One eye slowly opens.........

So, there I was on the sofa on Saturday moaning to the DSM that I would feel that I had flu if I were running a temperature, and he was replying that well, that was a good thing and at least it couldn't be swine flu....

Which indeed it may not have been. Only - loads of people who were at SOAR have been reporting in that they have actually tested positive for H1N1. And giving their symptoms. Which match mine, precisely.

Ah.

We shall never know. What I do know is that I have been feeling like death, and am only just really coming round. Temp or no, H1N1 or no, I shall surely be glad when this finally passes. Gilt well off holiday gingerbread, and game less worth the candle than heretofore.

Expletives.

Before I lose all enthusiasm, final round up.



My friend Jeannine modelling her gownless evening strap at the SOAR fashion Show. The girl has talent. For something.



I hadn't thought that this would come out at all. I have tweaked it a little with Photoshop to get it slightly closer to what I remember seeing. Glorious.



I fell in love with aspens, and particularly loved the trunks like these. There has to be inspiration for something in there somewhere.

Then there were other trees....



Now, that is a Christmas tree!





Couple of shots from up at Crater Lake after leaving Bend. Like, wow.

Pleasant drive back to SF, and a final couple of lovely days with friends. The warmth of the weather and of the welcome both will stay with me all winter long.

I spent the long flight back quietly planning in my head all the nice things I was going to do over the next few weeks - I always come back with projects simmering even if most of them don't ever really fly. This time, though, my project is to simply recover. I am slowly improving, and have finally, finally, trawled through the loot. Now to work up some enthusiasm for doing something with it.

I have come back to mixed fortunes, anyway, some good news, some less so. many things to get my head around. First up, once my head clears a bit more, an article to write, and a proposal to get in; and I have a meeting on Monday to talk about something local that might prove to be both enjoyable and interesting.

There, if I can contemplate such, then all is not lost!

One final photograph. We drove up to Grizzly Peak on our last afternoon, and I took this directly in to the sun. Again, I've tweaked it in Photoshop, the graininess is deliberate. To me, views over the Bay are magical, and I love this. It is real - it is what I can see in my head.



And here, at home? It is dark and it is raining and I need another cup of tea.

Intermission

I'm back.

I'm sick.

I'm very fed up.

Whether I did the same as last year, and had first one bug and then another, or if it is one long mutating thing exacerbated by the long flight, I know not, neither do I really care. I just know I am sick.

So sick that I haven't even unpacked and gloated over my loot. So that tells you.

Updates as and when.

Blech..........

Somehow, it's got to Thursday

Which seems slightly faster and odder than usual, because the DSBloodyM passed his cold on to me. So I bailed out of the last day of my workshop, and spent the time either sleeping or whining. Worth it, though, as I feel much better today and have managed a first foray to the market. The other two have gone off in a jolly party to the High Desert Museum, which I would have liked to have seen, but I deemed it wiser to stay here and recover a little bit more, as well as doing their laundry.

We are staying in a mini-palace. Supposedly a condo, a holiday home, it is larger than our regular abode, and very well appointed.

We even have a garlic press.

And a washer and dryer, which is so much cooler than hunting down the resort facilities and feeding them with endless dimes.

I digress. Just to prove I actually did spend some valuable time in Judith's class on Spinning for socks....



I took some more photos, but was already feeli8ng pretty seedy, so nothing all that noteworthy except for



A glorious 1950s Bohus sweater someone brought in to show us. And



Diane, a long time SOAR friend graciously posing so I could photograph her lovely Noro vest.

Oh, and by the by, just look what we woke up to on Tuesday morning!



It didn't last all that long, and was actually colder yesterday. But today has warmed up again and is a rather nice autumn day, gently sunny, slightly crisp and very pleasant all round.

Except in the market, which was crammed with people and a lot of very hot lights, and so rather overwhelming. I have been, so far, fairly restrained. Only one spindle (this may well change....) a very pretty purple striped Graftonfibres medium weight, some books and a dvd, and less usual fibres - yak and silk, pygora, dyes suri alpaca.

However - there are two more days of marketing to go. I somehow doubt that this will be it.

Meanwhile, I continue to chug the Emergen-C and other necessary stuff to appease the cold, and am glad to be back in the ongoing tide of catching up with good friends and talking about fibre, fibre tools and so on without being looked at pityingly by the rest of the world.

I'm quite tempted to get my borrowed Lendrum out and spin, but if I do I will have to finish whatever by Sunday morning, so on balance, knitting is better. My befuddled condition led to a few mistakes in "Birch", but I think I recovered them. Oh, and perhaps not too surprisingly, this place is full of loads of lovely lacy shawls! I have to say, I was glad of my purple one last night, it was chilly!

Knitting on the dock of the bay

As I type this, the wind is howling and the rain lashing down on to the window. Ordinarily, I would be plunged into despair at such weather, at home. But somehow, here, the proximity of the ocean makes it dramatic and interesting. And there is always knitting to be done.



I cooked us pancakes, served with a lovely raspberry sauce made locally for breakfast this morning. That makes the world seem a good place, too!

Yesterday wasn't so bad, and we had a good tootle out, doing a loop drive back from the coast along the Siletz (?) River, and back down to Newport. We went down to the "historic" district, which was actually great, a working port as well as excellent tourist shops. Plus a very good coffee and pastry stop.

And then, as I promised, more sealions. Lots and lots of sealions!



