On The Road (Again)

18 October 2018

We've been having a beautiful autumn in the Pacific Northwest, with sunny warm days (if you can call the mid 60s F, or about 15-17 C, warm) and very chilly nights (at about 40 F, or 5 C).  Golden sun, golden leaves, and a snow white Mt Baker keeping eye on the city of Bellingham.

In fact, it has been so warm the rhododendrons have started flowering again!  This is the state flower, you'd think they'd be used to the occasional warm spell in October and not confuse it with the spring!

But those cold nights mean the cold days are coming.  And in this corner of the country, cold days include cold rain.  Grey skies.  Early sunsets.  Actually, not so much sunset as just a slow fading of the daylight.

So we're outta here!

We bought a lightly used car, and we've hit the road.  We're actually on the trip as I type, at our first stop - the Village Inn in Marysville, Washington, a family favorite.  This is the famous pie place we kids loved, and where I introduced Richard to bumbleberry pie.  It's a good stop on the way south.

And like migratory birds, we're heading south for the winter.

Our final destination is Tucson, Arizona.  Not for any particular reason, just that it isn't a huge city.  And because it's warm without being hot all winter.  And, well, why not?

But this is a Richard and Phebe trip, which means we'll meander our way south.  The vague plan is to head south on Interstate 5 (I-5) to Olympia, at the southernmost tip of Puget Sound.  Then we'll head west to the coast, and catch Highway 101.  We can take 101 south along the Washington and Oregon coasts, and then in California the same road eventually becomes the Pacific Highway, or Pacific 101, or something.

We're planning to make this a slow and easy drive.  We have 1800 or so miles (roughly 2900 km) from Bellingham to Tucson, and no time limit.  We figure if we make 200 or so miles a day, we're doing fine.  Something like 3 to 5 hours of driving time.

We even bought a US road atlas!

The restaurant music system is playing Janis Joplin's "Me & Bobbie McGee," the perfect song for a road trip for two people of the '60s!

So that's the plan.  Slow travel exploring the coast, revisiting some places and seeing new places.  We're taking our time, singing our way south.

Hopefully without the windshield wipers slappin' time.

Not All The Leaves Are Brown

7 October 2018

Nor are the skies grey.  But, maybe half the time blue, and half the time grey.

Some leaves here are red, others orange, and other leaves yellow.  Or my punk rock leaf, that somehow turned deep burgundy almost black, with a lovely red circle on the bottom section.  With little beige spots for contrast.  Seriously one of the most interesting leaves I've ever seen!

It's autumn in the Pacific Northwest.  It seems to have arrived early this year.

And while Washington is known as The Evergreen State, there are plenty of deciduous trees with gorgeous varicolored leaves this time of year.  Plus the sun is at an angle that causes the afternoon sunlight to create a golden glow that diffuses the landscape, brightens the changing leaves, and even makes the air almost sparkle and shine.

Yeah, I like October up here.  Or at least the first half of October.  By the third or fourth week of the month, the winter rains usually arrive, along with the grey skies and chilly temperatures.  So yes, we are making plans to move along.  Before it gets really cold and really wet here.

But our neighborhood supermarket seems to be getting into the Halloween and pre-Thanksgiving spirit - check out the pumpkin display featuring the plastic calf model!!!  I mean, when was the last time you saw a cow as part of Halloween?  Too funny!!! 

Even if the weather isn't as warm as we'd like, the colors are gorgeous.  And there are always plenty of hot drinks, cozy sweaters, and fun socks to fend off the chill and drizzle.

Oddly, there are also late season flowers.  Our hotel's sunflowers have decided to bloom, as have some random azaleas.  The sunflowers and asters I can see - but I think the azaleas are just confused.  They do make wonderful and unexpected pops of color, though, so I'm okay with their confusion.

We had another trip to Seattle for a long weekend - we already had the hotel reservation from the weekend when I couldn't travel due to the stupid pneumonia, but the hotel was nice and was willing to just move our reservation to another date.  So we caught up with friends and had some more city time.  And I found another pretty manhole cover.  Seattle isn't known for the manhole covers, but I've found more and more interesting ones, rather than the usual blah industrial kind.

