alright alright yes 10 days since last i blogged. i have accomplished very little in the last 10 days when it comes to getting the new issue printed, updating websites, and shit, even doing laundry. i haven't even mailed my own father his christmas presents and today is new years. i got my gram and aunt b. bags of COFFEE for xmas. sure, it's the best coffee in the universe (STUMPTOWN, REPRESENT!) but still... lame. i'm a selfish bastard in some respects, and in others, i'm generous to an unhealthy level. plus i loathe how this christmas thing manifests itself in respect to consumer frenzy (cliche, i know) and giving gifts to people i'd rather just buy stuff for when i see it other times of the year. also, i'm working at a delivery job where the delivered product is most popular around the holidays, so i now feel like the hardest part of my job is OVER. in fact, i'm going to MEXICO in 3 weeks, and HAWAII in March...yay!! i'm so stoked. i'm desperately hoping i won't get fired over going to hawaii, but the trip is a gift and i'm not going to miss it.
so do you wanna see some pictures from what i've been doing since xmas eve?
first justin and i picked up sone-loc at the airport. after 115 days aboard a container ship between honolulu, guam and shanghai, she'd just flown up here from long beach to spend xmas with me! we all had our xmas eve dinner at my favorite vietnamese restaurant, tamarind tree. here sone is modeling the taste sensation that is the green tea martini. notice the lemongrass martini on the table.
justin wanted to do some cooking belowdecks on the ferry that night, because he says that there's full kitchens and a sort of "iron chef" atmosphere in the bowels of the washington states ferries. for example a call will come from the wheelhouse: "hey do we have any paprika? oh, and FULL ASTERN!" so anyway justin couldn't find a turkey at the asian market next door to Tam Tree so he settled for 3 chickens, each in their own bags, with heads still attached.
we dropped justin off for his overnight shift and then took some xmas gifts up to my sister. the next day sone, Fish and i met up at nans to finish prepping for our Very Ferry Christmas. we brought the joy and happiness of the holidays to Justin, who had to spend them aboard the ferry.
this was our food: spicy lemon crab cakes, mushroom spanokopita, 6 different kinds of cookies, prosciutto/romano/pear paninis, chili with chocolate in it, and fresh organic cranberry-orange pie. all from scratch, all made by nan. amazing. as usual.
sone's loving family in chicago had sent a large box with 2 giant deepdish chicago pizzas, some sausage and a giant new york cheesecake all packed in dry ice. she was only staying for 5 days so we went ahead and gave the cheesecake to the ferry engineers.
here's justin loving up his new ROLEX that sone bought him on the streets of shanghai.
then i had to work the rest of last week.
but THEN... sone and i attended a circus contraption event at the seattle centerhouse on friday night, and later i took her up to capitol hill for a few drinks. the honey hole was kinda boring, but the drinks were great as usual. we walked over to the metropolitain to see if those 25cent pbr's were still happening. there we found FLUFFZ aka the dude i no longer date, rubbing up all over a brunette. that was a bit weird because i'd never seen him with another girl, but since i'm involved with someone special it wasn't upsetting. just weird. in fact, it was quite liberating to see Fluffz In Person and NOT be attracted to him, for once.
sone complimented a cute dyke with a viking seafoods sweatshirt and we could barely shake her the rest of the night.
saturday found us hiking rattlesnake ridge with Fish. it is the highest/longest hike little sone from flat chi-town has ever been on. we brought wine and i wore regular clothes with my cheap rubber boots. it gave me great satisfaction to hike like this in the snow on this SUPER EASY hike while all the nouveau northwesterners sported their rei ensembles, complete with camelbaks, vasque boots, GATORS, and jesus even storebought walking sticks and the removable wire shoegrips. i mean really, people. it's a 2 mile hike with a 900' climb. all switchbacks. hmmph. i hope they were preparing for rainier or everest or sumthin.
i'm really happy that my friends are more about just being themselves and having a good time rather than worrying about their clothes, gear, appearances, etc. Fish and I are both sloppy looking freaks at times. probably mistaken for bums, which is what we both plan to be in the future anyway. boat bums, i mean.
after the hike we attended a party held by the Kayak Twins on their Lake Union houseboat.
everything was calm until the bulk of the guests left. then all hell broke loose. i was coerced into joining a Polar Bear Plunge. here this meant jumping naked into a 40 degree freshwater canal between 2 rows of occupied houseboats.
here's the kayak twins themselves getting back on the dock. to the right you will see the hairy back? ass? of skyler, the neighbor who first appeared as we all climbed out in our birthday suits and whom we forced to jump in if he planned on continuing to watch us. so he jumped.
I jumped in twice, but after that first jump i was stone cold sober and couldn't get drunk again the rest of the evening. everyone else drank a lot more and jumped a lot more. Fish jumped 5 times and tried to touch the bottom.
other hilarious events of that evening included a less animated guest named eddie. eddie was one of the KT's driving companions on a cross country trip. one of eddie's most prominent appendages had to be "deflated" during the drive because it was scaring small children in other vehicles. sone decided it was time to bring new life back into eddie's forlorn member. we had lots of fun with eddie.
so ends the xrated part of this post. we woke up at 7am on the kayak twins' floor and realized sone's plane was due to leave in 90 minutes. she hadn't even packed her stuff at my house. sone missed that plane but caught the next one. i caught up on some sleep and then joined the crew at the houseboat with justin once again on new years eve, to watch the space needle pyrotechnical flub at midnight. tomorrow i go back to work and start looking forward to MEXICO!
I also took some video of "sleeping bags you can walk around in" being modeled by a local hip hop dance troupe, next to the climbing/bouldering wall. 
