Must you Drone On?

While the entire US of A is freezing and buried in snow - we are having a fantastic winter in the Puget Sound. On Wednesday, for work, we ran down to a jobsite to get some pics and video with the drone. Talk about an awesome day in the sunshine!

I'm on the left, looking into the phone, snapping photos as the drone is flying around.
PM and SUPT getting drone-buzzed.

Our subject - apartment project under construction in Tacoma.

Co-worker Justin is piloting the drone here.

Here we are at another location shooting views from various heights.

Have a good weekend. Hope to have some interesting posts coming up. Things have been a little bit dull on the posting end. Sorry. 

And people complain about the weather in Seattle?

Evidence that Boston is having a  B R U T A L winter.

from Slate.com

from WBUR

Evidence that Seattle is under blue skies and glorious conditions this winter.

KOMO photo

accuweather report for today in Seattle

Dear Boston - Congratulations on the Superbowl win, but we here in Seattle have in fact kicked your asses in the weather department. And for all of the rest of you around the country who always ask "Doesn't it rain ALL THE TIME in Seattle?" The answer is "YES - all the time! You should never move here - it's just terrible weather - all the time." ....chuckle chuckle!

This scares me

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/15/magazine/how-one-stupid-tweet-ruined-justine-saccos-life.html?smid=tw-nytimes&_r=0

I've seen this article going around social media the last few days and it is so interesting and also so scary. It's about a woman who tweeted something completely stupid and how within a period of a few hours her tweet went viral and basically wrecked her life. If you have a chance to read it, please do. 

It seems that in the real time world of Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, etc... we all have equal opportunity to make complete asses of ourselves but also the opportunity to bully the hell out of someone. This article is such a good reminder to slow it down and think carefully about what we are tweeting and posting, in what context it will be seen or read, and what the point is... really. The best part of the article is that you don't have to choose a side here - because it's all bad. Obviously, whether any post is just plain mean or racist or ugly - it's bad, but the pack mentality of bullying that person is really ugly too. 

I'm going to try harder from here on out because I know that I am guilty (to some degree) of judging and also of bullying too.... Let's all not be so judgy - on all sides of it. Whether our posts or tweets are meant to be tongue in cheek, or funny or whatever - we don't have to agree with every tweet we read but maybe we could TRY NOT TO RUSH TO JUDGMENT! And my God - the relentless bullying - at the very least, let's try to make the punishment fit the crime.

Glass houses people!!!! Haven't we all done or said something so stupid, embarrassing or shameful in our long lives? Things we'd rather forget? If anyone out there is perfect - then you may go ahead and judge, but if you are a human being who is on a journey in this life like the rest of us, making mistakes and learning things along the way, maybe a little forgiveness and understanding is in order.

Yes, I will try anything!!!

So, three acupuncture sessions in, and I have to say I really like it. I also think that my shoulder pain is starting to ease up - just a little. I can't tell if that is because 1) I want it to 2) my pilates instructor is also working on my shoulder or 3) it's the needles and this super awesome device called the percussor! Whatever it is, I like it.

This is a percussor. It beats the crap out of your muscles - in a good way.

Today - I had the added treatment of cupping. The idea is that it these cups suction onto your skin and can pull toxins up and out, or away from your muscles. I know - I'm sooo Gwyneth Paltrow right now.... but if it works I don't care if you make fun of me.

This is what cupping looks like. It feels pretty good - but yes, it's a little weird.

But, just in case it all doesn't work, I have a back-up plan and an appointment with a physical therapist in a couple of weeks. No matter how it happens, I'm getting this shoulder thing taken care of. I'm just trying the natural way first.

The whole thing makes me feel like an old lady, and just about everything I've read somehow manages to work in "frozen shoulder" as a potential problem. What? No? That seems like such a "fake" thing to have, but turns out it's real and really really painful I think. So, I keep on moving it and doing crazy exercises and hoping for the best. I can't keep doing everything one-handed. It's ridiculous!

Look what I'm doing now!

