Vantage, The Cops & Liquid Smoke

Liquid Smoke: We arrived a little early. Around 2:30pm. It was blowing about 25mph. And sure as clockwork, at 4:20pm Vantage turned into liquid smoke. We think it was blowing 40+mph - classic Vantage - huge swells, spray blowing everywhere and water funnels shooting 30 feet into the sky. A little slice of heaven.

The Cops: You know it's a good windsurfing session when the cops or firefighters show up at the beach... "we got a call, people thought you were in trouble, is everyone ok?" The Vantage cop told Wes there was a rescue boat at the Vantage marina and the Dam had a few boats too - just in case we ever needed them.

4 days remain

In 4 days i will have:
- Wes kicked out of the boathouse
- Clean house
- Less beer consumption
- 2 jet-lagged kids (eating breakfast in middle of the night)
- Home cooked meal?!? (i hope)
- Very happy wife?!? Please! ;-)

I'm ready for the old, boring andy to take center stage again. Party Andy is killing me.

Vantage Goes Off, Wes Swims

Wes and I had been watching the weather reports for weeks... then we saw it:

Ellensburg - 20 to 30 with gusts to 40mph.

YES!! Classic Vantage conditions.
I took a quick peek at the Vantage cam. The glassy river was full of wind gusts... let's go!!

2 hours of packing the van
2.5 hours of driving
1 hour of rigging the smallest sails we own, stashing beer in the water (to cool down), and we're ripping!

Wes sailed for 15 minutes, then broke his boom in a big wipe out. He spent the next 2 hours swimming in 40mph wind and carrying his gear over rocks, etc. By the time he made it back to the beach the sun was going down.

I sailed for 2 hours in classic Vantage wind - the tops of the whitecaps were blown clean off, hitting me in the face. I found "Vantage Island" - the shallow spot in the middle of the river where Todd Regis clipped his boat prop just weeks earlier. Many times during the session i experienced the rag-doll-toss (getting thrown over the board/sail during a 40+mph gust).

As the sun was setting...
1 hour of packing and de-rigging
2.5 hours of driving to Seattle

and we're watching the wind forecast again... ohhh, looks good for tomorrow!

Ellensburg - 25 to 35 with gusts to 45mph! Look for us on the Vantage cam around 6:30pm tomorrow!

Glasgow on TV

I just flipped on the TV while getting ready for bed - hey, it's Glasgow! The Travel channel dedicated an entire show to Glasgow - and even though we were only 2 hours away, we never made it. Actually, we thought it was a rough-and-tough town. With the highest knife crime. ugly industry. bad whisky. But, we were wrong... according to the Travel Channel. And i must say, i bought a bottle of Glasgow whisky and it was very tasty.

I made dinner!

I finally broke down.
After 10 days of frozen food, pizza and tacos,
I set a lofty goal... make dinner.

I put water on the stove. check.
looking for pasta.... looking...
looking... looking...
awhhhhh heck, maybe this cooking thing isnt going to work!
(deep breath... ok, one more try)
looking... found Pad Thai!!
That'll work.

1 hour later. 20 dirty dishes. 1.5 beers. I made dinner!

Bachelor Daze

Jana and the kids are in Edinburgh. Eating healthily. Going to museums. Good global citizens.

I'm in Burien. Eating pizza, tacos and chipolte sausages. Drinking Vitamin R (Rainier Beer). And putting around in my dads boat. All the neighbors know "Andy's bach'n it", and they're keeping a safe distance from the party house... :-)

Jana and I have had a few chances to talk, but here's the quick day-by-day blow, and a few items i forgot to mention on our call.

Thursday Night:
Larry and Margi had a great party. I walked away with all the leftover taco fixins. enough to feed a small army "should feed you for the week" said Margi. Oh, Margi also found a mysterious baggie and gave it to me. Not sure what that was... but it's gone now.

Friday:
Got to work by 10am (not bad considering jetlag,etc.). In the evening a small army showed up at the beach house. Ate all the taco fixins and drank two bottles of Scotch. Jon was toasted and called Stan Seo at 11:30pm. Rock fight broke out. Wes passed out in chair. Jon stuffed Wes's pockets with rocks. Mark and David slept inside.

Saturday:
Wes asked himself during morning coffee "hummm, why are there so many rocks in my pockets?" I had dinner with my dad and picked up the boat. I took the boat on a little cruise with the guys.

Sunday:
Nice day at the beach. More vitamin R. Actually had a little business meeting at the beach. More boating. Another long night around the camp fire.

Monday:
Meetings all day at work. It's good to be back! Had some spicy sausages for dinner. Sounds like a little poker game is brewing for tonight. I just noticed - Lupe has a big NEW bump on his leg. Looks and feels like fluid. We'll be headed to the vet later this week.

Overall, I'm trying to keep the house CLEAN! I even made the bed. :-) Wes is living in the boathouse, but he's keeping busy painting the Rossmans house. Speaking of Tom and Brenda - they bought a new house and they're moving asap! I'm bummed.

Edinburgh with Kids

Hello in there?!?!
Originally uploaded by B-TownMom.

We've been in Edinburgh for 5 days... here's the quick update:

Jana and grandma have escaped the 1am and 4am breakfast sessions with the jet-lagged kids. So daddy had to figure out how to cook crepes. After a few days of edible mistakes, i finally got the hang of it, and now i can flip a crepe in the air.

I had the best sandwich yesterday. Chicken, cream cheese, bacon, bbq sauce, gouda, salami and mayo. Jana called it the artery clogger. I called it heaven.

Had my first 'real shave' by a scottish barber. Britta was with me. As long as i kept feeding her bits of broken cookie she was happy.

Karsten puked on the kitchen table, chair, couch, living room floor, his shirt, pants and on his bed. Then he felt much better.

There's no TV in our flat, so we've been watching movies on my laptop. Most watched: Thomas the Train, Superman, Muppets.

Karsten loves castles, dungeons, ghosts and monsters. Luckily Edinburgh has plenty. He's super excited to see nessy. While getting my haircut i heard a song on the local radio station "here comes the monster"... i'm not sure if that's just a local favorite or global hit?

Things we couldn't easily figure out how to operate: dishwasher, washing machine (dryer still a mystery), toilet, door locks, oven, stove & microwave. Diane has been hanging clothes in creative places around the flat.

Kids favorite food so far... Karsten: Thomas spaghetti-o's and Thomas yogurt. Britta: oranges (she calls them apples)