01/02/2009  Partly cloudy, 28-35
Another little snowstorm overnight traced every branch and twig in white. While I was out taking pictures the stratocumulus overcast began to break up and we were graced with a few sunbreaks. By afternoon the air warmed up and all the snow around the house disappeared. I took advantage of the bright conditions to snap a few photos with the 80-400 zoom. The minimum exposure to get reasonably sharp shots with that lens seems to be 1/250 at f11 using ISO 400, which pretty much requires midday sunlight or very bright overcast. Occasionally I can get a decent picture at 1/50 or slower though, tempting me to chase our yardbirds even on the more typical gray days.
I added Susan to my Y membership today, then we went swimming together, as we had been doing once or twice a week in December before things got too busy around Christmas.

01/07/2009  Ovc, rain, 40
Today, the second of two days of continuous rain, we received 1.6 inches on top of 2.7 inches yesterday. That's close to a two-day record for us. Rivers are flooding around western Washington, with the Tolt and Snoqualmie predicted to set new records, and possibly the Newaukem and Chehalis rivers down Pat's way as well. That could make for some good agate hunting next week, one of the few bright benefits of this radical weather. Centralia and Chehalis are bracing for severe flooding and I-5 is expected to close sometime this evening, hopefully after Daniel comes through on his way home from Bend. He drove down to Eugene to visit a friend for a few days then drove over Santiam Pass to Bend to stay with another friend and do some snowboarding at Bachelor. Unfortunately conditions at Bachelor were so bad the mountain closed and he wasn't able to do any riding. Now he's headed home, hoping to beat the I-5 closure. I-90 and the other passes are already closed due to extreme avalanche danger.
David and I drove around in the morning to inspect the flooding then I got out my kayak and tried paddling in the ditches. The puddle at the foot of the driveway was a little too shallow, so I portaged down our road and put in where water was running across the road. I couldn't really paddle across the road but it made a good photo (by David). I climbed over the fence and paddled across the field and back, then down the ditch to the culvert and up the stream, dodging alders. Mother and daughter in the house with the garden and swingset came out to take pictures of the kayaker in their creek.
(Later) Daniel arrived home about 7PM to report that he was the last northbound vehicle on I-5 before the DOT closed it between Hwy 12 eastbound at exit 68 and westbound at exit 88. Hwy 12 is also closed both directions due to mudslides, as are about 60 other roads around western Washington. Approaching exit 68 Daniel noticed that the traffic was speeding up despite the heavy rain and poor visibility. When a DOT vehicle passed him going 80, then slowed down ahead of him and turned on its flashing lights, Daniel accelerated and re-passed the DOT car. Shortly afterwards he reached the Hwy 12 exit where two other DOT trucks were pulling over with their lights flashing. Daniel passed them too and kept on going, and when he looked back, there were no other cars behind him. He figured he'd better not be the last car so he drove hard, following a fast pickup in front of him, and passed a number of cars and trucks in the next few miles. Looking out on either side of the freeway all the fields were flat, dark and shiny; everything was underwater but the roadway. There was only one section where water was encroaching on the freeway itself but most of the exits were blocked. Cars were being directed off the freeway at one exit but the pickup ahead of him kept going so Daniel did too. Lots of lights at the blockade on the southbound lanes at exit 88 but northbound traffic was being allowed to continue. Adrenaline kept him awake the rest of the drive home. Susan was very relieved that he made it through.

01/13/2009  Mostly cloudy, 47  Up an agate creek, part 1  
Photo Gallery
The flooding last week, though not as bad as predicted, still promised good agate-hunting on the re-worked gravel bars of the tributaries of the Newaukum River. We were late getting down there though. Pat and Shirley drove up to Lucas Creek on Sabbath afternoon and found a crowd of cars lining the logging roads near the creek. He reported that gravel bars were already exposed even though the water was still high and murky. We decided to wait a couple more days to let the water come down and and hopefully expose a few agates that the early birds missed.
Daniel and David came with me. Whether or not they have a knack for picking the right days to come agate hunting, I'm not sure, but they sure picked the right day today. We left here around 7, joined Pat for a little extra breakfast then drove over and parked where the county road bends up the hill, about a quarter mile above the big culvert on the main stem of the creek. We walked past the gate about a quarter mile then dropped into the creek. Didn't find anything but tracks below the first tributary. Lots of new mud in the floodplain - the creek must have really been up. We soon discovered why. About 0.3 miles above the first tributary, elevation about 650', we ran into a 10' high wall of logs and brush which spanned the whole creek valley. The boys scrambled up on top of the log jam while Pat and I worked our way up around one side. What a sight! A sea of logs filled the valley from one side to the other for more than 100 yards upstream. Above it Lucas Creek meandered in braided channels down a level floodplain of gravel devoid of any vegetation. Buried under all that gravel and debris was the most productive section of one of the best agate streams in the state. On the other hand, there was lots of new gravel exposed. Too bad we weren't the first ones to search it.
We started finding agate right away as we hiked up the gravel bars above the log jam. Daniel was the first to find a good-sized chunk, then I spotted a large rounded cobble at the edge of the stream. It was pitted like vesicular basalt but a little rougher and appeared dark gray with just a hint of red. As I stooped to inspect it more closely I realized it was a very large agate; the end which had been buried in the gravel was broken and the smooth, semi-gloss surface of the fracture was very dark red. It was nearly 8" long and 4-5" in diameter, certainly the largest chunk of carnelian I'd ever found. It would not be the largest of the day though.
That agate was nearly in the same spot as the 5" slab of carnelian I found back in 1996 after the big floods that year. I recognized the potholes in the blue-gray clay of the streambed. The second tributary M+ was where the log jam had come from, scouring the slope on either side of the narrow valley up to 10 feet above the stream and leaving nothing but mud, rocks and woody debris in its wake. The subsequent heavy rain and high water had washed the gravel bars clean and left quite a few chunks of red and orange agate exposed. The tracks we'd been following continued only a short distance up the tributary; beyond that point we were the first on the scene and we found some spectacular agates. Daniel found the largest, a 17 lb cylindrical gray and orange nodule up to 5" in diameter and more than a foot long. By contrast, my dark red cobble weighed in at only 6 lbs. By the time we stopped for lunch about a half mile up the tributary (about 100 yds above the clearcut on the north side of the creek), we'd found more agate than we ever expected to. Just while I was eating my lunch I walked back down the stream 50 yards or so and found another chunk of carnelian larger than anything I'd found ever found on previous trips. What an incredible day!
A few hundred yards above our lunch spot we found a 30 foot waterfall where the stream cascades over a rounded wall of basalt. The boys and I scrambled up while Pat decided to search back down the valley. About 0.3 miles above the waterfall we emerged into a recent clearcut. Agate was scarce from that point on up. At about 1400' I found the source of the mudflow, a multi-level slump of deep reddish soil in a stand of young timber about 500' above the upper edge of the clearcut. The slump area appeared to be about 50 yards across. Unobstructed as it crossed the steep clearcut, the mudflow had been able to build enough momentum to take out all the trees and brush in its path once it entered the forested portion of the stream valley, through which it had flowed over a mile before the gentler gradient and more mature forest along the main stem of the creek had succeeded in stopping it. Devastating for the riparian ecosystem but fortuitous for the first agate hunters to show up.
Pat was waiting for us back at our lunch spot. We sorted through our agates and filled our packs. Pat carried his out in a 4-gallon bucket. His arms and shoulders were pretty sore by the time he got back to the car. Our packs got heavier on the way down as we came across agates we'd dropped on the way up. Shirley fixed us all spaghetti for supper. I was hoarse from shouting all day about the agates we were finding, and exhausted from the hike and little sleep last night so David had to finish driving home.
A note on the river level: The Newaukum gauge was at 5.96ft (1.91kcfs) at 20:00 hours on the chart, noon local time. At that level Lucas Creek was easy to ford in most places with hip boots but could only be crossed in a few spots with mid-shin muck rubber boots. Visibility was only a few inches in the water so we didn't find much in the creek.

