New Year’s Eve
I’m writing on Sputnik, my new Lenovo netbook running Windows 7 and Office 2007, while Rich’s reads the newspaper and perpetually comments on articles. He’s ranting about how terrorists are missing an opportunity to blow themselves up inside airports. Why sew explosive filled maxi-pads in your underwear when you can skip the lines and nail everyone waiting to check in?

We’re both suffering from cabin fever.

It’s New Year’s Eve and we’re in our motor home at Larrabee State Park near Bellingham, more precisely, near Chuckanut Bay. Joining us in our isolation, for there is only one other camper in sight, is Jujube the Brat and Zephyra the Sweetheart.

It hasn’t stopped raining since we’ve arrived. So instead of taking a long walk along the beach and exhausting ourselves, we’ve been cooped up for hours listening to the rain hitting the top of our aluminum penitentiary. It sounds like water popping in a pan of hot fat. Pop. Pop. POP!

We’ve completed several courses… starting with roast beef sandwiches from Arby’s around noon then coffee and German chocolate cake as we waited for the rain to cease. It never did. We then eased into dinner, starting with hunks of multi-grain baguette dipped in chopped garlic, fresh ground pepper, and seasoned olive oil.

Dinner was tikka masala (Indian curry) over rice. Last night, I boiled cubed red potatoes and carrots and placed them in a storage container with slightly cooked fresh string beans. I then poured chunks of chicken that had been cooked in masala sauce (from Costco) over the vegetables. Half an hour ago, I plopped some rice on a Chinete paper plate, plunked the vegetables, chicken and sauce over it and tossed it into the microwave.

We complemented this “elegant” meal, served on “fine china,” with Fetzer Gewurztraminer (vintage $6.99) in crystal wine glasses from our wedding. You occasionally gotta’ splurge!

Dessert, so far, has been Halloween-colored M&Ms along with a Reese’s peanut butter Christmas tree (purchased by Rich, a few days after Halloween and Christmas at 50% off).

Pop. Pop. POP! The rain continues.

At least, the cats are happily sleeping.

Since there are a few hours remaining before the end of this decade, we thought it would be fun to document a few remembrances from the past ten years, actually nine years because Rich and I didn’t meet until February 1, 2001.

• Sold three houses: Sherwood and Tualatin, Oregon and Round Rock, Texas
• Bought three houses and piece of property: Round Rock, Texas, Mount Vernon and Kirkland, Washington, and Anacortes, Washington (property)
• I had four jobs: Bernhardt Agency, Intel (Ace Communications), Dell, and Microsoft
• Rich had two jobs: BIOS Engineer and Linux Advisory Engineer at IBM
• Three of my six cats – Pu’Yi, Goldakevtch and Ariel Anne – moved from Oregon to Texas then back to the Pacific Northwest. Micheko, Calamity Jane, and Mongojerrie moved to Texas, but were put to sleep over the course of four years because of age-related issues. Zephyra and Lunetta were deposited at our house in Texas when they were kittens, and Jujube who was plucked from a box of eight kittens at a block party in Texas. All three moved to Washington. Finally, Scoundrel was a feral tortoiseshell that showed up at our Texas house when she was a kitten and mysteriously disappeared two years later when we were on vacation.
• We’ve had several cars: Gold Plymouth Voyager and red Toyota Corolla (both sold in Oregon), red Honda CRV (still have), red Honda FIT (bought in 2007), red Honda Insight (bought in 2009), teal Dodge Dakota truck (still have), silver KIA Sephia (demolished in a car accident)
• I was in a major car accident and fractured my pelvis in four places and cracked ribs; outside of this challenge, I’ve remained healthy, except for seemingly perpetual dental challenges from cracked teeth to removal of impacted wisdom teeth
• Rich managed to remain healthy except for declining hearing, vision, and receding gums
• My eyesight has barely changed
• Rich now wears bifocals after years of denial… “Is that a stop or yield sign ahead?”
• Rich saw the light and went from being non-political to making CNN Politics his home browser page
• Rich continues to do home improvement projects to justify buying more tools, which now include a spray painter, power washer, table saw, router, tile saw, battery-powered saws, pole saw, nail guns, chipper/shredder, riding lawn mower, utility trailer, and innumerable hand tools
• I’ve bought a sewing machine and taken up beading, which has been an excuse to buy bins of beads and tools

New Year’s Day
Rich and I really whooped it up for the New Years and managed to stay awake until 10 p.m. We fell asleep with the rain noisily falling on the motor home, but were cozy warm with flannel sheets, two blankets, a bedspread, an unzipped 1950’s era sleeping bag, and two cats at our feet. I dreamed that several drunks in a hopped up truck crashed into our motor home, but it was only the wind.

In the wee hours of the morning, Jujube decided to start whining. Rich claimed that he could smell predators outside and was reacting accordingly. Jujube continued to howl and whine throughout the rest of the night and morning! 

Happily, the rain stopped on New Year’s Day and we were able to walk around Larrabee State Park along with hike to Fragrance Lake. The only thing fragrant about the lake was that it was two miles straight up hill (1,000-foot climb) and my pits were odoriferous afterwards! Plus, we started late in the day and made it back to the motor home, half an hour before the sunset and the rain started to fall again.

Continuing our traditional of “fine dining” when camping, we had spaghetti sauce that I’d made earlier in the week over pasta along with the rest of a baguette dipped in olive oil, garlic and fresh ground pepper. We also had salad, the rest of the Gewurztraminer, and some more German chocolate cake. As I finish writing this article, it just occurred to me that we left the German chocolate cake in the motor home. I had put it in the oven so it won’t slide around while we we’re driving. Damn!

The pictures above were taken during our New Year’s trip. I took the one above by holding the camera in front of my face… pretty impressive self-portrait! Yes! It was cold, damp, and drippy! Welcome to Washington in the winter.