Portland and Bones

 

We spent some time visiting our Friends Mark and Wanda in Portland this last weekend. It was good to see them both and get away from the usual weekend doldrums we go through this time of year. Our visit with Mark and Wanda was very refreshing. We spend a great deal of time in the company of our children and having some adult company was fantastic! Although we did talk about our families some, we also discussed photography, work, travel to Belize, summer plans, scooters, cheesecake, and wine.

We drove out to Suave island and took some photos there - It was pretty cold, so no one was at the nude beach. There is a story behind the photo that I'll tell later on....

The scooter, cheesecake, wine, and trip to Belize isn’t my story to tell – but you can check it out at http://ride-the-light.blogspot.com/ if you would like! Saturday night they took us to a great microbrew pub for some good beer and food – Bridgett had too much hard cider and started the giggles. I was somewhat concerned… but she was happy and mellow.

Late Saturday night around midnight, Bridgett and I drove downtown Portland and were quickly reminded why we like to live in rural areas – no traffic – no excessive crowds – less noise – and no strange people that make you go “what is that?!” Sorry no pictures, I was driving.

Sunday came and we had to leave the big city and head home, we took our time, the weather was good and we had a nice breakfast with our friends. We plan to make another trip soon (depending on everyone’s extremely busy calendars).

However, the trip almost didn’t happen due to Morgan’s lack of balance. He had a middle school band competition in Reedsport on Thursday (they came in 3rd). On his way home he decided to climb a tree…. Wearing good dress clothes… and dress shoes with no traction. Being thirteen and growing; balance and coordination aren’t particularly his most well developed traits.

This resulted in a short fall and a twisted ankle. Not having his cell phone and the inability to walk due to pain, a parks and recreation worker called 911. Paramedics responded and took Morgan to the ED via ambulance (not code however – he should have asked!). The ED staff was very concerned about his lack of parents, but he convinced them that I was just down the hall in surgery. Not an easy feat as it seems that most hospital staff don’t listen to children very well.

Morgan of course chose the day that Bridgett was in Kings Valley (about 2 hours away) getting a real estate listing so she wasn’t able to come in. When I arrived everyone calmed down and Morgan , being very creative, did attempt to talk himself out of trouble for climbing trees in his good clothing. “It was a clean tree – it had been sanitized!” Regardless I wasn’t too upset, it’s about time for him to break something – I was 12 when I broke my arm. I think it’s only natural for kids to do this at least once growing up.

He had the “A” team in the ED and he was quickly assessed, x-rayed, splinted, taught how to use crutches, and discharged before I was able to make arrangement for another charge nurse in the OR to take over for me.

So while we had a great time in Portland, he spent his weekend at his friend’s house with his leg on the couch. I must say that de has done very well getting around – even with the stairway in and out of the house. Today he got some bad news that it looks to be about 10 weeks at the least before he can be fully functional. He gets a hard cast tomorrow should his follow-up CT scan show only the minor avulsion fractures to his ankle. If not… well that’s another story (we will cross our fingers and toes).

Annual Spring Camping Trip

Every year we get together with friends to camp and ride ATVs on the Oregon Dunes. This has been a tradition for what seems like almost a decade (ok… well it has almost been a decade).

Normally we stay at the KOA at Hauser just north of Horsefall. We like having full hook-ups for the trailer and the larger riding area with a huge variety of trails, open dunes, and fairly good sized sand hills. However, for a change of pace we went to Winchester Bay. Although Winchester is somewhat smaller, the sand hills there are much larger (not quite as large as St. Anthony Idaho, but pretty close).

Three years ago we moved the trip up to mid April from our usual Memorial day outing. The difficulty in getting a campground around the first big holiday on the coast proved to be far to complicated. April is still well within the coastal rainy season, but we have managed to get lucky and have fantastic weather for the most part.

I was very surprised at the weather, every time we’ve camped or ridden at Winchester we’ve been rained out, but we really got lucky this trip and had some good weather. I must say that I liked the close proximity to the sand (no long, tedious, whoopy sand roads) and it was windy enough to keep the sand smoothed out on a day-to-day basis. Wind of course is a double edged sword. For the sand it makes a clean slate to keep it smooth, but it can make for cold evenings by the fire.

This year there were a total of twelve people, five dogs, and enough stuff to keep us busy for four nights. As we’ve gotten older (what?) it’s not as cool to get up at the butt-crack of dawn and hit the sand all day long. Sore joints, muscles, and internal bleeding can put a damper on the fun…

Consequently, our other hobbies came along. We played with RC trucks, did some Geocaching, and I took some photos. Bridgett kept her riding toned down as she is still somewhat recovering from her surgery so took her Kindel and read a dozen or so books. Morgan, of course (still young) was chomping at the bit to ride as much as possible, even through some pretty deep water.

It was a great trip and we planned our follow-up at Winchester Bay again next April. This of course will not be our only ATV camping trip of the year, but it will probably be our only large group trip. Schedules being what they are never seem to be free at the same time.

