Not much has been going on that's been post worthy, but I thought I would mention a few things coming up over the next few months:

7th Annual Cheese Festival - We're going to the cheese festival today and might be meeting some friends there. It's free to get in and all the booths have free samples of their cheeses to taste. We're planning on buying two or three different kinds of cheese. I've been looking forward to this for months.

Visitors - Troy's parents are visiting us very soon and we're planning on going to Leavenworth, WA and Victoria, British Columbia. We've never been to Victoria, but I've heard a lot of good things about it, especially the Butchart Gardens. They'll also get to see our new apartment and neighborhood.

Seattle International Film Festival (SIFF) - Seattle has one of the best film festivals in the country. We've gone to a couple movies every year during the month-long event. Not sure what we'll see this year, but there's tons of options to choose from.

Northwest Folklife Festival - This happens on Memorial Day weekend at the Seattle Center. Lots of good food is available, as well as crafts, live music, and other things going on.

Mariners game - We'll be going to the Memorial Day game against the Orioles. We haven't been to a baseball game yet this season, so it should be fun. Hopefully the weather is much nicer by then.

Sounders-Whitecaps game - We'll be going to the first regular season match between the Sounders and the Whitecaps on June 11. The Sounders, Portland Timbers, and Vancouver Whitecaps will probably form a strong rivalry due to their close proximity to each other in the region.

More visitors - My parents and Uncle will be visiting us in mid-June for about 5 days. We're planning on going to a Mariners game and also scenic Deception Pass. I'm really looking forward to hanging out with them and showing them our apartment.

Bite of Seattle - This is probably my favorite Seattle festival. Last year we were able to go with our visiting friends and had a lot of fun. It's similar to Folklife, except even more restaurants and types of food to choose from. We'll be going to this in mid-July.

Hiking? - Hopefully we'll start hiking more as the weather gets better. We've had a really cold, wet spring so far, with high temperatures well below normal. My foot is also slowly improving, so it will be nice to hike again. Hopefully I won't have to wear my night splint forever.

So, we'll be pretty busy the next couple of months and it will be nice to have visitors. The summers are always the best time of the year in Seattle.

With Lesley's foot hopefully on the mend, I'd like to fit two year's worth of hikes into this summer, since we weren't able to hike much last year. Here are the top trails I want to hit:

• Rattlesnake Ledge - A moderately difficult hike that's not too far away and offers beautiful views. Probably my favorite trail in the nearby area.


• Iron Goat Trail - Not sure if we'll do this one again, as it's kind of far away, but it's one of my favorite hikes we've done in the past few years.


• Cascade Pass - We've gone twice before and it's been one of our favorite hikes. We'd like to go earlier in the season so that we can see all the wildflowers.


• Lime Kiln Trail - One of my favorite hikes we did our first year here, it's a little far away but I'd like to go again.


• Twin Falls - Another enjoyable trail that can get rather busy


• Cougar Mountain - We've been here many times as it's closer than all these other options. There are many different trails of easy to moderate difficulty. I hope we can go here several times.


• Olympic Peninsula - We went here with Lesley's parents a couple years ago, but the weather was rather hot. I'd like to go back and do some longer hikes in different parts of the park.

I have this dream of going to London, Liverpool, and Dublin within the next few years. I love to travel and am especially interested in international travel. I'd like to see Big Ben, the British Museum, Buckingham Palace, the Palace of Westminster, the Tower of London, Abbey Road, among several other things. In Liverpool, I'd obviously like to see all the places made famous by the Beatles such as the Cavern Club. Ireland and England are very close together and you can take a ferry between the islands. I'm not sure what I'd want to do in Dublin, but I'm sure there's lots of beautiful scenery and old castles to see in the countryside.

I'm sure it would be much more fun and easier to get around if we went with someone else or if we knew someone that lived there, like we knew our friends in Australia. It was much cheaper too because we were able to stay with them for a week instead of paying for another week of hotel rooms. International travel isn't cheap, but hopefully we can save up some money over the next two years and maybe go to London, Liverpool, and Dublin for our 5 year anniversary in 2012. Coincidentally the summer Olympics are being held in London in 2012, so we'd probably want to avoid those few weeks during the summer when it would be most crowded there. Or, we could go to some events if we wanted to spend a ton of money on it, but probably not, I guess we'll see what happens.

