Almost lunchtime, we’re headed out for chinese to celebrate Kevin’s bday. I barely ate breakfast, cause lunch will be good (and free!) and cause i’m still full from last nite! Luigi impressed us all with a great meal, and we were so incredibly full afterward. ;) An appetizer i can’t pronounce that involved fresh mozzarella, garlic, olive oil and white wine… cioppino (a traditional italian soup) made with mahi mahi, salmon, albacore and shrimp… and finishing with a mind-numbing, mouth-melting bananas foster… oooh! So good!

Called my sister’s house to see what her plans were for the evening (maybe she wants to help me pack?) - called the landline cause her cell’s being tweaky and won’t turn on, or so says Mom. Her roommate said she went to canada for the weekend, left yesterday, according to the note they found. That’s odd, cause i saw her yesterday at about 5pm and she didn’t say anything about it. Don’t know what’s going on there…

Office is all a-flutter watching a traffic accident on the freeway right outside our building. There’s a ford explorer with it’s tires in the air blocking two lanes of traffic (what am i always saying about those things being top-heavy?) that has everyone pressed to the windows. I tried to snag you a good picture from the traffic cam. Hopefully this won’t interfere too much with my free lunch. ;) … Oh, and i hope everyone’s all right, too…

Geez, thot i was gonna let it go a week there, didn’t ya? Well, not quite anyway. It’s been pretty busy lately, so busy i’m going to have to reduce it to bullet-points. Also, it’s really hot in the office today (well, like every day, since the AC sucks) and i don’t have the mental focus to type a whole bunch of long sentences.

Steph bought a great new house in Woodinville, Libby and i helped her move in friday. It’s a great place, and her new king size bed and neptune w/d are super sweet, too. Housewarming party coming up soon, if you wanna get an evite, email me. Big congrats to Steph on a great find, a big step, and the end to a huge, arduous adventure! :D

Danielle moved to seattle, she has a room in a great house in Green Lake area that Colleen hooked her up with, with some fun med student girls (well, Kat’s not a med student, but, whatever). Mom and Dad will be out in a couple weeks with the rest of her stuff (including Ferris the Kitten of Terror) and hopefully she’ll have a job this week, on a great referral from Mrs. Benjamin. Welcome to the west-siiiide, Danielle! ;)

Helped Patrick move out of his apt and into his parents’ basement on tuesday, then he leaves for LA on july 5th. Gonna be weird not having him around all summer! That’s kinda gonna suck… but i’m sure he’ll have fun in cali, and september isnt’ that far away…

Gabe returns to seattle on friday, for duty at McChord AFB! His training and tech school are finally over, and he got the station he wanted, so he’ll be back in town and we can live it up! It’s gonna be sweet! Now, nobody tell him my sister is single, mkay? ;)

Received a random phone message from Merris T, haven’t heard from her in forever! I called her back today but got her vm, gonna try again over the weekend when we can maybe both talk a bit. I hope she’s doing great, and it was sure a pleasant surprise that she called!

Max is being a PITA, tranny is slipping off the line, and having trouble dropping into overdrive. Dad thinks i may have bad clutches, Jeff said the same thing. Travis is gonna check it out today for me (regaining his ‘rocks’ status) and hopefully it’s just a fluid thing, and nothing mechanical, as the ATF does smell a little burnt. I did finally change my spark plugs last week, so i feel better about that, altho i did manage to break off one of the bolts on the right rear coil in the process (oops!) as it was really difficult to reach. Suck. Anyway, everyone on the boards keeps saying now’s the time for a 5spd swap, so i’m keeping that in the back of my mind. Ian very generously offered to let me drive his car during the week (incredible guy that he is) and Steph has many times extended the gracious offer of her garage. We’ll see, i’d love a 5spd and it would probably last a lot longer than another slushbox anyway, for about the same price. Hmm… things to think about.

Tonite Josh, Kim, Erika, Steph and i are headed to Luigi’s Grotto down in pioneer square for an authentic italian cooking class hosted by Luigi himself. I’ve been to one once before, it was superb, so we’re all really excited about this. I’ll relay the menu, it’s sure to be impressive!

