C-Objectively

I’d been meaning to check out the Tulip Festival that goes on in Washington every April but we hadn’t had very good weather all month long. Until yesterday that is. We finally had a sunny weekend in April and I decided to head up to Mount Vernon, along with about ten million other people apparently, to find out what all the buzz was about.

The line to get off on the exit into Mount Vernon and to the tulip fields extended about 0.5 mile into the 5 North. People were pulled over onto the shoulder to try to get off. Well some crazy man in a white Oldsmobile about three cars up from me got tired of waiting in the line and wanted out. Except, I don’t think he really looked before he tried to merge back into the two lanes of freeway traffic. Unfortunately for him and his wife, at that moment an 18-wheeler truck was barreling down the lane next to us at about 60 miles per hour. My mind slowed down the action as I saw what was about to happen. White Oldsmobile sticks his nose out into the lane and the truck just BARRELS through him like he was made of paper maché. Except that he wasn’t, and it made a big crunching sound as the 18-wheeler took half of the car’s hood and bumper with him.

Luckily there was no harm done to the people in the car. The same could not be said of the White Oldsmobile however. I witnessed two other near accidents while I was in Mount Vernon. There really should have been some police directing the traffic in the area. There were probably 10-20 times more cars in that area yesterday than there are usually.

Accidents and near-accidents aside, and after some misdirection on the part of my brain’s navigation computer, I found the tulip fields and snapped these glorious pictures which I will share with you now.

Skagit Valley Tulip Festival Photos

   

What’s up folks? I’d like to start by wishing you all a healthy and happy 2006. I don’t know about you guys but I’m looking forward to the year. I mean one might think that after 2005, when I graduated from Cal, moved to Seattle, started my new job, and caused all sorts of mayhem in Italy, that it would be hard to top last year. And yet, here I am trying.

Yeah so that little nugget in the last paragraph is true; I went to Italy around Thanksgiving to visit my brother who was studying there for the semester and to… well… see Italy duh! I saw Rome, Venice, and Florence while I was there. I also saw a bunch of ancient and Renaissance art and architecture and ate some awesome and not so awesome food. I’ll fill in more details as soon as I get around to touching up and sorting through all the photos I took over there. Man, these digital photos are seriously piling up and they take a not insignificant amount of time to sort through and fix up.

For the holidays I was able to head back to LA for the first time since I moved up here in July. (more…)

I went on another tour/drive with the local BMW club. The drive started in Issaquah, WA and ended Saturday night in Hood River, OR, along the Columbia River Gorge. Its an absolutely breathtaking area and also the nation’s windsurfing capital.

The club took off early Sunday morning for more twisties heading back home but I hung back to hunt out some waterfalls with Peter, Jackie, and Bert.

The waterfall we visited was in/near Panther Creek. I also drove over the Bridge of the Gods. They’re much better at naming stuff up here in the Northwest than in California I think.

Click here for the rest of the photos.

I’ve posted photos from my crabbing trip to Anacortes as well as the drive I went on to the Yakima River Valley with the local BMW CCA.

Crabbing in Anacortes

Yakima River Drive

Enjoy

Two weekends ago was the Second Annual UC Berkeley ASA Lake Tahoe Trip. I just gave a long official title to an event that doesn’t really have one. But I think the gaudy title is well-deserved considering how much fun its been both times and how much of a tradition its likely to (or already has) become.

Last year we had just over 40 people in the group and the three-story cabin was so large you’d get lost in it. This year we weren’t so fortunate with the cabin available to us so the group of almost 50 just barely fit. But it was good enough. As usual we took a charter bus over there from Berkeley. Except this year my cousin Ara came along on the trip with us. My brother Ara was there too. So was another guy new to the ASA who has the same name as my cousin Ara including middle initial. It goes without saying that this made for some confusing times on the trip.

So I just realized that there is no point to more details recapping Tahoe events since my brother has done a pretty good job of recapping himself on his blog. Plus he beat me to it. So all credit to him and if you wanna hear the whole story, please follow this link to his blog and read his Tahoe post.

What I will say again is that I had an incredible time. It was also great that my cousin Ara took our advice and made the trip up to join us. To all my other friends and family in LA, don’t say we didn’t tell ya. I’m also quite please that I remembered to take my iPod and the cable to hook it up to a stereo at the last minute before leaving. If I hadn’t we would have had almost no music to party to. What a shame that would have been…

And the best idea I heard while in Tahoe (I can’t remember if it was mine)…? Next year rent a cabin next to the ASA cabin for the alums! Only because I think we’ll be so many all together that one won’t hold us. I’m looking forward to it.

Lastly, Tahoe photos will be forthcoming as soon as I stop by and leech photos from the folks who took digicams there. I can’t depend on the ASA web site to have it up anytime soon (sorry Karen). Fortunately, Ara is the proud new owner of a gorgeous, amazing, Canon PowerShot SD300 digital camera as of yesterday and this won’t be a problem for us anymore this semester. Until I move away and I better buy one for myself then.