It was nice having visitors again for such a long period of time. David and Karen really tested us on their visit with questions about the area - moreso than any other visitors have done. In researching answers to some of their questions, I found out a few interesting things - for example, King County (the county Seattle is in) was named after Vice President William R. King. Neighboring Pierce County was named after the recently-elected president Pierce (King was his VP). King was the shortest-serving VP not to advance to the presidency and the only VP never to wed. He was also nicknamed "Aunt Fancy" by contemporaries and had a dubious relationship with James Buchanan. In 1986 the County voted to re-dedicate itself to Martin Luther King, Jr and this was approved by the state in 2005. That was the most interesting thing I learned. It was nice to be tested on my knowledge of the area and sometimes I surprised myself with how much I knew, but there's always more to be learned.

Despite our relatively small apartment, having friends stay for a week turned out to be virtually no problem or inconvenience whatsoever (at least for Lesley and I). I couldn't get along with just anyone staying with us for a week, but in this case it worked out fine, it could have even been longer with no problems.

I've also realized that despite having many ways to get around in Seattle, none of them are very good, especially for visitors. We definitely drove a lot more during David and Karen's visit than we normally do, however we took transit more with them than we had with any other visitors we've had. In some cases it just makes more sense to take mass transit rather than drive. We had a few problems driving through heavy traffic and trying to find street parking and we might have been better off taking the bus. Still, sometimes it's just kind of difficult to get around by any mode of transportation. For example, I still don't understand how to use and pay for light rail, despite being a big fan of it and keeping up with all kinds of local transit news. However, I suppose overall we didn't have too much trouble with transit. I had to write bus directions for David and Karen to use while Lesley and I were at work, and actually that worked out pretty well. We took light rail back from the soccer game, and while the streetcar was no longer running, it wasn't a big deal to walk home the rest of the way. So, even though Seattle is too big of a city for driving to be easy and the city doesn't make transit easy, it is nice that transit can still fit into our lifestyle.

There are probably some more tourist activities that Lesley and I would like to do sometime. The coffee tour that Karen and David went on sounded like a lot of fun and I'm sure there are some other walking tours that would be nice. Lesley and I still haven't been to the Seattle Aquarium or the EMP, though we have no real interest in either of those. Though the Space Needle is really expensive, it is nice to go up with visitors and point things out. It was nice we were able to avoid paying admission to a couple things this time, but maybe next time we have visitors we can fit in some other new things that Lesley and I might like to do and maybe some new restaurants to try.

We had our best weather in 6 months this past Sunday, with a high near 70 and clear, sunny skies. The summer is just around the corner and I can't wait to go to some of the festivals in Seattle in a few weeks. The Cheese Festival at Pike Place Market and the U-District Street fair are both the weekend of May 15th. The Seattle International Film Festival (SIFF) runs from May 20th-June 13th. And the Northwest Folklife Festival is Memorial Day weekend. I love going to festivals here because of all the good food, music, and having fun outside in the awesome weather here.

The baseball season started this past weekend and the first Mariners home game is next Monday. I'm looking forward to going to a few games this year. I'd like to see one of the inter-league games against San Diego and maybe a game against the Rangers. I've heard the Mariners are going to be even better this year than last year since they signed Cliff Lee who is a really good pitcher. Last year they finished as one of the most improved teams compared to the previous season.

I wish we still had cable so we could watch the games on TV. It was nice having the games on almost every night last summer. We didn't necessarily watch every pitch, but it was comforting to me to have them on since I grew up with baseball so much. It's ingrained in my personality. I wonder if one of my teams will win a World Series any time soon...

Troy got an email advertising a really good hotel rate for a hotel in Portland and for a hotel in downtown Vancouver. We're trying to decide which city to go to for a weekend trip. Both are great deals and we like both cities, so which one do we choose? We've been to Vancouver recently for the Olympics, so would we want to go again this soon? We also might be going to the Oregon coast this summer, so we'd pass through Portland at that time too and probably spend a day there. Either way, it will be a fun weekend trip. It's nice to be within a three hour drive of such awesome cities.

I'd never been to a foreign country before, not even Mexico or Canada. But spending two weeks in Australia makes me want to visit foreign countries more now than ever before. It was just so cool being in a different country and experiencing so many new things. I've already started a list of countries I want to visit some day. Hopefully Troy and I will be able to visit all these places.

• New Zealand - I've heard lots of good things about New Zealand. It has lots of natural beauty and is where Lord of the Rings was filmed. I'd love to spend a month there some day.


• United Kingdom (England & Scotland) - I've wanted to go to London for a while, probably since I first became a Beatles fan. I want to see Abbey Road some day. I also want to go to Liverpool to see where the Beatles started out and visit all the famous places, like the Cavern Club. Scotland would be cool too.


• Ireland - Seeing all the old castles and architecture would be cool. Going to Dublin would be the main thing to see. I don't know much about Ireland, but I think I'd like it.


