Spring

Spring has arrived in Bellingham!
I am making a very tiny garden in planters, and my seeds sprouted!

Those are baby lettuce and spinach, with some barely-up nasturtiums, and some established flat leaf parsley and pansies. 

This is my baby garden. It has lettuce, spinach, chives (x2), nasturtiums, flat leaf, and oregano. There are also some volunteer tulips!

Surprise Tulips! The best kind!

Fact.

Just some facts I felt like sharing because Facebook is so yesteryear. (remember that 25 things craze about a year ago? here's a throwback)

1.) Once my family and I were marooned on a rocky outcropping for three days in Canada due to really bad eddies/whirlpools/tides.
2.) I have been on 'vacations' we weren't allowed to talk about.
3.) I cut my own hair tonight. It went well.
4.) I really love making food for other people.
5.) I'm a little creeped out by the fact that I am beginning to enjoy math.
6.) I am now certain that I made a good choice of majors.
7.) I love chocolate.
8.) I dont get bitchy around PMS time.
9.) but if I am tired enough, watch out. Bitch-fest.
10.) I really love my job on Baker because I get to ski with high-caliber skiers and coach high-caliber athletes.
11.) No kids. ever.
12.) I got checked out today by the bank teller.
13.) I think vodka tastes like lighter fluid. That's probably because its the first ingredient in it.
14.) I am a self-titled health nut.
15.) I love food that takes forever to cook and involves local ingredients.
16.) I'd rather have a potluck with friends than a party..though I love to dance.
17.) I am a classically-trained Irish Dancer, but I really enjoy working in modern dance movements and melding the two.
18.) If you flaunt authority, I will buck it.
19.) If you earn your authority, I will respect you.
20.) I have recently rediscovered the guitar..and now homework is looking less inviting.
21.) I wish I had more time to drum...and I wish I had people to play with.
22.) I have new rock-climbing buddy! yay!
23.) I am way happier as one-of-the-guys, than feeling like I have to be feminine.
24.) I am also way happier single. Its a long story.
25.) Bellingham is the best thing since sliced bread.

Disgusting.

So much rain on Mt Baker today. 

Let me see if I can paint you an appropriate picture of the monsoon. 

There was a river running down the parking loop.

My gloves weigh 80 pounds....each. and I wore a different pair in the afternoon.

I wore rubberized commercial fishing overalls/bibs...and I was still soaked.

My blue turtleneck (under two coats and a sweater) got so wet the dye started to color my wrists blue. 

They blasted for avalanches at around 1pm to make sure the snowpack was stable, and we heard slides let go. 

But surprisingly the snowpack on the training course we set held up, and the snow was (weirdly) fast. 

and next weekend I travel with the team--Super Excited for that!

But yeah, defintly could have done without being soaked to my underwear.

And now my room smells like a ski lodge because things are in here drying...which is awesome and disgusting at the same time.

Episode 2

More tasty food!

Marie Rose Shrimp


Find some couscous. (its not a grain, its bits of pasta chopped teensy).
Put 1 cup of chicken broth in a small pot, boil it.
Add 1 cup of the couscous, take it off the heat, slap a lid on it, and leave it alone for 12 minutes. How's that for easy?
During those 12 minutes, defrost some raw shrimp, and take their shells off.
Put a little veggie oil in a pan, put the heat on medium low and let the pan warm up * its important to let the oil heat up with the pan, otherwise it spits oil and can burn you and make a hell of a mess*
Drop 10-15 shrimp in the pan. Immediately shake lots of paprika over them.
Let them cook all the way through, until the insides are white and not translucent, shaking and stirring the pan.
When they are cooked through, take another bowl and mix a spoonful or two of mayo, and tablespoon or so of ketchup, and a splash of lemon juice together. If you happen to have Worschester sauce around, throw a capful in, if not, dont worry about it.

Put the couscous on a plate, drop the shrimp on top and drizzle over the mayo mixture. If you like green beans, they go brilliantly with this.

