Oops.....

Just saw some Pacific NW breaking news that the dome of BC Place in Vancouver collapsed today! Fortunately no one was inside.

Now ya sees it......

Now ya don't."An icon of downtown Vancouver, this stadium is one of the most modern, attractive, multi-purpose facilities in North America. It is one of the world's largest covered buildings measuring 200 feet from field level to the roof, and is 776 feet long by 640 feet wide. The ten acre air-inflated cable-supported, teflon coated fibreglass roof has a transluceny of 15% allowing for natural illumination.This facility is the home of the Canadian Football League's BC Lions."

Happy Birthday Anushka!

Anushka is Lady Axe's daughter, and I found out that her birthday is this week. Axe may take her to an internet cafe in S. Africa, where they live, so hopefully they'll have time to stop by.

Anushka - I hope you like the necklace I made for you with the dancing bear. I have a dancing bear tattooed on my right ankle. It's one of the Grateful Dead's many symbols/logos. Have a happy birthday!!!

A little too close to work...

Below are some pictures taken by KING-5 and KOMO-4, following a deadly shooting at Foss High School, which is less than a mile from my office. One person was killed, but so far they haven't found the shooter. I doubt he'll make his way down here before being caught, so I'm not terribly worried about it. The strange thing is, I didn't hear any sirens at all. It's been very quiet and we only found out when someone called our office to tell us what had happened. I wonder if this will make national news again? If so, it's another black eye for Tacoma and Washington State.

TACOMA, Wash. - A student was shot to death early Wednesday morning at Foss High School in Tacoma and police are looking for the shooter.Tacoma police say police are inside the school and are evacuating students. District Spokeswoman Pam Thompson says police have told the district that the students are safe and they have a "strong" suspect.The victim died of his wounds, said police Spokesman Mark Fulghum, but he did not know what may have prompted the shooting.One student who called the KOMO newsroom said he was herded into the gym with fellow students were placed in lockdown. He said the principal came in to inform them that a student had been shot. Jacki Phongsavath is a junior at the school and said the shooting happened about 7:30 a.m. around the corner from where he was standing. "I thought it was fireworks, but it was probably three shots," he said. "I looked around the corner and saw someone laying on the ground and blood on the lockers."He said that the victim was male, but didn't know who the shooter was. Students will be sent home as soon as buses arrive, and parents have been told to come pick up kids who don't take the bus.

Happy Anniversary Sweet Pea!

One year ago today, our little guy, Sagan, came to live with us. We adopted him from the Washington State German Shepherd Rescue, who rescued him from the Pierce County Humane Society. Sagan's story was really heartbreaking. At the time he was discovered by a PC Sheriff, he was only 9 months old.

The story we were told by the Rescue people was that he was found locked in an abandoned car in a seedy motel parking lot out in Spanaway, along with a 3 month old purebred GSD that was apparently his younger brother from a second litter of puppies. The dogs were allegedly adopted by someone in the military who was in Texas, because both dogs were from Texas and that his name was "Soldier". "Soldier" was also registered with the AKC and we were given the info to obtain his papers if we wanted them. So it's December of 2005, and bitterly cold. The Sheriff went to check out this car in a motel lot and finds the two dogs, starving to death in the freezing cold weather. They were taken to the Humane Society, then by WSGS Rescue. Both dogs were pitiously underweight and dehydrated. Another day or so and it was all over.

Brian and I were kicking around adding another fur child to our home, and we knew we wanted a GSD. Brian is scrolling through the pictures, looking for an older, mellower male that we could introduce into our household, which already contained Pepper who considers herself "top dog" if you'll excuse the pun. As he scrolls by, I see an entry that says, "9 month old male". There was no photo yet, but the basic info. I squeal, "Oh look! A nine month old!" And that set the wheel in motion.

