Duck Dodge

Quincy gave me sailing lessons at the Center for Wooden Boats for Christmas, and Rishi and I have so far taken four lessons and one classroom session. We've been up and down lake union practicing our tacks and jibes, heave-to's and man-overboard drills. Tonight was a special challenge. Our lesson was during Duck Dodge!

Duck Dodge is a post in itself. Check out this page for the lowdown on this crazy, crafty, close-quarters, three-class sailboat race up and down Lake Union. When I told our first instructor that I wanted to learn to sail mostly because of Duck Dodge, she thought I was a little nutty and certainly an adventure seeker.

We went out for the fourth time in a Blanchard Jr Knockabout. The winds were between 5 and 11 mph the whole time we were out -- the best wind we've had so far. We got out to the middle of the lake by about 6:30 when our of nowhere dozens of boats, many with pirate flags on their masts (the theme of the evening) sailed around us. Our instructor Scotty had us sail up even with Gasworks where we worked on our jibes and tacks in close quarters with a rowing crew, jet skies, kayaks, sailboats, a tug pushing a barge of dirt, and motorboats. It was by far the most stressful of all our sailing lessons.

Twice we came pretty close to much, much larger sailboats. We did good, though, and kept our paint to our own hull.

I highly recommend Sail Now! sailing lessons through the Center for Wooden Boats. This has been a trip! We have one more lesson next week, then we'll do our "check out" and be ready to rent and sail out on our own.

Goodbye Subaru

Cars are like people and pets. As they get older their flexible parts become less flexible and require expensive maintenance or replacement.

Cars are not like people or pets. They are replaceable themselves, and often the newer models get better gas mileage.

This past winter the great mechanics at Smart Service Subaru predicted that my car would die on a hill or mountain soon if expensive maintenance was not performed. The price of the work was more than what the car was worth. Add to that our thoughts on getting a new car for Quincy, and I was really wondering if I wanted to keep investing in the car.

Well, sure enough, driving around in Normandy Park pushed the eleven year old wagon to the edge of brokenness. The engine temperature spiked a couple times -- the mechanic's prediction of final death throws. The next trip up to Woodinville left us stranded in a place called "Thrasher's Corners." Here's all the photos from my last minutes with her, while we waited for a tow truck to save us. (Jeff, Maggi and Scooter saved Quincy, since the tow truck was not dog-friendly.)

Following the advice given to me by Rishi a while back, I decided to donate the car to charity. There are a couple places you can work with to get the money to any charity you want. I used V-DAC because their website was easy and linked from Goodwill, a charity I had considered supporting recently. I would have used Feed the Children or KEXP or KIVA, but they weren't in the V-DAC database. They get my money anway. Oh, I digress.

So, the car is gone. I don't really miss the Subaru wagon, per se, but I do miss having a hauling car. Rishi and Jamie want me to get a luxury car. Quincy would probably be happiest if I bought her car from her. I want a small, electric pickup -- sadly those don't exist. I am thinking about a used Toyota pickup or, my dad's favorite, a Ford Ranger.

What do you think, internets?

Elsa Hotel

As most of you know, Rishi has been working on a big project the last few months. He's puting together a business plan for a small, boutique, budget hotel in Capitol Hill. The hotel is named "Elsa Hotel." I've been blogging a bit about his experiences so far at www.elsahotel.org. I'll admit, we haven't hit the really juicy stuff yet, but if you're into following Rishi's progress on his dreams, I suggest subscribing.

The most recent update highlights some of his Google SketchUp drawings of some of the rooms. He's super excited to be able to play around with this. It's a great break from grinding out number on water usage and P&L and marketing strategies.

So, check it out! I try to get in a post a week or more; I'm sure as things heat up I'll have more to write about.

www.elsahotel.org

Whidbey Island Dog Parks

The dog parks of Whidbey Island are legendry around these parts. Maybe it’s the crowdedness of in-city parks that drives us all to dream of acreage. I’m always a little hesitant around dog parks, not being a natural dog person, and wide open spaces don’t really add to my comfort. A dog near me is a dog near me – the only thing space might add is a the distance between the dog and its owner. But, so far, at all these dog parks we’ve only run into the sweetest dogs ever. Maybe city owners are just not as careful about socializing their dogs?





