Confused Again. Need Waffle-guidance, stat.

Never a good title. Lots going on in my mind these days. Not working and not going to school during the summer leaves me with a lot of free time, and I'm not sure if that is a good thing.

I'm trying to store up as much energy and create as many positive memories as I can during the summer to last me through Seattle's 10-month rainy season. I've been out hiking at least one day each of the past three weeks, which was a little goal of mine when summer started. It really is beautiful up in the mountains, and hiking has a way of clearing my head to prioritize what it is I really need to be working on when I get back to the city.

This Monday I returned to Leavenworth, this time with Chelsey and Mary Ann. Chelsey actually works Mondays, but from 4am to 10am as a barista, so as soon as she got off, the three of us headed up highway 2 to Leavenworth. We stopped at Sultan Bakery, and they didn't believe my ranting and raving about the place until our meal came. I split a breakfast sandwich with Chelsey, and she was a bit skeptical about not having enough to eat until her half of the sandwich arrived. We were all stuffed for the next 60 or so miles of the drive.

Turned out to be a classic car show in Leavenworth on Monday, and Chelsey is a big car and motorcycle buff, so she checked them out while Mary Ann and I acted like we knew the difference between the cars besides color (which I still had trouble with). We got gelato, then headed to the river and shotgunned beers. It wasn't pretty. Well, Mary Ann and Chelsey were pretty, but not me. I think I downed the beer in under a minute, which might be a new world's worst shotgun record.

After the river, which was a little too fast and too cold to swim in, we headed to the other side of Icicle Rd. and Chelsey and I did a bit of rock climbing. I had climbed here a little over eight years ago, as a freshman in college. I remember driving out at night, with snow on the ground in February, and camping in the snow while Becky tried to put the moves on me, to which I refuted (I was an innocent freshman).

Mary Ann soaked in some rays as Chelsey and I climbed up the side of the mountain looking for slabs of rock to climb, with beers and cameras in hand. Chelsey would find a rock to climb and I would use her camera to take pictures. Then I would find a rock and she would do the same for me:





I had a good view. I think Chelsey captioned her photo as "looking for a hand hold." I see a good hand hold... yeah. The climbing was fun, but I was going barefoot, which made it very difficult.

The three of us headed back to Seattle and stopped for a quick dip in the Wenatchee River on the way. We hung out again at Eddie's house last night, along with his friend Arez, who he met growing up in Toronto. I'll be living with Eddie at his parents' house in a month or so. Eddie's parents moved to Dominica last month, and will be staying for a year or two, so Eddie is holding down the fort and I'm helping. The house is ridiculously nice, with 3-4 bedrooms and 3 bathrooms, and I'll be paying $450/month plus utilities to have my own room, a spare room, my own bathroom, and a spare bathroom in case I stop up mine! Jackpot! We're out in the burbs, which isn't so bad because my likely teaching job will be out in the burbs, too.

Erin is back from Italy, and things are all sorts of confusing. She leaves for a 10-month stint in Jordan in September. If she left today, I think we'd probably split and see if we're still single when she returns to start anything serious. But with two months between now and her move, we have time to get to know each other better, to a point where we might want to stay together during her time in Jordan. 10 months and many thousand miles scares me. Erin scares me. Heck, I scare me!

I'm confused again about relationships in general. A lot of the marriages and relationships I see around me are pretty good for the most part. My parents are still together after what.. 50-60 years now, is it? (haha) All of my good friends' parents have stayed together. My three best friends are married, and they all seem to have found great mates.

My current confusion is that I think Erin would be great as well, I don't doubt this, but I also think there are plenty of other women out there that would be better. I've been hanging out with Chelsey more since summer began, and she is dream-girl material. Plays on a soccer and softball team. Just obtained teaching cert. Loves to travel. Has the same humor. Loves beer. Loves hiking. Loves motorcycles and old cars. Is a model. Pretty much out of my league, but she also seems like such a better match.

What scares me is that if I continue to think this way, I'll never be satisfied. Say I ditch Erin and then Chelsey and I get together. What happens when someone who is a better match than Chelsey comes along? The other obvious hurdle is Erin thinks I'm a great match for her, and I think Chelsey is a great match for me, and Chelsey thinks Waffles is a better match for her, and Waffles thinks The Wife is a better match for him, and The Wife thinks Betty is a better match for her... the cycle is endless! Madness!!

I feel like I should have learned this lesson in high school, but alas, I did not date in high school!