Please excuse any fuzziness, I used the digital zoom for this. Here they are against the backdrop of the Newport bridge.

But when you get down to the harbour, it is all set up for them as a tourist thing - floating platforms and so on. At least, I assume that is what it is.



Strange creatures. And extremely noisy!

So, today, we shall have to wait and see. Any plans for boat trips of whatever sort are right off the table, the weather is pretty grim. If it clears a bit, we will go out and potter a bit more - at the very least, we need a veggie or two for supper (fresh coho salmon.)

Meanwhile, we are not short of occupation.



Birch is making good progress. Really nice pattern - even I can learn it. I'm enjoying it!

Tomorrow, on to Bend. Dunno when I will be back.......

Now, where were we?

Don't ask me where we saw these elk, I can't remember....just that they were posing very prettily by the roadside all waiting to be photographed.

Next stop, Bandon. The DSM had fond memories of a magnificent breakfast had here fourteen years ago. We didn't find the cafe in question, but very much enjoyed the town. We hadn't booked a motel ahead, and serendipitously found an absolute humdinger, really comfortable and right on the shore. So there is some justice in the world.

This was at Coquille Point, and we spent a long time the next morning walking on the beach, which was extensive and lovely. As in....



Known as Elephant Rock. Yup, I can see that.



Face Rock. That, too. (Lots more - they will all go up on Flickr eventually, but not yet. Watch this space, or one very similar.)



And driftwood like no other I have ever seen. Quite wonderful. In fact, a beautiful place all round.

Then on the road north, we stopped at an overlook. I could hear this weird sound, which got louder as I walked in a certain direction. Looked over the cliff and saw....



A beach full of shouting sea lions. Seals I am accustomed to. Sea lions, - not so much! There will be more on these strange animals later.

And now we are safely ensconced in our condo in Depoe Bay. Which is everything that it said on the tin and more, and more. OK, right by the 101, but difficult not to be. But also right on the cliff edge, overlooking a little cove, and with a vista to die for over the bay. We have been pottering gently - any hopes of a whale watching expotition are fading, the weather is on the wild side, but we might take a boat out on a nearby river instead. Meanwhile, we have been exploring the little towns in the neighbourhood - faded seaside resorts out of season, just what we all love, especially as tow of us were brought up in same. Some might consider this an odd sort of holiday, but it suits us down to the ground.

One more day here, and then over to Bend for the madness that is SOAR. It seems strange, not sure why. The poor old DSM has a honking cold, which I am hoping madly will not cross the divide to me, having been through all of that last year. We shall see, and we shall survive. So much to look forward to.

For now, it is my turn to cook supper (having rented a condo with an excellent kitchen, we feel it incumbent upon us to cook in it, and the local restaurants don't particularly appeal, although the Chinese take out on our first night was quite good. I'm doing faux Mexican - black bean enchiladas. We have the wherewithal for margaritas and we have beer.

O, yum.

The story so far..........

Well, look where we are! And it's foggy, too.

Actually, not any longer, we have been travelling up country for a few days already and are now in Oregon. Of which more later.

There have been a few minor alarums and excursions along the way. The flight was ok-ish, but not unmixed - a two hour delay because the incoming flight was delayed by bad weather was not good news, and meant that we arrived in SF very late and very tired. We cancelled our dinner reservation and got a take out pizza (which was delicious) but fortunately were able to remake the aforementioned and enjoy a meal at the vegan restaurant that we had liked so much before.

SF was grey, but pleasantly warm, and we tootled around in a sightseeing bus very happily. Until, trying to return to our hotel, we found ourselves in the middle of an enormous police operation and crowds of kettled demonstrators and a positive throng of media vans and reporters. Turned out that the President was in town for a fundraiser at a very spiffy hotel two blocks down from ours,. We would have loved to have hung around to see the great man and waved our greetings, but didn't know when he was actually expected (despite the DSM practically climbing inside one of the media vans in an attempt to find out....) so we went back to our own hotel and crashed instead.




Next day we set off north, over the Golden Gate bridge again.




We easily managed as we had hoped to get to Point Reyes Station for a lovely lunch stop, and then to Point Arena overnight.

Oops. The website of the motel had most definitely been economical with the truth, but we had no alternative but to bite the bullet. Best we can say is - we survived!

Next day made up for it with a magnificent breakfast in Mendocino and a lengthy stop at the Mendocino Yarn Shop, a true delight. Pennie has yarn!! And needles, and a pattern!! And has cast on a swatch already!!! And that is all I am going to say thus far........

That afternoon we stopped at Founders Grove to pay homage to the redwoods.






We hightailed it for the relative safety of a Motel 6 for that night, which worked out ok, if nothing exciting....in itself. Unfortunately, the adjacent electricity substation (?) decided to blow up or short out twice during the night, with attendant loud noises and glaring green flashes. Such fun for the kiddies!

I realise sitting here that I am feeling very tired and I promise it isn't the gin (much....) I'm going to continue this tomorrow when I don't keep tripping over my own fingers and can actually remember what we have been doing when!

Not my usual view of myself......

I didn't quite realise that my hair was so long at the back, or so short on top! This isn't quite what I had envisaged, but I like it anyway - I think.



Packing half done - ironing not. Tomorrow will be quite a busy day.

Birch started, seems easy enough to do (only four false starts!) And I like the look of it, too.

So, off we jolly well go.........