Episode 1: Tasty Food

LENTIL SOUP 
-works great for warming up on a really cold day, and makes a lot for leftovers.

Start with a bag of dried lentils-- you can find them easily at grocery stores either in the bulk section or bagged. Find the GREEN ones.
Take them home and dump them in a really big pot. Like HUGE.
Fill 1/3 of the pot with chicken broth (or veggie broth if you don't carnivore it up) and fill the rest of the way with water to about 3" from the top.
Turn the heat all the way up on the stove and boil that thing.
Chop up some carrots and chuck them in the pot. Add a bay leaf if you want to. Just be sure to fish it out before you dish the soup!
Continue to boil that pot.
After about 10 minutes, drop the heat to medium and cook it for 45 minutes.
Then add some oregano..I just sort of chuck it at the top of the pot and stir...
Add a can of diced Tomatoes. These are generally cheap as dirt.
Stir everything together...it should be pretty thick. The lentils are done when you pull some out of the pot and eat them, and they aren't crunchy anymore.
You can top this with Parmesan Cheese, and Sriracha Sauce (in my house, we call it Cock Sauce...due to the large rooster on the bottle). Be careful with the Cock Sauce though, its got a lot of fire power.

Happy New Year!

As usual I spent an entirely enjoyable evening with my family and grandparents.
My sister had a glass of champagne and nearly fell asleep in her dinner.
Guess we know what kind of drunk she will be.
Lots of tales told, and embarrassing moments regaled.
Here's to next year!
Cheers!

Update

Here's the rundown, listy-list style.

1.) Currently loving this:


2) My car is on the fritz so I drove mum's today. I remembered how to drive a clutch! yay! its been a while.
and I remembered how much I love flying through the gears. I guess its been...well, since the Era of the Bug (high school).

3) I got some disappointing news the other day in the relationship end of things. Thought something was starting to happen, and then he dropped the "We should just be platonic" line followed by the "I recently met someone and have gotten close to her" line. Damn.
Oh well, life goes on, and we'll still be friends and all.  His loss. Hope he doesn't make it awkward, because he's a cool kid and I enjoy his company.

4) I will be on snow skiing 10 out of the next 14 days. This is exciting!

5) i found the world's most awesome christmas presents for my mom and sister... and have nothing for dad yet...

6) Now I'm gonna call my grandma and see if she wants to assist with some cookie-making.

Art and the Zen

Whoa. heavy title right? I went to a student choreography showcase entitled "Fall into Dance" tonight, and it was beautiful. Stunningly done. But I didn't understand a solid portion of the dances, and reflecting on this, I decided I was okay with it.
So here you are:

Art and Incomprehension


Words may speak to our brains, or maybe to our hearts, but art speaks to the soul. It can revive long-swept-under-the-rug memories and trigger emotions we thought we forgot about. You do not simply "watch" art.
You interact with it, identify with it. But what if it makes no sense at all? Are we to toss it out and disregard it?
What if the story it tells is ambiguous, or if we can't even find a story in it at all?
Perhaps what we should be considering here is the meta of understanding.

The complexities of understanding a movement are vast, and have a plethora of interpretations. Perhaps instead of searching in vain to find a chord that resonates with us within each piece, it is a more meaningful exercise to contemplate what it means to not understand and how valuable a tool it can be.

There is a certain amount of Zen in not understanding as well. Instead of becoming infuriated with the lack of understanding, rejoice in it. Revel in the fact that to you it makes no sense, but you can see the beauty in the movements, and in some parts understand the idea behind it. You can see where light and dark elements are used and relate that to the light and dark elements within all souls. "It is not a question of whether they are good or bad, for everyone has good parts and bad parts in them, but rather what is important is which of these we choose to act on." You can see where red is used for anger, love, and more pervasively, passion. Blue for calm. Yellow for joy. In compiling these, we can begin to build a basic framework for understanding. But sometimes dissecting a dance draws away from its heart, where the whole is greater than the sum of the parts. In this case, it is a valuable thing to step away from the microscope and simply - to quote The Beatles- Let it be. Accept the fact that you don't "get it" and decide that maybe there isn't really anything to "get" and then be okay with that. Like really okay with that. Be happy about it, reflect on it, and perhaps someday down the road, the gears will turn, and it will click with you. But for now, just let it happen and Love it.

