Seattle Aquarium

Rick and I spent last weekend in Seattle. Valentine's Day was our 28th wedding anniversary. We went to the Seattle Aquarium on Saturday. We got there about fifteen minutes after it opened. It's not a huge place, and I'd say it takes less than two hours to see everything. We were in and out within an hour and a half. It was good because by the time we left, the line to get in was crazy long. I couldn't believe it. I'm sure it was a madhouse the rest of the day. 

I had my Canon with me, but I really didn't use it much except for when I went outside. It's funny to see how the majority of people use their cell phones to photograph with. Hardly anyone carries cameras anymore. I ended up using my iPhone 6+ to take most of my indoors pictures. It's hard for me to adjust settings in the darker areas with my big camera.

They had a couple of red octopuses (above), but both were sound asleep when I saw them. I guess they were asleep. Their eyes were closed. Unfortunately, I forgot to take notes the names of other critters I saw. I usually do that, but for some reason I forgot this time.

The sea otters are always my favorite to watch at any aquarium. This isn't a big place, by any means, but they have quite a few sea otters and seals. They're always so comical. Sea otters remind me of Denny sometimes, especially when they're on their back.

I didn't post any pictures of Sea Cucumbers. A guy walked up to me with what looked like a Tupperware container. He said, "Do you want to pet a Sea Cucumber?" I told him no, but I wanted to say, "What kind of sicko are you?" Sea Cucumbers indeed. Slugs. That's all they are. You can call them Sea Cheesecakes for all I care—they're still slugs. Freak.

The aquarium had a lot of tide pools where people could touch the sea creatures. I'm just not into that, although I know kids love it. I had a bad experience as a child when my school took us on a field trip to the Queen Mary. I was totally content just looking at the critters—but no—one of the psycho staff members decided I just had to pick up a starfish. I was little. She grabbed my wrist and literally shoved it into the water, forcing me to pick one up. Scarred me for life. Now mind you, I will pick up a sea critter on my own, especially at the beach. The condition is that I do it on my own. Force my hand again and you might lose an eye ... or two.

The photo above is of salmon. This was a cool feature because it was directly over your head. Below are some jellyfish. They had them in a hallow arch. I tried to get a picture of that, but there were too many people walking in and out of it. There were different colored lights that came on, so the jellyfish went from being clearish-white to bright blue, green, pink, etc.

Below is the crazy line to get in. The aquarium opened at 9:30am. This photograph was taken about 11am. I guess Valentine's Day weekend is pretty busy in Seattle regardless where you go. Even so, I'm glad we got in when we did. I couldn't imagine being in there with all these people.

Her Pink Hair

"Long brown hair, short brown hair, no hair, short fuzzy hair, pink hair ..."

Her Pink Hair is the story of a young girl's perspective of her best friend's battle with cancer. Through a poetic text and mixed-media clay illustrations, experience the story through a unique lens. Suggested age for readers: 5-8 years.

I received this book from a drawing on Instagram. I didn't expect to win, but I did. Being a picture book author myself, I'm always delighted to see other people's work. What I loved about this book was how the illustrations are done with clay. It reminded me of watching Gumby or Davey and Goliath as a child. The book doesn't go into any of the harsh details surrounding cancer, but it's a wonderful way to introduce and open up the discussion with younger children who might be dealing with a sick loved one.

Jill Dana is an author, illustrator, artist, teacher, and filmmaker. She is a certified elementary educator with a Master of Education from FAU. She is an award-winning filmmaker with an MFA in film and television production from USC. She also studied psychology and motion pictures at the University of Miami. The author will donate a portion of the proceeds from the sale of Her Pink Hair to a children's charitable organization.

Please visit her website @ www.jilldanabooks.com

Guardian Angel Publishing, Inc.

eBook ISBN: 9781616335694

Softcover ISBN: 97816163335687

Happy 14th Birthday, Neil!

BB-8 on February 8!

Today is my 51st birthday. I've never been one to be bothered by my age. I know it bugs some people to get older, but I've never cared one way or another. I've always been comfortable getting older. I certainly don't want to go back and be younger—not in today's world, that is. Anyway, I had a really nice birthday. I just spent it at home with my family (minus Nicole, who lives in Billings) and we did the cake and present thing after dinner. It was nice. I got a lot of cool things too, including this awesome BB-8 cake above—I'm a total Star Wars nerd!

Here's a photo of all the goodies I received. Rick got me a Kindle Paper White, which is currently charging. I'm looking forward to giving that a try soon. I also got lots of football stuff, which might keep me busy now that the season has ended. I'm always asking Rick questions he can't answer, so now I have a Football for Dummies book. Maybe I can answer a few questions for him next season. The puzzle is awesome too because it's all of classic book covers, many of which we have. Nichelle gave me The Force Awakens mug. It's holds both hot and cold drinks. Awesome! And the Rebel Alliance earrings—did I mention I'm a Star Wars nerd?

Rick brought me home some roses too. I need to put them in another spot before I go to bed. Denny loves them, and I'm sure he'll be up on the table trying to rub his face on them. 

Congrats, Broncos!

Just one look ...

I'm sitting here listening to my Very Best of Linda Ronstadt album via iTunes. I don't know how I stumbled across Linda tonight while on my computer, but I did. I saw a recent photograph of her and was shocked at how different she looked. I guess most of that was weight-related, which I totally understand. After all, the woman is sixty-nine. What I did NOT know is that she is suffering from Parkinson's Disease. As much as I've always loved her songs, I never really followed her closely, so I had no idea she was sick. I found this article—click here—on her condition, although it's from 2014. My father-in-law suffered from Parkinson's. Just like Linda says in this article, it takes a long time to die from the disease, and most die from something else first, just as my father-in-law did with his cancer. But anyway ... I wish Linda well.

February Books

As per my casual New Year's Resolution, these are the two books I've chosen to read during the month of February. I've started Rebel Queen already, but I haven't gotten far with it yet. I bought The Nazi Officer's Wife sometime last year at a bookstore in Billings. It sounds really interesting. I ended up reading about four books during January, even though I set my goal at just two. I figured any more would be pushing it. Two is doable ... at least for me.

Unfortunately, I didn't read much this past week. I've been sick with some sort of cold or sinus crud. Lying in bed at night with my head propped up hasn't fit in very well. One night I was hit with a migraine-type headache that was so bad I couldn't even get myself up to take anything for it. I hadn't had a headache like that in a long, long time. Because of being sick, I found myself online more, which was the main reason I decided to read more books. Frankly, social media sucks during election years. I've watched family members fight, and seen people leave ultimatums regarding who can be their friends by who they vote for. It gets ugly. Some of my writer friends on Facebook are only interested in pushing their candidate. That gets old fast.

If being sick wasn't bad enough, I slipped on the driveway yesterday and fell right on my back. I knocked my head pretty hard, but at least it hit lots of snow. Considering how close I came to the bumper of the van, I think I was pretty lucky. I woke up sore this morning. Rick and I were going to run up to the store, so I just slipped some UGGs on, thinking we'd take the Jeep in the garage. Rick had the Subaru running when I came out, so I walked carefully down the driveway, even though I knew better in those stupid boots. One second I was upright, and another second I was completely down. Ugh ... literally. That's why UGG boots were originally designed by a surfer and meant to be worn at the beach. I knew better too. It was just a mix-up on which car we were taking. But anyway ... I'm paying for it today.