40 miles on a bike...for BEER!

Today was an amazing 75F degree early fall sunny Seattle day! Jo and I had discussed (along with other workmates, Lee and Tina) to do the big bike ride from Gasworks Park in Seattle to Red Hook Brewery in Woodinville...since last summer. So 2007 flew by and Lee left us as work. Then next thing we knew summer of 2008 flew by and left us too. Today was probably the last nice day (when we were available) before we put off this biking challenge until 2009! So Jo and her lovely GF Lynn, and I with my amazing BF Noel set off this morning at 11:30am for our 40 mile round trip bike ride to Red Hook and back. http://veloroutes.org/bikemaps/?route=24# The Burke-Gilman Trail is amazing! So beautiful and scenic and almost totally flat the whole way. http://www.seattle.gov/PARKS/BurkeGilman/bgtrail.htm. We got to see the UW campus, Sandpoint, Lake Forest Park, Kenmore, the Bothell channel, and Woodinville's wine valley.

We got to the huge Red Hook brewery at 2pm-ish and it was packed, looks like everyone else had the same idea we did (though many were families who drove via car not bike).

We waited for 45 minutes but it was all worth it. Two pitchers of beer and some greasy food, and then we passed out on their lawn for 1/2 hour. Now the question with our buzz on, can you get a DUI ticket on a bike. Hee Hee Ha HA HA! Can I tell you how painful the ride back was for all of us. Going there was beautiful and fresh...coming back we were pooped, full, buzzed, soar legs and butt...YIKES! But we did it...40 miles baby!!! Whewww.... Maybe again in 2009? Maybe...

SATURDAY, SEPT. 27th -

I also wanted to give out a couple more shot outs:

I actually drug my ass out of bed and went to the gym for 9:30am Water Aerobics! This was a first for me...and it wasn't a bunch of old people either...a couple fatties but mostly like me. Heidi had told me how fun it was, but she didn't show up. But it was Kristina, our kookie Aussie, who talked me into it the night before while having drinkies with her and Lori at the new Kushibar on 2nd and Battery (cool new sushi restaurant between Wasabi Bistro and Travola). Kris is training to be a substitute trainer for the class, so she helped me in the water. There were weights and everything. Pretty good workout. Heidi (and Andy) better show up next time! LOL.

Then Noel and I drove over to West Seattle to see Moon's little Sagean! She is so adorable! OMG!!! (ok so is Doug and big old Nugget their dog...and their house for that matter!). Carrie stopped by with huge Orien and it was suddenly a baby-fest. Very fun.

Then we met up with my Mom and did the end of Swanson's Nursery Fall Sale. Just when you thought there was not one more inch of dirt in our front yard, suddenly Noel bought 6 more plants. He is so friggen cute when he gets all gardener-y! My Mom matched us and also got some plants. My favorite was the "Wilma Goldcrest" which is a light green skinny cypress...but I think sounds like an 85 year old Jewish lady from Long Island at a bingo parlor. LOL. "B-12!"

We ended the day at Sam's Sushi in Ballard with Mom. She loved it. Good times. She has been sad and lonely with her pending divorce and all so I hope it helped to hang with us. Love her!

The world's longest street!

So I'm blogging from beautiful Toronto, post-Juliana/Rob's wedding... so backing up, or that is a quick recap of the weekend in Ontario backwards.

Tonight Juliana and Rob took Noel and I out for a quick tour of this huge city in their gorgeous silver Mercedes CLK 550 convertible, top down of course, on the way and post-going to dinner in the Distillery District down by the east lakeside. As we drove from their condo in the Rosedale area (north of downtown) we kept encountering 'Yonge Street'. Rob told us that YONGE STREET was the longest continual street in the world, I believe going from Lake Ontario to Lake Superior...weird huh? So before dinner we drove as the sun set down thru Yorkville (kinda of Rodeo Drive) thru the financial district and ended up in the coolest renevated 1830's brick wharehouse that were refirbished old beer distilleries. After dinner we cruised under the city lights of the night by the skyscrapers of Scotiabank and TD Watermark, down to the theatre district and by the Sky Dome and CN tower (Sky Dome= their Qwest stadium and CN tower = their Space Needle ...though both are much bigger than Seattle's equivelents). Then thru Chinatown, Little Italy and the University. Toronto is definitely a mix of New York City and Vancouver B.C.

