But when it includes three bottles of wine, a bottle of whiskey, a four-pack of Absolute minis as a thank you for a bed, two loaves of bread, one stick of butter, two packs of coleslaw, six Idaho russets, four pork tenderloins and a bottle marinade – no wonder it weighs a ton.

Got to the Amtrak station after a stop a Uwajimaya for day old sushi and got three tickets issued. Today’s business class seat to Portland, tomorrow coach seat to Seattle, and the roomette from Santa Fe to Seattle after Christmas. I wish this was my car for the trip down south.

The car (BNSF1) was part of a six car train belonging to Burlington Northern Santa Fe – no wonder Warren Buffet bought the whole company if this is how he gets to travel. If you want to see a roster of all the business cars for BNSF, it’s here: http://www.qstation.org/BNSF_Biz_Cars/index.html

I love taking the train to Portland, it’s so relaxing – even if I did have to sic the conductor on a coach passenger that had been drinking (or was off her meds) plopped herself down over three seats at the front of my car. And this trip I just hoped on MAX which is a couple of blocks from the station and it’s a direct shot to Julian’s house (and another two block walk). Damned convenient.

Dinner tonight was a party of six. Me, Jameson, two friends of his from high school, one boyfriend and one child. Nice meal, but I was up way too early (7am) this morning, so it was an early night.

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While the bread was in process (45 minutes in the machine, 45 minutes in the proofing [warming] oven) I got the scissor lift positioned on the slab – I only had to use the barrel jack half a dozen times to get boards under the wheels. Considering the three dozen times to get it around the side of the house, this was a welcome relief.

I should have taken the picture without the boards – looks much cleaner.

Swung by Home Depot to look at decking materials and to start thinking about the budget. Looks like (5) 2x6x8 at $4 each, (6) pre-notched deck rails at $19 each (ouch), (4) 2x4x8 side rails at $3 each… for a total of $150 before any of the electrics and bamboo siding. I might swing by Bamboo Hardwoods next week to see if I could do the whole project in bamboo for that tiki-like look. Shit, and I need to build the stairs up to the platform… it never ends – oh and that didn’t include the decking. Damn.

Dinner tonight with Swanda and orange-balsamic glazed chicken breasts, a salad, and a loaf of my bread. Oh, and a little wine, too.

Then home to figure out what to pack for tomorrow’s dinner in Portland.

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Going to church doesn’t make you a Christian any more than standing in a garage makes you a car.

Back in the swing of things – travelling west is sooooo much easier on my body. That and being exhausted at midnight which is my usual bedtime. Woke up at 8am ready to face the world, and a stack of mail, clippings to send, bills to pay, restocking the fridge – the usual stuff after two weeks of not being around.

So, what got done while I was on holiday? The concrete pad got poured and the oven thermostat was replaced. Nice to have a key box by the back door so that I don’t have to be here.

I should have had MoonSong put a big R.I.P and some fictitious details on the slab – it does sort of look like a mausoleum slab. And speaking of slabs – below is one of the slabs from the South Park Bridge…

Dinner tonight is with Dancing Bear… a peppercorn pork loin, roasted potatoes, salad, and a blackberry pie (leftovers from the freezer) for dessert.

It was an early night for me, but it was nice to walk around the neighborhood after dinner – lots of people and families out, some even using the new off-leash doggie park.

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1. You have a flight at 2:25pm
2. You have someone to take you to the airport
3. You can clear immigration in less than 5 minutes using the Trusted Traveler Program when the line looks to be about an hour deep

It’s not so nice when:

1. Your business class seat on a 9-hour flight isn’t all that comfortable (roomy, but not comfortable)
2. You clear immigration quickly, but then it’s back out through security to get two terminals over and your domestic flight home
3. You are so exhausted from the 3-hour layover that by the time you are on the 4 hour flight home, you don’t even want to drink.

But I’m back home, Curtis gave me a ride home, all is well. Apparently I’m not doing enough long distance flights – these didn’t used to bother me so much.

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I was more than happy to follow their lead. Yes, I am a tourist, but it’s a gray, drizzly day that is perfect for watching a couple of movies.

