Greenery

This morning we decided to take the dogs for an overdue walk and wound up on a winding trail along a lazy river.

Per King County's website, "The Green River Trail winds more than 19 miles through industrial lands near the Duwamish Waterway in Tukwila to the broad Green River Valley. The trail provides excellent views and access to the Green River and surrounding river valley from Cecil Moses Park near Seattle’s south boundary to North Green River Park in south Kent near Auburn."

I have seen Cecil Moses Park along the highway a number of times. I didn't know that is the trail's northernmost spot. We'll have to stop by some time.

Today, we walked for about 45 minutes along the west side of the river, next to the area labeled Skyway on the map. We parked at the Tukwila Community Center, walked across the Allentown bridge, and headed south along the paved pathway.

For a lot of the walk, we were sandwiched between the slow-flowing river and industrial parks. In the photo below, you can see the Boeing Employees' Credit Union (BECU) headquarters looming in the distance. 

We were pleasantly surprised by the number of benches and roofed structures along the way.

We reached a turnaround point near a huge Shell Station in Tukwila. On our way back to the community center, I saw a small, yellow winged creature near the riverfront. 

At first I thought it was a butterfly, but then I realized it was a bird. See if you can spot the tiny yellow spot in the crappy, enlarged cell phone photo below.

It was so bright, at first we surmised it might be an escaped parakeet. Then, it occurred to me that it probably was a goldfinch. I told the kids that I thought that, in fact, it might be the state bird of Washington.

Once we got home we hit the Internet and found out that, in fact, my hunch was right. The Audubon Society's BirdWeb informed us the American Goldfinch "is common throughout the lowlands of Washington, often coming to bird feeders. The male in breeding plumage is bright yellow with a black forehead, wings, and tail. He has one white wing-bar on each wing and white on his tail."

Here is a slightly better photo of the American Goldfinch (via Wikimedia, thanks to user Breck22)

I have not seen a goldfinch in YEARS (like, since my childhood), and the kids don't ever recall seeing one. 

We're definitely interested in exploring the entire Green River Trail. King County Parks describes it as a trail that "links industrial lands to pastoral landscapes, parks, communities, and river views. Ideal for recreational journeys and non-motorized commuting, the trail is highly popular with a variety of user groups. In the future, the trail is slated to continue south through the City of Auburn and eventually to Flaming Geyser State Park at the Green River Gorge."

Cool!

VINYL TIE: As we were walking along the Green River trail this morning, CJ informed Annabelle and me that Mudhoney's frontman Mark Arm used to be in a band called Green River, named after the waterway we were paralleling. 

When we got home, we learned more about the band. Turns out their release "Come on Down" in 1985 was pre-grunge at its perhaps first and finest. (In fact, Arm is the human credited with coining the term 'grunge.')

The band Green River was comprised of members of the biggest names in the grunge genre, Arm and Steve Turner, who would go on to form Mudhoney, and Jeff Ament and Stone Gossard of Mother Love Bone, and later Pearl Jam.

"Come on Down" was just re-released on pink vinyl, and CJ wants it so, SO much.

MOON WATCH: Wednesday night, there's a sweet treat in the sky, a "Strawberry Moon."

The first full moon of summer will take on a reddish tint and appear unnaturally large, according to a press release by a Washington State University press release. 

Moonrise will occur at 8:24 p.m. Pacific Standard Time and be at its fullest by 9:53 p.m. A double delight, watch for Saturn, as well. It will be a bright object just south of the full moon, the biggest and brightest it will be in all of 2018.

Weekend Scenes

TAKES THE CAKE: Busy weekend! Saturday, we were busy with a Teen Feed feed. That meant prepping for we're never sure how many diners in a one-hour span. It seems to range from about 40 to 80 meals. Saturday is was way closer to 80 - so busy! We had a "Hot Diggity Dog" bar (BIG hot dogs with multiple toppings/condiments), plus homemade baked beans (I made eight batches of beans in my Instant Pot pressure cooker), plus banana splits for dessert. Fortunately, we had lots of people helping provide food and serve the meal, and it went fast and well!

Sunday, we had a cake to make. We've started volunteering with Birthday Dreams, a non profit that provides birthday parties, cake and all, for homeless youth. 

