Jack Attack! or Cats n' Racks

My friends Kara and Jon accepted guardianship of a little black kitten last week, when a friend of a friend of theirs found a litter of kittens in a tree stump. They weren't sure whether it was a boy or girl, so they decided to call it Jack. Jack was a timid and terrified little fella, who didn't really know how to play and be a kitten. Amy and I went down last weekend to meet him (by default he is a 'he' until further notice). I brought him a present from a new pet store that just opened by my apartment. I basically walked in and told them "I've never had a cat or been a cat person, but I want to get a present for my friends' new kitten. What do you recommend?" The store employees directed me to what I like to think of as the Kitty Fishing Pole. It's a thin rod about two feet long, with some heavy duty string that has a 'bird' at the end of it. The Kitty Fishing Pole is also reminiscent of the Ribbon Dancer (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ttWINLCf7Og&NR=1). When you move the rod around, the 'bird' flutters through the air. At first, Jack was timidly curious.

What is that thing? Did it just move? I'm going to check it out...

Then he was entranced, and became brave enough to swipe at it and chase it a little.

After a few hours, he was a different cat. He was pouncing, doing backflips, and finally climbing up his kitty tower like King Kong to try and snatch the bird out of midair.

When he was all worn out, it was cuddle time. His adoptive parents were only mildly horrified by this Cats n' Racks pose. Check out the origins of Cats n' Racks at www.cuteoverload.com  but be prepared to quickly scroll past the Ferrets n' Racks picture that will haunt your dreams forever.

Jack liked to watch the moving screen. He thought he could catch it with his paw. So cute.

In non-kitten related news, I have decided to become a runner. I experienced running euphoria last Saturday (and the aftereffects of lovely endorphins flooding my brain), and also think it's a good way to set fitness goals for myself. My dad is quite excited. I even went running after one of my 8 hour workdays this week, and it was difficult and exhausting and there was no euphoria, but I did it anyway. Maybe in a year I'll be ready for a half-marathon. 

On the work front, I've had some trying times. They've been scheduling me to scrub a LOT lately, which I love doing, but it's certainly challenging. I scrubbed spines for 12 hours on Friday and Monday. On Friday, the cases were all pretty manageable and I didn't feel too overwhelmed. But on Monday, our second case (which lasted around 9 hours) was a doozy. I was pretty terrified, and had to give myself pep talks during my lunch and dinner breaks (Hard things make you stronger...hard things make you stronger...hard things make you stronger). The surgeon is nice and a good teacher, but he's also German and very VERY quick. So, I survived the case without any huge errors (although I did drop a couple of instruments on the floor and didn't mix the bone graft soon enought), but I wasn't really satisfied with my performance. All week, people have been making comments to me about being the new "Spine queen" and how they heard I did a great job...and it's driving me crazy. I don't feel like I did a great job, I feel like I did an adequate job. I don't think that's deserving of praise. 

But scrubbing the huge spine case helped me feel more comfortable scrubbing other things that I was afraid of/intimidated by before. Yesterday I had to scrub an ortho case that would have freaked me out last week. They changed it at the last minute from something really simple to something more complicated and with lots more instruments. And I rocked it. I feel like I did a really good job. If someone were to compliment me about that case, I would accept it. 

I can't wait to get married and change my name. Now that I'm off of orientation, they put my last name up on the board instead of my first. Which means I have people (sometimes the same annoying person every day) asking me how to pronounce my last name. If I tell you once, I don't want to tell you again. It is seriously one of the most irritating things a person can say to me..."how do you pronounce your last name?"

It is fun to live in a city with an MLS team. For reasons not solely influenced by this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fredrik_Ljungberg I am a Sounders FC fan :) Just to throw it out there...on July 25 of this year, the Sounders are playing the Chicago Fire in Seattle. I think that would be a great time for certain members of the Chicago fam to come out for a  visit. Think about it, people...

