Travel Diary – Day Three

Aug. 25, 8:35 AM – Not good: You know how I’ve been whining about jet lag. Well, Husband and I fell into bed 8:30-9:00 PM last night. And our room in Everett overlooked the pool. And people tend to shriek and holler when they’re having a good time in the water. Plus the AC would explode to life about every 10 minutes, and then quit seconds later. Not that we needed cooling. We needed masking noise for the pool party and a city that makes more noise than SeaTac Airport on a Friday afternoon. We ended up changing rooms first thing this morning.

Good: Breakfast. No need to hike to Denny’s this time. The Best Western Cascadia lays out a serious feast.

Aug. 25, 2:20 PM – Finally recovered from jet lag, moving to another room, and too much breakfast. We’re heading for attractions at points north. Husband spotted a lavish casino on the Tulalip reservation which offered a great photo op.

From there we turned off I-5 to trek east into the Cascade Mountains. Breathtaking!

Breakfast finally wore off by the time we reached the tiny town of Darrington. We were a bit wary of the only eatery for miles around - this rustic, 3-table Burger Barn. But let me tell you, friends, this place is a real find. We started with a basket of homey-tasting fries. Husband reported his “Famous Burger” was terrific even though served with tarter sauce. My salmon burger came with jalapeňos – an unexpected taste treat.

Aug. 25, 6:35 PM – Watching Hurricane Irene in disbelief. New York City? You gotta be kidding! Also – Comcast has collapsed again. Not much disbelief there…

Travel Diary – Day Two

Aug. 24, 10:10 AM Seattle, 8:10 AM Houston. Seriously jet-lagged. We’d chosen La Quinta for their fabulous complimentary breakfasts. This one, unfortunately, had only muffins and juice. Not to worry. Denny’s is just across the parking lot. Oh, the crisp, pine-scented air of Seattle! After we ate, I enjoyed a brisk walk around the grounds – something that would kill me back in the Texas heat…

Aug. 24, 1:00 PM. Staring up at the Space Needle in awe and a modicum of terror. An outside glass elevator? You gotta be kidding! But the queasiness from the ride up dissipated with the thrilling view. So much to see! Lots of water, to begin with: Puget Sound, Lake Washington, Lake Union, Green Lake – all bustling with sail boats, ferry boats, parasails, float planes, and way more. Great, snow-capped mountains all around.

Despite the touristy attire of the diners, this is unmistakably fine dining. The wait staff, personable and world class professional, wore suits and ties. I had the salmon (seemed apropos) served with wilted pea vines and blueberry chutney. Weird but excellent.

Aug. 24, 7:00 PM. The jet-lag and wine at high altitude (had a choice cabernet sauvignon with the meal) has really flattened me. After inching our way north from Seattle in very Houston-like traffic, we’re holed up in Everett, which will be our base for the rest of our vacation. There’s gobs of great stuff to report, but all I want to do now is post my blog and die. Unfortunately, the Best Western Cascadia has Comcast just like we do back home. And, yes, it’s down. The front desk will call if the reboot is successful…

Travel Diary - Day One

Aug. 23, 5:15 PM - Just got to Bush Intercontinental with gobs of time to spare. Got through security easily. Husband was in another line and got the full treatment. Had time to get me a cinnamon dolce latte at an adjoining Starbucks while he was getting dressed. Air Alaska doesn’t have much of a presence here. It shares a counter with Horizon, Air France, and KLM. Sad.

Aug. 23, 10:58 PM – That’s Seattle time. My watch says 1:00 AM. It was a lo-o-o-ong non-stop flight. But since we were in the air in excess of 3.5 hours, the airline was obliged to serve us something besides tiny bags containing pretzels, cheddar corn and roasted red pepper strips. For $6 I got a hamburger and a decaf coffee. The meat tasted like it’d been boiled. But we came through much better than I expected.

The SeaTac airport was an abrupt change of décor from Houston Intercontinental. There are abstract totems on some of the pillars, the café fronts were stonework and logs, and the shops had rows of plaster (or maybe taxidermied) fish on the walls. But the best part was emerging into the cool air of the Pacific Northwest. This is the perfect place: forests, mountains, and picturesque lakes and rivers everywhere you look.

Tomorrow: Space Needle!

The Scent of Fantasy

Back in December I did a 3-part blog on the music I play while writing. Last night I entered a new dimension: Fragrance.

Scent is a powerful thing. It instantly commands our thoughts, moods, and memories. Aroma inspires, enlivens and transports us as nothing else. And since I’ve always been sensitive to scents, I can’t imagine why I’ve never addressed it before.