We were going away for New Years and so we knew we couldn't pick him up until after the holidays. "Soldier" was transferred to Theresa's No Place Like Home delux doggie day care to be fostered till we got back, but Brian was able to meet our new doggie briefly. He was so, so hungry and very food-focused. We went to Theresa's right after Christmas to meet him and introduce him to Pepper. She opened up the kennel and out came this laughing, but painfully skinny, German shepherd dog. He came right over and was so friendly. He happily went over to Pepper for sniffs. But you know when my heart melted? When Brian and I were standing next to each other talking to Theresa, and all of a sudden there's this large dog wedging himself between us and then leaning on us. He looked up at us with these beautiful almond shaped brown eyes. Brian and I instinctively reached down to pet him and he was so, so sweet. You could see the love and relief in his eyes. His name was changed to "Sagan", in tribute to Carl Sagan.

I wish I had the photo we took of Sagan that day; it's in his scrapbook and I don't have a copy that's convenient, but he was all legs. You could see all of his bones - his ribs, growth plates, spine. No muscle at all. When we took him to the vet he was about 57 lbs.; when he was found I think he was closer to 50 lbs. This is our handsome boy in November, 2006, playing in the snow, all 77 lbs. of fur and love.

He's a real comedian...he's got the funniest sense of humor, and makes us laugh every day. So I bought him the jester's collar for the holidays. He loves belly rubs and often lays across door thresholds or at the bottom of the stairs so you can't get by without paying the "scritch toll". He's extremely smart and we can see now that he's closer to 2, that the training is catching on. When he needs to be on alert or on duty, he is. We've seen him come streaking across the yard, silently, if someone drives into the neighbor's yard. He "helps" me do the laundry. And by "helps" I mean he stands either directly behind me pinning me to the machines, or directly between me and the machines, and tries to get his head into the dryer. He inspects the stuff I'm tossing in there. He leans forward with me as I stretch to get another scoop of detergent for the next load. Then he plops down in the hall, with his big fat fuzzy feet hanging into the laundry room, and I'm trying to shut the door. Then he gets up and escorts me back to the couch. Who said chivalry was dead?
Happy Anniversary little guy! We love you!!!

For Tess

This is John Barrowman, current star of a show called "Torchwood" which is currently airing in the UK. I am not sure if BBC-America picked it up or not. I first became aware of him when he guest starred in the first season of "Doctor Who", in 2005, as "Captain Jack Harkness". He was only in the last few episodes of that season, but he made quite the impression on me. "Torchwood" is a spinoff of "Doctor Who". I believe when I first saw him, the first words out of my mouth were, "Wow, he's so good looking I could cry!" His imdb.com biography says that he was born in Glasgow, Scotland and was raised in Joliet, IL. Here he is with Billie Piper and Christopher Eccleston on the Doctor Who set.
Yummy.
Sorry ladies, he's not straight in real life. His boyfriend is one lucky guy.

Happy New Year!

I hope everyone had a nice new years eve! We always stay in, except for the years when we were lucky enough to score tickets for the Grateful Dead in Oakland. It was the show of the year and any Deadhead lucky enough to be among the lucky 15,500 or so souls inside on the big night was revered among those Deadheads who could only stay home and listen to it on the radio. We got to see the last 3 NYE shows the Dead ever performed: 1989, 1990 and 1991. Once the date was announced on the Dead's hotline in October, everyone raced to the post office to get their money orders. Next, we'd go home and lovingly follow the strict mailorder instructions - filling out our names and addresses in the top left corner of a 3x5 index card, with the date of desired show, venue name, quantity and total amount enclosed in the center The envelope had to be stamped, no metered mail allowed. We'd walk the envelopes down to the post office on the first day of mailorder, and wait in line just to watch the clerk hand cancel the stamp. Then we'd go home and check the mailbox every hour of every day for the next month, as if it were a Road Runner cartoon where Wile E. Coyote puts something in the mailbox, stands next to it and the postal carrier zooms up immediately with his package from Acme Explosives.