There is also a certain humbling that comes with art-interpretation of any kind.
It could be a painting, a dance movement, a street musician.
They (the artist) are expressing an intangible entity, an entity that is deeply personal to them, and you are a mere bystander in their story. It is through their immense generosity that they have chosen to share it with you, and expect nothing in return.

There is beauty in not understanding.

Well, Its been awhile...

since I've felt this way.
I'm out of practice.
I'm not used to being all emotional over a member of the male sect.
and he seems to be returning to advances.
and at the same time, it not entirely clear.
Are we in the money with this one?
or is this a great charade? I really hope not...

I think this really could be a good thing.
I just gotta be careful.. its a delicate thing.

This stone wall is all a'flutter.

In light of the Harry Potter release...

some musical genius whipped this little gem up...

In other news, it snowed

and current temperature with windchill is 6 ° F.  With winds gusting to 35 mph.
We've achieved winter.

Cue Photo Montage!

i've been busy

with my camera.

Heads-up: these photos are a bit sexy for a best friends fiancée. Smart people will read that and thus deduce that these aren't of me.

Sorry folks.

So here they are, just a few of them. Let me know what you think!

This is a bit off-topic...

But here we go anyway.

I'm fairly certain my roommates have tired of hearing about this, so I'm throwing it to you people.

How do you feel about leading on two people at once?

We'll do this in the hypothetical. You know person A a bit and have a had a few really excellent talks while you were in the same place, but now the sole method of communication (due to distance, think halfway around the world) is via the internet. and A seems to be expressing interest in you. Which is fine with you, but A lives across the world, though is now moving to Seattle for a job. Person B was met via the web, though lives in the same town, and also has expressed interest. So is it cool to lead both on? or should I just pick based on how I feel right now?

The consensus seems to be that this is okay, because they dont live in the same town, and there's essentially no chance of them ever meeting.

I just dont think I can reconcile this...I feel like Karma is gonna spin around and bite my ass.

thoughts?

Halloween

ah halloween.
What do people think of Farrah Fawcett a la Charlie's Angels?

Late Nights = Weird Dreams

I had a strange dream last night.
I was working in a bar in the old west during a horserace. Like, one of those distance ones.
I befriended one of the racers, whose name was Bentley.
Somehow us being friends was against some racing-regulation somewhere and everyone got pissed off.
So then, under the pretense of helping him move ropes and whatnot, I told him about some tricky parts of the race.
This race was supposed to start in the barn (one of those big old ones you can drive a haymachine into) make a loop, go back through the barn and out to some cliffs and stop there.
I was standing in the bar looking out at the barn and Bentley didnt come through...and didnt  come through... and didnt come through.
So I saddled my horse, rode out the cliffs, and there he was. He'd taken the wrong turn and had broken the ribbon on the finish line. Everyone was going to be very angry when they saw, so I put the two of us on my horse and sent his back. Then I rode down a steep trail cut into the cliffs to some pueblos built into the rock.
For some reason, there were still people who lived in them.
They led us through a tunnel and out the other side of the mesa, and we rode to safety.



Maybe I should not stay up so late....

Market Day

I love Farmer's Markets. I love seeing the people that believe in growing healthy vegetables sell to people who believe in buying healthy vegetables. I love seeing young couples with their sleeve tattoos and facial piercings talk to farmers about the price of kohlrabi while tucking the hand-crochet blanket more snugly around the baby, even though I'm pretty sure the popularity of kohlrabi is on the decline. How the hell do you cook that, by the way?
I love seeing the frugal college students pick through produce to find the One Tomato that perfectly aligns with their lunch.
Today I saw the man who sells ceramics with his newsprint-patterned apron balance a blond curly-haired two year old on one arm and make a transaction with the other.