Did I mention that my shoulder is killing me? For a while now (2 months), my right shoulder is a mess. I didn't hurt it, I think it's from the leftover chemo - which can cause some lingering joint and muscle pain, or maybe it's something else but it hurts like a mother all the time.

So, I'm trying this! Acupuncture. My first appointment was last night after work. Obviously, things probably will not be back to normal for a while, but I'm willing to see if this works for me. 

I got a recommendation to see a woman that my hairdresser sees - and I really like her so far. She has a very nice calm and comforting vibe - so from the get go I like her. She interviewed me for quite a while, and once she understood my "issues" - she has a pretty nice plan to get me back on track. She also told me quite a bit about how it all works, but I'm not sure I absorbed enough to tell you all that, you'll have to google it. Ha.

The action: I layed down on a massage table, face up, and she began to insert needles down around my feet, ankles, and up my calves a tiny bit. Then she worked up to my hands, inside the crook of my arm, and then my forehead, ears and between my eyebrows. Many of the needles go in with no feeling, a few make sort of a tiny electric shock feeling, and some cause a little shiver. But none of them hurt, it's pretty cool. Once she had some in, she asked me to move my shoulder and I have to say that some range of motion came back immediately and the pain settled down quite a bit. She said not to expect it to last because it's a cumulative process, but that immediate help indicates that she is on the right track.

Once the needles were in, she turned down the lights and put an eye mask on me, and turned the heat up. Apparently you want a warm room for acupuncture. She left me there for about 25 minutes - so of course I fell asleep and when I woke up I couldn't remember where I was - that freaked me out a little - but still, pretty great. When she came back, she pulled out all the needles, and then used a hand held massage/pummeling type of tool to work on my shoulder to break up whatever it is that is wrecking my life. Then, I got up, made my next appointment (for Tuesday) and went home. I have to say that things felt better for a while but now today - I'm back to feeling bad again. But not exactly in the same place. It feels like what happened yesterday has released some of the tension in one part, and hopefully as we progress things will loosen up all over my shoulder. Can't wait to find out. I am looking forward to the experience. Some of her upcoming treatment will include Chinese herbs to pull out toxins and then cupping - which I've heard of but haven't tried, so that will be really interesting.

I hope the whole thing works - wouldn't it be so nice to solve this problem without using drugs? And wouldn't it be nice to cap off an entire year using Western medicine for solving the big problem, and Eastern medicine for getting rid of the leftover effects of the Western medicine. I think this is going to be good. And it makes me want to go drink some green tea!

Have you tried acupuncture? Did it work for you? I'm curious!!!!

Sometimes you need to call in a Professional

Remember last year (well, actually, over a year ago) when we bought that beautiful slab of maple and we had BIG BIG plans about refinishing it ourselves and using it as the top of our island at the condo? Well, here's how that all went down.

We got the wood, which we were told was sufficiently dry and we would be able to work with it. Well.....as we began the sanding process we noticed that the wood was bowing a little on the sides. It really needed to stay flat. But it wouldn't. So we sort of kept looking at it and wondering what to do and hoping that maybe it would miraculously fix itself. Strangely, it didn't fix itself. So for another long while, we didn't do anything....

Then I had a busy year curing cancer... so nothing happened for another long while.

Then, we gave ourselves a talking to, and made a few phone calls, and we are now having an actual professional finish the job! YES!!!

Coyote Woodshop on Bainbridge Island is going to take our large chunk of wood, replane it, and sand it to perfection and sooner (not later) we will have the thing we wanted from the beginning, only it will be way better than we could have done, and will actually finally get finished. If you live around here, go check these guys out. We met Drew there, and he gave us a tour around their place. It's full of awesome slabs of wood (all kinds), definitely worth the trip plus it will give you all sorts of inspiration. And in our case, relief!!! 

Sometimes you have to just call it! We weren't going to get this thing done. Now we are! Woop woop.

Will report back as soon as it's finished.

Here is a reminder of what we had (before it got all 'cuppy'!) I'm super excited to get it done and installed.

