Peter joined mother and I on what is becoming a yearly tradition. Picking blueberries at Radke’s Farm. The Radke’s keep their bushes tall and luxuriant so even when it is sunny you are picking in the shade. Peter and picked 17.25 pounds and then helped mom finish off her 20 pounds. Peter was astounded at how cheap the berries were. A pint in Australia is about $8 AU, we paid 1.25 per pound. They are happily living in my freezer now.

Our goal this visit was to do some hiking that we had been unable to get to. My grandmother also requested that I come and help her with some computer tasks so we loaded up and headed over to Bend. Both Peter and I love Bend and were more than happy to go visit. I taught grandma how to take apart and clean her computer and made some changes to her login so it was easier and faster for her to use. We also took a lovely walk with her along the Deschutes River. On our route home we spontaneously decided to take the Old McKenzie Pass Hwy and saw some lovely scenery, hiked to Proxy falls and stopped for lunch at Scott Lake. My goal was to hike to Tamolitch Pool, which I hadn’t been to in years, so we stopped and did that as well. All in all we did about 8 miles that day.

Peter gave my Volkswagen Rabbit, The Bunny, a bath before he left and it looked wonderful, at least until I drove it down the dusty gravel road I live on :(

He left Sunday the 23rd of Aug and settled back into research. However, Mom-two (my stepmother Judy who earned the title Mom-two by being remarkably patient and loving to her newly acquired 14 year old pain in the ass step daughter) called to say that my step-siblings, Eric and Anna, would be arriving at the coast with Eric’s girlfriend of many years (who I hadn’t met yet) and my 2 1/2 year niece (who I also hadn’t met). My brother, Dana and Rhiannon also arrived and we had a beach bbq of Tuna steaks (DELICIOUS!), Oysters (MMMM), salad and marshmallows. It was lovely to see them all. Erin (other half of Eric) is wonderful and Savannah (Anna’s daughter) was also amazing.

Now I returned to research again and it is going quite well. I have ferreted out some bugs in my algorithm implementation and have high hopes of having pretty graphs to show Tom on Friday! Peter returns the 20th of Sept for 2.5 weeks and we are planning a road trip from Bellingham, Wa to Long Creek, Or.

Enjoy the photos. More on the flikr site.