The Cold Coast

Having lived near the beach in LA for 4 years, I'm accustomed to ocean waters bordering on warm temperatures, or at least tolerably cold. I've never been to the coast of Washington, beyond the Puget Sound channels of water where Seattle rests. So when a friend recommended we head to Westport - 2 1/2 hours West - where he could teach me to surf the Northwest Pacific waves, I was all kinds of about it.

What we did not anticipate was that surf shops close early and even in August, the ocean water this far North along the West Coast is absolutely frigid. I felt the chill all the way in my hips after standing in the small wake for :30 seconds. I will save learning to surf for a tropical location where sharks are more of a concern than hypothermia. But this left us a long afternoon to explore Westport, which happens to be the cutest damn beach town I've been to. Its a place where restaurants need names like "The One-Eyed Crab" or "Granny Hazel's Candy & Gifts."  The boardwalk wreaks of saltwater spray and oyster shells discarded by seagulls. You have multiple opportunities to purchase a windsock or a handmade lawn ornament. And you can see the mountains from the beach made of pulverized gray stones and white clam shells. It was a whole part of Washington I haven't seen before, and is a nod to part of our maritime culture that seeps Eastward into the city. There isn't much to do in this fisherman's town beyond listen to boat ropes creak and sea lions complain, fly a kite and watch the local color. But spending the day here had a funny way of putting a smile on my face that I didn't even know was there.

Audrey II

  It's Halloween Month. Yes, Halloween is in fact a celebration I make last a month. I love whimsy, the fright fests, the communal celebration of being someone who you are not, just for an evening. But more than anything, I love the gaudy excess. We stuff ourselves with bagfuls of candy and smother our homes in faux cobwebs and ghoulish horrors, and it delights us. When I was a wee one at Christmas time I always begged my folks to decorate our house with the colorful lights and tacky lawn ornaments. No such luck. We had the wholesome and holy white lights with red ribbons on the lamp posts. It looks good in retrospect, but I'd still love me a plug-in glowing baby Jesus.

Halloween was the only time I got away with cheap kitsch and flair. So I spend the whole month of October drinking pumpkin spice lattes, filling my Netflix queue with scary movies and turning my house into a display. It is a fact all my roommates have come to accept, and I think secretly adore. In October, my spidey senses are heightened, unconsciously attuned to the next craft or decoration I can discover. So naturally, when I happen to spy a Venus Fly Trap out of the corner of my eye in the floral department at the grocery store, I pause. This plant is is a man eating inanimate organism. See "Little Shop of Horrors" for a more accurate description of how this plant is a badass. So I bought him. And in tribute to the Broadway sensation, I named him (or her, I guess) Audrey II.

This evening, I happened to kill a mosquito whizzing around my apartment. I was going to throw it away, and then a devious sensation crept in as I remembered my little leafy friend. Experiment: Will Audry II actually eat a bug if I feed it to him? The result, a resounding yes. It's kind of a sick satisfaction to see your carnivorous plant feed on a hapless little bug. Kind of like the satisfaction Freddy Krueger may have gotten from slaying teenagers. Muahahaha!

Ikea Food is Artsy

I love it when artistry and food come together to create a dish that is as pleasing to the palate as it is to the eyes. But Ikea, believe it or not, has elevated the concept of eating with our eyes to a whole new level - with the help of agency Forsman & Bodenfors. Inspired by Japanese minimalism and high fashion, the partnership created a 140-page coffee table book, "Hembakat ar Bast," showcasing 30 classing Swedish baking recipes. The result is an artistic representation of ingredients, which are displayed in the forfront with such a beautiful and unusual manner, that they outshine the resulting pastry. Take a look.



A Family Portrait

Last week my brother and I were bantering back and forth on instant messenger in attempts to recall our Grandmother's maiden name. I started Googling in hopes of finding records of my grandparents' marriage and was led down an hour long exploration of my maternal Grandmother's family tree. I can trace my Dad's ancestry back to the 12th Century. Underhills keep track of everything, apparently. But I've always known less about who was there beyond the last few generations from my Mom's side of things. As I was led deeper down the rabbit hole I  discovered this photo of my great great great grandparents and their family, aka my maternal grandmother's dad's parents. Following me?...that's okay, continue on.

The youngest child sitting on the mother's lap is my great great grandfather. The picture was taken just before the turn of the 19th Century. And as I stared at this picture, searching the faces for glimmers of resemblance or personality, I realized how absolutely little I knew about him. We look at pictures or hear facts about our ancestors and place them under a microscope of comparative analysis with ourselves. Does she have my eyes, did he have the same interests I do, was he brave, was she funny? Did they do something impactful with their time that still resonates in mine? The remnants and trinkets of our ancestors possess a magnetism and significance imbued from their rarity and obscurity. They're puzzle pieces that we know will never complete the picture but give us a hint or insight into ourselves and our origins.

 I began to wonder what legacy my depictions and possessions would leave for my family a century from now. And then I realized, I don't have as many precious possessions as I do stuff. Loads of stuff. Not only material items that are devoid of personal meaning, but pictures, videos and conversations that will be forever accessible through the click of a mouse. And while it's pretty incredible to realize that five generations from now, my decedents will theoretically have my entire life at their finger tips, it also makes it less special and mysterious. I have 2,769 pictures on Facebook. I have an E-mail account that records every conversation with Search features. My life will be mysterious to understand not for lack of information, but for too much of it.

I have this one picture of my great great great grandparents and their family. This was a special photo. It was an orchestrated event to capture this brood of 10, in the farmlands of rural Missouri, in a rare family portrait. And somehow, this image survived and was scanned onto a computer so I could find it in a search engine over a century thereafter. While technology and social networks actually help us discover more of those missing puzzle pieces of our past, it makes it easier to muddle our own legacies that we choose to leave. And that's something worth considering.

Lullaby Moon

Celebrating the new moon - Lucia Neare's Theatrical Wonders held "Lullaby Moon" at Gasworks Park on Friday evening, a beautiful performance piece that combines music, dancing and enchanting story-telling to mark the beginning of the new moon and "celebrate our precious place in the Milky Way galaxy and the promise inherent in everyone's dreams."


Children, adults and dogs dotted the hillside as we were transported to the land of nod with glowing tick tock clocks riding ponies, white rabbits in waistcoats glided across Lake union on a glowing bed and ushers in top hats and coat tails danced to a live band. The best part of this free show is that it takes place out in the open, where you could stumble upon the experience by surprise, allowing for a sense of authentic wonderment to take over your imagination - you are Alice falling down the rabbit hole rather than a customer paying for a manufactured Disney experience.

Disco Deer

Look at him. He is beautiful. I don't even feel crass or boastful in annoucing how amazing he is because I rarely actually finish a crafty-artistic venture. I will get half way through scrap booking a trip, a first coat of brush strokes into a painting. But I'm turning a new leaf, starting with committing to continually posting on this blog, but first I started with Disco Deer.

DD was first inspired by the Seattle art and culture scene (every other bar has at least one animal bust and one scrawny lumberjack with ironic tattoos). We are woodsy people and the nature of the Northwest greatly influences the style and personality of this city. So of course I had to cover a deer head with glitter, right? Honestly, I wanted to take part of what makes Seattle feel like home and transform its familiarity in a shocking way. So I ordered disco tiles and bought silver spray paint, and did work! 6 months later (#$#@!) I finally finished, having forced myself to come back to the project despite long repreives spent on other distractions. Now he be chillinz abuv my staircaz, whattin to greetz yu!

The Cutest Thing in the World

... So I Googled "The Cutest Thing in the World" today at work. This is the winner: