Riding in the Rain and Indiana Jones

OK, so if you read all of this post, there may be spoilers in here about Indiana Jones, so if you don't want to be spoiled, stop when I tell you to. :-)

This morning, Brandon, Steve, Chuck and I all went out for 30 miles on the Orting trail. I could REALLY tell I hadn't been riding in awhile. I didn't have my Forerunner with me, so I'm not sure exactly how badly I did, I just know that at some point both on the way out and the way back, I couldn't see anyone. I was really far behind. I even made a comment to another rider "You know it's a bad day when you get dropped going downhill". Yes, we rode our paceline leaving out of South Prairie and were averaging about 22 - 23 MPH and after my first turn to pull (horribly short) I dropped off the back. And if the guys hadn't waited for me in Orting, I probably wouldn't have seen them until the parking lot. It was a horrilbly slow ride. To top it all off, Brandon had to go and comment "The weather man said it was supposed to rain all week this week and it didn't rain once" as we were sitting in South Prairie. Great. About 2 minutes into the ride back I said "Hey, that felt like rain" and then the skies opened up and it poured the whole way back. Sweet. At least I did the 30 miles, I can be happy about that, but I'm not feeling so good about the Tour De Pierce coming up next month. UGGGH.

STOP HERE if you don't want to read about Indiana Jones

OK, so my only comment on the new Indy movie is that everything I heard about the movie is true. George Lucas said basically "Don't expect much, it's not that good" True. Someone else said Harrison Ford and Shya LaBeuff (sp?) don't have any chemistry. True. And lot of other rotten comments. Was I entertained? Yeah, mildly. But if I could sum up the movie, it would be like this:

George: Ya know Steve, I think my bank account is in the low 500 millions right now, I think we should do another Indy movie.
Steve: Yeah, I was thinking I needed a new jet myself, let's do it!
George: You know, American Graffiti was really a hit, I'd like to reprise that somehow.
Steve: OOH and Close Encounters was AWESOME!
George: So you're proposing an alien movie set in the 50's?
Steve: YEAH! OOH, but I don't think Harrison Ford wants to go back into Space any time soon . . . so how about . . .
Both Together: Indiana Jones and The Space Creature with the Weird Looking Kid That's a Greaser on a Motorcycle!
George: Title too long?
Steve: Yeah, probably, damn consumer opinion
George: How about we throw a crystal Skull in there somewhere? We can probably get the guys that made Alien to give us a mock up!
Steve: Sweet, with that savings, I can probably put a Wii in every seat on my new jet! I love that friggin' Mario Kart!
George: The ILM guys can dig out some of the models for a zombie movie I was going to do in 1977 too!
Steve: OK, we're set then, Indiana Jones and the Alien Crystal Skull!
George: Let's drop the Alien, don't want to give away the surprise!
Steve (with fist extended): Dude, we rock.
George (extending own fist to collide with Steve's fist): Word.

As we were leaving the theater, Teri commented "I could have seen that at a matinee" . . . I replied . . . "I could have waited for the DVD". Now that I think about it though, the Free TV premiere would have suited me just fine . . .

Is it a scent I give off?

Seriously, what is it? For whatever reason when I'm trying to get out of town, my phone blows up and I'm so crazy busy I can't even see straight, let alone think straight. Tomorrow morning at 6:30, Teri and I will be (along with 21 others) on a plane headed for Puerto Vallarta for a friend's wedding. Starting yesterday, all hell broke loose. I've got two transactions that are scheduled to close while I'm gone and trying to get all the minor details done that normally would get done over the span of 3 or 4 days, in 1 or two days is always fun. Then I had to show homes yesterday to two different clients, both of which think they might want to write offers on one of the homes they saw. And finally, I got called by a new referral that wants to meet tonight at 4:30 and go see a home. (Thanks Scott!) Believe me, these are all good things. It means I'm busy, it means that my business is working, and will be working while I'm gone, but it's just so dang hectic and stressful. I guess it means the vacation will be all that more relaxing? I hope so.

A Boy Named Sue . . .

Johnny Cash John? Seriously? Oh yeah . . . Johnny Cash. I love iTunes . . . you get a wild hair for some music and poof! There it is on your laptop. No muss, no fuss. It's gonna be a Johnny Cash weekend.

See, The Thing is . . .

I'm sick. It started last Thursday when I woke up with a sore throat. The sore throat migrated into a stuffy nose and head. Now I have coughing, a fever (I think) and just feel miserable. But you see, the thing is . . . I'm ALSO self employed. The industry I'm in has seen better days, so I feel that I have to work every possible day I can to make ends meet. There is no calling in sick when you're self employed. You just work through it. AND since we're going on vacation next week, as always happens, I'm getting busier and busier. I just got a new referral this week (Thanks Erick!) and it sounds like she's rarin' to go to find a home. There's another couple I'm working with who have a home to sell in Pullman and I KNOW that because I'm going on vacation, they'll likely get an offer on it this week and be all hot and bothered to make an offer on something over here. Probably next Thursday when I'm half drunk on the beach in Puerto Vallarta. AND to top that all off, I'm now a John L. Scott certified mentor and for the past month or so, have been mentoring a new agent in our office. It's been taking quite a bit more time than I thought it would, but last night she had her first listing appointment. And from the sounds of it, she nailed it! I'm so proud! Don't get me wrong, being busy is a good thing. But trying to be busy while you're sick . . . is just miserable.

I Shot a Deer!

That got your attention didn't it? OK, with all the talk of guns on the blog lately, I can assure you, it's not what you think . . . see? I shot it with my camera. This little doe was out in the grass outside our hotel in Ocean Shores last weekend just chowing down for a couple hours. This was shot from our window with a 300mm zoom lens . . . I had to crop it significantly just to make it even remotely interesting. But I DO love my 10Mp camera!



So last weekend Teri and I spent the weekend in Ocean Shores, my gift to her for our 1st wedding anniversary. It was nice. After a stressful Friday for Teri, by the time we reached Aberdeen, I think she had somewhat calmed down. We finally arrived around 9PM that evening and just missed dinner, so we had a snack at the bar there and listened to a not so good cover band.

Saturday was supposed to be crummy weather, but when we awoke, it was just overcast, so we decided to take the bikes for a spin. We set out to ride the Ocean Shores Triathlon route that we'll be doing in July. It's supposed to be 6.2 miles out and then 6.2 miles back, but to make it more interesting, we did an 11 mile loop. So for those of you that actually take the time to look at the Motionbased map below and use the map player, the long pause at 6.3 miles is the turn around and ride back. Going out, we had the wind at our backs and routinely my speedo read over 20MPH. After making the turn at the Silver King (Boy is that place a dump now days eh?) we were riding across the wind and our speed fell to about 15MPH . . . well, mine did . . . Teri fell a bit behind at that point, only because she has a comfort bike and I have a road bike . . I have clipless pedals, she does not. This is NOT to be taken as a measure of my riding ability versus hers. Just an FYI. :-) Then after turning North, the wind was really in our face and many times while waiting for Teri, my speed fell below 10MPH. But we still did it in about 54 minutes moving. I think in July I'm going to shoot for about 40 minutes out and back.



After the ride, I had us signed up for a couples massage for 30 minutes. I have to say, the massage was nice, but not nearly rough enough for either of us. To light on the pressure despite telling them to go harder . . . c'est la vie. After the massages, we sat in the steam room for 15 minutes or so. We showered and headed up the coast. We stopped at the Green Lantern for lunch. Then it was off to see Seabrook, Washington's newest beach community. We weren't overly impressed. When we got back to the hotel, we took a couple hour nap before heading to dinner. After dinner, I watched Teri gamble for awhile and then off to bed. We were on the road by 9AM Sunday and got home in time to do some yard work. A well deserved weekend rest for the both of us me thinks. I probably wouldn't stay at the Quinault Resort and Casino again though. For the price, it just seemed to be lacking that extra sparkle to justify it. Dunno, something was off for me though.

Such a Romantic Day

So yesterday was Teri and I's 1st wedding anniversary. We both worked of course and from the sounds of it, we both had very trying days. I was embroiled in a short sale transaction and Teri was overwhelmed with drama from work. So how did we spend our 1st anniversary together? Shooting guns. Well rather, Teri shot, I watched. Teri tried out her new shotgun at the Tacoma Sportsmen's Club last night with a round of trap and a couple rounds of skeet. No dinner, no candlelight, no googly eyes at each other, just some gunfire, farting and spitting.

So Long and Sorry About the Fish

So today I saw something that will disturb me for ahwile. I know that during the foreclosure crunch we're facing, there are going to be casualties. Today I was showing a home that was vacant and listed as a short sale. The power was off as is often the case, but it was about 10:30, so plenty of light to see what the home looked like. When my client and I got upstairs, I remarked "they left the fish tank for you!" and then I saw the cylinder of food on top. "Oh no!" I thought to myself as I realized there was still water in the tank. Sure enough as I went around the corner to investigate, there were the fish . . . all dead, floating at the top of the tank. It really made me sad to think these people moved out of the house and just left the poor fish there to die. There was a big beautiful Angel Fish too. At that point I didn't even want to show the home to my client any longer. I just wanted to leave. It was a bad mojo house for me. So call me a wuss. Call me a pansie. Whatever, but there was no reason whatsoever those fish had to die. It made me think of all the dogs and cats too that might become casualties of the current housing market. Just sucks. I'm not going to easily forget this.