To: The guy sitting next to me at Zoka last night

Thank you for letting me take the empty seat at your table. Space was especially tight, and my computer’s battery isn’t what it used to be. Thanks also for letting me chime in with my Trivial Pursuit answers. It is admirable to see people playing a version that is older than they are–kudos to you for that.

Now that I’ve had some time to think about it, I would like to respond to your comment, “I really believe MySpace is of the Devil.”

No one–I mean NO ONE–who has seen MySpace doesn’t think it can be used for evil. Not only has it enabled dangerous lifestyles and child predators, but it has revived ascii art and created an entirely new evil: Blingees.

The point I want to make is that “used for evil” is very different than “of the devil.” Cars are often used for evil. Medicines are often used for evil. Frankly, churches are sometimes used for evil. No one believes that this makes these things exclusively the devil’s territory, it just happens that people are generally susceptible to making bad decisions.

There are three effects of your comment and the underlying belief that you may not have considered. First, you disregard, discount and dismiss all the ways that MySpace is used for good: Relationships get healed, faith-based events get publicized, lonely people connect with other lonely people. There is a lot of wholesome, Godly stuff going on out there, and by assigning it to the devil, you rob it of its glory.

Second, you give credit where it is not deserved. In the case that the Devil exists as a sentient being, how do you suppose that verbally giving him attribution would affect his power?

Third, you reinforce stereotypes that Christians are narrow-minded, naive, judgmental, self-righteous, isolationist fear-mongers. Please, please think next time you decide to make such flip statements about good and evil. Next time, the person who overhears you will probably take it out on their opinions of you and your god, rather than on their blog.

Okay, okay, everyone together now! One, two, three!

“I TOLD YOU SO!”

Good to get that off your chest? Feel better? Good. Now sip your frosty beverage and shut the hell up.

I’m not actually defeated by the weather yet. I’m not miserable, and I’m not even cold or wet. Probably that’s because I haven’t left the house without long johns for like two weeks, and my dearest loyalty these days is to my NorthFace rain coat. Still, I am coping, and I manage to get out of the house at least once a day, and usually on foot. Our general philosophy is that we must force ourselves to walk in the rain, since we’re too lazy to cook and too cheap to drive and we’re not ready to consider hibernating as a coping mechanism.

On Monday, Matt and I were talking about our week–should we bike to a cafe? Plan to stay home? They’re putting a new roof on our house (mixed blessing), so working at home is a bit of a sacrifice this week. We decided to check the weather. You know the joke about how the weather in So Cal doesn’t change? We have the same thing here, only different.

Monday: 54 Raining, Tuesday: 54 Raining, Wednesday: 55 Raining, Thursday: 53 Raining, Friday: 54 Raining.

We actually cracked up. Laughed and laughed. Welcome to Seattle.

Today, the predictions were a little off though. So far, from my seat at Zoka, I have seen sun, rain, strong winds, dark dark clouds, hail, lightening, and the roofers across the street scrambling like evangelicals at the apocalypse.

Actually, the strong winds are the most interesting, as they have so far thwarted a yoga class (power for the whole stripmall was out last night), and led to the funniest thing I have read all week. Courtesy of Matt’s rss feed: Holy Shit Windstorm 2007!

I’m thinking it’s time for an emergency preparedness kit, but Matt says that’s just because I’ve never lived anywhere with weather. I’m thinking I’d rather not go three days without hot coffee.

UPDATE: Okay, so it’s like POURING out there, and my only defense for being a little fascinated is that everyone else in the coffee shop is, too.  You know the kind of rain that makes it look like the street is smoking from all the splash and wind?  Turns out it’s mesmerizing to people who are used to Seattle weather.  So there.

Christina: Wow, that’s great that you’re so proactive about making friends.   I’ve just been going to bars and drinking by myself.

Lindsay: It seems like all that would get you is a bunch of boyfriends and no girlfriends.

Christina: Tell me about it!

Friday night we moved our theoretical conversations about a weekly Shabbat dinner into more concrete terms. It was Simchat Torah, which is the week that the annual schedule for reading the Torah resets back to The Beginning. Matt studied and made a fantastic pesto aoli, which he served with an amazing salmon fillet. I contributed Tomato Bread Soup (with a few modifications), that was frankly awesome, and a lovely spinach salad. Andy came over to enhance the sparkling conversation and contributed some excellent bottles of wine. Doug showed up late after getting a ticket on the drive up from Portland, and all in all it was a really great way to remind ourselves about what a day of rest should be like.  Thus ends the exercise in positive, or hyperbolic, adjectives.  Thank you.

The entire rest of the weekend, with little exception, was dominated by board games.

I am not in any way complaining. Quite the contrary, I’ve heard it hypothesized that because the weather is so bad here, people are obligated to be and do interesting things indoors. Intelligent conversation and compelling board games seem to be much more highly valued here than in other places I have lived. Not surprisingly, I’m thrilled.

Doug bought and taught us Rummikub. It’s Rummy, played with some variations and very satisfying domino-like tiles instead of cards. We played that for a bit after the hike and before dinner.