A side note about Winchester Bay is Dunefest, an annual insane ATV sand enthusiast event in August. For more info: http://www.dunefest.com/

Mark is the man

Many years ago I meet a young guy who I thought was pretty rough in his rose colored sunglasses and leather coat with fringe!! How was I to know that hanging out and hitting the parties and drives around the country would turn into what became the best years of my life. It's amazing how we just wanted to hang out and not really get serious, we had too many other things we had to deal with, and now just short of 19 years we are still hanging out and driving around the country side..

We share a brain synapses which can be really bad if we are in different places and need to figure something out on our own and is my best friend. He is shy and reserved, yet strong and firmly grounded, and keeps me and the kids safe, loved and protected. Of course he can be very intimidating when he wants to be around people who don't know him(it think he likes seeing little kids cry!), and how he has the patience to deal with all of the personalities at his work I will never know. As anyone who knows me well, knows I'm a very upfront and blunt person, but Mark is able to be quiet and listen, but I'm still learning.

He cleans the house, buys the groceries, cooks the food, what more could a woman want or need? Much more, which includes making sure I don't want for anything, giving up his time to help me figure out what the heck to wear when we go out for dinner, always having enough time when he go to bed to hold me close.....


Of course I love the things that others don’t always see, like how he giggles and can’t stop when he has had just a bit too much to drink, or his funny smile when he is running around the house with my bra strapped around his head like a helmet!!

Anyone who was at the work Holiday Party can confirm not only was he giggling but he was upright with the assistance of the handy chair and table right next to him. Good thing he wasn't dressed like a true Scot's man that night!! :-)



I may stop and cause a 10 car pile-up to save a squirrel but he forgets about stop signs when the right booty is walking on the side walk. Of course it makes it difficult to keep a straight face when we are stopped at stop lights and he starts mooing at people walking across the street, or when he starts yelling at me in the grocery store that he can no longer take my abuse and is going to go to a safe house where I can’t beat him up anymore!

Hitting the sand with the quads is one of his greatest stress relievers, but at times with the darn sand doesn't want to cooperate!!  Good thing he can move FAST before going over the handle bars, that is not a pretty sight at all, but it does make me laugh. Luckily, my helmet hides most signs of me laughing of course until it happens too me.

After all of these years the one thing I know for sure is it doesn’t matter what color my hair is, how many new frown lines I have, or what I wear he loves me for the snotty woman I really am. :-)

A new toy

One of the things I've never been very good with is resisting the siren call of electronic toys and gadgets. Photography is among one of the things that can give me a great deal of heartburn - its so very toy/gadget centered. The possibilities are of course endless.

Like power tools (and alcohol), peer pressure is rampant in photography circles. It doesn't help that there are a mix of amatures and professionals with very blurry lines (ha photography pun!). I say that I dabble with the "professional" side but haven't made a dime (still have the day job). While on one hand I think I would enjoy being paid to take photo's - it might just ruin it and become the daily grind. The definition of "amature" is someone who loves something. In my book the only difference between an amature and a professional is where the check comes from.

The "professionals" and the "semi-professionals" will sometimes go on ad nausem about the best camera system and the best this and the best that for real photographers. But they of course miss the most critical element - the photographer. Regardless of what system he or she shoots with - the talent is in the brain and fingers. While I know I'm not Ansel Adams - I can hold my own with composition and my understanding of technique.

Where do the gadgets come in? I started off with a Vivitar manual focus camera with a Pentax K mount that my parents gave to me in High School. So when I started getting really serious I stuck with the Pentax system.

Keeping in mind the best-of-the-best among narrow minded photographers, Pentax is like the hunchback in the basement that nobody wants to talk about. Picture this..... A group of photographers standing around comparing lens size and someone walks up with a Pentax. Everyone moves to the side to avoid the poor unfortunates embarrassment.

While I know the system isn't what is important - eventually you can outgrow what's being offered. I've watched Pentax's market share dwindle in recent years and have grown frustrated by their choices in R&D. I'll spare you my rant about what went wrong - Long and short - I decided to switch camera systems. This is of course a big deal.....

Did I mention that I have issues with electronic toys? Left to my own devices I probably would have broken the bank - or at least ended up needing to sell a kidney on EBay. Like that time about six years ago (we don't talk about that much anymore....)

So I appealed to Bridgett, our Chief Financial Officer, and she graciously agreed to let me buy a Canon EOS 7D and a few accessories to get me started. My choice in Canon is partly influenced by our friend Mark in Portland. He's a great photographer and I admire his work very much. I never felt judged having a supposedly "substandard" set of equipment around him, but I do see the advantages to using a system that has major market share in the industry. More importantly, I feel that I have room to grow and learn something again.

However, I think its going to be long road. Canon has a great system and so far I'm impressed. Of course I've only managed to burn out about a 100 images and half of those are photos of the cats, Bridgett yelling at me, and Morgan with a glazed look from flash shock (hey its been raining....) However, yesterday I managed to get out and take some in Old Town during a brief respite from gloom and rain. Overall, I'm quite pleased. The only problem is, I'm lacking a few essentials, like fast lenses, and..... Oh well - six months and time will tell!