First movie up… Thank You For Smoking. Good old fashioned dark humor for a dark day. Later in the afternoon after I’d finished the Grisham novel The Client, it was time for the Johnny Depp version of Alice in Wonderland. Sometimes as dark as the day.

Add packing for the trip home tomorrow and a pasta dinner and you have my day.

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I was packed (badly) and out of the house at 9:30 or so… a walk through the forest to the station, a little wait for the train and back at the main station am I. Found the DB lounge and settled in for the first real internet connection in a week, though it was a little odd… 15-minute cards. i.e. you got a connection for 15 minutes before having to log in another user name and password. Seems a bit silly to me, but free is free. I used one of the two cards to download all the mail (close to 300 messages), read/deleted/replied, and then logged on to then send them all. One chore down.

Had some drinks and light snacks in the lounge but had a more substantial lunch before finding postcards and heading to the platform for the train south.

Lovely train ride – had the entire compartment to myself which meant that for part of the trip I was stretched out across three seats and snoring.

Ezra met me at the train station and off we headed to his place for a lovely evening of sampling parts of his extensive scotch collection.

Here is the slideshow from this trip:

And how nice to  sleep in a full size bed in a room to myself.

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After whiling away the day reading some John Grisham piece of trash and doing loads of dishes, at 4pm the gates opened for the “day trippers” to come and have a meal with the faeries. Not only was this invitation open to Berlin faeries, but friends of faeries (including a middle-aged heterosexual couple).

As I sit and do this blog entry, once again faerie talent is practicing… an Asian/Latin gentleman who is a biochemist in Stuttgart is playing the ukulele. It makes me want to pick up the electric ukulele that I bought in Honolulu last year and actually learn how to play it. Maybe I should come back over for lessons – and pick up a Porsche while I’m at it (they are built in Stuttgart).

Dinner tonight for the first time at this gathering – unless you count the fish – was MEAT. Bratwursts, pork, chicken – in addition to the seiten, grilled vegetables, grilled tofu, and all that – it was a BBQ in the back yard – with a floor show of boys oiled up and wrestling on an Alaska 10-year Roof (a.k.a. Big Blue Tarp).

Last night was the talent show – and yes, I was up until 3am according to reports, and tonight is the auction to cover some of the fees that the poorer faeries couldn’t raise to attend this week. With my desire for only carry-on – I’m guessing I won’t be buying the 3 foot tall copper gilded penis – that would make a very ODD second carry-on item.

Short entry today – I’m running late, and the auction is about to start and I need some pictures of that penis.

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Today’s activities have included a seitan making workshop – that’s a gluten-based meat substitute which is often used for things like mock duck. Next up was the making of “flapjack” – which is butter, brown sugar and oats, baked up into a “sweet”, what the Brits call a dessert – and then some sort of Caribbean meal… I’m just the dish witch. I just clean up the mess afterwards.

I missed the business circle – missed the heart circle – spent my time hanging out in the smoking tent listening to the rain on the plastic, reading a silly John Grisham novel, waiting for a whiskey delivery, wondering the meaning of life, and not really worrying about what that meaning is.

At the moment (late afternoon blog time in my schedule) Miss Michael is doing his warm-up exercises – he is a professional dancer (modern/interpretive) from New Orleans who is leaving tomorrow to rejoin his company for a performance in Estonia. The dining room where I’m plugged in has this wonderful feeling of a group house from my youth where folks are just doing the things they need to do, like practicing, writing, cooking, or just hanging out smoking cigarettes and drinking beer.

It’s a strange and wonderfully calm atmosphere. Maybe it’s the music Miss Michael is dancing to, maybe it’s that it’s not a performance, just the exercise that he needs to get ready for tomorrow. Maybe it’s just people wondering in from bicycle rides in the rain. Maybe it’s just much ado about nothing.

Watching Miss Michael dance, I wish my mother and Helene were here. They are both dance fanatics and would enjoy the behind the scenes rehearsal, somehow made acceptable by the fact that we are both working at our trade at the moment. To hear him panting between numbers gives me a new appreciation for the physicality of what dancers go through. It is rare that I pant at the keyboard.

