Stuff and Nonsense!

Right, then.

First, my apologies for having disappeared and become seemingly incommunicado. It was not intentional, however, circumstances dictated that I focus on other things for a short space and now I have time to devote to this space once more.

So, what has your humble blogger been up to of late?

In short, on the third of June, I bade my co-workers farewell, cleaned out my desk and went home to pack. That evening, the inestimable Brandy, aka Chicken Dinner Woman, now Helpmeet and Partner to the Lovely Dougie, rallied round to give my mane a much needed cropping. By early morning on the fourth, I'd loaded my assorted belongings onto my father's truck and a rented trailer thingamajig and was on the road with my parents to Seattle. We arrived in the early afternoon and were met by my housemate, George, and we hurriedly unloaded my assorted objects. After making a quick call to find out where my folks could return the trailer, I waved good-bye to them as they roared off in a cloud of diesel fumes and sat down on the porch of my new home to have a smoke and wonder what the hell I'd gotten myself into. By a strange co-incidence, dear Quincy and the Brentling were in Seattle that weekend and helped assuage the transitional sadness I was feeling.

That weekend was a relaxed, yet somewhat busy one as I had seemingly endless loads of laundry, dishes, and unpacking to do in between adventures out with the Q and B team. George was still living at his old pied-à-terre. That Monday, I began the soul-searing task of looking for work. I had applied for several positions within the telecommunications company for whom I'd worked while living in Coeur d'Alene and trusted to the assistance of various kind and wonderful people who'd said they'd be willing to help - more on that later. I had an interview at a local placement agency that day.

For what it is worth, placement agencies tend to love me. They do a species of snake dance when I send them my résumé and come in for the wearisome tests designed to measure my office skills. (Confidential to any recruiters who are reading this: No matter *what* you say about your specific tests being more difficult or different from another agency's, you're full of shit. I took the same damned tests at about six different recruiters and scored within one to two points of my previous scores. Towards the end, I was getting consistently perfect scores because I had memorized the damned answers. Just an FYI.) At any rate, most of the recruiters start salivating at my experience and abilities, promise great things by the end of the next day, and then promptly disappear.

After a few weeks of desultory job hunting (in the third sense), I was finally offered a position with a company in the SODO (South of Downtown) district. While not as glamorous as working in on the forty-third floor of a massive glass tower, I like my job and my co-workers very much.

Shortly after moving over, Sina buzzed round for a few days visit to the city prior to winging off to Deutschland. It was a nice visit. She recently returned and buzzed through for a day and a half before legging it back to Coeur d'Alene, unfortunately, I didn't get much of an opportunity to spend time with her as our plans just never became more than discussion.

Doug and Brandy came over a few weeks ago for a spot of fun in the city and it was good seeing them again. They got into town at 8ish that Saturday and we went for brekkers at The Hurricane and drinks at Bleu on Broadway while Brandy was getting a new piercing. Later, we went to dinner at Nijo with his mum and several assorted friends of his from way back when. So after stuffing dear Brandy and Doug with tasty morsels of Seattle's finest sushi, we beetled up to Queen Anne in search of some karaoke for Dougie. Unfortunately, the place we hit on was like an upscale Mik-n-Mac's. Filled to the brim with white hats and bimbos with the merest veneer of class and taste, it was impossible to sit and getting drinks was even more of a nightmare. So I sat and chain smoked and commiserated with Brandy as she grew increasingly tired and (or so it seemed) annoyed with the general mayhem of the place and the jackassery of the individual running karaoke. While the word gentleman is an elastic term, I am hesitant to use it to describe this person nor will I be so bold as to use host as it is not an elastic term in the slightest. It implies a certain amount of courtesy and manner that this jimook did not demonstrate in the slightest. Further, deponent saith not.

My house is a bijou little dwelling I'm going to wrangle Brad into bringing round his digital camera so I can post new and better photos of Chez Nous on my blog.

Our neighbours downstairs - Drew and Holly - are fantastic. It was Holly who gave me the tip regarding the Leschi Market and its absolutely amazing selection of vins. I swear they have everything under the sun from decent plonks - I'm quite fond of two whose names escape me at present, thus I shall borrow a page from Mortimer and refer to them as Château Lake Washington Boulevard and the other as Château Leschi Marina. In addition to reasonable plonks, they also have more expensive offerings for discriminating palates. Moreover, they've nice chipolatas.

Back on Pride Weekend (this year named 'Pride Explosion' and even more of a snooze than normal. Nevermind the fact that it was as empty of social conscience as Phyllis Schafly - more on that later), George was in the throes of misery because he was unable to go out that evening. Or so he thought...

To Be Continued