Oct. 7th, 2017

bigmacbear: Me in a leather jacket and Hockey Night in Canada ball cap, on a ferry with Puget Sound in background (Default)
Wednesday, 9/20: Drove in to the office for the day, then made a stop at our other office in Redmond Town Center to deliver Greg his award before continuing on to Shari's for dinner with the Bears. Traffic was horrible: it took an hour and change to travel the 16 miles or so from RTC to the restaurant in Renton. We were six: Stan and John, Peter, Jim, Gary and me. Stan and John had news of our friend Gary from Federal Way, who had been involved in an accident in Brendan's truck and was rather seriously injured. [He's recovering nicely as I write, but still has a way to go before he's back on his feet.]

Saturday, 9/23: Had an all-day rehearsal. Decided to drive down so I could show Neil and Sam my new car. Rehearsal went rather well despite the fact it was way early in the concert cycle. Neil and I had lunch at Blue Water Taco Grill around the corner from the Washington Athletic Club.

Monday, 9/25: Bused it down to rehearsal. Had an early start so I went around the block the other way for a change and had dinner at Mod Pizza with Paul (the Episcopalian) and Rhane among others. Rehearsal went well, and toward the end Paul (our director) introduced the chorus to a really cute otter-pup who works with LGBT refugees settling in the area (either in the US or more likely in Canada). It looks as though Paul is going to work with him to tell these folks' stories in a larger musical work, not this year but maybe next.

Wednesday, 9/27: Parked at South Everett and bused it in to the office. A cute cubby dude sat across from me on the 106 bus between Canyon Park and my office. That bus ran way late so I wrapped up work around four.

Headed down to Capitol Hill for Bear Hump. Caught the 238 bus across from the Y and transferred to the 372 at UW Bothell/Cascadia. The connection was awfully tight and we had to shout at the 372 driver to stop because he didn't hear the other driver honk to let him know the three of us were coming. The big artic bus was practically empty, with maybe half a dozen people at first. A little bear about my age sat directly behind me. On the high bench was a kinda cute dude (but, alas, without face fur) wearing a windbreaker, cargo shorts, sneakers with half socks, and a Sounders scarf. His legs were intensely furry but the fur was blond so not as noticeable. I transferred to the light rail at Rainier Vista on the UW campus and topped up my ORCA card at the station; once I arrived at Capitol Hill, I walked in the usual arc down Olive and Summit (and felt just the slightest bit better about it this time). At the venue I ran into our friend from the Navigator Hotel and a mountain of ginger bear. I didn't stay long as I wanted to be back home in time for a late dinner.

I caught the bus down to Westlake Station, descended to platform level and noticed five security guards congregating at one end of the southbound platform, probably for the soccer match which was just getting underway. The first was a tall otter who reminded me of Wes (of Wes and Barry), balding with a thick black beard. In contrast, the second was far shorter and reminded me of Bob the TSO, except browner with more Hispanic features. A third resembled Jake Gyllenhall, the fourth Carlos from Chicago, and the last Stan Hill who commissioned and conducted NakedMan. On the train there was a smattering of Sounders fans still making their way to the stadium, and a cute cub in a curious tricycle wheelchair powered by a hand crank and bicycle chain attached to the front wheel.

When I left the train at ID/Chinatown and walked over to the bus stop the other side of Union Station, there was a camper sleeping on the stairs who I managed to pass without waking them up. At Washington Street a cub with long frizzy hair and a trim beard boarded. At 45th a tall dude with a dark scraggly beard and a receding hairline, wearing a polo shirt, thin basketball shorts with a loud printed pattern and sneakers, boarded and started reading a Carl Hiassen novel with obvious enjoyment. The dude to my right was Not Amused, judging by the expression on his face.

Saturday 9/30: We were scheduled for another night of Snohomo Bingo with ETHEL!! as Mistresses of Ceremonies. This time I'd prepaid for two seats at the Friends of ETHEL!! table. After a number of attempts, a couple other chorines and I managed to agree on a time and place for pre-bingo dinner, settling on Brooklyn Bros. Pizza on Hewitt Ave a couple blocks from the hall. Daren and Mitch joined us for pizza, salad, and good conversation. The theme was Superheroes: I wore the Superbear T-shirt I had received off Justin's back in trade for one of my Great Canadian Bear Hunt shirts at our first Bear Town, while Gary wore a new Flash T-shirt we just bought at Fred Meyer for the occasion. Bingo was quite fun, although as usual no one at the Friends of ETHEL!! table won. There was a touching moment when the family of Naughty Santa (who passed away earlier this year) sent a message to the Ethels to read.

Monday 10/2: I had to get to the rehearsal venue early for Membership Council elections and was running into the typical frustration of having everything go wrong precisely because I was in a hurry, but managed to make it to Subway for dinner and to the venue without further incident. Rehearsal went well and I met a new Upper Bass named Eli when he sat next to me. He's a cute otter-pup.

Wednesday 10/4: Parked at South Everett again. On the side bench "upstairs" there was a cute little otter with a trim dark beard with highlights and a half-bald head with the rest shaved to about a millimeter or two, wearing a North Face jacket, worn jeans and canvas deck shoes. He was seated beside a lady with long blonde-ish braided pigtails and an ample bosom, wearing an embroidered denim dress, who reminded me of a character in Cobalt by Nathan Aldyne (which has been described as a "gay Nick-and Nora mystery"). Beside me in the corner of the back bench was a skinny black kid in a hoodie alternately snoozing and working his phone.

Work went OK although I didn't get an opportunity to box up the leftover Pride shirts because Greg was out of the office and couldn't send me an interoffice shipping label. On the 535 bus to Canyon Park, a balding young bear with a thick red beard sat to my left directly behind the driver. Opposite me was a scruffy brown-haired otter-pup, who reminded me of the shorter of The Jims but for the fact his face was rather scarred; he left with me at Canyon Park.

That evening Gary and I headed for Buffalo Wild Wings in Smoky Point for dinner and to take in a hockey game. Unfortunately it seems this particular BWW location doesn't subscribe to Center Ice, so there was only one game on offer. However, the waitress handed me a tablet to redeem some of my points, and so once that was done we played trivia on the tablet and actually did rather well.

Yesterday, Friday 10/6: Had an incident with the Single Sign-On software on my laptop which resulted in getting locked out of Windows, so I finished my first conference call of the day from home and then drove in to the office. As I exited I-405 at 195th Street, I ended up following a big bear on a big motorcycle all the way to the office. The bike looked custom-made and he wore one of those helmets that looks like Sergeant Schultz from Hogan's Heroes.

The PC issues were fairly quickly cleared up by plugging in to the network and calling the Help Desk to reset my password. Once that was done I reserved my usual desk by the windows and sat down to work. Outside there was a window washing crew using a lift to get the upper-story windows, and I noticed both of the crew were big bears. I must have been smiling because I got a smile and a nod back from one of the window-washers.

After work I stopped by Safeway for milk and cereal, where I spotted a huge black bear in a hoodie and long basketball shorts coming in to the store while I waited in the cashier line; then I stopped at Ivar's to pick up our usual dinner (5-piece Cajun cod for me, salmon platter for Gary, and lots of chowder).

March 2025

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