Late last week, we searched the requests that homeless kids had for cakes/parties, and I saw that a teen had requested  Tupac Shakur cake for this Monday. We're Tupac fans and I thought it would be fun to give it a go. The teen requested a white cake with white buttercream, and mentioned her favorite color are red and blue. 

We baked a three-layer vanilla cake, put red between two of the layers and blue between the other two, and iced it all in white. 

We decided to go with a Tupac portrait cut out of a sugar sheet. Annabelle did made it, and it was really, really hard/dicey, not just cutting it out (via a Cricut machine), but transferring it atop the cake was super stressful. 

Fortunately, it worked, and then it was "just" a matter of surrounding it with a marshmallow fondant 'bandanna,' which we had to hand paint in a paisley pattern. I kind of grossly underestimated how long that would take. 

The photos don't show that we did the birthday girl's name in fondant on the cake board, or the blue and red filling stripes. Would love to have had a photo of that.

EYES ON THE SKIES: This weekend, our eyes were on the skies from time to time.

We're lucky to have three airports near, so there's often something interesting overhead. 

Sunday, this helicopter was so near overhead, I could see its pilot and passenger. 

I kept my camera out on the deck on Sunday, knowing the Collings Foundation was selling flights out of Boeing Field. I was hoping to photo one of their beauties. 

Finally, late Sunday afternoon, I heard the rumble, and here it came!

The shadow in the lower left corner is our house eaves. It was that close!!

Behold, the B-17 Flying Fortress!

 Developed in the 1930 for the US Army Air Corps, this four-engine heavy bomber is a sight to behold. 

We also saw this B-24 Liberator overhead several times this weekend.  

Its split-tail design is very distinctive (below is not my photo, obviously!).

Treasures

GOODWILL HUNTING: We had a little time to kill between stops yesterday, so we visited what I think is the biggest and best Goodwill Industries store in Seattle, on Dearborn.

We headed to the far back first, where the books and records were. CJ came away with a couple new LPs. He didn't come home with this one I used to have back in the day. 

If it was a bargain for $4.47 in 1972 dollars, it's a real steal for $ .99 now. :)

We also hit up the electronics aisle, as always. There, I spied a NEW IN BOX Realistic CB. I just *had* to (carefully) take it out of box and get my hands on it. What a gem. I wanted to buy it so much. But, it was $59, and didn't have an antenna, so I super reluctantly passed.

I'm still dreaming about it, though, literally. Last night I had cool sci fi dreams about plugging it in and firing it up and voices from the mid 1970s coming through it. I'm tempted to write a book about it.

As we entered the figurine aisle, I quipped to the kids, "This is where the real gold is." Yesterday was no exception.

Naturally, there were horrifying clowns.

 

And this "I'm sorry" statuette is soooooooo Seventies.

We were nearly to the end of the aisle when I spied something wrinkly. Wait ... what's this?

A Shar-pei?!?! Be still CJ's heart!

Not only was it a Shar-pei statue, upon closer examination it appeared to have an electronic feature. It was batteries-not-included, though, so we had to wait until we got home to find out the Shar-pei is a motion detector that barks. The Hive Mind is Watching!

WHEN WORLDS COLLIDE: Via Space.com, we learned about all sorts of fun names being given to geological features on Charon, a moon of Pluto. 

There are Star Wars references, like Skywalker Crater, (Leia) Organa Crater, and the fun-to-say Vader Crater.

And there are Star Trek references, like the Uhura Crater, Kirk Crater, Sulu Crater and Spock Crater in Vulcan Planum. 

There's also Kubrick Mons (a hat tip to 2001: A Space Odyssey, among other works). 

These monikers have not yet been approved by the International Astronomical Union (IAU), but who would object?!

Image showing the provisional names being used by the New Horizons team for features on Pluto’s largest moon, Charon.  Credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Southwest Research Institute

MUSICAL HISTORY: Our history lesson today was a musical stroll down memory lane of one Sir Paul McCartney. McCartney's spin on James Corden's Carpool Karaoke is spectacular.

Not gonna lie, I teared up at least three times in the twenty minutes. Such a bright spot when such dark news is dominating the headlines right now.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QjvzCTqkBDQ

Of Weeds and Wizarding

SPELLBINDING: Wednesday afternoon, we headed down south the main library in Kent for a special Wizarding Wands Workshop. Part of King County Library System's Summer Reading Program, it was a drop in DIY session, led by library staff. The promo for it on the library website read, "Make it Magical. Make your own Wizarding World Wand. Design it yourself from our select magical materials, or get enchanting advice from senior wizards. Participants may bring their own patronus or messenger bird."