We took two trips to the expansive Double Bluff Beach Dog Park. It located in such a way as to point back to Seattle, this two mile stretch of wide, open beach is a dog’s dream. We played some long-fetch with the dog both times. Grete loves the tennis ball more than anything, and flying disk/Hurley action just didn’t cut it. She chased a couple big birds, one of them a heron, but being a city dog she never gets close before they take flight.





At the end of the second day, Quincy and I tested Grete’s desire to swim out to sea. I think she just doesn’t swim. Eventually, we were able to goad her out as far as she could touch; but once the ball was thrown farther than that, it was lost. It was a little sad to see our dog hunting around for anything resembling a tennis ball on the walk back to the car. Maybe this will help her learn?



My new favorite dog park is Patmore Pit, about half way up Whidbey Island, near a huge naval air station outlying field. It’s touted as about 40 acres of wide open space, and it certainly is! There are tress in the middle of the park, and a small agility field fenced off in one corner, but other than that, it’s just wide open, flat, grassy field. Grete fetched like there was no more tomorrow. She jumped, bounced, ran, flew. Man, it was fun. We all had a great time in the sun. The park was nearly empty, too, so we had our pick of the most scenic fetching field. Even when other dogs strolled by, it felt like we were just passing in the Plains. (In the photo below, Grete can barely be seen in the center.)



We didn’t hit up any other dog parks on Whidbey. I don’t know why they have more! With the expansiveness of both, a dog owner can choose between clean dry fetching or dirty beach romping. Either way, on our last day of the trip, Grete was so tired (and I imagine sore) that she wouldn’t run even a tenth of a mile with me in the morning. She was still smiling from the day before!

The Inn at Langley

Last weekend Q and I took the short ferry ride to Whidbey Island to celebrate her birthday. We took Monday and Tuesday off to make a four-day weekend out of it. There are a number of dog-friendly inns and bed and breakfasts on the south end of the island, but since we were in a celebratory mood, we stayed at the best of the best: The Inn at Langley.

The Inn lived up to its reputation as a destination in and of itself. We brought enough cheese for a party of 40, and ate dinners of cheese, wine, Scotch, fruit, bread and crackers in the room all three nights. We took full advantage of the free breakfast, eating more fruit and breakfasty things in the room each morning. The warmer days, we were out on the balcony overlooking Puget Sound. The rainy days, we ate by the fire.

We thought ahead and brought the must-haves for a romatic getaway like this: ample CDs, candles, wine, and reading material. We spent a lot of time sitting on the balcony or soaking in the huge tube (with a view).

Of course, being a trip with Grete, we hit the two biggest and best dog parks. That could be a post in and of itself. Actually, that's a good idea.

We took a day trip up to the top of Whidbey to hike a little around Deception Pass. The park is great, but northern Whidbey is just like North Seattle -- where the south is very beautiful and coutry and folksy, the north is strip malls and six lane roads.

You can check out our favorite few photos here. There's a pile of photos of Quincy and I, and our vistas here. Then, there's, like, 200 photos of Grete jumping and shaking here.

House Hunting

It has been nearly six years since I hunted for a new home. Last time, the market was crazy fast. Houses were going for 20% over their value on the same day that they went on the market. Bidding wars knocked me out of six houses before I was lucky enough to land here. I love this house. It has spoiled me for future houses. The doneness of it has no connection to the constant upgrading and remodeling of my childhood home. I spend my weekends in the garden, not in the crawl space.



It all started with this little 1911 house down the street. It's very pretty, it's on the perfect lot, and none of the infrastructure has been up dated in my life time. Wiring, plumbing, sewer, foundation, bones, roof... they're all needing work to support the 21st century.

In order to see the house, we engaged Wendy, Quincy's amazing realtor. She's fantastic. Wendy brings a kind of honest energy to the search that I wouldn't expect from someone working on commission. Yesterday, she drove from Brier to Normandy Beach to show us a few houses.



Before heading to the deep south, we headed back east to a little bump off I90 named Preston. It's 20 miles outside of downtown (8 from Issaquah). The house blew our mind-- beautifully updated in every way. The lot was odd, with a creek running through it and gently sloped in every angle, but the owners have 10 acres and might be interested in changing the boundaries. But, it was far. And, it up a wash-out prone never-plowed road that would be impossible to traverse in the deep winter. Sigh. Back to the city we drove.

Here's what we saw with Wendy:



This updated house held a lot of promise. The back yard was in bad condition, but with a few grand in retaining wall/drainage we could get a big practice field. The neighbors had a huge garden. But, there were invasive weeds everywhere (think blackberries on steroids), it needed a new roof, it was priced for a view (but it didn't have one), and there was an unfinished bathroom off the bedroom.



This house had substantial yardage. There were flowering trees everywhere, and a few 200' cedars (that maybe should be cut down). No view, and the lot was heavily shaded by all those beautiful trees. The basement was recently remodeled, but they split up the space oddly and left us imagining opening it all back up again. For every interesting plus (outside fireplace) there seemed to be a strange minus (tiny entryway/sitting room).



We drove up some really steep hills into Seola Beach, nearly killing my car (so much for never having seen the overheating predicted by the mechanic). This house was pretty, but no usable yard. We started thinking that a view might not be possible with a yard. Then we remembered that views weren't on either of our lists.



Or maybe it was at this house that we remembered the view thing. Who knows, they all blended together. The concrete block house listing at 559k was incredible -- big lot, hideous unmaintained unupdated house, HUGE view. I mean, HUGE view.

Either way, by the end of the day, we drove out of Burien in my overheated Subaru tired and hungry. We made gluten-free pierogi and steamed broccoli. We watched the fantastic movie "Nick and Nora's Infinite Playlist" and ate popcorn. Next week, less hunting, more house.

House Hunting

Quincy and I have been looking at new houses. This is not news to those of you who see us often. We spend probably an hour a day each combing through the recent and not-so-recent listings on Redfin hoping to find our dream home. We’ve been regularly meeting to discuss our core requirements and nice-to-haves. Our dream homes look very similar – sadly, we have expensive tastes. (I remember my dad telling me that I always would voice enjoyment over his Asian-influenced dishes when he used better cuts of beef.) In a nutshell:

Core: Yard big enough to practice agility with two dogs (60’ x 40’); separate yard for gardening with good southern exposure; enough space in the house to store our stuff comfortably; two bedrooms + office; good light; safe neighborhood; access to gluten-free food; no more than 45 minutes to Seattle downtown via mass transit; affordable enough so that one of us can quit our job.

Flexible: Master bathroom off bedroom; gourmet kitchen (or budget to remodel kitchen); neighborhood with sidewalks (if in-city); close to businesses; views (sunrise/sunset); yard big enough to run a real agility course (100’ x 50’); out-building storage for agility/gardening equipment; mudroom; room that can support a pool table; front porch; feels-like-home architecture (hard to describe, we know it when we see it); space for ornamental plants and veggie garden; posh neighborhood; near a PCC grocery store; house sits above street or shielded from street; affordable such that both of us can get out of this crazy industry forever; not surrounded by industry or developments.


Yeah, I know we're crazy. All dreamers are.

This week we swung by our first house with Quincy’s amazing realtor, Wendy. The house is only a few blocks from our current home, in Greenwood. Here’s the listing. We were immediately drawn to the yards and the tallness of the house.

We were both a little disappointed in what we ended up seeing. The second floor was a converted attic that did have 540 square feet of floor, but most of the volume was taken up by the roofline. The three bedrooms were tiny. The views were beautiful. The basement was also a disappointment: what was listed as a spate apartment was nice, but also very small. The rest of the basement was unfinished and mostly just knee-wall storage and crawlspaces. It’s listing of 760 square feet is at best generous. The main floor was exactly as called out: 760 square feet of usable, beautiful space. The den was very small, but would actually be a great computer room for one of us. Converting the basement apartment into a “man cave” or TV room would be very doable.

In seeing this house, though, we both added a new requirement. This house was built in 1911 and was nearly 100% knob and tube wiring. Rewiring would require ripping out the walls, as there is no way to access anything with so many finished ceilings and floors. Quincy realized that with her entire life savings in the house, she wasn’t comfortable not having earthquake insurance. Since we’re overdue for The Big One, a retrofit and insuring would be required for her piece of mind. Again, with the walls finished and the extra story, this would be both expensive and invasive.

So, in the end we walked away from the house. I am still thinking about it daily. I wish it were just a little different. I wish the earthquake retro fit wasn’t necessary, and that the knob and tube wiring would magically update itself. At the price they are offering, we can’t afford to pay someone to do both, and do the other work the house would require (like a kitchen remodel, etc).

