Musings on an Assortment of Subjects

Oh yes, I almost forgot to brag about the view from my 10th-story downtown office window:

Whew, the past few days have been a whirlwind. I got here around 9 p.m. Saturday evening, was picked up and brought to the MVS house on Capitol Hill, where I met lots of people and moved into my temporary abode in the TV room (until the end of this week when some of the old VSers move to their new residence). On Sunday I spent the morning unpacking, then wandered around the neighborhood for a bit before getting picked up for the Grand Tour of Seattle.

Jill, the local MVS coordinator, ended up taking us on a 5-hour tour of many parts of Seattle. We started by heading a ways south down Rainier Ave. to visit a couple peoples’ assignments (including a quick detour to see Lake Washington),

then swung past the stadiums,

stopped at the Uwajimaya market,

headed on through downtown,

past the Space Needle,

and up to Queen Anne hill which offers a gorgeous panoramic view.

Then on up across the canals, past the Fremont troll,

to the Ten Thousand Villages in Roosevelt. And then west to Ballard and the Chittenden locks

before swinging back past the University and home again.

On Sunday evening I walked to Saint Mark’s Episcopal Cathedral for its well-known Compline service, where I met a friend from Goshen who I brought back to see the MVS house. And then today was my first day at ONE/Northwest–a day of meeting neat people who are passionate about technology and about helping environmental agencies engage their constituents, of setting up a new computer and learning about how this organization does things, and of actually diving into a bit of programming alongside my illustrious colleague Andrew. Oh, and I can’t forget this evening…one of my housemates managed to get some free tickets to the Mariners game from her work, so we headed down to Soldier field to see the game. Sadly, the results were not as desired (Oakland had two grand slams…TWO!), but it was still a fun end to some exciting first days in the Emerald City.

Yesterday afternoon my parents and I returned from a weeklong trip out to Harrisonburg for a Glick reunion. It had been 8 years since the previous reunion with this group of people–which was crazy, because the second-cousins who were seven years old at the last one are now sophomores in high school — which is the age *I* was at the last reunion. But, it was really wonderful to reconnect with this quirky, accepting, word-playing, board-gaming group of people that feels so much like home. I sincerely hope that it won’t be nearly so long until the next reunion, and that I’ll be able to make it.

I also got a chance, one morning, to revisit the Appalachian Trail in Shenandoah National Park, where I hiked with several friends last summer. We only hiked three miles, but still got to see two panoramic views more spectacular than anything I remember from last year. Beautiful. No snakes or queasy stomachs this time, either.

On Sunday we also had an afternoon gathering with the Algers (Dad’s mother’s family). Although this one wasn’t as familiar (I don’t think I’ve ever been to an Alger reunion, unless I was under 5), it was still good to meet family members that I wasn’t familiar with before.

Here are some of the more surprising relative revelations:
- Great aunt Nell, who owns a bunch of woodland with a cabin where she goes hunting and fishing pretty often
- first-cousin-once-removed-in-law Jan, the head of Google Norway
- second cousins from about four different conservative Mennonite groups, one of which still wears cape dresses

Here are some of my favorite shots from the week…