01/15/2009  Sun w/ fog, 35-50 Up an agate creek, part 2

Pat, David and I hiked back up Lucas Creek to search for agates in the creek under the assumption that the water would have come down significantly. It had. The Newaukum gauge read 4.92ft, 1.24kcfs at 20:00 hours and David didn't have much trouble finding places to cross the creek in my Muck boots. The water had cleared up some too, to where we could discern rocks 6" under running water fairly easily. The foggy overcast was breaking up when we parked at the bend in the county road. The forecast called for sun with highs in the mid-50's but sun didn't reach down into the creek valley and frost flowers were blooming on dead branches. Neither flowers nor frost, the pallid white "blooms" look like clumps of white fur growing out of the damp wood. Some of the individual "hairs" were two inches long. Also called "angel hair ice", I've seen photos of it posted on Flickr but haven't encountered it in person except along shady creeks on cold January days in southwestern Washington.
Someone had moved the elk hide and bones which had been dumped in front of the gate prior to our previous visit. We wondered if that someone had hiked up the creek yesterday agate hunting. There didn't seem to be any new tracks in the mud on the creek banks but when we reached the gravel bars above the log jam, we knew someone had been there. Two days ago a broken plastic bag with several small gray agates scattered around it had been lying near a stout stick propped upright in the gravel. Today the bag was still there but the agates and stick were gone.
It appeared that whoever had come in yesterday didn't hike far up the slide creek. Two days ago we'd left some good-sized agates sitting on rocks along the stream and most of those seemed to be where we'd left them, including two large chunks of seam agate. I estimated that the one I'd found weighed about 50lbs and Pat's about 35lbs. We'd left them sitting on the gravel bar where we'd found them and today those two pieces were also undisturbed. The seam agate occurs in large angular blocks which are often brightly colored, usually white, yellow and orange but some pieces have lots of red as well. The color often extends all the way through the pieces. Unfortunately the seam agate generally breaks up when cut and doesn't usually show attractive patterns. It makes nice yard rock but since we're more interested in cutting and polishing the agates, we usually don't haul the seam agate home.
We stopped again at our lunch spot where a battered alder trunk spears out over the creek from the left side. Despite reminding myself this morning not to leave my lunch in the car I left my lunch in the car, so I ate a bar I found in the pocket of my pack and a yam that David gave me. While the others finished eating I made a cairn with some of my agate, hoping the sun would come out to illuminate it. A few minutes after we started up the creek again the sun finally did come out. David basked on a sunny mudbank to warm up; he'd been uncomfortably cold all morning. No insulation. Pat and David explored up towards the landslide while I scrutinized the gravel bars for agates we'd missed. I found only a few new pieces but two of them were big geodes . The larger one was about 3/4 enclosed by a 3/4" rind of red agate; the other was unbroken but the agate skin looks very thin. Pat also found a large quartz-filled agate with a gray rind.
On the way back down to the lunch spot I was thinking that we'd probably found about all the large agates we were going to find in that section of the creek, and right after that I stepped over a 6" gray agate with a white quartz center, then a minute or so later, another intact 4" nodule. So maybe there are a few more large ones to find. Many of the agates I found today were either at the edge of the stream or actually underwater, including the bright one in these photos.
David waited for me while I sorted my agates at the lunch spot and filled my pack. David kindly carried out one of my larger pieces along with Pat's large agate. Definitely a burdened boy. The hike out took us 40 minutes. I saw agates everywhere I looked on the way down to the log jam. Though none of the good ones were as large as our bigger specimens, I was glad that the next people up the creek would have something to find.
Shirley served us kidney beans and corn bread for supper and a delicious berry cobbler with a topping made of cake mix and Sprite. I would not have guessed that something so tasty could be made with soda pop.

01/17/2009  Sun w/ fog, 30-45 Up an agate creek, part 3

Despite going to bed at 1AM, I woke up at 5:30 and started thinking how I could get down to Lucas Creek, get some more photographs of the hair ice, bicycle in via a logging road I'd seen on the map and do a quick look around for some agate and still make it back to Tacoma by 11AM when I needed to pick Daniel up at school. Why not? I thought I could leave by 6 but it was closer to 7 by the time I got packed up with my bike and ready to go.
It turns out the drive down to Lucas Creek is pretty close to 90 miles; it took me a little over an hour and a half. A maroon and gray pickup was already parked in our spot, and two other cars, a white Altima and a baby blue older van, were parked out by the other branches of the creek. The bike ride in only took about 15 minutes. It's a pretty steep climb but I was motivated. I stashed the bike at the first landing after the road emerges from the uncut woods and turns to the right along the edge of the clearcut on the south side of the landslide fork of the creek. 1.6 miles from the gate. The scramble down the steep hill to the creek wasn't too bad either, and I dropped into the creek right at our lunch spot. The hike back up was much tougher, 500' by the map at a 40% grade. I think it took me 20 minutes, twice as long as the ride out even though I walked part of the hill on the way down because I was afraid my worn-out brake pads wouldn't hold. On the way down I met a man on horseback leading a mule. He told me that the landslide had taken out the road as well, so he was on his way up to clear a trail around the slide, then would descend via the road which comes out by the first culvert. He also reported that there were numerous other landslides up in the hills. Might be worth checking those out someday.
Even though I was a little late, I stopped on the way out to get my photos of the hair ice along the north branch of the creek where taller timber shades the floodplain. Hair ice only flowers in the shade. Back out on the North Fork road I called home and found out that Daniel didn't need to be picked up until 3PM, so I had a few more hours to kill. I called Pat but he wasn't feeling well so I decided to go back in for another look around.
The ridge was no longer sunny; the valley fog had crept up into the hills. Seeking easier access to the creek, I biked in a little farther, about 2 miles, and followed a game trail down the ridge into the creek. It was easier, well worth the somewhat longer bike ride. On the way I met a rockhound named John. He showed me a chunk of seam agate he'd picked up, along with several small nodules. I showed him the couple of nodules I'd just picked up and explained that I'd bicycled in and hiked down through the clearcut, which was why I was hiking down the creek rather than up. Not feeling sociable, I turned around when I spotted two more rockhounds ahead of me down the creek. It was getting to be time to go back up the hill anyhow. Figuring out where to hike back up into the clearcut proved to be a little difficult. To avoid overtaking John again, I started up into the clearcut prematurely and had to cross an extra gully to get onto my ridge. Still easier than my initial route. Back on top I took a few photos and ate a bit of lunch before heading down.
I met Doug bicycling up the road with a gallon jug of water just before I reached the car. He's a rockhound few years older than I am who lives pretty much full time in his pickup truck up at Lucas Creek. The boys and I met him back in 1995 when we first started looking for agates in that area. He had showed us one of his digging spots and some of the agates he'd found - big crimson chunks of carnelian. That was the moment I joined the Lucas Creek fan club. This morning he reported that the fan club was parked all along the road but he was taking the day off. He doesn't explore much in the creek anyhow because his rubber boots leak. He digs up in the hills instead. He has several digging spots, most of them known only to himself though it sounds like one of them is in the clearcut on the north side of the landslide fork just downstream from our lunch spot.