The kids used chopsticks as the base for their wands, and then used decorative tapes, gems, and other embellishments.

We hope to plug into many summer reading program workshops and events over the next couple of months!

JUST DANDY: Last weekend, we took on an enormous task: Digging out probably around 500 dandelions from our front yard.

The space was basically just a dandelion forest rather than grass lawn at this point. 

As we dug up the dandelions, we talked about a different world, where dandelions weren't viewed as the enemy. 

                              Elizabeth Blackwell, - A Curious Herbal, 1736, public domain

CJ did a little research. ...

Dandelions are plants characterized by their unique blossoms (the two most common forms being yellow florets, and the other form being a head of seeds). According to NatureNorth, the word "dandelion" is derived from "dent de lion," a phrase used in the French language used to refer to the plants. Whiledandelions are native to three different continents (Asia, Europe, and North America), two of the most common species worldwide, the "common dandelion" and the "red-seeded dandelion," are of European origin.

For most of their history, dandelions were not regarded as weeds, and were often used in medicine, according to the Maine Organic Farmers and Gardeners Association. In fact, grass was pulled in many a yard to make way for dandelions. However, at a certain point in the 20th century, public opinion of dandelions turned towards the negative. By the end of the century, pulling dandelions had become standard yard-keeping practice.

                                       Dandelion leaf photo by Greg Hume, via Wikimedia

A LITTLE HISTORY: Recently, we also took a couple minutes to watch an episode of "Nick on the Rocks," a video series hosted by Central Washington University professor Nick

The episode we watched was about ancient volcanoes in the Cascades.
In it, told us about geologists who have found places in the Cascades where Mount Rainier-like volcanoes once stood. Though the ancient volcanoes have disappeared, there are still many clues today about the long gone 'ghost volcanoes.'

All About Empathy

GOING TO CHURCH: Last night, we found our sweaty selves in church pews waiting for a professional football player. 

What? Why?

Former Seahawks' player Michael Bennett is on a book tour. Its title, "Things That Make White People Uncomfortable."

Bennett has a Super Bowl ring, is a three-time Pro Bowl defensive end, and is an in your face kind of activist. He is a tireless philanthropist, including donating all of his endorsement money and the proceeds from his jersey sales to fund health and education projects for poor and underserved youth and minority communities, and recently expanded his reach globally to support STEM programming in Africa.

Weir Harmon, executive director of Town Hall Seattle, handled the introductions for the evening, as well as reading audience questions later in the program.

The evening's interviewer was Jesse Hagopian, educator and author. Hagopian teaches Ethnic Studies and is the co-adviser to the Black Student Union at Garfield High School, and co-editor for the forthcoming book, Teaching for Black Lives, and is the editor of the book, More Than a Score: The New Uprising Against High-Stakes Testing.

Bennett had some friends in the house, including former teammate Bobby Wagner.

Here's what Annabelle has to say about the event. ... 

Michael Bennett’s book, “Things That Make White People Uncomfortable,” is focused on talking about racial issues that most tend to gloss over or glorify. The most recent Seattle Town Hall “Inside Out” event was about this book and allowed Michael Bennett to expand on some of the chapters and reasoning behind them. He described how the “N word” affected his childhood - he thought it was just a pronoun until someone in his class said it with hate, obviously directed towards him. He did some research and realized that this was a hate term, and he believes that by using it we are disrespecting the slaves and colored people that were beaten and referred to as that for their entire lives.

Michael also talked about how he believes that women and children may have even more struggles, and he is a feminist because women should have the same opportunities as men and shouldn’t feel even more oppressed. He mentioned that while he was writing his book, he took a lot of advice from his wife and they largely worked together on it.

The event is archived on YouTube, and it’s definitely worth a watch. It’s a very powerful message and teaches quite a bit about the history of stereotypes. The book can also be purchased on Amazon and through other book retailers.

And here's CJ's take on the evening. ...