Going backwards... earlier in the day. We started the day with a day after wedding brunch at our hosts amazing 2 bedroom, 4 bathroom Elle Decor condo with family and outta towners, which was lovely. Ray and Brent (our hosts who put Noel and I up so graciously) cooked some amazing quiches among other things. After the last couple days, we has so much fun with Juliana and Rob's families along with some of their close friends...like the Maid of Honor, Mary Ann, from Waterloo (1-1/2 hour west of T.O.), and who looked and sounded just like Gov. Sarah Palin...who we kept calling until it stuck, poor lady. (see 'Sarah Palin' in her Nordstrom dress 2nd from the right in this photo)

The night before, after the wedding, Noel and I went to Church Street which is T.O.'s gay district and had some drinks (all Canadian, Labats Blue and Keets beers and shots of Crown Royal) at Woody's (http://www.woodystoronto.com/)which is this huge gay bar complex which was cool, and where they filmed all the bar scenes for the 5 years of Showtimes "Queer as Folk". We then went up the street to a bar/restaurant called the Byzantian (http://byz.ca/), which was really hip and cool, and I later found out where Luis' Josh bartended/waited when he came back to T.O. Hmmm...interesting. I don't see Josh there. After one martini Noel was 3 sheets to the wind, and after getting ketchup potato chips down the road we scurred back home via taxi by 1am. Keep in mind we had been drink pretty much from 4pm on, wedding reception on, all day long beer, wine, champagne.

So the wedding Saturday...how lovely. Loved every minute of it. It was a perfect day, 75 degrees, sunny, and was outside in their condo's shared cabanna room (where the reception was immediately following). There were 70 peeps, and the ceremony was short. The speeches after were long but great from the bride, groom, BM and MOH. I hung alot with 'The Goddesses', Juliana's GF's that I had hung with a couple years earlier in PV...Heidi, Rose and Beatrice. Fun Canadian ladies...love them. We had hours of fun people watching, being caddy and such. Juliana looked beautiful in a very non-traditional bride's attire...in a silver grey silk jacket, was same colored skirt that had random oval sequins and was a little below the knee. She looked stunning, and perfert for a 50 y.o. woman who was anything but a traditional bride. I also hung out with the bartender, Natasha, who was from Nova Scotia and preceded to tell me about Canadian beers, and wine, and then later invited us to meet her at her other job as bartender downtown, where there was a 50th b-day party of the coach of the Toronto basketball team, the Rapters. That would have been fun I suppose, but 1) Noel and I wanted to gay it up a bit, 2) straight sportsbar with a bunch of Canadian basketball players...maybe fun? maybe not, 3) I didn't even know they had a basketball team...and I said "that sounds fun, I love hockey players" (ooops!). It was an interesting crowd, outside of a handful of Americans there were many Brits and lots of Ontarians. Earlier in the day, Ray and Brent took us to lunch on Church Street and showed us many gay sites for later. It was truly a beautiful weekend. They were such nice guys. We got them a little gift certificate for a restaurant down the street "Lakes" as a thank you, along with one also for Jewels and Rob to enjoy.

Friday night we arrived, via our rental car, from Buffalo to Toronto at 5pm. There was a rehearsal/outta towners dinner down the street at an Italian place called Piccalos. Very fun. Prefix menu and free flowing winde. Good times. We played a little game as an ice breaker which was actually fun.

Still going backwards...we left Buffalo at noon-ish and stopped for a couple hours at Niagara Falls. Totally breathtaking. I can't believe it was as amazing as I imaged. Cool! Now one more thing off my 'bucket list'. It was funny too...the U.S. side was old school, old town, but the Canada side was friggen Las Vegas with casinos, Hard Rock Cafe, Planet Hollywood, etc. So glad we drove through. By driving thru, between Niagara and T.O., we found out it was wine country, and that there were 30+ wineries there. I have never heard of an Ontario wine, probably because they do not or can't import them into Washington State. Conversely, we could not find any Washington wines or beers in the huge renovated train station liquor store next door.