Lake Wenatchee

Last year, I was invited to come camping with a few people from my teaching program up at Lake Wenatchee. I had never been to the lake before, and we went in August, during our summer break. A handful of us from the cohort made the trip up last year and we had a blast.

This year, I was the only person from the cohort besides Caroline and her family (who invited us out last year). I motorcycled out again this year, and the ride was great except for the five mile stretch of grooved pavement between Monroe and Sultan. I have very little control over the bike on grooved pavement, and it was like going over a wet grated bridge for five miles.

Once in Sultan, I stopped at my favorite bakery to shake off the grooved pavement blues and eat a huge breakfast sandwich. I finished the entire thing, and staved off my food coma until I made it to Lake Wenatchee, then promptly passed out on the beach. The mosquitoes were a lot worse this year, which must be due to coming earlier in the season. I kept my sweatshirt and sweatpants on the entire time, even though it was 80 degrees--just to keep the bugs from biting.

I decided to only bring a tent and sleeping mat this year, no sleeping bag. This was a mistake. I froze my tush off at night, and tried to cocoon myself in my sweats and motorcycle gear, to no avail. As soon as the sun rose, I hopped on the motorcycle to get out of the forest and find some sun to warm up. I rode the back way to Leavenworth, which is an incredibly fun road to ride. I hadn't checked my phone for the time, but I knew it was early because of the sunrise and the fact that Leavenworth was a ghost town.





I explored the town a bit, trying to find a place for hot chocolate and breakfast. Sandy's opened up an hour after I arrived... at 7am. I felt guilty just ordering a hot chocolate, so I ate a big breakfast and had my second food coma of the trip. I elected to siesta in the Leavenworth park, in the sun, before riding back to the Lake Wenatchee campsite. I got a bit of reading in down by the lake, then rode back to Seattle.

On the way back to Seattle, I stopped at two spots. First, Deception Falls, which is just a waterfall right near highway 2. It was a nice spot to stretch my legs and snap a few pictures.



Second, I stopped at the Lake Serene trailhead, which I intended to hike this past Monday until finding out one of the other hikers hiked that trail last week.

Spokane Hoopfest 2009

The 20th annual Spokane Hoopfest was a pretty amazing experience. The streets of downtown Spokane were completely filled with basketball hoops. Around 7,000 teams participate and 200,000 people come to watch. I joined a team led by Wynne, who is a friend of mine from college and she would always organize our intramural basketball and volleyball teams.

We drove down from Metaline Falls at 5:45am on Saturday morning and made it to Spokane with plenty of time for our 9:00am game. Parking could have been a nightmare, but we found a shady spot under the freeway for only a few bucks. We ended up losing both of our games on Saturday, putting us in the consolation bracket Sunday. Both games were close, and we could have won both, but we weren't too shook up about losing. There are two ways to win t-shirts at hoopfest: you can win the entire division, or you can win the jester shirt by winning the consolation bracket. Also, if you win your first game and lose the next two, you don't even get to play on Sunday. For the rest of Saturday, I walked around downtown Spokane taking photos of hoopfest, watched basketball, or polished off a jumbo cherry snow cone... I'm talking soccer-ball sized snow cone.

I wasn't really sure what to expect at a 3 on 3 basketball tournament, but watching the other teams play, it seemed like there were a lot of terrible basketball players in our division. Then we played our first game and completely bombed. Air balls, dribbling out of bounds, you name it. There were a few factors I hadn't considered before stepping on the court. First, the street falls off on each side, so a 3-pointer from the corner is shooting at an 11ft basket. In the middle of the street there are noticeable ridges in the street due to cars with studded tires in the winter, so if the basketball hits one of those ridges wrong, it won't be where you expect it to be while dribbling. The wind really affected shots, too, and your shot might be on line when you release it, but the wind knocks it off course on the way.

The style of basketball was interesting to me, and the winning teams were really good at posting up. Our team noticed this after our first game and tried to bring it into the post more in our second game Saturday, but the three of us suck at posting up, so we were out of our comfort zone. Being tall and skinny is usually pretty nice for basketball, at least 5 on 5 basketball, because I can run up and down the court like a gazelle and shoot over people from the outside. In 3 on 3 basketball, there is not much running, and shorter more muscular people could man-handle me on the block and I couldn't shoot outside due to the court and the wind. I felt pretty useless on Saturday.

