Mini road trip

After learning that I may only have a few weeks left of solid work, instead of freaking out and frantically looking for jobs and updating my resume (which I probably should have been doing), I spent my Saturday sleeping, taking 2 naps during the day, totaling 5 hours and then went to bed and had no issues sleeping --- I think I'm tired. I've spent the past 5ish months getting up around 6:45am and starting data entry at 7:30am often going into the later hours of the day, even working after 9pm --- this is of course because I work in spurts of 2-4 hours and then take little breaks throughout the day. It's been awesome to have the freedom to do whatever I want each day, work as little or as much as I'd like and in my bed/at desk/library/coffee shops and wear whatever I want, often in pj's till noonish. It has allowed me to do lots of housesitting of dogs and I haven't had to make many social sacrifices which is awesome. The downside though has been the actual job - data entry is pretty monotonous, as one would expect. I work with terrific people though and have found daily enrichment from volunteering opportunities in town.

But I digress. So Saturday was a day of relaxation and then Sunday was a day of fun. My friend and I set off from PT around 1ish to catch the ferry to Whidbey Island...we didn't think we needed a reservation and got super lucky being the 3rd to last car making it on the ferry - it was meant to be. I drove us up the island toward Anacortes and then east to see the tulip fields. I've seen a lot of photos of the tulips since arriving out this way and felt it to be a must - unfortunately they hadn't bloomed yet but there were so many fields, they were thinking about opening, probably another week. Oh well. Saw the daffodil fields though instead and that was neat - it just looked like yellow fields. Stopped for some marionberry pie (which I'd never had before), tasted much like blackberry. Drove onto to the little town of La Conner just a few miles south of the fields - super cute, like a mini PT on the water. A fellow swimmer told me about their art museum. We easily found it and happily paid the $5 admission (what a deal!). It looked pretty small though and I anticipated it taking an hour, if that, to get through. Oh contrare! They had an fabulous docent that basically gave us an exclusive tour of the first floor which was a glass exhibit (not blown, fired). It was super neat, especially learning the techniques used to make everything; I wouldn't have appreciated it all without knowing all the back story and it turned out that the docent lived in Pittsburgh for 20 some years, after moving to the U.S. from Switzerland (he still has a heavy accent), his name was Rolf. There was a painting/drawing exhibit also that was super neato and I'd totally love any of the things in there to be on my walls someday. Then we took a stroll through La Conner. Very idyllic and even had a brewery which we hit up for some delicious mediterranean pizza and locally brewed beer. The day had been awesome so far and I hadn't really planned out anything (no maps or anything) - we got in the car with some ideas in our heads, that was it. Then as if the day wasn't packed enough, we headed back to Whidbey Island to get back the ferry in time and stopped at Deception Pass (a beautiful area with bridge, state park with camping too). I've driven over the bridge a few times but never stopped and we were blessed with some late day sunshine which provided for good photos and even saw a bald eagle. We hopped back in the car and down the ferry, the winds were pretty brutal, around 40mph and I was feeling pretty uncertain that the ferry'd be running and thought we may have to drive around the long way to get home, nearly twice the time. However, they lined us up and the boat came and on we went but boy, what a ferry ride it was. The boat was pitching to and fro and normally they cancel it when there is much less wind than this. As we arrived on the other side though saw no cars waiting so we had caught the last boat before they cancelled the rest for the evening! The day was meant to be, it renewed my spirit but also reminded me how fortunate I am to live in such a special place as this. I hope to find work which will keep me on the peninsula or at least western Washington or Oregon so I can continue to explore and discover all the beauty that is the Pacific NW.