Then we taught Doug how to play Settlers of Catan. It’s a Risk-like game, where you expand, settle, and eventually dominate. I really don’t know what it is about this game; the board is different each time, and that’s kind of interesting, plus there’s lots of other things that can be left to chance and you get to barter/trade/extort from your fellow players, but for whatever reason, BEWARE SETTLERS. It is addicting. I mean addicting. We spent the rest of the weekend playing this game. The only time we weren’t playing was when we were eating or sleeping. No lie. Doug admits to waking up this morning, thinking about the game.

Luckily, Matt and I were able to go to work today, as the game requires 3 players and Doug went back to Portland Sunday evening.

Other games we’ve been enjoying quite immensely are Carcassone, which is sort of like Settlers, but different and available to 2 players, Set, which is an old favorite among many friends, and Killer Bunnies, which I still have kind of mixed feelings about. The game is smart, and the cards are funny, but somehow I’m just not sold.

Also of note: We ate at the highly recommended Santa Fe Cafe last night. There were enough green chiles in that meal to satisfy even me. It was scrumptious.

And, so ensure this post goes full-circle, I made Matzoh Ball Soup tonight for dinner. It was quite good, if I do say so myself. Hmmm…why am I suddenly feeling guilty all the time?

Such a funny thing. For weeks now (weeks! Eeek!), I’ve been feeling guilty about all of the fun things I’ve been doing without blogging any of them. Now, of course, I’m blogging, and I can’t remember what it was that was so much fun that I felt guilty about not blogging about. Or something.

Anyway…we spent the morning at REI today, getting our bikes measured and adjusted to fit better. I’m quite pleased, and I can’t wait to get out there and ride some more. Brief overviews of recent rides.

30 Miles on the Burke-Gilman Trail: first of all, it was an absolutely divine day (a few weeks ago, now), warm, but not too warm, sunny, and clear. We decided to see how far I could ride if there was no hill to threaten my morale. It turns out, I can get all the way to Kenmore Bowl from my house, just about 30 miles round-trip–30 of the most beautiful, lake-front, forested, bike-friendly land on the planet.

Ballard via the northern route: Just last weekend we decided to ride North for a bit before we turned West, so we’d have a good amount of Southwardness before we got to downtown Ballard and a greasy breakfast. Ugh the hills. Ugh. Some were straight up standard neighborhood blocks, some were winding up single-lane paths in elite Puget-Sound-View neighborhoods. The views were often gorgeous, but it’s not like we found ourselves somewhere you couldn’t get to by car. In the end, I made it safely up and down many of these monsters, and did more than enough work to justify my Bacon Two Ways breakfast: Bacon omlette, bacon waffle. No bacon in the coffee.

In addition to playing the How-Often-Can-I-Bike-Instead-of-Drive game, my other big addiction has been knitting. I know, you thought I was already a knitter. Well, so did I, but it turns out we were both wrong, as I am now exploring new ways to knit as much and as often as possible. Some examples:

I have joined a knitting social networking site. Like myspace for knitters. I’m actually a beta-tester, which means I get to be a user before the whole general public has access. I’m not special, I just signed up. And I bought a t-shirt to show my geek pride in being a beta tester for Ravelry.com.

Besides my regular Wednesday night knitting, I have joined a knitting meetup group. North Side Knitters meets three different times each month. Talking, coffee, advice, and yarn swaps. (As an aside, I was pleasantly surprise by the number of female coders in this group. And they were old. Rock stars.)

I have produced more knitted items in the past six weeks than in my entire life previously. All of them are gifts of a surprise nature, except my new leg warmers (omg! leg warmers! whatever, it’s cold here!!), which were inspired by Beth’s new leg warmers (in Forest and Sky), Rachel’s new black wrap, the re-do of my prettiest ribbed beanie, and my new hidden-picture scarf, which you will have to wait and see to find out what the hidden picture is.

I am really very proud of my restraint, as I am in yarn stores like twice a week and am still keeping my stash to a containable volume. Also fantastic: When I asked Matt if it bothered him that I was ALWAYS knitting, he said that the only way that it bothered him is that he was a bit jealous because I could be productive all the time–in the car, waiting for a meal, drinking with friends–and he didn’t have anything that he could double-up like that. Isn’t that nifty?

In other news, Matt’s been cooking up a storm. I’d like to mention that we’re both below the weights where we have spent most of our adult lives, and somehow, we manage to eat like royalty (hint: portion control). In the past week, Matt has made (from scratch!) green curry vegetables, Chicken Parmesan, spinach and noodles with peanut sauce, and Saag Paneer (for my developing Indian food addiction). Man, am I spoiled. Oh, and I made a cherry pie that was so-so.

Last thing before I run to purchase protein for tonight’s meal: We have a garden! Lettuce and spinach are already sprouting, and this weekend we’ll put the bulbs in so that when the sun comes back I will be happy every day with fresh Tulips!

Oh wait, one more thing. It’s cold here now. And wet. So far, it doesn’t get me down because it’s a good excuse to do a little shopping.