01/22/2009  Ovc then sun, 30-40 Up an agate creek, part 4

Pat and I headed up the Slide Fork of Lucas Creek again to see how much agate is left after the Treasure Hunting Wiki trip up there last Saturday. We bicycled in the route they took, following the Weyerhaeuser road (on the left 0.2 miles past the first culvert) up about a mile to where a grassy spur road angles off to the right. From there it is about 0.2 miles down to a landing from which the junction of the Slide Fork with the Main Stem is visible through the woods. We didn't have any difficulty finding smaller agates in and along the Slide Fork of the creek, even in the lower sections. I kept two or three pieces before we stopped for lunch at the rich gravel bar about 100 yds below our previous lunch spot, including an intact 3" gray nodule right on the gravel bar. Pat found a nice pale gray "limb cast" type of nodule about 7" long in the creek.
After lunch we worked our way up past the waterfall. I found several more decent pieces between the waterfall and the clearcut, including a big orange nodule, 8"x10"x5", unfortunately broken at both ends revealing fairly uniform light gray agate inside. That one was mostly buried in the gravel bar and I almost didn't bother to pry it out, thinking it was probably seam agate. Glad I checked. Nearby I found another round chunk about 5" in diameter, hard to tell what might be inside but it does show some greenish agate in a few places on the outside.
After that I started photographing agates as I found them. I wish I'd been doing that all along but it's difficult to manipulate the camera when already juggling a shovel and a doubled-up Walmart bag half full of rocks and maybe lugging another big nodule, particularly when my hands are usually both wet and muddy. My idea was to photograph the keepers, but often I couldn't tell ahead of time which ones would be keepers, and then when one of the agates I photographed turned out to be a good one, I was usually too excited to take another picture of it after I pried it out of the gravel bar or pulled it out of the creek.
When we reached the clearcut it was already 3PM and Pat was thinking we should turn around but I wanted to continue up across the clearcut . We decided to go another half hour. Again we didn't find much in the clearcut, though I did find a nice orange piece above it. When we reached the landslide Pat started down while I scrambled up to the top of the slide.
The slide originated in the backslope of a road at 1500'. Composed mostly of saturated soil with very little rock, it slid across the road then apparently triggered a slump of the downslope. About 150' of the slope gave way and dropped into the stream gully, creating a flood 15-30' deep which swept away all vegetation as it passed through. Where it entered the clearcut the flow swept about 40' up the left hand side of the stream gully then banked off a small ridge and shot out in a broad arc over the clearcut above the other side of the stream, leaving behind a blanket of mud a couple of feet deep as evidence that the flow was already both very fluid and very swift at that point, which is just a few hundred yards below where it started.
I caught up to Pat by taking a shortcut across the clearcut but lost him again when I went back to retrieve a big geode that I'd set on a log on the way up, then missed on the way back down. By the time I started down the falls it was 4:40 and the sun was starting to set. I caught up to Pat again at our lunch spot and we hustled on down the creek. The hike up to the landing was an effort after a long day but the ride back down the road didn't take long; I think it was 5:25 and starting to get dark when we reached the cars.

01/23/2009  Ovc and fog, 30-35 Up an agate creek, part 5
I bicycled up alone today to explore a couple of feeder creeks. Pat couldn't make it so I lingered over breakfast with him and Shirley and didn't start up until 11AM, by which time there were already six cars parked between the culvert and the Weyerhaeuser road in. I later learned that four of the cars were with a Treasure Hunting Wiki outing but I didn't meet anyone where I was above the waterfall. I bicycled up a logging road and explored a couple of the feeder streams, finding a few nodules and a fair number of colorful but smaller pieces. I left the smaller pieces, along with a large piece of a broken geode which had a bright red rind enclosing white quartz. It was pretty but I didn't know what I would do with it, so I left it.
By mid-afternoon I ended up in the landslide creek, searching for agate for the second or third time on that section of the creek. I didn't expect to find much new material and I didn't, except for one previously undisturbed 7" dark gray nodule which I didn't spot until I'd stepped over it at least twice. That was a nice bonus. It didn't appear that anyone else had been up there yet because all the agate we left along the creek was still there.
The hike back up the hill warmed me up enough to tolerate the chilly ride back down. I don't think the air temperature ever made it much above freezing all day.

01/25/2009  Mcd, 30-34, 1/2" new snow in AM   Yours Truly 50K
Today was the first date for the Cedar River running of the Yours Truly 50K, and the first time I've seen some of my Maniac friends since the Skagit Valley marathon last September. It was cold. I told the dozen or so runners about the course change and got them on their way then bicycled down the course after them to put up a sign at the turnaround, riding hard to warm up. By the time I got back to the start again and set out to run my one lap of the course, I was warm. And tired - my legs felt heavy and slow for most of the 8 miles. Near the finish I met up with Monte and walked back a half mile with him, getting caught up on the last four months. As soon as I finished my run I drove home to get lunch - didn't have time to take it over in the morning because I didn't pack anything up last night. At least I got the chili made though. I was back at the start with lunch on the Coleman stove before any of the 50K runners finished.
Most of the runners stayed for chili and hot chocolate and even so, I had way too much of both. Only Monte hadn't come in when I left to pick up my sign and some aid that Dan Pfunder left at the turnaround. My second ride of the course was almost as cold as my first; I rode much of it no-hands so I could hold my hands out of the wind.
Here's the list of everything I used for the race.

01/27/2009  Ovc, mid-40's 

I'm really pleased with the 70-300 lens. It's lightweight, quick to focus and quite sharp even hand-held as slow as 1/20th of a second. The flicker was shot at 1/5 second, the others at about 1/30, though on most of the shots I was bracing the camera on the porch railing, so they're probably not truly representative of what the vibration reduction can do. I've now used the 70-300 to photograph most of the different birds that have been visiting our feeders recently. The towhees still elude me - they've been staying in the shadows most of the time. The Purple Finch showed up just recently and seems to be missing feathers around both eyes. I'm still not 100% sure it isn't a House Finch because we have another reddish finch which seems intermediate between the two.
With the Purple Finch, we are now up to 28 yardbirds for the year, including our first Northern Harrier on New Year's Day, a Peregrine Falcon flyover on the 9th and a Great Horned Owl hooting down in the woods the past several evenings. I was hoping to get the White-throated Sparrow I last saw before the December snowstorms as a yardbird for 2009 but it seems to have moved on.
On another topic, I attempted to add up the weight of all the agate which has been reported as taken out of Lucas Creek in the past two weeks and came up with a total of about 2200lbs, a remarkable haul. That figure is almost certainly low too, because I used only what I either know about or have seen reported on the Treasure Hunting Wiki. I suspect that the actual number is 50% or more higher, which would be at least a ton and a half. Very impressive, especially considering that almost all of that is surface collecting from the various branches of the creek.
On yet another topic, I made Indian Pudding today for the first time in many years. John usually makes it when we visit New Hampshire, but I don't think even he has made it the past couple of times we've been back there. It wasn't as difficult as I remembered and it used up about half of the excess milk we bought for the hot chocolate for the Yours Truly 50K race. Here's the Indian Pudding recipe.

