You know it's summer when the festivals start cropping up. I think I'm going to start a collection of my favorite ones, for example next week is Leavenworth's Sausage Festival . What could be more perfect? I guess their motto, which is "Put a little oopah in your life!"

Summer is kicking into high gear in Seattle and it's amazing. Lots of great things to do, there is rarely time for them all. The beach is so close. It's hard to stay in the cubicle. I think I'll try and spend some time outside today with the powerbook.

A goal for this summer is to buy or borrow a bike and do the whole Burke-Gilman Trail. That would be around 24 miles round trip. Anyone interested? Perhaps someone who has been honing their skills in the "land of the bicycles"?

As we had hoped, Timmer was on MTV. Not a speaking role, but he did play an important part in the drama. He was the "school administrator" who counted the votes for prom king and queen. But seeing as the high school is in Florida, you don't think it could go off without a hitch. Turns out that everyone was stunned by the person who actually won and all started chanting some other girls name. I'm sure Gore could relate.

Anyway, it's nice to have a famous friend. He can now start building an IMDB entry and include this, plus his Disney stuff, and that time he was on the news in Pittsburgh talking about his leaky basement.

My favorite new piece of music is Elvis Costello's new release When I Was Cruel. It's soooo good, like the old days: angry, energetic, addictive. It's making retaking hundreds of screenshots almost bearable.

Reality TV is hitting closer to home. My infamous friend from undergrad, better known as Timmer(pants), might be on MTV tomorrow night. It's a show called True Life which is a sort of documentary like feature focusing on one topic. This week's topic called "I'm going to prom!" was shot at the high school were Timmer teaches. He was interviewed for the show and we're hoping that it didn't end up on the cutting room floor. It airs Thursday, June 20 at 10pm.

Now the graduation stuff is over (and it was fun indeed) it's time to start thinking about the rest of the summer and the job hunt. I guess one way to become more enculturated into the world of technical writers is to laugh at what they laugh at.

I like the fact that I have a friend who actually is doing what he's always said he'd be doing. My friend Andy had been in NYC since last fall trying to make things happen as a comic. He's in town this weekend back for some vacation and to comment how although we think people in Seattle are nice we have no f*cking idea how nice people in Seattle are. Yeah for actually doing something to attain your dream. Yeah for that.

What's your dream that you are not pursuing?

Haven't posted in a bit, probably won't for a while. All my work for this quarter is done (I think!). The next week or so I will be spending fun filled days entertaining the family. They are all coming out to see me not graduate on Saturday. I'm graduating in August but the department ceremony only happens in June. I'm very excited to see the whole clan. I have some activities planned including the Henry exhibit that brings together art and human genomics. Give me a break, did someone profile my family to find an event we could all agree on? And instead of suffering through the UW ceremony we're going to take a quiet boat ride through the locks, which should be nice.

I'm glad I'm not from Italy, our friend Eddie says that when he graduated he had to walk around his little town dressed in nothing but a thong. Yowsers.

I'm also planning a hike or two. We're having a little heat wave out here at the moment and people are freaking cause it's in the mid 80s. The three things that make the heat out here feel different than it does back east:

1. No air conditioning (maybe in some places, but not in most)
2. The hottest time of the day is 5pm, so when you are sitting in traffic or on an airconditioned bus it's sort of brutal
3. I'm a big baby who can't deal since I've lost touch with my sweltering Ohio summers.

I'm glad it's not raining though. Everytime my folks come out it rains and they wonder why anyone would want to live here, a direct quote: "With all this rain, it's like being in bloody England."

OK, I'll be back next week Otobasing my butt off. And I'm looking forward to a little road trip to Spokane in July.

Wanna have some fun? Click here, then click games, then click on Ant City. You get to use a giant magnifying glass and reak havoc. Oh yeah.

Today is the day we officially start our usability testing. I can hardly believe it. Thanks to MT for sending this article on Jakob Nielsen's new partnership with Macromedia. I love how the article calls him the "the king of usability." Last year he was called guru and this year king. I wonder what's next, supreme overlord? I wonder if he got the gig cause he was so loud about the limitations of Flash. Maybe that's a good way to get a job, just keep insulting something until they have to hire you just to shut you up. Maybe it'll work for me! I could get a job here, or here, or here.

This morning was the Race for the Cure. They said close to 20,000 people participated and I was one of them. I hooked up with SK and some of his work buddies. We opted for the 5K walk instead of the 5K run and spent the early morning hours strolling down the viaduct. Barely surviving last year's 6.8, it's predicted that the viaduct could crumble in the next 10 years. I couldn't help but thing of how ironically tragic (and sort of funny) it would be if an earthquake had hit at the time. I guess they'd have to have a charity march next year to commemorate all the charity walkers who fell into the sound.
Luckily, everything went well: no earthquakes, no falling into Elliot Bay. There were belly dancers cheering on the racers and I have a very funny picture of SK cheering on the belly dancers. I'll try and post it soon. After the walk there was a big ceremony in Safeco field with a parade of the survivors. It was pretty emotional and inspiring.

Tonight was a beach night. We went to Golden Gardens in Shilshole. It was Wilemski's goodbye. He's moving back to the east coast. Met some nice people, got to watch some hula hooping (including a female cop) and saw the sun sink over the Olympics and the sky turn amazing rosy colors.