Back to the hunt, I guess. I am worried we won’t find a house that matches our expectations. I am more worried that the search itself is driving a considerable wedge between us, and I push for a shorter commute and Quincy dreams of acreage.

Wish us luck.

Beautiful Weather, Beautiful Weekend

This weekend was a blur! Quincy was out of town with her girlfriends in the mountains. I spent the weekend with Grete and the gardens.

I pulled up all the weeds in the back yard beds, redid all the edging, put up a new fence to keep Grete out of the beds, planted three new plants, put down a yard of mulch, mowed, and repotted/staked all of my indoor succulents. In all, I spent about 16 hours in the garden.



Almost the whole time Grete was by my side, dropping the ball and chasing after it. She got pretty good at bringing it close enough so that I didn't have to move from my weeding spot. As a reward, we went to the Green Lake dog park for some long-throw fetching. The weather was perfect all weekend.



On Monday Quincy and I woke up with headaches from all the pollen in the air. We decided to stay home and take it easy. This lead to a trip to Marymoor dog park, which led to me going to Fremont for lunch at Silence Heart Nest, which led to us washing the cars.

In other news, we found a house we like. And... it's right down the street! More on that later, we're going to stop by tonight to check it out with our realtor. We're not getting our hopes up, but after seeing the back yard, Grete is already packing.

Ta-ta for now!

Relationship Economics 101

It’s rare that a speaker can plow through material of any kind and leave me behind, or even lagging. No matter the depth or pace, I usually can keep up with the parts that I find interesting. This afternoon Mr. David Nour wasted me.

David was hired by The Company to give a 120 minute motivational talk titled “Relationship Economics.” His recently published book of the same title (Wiley, 2008) has been turning heads. This guy’s background story is head spinning as well. He arrived in the country from Iran in the early 80’s no knowing a lick of English. Now he is paid by Fortune 100 C-level executives to help them build their business networks and encourage their own professional growth. A 1st-generation immigrant story of the nth degree.

There was a lot in David’s talk. I had little hope of absorbing much new material at his breakneck speed. I jotted down a few new concepts, but mostly I was reminded of some of the lessons and best practices of my own professional development that I left behind in the last year.

First, I have not been growing my personal relationships. I have been growing one with Miracle Grow, Full Spectrum Lights, and attention, mind you, but my network is slowly fading to the background through starvation even as my relationship with Quincy grows daily. There’s absolutely no reason why I can’t do both at the same time. David brought up a number of quick tricks that I plan to make habits of. Personal notes; grooming my LinkedIn; finding reasons to connect with geographically distant friends; spending work-hour downtimes like lunch growing internal relationships; and most basically, doing something for others more often – these are just some.

As y’all know, I’ve been looking for more meaning lately. All it took was a couple months of decent blood flow and I’m ready for the next big thing. Maybe the next big thing is a thousand little things.

Or more accurately, maybe the next big thing will be the result of a thousand little things. My last 90 goal was to take over the QA department of The Company. Even though I worked pretty half-assed at it, the Universe still managed to plop most of the department and a promotion in my lap in just over 90 days. My next goal is for something different: I’d like to get offered a job of higher rank. I have yet to be recruited for much of anything. This is a direct effect of a starving relationship portfolio. Heck, I’ve ignored emails from people likely to offer me a job in the past just because I wasn’t in the mood or thought I knew I wouldn’t want it. I’ve got a few grade-A connections, people who I actually like as well, that I have been ignoring. Time for me to step up.

And, you all know me. Once I set my mind to something, even if I put it on the back burner, eventually I get exactly what I want. Or better.

But now, it’s time for dinner. Here’s hoping it’s less exotic fishy than last night’s course!

Savagely

Gay bars in Seattle, by and large, are not scary.

My first experience being a tourist in such a strange land was in Wilkes-Barre at a bar called Twist (I had to look that up). It was positioned such that my college apartment was halfway down an alley between it and the only full nudie bar in the city, Toppers (I didn't have to look that up). It created a general weirdness vortex under our fire escape where we learned that human poo outlasts winter snows and wrote a punk song called "don't pee on my house" to serenade our late night visitors. Anyway, my old friend Tyler and I swung by Twist after being asked to leave an Irish Pub for not fighting. It was late - very late - and the bartender gladly made two "Mind Erasers" for the tall blond and young kid. From what I can vaguely recall (the drink lived up to its name) we were followed out of the place by two lonely, likely married (to wives), men who very much wanted to give us a ride home. I'm sure they had the best intentions. Tyler and I had a good laugh, then chucked on his carpet.