01/29/2009  pc, 38-42 Up an agate creek, part 6
Pat and I bicycled up today to explore a couple more feeder creeks and to retrieve the big chunk of seam agate which I discovered on my last trip. Pat set out ahead of me because he walks his bicycle up the hills; it took me 20 minutes to catch up to him . For the first time bicycling in recently, I was actually warm and had to stop part way up to tie the upper part of my coveralls around my waist. First time I've tried the coveralls too, the idea being to slip more easily through the brush, and they worked great. Not only do they shed the stickerbushes well but they also have lots of pockets to fill with agate.
While I was exploring the upper reaches of feeder #2, Pat went on to feeder #3 (2.5 mi from the car) and hiked some distance up it without finding anything. He reported that there was very little agate in that creek. I met him back on the road and we continued on past feeder #3.5 at 2.7 miles to #4, now known as Fingertip Creek, at 2.9 miles.
We looked in the creek and the big orange seam agate was still where I found it.Pat had tweaked his knee bushwhacking back down through the clearcut after hiking up #3 so I offered to carry it out for him. It was a challenge. I had figured it at about 80lbs and after lifting it out of the creek, I think that might be low. I picked it up and stumbled up out of the creek with it, enjoying the challenge of getting it across the steep slope and out the 50 feet or so to the road. I don't remember exactly what happened next, but as I recall I was stepping sideways across the hill, facing uphill and carrying the rock in front of me, when my foot slipped and I dropped the rock to the ground. Because it was above me and I didn't want to lose control of it, I didn't let go of it when I slipped and it landed on the third and little fingers of my left hand. My hand immediately went numb from the impact. Since I was wearing blue nitrile gloves I couldn't see if there was any damage so I figured I'd better check to make sure I hadn't broken anything. The third finger was OK, but when I felt the little finger, there was a gap near the end, then a soft little bump at the tip of the glove. Immediately I thought "This can't be good." I peeled off the glove and the last centimeter of my pinkie was dangling from a bloody stump by a thin white thread. The thread seemed to be attached to the center of the amputated tip, "a nerve", I thought, though I couldn't feel anything but shock in the stump and the tip had no feeling at all. The sharp edge of the big agate had pinched my fingertip cleanly off leaving a ragged red edge of torn tissue but the fingertip itself was intact. I balanced it on the end of the stump as if to stick it back together but it kept falling off. Pat hefted the rock over to the edge of the roadcut and rolled it down to the road. It nearly ran over Gus. Out on the road I fished my first aid kit out of my pack and we rolled my little finger up loosely in a big gauze bandaid then taped it together. I shoved my hand back into the glove to hold the bandage in place on my finger.
With my injury taped up and out of sight, I thought briefly about continuing on to the Slide Fork to pick up some of my stashed agates but decided it would be wiser to head down to a clinic or hospital to get my finger taken care of. Pat managed to lift the big rock into the milk crate on his bike rack but he only made it a few feet before the weight of the rock tore the crate loose as the rock crashed out onto the ground. Clearly the rock wasn't going home with us today, so we stashed it in a briar patch next to the road and set off without it. Trying to keep my injured hand elevated, I rode mostly with one hand back to Feeder #2 where I'd stashed my agates. Pat helped me retrieve my stash and load it into my pack, then lifted my pack onto my back. About 60-70lbs he figured. The ride out was fast and rough, especially down the hill. I used one hand except on the steeper sections where I had to use my injured hand too, but my hand was cold and still mostly numb so it didn't hurt much to use it. Back at the car I was able to load up everything except my pack before Pat arrived.
On the drive back to Chehalis I kept my hand out the window thinking that if I kept it chilled, it wouldn't bleed as much and maybe the tip could be reattached, even though I pretty much knew it was done for. When we took off the glove at the clinic, the fingertip was on backwards - slightly grotesque. Dr Churfey at Providence Chehalis Hospital also concluded that the fingertip wouldn't survive, so after giving me two injections of anesthetic (the most painful part of the whole experience), he trimmed and sewed up the stump. Although I had no sensation of pain at that point (Thank God for local anesthesia), the thought and sound of him working on my finger was a little hard to take. It looks like he did a good job though. I missed supper at Pat and Shirley's but the veggie quesadillas at the hospital were quite good and the nurses were very helpful. They finished with me around 8:30 and I decided I'd better head home rather than staying with Pat and Shirley as I'd planned, because if I had to take the Percosets they gave me for pain, I wouldn't be able to drive myself home. As it turned out the finger stayed numb for nearly 24 hours and after that, required only Ibuprofen, but going back up Lucas Creek with Pat and the Longview Rock Club the next day probably wouldn't have been a good idea anyhow.

01/30/2009  Sunny, mid-40's 
Six weeks after I last saw it, the White-throated Sparrow showed up again this afternoon in our back yard. I managed to get a couple quick photos before it retreated back into the woods near the big fir.
The finger is doing OK I think. It was numb most of the day; feeling finally returned late in the afternoon. I sanded some rocks in the middle of the day and while I was doing that it bled some, staining the bandage. There was also some swelling apparently because in the morning the bandage would fit into a glove but in the afternoon it was too large. That's somewhat inconvenient. This evening it began to get a little sore so I took an Ibuprofen and the pain went away.

02/05/2009  Mostly sunny, 58  Up an agate creek, parts 7 and 8  
Dr Sherfey wanted to see me for a followup visit today to evaluate how the finger was healing, so I drove down yesterday and Pat and I headed into the hills to retrieve his big agate, the same agate that ate my finger last Thursday. Pat purchased a deer carrier at Cabela's on Monday and modified it so he could tow it with his bicycle by welding a sleeve of pipe to a bolt which he then bolted loosely to the frame of the carrier, leaving enough play to allow the carrier to move somewhat independently from his bicycle. To attach the carrier he simply slides the stem of his seatpost through the piece of pipe. It rattled a bit but worked very well and with it he towed out the big agate. By the time I arrived at his house, just a few minutes after he did, Pat already had the agate weighed out at 96 pounds, 12 pounds heavier than the big geode Jake discovered and published on the Treasure Hunting Wiki last summer.
Before we hauled out Pat's agate we split up and did some exploring. Pat hiked up Fingertip Creek to the next road crossing at 1250' while I searched up the Landslide creek from the waterfall up to the edge of the clearcut, then up the small feeder creek (Feeder #5) which borders the west edge of the clearcut. I expected to meet Pat in the Landslide creek yesterday but I didn't run into him even though he did hike some distance up through the creek after dropping in from Jake's Landing, which is just up and around the bend from Fingertip Creek. It's a shorter and easier route down to the Landslide creek than my route to the top of the waterfall. Jake had hauled up the big chunk of seam agate Pat had found on the 15th but it had broken in half when he dropped it at the landing and it was still sitting there.

Today I hauled Pat's rock carrier in behind my bike so I could bring out my big seam agate, which as it turned out, weighed 69 pounds. Not a record-breaker but still respectable. The rock carrier didn't slow me down much so I got a ways ahead of Pat. I used the time to explore one of the feeder creeks we hadn't looked at yet. I didn't find anything below the road and was just starting up when Pat arrived. It would have been very tough bushwhacking upstream on that one so I was glad Pat showed up when he did.
We left the bikes at Jake's landing and dropped down to the Landslide Creek then searched up through the clearcut. I fished a nice partial geode out of a pool just below the clearcut - that was a surprise because there isn't much big stuff left lying around. The clearcut itself has produced very little agate for us but the areas just below the clearcut and also between the clearcut and the landslide have been quite good. The deposits above and below the clearcut differ somewhat in that most of the agate we've found in and above the clearcut has been gray while the bulk of the material downstream was red. Today we didn't find anything big along the stream above the clearcut but there were still a number of 2-3" pieces of agate along with a nice 6" chunk of seam agate right in the middle of the stream.
After lunch today we continued up the creek above the south side of the landslide as far as a landing at about 1750'. We found quite a few small pieces of gray agate but few larger pieces and those were mostly of poor quality. I kept only one rough reddish nodule about 2 1/2" across. Descending back to the landslide we crossed it and walked north long the road past the borrow pit then dropped down into the upper reaches of Fingertip Creek. Thick Salmonberry kept us from inspecting much of the creek but we didn't find any agate in what little we did look at.
Back at the grassy landing Pat helped me load up the rock carrier. We put my big seam agate on the bottom then lashed my pack with the other agates in it on top. The combined weight was enough to slow me down quite a bit on the uphills, gentle as they were, on the way back to the cars. On the downhill sections my aging brakes fortunately sufficed to keep me at a pace that was pretty sedate compared with my usual rate of descent. I felt like I was driving the bicycle equivalent of a semi truck.