It had often been said that Bay Area Deadheads were first to get the coveted NYE tickets. Since we had just moved to San Francisco, we crossed our fingers and hoped. The day arrived when we saw our return address stamped envelopes in our mail. We tore open the envelopes....yup, we were going to 12/27/89 and 12/30/89..... and....and.....YES! WE WERE IN!!! There were the giant pink tickets with a skeleton and balloons and party hats!

And what a show that was, too. Bonnie Raitt was the second opening band, and she just smoked. She even joined the Dead playing slide guitar on "Big Boss Man". In 1989 we met some great people. These girls, Kim and Kris, were sitting in front of us and they invited us to sit with them. At midnight, after promoter Bill Graham did his big Father Time midnight show and we'd counted down, Kim produced out of nowhere a bottle of champagne she smuggled in. She was wearing layers of hippie skirts so it was never noticed under her clothes. The champagne was very warm by then but we didn't care. We were passing the bottle while the Dead jammed "Not Fade Away" and the hundreds of thousands of balloons which had been released into the crowd below started popping so loud it almost drowned out the band. Those NYE shows usually ended around 2:00 and after being inside the Oakland Coliseum with 15,000+ of your best friends, most of whom are tripping, since about 5:15 pm it was a paradigm and/or reality shift to say the least!

1990 was also a blast; we went with 3 good friends and ran into everyone else we knew. These were my fave tickets, for the 1990 show. We've had them framed in our family room ever since that night.

And who can forget NYE 1992, when we drove all the way up to Fort Bragg, on the Mendocino Coast, late that afternoon in a blinding rainstorm, me with bronchitus in full swing? I tried to stick it out, but I was way too sick. We ended up leaving the hotel at 2:30 a.m. because of my non-stop, strangling cough. It was still pouring rain as we wound our way through the dark, wet, foggy coastal mountains to get back to Highway 101. There was a 24-hour Chevron station and convenience store at the end of the road, and to this day, we still talk about how that was the best cup of coffee either of us had ever had. We finally got back to San Francisco at 5:45 a.m. and Brian dropped me off at the hospital urgent care.

But this cartoon is more like it for Brian and I now. If you can't read the text, the woman's looking at the clock and it's 1:15, and she says, "Wake up, Brian, we slept through it again this year", and hubby's fast asleep. I changed the name of course.
And this one's pretty accurate too. Yesterday (NYE) after I showered in the a.m., I decided I had absolutely nothing to do so I climbed back in my jammies and stayed that way.

T-Town

Welcome to Tacoma, Washington, USA - "The City of Destiny". Tacoma has a lot of potential, and it definitely has it's gritty areas. Overall, the downtown part is undergoing a slow, but steady, transformation from boarded up old buildings to pricey condos, trendy restaurants, shops, bars, nightclubs and museums. So far, so good.

Here's one of The Sounder trains that take commuters to Seattle a few times a day during the week. They also run it up to Seattle for Mariners games on Sundays in the summer, hence the logo on the front. We took it to a game once in 2001 and it was a blast! Freighthouse Square is my new fave place to shop. There's a huge antique store, called Katy's Antiques. She's really cool; originally from Alaska. My fave store in the world, Crescent Moon, is there too. I could spend thousands of dollars on the celestial/Wicca/dragon/faerie/crystal themed books, clothes, art, objects, etc. There's a huge food court, lots of other little shops and art galleries.
Thea Foss Waterway, looking west towards Commencement Bay. Lots of condos are being built along on the water.
Looking east: Thea Foss Bridge, Tacoma Dome most prominent features. The cloud in the background on the left of the bridge is one of Mt. Rainier's lenticular clouds. Sometimes it sits right on top of the mountain like a hat, and sometimes it drifts a little ways away. People have actually mistaken them for UFO's.
"Ride the Blue Wave". Tacoma Lightrail, Pacific Avenue.
This is Union Station, shot from the back. It was a train station in its heyday, but it now serves as the US Courthouse in downtown Tacoma. It is filled with beautiful glass art created by Dale Chihuly and his students.