As if this week wasn’t busy enough, friday Matt and i are driving to missoula, and then saturday it’s up to flathead for Tonya and Jared’s wedding. We’ll be coming back to seattle monday. I haven’t even thought about packing or anything, i’m too stressed with the things that have to get done before i leave! Augh! I think it will be a nice vacation, provided i don’t have to tow the Max home. Hopefully just the nice part will come true, and not that second part…

Gotta go now, gotta go meet Travis. Wish me luck!

Happy Birthday Christian! Since you’re phone’s broken and i can’t call you, this is your web-based birthday wish. And you probably won’t get my email today, because you’re on the beach or out clubbing in Munich or driving somewhere in a german car. I really wanted to send you a pint, but Ben & Jerry’s doesn’t ship there (i checked). Sorry! Guess you’ll just have to find something interesting to do in europe that doesn’t involve ice cream from new hampshire… ;)

Been a great week to be a Mariners fan - Steph and i watched the M’s beat up anaheim last nite 1-0, and Josh and i were there monday night to see the M’s to a 4-2 victory. Despite some obnoxious fans, both nights were a blast. Watched Mike Cameron knock out a few home runs, Olerud’s monday homer was also his 2000th hit, Freddie pitched 8 no-hit innings wednesday, and of course Ichiro’s polished skill is never a disappointment. I really need to figure out the whole bus thing, tho, cause parking down there really is evil, especially at sold-out games. I’m plotting a social day at Safeco field - invite a bunch of friends to a game, buy a block of tickets on a front rail, make some large, neon-colored signs featuring bad puns on the players’ names - so be watching for that evite. ;)

I need a job with air conditioning! Augh! The hvac in the corporate office sucks, so it’s stuffy and pushing 80 in the building today, even worse in the tech department amidst several dozen running computers. I took a lunch break and drove around just to enjoy the Max’s AC, and stopped at Sharper Image for one of those little neck-brace cooler things - i had a gift certificate i’d been meaning to use, and they weren’t as expensive as i remembered, anyway. So far my neck is really cold…

Hilly is sick at work today - sorry, babe! Hope you feel better soon! Something going around, i guess, as both my roommates are on drugs (the legal kind) and i keep hearing coughs and sneezes in the hallway. Strange, as it’s unseasonably warm and sunny - maybe Seattlites are so used to rain, the sun makes them ill???

Lindsay liked the iPod so much sunday she went and got one for herself. Poor soul, she’s using it with windoze - it’s only half a machine without iTunes 4. But it’s still the coolest mp3 player around, and she seems to be enjoying it. ;)

Okay, i’m feeling a little cooler now. And a look like the terminator, so at least there’s that…

Sunday nite, i should be in bed, but it’s still too hot to sleep. It’s even too hot to clean my room, even though it really needs it. ;) Not to hot to sit in the office and surf, tho…

All you slackers that replied ‘yes’ on coming out to the Cloud Room friday are in big trouble! The ‘maybe’ folks, i hate you, but in a friendly way. The ‘no’ folks, well, there were some good excuses in there, so i’m gonna let that slide. But all you ‘yes’ types that morphed into ‘no’s… that’s what ‘maybe’ is for, fools! Thanks to the ‘yes’ folks who stayed true, we had a good time without all you goobers anyway… ;) Turns out the Cloud Room was actually closed for a private party, which was and continues to be really lame of them. Not impressed. We walked up the street to the Capitol Club instead, where the patio’s just as breezy, the drinks are just as expensive, but the view’s not as good. Met some cool people around a shared table, tho, had a good time. Someone we won’t mention (who knows who she is!) took a ride with a nice guy on a streetbike and didn’t come back for quite a while…

Helped Christie celebrate her birthday a few days early by drinking beer in her living room and helping her watch bad tv. Julia and i found a great new teriyaki place on california ave and got some good skating time in. Breakfast on the beach with Adam & Lindsay (well, i had breakfast - they had lunch ;) - crabcakes benedict at the Alki Cafe… very good! ) Called Dad to wish him a Happy Father’s Day and a Happy Birthday! Received a really groovy postcard from Christian’s trip to Italy, a photo of Firenze, making me hate him even more (but in the way mentioned above). Josh and i beat a PS2 game sunday evening. Patrick wrecked his car (suck!). Travis was too busy at work to look at my car, which had an adverse effect on his ‘rocks’ status, dropping him to merely ‘is pretty cool’, although there is still time to redeem those lost points. Didn’t get my car washed, my room cleaned, or the bills paid - my three chores for the weekend - but there’s always tomorrow… ;)