02/08/2009  Fog then sun, 46  Up an agate creek, part 9  
David wanted to go hiking somewhere but the snow level is pretty low so I suggested mountain biking instead. I told him I knew just the place with nice logging roads to bike on - Lucas Creek. He decided that would be OK so I picked him and his friend Daniel up around 9AM. We parked at the bend in the county road and bicycled up the first tributary, up the big hill and through the woods to the clearcut. We were in the fog then but after half an hour or so the sun broke through and the rest of the day was beautiful though persistently a little chilly. At the corner of the woods we parked the bikes and David climbed a snag. We all hiked down into the first tributary where I looked for agate but didn't find any.
We stopped for lunch at David's knoll, elev 1230', overlooking the landslide creek where it runs through the clearcut. I suggested that the creek was just an agate's throw away but none of us were able to reach the creek with either a batted or thrown stone. Daniel came the closest. After lunch I hiked down into the creek. In the 15 minutes or so I spent looking for agate below the clearcut I found one new fist-sized gray nodule but left it, along with several smaller pieces. I was glad to see that it is still possible to find agate up there.
We continued up to the next junction where we stopped to admire the view of Mt St Helens. David climbed another snag. The next hill up to the borrow pit road was a steep one but it was brief. We traversed north to the landslide, portaged it and continued on to the borrow pit. While the boys played in the pit I bushwhacked a short distance up Fingertip Creek and found one good-sized but very rough, dark geode or nodule, about 5" across and 2" thick. About even with the top of the borrow pit the creek became too small and brushy to proceed so I met up with the boys in the pit. David was up at the top of the cliff throwing big rocks down into a small pool. They were falling so fast you could hear the whoosh just before they hit the water.
Although we crossed several more feeders on the way down I only investigated one, the upper reaches of #3, where I found lots of crystal and some small agates of which I kept only one. David loved the ride down. Fortunately I caught up with him in time to warn him about the gate at the bottom of the last hill. His brakes aren't any better than mine and I didn't want him to round that last corner at 20mph.
By the time we rode back to the car we'd covered about 12 miles on the bikes. I figure I did another couple of miles on foot. I, of course, had a great day but I was glad the boys liked it too.

02/13/2009  High clouds w/ occ sun, 45  Up an agate creek, 10 & 11  
Pat and I had intended to go up to Lucas Creek again but it snowed a couple days ago and hasn't warmed up much. Since the snow would probably have been too deep for bicycling up there, we decided to try Salmon Creek instead. We met at the end of Toledo-Salmon Creek Road around 10AM yesterday, giving us about 3 hours to explore the river before I had to head back to Centralia for my finger checkup. It's been pretty tender since Monday when I dug a big hole in our front walkway to expose the section of the drain where the roots have been clogging it up, most recently on Sunday evening, or so I thought. I called Rescue Rooter and dug out the pipe on Monday, then on Tuesday they came out and replaced the concrete pipe with a section of ABS pipe with a bi-directional cleanout. Unfortunately the drain was still clogged with the new pipe, so for another $500 they jetted out the main line of the drain, blasting out the obstructing sludge. No more bicycling down to the woods first thing in the morning, but the finger remained a little tender. Not too tender for agate hunting though.
We searched gravel bars along the stretch of river above the bridge. Everywhere we went we saw tracks of at least two other agate hunters before us. Despite not being the first ones on the creek, we did pretty well. I was particularly pleased to find a coprolite (pseudo-coprolite actually) in the shape of a robust handlebar moustache but I also managed to pick up a nice pile of very colorful agate. Salmon Creek agate may not be as large as the Lucas Creek material but nowhere I've been has more colorful carnelian than Salmon Creek.
I underestimated to time to get back to the car so arrived at the doctor's office with only a minute to spare. They didn't mind. I didn't see Dr Sherfey this time. Instead a physician's assistant named Cas came in and took out the stitches. He had difficulty seeing what he was doing so I loaned him my glasses. He was initially reluctant to accept them but afterward admitted that he couldn't have done without them. Removing the stitches stung a bit, particularly the first one, but fortunately no anesthetic was required. Cas also told me to begin getting the wound wet, as in when I take a shower or wash my hands. That's a little scary since it appears to be still nearly as open as when it was first stitched up.
Shirley fixed simple but delicious enchiladas for supper with a delectable apple pie for desert. I almost fell asleep during "Survivor" after supper. Pat was tired too so we all went to bed around 9:30. I turned out the light by 10PM. It was the first time this year that I've achieved my 2009 goal of getting into bed before 10PM.
We returned to Salmon Creek today since yesterday the temperature didn't warm up enough to melt much of the snow. Unlike yesterday, we found a stretch of the river where we were the first rockhounds to show up since the flood. As a result we found more of the larger pieces. Pat also found a nice block of brown petrified wood about 5" on a side. We stayed out longer today too, so by the end of the day we had quite a bit of agate in our packs.
I stayed for supper with Pat and Shirley again and took a little nap afterwards while we watched TV. On the way home I detoured over to UPS and picked up both boys. Daniel had been cheerleading at the last regular game of the season, which UPS won 81 to 71. Apparently the win clinched their position in some playoffs so Daniel will be cheering a little longer than he anticipated. After we got home we took the Christmas tree out and torched it. It burned well but not fiercely; for some reason this year's tree didn't dry out as much as they have in previous years. Maybe our house is colder. The fire kindled a latent firebug spirit in the boys and they stayed out until 1AM setting fires in the grass along the fence behind the driveway. I figured the neighbors would call the police but I guess they'd all gone to bed already.

02/14/2009  Increasing clouds, 48
Happy Valentine's Day, and Happy Sabbath. I remembered that it was Sabbath and felt grateful to God for the sunshine and having the boys home and having the time free to putter in the garden and saw a few rocks, but we didn't do anything openly to acknowledge the day. Valentine's Day, on the other hand, we did acknowledge. I bought Susan a dozen red roses at Safeway. Susan made Valentine's day care packages for all of Daniel's floor, with cupcakes, brownies and shortbread and pink and gold labels with captions such as "Smooches" and "Wild Thing". Daniel took Hannah out on a date; she was going to take him ice skating, then they were planning to see a movie after dinner at Rosemary's. David went back to campus with Daniel in order to see "The Vagina Monologues"; I don't know what else he was planning for the evening. They had a pleasant afternoon though. While I was mining old compost from the compost pile in preparation for starting a new one, they were burning the field and garden just for the fun of it.

02/17/2009  Increasing clouds, 48
I've been digging in the garden the past few days, trying to eradicate the bindweed by removing all of its fat white roots from the soil, and planting some of the bulbs I salvaged from bags of bulbs Susan bought last year or the year before and never planted. The bindweed has even managed to infiltrate the greenhouse bed - pernicious stuff. Today I filled in the hole in the front walkway where we had the concrete pipe replaced with ABS a cleanout added. I didn't lay the bricks yet though; I quit around 3PM to eat some lunch and go for a run, although I haven't made it out for the run yet. That's been happening now for several days - I plan to run in the afternoon, then I don't get around to it.
I've also been sawing some of the Lucas Creek and Salmon Creek agate. Today I finished cutting bookends out of the big agate half-pipe I found on our first trip up the creek. The cutting wasn't quite square so I'm going to try trueing them up with the trim saw, but the color, pattern and shape are pretty cool. I've finished polishing my first set of Lucas Creek bookends - again not very square, but nice color. I've been using the Genie to sand off the nubs, then using the high speed sander with 100 grit and 220 grit silicon carbide, then back on the Genie with a pair of 1200 diamond wheels, then to the buffer. Buffing is pretty quick after the 1200 diamond grit, which in turn is faster than the 400 or 600 silicon carbide, so the overall process is takes significantly less time than it used to. Now if I could just cut them squarely.

