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 dwindles away, fatigue is setting in for the communities affected. Meanwhile, the Stilliguamish River (“Stilly”) is about to go into flood stage. Damn. Who knows where it will go.
Speaking of wild rivers, The Elwha river, the first to have a dam removed from it, looks to be flowing clean and clear, the sediment released by the dam removal that I watched last year finally settled down. Salmon are running up it; as the Indians would say, balance has been restored. Meanwhile the Olympic National Park is being expanded (by Presidential order) to a wilderness designation, adding a lot of land to the place. Loggers are up in arms, but the reality is that they are a very small minority around here now. Times change.
On a personal note, I’ll have a lot here at Chimacum on Monday.