This weekend I accompanied a few of my friends to show support of the Capitol Hill scene in the face of a crazy threat from a deranged or lonely person. Apparently, and I'll let the FBI handle the details, some nut job sent letters to most of the gay bars on Capitol Hill (and one to The Stranger) threatening to spike 55 drinks with ricin. Which would not be nice. Anyway, the gay community answered in the best way they know how: they threw a party and called for a pub-crawl.

I'm not much for crawling, and neither are my friends. We actually camped out at Purr most of the night on big, cushy leather couches. Dan Savage dropped by. He sends his regards. He's much cuter in person, but I'm still straight.

So, my friends and I talked at the top of our voice while tall beefy men and obviously-not-ladies women danced and flirted somewhere on the other end of the bar. None of us are dancers (though I believe one has a thing for them).

Long story short: at least so far the threat is as empty as the threater's head. I hope it stays that way. The news camera outside of Purr Saturday night made my skin crawl. Too much attention to such a despicable act. Why can't we all just get a long?

By friend, I mean creepy Russian mafia-looking dude

I'm not easily startled. But today I got a good little rush of adrenaline on my way home.

I had a drink and dinner with Megan at Vessel and Purple downtown after work. I walked over to the bus stop outside Macy's at 3rd and Pine to wait for my bus. While standing in the rain under the awning with 40 other people, I noticed the guy next to me staring at me. I made brief eye contact and went back to staring straight ahead. It's not unexpected to encounter strange people at the bus stop, and the stop at Pine at 7:20 is not exception. The 358 pulled up and I boarded. So did my new friend.

I picked an elevated seat midway back in the bus on the driver's side. He sat at the sideways facing seat closest to the front door. I did a quick plan of action in my head in the off chance that this guy was going to follow me somewhere. I rehashed his description in my head as well, so that I would remember later.

He stood about 5'11" and weighed about 180 pounds, maybe a little more. He wore brand new glossy black Adidas track shoes, brand new orange and black track pants, and a brown knit cap with white stars (or snowflakes). He was very Slavic looking, probably light hair and probably dark brown eyes. He was clean shaven and wore a flat expression the entire encounter.

As the bus ran its route, he looked towards the back of a bus now and then. Everyone does that. I stared straight ahead mostly, not really looking at him. Once the bus passed 70th, he looked directly at me at every stop. I made eye contact a few times, and he always quickly turned his head back towards the front of the bus. I considered multiple options, and decided that my stop at 100th was likely the safest bet, with the well lit Subway and Burger Master nearby. I figured I'd keep to a crowded area until he went away, with my cell ready for 911 should I need it.

As I prepared to exit the bus via the front door, he stood up normally in front of me and exited before me. He went north, towards HT Market; I went south towards Burger Master. After 20 or so steps, I turned back and spotted him turning back towards me. Maybe I spooked him? He took off running towards HT.

Now, it was pouring rain and gusting wind, so running towards cover didn’t strike me as too suspicious in itself. I crossed 100th and waited for the light to change so I could cross Aurora heading west; I stared back towards where I last saw him. Sure enough, a few seconds later he reappeared. We exchanged eye contact and flat expressions.

I pulled out my cell phone (dialing 911 but not pressing the call button) and walked across Aurora very slowly. He walked faster, then crossed 100th well in front of me and jogged towards the awning and the tanning business and cigarette store. There were two men smoking there. I walked passed the building about two steps, turned around, counted "One. Two." then took two confident strides back towards Aurora into view of my new friend. Surprisingly he was walking quickly back towards me as well! Okay, now we were following each other.

I lit up my cell and made it obvious, walked sorta backwards across 100th towards Aurora and kept him in view. As soon as he saw me he ran passed me (not too close) to the awning of the motorcycle shop, staring at me almost the whole way. Two seconds later he ran towards the alley behind the tanning/cigarette shop building and disappeared into the shadows. At this point, I was sure that 1) he was following me and 2) I spooked him away. I was also sure where he disappeared was between me and my house on an unlit empty street. Sigh.

