It's not a Nikon....

.....but it is an SLR! Let me start by saying, has it really been almost six months since my last entry? That's terrible. Long story short, I got laid off from my last job, got a better job, have had a chance to make some new friends (like, real friends, not just people to go watch a movie with...), ended up with a German Shepherd puppy, and recently gotten into photography. I can actually afford to do that now. I did end up moving since my last bike post.....I have the bike still, but the town is much bigger and hilly. Suffice to say, during winter photography is much easier. If you want to see some of my pictures, go to flickr and look for thayne2k. Anyhoo...... the camera is a Minolta Maxxum 5, and it takes pretty good pictures for only having a Quantaray (i.e., Ritz store brand) lens. I'm also about to purchase a Pentacon Six medium format camera, so hopefully I know what I'm doing by the time that gets here. (It's coming from a private seller in Hungary.) OH!!! and I almost forgot about Lost! It's back on again if you hadn't heard. I actually haven't had a chance to watch tonight's episode which I have recorded; I was watching some season one with a friend who is just now starting to watch it. (She has a lotttt of catching up to do.) What else.....hm. My betta is still alive and kicking. Or ....finning? Had I mentioned my betta? In any case it's late and i'm tired, but now I have introduced some newer topics for posting in the very near future.

time to get into it.

It's really hard to get into a regular biking schedule....a lot of that has been the weird cold/rainy spells we've been having every other week. I do have a rear blade fender, but really that doesn't help; the worst of it gets kicked up by my front tire and goes straight up. At any decent speed, I ride into this continuous stream. I'm cheap, so rather than buy a front fender I tell myself I'll just ride on nice days. Sadly these same 'nice' days have 40 mph wind to ride into, are days when I have stops to make in my job hunt, or both. All that aside, I'm now pledging to myself, starting this Saturday, to ride at least an hour a day every other day after 5 pm. This is totally feasible since any job hunting I need to do will be done by then, and since it's becoming summer I won't need to buy a light and reflective gear. I'm also not allowing skips due to wind, but I am retaining a rain exception. Unless I'm swimming, I DESPISE being wet. I do like the rain though......driving in it, sitting inside looking at it, etc. I have the luxury of enjoying it since I live in the rainshadow of the Cascades. Tying local geography back in with my original subject, my goal is to be able to bike the canyon to Yakima by September....depending on progress I might change the goal to there and back, but one way is good for now.

how do people do it?

I swear, I don't know how a month just went by. I'm definitely not a 'blog every day' person. Oh well. I just moved; that was interesting. I'll just sum that up by saying I'm in a much better environment (plus rent is cheaper and my room is bigger). I'm also super close to downtown, which is nice. I can walk to and from the bars! On a related note, all the snow is gone so I've finally been able to ride my bike all over. I'm still getting used to riding in traffic occasionally and still haven't quite found a good seat height, but otherwise the bike has been great. Eventually I'll want a helmet, and better splash guards, etc. Luckily there's no helmet law in town, and since speed limits are pretty much 25 everywhere it's not an issue.
I made some red curry last night; it wasn't quite what I wanted. I needed to get basil, lemongrass, fish sauce and other authentic thai condiments which I didn't have on hand. It was still ok. I got some plain yogurt and tomato paste; I'm trying some sort of tikka masala next. Delicious! For now though, I'm going to eat an english muffin and watch the office online until LOST COMES ON!! AHHH!!!