Gnuman Does The Pacific Northwest: Monday - May 14, 2007

Today I arrived in Washington State on Maryanne's doorstep. She was pretty excited to see me. I found myself in a place with lots of waterfront, beautiful mountains, and lush green forests. And you know what? The sun was shining! I'd heard all kinds of bad things about how gloomy and rainy the Pacific Northwest is, but I'll tell you, there's no place like it when the sun's shining! The first thing we did was take a tour of her garden. She's awfully proud of her little flower garden and insisted I get a closer look at the irises she currently has blooming. I think it will be a few days before my hind end recovers.....

After that, I met the family. Nelson (the Jack Russell) wasn't too sure what to make of me. He thought I smelled interesting, but when he came closer for a lick, I got a little nervous. Jack's are known to eat small things, so I thought I'd better keep my distance. I think he might have been tasting me! Eeeep!

This sweet old gal is Britt the chocolate lab. We got along great once I got used to her "aroma" (Maryanne just calls her "stinky"). She wanted to give me a few kisses, but I had to pretend I had a girl back home so things wouldn't get awkward when I leave in 5 days. Don't worry. I'll let her down easy.

After Maryanne's husband R arrived home and all the introductions were finished, they drove me down to the park where they got married. It's right along the waterfront and behind me you can see Puget Sound and the San Juan Islands. She tells me that it's usually really breezy and cool down here at the waterfront, but tonight it was just right. The view was gorgeous and we saw quite a few sailboats enjoying the nice weather.

Here's me relaxing on the grass at the park. Normally you can see Mt. Baker with its snowy peak (even in July!) in the background, but it didn't show up in our photo. There's lots of boaters up here and Maryanne and her husband take advantage of the scenic waterways with their kayaks when the weather's nice (and when her knee isn't acting grumpy).

After the park, we drove down to a historic part of town and poked around a little. Here I am posing against a mural painted on one of the buildings downtown that shows the rich Native American, Pioneer, logging, fishing and shipping history of their town. Kind of cool!

This is me posing on the front steps of the museum downtown. It's a shame you can't see the whole building, because it's pretty cool looking. During the 1800's this was actually the city hall for their town. Since then, they've moved city hall and they've preserved the building as a museum with quite a few permanent collections, and then rotating collections of all kinds. Maryanne remembers going to a really amazing one close to 10 years ago that consisted of historic recreations of teenagers' bedrooms from the early 1900's on up to the 1980's. She tells me she's a sucker for all that retro stuff.

Well, that's my visit so far. Maryanne feels pretty bad about having her knee surgery this week and not being able to take me very many cool places. But I'm having an o.k. time so far. She took me to work with her yesterday and today and I've got some fun things to tell you about that, but that will have to wait for tomorrow. Until then - greetings from Washington State!