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I was in the living room reading my book when Saffie started barking and growling. Saffie rarely barks and normally it’s just if someone is in the front garden or the garden next door.

When she didn’t stop after half a minute I went out to see what she was growling at. She was pacing round the tree and looking up into it.

I assumed there’d been a squirrel scavenging on the ground and she’d seen it and chased it and it’d ran up the tree. Imagine my surprise when I looked up and this was staring down at me:

A raccoon! I’ve never seen one in the wild before so that was kinda cool. It looks quite young and terrified of Saffie and Dolce.

I sent them back inside and shut the door then took a quick pic to prove I saw it, and then went inside myself. It probably won’t come down for a while but I know it won’t move an inch until it thinks the dogs are gone.

Technorati Tags: animals, dogs, dolce, saffie, Seattle

I’m sitting in the kitchen having a chai latte and dipping the caramel wafers you get in Starbucks into it. Does it get any better?

My chai is well deserved tho, I just got in from trimming back the bushes out in the drive so Tim can see out when he reverses. Hitting people with your car is frowned upon here, what’s with that?

Tim finally updated his blog today, he’s taking me on a photo excursion on Friday. He’s taking a vacation day from work and we’re gonna go to a couple places he thinks are photogenic.

On Saturday and Sunday we’re heading to a few places further out including Forks and La Push, two of the places mentioned in the Twilight books.

I’m about two hundred pages into Eclipse and it’s been very good so far. I think I’m just gonna go to Barnes & Noble at some point over the weekend to get the fourth book.

Wow Friday is the first of August, are we through July already? Crazy.

Adobe released Lightroom 2 yesterday and I have to say I’m really impressed with it. It’s a huge improvement over the first. I’ll delve into it more in a dedicated post though.

For those who didn’t get the e-mail, or can’t follow links, I started a weekly recap video podcast of my holiday. I did the first episode the other day and it’s a very rough first attempt. Perhaps the more I do the better, and less stuttery, I’ll get.

Technorati Tags: adobe, Books, chai, coffee, eclipse, Lightroom, Seattle, Tim, twilight

The Zune guy, the guy stupid enough to get three tattoos professing his love for Microsoft’s “iPod Killer” Zune, has now decided to get them covered up….and bought an iPod Touch. Priceless.

Poor Microsoft, just as they manage to get a profitable year for the Xbox, the Zune is circling the hole.

Technorati Tags: Apple, iPod, Microsoft, xbox 360, zune

Wow the new Spiderman game actually looks pretty fun. I guess being able to make up their own storyline (and not follow the trainwreck of a film) is helping them make a good game.

I also saw the first gameplay footage for Stargate Worlds, an MMO based in the Stargate universe. It looks like it could be fun, maybe even worth buying. Of course I’ll need to wait till I get a new laptop for it but it could be fun.

I’m almost finished New Moon, the second part of the Twilight Saga. I ordered the third part, Eclipse, last night but it hasn’t been shipped yet so I don’t think it’s gonna come till Wednesday which sucks. The new one is out on Saturday and I wanted to get it on release cos they’ll prolly sell out quick.

It’s a lovely day outside, 73ºF so far. Maybe I’ll go for a walk.

Sabah and Kirstin both e-mailed me yesterday. Sabah was pretty pissed cos I hadn’t replied to any of her texts about her and Gordon breaking up. I e-mailed her a couple weeks ago telling her my phone wasn’t working her but it was to her old e-mail, apparently she uses Gmail now.

I tried phoning Orange to get my phone activated for abroad but the call won’t go through. I know I can make international calls because I phone Halifax about my card before so I don’t know why it isn’t working.

It’s stupid they don’t let you do it online.

Technorati Tags: Books, eclipse, games, kirstin, new moon, sabah, stargate, twilight, xbox 360

On Saturday I woke up pretty early (9.30 is early for a Saturday) and went downstairs and Tim goes “oh good you’re up, I was just coming to wake you. We’re going to the cabin.” I was like “Oh, ok”.

In reality I was pretty excited to go, it was just very sudden since the day before I had blogged about going to the highland games!

So we got all the gear out: tent, chairs, table, dog food, lantern, torch. Piled it all in the car (after showering) and headed off.

Turns out it was Rob’s birthday so the guys had all gone down there the day before. We arrived about 1 and I got my first glimpse of the cabin. Originally I’d thought it was a proper little cabin with doors and toilet and stuff.

Then I got told it was the exact opposite, so I was expecting this tiny little shed. But in the end it was pretty cute and bigger than I expected. Still no running water or toilet tho…

After we’d unpacked and said hi to everyone (I’d only met Rob and Rick before) we headed down to the beach nearby so that Saffie could go swimming. It was a nice walk, the surrounding area is very Scottish looking.

The driveway up to the cabin with Eric’s truck, Tim’s in the middle and then Rick and Steve’s.

The path to the beach with Rob and Tim in the distance, Saffie anxiously waiting for me to catch up.

Down at the river, which is a glacial run off so rather chilly. It’s also very strong current wise. There were a few times when Saffie got pushed down the river some.

Rick taking a group photo. Rob (in black) and Steve are sitting in front of him. Eric is standing looking at me and Ed is crouched.

Saffie and, unbelievably, Dolce swimming in the river.