Richard is diligently going to physical therapy.  But I finally decided it was time for a tattoo to cover up my knee replacement surgery scar.  It's not so much that I'm a tattoo sort of person, but I'm an artist, and I didn't like the scar.  It was about 8" long, not a straight line, and while most of it faded to white, there were some very red areas.  So I wanted to turn it into something beautiful.

I thought a stem of flowers would be perfect, since the stem could cover the scar itself.  Couple of flowers (especially to one side, there's an area that's still numb).  Just, pretty.

So I wandered into a tattoo shop, chatted with one of the artists, and asked for a stem of peonies.  Pink peonies.  We talked style, color, size, placement.  Sketched, talked paint colors (he also paints), and came up with a plan.  And scheduled an appointment.

Wednesday was the day.  Now, for people who haven't gotten a tattoo, let me explain briefly: the work done over flesh is less painful.  Needles impaling the skin and flesh, but less painful.  Over bone?  Yeah, that's a whole other ballgame.  The equipment does the same needles drilling, but there's sort of an internal reverberation going on.  On the other hand, I knew I had survived knee replacement surgery already.  And once you've done that, well, you can pretty much do anything.

So I sat for somewhere around 3.5 hours and got my tattoo.  BIG shoutout to Mikel K at Old School Tattoos in Bellingham, WA, for this fabulous design.  The tat is still quite fresh, so the colors are a bit brighter than they will be when the skin is fully healed.  But I LOVE it!  It's exactly what I wanted!  Similar to the Renaissance botanical studies by Basilius Besler, complete with shadows - but with an almost Japanese feel to the stylized flowers.  (Yeah, the artists among you will know just what I'm talking about.)  Bold yet delicate, detailed, somewhat lacy.

My tattoo artist commented that he's had quite a few "badass" women recently, who are getting large tattoos and sit quietly, without a peep, managing to tolerate the pain.  So I'm happy to know I qualify as "badass" these days!

https://www.facebook.com/OldSchoolTattooandPiercing/

Keep posted for updates - we're looking at driving to our next destination, and we all know how much fun road trips can be!!!

Outside, Wild Winds Are Calling, Broken Leaves Are Falling

12 September 2018


Apologies to Midge Ure - the title of this blog is the beginning lyrics to his song "Call of the Wild."  But, autumn has begun in the Pacific Northwest, with some wild windy days and leaves turning all sorts of colors, then blowing off in that wild wind and whirling around like fragmented dervishes.

And, my youngest brother, sister-in-law, and I went down to Seattle at the end of August to a Midge Ure concert.  We're all fans, Midge is wonderful on stage, and, well, why not?

We had a wonderful time - Midge Ure sang with Ultravox back in the 1980s. (British/Scottish group.)  This was at a club sort of setting - my brother had booked a booth for us, we were right dead center, and I somehow was under a spotlight. So I swear Midge and I were making eye contact half the concert!!!  

And in the words of my sister-in-law, he is HOT!!!  Really, a Scottish troubadour with a twinkle in his eye, a personality that engages the audience and shines from the stage, and a voice that caresses the music as his fingers dance on the guitar strings.  So making eye contact with him across a room?  Definitely worth every minute and every glance!!!

My brother actually has met him - brother has been doing sound systems since about age 12, he's just a techie sound sort of guy.  Ivan specializes in live sound, and works for some big fancy sound system company on product development, testing, and sound system installation and sales.  (You can tell that I have only a vague understanding of the technical side of live music performances.)  Anyway, so it's always interesting to go to a concert with him, because he'll notice things that most of us don't.  For example, I told him I thought the instruments were miked too high and drowning out the vocals, he agreed and pointed out that one backup vocalist's mic was turned off!!!  I mean, does everyone notice that some mics never got turned on???  I wouldn't be likely to notice such a thing.  At one point, Ivan also tracked some of the sound on his phone, doing some graph of the mix or something. 

So, it was a good show for the first half, only because Midge finally stopped asking the sound guy to fix something, and just sang over the instruments.  The man has a set of lungs on him!!! 