Things that Take a Really Long Time

Oh, just sitting here waiting for my hair to GROW. OUT. FROM. SCRATCH.

I thought maybe every other week or so I would post a couple of photos of my hair, while it 

s l o w l y  grows from nothing back to something. I'll start with the before pic. This was my hair the day before I met with my doctors - about 2 weeks before it fell out.

This is where it is now - I've had it cut twice as it's come in, just to try to give the sides and back a shape while it grows and so that it doesn't look like a mullet. 

Sorry it's blurry, I had to take my glasses off for the photo, and I couldn't see what I was doing.

This photo illustrates exactly how I feel about it. It's getting quite puffy on the top, because the hair that I have now is a lot curlier than my own hair was, so it's got a little 'whiz bang' going on, and some sections are pretty coarse - they say that will grow itself out and that at some point in the future I might get my own hair back. 

On the bright side, better than no hair at all, right?  Product suggestion welcomed as this thing grows.....

It's Raining in Seattle

And here is why:

We are all crying over the Superbowl loss of our beloved SEAHAWKS. But, we shall pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off, and start all over again! 

And to you Seahawks - thanks for everything! I'm so sorry you couldn't get the 2-fer, but you were so much fun to watch, so entertaining, and what a great season it was. 

Now, heal up, have some nice down time and we'll see you next year. 

GO HAWKS

Big big day coming up. SUPERBOWL. Oh the excitement. Oh the nerves. Good luck to our hometown team!!! We support!

Look at the Bright Side

If you are 50 you might have already done this, but on Monday I had the "pleasure" of my first colonoscopy. I'm not going to tell you anything about how much I really wasn't in the mood for such an event, so instead I'm going to tell you all the good parts (or as many as I can come up with!)

All docs are different and have different protocol for how to prep. Some use a certain kind of "mix", my doctors gave me a prescription for polyethylene glycol, or PEG bowel prep. Not terrible, not great. But the good the comes along with it all is this:

Three days before event you have to not each veggies or fruit or high fiber - so as long as I avoided those, I got to have an excellent dinner of anything I wanted knowing that I wasn't going to be eating for quite a while. I had a chicken quesadilla - yes!!!

Two days before you are on liquids but they don't have to be clear liquids yet. And the directions say right out loud that you can have a milkshake!!! And I did and I didn't even feel bad about it at all. That was probably because it was the only thing with any calories at all that I could think of to eat drink! I think I got some juice and maybe some clear soup later.

One day before, it's all clear liquids. Broth, juice, pop, that kind of thing. I ate Miso soup with the good stuff strained out. There is really no good part of the one day before.

Day of dreaded event. The good news is that by now you are practically one-sided because you haven't eaten for a while, so you get to show up for your appointment feeling really skinny.

And finally... the best part.... the drugs they give you are awesome and you're pretty much out of it for the whole appointment. In fact, it's like you weren't even there.

And that's it. Over and done. Not bad. You don't need to know anything else - done and done.

Weekend Follow-up

We liked it. 

Utah was awesome. We flew into Vegas, got a car and drove up to St. George, Utah. Maybe an hour and a half driving - traffic out of Vegas at rush hour but the drive was easy once we got going. Weather was sunny and around 60 degrees the whole weekend, which was a little unusual for that area in January - but whatever, we loved it.

The resort was perfectly fine. Not a 5 star deal, but really comfortable and very nice for a wellness place, and not too hippy dippy at all. We got in just in time to drop our bags and head to the dining hall for dinner. The menu is smallish (just the right size) and all the options show you the calorie count, etc. if you are trying to be healthy. The food though is still really nice. Healthy nice! If you want, you can get beer and wine so you aren't forced to be on a diet here if you don't want to - and there is a dessert menu too - overall I would say AWESOME food. Really nice soup and salad bar, and the breakfast options were super good. Again, all healthy choices, and lots of choices. Fruit, yogurt, but also eggs and that kind of thing, oatmeal, toast, pretty much anything you want - so from the really important WHAT WILL WE EAT portion of the show, we liked it.