So, I waited in the pouring rain until two other people appeared out of nowhere to walk up my street. I walked up with them, keeping my eyes peeled. When I got home, I stared down the street waiting to see if he followed. Nothing for 30 minutes. Yeah, he spooked me too.

All in all, nothing happened. If I needed to, I was always within 20 meters of a populated well lit area. I wonder if I did the right thing? At one point, when we were closest and he was running, I realized that dialing 911 was going to be very slow (though I had it pre-dialed at that point). He was very fast and bigger than me. I was depending on the kindness of strangers a little too much for my liking. But what were my other options?

I've been attempted to be mugged once in my dumpy college town. It was just some old druggie who didn't have a weapon and was too chicken to call my bluff of a fight. I've also averted a few confrontations by simply addressing the person in a friendly matter right away, eliminating the element of surprise (they just walked away). I felt young and invincible with nothing to lose. This was different. Maybe he just wanted my cell and wallet. I'd freely give those up. Maybe he was unarmed or maybe all of this is just my imagination. The only lingering uneasiness I have is that now I'll never know. It's unresolved, like some sort of independent film.

Sorry for the long post. I wrote all this up in detail to pass on to our neighborhood watch committee, and our local Police officer. I figured blogging it couldn't hurt.

White elephant party

Maggi & Jeff hosted a super fun white elephant party this year. Quincy got stuck with, er, won, a seven-days-of-soap pack. I smell a re-gift. I held onto a super-cool apron for a moment, but lost it in the fray. Much fun was had, and if Maggi & Jeff's party wasn't going on 4+ years, I'd host one next year. The photos from the party are here.

Quincy and I themed our white elephant gifts on gaming. I brought along an Atari joystick that had been converted to include, in the joystick itself, 12 games. Along with that I included an old master-mind-like electronic game from the early 1980's (you try to guess the 4-digit combination the computer randomly generated). Quincy wrapped two sets of Magic: The Gathering cards, two Shadowrun books (the Seattle expansion; oooo) and a Star Wars role playing book. I think we geeked the heck out of the joint. There was a modern board game version of Mastermind at the party as well.

Since I missed the Insightful holiday party this year, it was good to get my White Elephant gift exchanging out of my system. Go tack!

2008 in thumbnails

This year started off auspiciously with a backwards repel down a waterfall in Costa Rica. I came back sore and wondering what the heck I was thinking. That was January 1st. The 365 days that followed stayed in the same theme: exhilarating and sometimes painful. Overall, it was one of the busiest and most eventful years of my life.




My dad visited in January, followed by a nontraditional wedding between two of Quincy's best friends, Maggi and Jeff. I spent January through March unemployed by choice, preparing the house for Quincy, Grete and Gesso to move in, and relaxing for the first time in years. Rick moved out in February after four years of living in my basement -- it was both sad and happy, as he is now in Portland with more room, more light, and more music in his life.




Rishi, Omar and I went to Vegas for the Super Bowl ('nuf said) and Grete spent her first weekend at my house. Quincy and friends spent long hours ripping up the floor in her kitchen, preparing it for an eventual sale which would be both stressful and ultimately rewarding.




Quincy, Grete and I met my mother and Eileen on the Oregon coast for a long weekend of hiking and beach walks. I was getting weaker and sicker at this point, and visited the doctor for more blood work. Still no idea what it could be, we traveled to Pennsylvania to meet my family and to South Dakota to visit Quincy's. I swung up to Vermont to see Brian wed Becca, certainly one of the most beautiful weddings I will ever witness.




Quincy and Grete ran their first 5k. Quincy moved in and we started gardening in earnest in the middle of the summer. By July, I was finally diagnosed with celiac disease. Just one month later, with a fresh supply of oxygen in my blood, I asked Quincy to merry me (the day before Vena married Simon, another beautiful gathering of friends and family).




We dog sat DJ & Emily's Lola and hosted a super-fun game night in the fall. Megan and Talina got engaged this summer as well, so we spent a few nights sharing our wedding planning. I continued working at Attenex, taking the bus every day, and re-learning how to manage stress (now that my energy returned, so did much angst).




Parties (with DJ & Emily's new baby!), outdoor lights, and snow capped off an amazing year. Quincy and I have absolutely no idea what next year will hold for us. After all that we've done so far, I know we're both hoping for a little breather. So, who wants to take bets? hehe... I didn't think so. Let's go sailing!