Last night, in the sweltering summer sun, my family walked from our car to a the Seattle First Baptist Church in Central District. We had come for a presentation given by former Seahawk and Super Bowl champion Michael Bennett, accompanied by Jesse Hagopian, a history teacher at Garfield High School, also in the Central District. Bennett's presentation was to promote his book "Things That Make White People Uncomfortable" (TTMWPU). This is a bit of a misleading title, for reasons explained later.

Prior to the actual presentation, the audience was told that we could write questions down on slips of paper and hand them to volunteers coming through the pews, and (hopefully) have Bennett answer them. I asked the question "If there is one thing you want the audience to take away from this, what is it?" Bennett was not asked my question by the volunteer who read the questions aloud to him.

Throughout the talk between Bennett and Hagopian, a common theme was "empathy." At one point, Bennett said that he will sometimes hear about injustices committed against native Americans, against women, or against transgender people, and, while he is none of those three things, he can feel empathy for people other than him who have been wronged. In addition, Hagopian brought up a chapter of Bennett's book in which he names every unarmed American killed by police officers over the year prior to the book's publication. Bennett acknowledged that while many of the people named are black or brown, a portion of those named were Asian or white. Bennett said that all of their deaths meant tragedy for friends and family members.

Personally, I believe the name of the book (as well as the presentation) is misleading. During the 45-or-so minutes of the talk, Bennett did not say anything that made me uncomfortable. I cannot picture a reasonable human being uncomfortable at the thought of having empathy for people who are different than you.

However, I was uncomfortable at the event. Not because of anything Bennett said though. ... 

but because of the face-melting heat in the old church with no AC. 

And now, a couple of words about the venue. The event was held at Seattle First Baptist Church, 111 Harvard Ave.

According to the church's website, the church has three building, including its historic Sanctuary, for which the cornerstone was placed in 1910, and the first service took place in 1912.  It has been renovated several times over the years, with the addition of a chapel, stained-glass windows

The church actually pre-dates its building, however. Per their website, Seattle First Baptist Church was founded in December, 1869, by 11 members who first met in the home of Abigail Hanford.  New members were baptized in Elliott Bay. Brr!

We've driven by this church so many times, and admired its sky-high spire.

As we were exiting last night, we noticed Bennett, Wagner and Hagopain were out on the balcony.

We waved at them and they waved back (see Bennett's blurred hand below). ;)

https://youtu.be/_6461SRmEqA



We happened to experience this event on Juneteenth. Here's a video explaining a little more about that. 

Stop and Listen

CAN WE TALK?: Tonight, we were fortunate to be able to attend a presentation by former Seahawks' player Michael Bennett.

Eloquent, thoughtful, and provocative, Bennett is on tour promoting his book "Things that Make White People Uncomfortable."

I have more photos, and we all have many thoughts about the evening. Stay tuned for more tomorrow.

IS THERE A DOCTOR IN THE HOUSE?  Today, a Facebook friend posted a photo of a dude supposedly performing surgery on himself.

Rather than just 'liking' it, I suspected it might be fake, and I decided to Google it. Turns out the story was about Russian surgeon Leonid Rogozov, and it was legit.

After seeing the photo (above), I Googled "man who performed surgery on himself in the Arctic" and found this headline: The man who cut out his own appendix
by Sara Lentati of BBC World Service. 

So, sure enough, during an expedition to the Antarctic, Rogozov became seriously ill and diagnosed himself in need of an appendectomy.  Rogozov was part of the sixth Soviet Antarctic expedition, a team of 12, far, far from civilization. 

One thing I learned today is that appendectomies are now compulsory for Antarctic explorers from some countries, and some medical professionals have suggested any future astronauts leaving the Earth to form a colony on Mars or the Moon have an appendectomy before exiting Earth.

Fortunately, Rogozov's story had a happy ending. He recovered completely from his surgery, and lived for decades afterward!

Almost Summer

ALMOST SUMMER: Ever since we've lived in Seattle, a 'summer's coming' activity has always been heading to the International Fountain at Seattle Center to cool off on the year's first 'super' hot day. 

It was about 85 F today, and so we thought it time to hit the water.

The photo above doesn't show it, but the place was super crowded! There were multiple graduations going on at adjacent Key Arena, so hundreds of graduates and their families were standing by the fountain and the Space Needle back drop for photo opportunities. I told the kids to photobomb as many of them as possible. ;)

AMELIA'S CLUB: Friday night, Annabelle slept over at The Museum of Flight. Lucky girl! I'd love to do that!