The three of us went to another Midge Ure concert back in 2014 - and of course, I blogged about it. (Richard isn't fond of his music, so he doesn't come along.)  Here's the link for anyone who is interested: 
http://rollingluggagers.blogspot.com/2014/09/a-modern-troubadour-with-guitar.html 

Then, the second half was Paul Young, who, well, might have been a little drunk, or just took a while to get into being on stage.  He just didn't have much stage presence.  And he's a bit more pop than old school rock, so not so much to my personal taste.  He livened up after a bit.  

He also had his own unique on-stage bit, where he'd pick up the entire mic stand and twirl it like a baton!  Seriously, twirling out to the side, over his head, whatever!  Teachers and parents in the audience all thinking "OMG, someone is going to get hurt!"  Yeah, we're no longer in our 20s or 30s, so our thoughts aren't how cool this is - just the potential for injury!

But for us, Midge really was the highlight of the concert.  (And the photos of him are all from the internet - I don't take photos during concerts, it's distracting.)

I found a couple of reviews of Midge Ure - from 2017:  http://backbeatseattle.com/2017/02/13/show-review-photos-midge-ure-the-triple-door/

And from 2018:  https://www.columbusunderground.com/concert-preview-interview-midge-ure-gw1

The other highlight was this past weekend, when we drove out to Yakima, in the center of the state.  Yakima is surrounded by a ridge of hills, almost like an ancient volcanic caldera, providing the valley with protection from storms and rain, creating almost a micro-environment.  The area is dry hills and sage brush, but the valley itself is fairly fertile, and grows something like 70% of the hops used for brewing beer worldwide.  Really, Yakima hops were used for the beer served at Prince Harry and Megan Markle's wedding this year!

My middle brother, Howard, is our person.  He gets our mail, scans and emails anything important, deposits any checks, all that "business" stuff that happens in life.  So we keep a storage unit in Yakima.  This year, I was determined to downsize a bit.  Richard and I spent a couple of hours at the storage place, and I managed to empty out four boxes worth of stuff.  Enough to fill a huge garbage bag with clothes, shoes, and a few other items that I no longer want to save.  Fortunately, there were those big clothing donation boxes near the storage place, so it was easy to donate the items for people who need them.  

(Side note - I often include a bar of soap or two in boxes of clothing - it helps keep things smelling fresh.  But I seem to have developed an allergy to lavender soap, my favorite.  So those went into the donation bag.  If you make donations of clothing, consider adding bars of soap and other toiletries - they are very helpful for the recipients.)  

Anyway, readers and probably puzzled by the photos, and how this relates to our trip to Yakima.

My sister-in-law, Howard's wife, had planned a surprise party for his 60th birthday.  Not exactly on the actual date, but close enough.  Just a date when friends and family could be there.

And since her husband, my brother, was turning 60, well, it made perfect sense to have a 1960s theme for the party!!!

It was great!  Tie-dye fabric for table cloths!  Wine bottles filled with water and food dye, with a couple of strands of beads wrapped around, and of course fresh flowers in the bottles!  Yummy food, some reminiscent of the 60s (Lipton onion soup mix chip dip, anyone?).  And of course the music of the times, from the Beatles and the Stones to Jefferson Airplane and Jimi Hendrix (who is from Seattle, WA!).  

Some of us just went into our closets or luggage and pulled out embroidered tops or tie dye tee shirts and jeans.  Maybe found some pale pink lipstick, and some fake flowers for a garland.

But others went all out, complete with wigs and clothes from the time.

Yeah, Ivan and Lisa won the prize for the best costumes!!!  They actually walked into the room, and I didn't recognize them for a moment!  I mean, this is my youngest brother, I was 8 yrs old when he was born!  I've known him all his life!  And I officiated at Ivan and Lisa's wedding last summer!  So you'd think I could recognize both of them, despite the wigs and granny glasses.  Nope, it took a moment or two!  It really was funny!

It was a wonderful weekend, with a lot of just hanging out with the family, including my now-adult nephew who lives in Yakima, and my niece and her husband (the ones who were married in Hawaii two years ago).  Lots of talking and laughing, fueled by all kinds of drinks and way too much food.  And the best mint brownies ever.

Then a long drive back through the mountain passes, where it was windy and rainy and dramatic.  Couldn't even see the tops of the mountains as we drove by, nor from the rest area once we were through the passes.  But hey, at least it wasn't snowy.