In between our first and second games on Saturday, Wynne and her family surprised me with a chocolate birthday cake. It was my golden birthday, as I turned 27 on the 27th of June. Hoopfest was a great place to be on my birthday, and I was soaking it all in. Chocolate cake in 85 degree weather before a basketball game might not have been the best idea, but the thought of bringing a cake for me was really nice.



On Sunday, we were down 7 to 12 in our elimination game when things finally started clicking. I luckily banked in a two-pointer (3 pointer, playing by ones and twos), then Wynne and her brother made a couple of nice post moves while we locked it down on defense. We tied the game at 17 with under a minute to play. The other team missed their shot and it got passed around to me with only a few seconds left to play. I had an open shot and tried to bank it in from the elbow and missed. The game went to overtime and first team to 19 wins. Both teams have a possession and miss, then I come off a screen from Wynne and drill a 2-pointer from the top of the arc for the overtime win. It was pretty sweet to finally feel like I helped out the team!

Our last game of the tournament was the consolation championship game, which pitted us against another team with short, strong guys that I wasn't looking forward to. I guess our team figured out how to play together, because our defense was water-tight and we were gelling on offense. I finally started hitting my 2's, and Wynne and her brother were dominating the boards. We won 20-9 and got 13th place t-shirts! The only bad part about the weekend was retrieving our 13th place shirts along with hundreds of other teams at exactly the same time!

Metaline Falls

This is a trip I've been wanting to make for about a decade now. I've never been to Northeast Washington, and not that many people have. Really, there isn't a great excuse for coming up here other than to fully explore the state. But it is gorgeous here. I've seen half a dozen deer and a huge black (dark brown?) moose, not to mention Wynne's family's two horses, two cats and two dogs.



This picture I took from Washington Rock. Metaline Falls is the small town on the left, and Metaline is the small town on the right. There are a couple of dams that keep the towns going, and the big concrete structure in Metaline Falls used to be a concrete factory that produced or manufactured concrete for all over. Seattle City Light maintains at least one of the dams, which is interesting to me because we're about 400 miles from Seattle, and my mom used to work for the company in Seattle.

The only reason I am up in this part of Washington is because Wynne grew up here, and needed another player for her Spokane Hoopfest team this year. My camping trip fell through, so I jumped at the opportunity, and suggested that we head over to Spokane early and hit Metaline Falls for a few days. We ventured to the Gardner Caverns today, too, and I snapped a few photos.





We got to the caverns about 30 minutes before a tour, and there is a half-mile trail to the Canadian border we decided to walk. I'm not sure what I expected, I guess maybe a sign, or possibly a booth with a guy there to check passports, but that did not make much sense in the middle of a forest. Turns out, there is a 20ft wide line cut through the forest at the 49th parallel. I asked the tour guide about this later, and he said it extends all the way from the Montana plains to the Pacific Coast, and is lined with sensors to detect people crossing. He said just last week a fugitive was on the loose and tripped a sensor at 4am crossing into Canada and they nabbed him.

We made it back in time for the cavern tour, which was pretty amazing. I'm always amazed by these naturally formed caves (minus the steel walkway and lighting). The tour guide was complemented by the guy staring at the camera, who was visiting and a geology major turned dentist. This particular cavern is home to a packrat, three bats, and the Pacific Northwest's largest column (a column is when a stalactite and stalagmite finally reach each other).



According to the guide, the column weighs 7.5k lbs and has been forming for the past 70,000 years, and is continuing to grow. Dad always mentions that I am growing old at a faster rate than he is, but I think this column might be growing old even slower than him! But I'm not 100% sure on that.

Wynne's young sister got me pretty good in the afternoon. She is a soon-to-be 4th grader, so she reminded me of the students I got to teach this Spring. She desperately wanted to toss the frisbee with me, so I obliged and we went outside to their pasture. They have a single-wire fence surrounding the pasture, and I asked Jewel if the wire was electric. She said, "Dad doesn't keep this part on."

I tapped the wire with my finger and ZAP! I jumped back and looked at her.

She was howling with laughter.

"I can't believe you fell for that! Ah hahahah!!!"

I couldn't help but laugh, outsmarted by a fourth grader... again. And probably not for the last time.

We ended the day with a picnic at Sullivan lake. We skipped rocks and ate burgers, which was a perfect way to end the day.



Tomorrow, we head back down to Spokane for the 20th annual hoopfest, which is the largest 3 on 3 basketball competition in the world. I can't wait, and I hope to take plenty of pictures so that when the November rains come in Seattle, and hopefully I'm bogged down in teaching work, I can remind myself of the fun to be had next summer.