Kingfisher Cove

Art! And Things.

I’ve dabbled in a few more glassy things:

The idea was “underwater” — although I couldn’t think of a way to add “fishies” without looking dorky. But I like the overall look and feel of it. Sort of a contemporary peek out of a porthole. And then, these:

A votive holder (above) and this is a business card holder. As you can probably tell, I should buy stock in blue, green, and aqua glass commodities. (Yeah, I don’t think glass is really a commodity…)

And does one even buy stock in commodities? Or do they just buy the commodity? OK, I’ll stop being blonde now.

I swear, two-day weekends are not ENOUGH! Can’t believe it’s time for another work-week. Just one more, though, and then a week off for vacation!

Got steaks grilling and I’ve marinated them all day with this recipe that sounds awesome (for 2 steaks):

Ingredients

• 1/2 cup balsamic vinegar
• 1/4 cup soy sauce
• 3 tablespoons minced garlic
• 2 tablespoons honey
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 2 teaspoons ground black pepper
• 1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
• 1 teaspoon onion powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon liquid smoke flavoring
• 1 pinch cayenne pepper
• 2 (1/2 pound) rib-eye steaks

Directions

1. In a medium bowl, mix the vinegar, soy sauce, garlic, honey, olive oil, ground black pepper, Worcestershire sauce, onion powder, salt, liquid smoke, and cayenne pepper.
2. Place steaks in a shallow glass dish with the marinade, and turn to coat. For optimum flavor, rub the liquid into the meat. Cover, and marinate in the refrigerator for 1 to 2 days.
3. Preheat grill for medium-high to high heat.
4. Lightly oil the grill grate. Grill steaks 7 minutes per side, or to desired doneness. Discard leftover marinade.

The reviews at this great recipe site are stellar, and it does sound like you don’t really have to marinate them for a day or two — I’ve given it about 6 hours. I’ll let you know how it goes.

Hello, Saturday!

Aaaaaaaand… it’s almost July already!  Which means that summer might actually finally arrive (probably July 5th). Actually, today is fairly decent with some sun shining through the clouds, so I’ll take it with a smile.

A busy couple of weeks have passed, including my dad’s 76th birthday and Father’s Day, which we spent at Camano Island. It was one heckuva gray and dreary day, but at least it didn’t pour on us and we were able to grill steaks on the deck. Dad is doing soooooo much better, and it was great to be able to see him as his old self. (He still has his beard!) He wishes his energy level was better, but I’m thankful for his much-improved mental acuity. Camano was almost infested with bald eagles on Father’s Day. They were everywhere and we joked how they may eventually become a nuisance like Canadian geese. We kept a close eye on our weenie dogs after hearing about an eagle snagging a baby deer and and dropping it in power lines, causing outages. Here’s one:

Heh heh. But this shows you just how pretty darned decent my camera’s zoom is:

Yup, same eagle!

As time and energy have allowed, I’ve also been playing a bit with glass. I’ve been working at trying to make a decent soap dish, and either the molds have been defective or the outcomes have been the opposite of stellar. For now I’m using a square “sushi plate” mold and adding ribs in the center to hold the soap.

So guess what? We have something to look forward to — we’re taking the week off of the 4th of July! For me that means without pay, which is pretty weird. But, I’ve been saving up so it should be OK. (I hope!) We’ll spend a fair amount of that time at Harstine — we’ll wing it depending on the weather. We hope to get up to Camano, too, because crab season opens July 1st! I’ve been craving some fresh Dungeness!

It was two years ago today that Nate left for Navy Boot Camp. Kind of blows my mind.

A Couple of Things

OK, so I received this from Amazon yesterday:

I love children’s books, and this is one awesome children’s book! Uhm, actually? No it’s not! I mean, it’s awesome, but it’s not really a children’s book! You really must check out Samuel L. Jackson’s narration to see what I’m talking about. (Update: Oh no! YouTube removed SLJ’s narration due to some copyright issue!) And if you are most parents, I’ll bet you’ll run right out and buy it. Or order it from Amazon.

And this is great – the truth about the economy in about 2 minutes. Bottom line? A strong economy requires a strong middle class. (Like, duh.)

For now, that is all, because I am TIRED.