• Italy - Florence, Rome, Venice, the list goes on. There's so much history in all of Europe, but I'd probably want to visit Italy the most, after England and Ireland.


• Spain - I'd like to see Madrid some day. I remember learning all about Spain in my Spanish class in high school and it seemed pretty cool.


• Mexico - Seeing the old Aztec ruins would be pretty neat, as well as spending several days in Mexico City. Maybe some day Sofia can show us around her home city. Cancun would also be nice and relaxing.


• Prague, Czech Republic - My cousin has been to Prague before and actually took her family there last month. She loves it and I think I would too because of all the cafes, shops, and cultural things to do.

It's been a while since I've seen my alma mater play. In fact, I'm not sure that I've been to a game since I graduated. And, now that I live far away from the campus, I expected it'd be a while longer. But, recently I found out that SMU would soon be in Pullman, on the other side of the state, to play the Washington State Cougars.

I like going to football games but didn't think I'd have another chance to see the Mustangs play for a while, so I'm glad this game is so close. Plus, Lesley and I have kind of wanted to go to eastern Washington but haven't really had a reason to yet, and doubt that we'd get a better one than this.

So, we've ordered our tickets through the SMU ticket office so that we can sit with the sure-to-be-small crowd of SMU supporters. And, while SMU has had some rough luck in football lately, WSU hasn't been doing so well either, so this is a very winnable game. I'm ordering a new SMU shirt for the occasion and am looking forward to the game.

We've been watching Mariners games on FSN since the season started. Unfortunately the price of our cable package, which is now at an introductory rate, will go up from $30/month to $55/month, so I don't know if we'll keep it. But for now, it's fun to watch the Mariners games on TV for something to do.

The Mariners' home opener next Tuesday against the Angels is sold out because it's Ken Griffey Jr.'s first home game back with the Mariners. We're going to the April 18th game against the Tigers with two friends from church. Then we're going to another game on May 1st against the A's with my co-worker and her husband. I'm looking forward to going to baseball games again, they should be fun!

We're going to our first Seattle Sounders FC game (against Real Salt Lake) this Saturday at Qwest Field. Last week we watched the first Sounders game ever, and it was completely sold out. It looked like the fans were having a blast, so hopefully the crowd is just as loud this time. We took some pictures of the stuff we bought to wear to the game. I'm sure we'll post pictures from the game afterward.

Seattle is getting a new Major League Soccer team, Seattle Sounders FC and there has been a huge response to the team locally. Sounders FC already has more season ticket holders than any other MLS team. I really wanted to go to their home opener, but tickets have sold out even though seating capacity for the game has been expanded twice, up to 32,400.

I'm not a huge soccer fan, but I've become a casual fan since several of my friends are big fans and I went to a university with a great soccer program. I thought it'd be cool to get to go to the first-ever game, and I really wanted to go, so it was surprising and disappointing to find out about the sell out.

Fortunately, this game should be on TV, so I'm planning to watch it, and have already purchased tickets for the next home game on March 28. With such a large fan base, it should be a lot of fun.

I didn't used to like wine at all, but after trying several different kinds the last two years, I've grown to like it more. I used to only try white wines, but recently Troy wanted to get a red wine, so we got one and it was alright. I don't really have any idea what labels are best or what's a good wine for the price or anything.

I'd like to learn more about wine and so we recently bought a book from Half Price Books all about wine. It talks about the grapes used for different kinds, how to taste it and drink it, where wine is made and how, and what wines go best with certain foods.

Going to some wineries in Washington would be fun sometime. I'd also love to go to Napa Valley someday.

Two of our good friends moved to Melbourne, Australia for grad school earlier this month. It's pretty cool that they were able to apply for schools and get everything worked out in order to move to another country.

We're going to visit them sometime this year, most likely at the end of September and into the first half of October. It's the start of their spring in October and airfare is significantly cheaper than in November or December. It all depends on their schedule though. They said there's plenty of room in their place for us to stay, which will save us a ton of money.

We're thinking we'd spend about a week or so in Melbourne and then a few more days in Sydney. We'll probably be gone a total of two weeks when you count the time it takes to fly back and forth. It'll be nice to hang out with them in their new city and have them show us around and be a tour guide of sorts. The weather should be decent too.

We're really looking forward to it. It'll be the biggest and longest trip we've ever taken. It'll also be the first time for me to be outside of the United States (assuming I don't visit Canada before then). We can't wait to visit them in Australia! Now if only we could figure out a way to fit New Zealand in there...