Following, she'll tell you a bit about that. 

At the Amelia’s Aero Club sleepover this year, there was a variety of cool things to see. As soon as we arrived (and after a brief “name game”) we went to the Challenger learning center, which had been turned into a mock-up of a Mars Transport Vehicle, or “MTV.” The group split into two, one for the MTV and the other at Mission Control on Deimos. Each person got their own role/station such as medical, navigation, or remote operated vehicles (ROV). For our first mission, I was the weather specialist on the MTV. My primary mission was to locate a dead satellite that had been orbiting the planet and radio the location to mission control. However, on my way to doing that, I found an asteroid in the sky grid! The asteroid was headed straight from our landing site, which gave us only a few minutes to land, refuel, and leave immediately.

This caused a problem for our next mission, where a team of geologists had been separated from the mars base by the crater and the nearby greenhouse was damaged, risking years of research if not saved. This time I was in mission control, and by communicating with the weather personnel on the MTV, we were able to track a nearby dust storm and determine it was not a problem for the geologists or the rover that was planned for launch. The geologist team went to the greenhouse and saved the plants, all returning to the mars base safely (except one member who had heat stroke but made a full recovery later). The rover launched on time and went into the crevices of Mars to look for signs of life and/or water.

After that, everyone regrouped and began making rockets from 2-liter soda bottles. These rockets were launched the next day with nothing but seltzer water and a bike pump. We all took turns either making rockets with our partners or going to check out the crew cabin of the space shuttle trainer. The cabin is very small, being only two rooms: one mostly empty save for a 1-foot “kitchen” (hot water/microwave) and Velcro on the walls to hold sleeping bags. The second room is predictably the control room, with a pilot and co-pilot seat surrounded by more than 7,000 buttons and switches. This part is usually closed to the public, so it was a treat to be able to enter it without needing a special reservation!

The final thing we did was trek to the World Wars gallery to watch the movie “Arrival”. The movie is about a mysterious yet peaceful race of aliens known as “heptopods” and how they help the protagonist overcome the loss of her daughter. With microwave popcorn in hand, the movie ran until past 1 AM. The World War gallery, while uncomfortable to sleep in, was the best we could do at the time and ended up being mostly okay. There were plans to get up early and explore at night, but we were all so tired that no-one woke up in time. Overall, the sleepover was fun and, even if you can’t attend a future sleepover, I recommend checking out both the Shuttle trainer cabin and the movie “Arrival.”

Saturday morning, I headed to the museum to watch the launch of the rockets the club had created. I got there a little early, so spent a few minutes alone with Michael P. Anderson. 

This lovely statue of the Washington state native is a tribute to a man gone too soon. Anderson was on board shuttle Columbia, which burned up upon re-entry back in 2003. I remember standing in Fred Meyer south of Portland, in their audio/video section, watching the horrific coverage of the event. I was very pregnant with CJ at the time.

I've seen the statue many times, but never really studied it before. It is lovely. The detail is phenomenal. 

 Right down to the mission patch, Anderson's name patch, and the strap on his flight suit.

The base of the statue says "Keep the Dream Alive." That's just what the girls were doing Saturday morning. 

The grass next to the fallen astronaut's statue was where the girls launched their rockets. Below is a photo of the one Annabelle and friends made.

Not bragging, but I have to admit, their rocket flew the highest. Annabelle said that's because each group got 40 pumps on the bicycle pump, and she made sure to use the full length of the pump each time, to get the most power. :). Go Bee!

SWEET SATURDAY: Friday and Saturday next week, we were a little busy, making 5 different kids of cake. It was for a cupcake buffet for a friend's graduation party. 

We made some Elvis cakes - banana cupcakes with peanut butter buttercream topped with a whopper of a chocolate covered peanut butter candy.

 We also made some summery strawberry lemon cupcakes.

 A little something for the adult palate, we made some chocolate cupcakes with a healthy splash of red wine in them. 

 And for our vegan and gluten free friends, there were chocolate coconut cupcakes, with yummy toasted coconut on top.

And we made a cupcake cake. :) Purple velvet with raspberry puree, the cupcake 'wrapper' was actually a solid candy melt shell, and entirely edible!

Not sure why it looks so blue in the photo, it was definitely lavender.