After we headed back to the cabin and had a few drinks it was dinnertime. Eric started the fire (and just about set himself on fire) and we shucked some corn and wrapped some potatoes in tinfoil. The rest of the guys had steak but I had a hotdog. The corn was really tasty and I tried a baked potato but wasn’t a big fan.

The rest of the night was just spent sitting round the fire chatting and laughing. It was really nice. The open air (thankfully it didn’t rain), the fire, some music. It was very picturesque.

Tim and I were gonna sleep in the tent but we couldn’t find a flat spot to pitch it so in the end we slept in the truck, which was…..fun.

Amazingly the length was actually longer than prolly a king size and about as wide as a double bed. I wasn’t a fan tho as I woke up at least once an hour in a panic because of the small space.

But morning eventually rolled round and it was raining. We lay in the back of the truck with the doors open and the morning air was so refreshing.

The guys weren’t gonna be up for a while so we took the girls for a walk, what a mistake. Saffie rolled in some poop and was absolutely stinking. We got most of it off but she was still stinking.

Since the guys weren’t gonna be up till prolly noon or later and there wouldn’t be much to do with the weather and all, Tim and I decided to head home. What a fun journey it was.

We stopped at a couple of viewpoints they have for the dam.

And got a couple of photos of us for families.

And then we were home.

All in all it was a really fun weekend and I’d definitely go down there again. If the weather had been nicer it would’ve been better but it is Washington after all!

The rest of the photos are @Flickr.

Technorati Tags: elbe, flickr, holiday, photos, Seattle, Tim

Tim and I were gonna go camping tomorrow since it looked like it might be cool enough in Elbe for the girls. However then we discovered this. And now he wants to go.

It should be a laugh tho to see how the Americans do Scottishness.

I finished Twilight today and immediately started on New Moon. It’s been pretty good so far too. The third book Eclipse isn’t out in paperback yet so I’m gonna have to order it and the last book, Breaking Dawn, in hardcover which slightly miffs my organizational side. But oh well.

Ninja Gaiden 2 arrived in the mail this morning and it’s pretty fun, if a bit unbalanced. The levels are pretty easy to get through and then the boss battles are insanely difficult.

I also missed collecting a good weapon so I had to go back over and start from the beginning again, which kinda sucks. But hopefully with some visits to Gamefaqs I can beat them.

A rumour surfaced this morning that Orange is gonna start selling the iPhone come October because O2’s exclusivity is up come the end of the year. While I doubt it will be, I really hope it’s true because the competition between the two would hopefully lowers the tariffs.

Technorati Tags: Apple, Books, iPhone, new moon, ninja gaiden, Seattle, twilight

Two new posters were released for Max Payne today. The first one is really cool and I really like the art style, it reminds me of the box art for the game.

The second one I’m not so sure about. I don’t know what the winged creatures are, I don’t recall them from the games, but I hope they’re just hallucinations brought on by the drug Valkyr or else a manifestation of Payne’s grief.

Either way I’m pretty excited to see the final product, and really hoping it’s good.

Technorati Tags: gams, max payne, Movies

I finished Mark Billingham’s latest Tom Thorne novel, Death Message, yesterday. It was pretty good but it seemed to reference back to the other books a lot, as if Billingham himself knew it wasn’t quite as good as the others. It wasn’t bad in any way though, had a satisfying ending.

I started on Stephenie Meyer’s Twilight last night. I’m already 150 pages in after only last night. It’s really good so far. I ordered the second book in paperback this morning for another £3.50.

Technorati Tags: Books, twilight

Tim came home with some flowers for me the other day, which was a really sweet thing to do, so I decided to take some photos of them.

He introduced me to the world of Sid Meier’s Civilization Revolution the other day. It’s a turn based strategy game so I didn’t think I’d like it but it’s actually quite fun. Ninja Gaiden 2 is on it’s way from Gamefly which I’m excited to play when it arrives.

I liked today’s Woot shirt so I went ahead and ordered it. I got an e-mail this morning saying my other one had been shipped so that’s pretty cool.

Oh Tim also got me a bar of chocolate, white chocolate of course. It is the tastiest chocolate I ever had. Ever. It’s Lindt Lindor and it’s scrummilly delicious. Very sweet tho.

Technorati Tags: civilization, flickr, flowers, gamefly, games, holiday, ninja gaiden, Seattle, Tim, woot, xbox 360

I’m now exactly half way through my holiday. It seems crazy to think I’ve been here six weeks already but then it also seems crazy that it’s only been six weeks.

The other day I was trying to remember what we did to write an e-mail home. I was trying to remember what we did on Saturday 21st June. I knew that in the morning we went and Tim got his haircut then we went to Starbucks, then the dog park but then….?

I totally blanked but I knew we’d done something important/significant. And then it came to me: Avenue Q! It seems like it was forever ago but it was this same trip.

So six weeks tomorrow I start my journey home. I’m actually going to London first to see Amy and Ian and then I’m getting the train home on Tuesday. It should be a fun weekend. I may even buy an iPhone if they have them in stock.

But we still have lots to do here before I go. There’s PAX, Shrek The Musical, another couple movies, another couple gaymer nights, a couple BBQ’s with Frankie, Layla, Jack and his boyfriend. It should be fun.

Technorati Tags: amy, avenue q, bbq, Gaymers, holiday, ian, Seattle, starbucks, Tim