Bertha is a tunnel-boring machine used to drill a replacement for an overhead viaduct along the waterfront. I've got a good punchline, but first, the set-up. An earthquake in 2000 severely damaged the 2-level viaduct, enough so that I don't drive on it. Patched up with braces and clamps, another quake (now overdue) will pancake it at a high loss of life. The fix, after arguing about it for ten years, was to bore a tunnel under it to provide for...
She was born yesterday, weighed in (or is it out?) at 8 1/2 pounds. Kate and Matt are doing well, though Kate looked a little tired to me today. Ada seems to be running on all cylinders: eat, sleep, cry, repeat. She has pretty hair, kinda like a strawberry blond. So it was a nice trip into downtown Seattle today, my first since arriving. There's a lot of construction work, a lot of fancy new buildings, and the streets are messed up. I was struck...
The FBI has allowed the State of Washington to access their files when doing background checks on cannabis license applicants after a year of doing nothing. These checks were to comply with the DOJ guidelines that no one associated with drug cartels or organized crime be licensed in the cannabis industry, especially given that the FBI has a list, albeit of uncertain quality, of such people. To require such checks, then to refuse to do the...
I'm beginning my 8th year on the road fulltiming, and moved onto my spot today for the summer. I asked for a load of gravel to be dropped on the spot and leveled off before I parked, but I got a load and half-heartedly leveled. So it took a while to make myself a level parking spot. Normally I'm happy when I get sorta close, but I don't want to live with my refrigerator contents spilling out for 4 months. I already know my immediate neighbors,...
Yesterday I said the Free Speech Guy in Port Townsend had downsized his exhibit and came into compliance with the new ordinance. His white boards, tables, and carts were all stolen from their storage space on Saturday night. He got his third and final warning ticket on Saturday, and a court date was set for the 21st. Apparently, someone couldn't wait for the slow gears of justice to turn. It shouldn't be too hard to find the culprit, I'd start...
I completed the simple process to become a leaseholder at the Escapee Coop park in Chimacum. (For those familiar with Chimacum, that road that goes off into the trees is the road to the garbage/utility area) When lots become available they are first offered to existing leaseholders, then to the person on the waiting list (I've been on the waiting list for 4 years). There are 175 lots, some of which have been "improved" with landscaping,...
A nice day on the Peninsula is azure skies, intensely green trees, snow-topped mountains, vibrant strait and bay colors, and vivid Spring wildflowers. The Indians that lived around here (and still do) would naturally have a word for these days, a greeting, mornings perhaps, "Tokitae" which means "nice day, pretty colors". Tokitae days are special days here, worth having a word of their own. I spent the day in the warm sun just wandering around...
This weekend I go over to Seattle to see the kids, hauling my big box of gifts and weird crap I've picked up along the way. I figure weird crap is just the ticket for 2 year old boys. Well, I liked it then. The Oso slide is much discussed around here. The overwhelming consensus is that everything possible is being done, that all agencies have been completely responsive, and that this is an impossibly difficult mess to deal with. While the press...
When the weather is good I go for a drive to some nearby place just to see the mountains, the bays, the Spring flowers, and the unusual shops scattered here and there around the Peninsula. Port Angeles ("PA") is where ships from the seven seas must stop to pick up a pilot who knows the waters through the Strait, through the San Juans, into Seattle and Tacoma, and into Canadian waters. PA's history is logging, fishing, timber mills, fish...
A couple of tidbits concerning legal marijuana in Washington: The FBI is not doing background checks on I-502 license applicants, though they do for Colorado licensees. And, they do checks on the ACA Navigators in Texas. Go figure. Almost all states with legal cannabis either for retail or medical uses have a 1000 feet rule, operations are not to be located within 1000 feet of a school, park, or anyplace kids are likely to be. No such rule...