The "sisters trip, 1, 3, 4" to Seaside, OR went famously.  The weather was absolutely fabulous: sunshine and blue skies the entire trip.  We visited Tilamook, Cannon Beach, Astoria, and a variety of places inbetween.  Saw a few lighthouses and did a BUNCH of walking, not just on the beaches, either.  We ate at Moe's one day (I had to try the clam chowder); we got done just before low tide.  We walked the 1/2 mile or so to Haystack Rock, took a ton of pictures, jumped over tide pools, and watched the sun start to set.  Beautiful. 

And we SHOPPED.  We all picked up "take home gifts", and a bunch of Christmas presents.  There is a store in Seaside that sells leather coats and other accessories for $20 or less.  I picked up a leather bomber-type jacket for The Man as a take home gift/X-mas present.  $20.  How could I pass that up?!?  (The Man loves it.)  We also found something there for Dad, the man who has everything.  Well, he doesn't have THIS.  Sisters 1, 3, 4 went in on the present together.  Once home, I offered Sister #2 a chance to get in on the action.  She accepted.  WOOT.

The trip home was equally fabulous.  We decided to bypass Portland on the way home, by way of Mt. St. Helen.  We left Seaside before 8am, and didn't get to the Volcanic Monument until noonish.  The escapade up to the viewpoints closer to the mountain took another couple of hours.  We saw birds, hawks, and right in the blast zone, 3-4 cow-elk.  Spirit Lake still has dead trees and pumice floating in it.  After 30 years, the blast zone and surrounding affected areas still look bleak, but you can see where the vegetation is trying to recover.  There are huge spots where man helped out by planting seedling conifers; I think someone said they've planted over a million.  There are groupings of snags (still standing dead trees) to encourage wildlife to return.  The flow site still looks awful.  Probably for the best.  The old girl is still kinda pissy, and she has 2 cones now, both still growing.  I hope the pictures I took do this part of the trip justice.  

We stopped in Yakima at 4pm for some dinner, and decided to push on to Boise.  We crossed the Columbia River at Umatilla.  The sun was just setting, so I took pictures through the tinted windows.  In fact, I took a bunch of pictures of the sunset on the way home.  Lots of reds.  It was gorgeous.  We pulled into Boise just before midnight.  I was in bed within 15-20 minutes.

Best of all, I didn't gain any weight while on vacation.  Didn't lose, but didn't gain.  Don't know how I managed that one, but perhaps all the walking helped.

Next week, The Man goes in for surgery to correct a previous surgical screw up.  Needless to say, he's been a bit of a twitch, and my vacation came at a great time.  He'll be home for at least 8 weeks, we think, but he might have the opportunity to work from home a bit while he recovers.  I certainly hope so.

I am still on the job hunt.  I'm not going to look too hard over the next few weeks while The Man gets over the worst of the recovery period, but I DO need to get on the stick if for no other reason than to pay hospital bills.  Christmas is going to be limited this year.

I am into chapter 21 of the book.  I did very little writing before the trip, did a bit of editing on the trip, and am finally going to get back to the forward progress today.  I have missed my personal deadline of Sept 30th, but I hope to be done by the 25th, the next Moxie meeting.

Cheers to all-