Gripe, Gripe, Gripe

Pretty much a head-->desk kind of week, as I am reminded (once again) what misogynistic, unenlightened good-ol’-boys that male engineers tend to be. I should know this by now, having worked with them for 31 years. (31 years?? Why, yes, it has been!) And yes, I know that’s a hasty generalization; not every male engineer is this way. But, boy oh boy. Most of them are!

 Cases in point:

1. After I edited a (horrifically written) document and corrected (gobsmacking) grammatical errors, the engineer had a hissy fit and changed everything back to passive voice and back into an error-ridden horrifically written document.
2. The proposal I completed a couple of weeks ago was “shortlisted,” meaning that it was selected among the top three by the client and now we need to prepare an interview to present to the selection committee. In every job I’ve had, I was involved in coaching the interviewers, as well as overseeing the development of the presentation. In all these cases, the “coach” was generally respected and appreciated for providing guidance. There is standard protocol with these interviews: bring a small group of key people who all participate in the presentation; follow the criteria exactly as the client has provided (order of key points, keep within the time frame, address their points of concern); don’t bring along the “boss” unless he’ll be working directly on the project; don’t assume you’re a shoe-in; and so on. There are also protocols in coaching, such as encouraging friendly interaction among the presenters (to show their teamwork ability), pointing out nervous gestures, encouraging enthusiasm, not filling slide after slide with bullet points, etc. So…this engineer absolutely refuses to listen to any advice, wants to bring in 5 or 6 people (“they don’t all need to participate”), wants to bring the “boss” who is NOT involved in the project (“We need to show our horsepower”), is assuming that we’ll get the job so “this will be a cake walk,” and was downright rude and condescending to any suggestions (“You couldn’t possibly understand.”) UNTIL – one of his MALE PEERS brought up many of these same suggestions and all of a sudden, those suggestions were GOLDEN. (Imagine that.)
3. And. How many times have I gone into the coffee kitchen to refill my coffee cup to find that ALL of the coffee pumps are empty? OR, how many times have I witnessed a male engineer pump out the final dregs of a coffee pump and exit stage right? I guess it’s beneath them to make coffee.

