Hear ye, hear ye.

Well, it's Sunday which is a good day to blog.

This week was so boring at work, but I'm working on a pretty good story. Apparently a new sustainable community in Vancouver BC is going to use the heat from sewage to heat their water and home. Completely sustainable except that the sewage still only goes through primary treatment and all the heavy metals, PCBs and other nasty stuff gets released into the ocean. I've interviewed two city stiffs, one of which denies that their sewage goes to the plant which I have confirmed it goes to and next week I'm talking to an activist from the Georgia Strait Alliance. I'm also talking to a man named James, movement coordinator for People Against Outfall Pollution (POOP), an organization that protests Victoria's waste management practices. James dresses up as a character called Mr. Floatie, a 6-foot piece of poo who urges people to write the mayor of Victoria to change its ways "Mr. Floatie, the ocean poo. If you poo in Victoria, I'm from you."


I spent Thursday looking for jobs online. I applied to a fall internship at Plenty magazine: http://www.plentymag.com/

And I'm applying to a general assignment job at the Tacoma News Tribune, and also a similar position at the Bozeman Daily Chronicle in Bozeman, Montana. I'm just trying to keep my options open because I'm fairly sure Audubon is not going to hire me.

Friday I went for sushi at a place called Ocean Drive in town. I wasn't too impressed with their salmon (it was the color of pink lemonade) and the waitress poured my soy sauce for me (I had to put the whole glob of wasabi in to make it spicy enough) but hey, it was good. Then headed to a bar called the Greenroom in Black Rock where I met the real live Optimus Prime... or a guy who was high on "flake" and just kept calling himself that. He was hilarious, clean cut guy who would be fine one minute but once people stopped laughing at his jokes he started "transforming" and getting all robot on our asses. One of those guys you're happy you met on a night out.

The bar was awesome too, long couches and pillows everywhere, usually live bands play there and an awesome area outside to chill with some lanterns. Very cool, and honestly I couldn't think of any bar in Bellingham that is similar.

Yesterday I went hiking with a kid named Matt. Scruffy kid, calls himself a hippie but he's far from the Bellingham standard, but he is going to be my link to the great outdoors of Connecticut:

So, folks, this is it. Connecticut is as flat as my chest sophomore year of high school. There's nothing to see here. No snowy peaks, no rolling hills even. But the hike was strenuous for sure. We climbed up an almost vertical rock face for what seemed like forever. I was a little pompous because Matt, a smoker, kept having to stop and cough up a lung while I kept scrambling upward on the hot rocks.
At the lookout was a view of... a university. I climbed up rocks hot enough to fry an egg for this? Well... Sleeping Giant (the park we hiked) is only 739 feet above sea level. I try not to be condescending about how beautiful Washington is compared to here, but it's so damn hard. Matt took me out for pizza and beer at Eli's on Whitney St. (ha?!) and thank god they actually had beers I recognized for once. Yay Sierra Nevada Pale. Then he took me to Milford, where he seemed to know everyone because he's in a band that frequents there. We bullshitted with the bartender about mid 80s tv shows like Punky Brewster, Charles in Charge, etc. It was good times for sure. Not sure if I really like Matt's overt cockiness but if he wants to take me hiking, I'll let him.

Here's some other photos from the hike. We hiked up to a fire lookout that was made like a castle:

That's him in the corner.


Today Sam, Tony, Danni and I went to the Renaissance festival in Ansonia. Danni is a HILARIOUS German friend of Sam's who nannies some kids in a big beautiful house out in the boonies (like most of Sam's friend do). We got there and I was like... alright... Renaissance fair, I can handle this. For sure, lots of total weirdos there. They had people playing life-size battle chess, kids in full armor, women in corsets with their boobs up to their chins, etc. Sam threw tomatoes at a guy for 9 bucks but didn't hit him. We saw swords, helmets, dragon art, boobies boobies and boobies. Good times, indeed but I was eager to go home and get something I could actually eat.

I realized that Wednesday will be my 3 week mark and that's practically half way to being done here. Depending on a lot of things, I may stay, but at least I'll be home in August for the wedding. Staying here won't b so terrible. I've found I'm alright at getting used to places, but I miss my friends terribly.

I got a check from my great uncle Paul and great aunt Therese in the mail and it almost made me cry how far away I am from everybody who cares about me. I look forward to seeing everybody again soon. Please write me and keep me up on your stuff.

-Shawno