After waiting almost two months, Troy and I were awarded tickets to two events in Vancouver for the 2010 Winter Olympics. We're going to the men's individual 5,000 meter speed skating final on 2/13, and a men's preliminary hockey game on 2/16. It would have been nice to see the luge or another event I haven't already seen a hundred times like I've seen hockey, but it'll still be pretty cool. Tickets were pretty expensive though, so it's probably a good thing we didn't get all the events we requested.

Now we need to start looking for a hotel and figure out what else we want to do in Vancouver while we're there. I can't wait!

We were supposed to find out this week if we were awarded any tickets to the 2010 Winter Olympic Games in Vancouver. Unfortunately, the notification has been delayed because CoSport has been allocated additional tickets to distribute to countries other than Canada, which includes us. So they're going to run another lottery process in order to allocate the extra tickets to everyone who requested them. So, I guess it's a good thing that we now have a higher chance of getting the tickets we requested, but it sucks having to wait until the week of January 5, 2009 to find out.

We requested our tickets to a few events for the 2010 Olympic Winter Games in Vancouver. Unfortunately, the prices were so inflated for American citizens that we couldn't really afford to see the opening ceremonies (over $650 per ticket) or any figure skating event (over $200 per ticket), both of which I really really wanted to see. I was pretty disappointed about that. But I guess it will still be cool to go to a few other events, assuming we are awarded the tickets we requested:

• Speed Skating - Men's 5,000 m Individual Final - 2/13


• Short Track Speed Skating - Ladies' 500 m Qualification / Ladies' 3,000 m Relay Qualification / Men's 1,500 m Qualification and Final - 2/13


• Ice Hockey - Men's Preliminary - 2/16


• Luge - Doubles Runs 1 and 2 - 2/17

It would have been nice to go to a medal match in hockey or something like that too, but tickets for the bronze medal game are a minimum of $235 each and $454 each for the gold medal game.

The ticket process is kinda crappy. We weren't sure how many events to request tickets to. We were afraid of requesting tickets to several events and then getting all of them and spending a ton of money, in which case it would be really hard to resell them. You're not legally supposed to according to the CoSport website. But we didn't want to request too few events and then have them all be sold out and not get any tickets. So, who knows if we'll get the tickets we requested, I guess we'll find out in mid-December when they notify us. The events we wanted are spread out pretty well. It will be nice to explore Vancouver and do other things in the city too. At some point we'll have to look into hotels too.

We're planning on going to the 2010 Winter Olympic games, which will be held in Vancouver, BC, only 140 miles from us. Tickets will be available to request this Friday, October 3. Thankfully the tickets are not first-come-first-served, it's more like a lottery system. I'm interested in seeing the opening ceremonies, figure skating, speed skating, and hockey. Medal events cost more too, so it will be difficult to decide which events are most important to us. And I guess it depends on which tickets we are able to reserve depending on demand. But anyway, I'm looking forward to hopefully going to a few events and spending time in Vancouver.

Ticket prices dropped significantly today on some of the flights we were monitoring, so we booked our tickets today. Prices had been hovering around $515 per person, but we were able to get these non-stop tickets for $434 with taxes and bag fee. We'll be arriving the evening of Sunday the 21st and flying back here the morning of the following Sunday.

We wanted to arrive back here on Saturday so that we'd have a day to rest before going back to work, but we also wanted to have at least 6 days there. I also kind of wanted to be able to go to our old church. But, we had to compromise a little bit to get the good price. So, we'll be coming back here a day later than we wanted to and we won't be able to go to church, but we'll still get to be there for a full 6 days.

The things that are in Dallas/Fort Worth that I like most are family, friends, and food. You can add football to that list too, since I'm a big fan of the Dallas Cowboys. I've been able to travel back a few times to visit with family and friends and to eat the food. However, I'm a little concerned about what I'll do once the regular season starts. Seattle Seahawks games will get local priority, so if the Cowboys and Seahawks are playing at the same time, the Cowboys game won't be on local TV. So, I'm trying to figure out what to do so that I can watch the Cowboys games, because not watching them is not an option.

There have to be other Cowboys fans up here, so I'd be curious to know what they do to watch the games. Unless I make friends with a Cowboys fan who gets all NFL games, I'll probably have to go to a sports bar to watch the games.

I'd like to find a sports bar that is close to downtown and thus, close to me. If I could walk to watch the game, that would be ideal, but I'm open to driving a few miles. I'd rather not have to go to the suburbs. Also, I'd like to find a decent place, nowhere too loud or rowdy, since Lesley will want to come along (to root against the Cowboys, unfortunately). But, I don't want somewhere very upscale or high-priced.

Anyway, I'm not sure how to find a place that meets those criteria, but I'll see if I can search online, ask around, and maybe find some kind of Seattle Cowboys fans group to ask. If anyone has any suggestions, let me know.