It came to a head most unexpectedly. A Facebook friend announced she was having a Scentsy party. A what? As it happened, the scent event was only about 10 minutes away. I went. And I learned a heck of a lot. Let’s start with fragrance oils: (Quoting from the brochure)

·        Essential oils, which are natural oils extracted from plants and flowers.
·        Absolute oils, which are highly aromatic, concentrated, oily mixtures extracted from plants.
·        Synthetic oils, which are man-made scents that duplicate a particular fragrance.

Then there’s fragrance structure:
·        TOP NOTES are the first thing you smell - fresher and lighter than mid or base notes.
·        MID NOTES are the heart - they define the character, or body, of a fragrance.
·        BASE NOTES create longevity. They are heavier, sweeter, and more long-lasting.

First I painstakingly chose the right warmers: A full sized one for my computer room, and a pretty little plug-in for the upstairs bathroom. Then I explored the nose-boggling array of aromas. Wow. There must’ve been over a hundred. 

Most were well-calculated naturals – botanicals, subtle florals, and herbals  - that were wonderfully evocative. Some, like Satin Sheets, Snow Berry, and Sunkissed Citrus, were lively and stimulating. Or you can mellow out with the likes of Baked Apple Pie, Sugar Cookie, or Mochadoodle. Some were quite masculine, like My Dear Watson, Embers, and Route 66. And there must’ve been a dozen appetizing takes on vanilla. 

Me? I ordered, among other things, Honey Pear Cider, Mums & Marigolds, and Cranberry Mango. I even got scent hangers for the car.

Look ‘em up: https://abbeynewton.scentsy.us/Buy. It’ll blow your nose.

Do I Detect a Trend?

Do I perhaps detect a craving for sanity and simplification? Duh. Look at us. Economic crises. Dysfunctional homes, joblessness and desperation as far as the eye can see.

That may account for a trend I’ve been noticing both in the news and as I peruse the Top 100 Entertainment/Book blog list. This morning alone I’ve encountered three posts reviewing books on Amish and Mennonite values. In the last month I’ve seen TV specials on these simpler and more successful lifestyles, plus a number of online articles extolling the merits of reducing your living space to 380 sq.ft. Hmmm…the modern-day hippie equivalent of dropping out?

 No, we are grownups looking for a reasonable way to survive. And no government program or feeling of entitlement is going to hand it to us.
So…we’re looking to a subculture with a workable system. We’re tired of being owned by material things. We can no longer afford the liabilities imposed by former prosperity. In short, we want to get real. Judging from the popularity of these homely and minimalist concepts, we may actually be onto something.

Want to see what I mean? Here’s what’s called a Lego style apartment http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=juWaO5TJS00&feature=related Something like 86 sq.ft. and incredibly clever. Then we have:

You gotta be kiddin’! (When Houston freeways trump fantasy)

SFX overload everywhere these days. Spectacular scenes of unmitigated destruction and carnage all over TV and the big screens.

Time for a reality check.

So check out I-45 just north of Airline Drive in Houston. At this writing, they still don’t know how the heck this happened. About all I can do is send you a link to the news story.

ww.click2houston.com/video/28817072/index.html

So click quick and you too can say: “I saw this before it was an item on YouTube!”

Yay! Finally Saw the Final Harry Potter

You see, when a major movie comes out, we wait and wait until all the crying kids, twitchy teens, and the rest of the crowds have all seen it. Then we venture out on a weekday for the earliest showing. Of course, we love the kid stuff, too, so if there’s a daycare van unloading in front of the ticket window, it’s an automatic postponement.

But this time it was perfect. It was 10:30 AM Thursday at the local AMC 30. Yes, there were quite a few cars in the parking lot, but the few kids trooping in with their harried moms made for the Smurfs or Captain America. Most the couples heading toward the sleek circular ticket terrace were like us: graying with a slight arthritic limp.  

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part 2 did not disappoint. Normally I’m not big on distopian settings, which pretty much describes the wizarding world with the rise of Voldemort. But by now the characters are so near and dear I want to follow them no matter what. J. K. Rowling is that brilliant.

The kids, meaning Harry, Ron and Hermione, are still endearingly young. But now, on the run against deadly evil, they display incredible resourcefulness and quick-minded maturity.  The real hero, of course, is Hermione. Not taking anything away from Harry. He stands up and does what he needs to do. Ron’s value, aside from his loyalty and great lines, is largely accidental. He just happens to pop up at the right time or overhear some piece of critical info. The point is that they wouldn’t have gotten one meter on their way without Hermione’s cleverness and attention to detail.

The most important thing for me is the emergence from tragedy and near total destruction to the fresh and new. In the end, a new generation melts through  the pillar at Kings Cross Station at Gate 9 ¾ to clamber aboard the gleaming red Hogwarts Express. Gotta love it.