← Feed

Posts

• Post #4386302

  Sooo ... I stopped drinking alcohol a few weeks ago for financial and health reasons. A cool side effect is that I've dropped 5 lbs without otherwise changing my diet or activity. Turns out drinking beer really is like swilling bread.

• Post #4311949

  More beach agates! After winter storms is the best time to go agate hunting because the gravel beds are exposed but there’s never a bad time to walk along the Oregon coast.

• Post #4214270

  This was a cool agate. I love the patina the sea gives to these rocks.

• Post #4169895

  Tunnel Beach at Netarts, Oregon

• Post #4147918

  Not bad for off-season agate hunting! This is near Nearts, Oregon. Super cute community.

• Post #3974295

  Am I doing this right? I heard putting paper sacks over your fruit will help protect them bugs. (I don’t want to spray insecticide.) This is a pear tree btw. Experiences appreciated!

• Post #3965274

  Yowza, a bad cougar encounter is one of my worst fears being out in PNW forests. They're just really scary predators. A cougar was acting aggressively towards a trail runner and bicyclist in the Methow Valley. They did all the right things but it wasn't giving up stalking them and even approached one man close enough to wet his leg with its nose. It ended up chasing the cyclist for half a mile. Most likely a young curious cougar, but it was still very dangerous. This might be a great r...

• Post #3894923

  Voter ID laws

• Post #3892380

  My review of The Odyssey: I loved the historical realism (excepting the mythical creatures). You definitely felt the temple to Athena at Pylos might have looked like that. Metal was all bronze, not iron. The rhapsodes would pound sticks on the floor when declaiming a poem. I really appreciate attention to details like that. The movie also used the historical context of the poem itself as one of the themes. When Homer wrote The Odyssey, the age of the Trojan War (~1,000 BC) felt like a sort of...

• Post #3814939

  Our entire family is going to see The Odyssey at its opening on Thursday night. We're pretty much all Greek myth nerds so really looking forward to this one! I'll post a review afterwards. #theodyssey

• Post #3476192

  I found this fun The Irish Times article about Seattle hosting World Cup games. Apparently, Seattle "has always been shrouded in a kind of mystery, up there in the far northwest, moody and forested, given to spectacularly gloomy winters." Fair enough, lol! Another favorite description of Seattle: "It’s eclectic, tolerant and its locals seem fond of tattoos." My daughters were on a hike on Saturday and met a member of the Belgian team. My brother-in-law has been down outsid...

• Post #3473157

  There are two interesting chess documentaries released to Netflix in 2026. They're both pretty interesting. First is Queen of Chess, a documentary about Judit Polgar. She was one of three Hungarian sisters who were a sort of "experiment" by their father to show that nurture rather than nature was the determining factor in expert success. I also loved that she has an amazing attacking game. The story centers on her quest to defeat Garry Kasparov, which she eventually does, marking...

• Post #3413588

  I'll never forget after 9/11 when George W Bush said that it was patriotic for U.S. citizens to go out and spend money. That was the first time that I realized not being a "consumer" was to go against the system. (I consider myself a patriot, but don't measure my love for my country in terms of consumer spending.)

• Post #1304594

  Rattlesnake Lake yesterday morning from the kayak. I caught no fish but refilled my soul. Take your PTO, my friends.

• Post #989027

  I stepped in cat barf just before I joined an online meeting at 7:30 a.m. How's your Friday going?

• Post #989025

  Photos of the 120+ year old ginko tree on Front Street in Issaquah. The leaves are just starting to come out.

• Post #889335

  Excited to watch Project Hail Mary at my favorite movie theater

• Post #600929

  A couple of years ago, I started reading Wendell Berry’s Port William novels and some of his essay collections. His thoughts and values have made a tremendous impact on me, which I’ll try to explain briefly. His book The Unsettling of America (1977) makes an argument for what people today might call de-growth or at least systems thinking aiming for sustainability. He asks us to question the assumptions of our modern capitalistic society. “What are people for?” Berry points to the self-suff...