Time

"And you run and you run to catch up with the sun, but it's sinking
And racing around to come up behind you again"
- Pink Floyd, Time


Listened to this lyric on the way to work the other day, and it's a nice summary of how things feel right now. Run hard all day and time just keeps slipping by. I knew I hadn't updated this for a while, but jeez, since Bloomsday? Really?

Now the summer is here, and things aren't going to slow down any time soon I guess. We'll try to update this a little more often over the next couple of months, since we have some trips planned.

So for now, some recaps of the last month or so. With pictures of course!

One nice thing about having the house is the fact it gives us a place to actually entertain people. I mean, otherwise, if we don't invite people over, we'd never clean the place. Not that we, uh, wouldn't invite people over anyway.

Anyway, one recent gathering celebrated Jamie's Dad's birthday. Dick and Marcia, and Kelly, Beth and Parker came over for some copper river salmon and other dishes.



Grandpa Dick with a crazy grandson.



A few weeks ago, we ventured out to take part in a new sporting activity for the Armstrongs. Something has to put the "adventure" into this blog, right? My friend Kathleen from work invited us to join her and some friends for a birthday celebration, and a rousing game of WhirlyBall.

What is WhirlyBall? Think of a basketball game, 5-on-5, with a basket/target at each end. Only, you're not running or walking - you're driving around these bumper car things. And, you have a jai-ali scoop thing with a wiffleball you're trying to throw into the basket. All-in-all, it was a blast! We got in 4 games in the 90 minutes we were there.

One of the twists we discovered was that Kathleen's friends required costumes for the game. Here are Jamie and I dressed to play - I particularly liked my crown/cat ears combo.



Even the referee was forced to wear a costume before starting the game.



WhirlyBall'ers in action!



So, yeah, that was exactly as fun as it looks. Hopefully we'll get a chance to go back again.

Another thing we've been up to lately is attending graduation parties. We've been through the wedding phase, and certainly have plenty of friends with kids to go through the newborn phase, and now I guess with all of the cousins out there we're kicking off the graduation phase. First up this year was Jamie's cousin Alex, and we followed that up last weekend with a visit to the Bonney household to celebrate Brendan's graduation from Lynnwood High School.

It was great to see Al and Regina, Brendan and his girlfriend, and some of the other usual Bonney suspects. The graduate was getting ready to take a two week trip to Bulgaria with his girlfriend and her family, but we were able to get a picture taken before he took off.



Last but not least, we found some time to catch the Washington Dinner Train with our friends Pat and Heidi Brown. The Dinner Train is just what it sounds, a train you take from Renton up to the Columbia Winery in Woodinville and then back again. The deal is a pretty well-oiled machine (pun intended, haha). Have a nice meal and wine on the train, then a quick tour of the winery. We had a great time with Pat and Heidi, and enjoyed the scenery. I think it was the first time I had ever been on a real train, if you throw out monorails, or subways. Good times.

Jamie and I enjoying the night.



So, that's just a little of what we've been up to. Other spare time is filled with things like whipping the garden into shape, running, and oh, work as well.

This next week will be another busy one - I have the Seattle Mariners Cystic Fibrosis golf tournament on Thursday, then we catch a red eye to Florida to visit Grandma Shafer and some of the other Shafer family! More pictures to come.

That brings the end to another blog post. And as the song says...

The time has gone, the song is over, thought I'd something more to say