02/19/2009  Sunny, 55
One of those days when things don't work out as planned, but they still work out. Intended to go agate hunting with Pat on Salmon Creek but the shower drain was backing up a bit yesterday evening so I figured I'd snake it out before heading south. After searching the workshop I found the snake(s) in the furnace room and I took what I thought was the longer one and snaked the line from the cleanout in the laundry room but couldn't reach the blockage, which was downstream of everything upstairs and downstairs, but upstream of the bedroom bathrooms. Then I tried the other snake and discovered it was 6' longer at 24', but harder to use, so I swapped cables and tried again. Still no luck. I tried going in from the outside cleanout but couldn't get past about 20', which may have been where the problem was, or maybe not. By then I'd been at it for 3 hours so I called Rescue Rooter. They'd cleaned out the line just a week ago and they promised they'd send someone today, so I called Pat and told him I was staying home.
Then the van rolled out of the garage and across the driveway, headed for the garden. It took out the first fence, the old one, but the garden fence stopped it. Susan was already late heading over to UPS to pick up the boys to take them to the opening day of the Flower and Garden show, so I unloaded my car and had her take that while I figured out how to untangle her car from the fence and drive it back up the grassy bank onto the driveway. While I was playing with that Rescue Rooter showed up, 2 hours early. Kyle was great. He pulled the toilet in the downstairs bathroom and rolled his industrial strength snake in and went to work on the 12-15' of line between the toilet and the junction with the drain from the bedroom wing. Before long he had the water flowing again at the outside cleanout. His supervisor ran a camera down the line and told me that the pipe was broken but it looked to me like it just had a lot of sludge on either side of a narrow channel down the center of the pipe. All clear below the bedroom wing junction though. Before he left Kyle demonstrated how to reinstall the toilet so I can remove it some day and try my own hand at clearing the line, which will clog up again soon, according to Kyle's supervisor.
Meanwhile I cut the fence out from under the van, dug trenches in front of the front wheels and filled them with gravel to provide enough traction to get the van up the hill. When the van backed into the fence the tailpipe got hung up and bent the muffler pipe in two places so I pried it back straight enough so I could wire the tailpipe up off the ground, then I called Herb's Muffler in Auburn. They were close and had positive reviews on google. They said "Come on down" so I did, and read a book in the library while they cut out the bent pipes and custom-fitted replacements for alot less than the cost of a whole new muffler.
Susan and the boys enjoyed the Flower and Garden show but the boys both have colds, along with most of the other students in their dorms.

02/20/2009  Sunny, 57  Up an agate creek 12  
Pat and I explored Salmon Creek again today, dropping down a narrow ridge into the river where a stream comes in from the south. We found lots of tracks but not lots of agate on the first several gravel bars as we headed downstream. One or two sets of tracks looked very fresh and sure enough, around the next bend we spotted a couple of men ahead of us, scrutinizing the gravel bars.
We decided to climb out of the river and cut the next bend, then drop back in ahead of them. Perhaps it was our imagination, but it did seem as though the next few gravel bars had more material, and we didn't see any more tracks for a while. We didn't see the other men again either. We did find quite a bit of fresh coprolite though it tended to be more of the lumpy rather than ropy kind. I find the ropy kind more convincing. According to an article I read the clay is Miocene age, and the coprolites may technically be cololites - casts of animal intestines. That theory explains the ropy ones reasonably well but not the knobby ones.
We explored several more gravel bars and I found a good-sized orange agate in the water, not easy to spot. There are some big logs along the river in that area - Salmon Creek must have been really impressive before it was logged, huge old trees framing the languid stream with its grassy shoulders. I imagine the water was clearer then and probably full of salmon in season. May have been more agate on the gravel bars too, though we didn't do too badly today, especially considering that for most of the day we were not the first ones on the river. As is evident in the pile I brought home, I didn't pick up many small ones.

02/21/2009  Sunny, 50  Up an agate creek 13  
Pat and I hiked up Lucas Creek on a field trip with the Longview rock club today. I bicycled but most people hiked Dan's road, then up the landslide tributary. Everyone found something but the best piece was a nice half geode that Tom found.
Pat and I ate lunch together where feeder #5 meets the landslide tributary at the bottom edge of the clearcut. I sat on a muddy boulder in the sunshine and tossed bits of bread for Gus. It was worth sacrificing a little of my bread to get Gus's nose off my shoulder. Pat poked around looking for agate and found a thin botroidal piece which he traded to me for two pieces of red agate. Emmett and his brother-in-law Phil returned from the hiking up through the clearcut as we finished lunch. I wanted to hike over to the upper part of the first tributary but didn't want to go alone due to recent reports of mountain lion activity in the area. Phil was willing to join me so we headed up to David's lookout while Pat and Emmett started downstream.
Phil protested that he was overweight and out of shape but I didn't have to wait much for him, and he tackled some pretty tough bushwhacking with no complaints. We didn't find anything in the first tributary though so I suggested that we continue on over to Frase Creek. We'd stashed our packs, along with my map, but I managed to find our way over there and we did fairly well going over the same ground that David and I did back on the 8th. We explored down as far as the pond; unfortunately below that the geology doesn't look as promising. I gave Phil all the agate I found, including the fairly nice partial nodule pictured above.
We hiked back from Frase Creek on logging roads and dropped into the landslide creek just below the waterfall. Searching on the way out I was surprised to find the big rough-looking blackish chunk that I'd left on the dirt bank at about eye level in a narrow part of the canyon a month ago. I'd looked for it but couldn't find it last time so was amazed to find it today, in full view where everyone has been climbing right past it.
Pat, Emmett and a few others were waiting for us when we came out. Dan and Skeeter had come out not long before I did. Skeeter had been hauling about a hundred pounds, most of it quartz according to Pat. They were the two men we'd seen up in the clearcut during lunch, whom we'd assumed to be Emmett and Phil.

02/22/2009  Damp, then sunny, 54   Yours Truly 50K  
About a dozen runners were waiting for me in the rain at Landsberg. Monte called me on his cell phone as I was driving through Ravensdale and said the runners were ready to go but when they heard that I was almost there, they waited. I got them on their way then returned home for the chili I'd forgotten. I made it back to Landsberg with just enough time left over to squeeze in a 12 mile run before fixing lunch for everyone. I ran with Jess and plied her with questions about her job and her running. We ran at a leisurely pace but the time passed quickly thanks to the conversation.
The sun came out before lunch so runners lingered after finishing. Mel was still out on the course after everyone else left. I snuck away to pick up the aid station at the 3.8 mile turnaround and found Mel about to help himself to the chili when I returned. I was glad he stayed, and glad also that he didn't stay very long, just long enough for some hot chocolate and the last of the chili.

02/27/2009  Sunny, 55  Up an agate creek 14   I didn't have much time today due to a late start and an early appointment with the finger doctor so Pat and I just hunted the creek by his property. It was my first time up there in quite a few years. The woods have been clearcut on both sides of the creek now, leaving just a ribbon of alder along the stream. A fair number of the alder have blown down across the creek but didn't impede our progress much. I recognized the topography of the stream - gravel bars above the access road, then a little gully where the stream cuts into the agate-bearing layer of clay and cobbles, then a section of basalt ledges and above that more gravel bars but not much agate. Below the road, beavers have ponded most of the stream down to Pat's property line.
We searched that creek so extensively in the past that agate has become somewhat scarce despite floods during the intervening years. But perhaps not that scarce, particularly considering that Pat has already been up there once or twice high-grading the gravel bars. Although we were only up there a couple of hours, I carried out about 20 pounds and Pat nearly twice that amount. Better quality than I remembered too, similar to Salmon Creek but a little more varied.
At the doctor's office Cas removed a scab consisting mostly of Xeriform bandage from my nailbed. Good thing, because the skin was beginning to grow around it. Dr. Sherfey came in to check things out and was pleased with how it's healing up, said I don't need to see him again unless something goes wrong - pain, swelling or infection - and I no longer need to bandage it either, though it will remain sensitive for some time. It has been four weeks and a day since I inadvertently amputated it.
I was rewarded for my late start this morning by the sight of a peregrine sitting in the snag by the Wabash church. Not a great photo, but identifiable at least.

02/28/2009   
Though it was Sabbath, we didn't make it to church. I puttered most of the day, sawing rocks and cleaning up the workshop some. We considered attending the evangelistic series at church in the evening but then Daniel called to invite us to the UPS basketball game at which he would be cheerleading. It sounded like he wanted us to come so we drove over. I took a few dozen mediocre photos of the cheer squad in action; the 70-300 lens did a decent job but even at ISO 1600 it wasn't really fast enough, particularly on the shots of girls in flight. Afterwards we had a pizza at Farellis with Daniel and his girlfriend Hannah. I enjoyed meeting and talking with her.