I love finding artfully displayed goods that shows just how much care they put into their goods. 

Someone I don't know who I thought looked artsy; thus I crept up and snapped his photo.

I hear sad chickens make shitty eggs, so I'm glad these ones are happy.

Two Posts in one day? Say WHAT?

Dear Bellingham,
What the hell?
You are supposed to be the nice, safe, hippie, green, sustainable city that I know and love you to be.
What's up with this streak of violence?
Get your shit together.
Love Britta


They found Dwight Clark today. He's been missing for a week, and they found him in the Bay this morning. This is not Bellingham. 


Rest in Peace, Dwight. 

Cody

I wasn't going to blog about this.
I really wasn't.
It hits too close to home to share with the world.
But then I decided that maybe someone, somewhere needs to hear this.

So here we go.

A good friend of mine who I worked with over the summer committed suicide.
He was 16, star of  the wrestling team, in Leadership classes, stellar student, a hard worker.
I went to his memorial this past saturday, where the news really hit home. I got the call while I was at sea, and was unable to process what was being relayed across oceans for the work that needed to be done. I figured I owed it to myself to be present on that ship and engage myself in it whole-heartedly. I'm glad I did, but it also meant shutting down the emotional stream that usually follows news such as this. So sitting in my old high school gymnasium, listening to eulogies, I let it hit.
It was ugly, it was painful, and it was healing.
I miss that kid like crazy.


I've been to too many funerals for kids.
and it never gets easier.

Peanut Kicking Time

I've just returned from a little over a week on the Kilo Moana.
Its a research vessel owned by the University of Hawaii and the US Navy and operated by UH.
it looks like this:

From here the pictures are nonchronologically ordered, so I'll just caption them...

Sun through cloud breaks. 5 nautical miles Southeast of Kilauea. 

my cousin's dogs: Richelle Chompski and Lucille Fernandez...I kid you not.

our lab.

bridge of the ship!

Mauna Loa...50 nautical miles southeast of the Big Island

Sunrise baby

self portrait

Yellow ginger... there are entire walls of this stuff up on the Pali lookout road

Peanut overboard! Jackie (cheif scientist), Dan (Woods Hole Oceanographical Institute), Mike (AB) and Tim (WHOI as well)

Leaving honolulu for Lo'ihi!

deploying MAGGY :)

Sunset over water

Kilauea ocean entry. The stream of steam is the tubed over lava flowing downhill

03 deck and the bridge

Honolulu at night from the 02 deck

watching our gangway be lifted away by a crane

The other hull! its a catamaran...

justin whipping ropes. we descended upon him and demanded to be taught how. we did all the lines on the ship that day.

Kilauea entry in the evening

view from Pali

LOOK!! a deserted beach! the portugese man o' war were in.

So there's a snapshot of my adventure. maybe i'll write a more detailed report of exactly what science we were doing/what I learned later. 

September Hikes and Stupid People

Because I had a lot of time on my hands before I had to pack, I went hiking.

Hike Number 1
I went up the Teanaway Drainage in the Wenatchee National Forest, and hiked into Gallagher Head Lake.

Its about 4 miles in. Along the way you get to see pretty Sub-Alpine country like this:

and this:

and this:

and then we got the lake, which was gorgeous and looks like this:

Gorgeous, right? Stunning, no? WELL. What you don't see in this picture, because I very carefully kept it out of my shot, is that you can drive to the Lake. Yeah. DRIVE. So there's a huge camp of stupid lazy people tearing around on their dirt bikes and ATVs in this beautiful area. So not environmentally responsible.

Hike number 2 

I went up Rattlesnake Ledge. Not very exciting, or very long, But it was a lovely day and you can see a long ways.

AND the lovely beautiful Glynis hiked it with me, which made it all more enjoyable.