I’m sooooo tired of this. I’ve been dealing with it since I entered the work force back in the 1970s, and it astounds me how little things have changed over the years. Other than hearing the old farts (who, incidentally, are around MY age now) piss and moan about having to be “politically correct.” God. Just how bad would it be otherwise?

~~~~~

Working in the city is no picnic. Ugh. This has been a particularly horrific traffic week with big daytime events in Seattle resulting in clogged city streets and freeways. And all it takes is one blocking accident somewhere to have miles and miles of ramifications, like it did yesterday (when it took me an hour and 20 minutes to drive my 16 miles home).  It’s only going to get worse because there is dire road construction in the wings that will affect me in so many rotten ways that it makes me want to run away and hide for however long (years!) it takes to finish the projects. 

And the noise! Ugh, cities! A huge apartment complex is under construction next to my office and it’s  an incessant high-decibel chirp of back-up beepers on cranes and trucks, hammering guns, and screaming saws. And have I mentioned the sirens? Cops, medics, fire — every day, sometimes every hour.

Calgon, take me away! (No Harstine this weekend, though. John has to work and I will be CLEANING THE PIGSTY HOUSE!)

Woohoo.

Lots Done!

Sunday’s waning already! (Personally, I think unions need to rise in power again and insist on a four-day work week so we can always have three-day weekends!) (Yeah, republicans would go for that…not!)

Today is my kiddo’s 25th birthday, so a shout-out to Navy-Nate! Blows my mind that he’s 25. So, 25 years ago today (actually starting the evening of the 4th) I was in for 23 hours of hellacious misery. It was all worth it, though! Here he is on his ship. It’s pretty blurry, but still quite cool:

It’s been a nice outside tidy-up day here at Harstine. Not nearly as stellar as yesterday was, as high clouds moved in and blocked the sun, thanks to some storm system in California. (I blame California!) At any rate, it’s still plenty pleasant, just not as colorful. And it’s cooler. Which lent itself to physical labor being a bit more palatable (even though it’s been on the muggy side).

The plants are in! Yeah, it looks kind of silly right now, but we do know that they GROW. Fast. (And hide the soaker hoses). We’ll likely add a couple more things.

 

The path was absolutely COVERED in fir cones (and sticks/branches from winter storms), so I raked them into the gully. There are still plenty more down the rest of the path, but it looks better heading down to the first landing:

We had a beautiful clematis that thrived up our anti-white-trash screen for the past few years, but it didn’t survive the winter. John had to cut all the “sticks” left of the dead branches that had wound their way through the lattice and beyond.

I was so sad! He cut it all the way back to where he could detect “green” in the seemingly dead vines, so we’re hoping it might come back in the next year or so. But at least the grape ivy is starting to take off:

And then, this happened:

(No, Peanut wasn’t the guilty party!) And thankfully (!) the glass didn’t break! I was shocked! I think I’ll take home the glass and clean it up then we can stick it back in the garden stake once we get some more of that silicon goopy stuff. I really like this butterfly and it was a bitch to make!

And finally, I know that I’ve shown a similar picture before, but I continue to be amazed at how excellent the zoom is on my little Canon camera:

I’m not a big fan of yellow, but I sure do love our Washington State bird!

IT’S FINALLY SUMMER!!!

Holy cow, it took a long time to get here. Until today, we hadn’t seen a day above 70 deg. since last September. Good thing I take Vitamin D supplements.

It was a cold, wet, long, 4-day work week, but it did include my birthday! I wasn’t expecting much, really, because it was a Wednesday, a work day, and did I mention cold and rainy? But it ended up being a very nice day (except for my commute home from work — took 40 minutes to travel 3 miles on Seattle’s Elliott Avenue before even getting to the Alaskan Way Viaduct! Grrr!) I was taken out to lunch, coworkers all signed a birthday card for me, and John took me to Anthony’s Homeport for a scrumptious dinner! Yes, I had Copper River salmon! And their to-die-for Dungeness crab cocktail! Just before my salmon arrived, the hostess who had seated us came to our table and said in a grave tone, “Mrs. Watkins, you have a phone call up front.” I was speechless. People call me on my cell phone if they want to reach me! Who? What? WTF? How would anyone even know I was there at Anthony’s? Then I remembered that I’d posted on Facebook before we’d left that John was taking me there.

It was Nate! Of course it would be him! He worked at Anthony’s for years, and it was fitting that he’d call and make arrangements with the hostess/waitress/whomever to put the fear of God in me with a stern announcement of a phone call. It turns out that Nate did try to call me on my cell phone, but it was buried in my purse, probably with the sound turned down, and I didn’t hear it. It was great to hear from him! (Also? Landlines sure do have much better sound quality than cell phones…) Afterward, his old boss emerged from a little side office and introduced herself (and wished me a happy birthday). And it turns out that our waitress knew Nate, too! Got a complimentary dessert!

I love my kiddo! And tomorrow he turns 25! (How is that even possible?)

Yesterday (Friday) I took off work a couple of hours early and John and I headed down here to Harstine, with the hopes of beating the godawful Friday night traffic. It was still horrendous! (Rant: I wish the damned republicans would stop trying to legislate women’s reproductive systems because WE REALLY DO NEED FEWER PEOPLE IN THIS WORLD. Rant over).

Anyway. After a week of incessant construction/city noises — heavy vehicle back-up beepers, police/medic sirens, car alarms — it was truly awesome to only hear and see chirping, happy birds imbibing at the bird feeders!

 

My bff, Helen, sent me a whole variety of seed mixes plus that nifty cover for my new feeder. The goldfinches are supremely pleased! (As well as the grosbeaks, juncos, nuthatches, house finches…)

Finally, I’m able to wear capris and sit out on the deck with my computer and enjoy the scenery! It’s pushing 80 degrees!

John’s been a busy Gus. Our landscape area leading up to the camping trailer had really gotten out of hand — overgrown, plus a number of things didn’t survive the winter. He’s pulled out everything, including all the ground cover (with root systems to China). Some of it I’ll miss, like the lavender, but we’ve learned some lessons: Save ground cover and lavender for BIG expanses. We’d picked up a few things to replace it all, like more sage for the hummingbirds, and a bleeding heart. But first he’s laying down new soaker hoses to tie to the timer. (Secret to healthy plants when you aren’t around every day to water: soaker hoses on a timer!)

Before, although this doesn’t look as bad as it eventually became because some plants had died and the graveled pathway was almost covered:

Another before shot, even after we’d trimmed it up some:

Right now:

Yeah…it looks a little forlorn, but at least we’ll be able to see the nice rocks again. Looking forward to the new stuff!

Also, that picture of Mojo up there (he was young!) makes me miss him! He missed the bus this trip!