The Way Back Room

A month or so ago, I posted photos of our den. This is the room next to the den, and for lack of a better name for it, we dubbed it "the way back room". It's very cluttered with bits of memorabilia and brick-a-brack that we've collected over the years. We like to collect bits of pop culture, and you can tell a lot about our interests from looking at all the stuff in this room. I'm not sure but I think if you click on the picture, it might make it bigger on your screen. Note the metal handlebars of the gazzelle machine that never gets used.
That's a map of Narnia in the top left corner of the wall, above the 1930's looking radio.

There's the gang from Lost in Space, one of my all time favourite TV shows. Don West was such a dreamboat! Yes, Val, that's a Yellow Submarine. The local record store gave them away with the purchase of Yellow Sub when it was re-released a few years ago. Somehow it has survived for about 8 years without popping or deflating.
You can't really see it well, but Sagan (aka Destructo Dog) got ahold of our Jerry Garcia doll and bent poor Jerry's wire glasses hopelessly out of shape!!

We got the autographed baseballs from the Tacoma Rainiers games we went to in the past. I don't remember who half of them are, but a couple of them have made it to the big leagues, like Bobby Madritsch. The big black thing in the center is a paper camera that I built. Brian got me the kit many Christmases ago and one year I decided to finally tackle it. It took from January to about April to finish the kit; once I got going, it actually became pretty easy to build. The camera is made entirely of heavy stock paper, except for the fabric bellows. Even the gears inside at the back, are paper. I haven't tried it, but the camera supposedly works. There's a pinhole in the lens, and you remove the lens cap to expose the film, then put the cap back on, and wind the gears to line up the next frame of film. Maybe someday I'll try it.
Oh, and by the way, since I know someone's gonna inquire, no, I don't dust this room very often at all.

A sense of foreboding....

We get some wild weather up here, as you all know. In the fall and spring, we will have sudden downpours, followed by bright sunlight. The cycle repeats itself all day long - the sky gets black and rain comes down in torrents, then 15 minutes later, the sun is out. It causes havoc on the highways when everyone is blinded by the reflection of the rain on the pavement, so they slam on their brakes and massive pile-ups occur. This was shot off my back deck, facing east, in the late afternoon, in September. We'd just had a downpour and the rain was moving east into Buckley and Enumclaw. Although it did not happen on this day, I also have similar photos of the dark sky over the brightly lit trees with a rainbow arcing across the sky.

One year we were watching the annual Daffodil Parade in April, which was live from Puyallup, just about 7 miles west of us. It would rain there, but be sunny here. Then it would be rainy here and sunny there, and that cycle kept up for most of the parade, so we were able to figure out when our next downpour would arrive, based on the weather we were seeing on TV from Puyallup.

Thanks Val!

My dear V-love friend Val took up for me regarding a small incident and my other V-love friends backed her and me up, and I just wanted to express my sincere thanks to all of you for that. It means a lot!!!

Happy Friday!!

Pepper sez, "Have a good weekend!"

I absolutely adore this picture of her. I shot this on a gorgeous September day at a small park in downtown Tacoma.

Wow! We cleaned up!!

Well, I cleaned up!! My hubby went over and above with the gifts he got for me. I am still blown away! Usually, what we do is fill out order forms from catalogs we get, then give them to each other during the summer. All we have to do is order and wrap....Well, Brian went out and shopped this year and shocked the absolute socks off me with diamond drop earrings, which he placed in a beautiful Celtic-designed round jewelry box. Not to mention a sewing machine! AND he got me this mixer thingy and software into which I can plug in the turntable to the computer, and make mix CD's FROM MY RECORD ALBUMS, 45's AND TAPES!!! WOW!!!!!!!!! Cause I've been lamenting that I have literally hundreds of vinyl, not to mention about 600 hours of live Grateful Dead tapes, and no way to transfer them to CD's. He also got me the book "Eragon" and the 40th anniversary edition of "To Kill a Mockingbird." Also, a whole bunch of craft stuff, craft books & colouring books, a silver thistle design barrett, and a Celtic celestial cross pendant. And a gorgeous stained glass Celtic design table. Needless to say, someone's gonna get lucky later today! tee hee hee