We're back in Bellingham, finishing up doctor visits and trying to decide where to next.  This week is rainy and chilly, reminding us that we need to move on.  By mid-October, this corner of the country will be in full autumn mode.  That means daily temps in the 50-60 F (10-15 C), and wet.  Rainy.  Foggy.  Drizzly.  And grey.  As much as I love this area in summer, once that cold wet grey weather moves in, I need to be gone.  We both do.

We're mulling over possible places, and will come to a decision soon.  We'll pack our bags, give Ivan the boxes with our cold weather clothes, and we'll be gone.

And that's about it for now.  It's been fun, but it's getting time for moving on.

Shrinking Our Lives Into A Suitcase

24 August 2018

Well, shrinking our lives into two rolling duffels.

As our time in the US tends to be, things have been rather uneventful.  As ever.  The usual doctor visits, plus some extras this year.  Richard has seen a round of doctors for his back, confirmed that it seems to be purely muscles, and is going to physical therapy here.  And me?  For dramatic effect, I came down with pneumonia.  In August.  (We blame the air quality here - there have been ongoing forest fires in British Columbia as well as the Cascade Mountains to our east.  Even smoke particulates blowing up from California.  Yeah, not clear out there, especially for those of us with sensitive lungs.)

Anyway, so nothing new or exciting going on.  Enjoying television and newspapers where we understand the language.  Also enjoying our favorite eateries around town.  And, well, both of us working on getting better.

But the point of this blog post is how to downsize.  We spent the summer of 2012 downsizing our three-bedroom apartment, getting ready for our life of travel.  So I thought I'd share how we did that, thinking it might help people who are trying to get rid of their stuff and head off travelling full time.

Because when you think about it, if you aren't paying monthly rent or mortgage fees, plus utilities and all, you can use ALL of that money for travelling!  

If you want our strategies for budget travel, here's a link to that blog post:  http://rollingluggagers.blogspot.com/2015/07/budget-travel-advice.html

So, down- sizing.

We started by contacting family members to coordinate someone to be our person - the person to get our mail, have a joint bank account to pay bills, that kind of stuff.  Took a couple of tries, but my brother was willing to do this, and we try to keep the work minimal.

Then, Richard and I both went through our stuff.  What did we own that we wanted to keep, that we just couldn't live without?  This differed for each of us, but we both had sentimental things we wanted to keep.  We both had photographs, writings, candlesticks from our mothers, whatever.  Personal items that we wanted to save.  These were boxed up and mailed to my brother.  (We found that the US postal service was the easiest and least expensive way to ship things from the US Virgin Islands to Washington state - flat rate priority mail, open an account, print the shipping labels on the computer, and get free tracking.  Perfect!  And you can mail up to 70 lbs in the large box!)

I should add that I created a table on the computer so I could keep track of our boxes.  I know, it's a bit compulsive, but I figured we'd eventually forget what was in each box, so I wanted a record.  Each box was labelled - H for house, B for books, K for kitchen, etc.  Then a number added.  I input a short list of what was in the box.  Then, as they were shipped, I added the date the boxes went to the PO.  I tracked them, and when they arrived, I added a check mark.  (And once all the boxes arrived, I removed the date shipped and check mark columns, making a smaller table.)

Next came the household items we wanted to keep.  We didn't want to keep much, since we had no idea when we'd have a house or apartment again.  A few family items were sent off to family members.  A few household items (my Le Creuset cookware) were packed and shipped.  And, done.

Clothing was a biggie.  I'll admit that I like clothes.  And while I've downsized what I pack and how much I carry as we travel, I probably have some 40 boxes of clothing in storage.  (My plan when we get to Yakima is to downsize once again, and give away a batch of clothing.)  My initial way of packing was to ensure each box held a capsule wardrobe - dark slacks, a skirt, a basic dress, some tops, a coordinating sweater, and maybe a jacket.  One pair of Birkenstocks.  So I could have box #XYZ shipped to me in Mongolia and I'd have coordinating clothes to wear.  Now, I'm rethinking this, since we come back each summer.  I might just do a few boxes of tops, a box of sweaters, etc.