There is so much to do...we already know we have to come back next year (or two)....The first week of September would be fun, good weather then,wine country tours, theatre 'broadway' shows, and also the Toronto International Film Festival!!!

SIDE NOTE BACK IN SEATTLE: So the hour before we left Toronoto to drive back to Buffalo, we caught Shelly in town from New York City selling her goods to a couple stores in T.O.....what are the chances??? So cool to see her period, but even more surreal outside of the country and totally unplanned until hours earlier! Life is so cool sometimes how it works that way! ....and yes, again, what a small world!

SIDE NOTE #2": We had extra time before dropping off our rental car, so Noel and I spent an hour downtown Buffalo. Great architecture, but the most depressed and depressing city I have ever been to...boarded up buildings and garbage everywhere. Very sad. Noel was sure they were zombies...."don't look into their eyes, or show emotion...they will know we don't belong!" he said.

More video at work, more H&M and Toronto on the horizon!

Okay, it's 1:17am...and I must go to bed to get up again for another stressful video producing, actor-model casting, flash and URL pathing day at work...and to prepare to miss 3 days of work...TO GO TO TORONTO!!! I am so excited to see Juliana, and Toronto, and the Niagara Falls!!! ...off the falls in a barrell baby!!!

So Noel and I went to Pacific Place tonight to see a free screening of "Lakeview Terrace" with Samuel L. Jackson (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0947802/), but after an hour of waiting there were no seats to be had, so we help ourselves to another movie, and the only one starting when we needed it was "Babylon A.D." with Vin Deisel and Gerard Depardieu (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0364970/)...Not good, good special effect, but not good...atleast it was free. LOL.

...on the way home we walked around the block down town to see the newest/3rd H&M have a private pre-grand opening gala red carpet and all. We couldn't get in but saw Jenny our N.com proofreader, and she said she saw the DJ Samantha Ronson, Lindsay Lohan's lesbian lover(reference = http://www.nydailynews.com/gossip/2008/07/25/2008-07-25_lindsay_lohan_makes_girlfriend_joke_abou.html), along with Blayne of Project Runway who has self-proclaimed tanarexia (http://www.bravotv.com/Project_Runway/season/5/bios/bios.php?designer=blayne). I am excited to have H&M in Seattle, but I know full well it won't feel special anymore being in the NW...just another GAP. I do like H&M's clothes better... more fashion but with a low price...

Finally 2 more days until we are in Buffalo (2-1/2 until we are Toronto-ing) and I have to say that today I booked us a cheesy hotel at the Buffalo airport being that we get in at midnight. It looked a little scary...stay tuned...

Palin, Volunteering, and H&M!

First of all before my 'Week in Review'...I'd like to talk politics because this is my blog and I can say what ever the hell I want to say. First off... what the (BEEP) were they thinking nominating Sarah Palin as the Republican Vice President? For all you Monty Python lovers, I deeply enjoyed this: http://michaelpalinforpresident.com/ , along with Doug Wright's facebook caption today: "Sarah Palin handled her first interview with all the practiced charm and virtuoso intelligence that befits a Runner-Up for Miss Alaska." Did anyone see the opening of the 34th, yes 34th, season opener of Saturday Night Live last night? (can't believe I was home watching it, I remember watching it 30+ years ago when I was a kid, LIVE!..and I'm never home on Sat. night...but Noel is working at Virginia Mason all weekend...and I just hung my granddads light fixture over our beautiful leather sofa...and am love being home - sorry I digress)...the opening of SNL had Amy Poeler as Hillary Clinton and Tina Fey as Sarah Palin....HILARIOUS!!! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W8WkCfkQ4DI ...POELER AS CLINTON "I believe that diplomacy should be the corner stone of any foriegn policy..." and FEY AS PALIN "I can see Russia from my house..."

If you cannot tell, I am a OBAMA supporter. God helps us all if McCain/Palin are in the White House. Yes, both Noel and I voted for Hillary in the Washington State primaries, and Yes, I do wish she was Barack's running mate instead of Biden...but I do think I like Biden, the little I know of him. But let's be serious. Obama could have picked almost anyone...

