i'd vote republican if it got me longer weekends

I woke up to the sound of rain on the pavement this morning. (Well, and the sound of my phone beeping to wake me up). I love the rain. One thing I really miss about the Midwest is the thunderstorms, they're so amazing in the thunder. I miss the nights on my parents porch watching the lightning or getting woke up by a huge clap of thunder. Seattle doesn't have storms. I've seen it lightning twice since I've been here. Both times everyone stopped what they were doing to watch because it happens so infrequently.

So my summer seems to be flying blissfully by. Work seems to occupy a bigger chunk of time than I remember. That five hours between getting home at six and going to sleep at eleven sure fly by. The only way I seem to get things done is to wake up at 6 am.

Adrian and I are trying to take maximum advantage of the beautiful place we live in. Despite being exhausted, I agreed to go up camping in the North Cascades last Saturday night. We tend to camp with little preparation (and by tend I mean the twice we've gone). Even though I have equipment to make meals, we live off of granola bars, fruit, and s'mores. Totally manageable when you're only camping one night. Adrian is pretty good at planning where we go, but beyond that he has a bit of trouble, particularly in packing for himself. I couldn't resist making fun of him for packing only one pair of shorts, no pants, and nothing to swim in. But hey, he remembered a jacket this time.

We got up to the Cascades midafternoon (we can't seem to get out of town before eleven). We took in some amazing views along the roadside and then found ourselves a campsite and set up camp. We have a nice little devision of work. I put up the tent and get our sleeping bags set up and he gets the fire ready.

We did some hiking then decided to try in swim in the lake that had probably been all snow further up the mountain a day or two ago. What I'm saying here was that it was insanely cold. Even the kids were cold and kids will swim in any temperature. It took a little convincing, but I jumped in off the end of the dock. It was bad. Pretty much cold enough to hurt. We got out immediately and I thought that was that, but then Adrian pushed me back in. Apparently I went in too willingly the first time.

We spent the evening playing with our fire and Adrian's camera (check out my Picasa Album). Probably the most entertaining part was listening to our neighbors' drunken fire conversation. ("That's pretty cool, huh?" x 148) Too funny really.

Of course it rained a little that morning so that my tent would be damp once again when I put it away. (I'm lacking a yard to air it out in). We explored more of the road through the park and forced ourselves to make one more extremely difficult hike (one mile and no elevation change) up to Rainy Lake. As you can see in the picture, it was totally worth it.

Basically after that we went home. The rest of the night was pretty good too (who am I kidding it was amazing) but it was really just me and Adrian hanging out so there isn't much to say, other than we're both stupid crazy about each other. I'm still recovering from all the mosquito bites. With my lack of self control it's making me itch like a girl in tights before her piano recital (which trust me is REALLY bad itching!).

Time for another day at work. I hope the rain holds off so I can play frisbee with Jessica tonight.