Christ is Risen

I've been thinking a lot about freedom lately. What it is, and what it means to "live in it." To a large degree, I'm learning that it's a choice. Every single day, I can either pick up the chains that bind me and draw them more tightly around myself, or I can choose to let go of them. A huge part of it is just realizing that the chains exist. 

Today I feel freer than I have in a very long time.

God is good.

Diarrhea on the Rocks, and other Seattle misadventures

I sometimes feel like my life is being taken over by passwords. At work I have 3 separate passwords for things. Then there are my two email accounts, my bank account, my twitter account, and my netflix account. And all the bills that I pay online (three). And it isn't 'secure' to use the same password for everything. So that's 11 passwords that I have to somehow keep track of. Ridiculous.

Today I went to the gym, forgetting that it is the official "Grand Opening" (nevermind that they've been open for a month already) and was faced with mass chaos. Balloons everywhere, a full on band (playing music that was not ideal for working out to, but whatever), and lots of personal trainers lurking around looking for unsuspecting fat people. Unfortunately, one of them swooped up on me while I was using one of the weight machines. Since I couldn't think of a good enough reason not to, I was forced to endure a free personal training session. Oh. My. Gosh. I don't think my legs are going to work at all tomorrow. And then of course I got talked into signing up for a personal trainer for the next six months. It's soooo expensive. I can only afford the once a month option, and had to be very firm with the guy (who wanted me to sign up for the 4 sessions a month option, which costs $200 a month! can anyone really afford that during these tough economic times? I sure can't.).

So last weekend Jon and Johanna came to visit me. It was great to see them, but I felt a little bad that the weather was so crappy while they were here. As they said, gray and rainy is pretty much exactly what they expected of Seattle. I picked them up on Thursday evening at the airport around 9, and took them straight to their hotel (as I'd worked 4 days in a row and was beat). I think they're going to do a blog post, so I'll let them tell you about the hotel. 

All three of us agreed that we really wanted to sleep in, so we didn't get started till late morning on Friday. I took the bus to their hotel, then we walked downtown, stopping at Top Pot Doughnuts on the way. We went to Pike's Market, which was as usual, packed with people. Jon expressed that this was exactly what he imagines hell to be like :) After picking up lots of goodies at Pike's and a quick stop to buy some Aleve at Walgreen's, we hit all the stores that Jon and Jo wanted to go to. 

There is something very tiring about wandering around a city all day shopping, so we decided to take the Monorail back towards the hotel when we were all done. It was positively posh compared to the bus (although it cost the same), and we enjoyed our monorail experience immensely. We dropped off J-squared's portion of the day's loot, and they freshened up for dinner, and then we hopped on a bus to my place.

My friends Amy and De met us at my apartment, and we all relaxed and chatted for a little while. Then we all met my roommate at Ray's Cafe...my go-to waterfront restaurant for visitors to Seattle. We had a lovely dinner (although I'm always surprised at the quality of waitstaff at Ray's...because it just isn't on par with everything else). One pregnant and very thirsty member of our party, after trying unsuccessfully to flag down a waiter to refill her glass, got up and walked over to the drink station where she picked up a water pitcher and brought it to our table. I kind of wanted to pump my fist into the air and give a loud "woohoo!" or an old school "you go, girl!" but I refrained. 

Saturday was cold and rainy (where Friday had just been cold and cloudy), so we planned on indoor activities. First, we went to the Hawaii General Store (the only place Johanna said that she had to visit while here). It was full of terrific Hawaiian things, and had a very friendly proprietor who told us which restaurants around had the most authentic and delicious Hawaiian food. One of them is in a town about 20 miles north, but since it was on the way to the outlet mall we were going to, we decided to check it out. By the time we left the General Store, we were pretty much all ravenous. We enjoyed some spicy rice cracker mix and refreshing Guava beverages in the car, and began our trek...eager for the highly-recommended Hawaiian plate lunch awaiting us in the north. After a wrong turn off the highway, which lead us through a beautiful forest and to a great bluff/view of the water, we finally found the restaurant. As we drove up, I noticed that the Open sign wasn't lit up, and there was a note taped to the door. It read "Sorry, we are closed today for a luau." And that is the story of how we got Humpbacked by Hawaiians.

