Weeks worth of updating

I've had a lot of fun and stress over the past few weeks, which has prevented me from doing a lot of things; namely, blogging and doing my workout.

First things first, the bad stuff. I always like hearing the worst because it makes the best seem so much better. Simply put, I have too much work to do at work and it's making life very stressful and sort of miserable. I'm behind by days and I can't make myself do too much work over the weekends. But, help is on the way; I'm to get a new minion this week (hopefully).

Also, I just found out my mom had to go to the hospital in Greece, but I hear she'll be ok. Breathing complaints.

On to the fun!

Last weekend, I went camping with the Taxpayers and friends. I wasn't supposed to be the only girl, but Trisina fell ill right before the trip, so the only females present were me and Sasha (Rob's dog), who doesn't really count (except to Max). I still had fun though, even though I had really been looking forward to getting to know Trisina. We hiked about eight miles up Zigzag Mountain to Burnt Lake, which is a beautiful, warm lake full of crayfish at the top of a mountain. Rob fished, Nathan and I swam, John caught a crayfish which Chris took pictures of. We ate smores and drank tea and ate lentils. A camping neighbor brought us her leftover rice. We hiked back down the next day, for a total of about 15 to 16 miles with 25 pounds on my back (27 for Nathan). I can't find a calorie calculator that will tell me how many calories I burned doing that. Should I just add 25 pounds to my own weight? How does one calculate for the ascent and descent? To ford the river on the way back, I took my pants off - which made it the first time I've ever done that in public but not the last time that I did so that day.

After we got home from camping, we dropped the boys off, dropped Max off, and headed back over to the Sea Shanty (Rob's house) for a party involving touring bands. Lesbian touring bands, in specific. The lineup was the Taxpayers, Hey There Cowboy, Fixed Gears are for Jerks and Lesbians, and the Pussy Pirates. All the bands were awesome, and I took tons of pictures. The Pussy Pirates were the highlight of the evening. They called a pants-off party, and I obliged because it was about 100 degrees in Rob's garage. Still hot, I also removed my shirt. I've never been so nude in public without having a bathing suit on. But apparently, when you get old and matronly, you just don't care about modesty anymore. Pics from the show are here. Pics from a party the Taxpayers played the other night are here. I think my photographic style is improving. I'm taking fewer, but better pictures. Not to mention the other night I caught my personal photographic holy grail - a band member doing one of the traditional punk show jumps.

Other than that, it's been work work work. Also, I have house guests from North Carolina that have provided me some mental diversion from the pain of work. Don't worry Kira, the spare room is reserved for you and Barry later this week.