03/02/2009  Mostly sunny, 62     
It was 53 already when I got up - isn't spring wonderful! The crocuses are flowering under the cedar tree and the daffodils, at least the established ones, are showing flower buds. The bulbs I planted two weeks ago are just poking above the soil. I spent most of the day outside. I'm digging a trench 18" deep along the edge of the upper garden to install a barrier of landscape fabric - my Maginot line to fend off the invading hordes of morning glory (Ipomoea) roots. Unfortunately I tweaked my lower back while digging so that project may have to be postponed. I sawed another couple of Lucas Creek agates and filled in the trenches left by my efforts to get the car out of the garden.
While I was doing that I spotted the red-breasted sapsucker tapping the vine maple in the goat's pen I ran inside to get the camera but of course the bird had flown by the time I got back out so I sat out back for an hour or so and managed to catch a towhee sunning and our resident golden-crowned kinglet flitting. While waiting for the kinglet I caught a glimpse of the white-throated sparrow again so it's still around, as are several varied thrushes, two fox sparrows, two or three golden-crowned sparrows and a small flock of evening grosbeaks. Ravens, increasingly common, fly over almost daily, sometimes escorted by crows. We've also had two new yard birds in the past two days; a merlin perched briefly in the top of one of the Minnick's firs, and two bushtits were pecking at a suet feeder yesterday.

03/03/2009  Mostly sunny, 53     
For exercise I walked down to the river today, figuring a walk might help my back. The channel has shifted since the high water a month ago and a good-sized gravel bar has formed on the near side of the river. Once in a while the Green River produces a nice agate so I've been wanting to check it out. I took the camera too, in case I came across any interesting images. The gravel bar was barren. So were the more extensive new bars on the far side of the river - not worth freezing my feet for. I searched for an hour and appreciated the solitude while I wondered what to do next. Though I found neither agates nor answers to my questions, I did find a few photos, of cobbles and maples and moss. It is the season for ferns and moss. They revel in the light and moisture of early spring; once summer brings leaves and drought the ferns and moss go back into hibernation.

03/06/2009  Partly cloudy, 51     
I finished re-laying the bricks over the sewer line cleanout today. It was fairly pleasant outside so both Susan and I did a little gardening. She planted phlox in the plot in the center of the driveway and I put the tall white roses she bought last week at Costco into the big pots on either side of the garage door.
At the Friends of St Thomas meeting they're discussing The Shack so I emailed Pastor McClarty to see if he had an extra copy that I could borrow. He brought it over this afternoon, and commented on a couple broken geodes that I'm using to hold down a black plastic tarp in the driveway, a weed-control project. It turns out that Pastor McClarty likes collecting rocks; I wish I'd known that a month ago, when we were finding the spectacular agates in Lucas Creek. He'd have enjoyed that. Although we didn't make it either to the meeting at the Academy church, or to the Friends of Thomas meeting, I did read the book this evening. Made my eyes water even more than hay fever does. I want to take another look at some of it since I went through it pretty quickly the first time - I liked the characterization of God but didn't make much of a personal connection. I'm hoping that by re-reading it I can gain some insight into my own indifference towards God.

03/08/2009  Mostly cloudy, 30's, snow     
We had a little snow yesterday evening then around midday a prolonged heavy snow shower dropped about 2", half of which melted away later in the afternoon when the sun came out for a while. The snow concentrated the birds around our feeders so I went out several times with the camera and succeeded in getting my first photos of the evening grosbeaks.
We've had a flock of a dozen or so around for a month now. The best time for photos is when they're first coming into the feeder, when several come down at once and they aren't particularly skittish. On my first couple of attempts I flushed them when I approached and they flew up into the top of the maple tree. There they stayed while I waited for 15 minutes or so hoping they would come back down. A couple of individuals did come back down to eye me nervously before returning to the tree top, and soon after that the whole flock left in a commotion of wingbeats and calls.
Juncos remain our most common yardbird. I think we have 20-30 of them around most of the time eating millet both at the feeders and on the ground. In the past few weeks they've begun singing and squabbling more; I guess their hormones are ramping up for spring.
While I was standing near the feeder trying for a photo, the consistency of the snow changed and large clumps of flakes began to fall. One such clump fell right on the back of one of the juncos, like a saddle blanket, and stuck for a brief moment before sliding off. I kept watching for it to happen again, hoping for a photograph, but the best I could get was this shot of another junco with snow on her? forehead and tail.
David came home yesterday evening and stayed home today to work on a paper for one of his classes. It was nice to have him around. I made guacamole for lunch and Susan fixed a delicious meal of refried beans, red cabbage and rice for supper.

03/09/2009  Partly cloudy, 30's, more snow     
Three or four inches fell overnight and into the morning, carpeting the field and coating the trees, then the sun broke out from a bright blue sky. The bright sunshine gleaming on the new snow reminded me of sunny winter days in New Hampshire. Later in the afternoon another band of showers moved through from the north and dropped another inch of snow, the last of it according to the weatherman.
I worked on our finances in the morning and took a few more photos in the afternoon. The good news is that though our investments are down another 20% since the beginning of the year, we're still OK even if I'm not able to find work right away. Before supper I did a core workout, my first since I tweaked my back a week ago digging up morning glory roots in the garden, back when it felt like spring.

03/10/2009  Partly cloudy, 30's  WTA - Grand Ridge  
It felt good to be back on a trail crew again. I arrived late but was able to follow the prints of hiking boots in the snow to find the work site. I recognized many of the crew from working together back in December in O'Grady park, and they remembered me too, which was nice. It was also nice to be able to read my fellow workers' names on their hard hats.
When I arrived everyone had paused to watch a black-tailed doe browsing on salal but we soon got to work grading and hardening a new section of trail about a half mile in from the parking lot. I ended up on an apparently endless pit of duff, and when I did finally dig my way to the bottom of it I found an underground stream so at the end of the day, my trail looked worse than when I started. Mike threatened to save it for when I returned but I won't mind if he doesn't. I wasn't the only one relieved when he called it quits a little early; I'm a bit out of shape for digging and Paul next to me commented several times that he didn't have any Oomph today. Back in the parking lot the hot cider and raspberry muffins were delicious, and the companionship and sense of accomplishment were satisfying too.

03/13/2009  Increasing clouds, 50's  WTA - Grand Ridge, 18 mile run  
I worked with Molly, Sue and Lauri to dig a ditch on the upslope side of the trail, partly to intercept underground seeps which would eventually make the trail soggy and partly to collect rocks which we used to harden nearby sections ofthe trail. It was fun, particularly after lunch when I got to play in the little stream running down my section of the ditch. On the way home I stopped at Landsberg for a run.
Before running I returned a call to Kathy at King County regarding the permit fee for using the Snoqualmie Valley trail for the Light at the End of the Tunnel Marathon. The fee is the greater of $1.40 per runner or 20% of the gross receipts, which for 100 runners at $50/runner would be $1,000.00. I'd have to raise my price for the marathon by $10 to cover the King County permit for running on just 5 miles of the trail. Then of course, I'd owe an additional $2/runner to King County for the increase in my gross receipts as a result of charging more to cover the King County permit fee. And an additional $0.40 on that $2, and an additional $.08 on the $.40, etc. Basically just tack on an additional 25% to whatever I would otherwise charge for the marathon to cover the King County permit. That's just not right, in my opinion. There is a possible workaround. If the marathon benefits a charity, I'd be more likely to win an exception allowing me to pay King County just the $1.40 per runner. Washington Trails Association would be a good candidate for the charitable beneficiary. Not only does King County benefit from their trail maintenance services all winter long, but many of the runners in the marathon also use trails maintained by WTA.
I set out down the trail (itself another rail-trail maintained well by King County) with the idea in the back of my mind that I might be able to put in the 18-miler that I didn't get around to doing yesterday, and which I've been trying to do since last Sunday. I didn't have any water bottles and could only find one Nutrigrain bar stashed in the car so I wasn't particularly well equipped. On top of that I'd spent most of the day digging a big ditch and I was already tired and a little sore in the hamstrings and lower back. But when would I get motivated to do 18 miles if I didn't do it now? So I did. The first six were fairly easy, the next six not too bad, but the last six, and particularly the last two, were difficult. With my frequent walk breaks (every 300 steps in the final mile), I barely managed 12 minute miles but I did manage to keep my shin tendon from blowing up and my IT band from seizing up and my hamstrings and right heel never did get any more sore than they were when I started out. I finished at dusk and was wiped out all evening but felt great knowing that if I can run 18 after a day of trail work, I can surely finish Boston five weeks from now.