Saturday night was my friend Amy's birthday party/charity event. She ended up getting this party space donated in the back of a great Thai restaurant downtown. You can read more about it here: iwillnotforgetyou.xanga.com and the charity the proceeds went to here: www.sharingonline.org/orphan-relief

There was delicious Thai food and a DJ, and lots of fun was had and money was made for a good cause. We didn't stay till the end, because apparently I am a grandma now and am exhausted by 10 pm. Although to be fair it had been a busy week and I didn't get my customary night of 12 hours of sleep. The title of this post comes from a cocktail that my roommate ordered that night. I believe it was called Spiced Thai Iced Tea and was a signature drink of the restaurant. We all decided that Diarrhea on the Rocks would be a far better name, as that is exactly what it looked like.

On Sunday I picked up J-squared for the 11:15 service at my church. We stopped by Winchell's donuts on the way to get Amy and De, and Jon and Jo were lucky enough to have an authentic Seattle-crazy-person encounter. There was loud ranting about how "THIS CITY IS ALWAYS KEEPING PEOPLE DOWN!" and I can't remember the rest of it. I'm glad he was there,  but it would have been cooler if they got to meet pops-out-his-eyeball-guy. Maybe next time...

The weather was actually really nice on Sunday, so after church we visited the Fremont troll, then wandered around Ballard for awhile. We spent quite awhile in Archie McPhee, where one can purchase anything from bacon-flavored jelly beans to a creepy rubber owl mask. We headed back downtown for dinner...to the only remaining Hawaiian restaurant available to us. The food was pretty good, but the ambience really made me wish that I was at the beach (as in, the warm kind where you get tan and go swimming without becoming hypothermic). Then I showed Jon and Jo where I work, at the top of a gigantic hill. We called it an early night, so they could pack and I could do some adult chores (filling my car up with gas, buying groceries, etc).

Monday was kind of low-key. After checking out, we went back to Top Pot Doughnuts one more time. On the way, I became highly confused about the rules for driving on a one way street with four lanes that are separated in the middle by Monorail pylons. Anyone who knows the rules should let me know ASAP. I just waited till a light came up, then crossed over to the side I needed to be on, but I'm not sure if that's legal. The day was colder then we were expecting (and none of us were appropriately dressed), so after a quick stop at Patagonia we went and hibernated in my favorite Barnes & Noble. Then grabbed a quick lunch before heading to the airport. It's crazy how much has changed since the day last August that I dropped my mom off at the airport. I remember sobbing as I drove away that day, wondering what I was doing on my own in a strange city that might never feel like home. And now, 7 months later, it does feel like home :)

Notable firsts for Rachel thanks to Jon and Johanna visiting:

- Tried Ahi Tuna for the first time. Pleasantly surprised.

- Clocked numerous hours driving downtown in the thick of things. Also parallel parked downtown many times. Have overcome my silly fears about driving/parking downtown and feel that this may revolutionize my social life. 

- Tried Spam Musubi for the first time. Found it to be a delicious treat. Will hereafter refer to appetizers by their hawaiian name, pupus (pronounced poo-poos...heehee).

For absolutely no good reason, I don't have many pictures of the weekend. Those that I do have are kind of blurry. I'm just going to blame it on my eldest brother's strong anti-camera feelings. I'm pretty sure that Jo got a lot of good pictures, and hopefully she'll post them soon. These are the ones that I have: 

Jo and I, ready to take on the city in our rain hats. 

J-squared and the troll, plus one annoying kid who would not stop climbing on the thing so we could get a picture without him in it. 

Cool fountain at the city center. It's not in the picture, but there was a large crowd just off to the right whose various members were trying to see how close they could get without getting wet. 

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