Can you image if McCain wins and literally croaks in the first two years of his term? This unqualified right-winged Alaskan riffle-totin' bible-thumpin' anti-gay pro-lifer 44 year old woman would be President of the United States. Did any one ever watch that TV show a couple years ago with Geena Davis "Commander in Chief"...it was good and spookedly close to this scenario. Ok, enough said...we are just fucked (oops forgot to 'beep') if McCain wins whether him or Palin is the commander in chief. MAJORLY STALE!!!!

On to my WEEK IN REVIEW...we started with seeing "Tropic Thunder" on our semi-weekly Monday date night, Noel and I. It was, well, ok. Had potential, but was at the Oak Tree only 10 blocks from our house which is always nice. Then just a crazy long week at Nordy's with a couple projects of mine (October Holiday 'Make An Entrance' in final, Boot Video Guide in test and not ready for live launch and the script finals and casting of my Denim videos being shot next week). Friday was a crazy day, United Way 'Day-of-Caring' in the morning (til 1pm) at the Children's Special Needs School where we painted their gym. Then I had to go back to work 1-4pm (with paint in my hair and on my shoes) to continue my hot projects, and then Heidi and I went to a 4-6pm Unite Way post-volunteer thanks party at the Qwest/WaMu arena for the free food, beer, and a chance to win a cruise (which we did not). By 8pm I was home half passed out on a beer buzz, and next thing I know going to dinner at Machiavelli's with Noel, Lyu, Justin and Jae...what a long day...finally a bottle of red wine put me down.

Noel worked all weekend (his once a month duty at Virginia Mason...which I wish he'd quit but the extra money is nice for both of us...can you say kitchen glass tile back splash? - LOL). So I chilled most of the weekend going on 2 long runs with Pugsley. On Sunday I walked from our townhouse in North Greenlake to University Village, and on the 80 degree day and briskly walking I made it there in 57 minutes, quicker than I thought. I was and awesome walk through Ravena. I ended up at U-Village to meet Noel at 4:30 post-VM to check out the new H&M. After dropping $90 at H&M, and cruising the Apple store (new iPod Nano Chromatic), and purchasing at Storables...we met Chels, Adam, Jo and Lynn at the RAM for food and beer in the sun (and we had a BOGO dinner coupon - buy one, get one free). What a lovely weekend!

Housewarming Party down...next up Toronto!

So this was an amazing weekend having our big housewarming party on Saturday, brunch on Sunday at Swanson's Nursery in Crown Hill with the Kitashima's and then wine tasting and a concert at the Chateau Ste. Michelle winery in Woodinville with my Dad, Step-Monster, Breanne and Sonny.

The housewarming was a complete success. Of course, like any party, there's always the people who you hoped would show up, and the ones who just never respond. It was a fun mix from my Mom, to my 3 sisters, to the wacky Brits Rohan and Fiona, to Shane from B'ham, to Ainslee our neighbor, to Kumi and Tony.

The concert at the winery was for Wine Club Members (a gift I recieved from my Dad for my 4oth b-day). The performer was Jackie Greene...never heard of him, but liked him...and he has a cool site: http://www.jackiegreene.com/

How is it Labor Day already...geez!

Yes, the summer is again, just like every year...OVER. Funny how that happens. And, at least in Seattle, God has so generously reminded us by making it a cold grey poopy day. We (Jo, Lynn, Noel and I) were going to go bike ride the Burke-Gilman trail all the way from Gasworks to Red Hook in Woodinville (since we have been talking about it for now a 3rd summer), but the day is crap and we all have projects we are working on: Jo, her motorcycle, and Noel and I more house stuff like mounting shelves, finish painting, rewiring light switches, etc (and get ready for our housewarming party next Saturday). I have to say...no complaints on the weather, especially when poor New Orleans is getting hit by Hurricane Gustav on their 3rd anniversary of Katrina.

More on hurricanes, Palin as McCain's running mate, visiting Shane/Bellingham yesterday, my Mom's new (rebuilt) beautiful house on the Ebbey Slough, and such later...I am now adding to my August 24th entry on P-Town...so go back and ready...if you must! LOL...