaged, and 95% of the apartment got moved over to the house - and much of that got moved in, or at least put in the appropriate room.

Had some great food, and it was definitely fun to see friends and family.

Easter was a lot of fun, and was as we felt it should be. We had 14 people here at the house, plus two cute little girls (hi Elise and Fiona!); we had a feast, lots of laughs, and generally a good time. Janene got a headache - perhaps just from stress and letdown and emotions going up and down so much - but by the time she crawled into bed it seemed to be better, and this morning seemed to be gone (from my perspective, anyway...)

The house is wonderful - it definitely has it's little quirks, and it needs a really deep clean (the cleaning lady that came in didn't do a FANTASTIC job - she did a mostly ok surface clean...) so that's pretty high up on the list of priorities. We have several things we're going to need to purchase (some lighting for Janene's studio, some furniture pieces, drapes, etc.) but overall things are really great.

I'm sitting here waiting for the Comcast guy to get here, so that I can get online - in the meantime, I'm piggybacking on someone else's unsecured wireless connection. It's amazing that just about everywhere I go I can do that - kinda funny, kinda scary.

I do still have a ton of photos to clean up and get into the gallery - that'll be another couple of weeks probably. I have a bunch from our trip, and from ArtFest, as well as some great ones from Easter here at the house. Oh, and there's a bunch 'o baby chicks running around Country Village that I got some good pictures of, so I'll be sure to post those in, too.

I can't believe how far behind I am on things, and how much is going on - the store expansion is flying up on us so quickly it's just nuts. On top of that is still moving in and getting settled into the house, which is fun but definitely work.

Thank you all, who helped with the move, so much. We (obviously, and literally) couldn't have done it without all your help and effort.

We're looking forward to "many moons" of fun, laughter, and life in this house, and you're all welcome to come by any time!

It's late, and tomorrow is a big day...

So this is going to be short. Hopefully after this weekend, as I start to get caught up on things, I'll be back to posting something nearly every day. I know it's been a little sporadic, but I'm working on things...

As everyone who reads this blog knows, tomorrow is the start of the "big move" down to Snohomish. How exciting! Janene and I met my parents down at the house tonight, did a walk-through, took pictures of things, and cleaned the kitchen cupboards so that tomorrow the kitchen can be moved in... Holy cow.

Comcast comes on Monday between 8am and noon - so we'll have internet access after that, as well - which will be great.

The house is so wonderful - even with several issues (just from it being built in 1900) to contend with, we love it. Neither of us wanted to drive back to Seattle tonight - and it wasn't just 'cause we were exhausted. It'll be fun to sleep there starting tomorrow night... :)

Thank you, in advance, to all of you who are helping make the move possible - we REALLY appreciate it... :)

I'm brainstorming some good (deeper, richer, more inspired) blog subjects - so if there's something (serious) you want me to rant about, let me know! Otherwise, I suppose you'll get whatever my twisted mind comes up with!

And now, since tomorrow is going to be a long and physically difficult day, I'm going to push "Publish" and then go to sleep. Sllleeeeeeppppppp.....

so MUCH crap...!

What a week, and what a day...moving, as exciting as the end result may be, is still an act of self imposed insanity. I cannot believe how many boxes we have packed and taken up to my parent's living room (which has, most of this last year, been used as a "storage locker" for some move or another)... I have another full van load to take up first thing in the morning - and the sad part is that (guessing here) we've probably got at LEAST 2-3 more loads. Fortunately, once they're all there, it'll be a single UHaul load.

Which reminds me, I need to call UHaul and reserve a truck. Hm. That'd be a good one not to forget again.

I'm so stinkin' tired, my body is protesting sitting upright to write this. However, I know that if I don't blog on a regular basis the world will stop spinning on it's axis, birds will fall from the sky like stones, fish will fly (as will pigs...), and this sneeze I've developed from so much dust will propel me into space for all eternity.

Which might be ok for some, but there's no way I'm going to be the reason for the end of Earth as we know it.

So today was hectic, as I had to cover the afternoon at the store - nothing like not being able to find anyone to cover things for an afternoon.... My mom was gonna cover (she's one of our employees) but she awoke (after being here until midnight last night helping us pack) with a nasty migraine that made her physically ill - so that obviously wouldn't work. So I covered. Oh well, it was a good break from packing.

And now, at 9:36pm, I'm going to go take a hot shower (I'm soaking wet from carting load after load of boxes to the van in the pouring rain) and crawl into bed. I need to do some introspective art journaling, I think. That and curl up in Janene's arms and fall asleep. There is, I think, no greater comfort. And yes, I'll proudly admit that sometime's I need to be on the receiving end of comfort instead of the giving end.

Trip Summary

It has been a few days since I posted - we were obviously out of town (for ten days, even though I only managed to get two "travel logs" up during that time) and since we've gotten back life has really hit hard.

To summarize the trip, it was fantastic. Janene took her first class of the trip with Claudine Hellmuth in Coupeville. During this time I took hundreds of photos, watched a few good movies, slept some, enjoyed the view from our "Cottage on the Cove", ate some good food, and hung out with Janene and some of the artists.

From Coupeville we moved on to Pt. Townsend for ArtFest. Janene took three days of metals classes this year, which was a new and exciting experience for her. I regained an interest in doing some art, and have started turning my journal into more of an art journal, which is kind of fun. I've also decided I'd like to learn some metal work, and do that on a semi-regular basis.
Andy, Holly, and Elise came over to say hello on Friday afternoon, which was just wonderful. We hung out until Janene was done with class, then chatted a while, caught dinner, and went to Vendor Night at ArtFest. They caught the late ferry home - it was really fun and meant a lot that they came over.

We went from ArtFest to Union to see Don and Esther for Sunday afternoon - which was very relaxing. Pretty much sat around chatting and munching on food, and didn't hardly do any work at all. It was great. We came back into town on Monday morning first thing.
Since then, it has been shop work left and right - and on top of that trying to pack. Life is crazy, but it's a good crazy. We're really pushing to have our place packed up as early as possible, and to live off of ... nothing, really, for a day or few. That way we can move on the 15th with as little hassle as possible - I'm really excited.