Tuesday, July 10, 2007

Back to the Rat Race

I made it back from Oregon safe and sound. It was pretty hilarious comparing my take off from Oregon VS my landing in LA - trees and mountains VS packed housing and freeways & smog as far as the eye can see. Luckily it's a quick flight! It was nice to be home. More Oregon pics below, but first...
Work was nice enough to treat me, Kirsten and Lisa to a special advance screening of Harry Potter & the Order of the Phoenix. Whew, that's a mouthful! It was excellent, I really enjoyed it. Of couse, I didn't read the book, but Kirsten and Lisa are huge fans and said it was very true to the book (except for leaving some things out of course).
It's definitely the darkest of all the HP movies, and I felt it was definitely a departure from the previous ones in that it doesn't include a lot of the standard HP elements (like a Cribbage game). Overall it's very well done, acted, scripted, and of course the FX are great.
If you can, see it on the IMAX screen! They even did the last 20 minutes in 3D! I recommend it if you've enjoyed any of the HP movies.
While home in OR I saw Ratatouille with the family...


It's so cute! Pixar does it again.... it's not as amazingly good as The Incredibles or Finding Nemo, but it's very well done and has lots of laughs. The animation of course has jumped up another level, some of the scenes look photo real. Definitely worth seeing!

So we had planned to go whitewater rafting on Saturday.... welllllllllll Mother Nature had a slightly different plan in store for us. On Friday night the emergency broadcast came on - NOT A TEST - and said a strong thunderstorm was moving through the exact area of the state we were headed to go rafting the next day. Then, the kicker, was they said to expect hail up to 3/4 of an inch, and to PROTECT YOUR LIVESTOCK! HAHAHAHAA Yes, Dorothy we ain't in Kansas no more. So, suffice it to say it sorta gave bad mojo to being on class 4 rapids shooting down the river if you were being brained by hail the size of golf balls. Notsofun. Thankscomeagain.

Ended up going to Indian for dinner on Friday night, which was very delicious....
But unfortch WAY too filling!

Yes, it's not pretty, but it's how I felt. I'm naming my belly Saag Paneer & Naan. It's unconventional, but fitting - unlike my belt. (awwww)
Note Mom's hysterical laughter and my unpleasant superfull feeling that emanates from this photo. Thanks for the support MOM.
"Why'd we have to eat there? I think I'm never eating again..."
And yes, Mom was going for the fan-on-the-model look.
"You're a tiger! Pounce! Hate the camera! LOVE the camera! Scratch!"

Here's a nice pic of downtown Ashland - nothing that purty in LA, even on a set...
Look a park with a lake! Look, trees! Real ones too!
Next up, HELLGATE:


Instead of rafting we went on a jet boat tour to "Hellgate Canyon" which turned out to be a lot of fun. They go super fast (four Chevy 357-something engines and 100 gallons of fuel, WOO!) and part of the ride is that they will randomly slam the brakes on the boat, causing it to careen forward, and a MASSIVE wave to come up over the front, thus soaking the tourists inside. We thought we were being smart to sit in the 3rd row and thus not get as drenched as the 1st row... welllllllll apparently the waves enjoy DUMPING on the 3rd row, especially if you are TALL. Joy.

Yeah, I was soaked to the bone for the entire ride. :) Luckily it was hot out!

Altho after a bit I was like "OK, enough with the water in my FACE!"

Pretty!

Volcanic!

Crazy! Yes, that is a dude jumping from the rock cliff. Click for a closer look.
At least he was wearing a life jacket - there are usually quite a few deaths each year from people swimming (drinking beer) in the river and drowning. Does clean up the gene pool a bit tho.

Bye bye Hellgate!
Mom doesn't stop posing.... ever.
"Shop at the Sunglass Hut for your family's eyecare needs!"

So now for the last of the home pics - you know I made mention of the crazy ass wild turkeys that were up in the trees, scaring the living bejeezus out of me when I was outside... I wasn't freaking kidding! Bast chased all of them at one point, there were like 20 around the house. I caught a few pics of them on the last day:

You can click the image for a closer look. I wasn't making this up! They look cute and all, till you get close and see they are basically mobile death machines. Wild turkeys = nature's not so silent killer.
Bye bye woods!
BYE BYE WOOOOOOOOOOODS!
Bast was quite mad at me for leaving. :( She even whined/howled.

HAPPY SUMMER!

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