Tonight is the talent show… and there are several faeries making noise about me doing something for the show… but what. Not really my strong suit. I haven’t looked to see if Miss M is on the schedule. I do know that one of my roommates (I’m in a four bed bedroom) has been working on his makeup for two hours (at least). I’m sure that it will yield some amusing photos – but those will have to wait until the weekend.

So, it’s just a drizzly but not gloomy day around the house. I’ve only taken two calls so far since arriving… one from H²0 Blanco, about the thermostat replacement for the Wolf ranges, and to return a call from Curtis who butt-dialed. An interesting calm when you “internet time” is the 30 seconds it takes to upload the blog.

I am realizing that I’ve missed the EuroFaeries… ten years was too long a break, but until you take that break, you never know. Maybe there is hope for my reconnection with the US faeries as well.

Or maybe it’s time to sell the house and hit the road.

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OK – that was one long run-on paragraph – I’m surprised that MS-Word didn’t flag more “grammar” issues.

Yesterday I was mostly a slug – I don’t know if it was me just feeling anti-social, but I skipped the Viennese Waltz workshop/dance after dinner, and just went straight to bed. It could have also been the excessive liquor consumption the night before. With the early to bed, I was up at 6:30 (the dance party ran until 4am) and making coffee, busing dishes scattered about the grounds, making a couple of fried eggs with the last two pieces of toast. By 7:30 the place was cleaned up, I was fed, and the “early” risers were starting to rouse themselves and make breakfast for the rest of the crew.

While most of the boys went off on their guided sightseeing tour (with our own faerie guide, CoCo’s boyfriend), I stayed at camp, did my laundry, did more dishes, helped with dinner prep, finished an Evanovich novel, set up the dining room for dinner, and basically just hung out in the woods.

Dinner tonight is a massive pasta salad with a quark and sour cherry dessert.

Good thing I ate all those Frankfurters in Frankfurt.

Oh, and the no email means I can’t approve any blog posts. That will wait for Saturday as well.

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Was up at 9am for breakfast, then back to bed until 3. Wow. I must be on holiday. Didn’t even get into the shower until almost 6pm. And after the excessive scotch night last night, thinking that tonight is going to be a wine night.

No motivation to check out the café down the trail to see if they have wi-fi. Maybe tomorrow. I did get a text in the middle of the night from Fluffernutter asking if I was back. I assume that was in response to my request for a ride home from the airport NEXT Monday. So for those of you keeping up with Uncle Markie’s European Holiday, don’t figure on me checking email regularly until Saturday – though I will respond to text messages, though mind the gap (the time gap that is). Here is a good example – it is 6:24pm in Germany at the moment – or 9:24am in Seattle. 9 hours is the time difference.

We are eating well here… by faerie standards. Last night’s meal was spinach lasagna made by Royal, whose faerie name should be Royal PITA. Any guesses? The “P” is for Pain. I’m sure you can figure out the rest. That said, it was an amazing lasagna – with a layer of béchamel sauce in addition to the tomato, mozzarella, pasta layers – that and a fresh green salad. Yum.

Tonight’s dinner (which started out as a late lunch soup and then grew and grew) is a ginger carrot soup, mini baguettes, and a green salad. Add a Nuviana Tempronillo/Cabernet Sauvignon and you have yet another damn fine meal.

One of the faeries has a high-pressure day job that he hasn’t been able to escape from but comes each evening for dinner and whatever happens after dinner. While this strains the sense of community in some ways – it also means that I can get the International Herald Tribune delivered the same day as it’s published – albeit late in the day. Yes, gave up email, but am still getting the paper – roughing it in the woods.

Speaking of the Trib – the American not living in Paris, but an hour south, had several days worth of issues when he arrived – unfortunately it was from about the same period that my New York Times was from… and since there are sister papers, a lot of the content I’d already read. It reminded me of the trip to Tuscany several years ago with Jill, Darcie, Jeanne and another half dozen people – where the café across from the villa had the IHT available (that day’s edition) by 10am – so I got in the habit of waking late and going for my cappuccino, pasti (Italian breakfast pastry kinda thing), and the paper. Truly civilized.

That’s it for the day. Back to the fun.

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