03/14/2009  
Finished up a number of rocks today. The last step is pressure-washing to remove the buffing compound from fractures in the face of the rock. The compound traces even the finest cracks in white, generally not an effect I want in the finished piece. Over the past week I've worked through much of my backlog of rocks awaiting buffing, including two Friend eggs from last summer, several Red Top nodules from the summer before last, some Richardson's Ranch eggs from 2006, a pair of small bookends from Saddle Mountain and some recent pieces, big and small, from Lucas Creek.

03/17/2009  AM slush
Cold wet weather brought birds to the feeder today. I sat on the corner of our covered back deck in my down parka and photographed the birds as they came in, particularly the colorful and engaging Evening Grosbeaks. After a while I started recognizing individuals, the males by the pattern of the yellow stripe above their beak and eyes and the females by their malar stripe and wing patterns. Young males have more mottled wings than the adults - white spots and edges on the dark feathers and dark smudges on the inner white secondaries.
I was able to get photos of several other species too, including a female red-winged blackbird, a new yardbird for the year. That's one of those birds I normally don't look at closely, so seen out of context I wasn't sure what it was at first - streaked like a sparrow, but too big, and the black body streaking didn't fit any of the local sparrows anyhow. By the time I looked at the bird book, I'd already managed to guess her identity.
The siskins are getting pretty feisty, squabbling with each other and displaying aggression towards other visitors at the feeder. They usually manage to displace the juncos and don't hesitate to threaten house finches and even the grosbeaks, though they don't usually win disputes with those larger birds. Their threat display consists of crouching and spreading their wings halfway. The one in the photo is apparently taking a break from the action.
 

03/21/2009 Charles Wright auction
With the market still down and no prospect for work soon I was feeling particularly poor this evening so we didn't bid on anything expensive. No condo on Maui or up at Crystal Mountain this year. Susan bid on a few small items and won one, something for the boys, I think. On the Fund-a-need, we waited until the last request, for just $100, to raise our paddle. The meal was OK. The coral reef themed decor on the other hand was very well done. Inflated jellyfish floated over our heads and clumps of balloon coral sprouted all around. We'd purchased tickets for Daniel and David but only David could make it. I suspect he would have found it pretty boring had he not been able to persuade Mai to join him.

03/22/2009 Mercer Island Half Marathon 1:48:08 (8:15/mi)
Today was my first race in six months. I hadn't been planning to run the Mercer Island Half but a week ago Jeff Poppe emailed me asking if I was planning to run so I signed up, figuring it would be fun to see him again and OK to run a shorter distance somewhat hard instead of a long run. I'm glad I did. The weather was cool and cloudy with a hint of rain now and then. I found my place in the 9:00/mile vicinity of the starting pack but picked up the pace within the first mile, despite feeling pretty clunky, and averaged 8:30 for the first 3 miles. In the middle section I picked up the pace a little, peaking at 7:40 for miles 10 and 11, then slowing back down again despite pushing fairly hard in the last two miles. I never did see Jeff during the race; he finished a couple of minutes ahead of me. Ran with Betsy Rogers and her husband briefly around mile 7 I think. At the finish my HR reached 183, the highest I've seen since hitting 184 during the Skagit Flats marathon last September. It felt great to run hard again.
After the race I phoned Jeff, found out he was already on his way home. After some dithering about whether I invite myself over to his house again, I drove over there and really enjoyed myself, sitting in their kitchen talking with Jeff and Anita, drinking a latte and eating a few leftover pancakes. Jeff is running Boston so we made tentative plans to meet for dinner before the race.

03/26/2009 Job Interview
Murphy and Associates came through with a job interview for me today, my first (as interviewee) in 15 years. I didn't think I was too nervous beforehand but realized otherwise when I knocked over the can of pens on the receptionist's desk. The interview itself went well though. We discussed the requirements of the project and the makeup of the team. They want a database to store file hierarchy data, aren't too concerned about the front end. Mostly for reporting. Although just 5 weeks long, the project sounds like fun - I found myself working out aspects of the data model during my run along the Cedar River on the way home. It will be a good way to refresh my skills and get started back in contracting.
Along the Cedar River at Landsberg the sun was almost shining and the air was almost warm, considerably more pleasant than the cold overcast with occasional rain or even snow that we've been having recently. Back at home I planted the third yellow rose along the deck off the bedroom. About 15" below the surface the substrate is the original semi-lithified mudflow the color of, and nearly as hard as, concrete. I chopped out the poplar roots, flipped the sod onto the hardpan, mixed compost into the subsoil and laced the mixture with granules of rose fertilizer so maybe the roses will do OK.

03/29/2009 Crystal Mountain cabin
Not actually at Crystal Mountain, we realized when we called to arrange our use of the cabin we won a year ago at the CWA auction, but down along 410 at the base of the Crystal Mt road. Daniel and David lined up some friends to join them and we all headed up there Friday evening. The forecast rain evolved into snow by Saturday morning but fortunately the road was still clear for our drive up. A fire was burning in the fireplace and the lights were on when we arrived - rustic, cozy and welcoming.
We awoke to snow filtering down between the tall firs. About an inch had fallen when I went out for a run up 410 into the park. WSDOT has plowed as far as Cayuse Pass, getting a jump on the spring though the hard part, up over Chinook, will take another month or more. The snow along the road and in the woods was generally around 3' deep. It was nice to run without traffic, just the tall trees, the gently falling snow and an occasional glimpse of the White River, low and clear this time of year.
By midday when we set out to build an igloo several inches had accumulated. The plan was to try out the Ice Box igloo-building tool I bought over a year ago but never got around to using. We all started out working on it but four of us - Selina, Sage, Jeff and I - ended up building the bulk of it. David took photos (these are his) and Daniel left early to drive back down to Enumclaw to pick up Hannah and two friends of hers. Hannah's car isn't good in snow so they had gone only a short distance past Enumclaw before they had to turn back. The Ice Box worked very well for us. Although it took us about 4 hours the end result was nearly perfect, far more elegant than any hand-built igloo or snowcave I've ever made. Sage and Selina even spent the night in it.
Daniel was able to get down to Enumclaw to meet the girls in the Safeway parking lot but their return was delayed by an accident which closed highway 410 for a couple of hours. When Hannah asked the policeman at the Enumclaw roadblock when he thought the road would open again he replied that he wished it could stay closed all winter. "Every winter someone dies on that road, and there's nothing up there worth dying for", he said. They finally made it back to the cabin around 9PM. We ate a late supper and sat around the fire late into the evening. Sunday morning the kids had a snowball fight and we all trekked over to inspect the igloo. It had hardened up enough that I was able to climb up on top. Daniel side-stepped up it on his split board and jumped off. He shuttled the girls back to Enumclaw then returned and took the rest of the kids back to UPS in the Subaru while Susan and I finished packing up the van. The sun had come out so the road was bare and even partly dry for our drive home.
Dennis next door reported that we'd had an inch of snow on the ground Sunday morning.

03/31/2009
I ran a comfortable 20 miles today at close to a 9:00 min/mile pace including 30-second walk breaks every 5 minutes. I felt light on my feet almost the entire way, though towards the end my left shin began to get a little stiff and sore at times. Providing the soreness clears up quickly, running a good 20 means Boston might not be too bad after all.