The stuff I got him pales in comparison; mostly books, DVD sets of his favourite shows, some Weyerhaeuser gear (hat, knife, tshirt), an autographed photo of Emmy Rossum, and this hilarious infrared "shooting gallery" that has a gun that shoots an infrared beam at a plastic log and has "bottles" and "cans" that go flying when you hit the target.

Here's the tree with the gifts, as seen at 8:15 a.m. today.
And the stockings. Pepper and Sagan got a bunch of rawhide chewies in their stockings. We never know what to get for stocking stuffers so we just do lottery tickets. I won about $21, but Brian only won about $7.
Sagan's first Christmas with us. We adopted him on 1/2/06. He's already destroyed one new toy in less than 2 hours.
Little Pepper with her new BoBo squeaky toy.
And the aftermath....
Isn't this table just gorgeous?

Ye olde tradition

Back when Brian and I were first married and living in San Francisco, we started to develop our own holiday traditions. We would go up to the Marin Headlands each Krissmiss morning to watch the sun rise over San Francisco. I have 10 years' worth of photos of the sun coming up between the Transamerica Pyramid and Bank of America building. This one particular year we had spectacular, coloured clouds and I managed to capture the north tower of the Golden Gate Bridge in perfect black silouette against the sky. I think this was taken in 1991. By the by, if anyone wants a chuckle, or something fun to show their kids on Krissmiss Eve, go to www.noradsanta.org . This is NORAD's official Santa-tracking site. I was just on there and their latest press release assures the world that, despite the recent Colorado snow storms, the Santa radar tracker is up and running, and will be tracking Santa's journey on Krissmiss Eve.

Happy Winter Solstice!

Sunrise today: 7:55 a.m.
Sunset today: 4:22 p.m.

Personally, I like the dark winter nights and I am not one who celebrates the return of the sun, which is the traditional celebration on Winter Solstice.

When we moved up here, I immediately noticed the much longer summer days and much shorter winter days. Washington State's latitude is closest to Ottawa, Canada (7:39 a.m. and 4:23 p.m.) or St. John's Newfoundland (7:45 a.m. and 4:11 p.m.).

Here are some other sunrise/sunset times on today's Winter Solstice:

San Francisco: 7:21 a.m. and 4:54 p.m.
Boston: 7:10 a.m. and 4:15 p.m.
NYC: 7:17 a.m. and 4:31 p.m.
London: 8:03 a.m. and 3:53 p.m.
Anchorage, Alaska: 10:14 a.m. and 3:41 p.m.

photo: coreyfordgallery.com

The Ghost of Christmas Past

Well at least I wasn't screaming, like most babies do on Santa's lap. This is from Christmas 1966, I had just turned 2. This was taken at a Sears Roebuck store. Christmas 1967, taken at Edaville Railroad, in South Carver, Massachusetts.
I like to call this "Little JoJo Crankypants". I could NEVER sleep on Christmas Eve; probably 3 hours at best. So here I am, overtired, crying about something, and dad just had to make it a "Kodak Moment."
And there she goes, down into the sled, sucking her thumb, holding her new Thumbalina doll by the head, with the crayons spilled everywhere.
Christmas 1973. I loved that outfit; it was a cobalt blue velour vest and pants set, with a white blouse. I called it my "Partridge Family" outfit; I really wanted the blouse to be all ruffly up the front like the Partridges' but mom thought it'd be too over the top. Note the "magic 8-ball".
Merry Krissmiss to all and to all a goodnight!!!