Saturday after breakfast we drove to the golf course. Had a great time there, beautiful course, pretty scenery. Loved it. Got back to the resort in time for spa appointments. We both had massages - very nice. Then we got dinner and hunkered down for a movie in our room. Great and relaxing!

Sunday we did a quick little hike in the State park next to the resort property. Gorgeous. Got back to the resort in time for more spa stuff. Followed that with the CRAZIEST FOOTBALL GAME ever. Watched the Seahawks pull out a big win over the Packers in the last 3 minutes of the game. So good, and soooooo stressful, but our Seahawks are now off to the SUPERBOWL!

Monday we checked out around 10am so that we could drive up into Zion National Park. It's about an hour outside of St. George, so we headed in, did a scenic loop drive, and a little hike that had a beautiful view, did another scenic drive the other direction in the park, and then worked our way back to Vegas. We got back just at dinner, so we pulled into the Bellagio, and ate at Yellowtail (Sushi) and had just enough time to win $10 bucks at a slot machine before heading to the airport. That, my friends, in not nearly enough gambling time for me, so just know that there will be another trip to Vegas in my future to make up for the lack of "gaming".

Got home late Monday night.

Here are a few pics of our little trip. Sorry, none of me, I'm still trying to come to terms with my new hair, so to survive the super short and hideous doo, I'm avoiding photos for the next couple of weeks. It's a complete fucking disaster, but since I can't do anything about it, I'm just avoiding looking at it. All I can say about it is.....Sigh!!!

Weekend re-TREAT!!!!

We are going somewhere GOOD this weekend.

Red Mountain Resort in St. George, Utah! We've never been there, but have heard a lot of nice things about it and are super excited to check it out. Apparently, you can sign up for guided hikes, horse riding, other stuff while there. Or you can go ala carte and just wing it. That's our plan. They have daily "events" like yoga, stretching, pilates, etc... so you can swing in to anything at any time or decide not to - your choice.Our plans so far:

Friday - Fly into Vegas in the afternoon and drive up - have fab dinner and check out the whole cozy joint. 

Saturday - Golf at The Ledges, then spa here, then maybe a little hike around the area, which looks super pretty.

Sunday - More spa and salon then football then another hike or something outdoors after the game.

Monday - check out and work our way back to Vegas to get home. And don't for a second think we won't stop at a casino on our way out of SIN CITY!!!

All photos are directly from the Red Mountain Resort website.

Here's hoping the resort is what we expect and that my shoulder holds up for golf, and that the weather is beautiful and that we have a great time. Can't wait.

Field Trip

Mt. Rainier? Huh? Oh that mountain that I'm practically picking it out of my teeth every sunny day? That one? Yep! Well, again, true, never been there. UNTIL NOW! Another thing we checked off the list over the Holidays. Jumped in the car and drove right on up. It was delightful - well.... once we got there it was nice, and once we got down it was nice, the actual getting to was a little distressing for me.

The roads were sort of snow covered on the way up, naturally. It was December and it is a big mountain... so you would think I might have considered that when I said "yep, let's go!" - then right when the road turned to snow and ice I thought that maybe it wasn't such a good idea. Did you know that there are a really lot of steep cliff-like drop offs on the road to Mt. Rainier? Did you know that I'm terrified of heights and cliff-like drop offs? By the time we got to the top Kit had to peel my fingers off the arm rests. I was tense - to say the least. I might have said "Could you slow down?" about 850 times.

And by the way, the car did perfectly fine. We didn't slip at all - I was just way overly worried that we would, and then plunge to our deaths - ahhhhhhhh! We didn't. On the way down we saw a Land Cruiser in the ditch and thought "what a douchebag" because he was probably going too fast. Lucky for Kit I repeated "Could you slow down?" another 850 times on the way back down the hill, so we never ended up in any ditch.

The mountain is beautiful. I'd like to go back, but in a different season. That would be nice.