Well, so good to read posts and comments and have some time to catch up with this and Susanne's blog. I have been too busy but enjoying work, feeling perfectly entitled to totally veg out during the hour I have between when I get home and go to bed.... I really need to get out of there earlier. This weekend I helped my girlfriend in Seattle do a big catering job for UW Med School residents at Mt Baker Community Center and we're still eating the leftovers, yummy. Also went to the Pt Defiance Garden Show today and bought hostas to grow in the shade... I'm very excited about them. I always thought they were kind of ho-hum plants, big leafy green things, but the leaves are totally amazing!!! Every plant has a different color combination and the leaves look like they were individually painted by a watercolor artist!!

I also made a ruby, gold, and watermelon tourmaline bracelet today that turned out really pretty, and am planning to make a necklace and earrings.

I went to my college reunion in Southern California in early May. It was fun, great weather, and lots of good connections with old and new friends. Bob and I went to visit friends in Bow/Edison a couple of weekends ago and ended up at a wake for a musician (Coyote George) whom we didn't know, but our friends encouraged us to go and we were glad we did. Coyote George worked in the mental health field in addition to playing guitar in the Poor Man's Jug Band, so there were lots of interesting people there who also worked in mental health. At the end of the evening we did a ceremony and then they lit this 10-foot wide metal eagle with kerosene-soaked fiberglass rope and made the wings flap while it was covered with foot-high flames!!! Totally amazing!!! I want something like that at my wake!!! Like a giant phoenix bird. The next day our friend's girlfriend invited us to go to a little gourmet picnic on the deck outside Taylor Shellfish on Samish Bay, with caviar, oysters, clams, mussels, nice salads.... it was a really great weekend.

We have a book group at work and just read Winter Dance by Gary Paulsen about the Iditarod, which was a fun read and increased my respect for dogs and made me want to go to Alaska. I'd love to be able to see the sights he describes in the book, without freezing my nose, face, or toes off. I just started another book by Pete Dexter called Train, which is so good I don't want to put it down.

I'm also walking some, trying to get ready to walk the Virginia Mason 1/2 Marathon at the end of June again. It's hard to find the time to walk as much as I did last year. I'll just have to use determination to get through it, and moan and groan later.

I'm going to the Behavioral Health Conference with a few people from work, over in Yakima, which will be nice, since it promises to actually feel like summer over there. Anybody else going? I miss seeing all you people at our monthly lunches or the occasional party. I hear Charlie is retiring in the Fall. Will there be a party like for Cheryl? I'm sure there will be.

And did Crystal take her licensing test, yet? I guess I need to read more posts. :) Time for the book and the bed. xo K