End is near.......run!

Apologies to the very few loyal readers for whom I have produced nothing to read for the last 7 weeks. Things have been fine, but summer does not tie me to my motherboard like it does during the school year. Hence fewer electronic posts have been possible. But I've been sending mental vibes out there like CRAZY. That must count for something. Tonight, however, I am climbing back onto the saddle and issuing forth the first post for July 2008, a month that is practically in the grave as I type.

There has been accomplishment and progress since I last wrote here. There has also been boredom, but less so than the former. Work is pleasant, I received some good feedback from people. That feedback did, however, come to me over the course of a firm sponsored happy hour during which staff were freely downing pints. That is fine, though. I do not discard even drunken compliments, if they come from the right people that is.


These are the three employees from the AT&T store who I watch take many smoke breaks during the week. This bench is what I look at from my second floor office window. I've seen a wide variety of antics go on around this piece of standardized street furniture.

This weekend I traveled to the bowels of the Beaver State to carry out a family task of enormous proportions. Both emotionally and physically it wore me out. Typically disbanded family members traveled to and spent a night in Maupin, population 411. During the summer Maupin's population doubles because of its river rafting infrastructure and related private enterprises along the Deschutes River. We were in Maupin for other reasons, but the rafters were still funny to watch. People lose all their senses of control once they jump on a raft and cinch up a lifejacket, it seems.


Here the family takes a stroll down Macks Canyon.

The past weekend I ventured to Washington, DC. There, I visited with many loving friends, got some professional assistance, acted as mosquito bait, and forgot to take enough pictures. All in all a fine journey. Here are some of the few pics from that escapade.


My hair is going a little wacko but otherwise fine pic of me and Amanda.


An amazing beech tree at Dumbarton Oaks.


Hand-carved stone statue with water feature @ DOaks.

This coming weekend I have a visitor in town and that makes me very happy. There will be fun and adventures. The following weekend the birthday train heads north to Canada where hopefully mother will not mope too much about the value of the US dollar.

Then the summer is over and I have to return to Berkeley to resume my life of serfdom. So it be.