At any rate, organize your clothes in a way that makes sense to you, record it on the computer table or spreadsheet, box it up, and mail it to your storage place.  (Yeah, if you live near your storage center, just drive it over.  We were 4000 miles away.)

Then, furniture.  We decided not to save any furniture.  And we had a lot of household items still.  Plus some clothing.  So, we had a house sale.  We had mailed 90% of what we wanted to keep, and our clothes were in the closet.  To make our lives easy, we moved clothes to sell into one closet.  We priced NOTHING.  I know, it would make sense to price things, but it was busy, it was my birthday, we skipped putting prices on things.  We had put an ad for the house sale in the newspapers, and that morning we woke up to the early birds.  Asked them to wait, and promptly at 8 AM opened the door.

We were in luck - people milled around, asked prices, and we sold stuff.  Sold some antique furniture I had, sold our dishes and small appliances, kitchen linens, silverware, cooking utensils.  I even sold hangers out of the closet!  And any woman who looked about my size, I told her about the clothes for sale in the closet in the back.

By the end of the day, we still had some large furniture - so we listed those items on craigslist, and managed to sell them.  The small household items went to our synagogue for their annual arts and antiques sale.  The antique furniture and other good stuff also went there, and my brother received the check in the mail later in the year.

Unsold clothing went to the women's shelter and the homeless shelter.  Items like pillows, towels, sheets, and blankets went to the animal shelter (to be used as animal beds).  Be creative with give-aways - you'd be surprised at how things can be re-used by someone or someplace that really needs them.

Our last day in our apartment, the lady who bought our bed came by to pick it up.  I gave her the sheets on the bed, as a starter set.  

Then we stayed in a hotel (owned by friends) for a week while we finalized the sale of both our cars.  (It takes a little while to do this.)  Made sure the utilities were turned off and our accounts closed.  Hired a cleaning lady to clean the apartment, to be sure we got our full deposit back.

And then, we were gone.  (Some of you might have noticed Cleo, our cat, in the photos.  Sadly, she passed away during the summer.  We knew she was quite ill, at 18 years of age - so it was expected.  But that way, we didn't need to leave her behind.)

Now, if you live near family and friends, you can head off to parts unknown.  We did a farewell tour across the US, visiting family and friends, and then made sure all of those boxes were packed into a storage unit near my brother.

But we also cashed in our frequent flyer miles and booked tickets.  The hardest part was figuring out a starting point, not knowing how long we'd be travelling.  We finally agreed we should start in New Zealand, and slowly make our way west and north, eventually (in however many years) coming back to the USA.  Didn't quite work that way, but we did head off to NZ.

At any rate, we headed out without keys, with only one rolling bag and a day pack each, ready for the world of adventures.

So, it really wasn't as difficult or time-consuming as we thought it might be.  Once the first box was packed, or the first item sold, it just got easier.  Our lives became lighter and free-er.  

We became unencumbered.

We became voluntary nomads.

And life is good, on the road.

It's a Slow, Slow Summer

4 August 2018

We're back in Bellingham, WA, our home base.  We usually come back for our medical check ups, renewing our prescriptions, getting fresh clothing, and visiting friends and family.  Drive out to the middle of the state to visit my brother who gets our mail - so we pick up the collected mail, sort, save anything important.  And then we head out on new adventures. 

But this year seems to be a bit slower than usual.  Most of our medical people seem to be on summer vacation.  The town has grown and it's getting harder and harder to get the medical appointments.  And we're trying to take care of Richard's back issue, but the spinal specialist in town is changing from one practice to another, so we're waiting for him to get to the new place and begin seeing patients again.  While of course seeing our usual doctors, and trying to find someone who can at least prescribe physical therapy or something.

Yeah, it has been slow.

But Bellingham is a beautiful place to be in during the summer.  The long rainy fall-winter-spring turns into glorious warm dry summer days filled with incredible flowers from all of that rain the rest of the year.  The sky is usually blue blue blue, and the trees are filled leafy green backdrops for all of the flowers and berries.

So we're enjoying our very relaxing time here in town.

Bellingham is decidedly quirky.  Or at least full of quirky people.  My favorite supermarket decorates with life-sized plastic cows and calves.  I'm not sure why.  They've had the plastic cattle for a few years now, and move them around to different displays.  Just their thing, I guess.  I particularly like the calf out in the flower area.

The entire entrance to this supermarket is like an Impressionist garden.  The outer area is something like Monet's garden, a profusion of flowers that blur into spots of color amongst the greenery, but minus the waterlilies.  Closer to the door is a collection of van Gogh's sunflowers, welcoming shoppers and looking much more cheerful that van Gogh's vaguely depressed sunflowers.

Instead of the waterlily pond, we have a series of watering cans creating a garden center fountain.  Not a water-shooting-upwards fountain, just watering cans on a stepped wall, so one spout pours water into the lower can, which feeds into the next one, and so on.

Today, I was watching a crow who decided this was the perfect drinking fountain for him.  Nice dry handle for his feet as he leaned over and sipped the lovely fresh water.  He was funny to watch!

And yes, the entire garden area of this supermarket has small café tables and chairs, some tables with umbrellas, so shoppers can buy food and sit outside having a meal or snack.  Inside the store is one of the ubiquitous Starbucks - this is Washington state, after all, home of the original Starbucks down in Seattle.  We drink our coffee dark, needing caffeine to keep our eyes open in the dark rainy days of winter.  But a cup of iced caramel macchiatto (with nonfat milk and sugar-free syrup), maybe a bran muffin from the store bakery, and then a table in the sun out in the garden - it's my urban Bellingham answer to a sidewalk café.  I read, or people watch, or crow watch.  It really is quite pleasant.

There also are "dog parking" eye hooks set up around the seating area, so shoppers can tie their dogs securely, and the dogs can wait in a covered area for their people.  (There's also a central sort of fireplace to heat this area during the colder months.)  As I said, this town tends to the quirky.

I think the profusion of flowers is the local reaction to that long dark wet fall-winter-spring period.  Really, things stay very green here (it is the Evergreen State).  But spring through summer is the time for COLOR!  Bulb flowers like crocuses and tulips, flowering trees (all those apples and cherries), rhododendrons and azaleas.  Right now, sunflowers, dahlias, and gladiolas are everywhere.  And clumps of lavender perfuming the air.

My dentist's place has the most gorgeous periwinkle-blue hydrangeas out in front.  He lives and works in a huge old house, built some time in the late 1800s I believe.  The building is actually on the National Register of Historic places, and is beautiful.  How many people visit the dentist in a building that is over 100 years old, filled with incredible woodwork, tiles,  stained or leaded glass windows, and fireplaces?  Carved banisters leading to the residence upstairs, complete with bay windows?  Views of the marina and the bay from the treatment room windows?  Yeah, I don't mind visiting the dentist at all.

So, in this slow (slow) summer, we do exciting things.  Pick up lunch at the supermarket and find a park, sit in the sun and eat and read.  Walk around the forest and take a nature break.  (The Japanese call this nature bathing.)  Or meet up with friends and have lunch by the marina, watching the boats come and go, the Alaska ferry unload or load up for the next voyage.  Our favorite ferry to Victoria no longer leaves from Bellingham, but we may head up there at some point between all this medical stuff.

Mostly, we're relaxing and enjoying being here.  Catching up with friends and family.  Enjoying this town that describes itself as the "little city of subdued excitement."

And shopping for fresh clothing, because when we travel with a limited wardrobe, clothes truly get worn out.  Worn through.  (Yes, I probably enjoy the shopping part much more than Richard does.)

But my favorite part of summer?  August is my birthday month, so it's full of celebrations as I meet up with all those friends and the family members, and we commemorate one more year around the sun.  Much food and chocolate, many hugs, lots of conversation and laughter.  Because with all of our travelling, and our living a very pared down life in terms of belongings, we've come to realize and truly appreciate that the most important things in life are experiences and relationships.  That truly is what life is all about.

So we're enjoying that, above all.  That is a huge part of why we come back to home base each summer, to see Richard's family and my family, to see as many of our friends as we can.  To maintain those relationships.  To experience the friendship and love.

To celebrate life, and each friendship, and each year around the sun.