Puddle Jumping in the Cooks October 2015 | On my way

I'm sitting at the gate in Seattle after a get-up in the wee hours of the morning to catch a 6:15 flight from Edmonton to here. Of course it didn't leave until almost 7, but that's not unusual. Shock and awe--they had to de-ice. Who knew? Well I know, we always de-ice in Edmonton, but there wasn't even frost on the windshields in my neighbourhood this morning.

I woke up at 3, as I often do, and since I had so much time to kill, I decided to repack. I'm feeling a little old, or perhaps a little cranky, about trying to squeeze everything into too-small bags. As an old friend used to say: "Ten pounds of shit in a five pound bag." That pretty much says it all. I was picturing schlepping my bags down that long walk to US customs at YEG and thought, nyet, not going to happen. So I've relinquished my pride in being sparse on the packing and heroically hauling it around myself, and given myself room to grow into a bigger bag, checked of course.

I left a perfect gf breakfast at home in the fridge. Feel free to help yourself in you are in the neighbourhood. Freshly baked muffins, a ham and cheese sandwich, sliced carrots. Ok lunch too. My search for a decent breakfast here in Sea-Tac ended in failure. Fried potatoes that looked like they'd been coated in glue-paste before meeting their final demise in the gritty brown deep fryer fat ( I did not taste them), bacon so underdone I could not cut it with the (plastic) fork, and (I think-I probably shouldn't assume) scrambled eggs. No green tea; only black. Too late, I found Seattle's Best down by the D gates.They have fruit cups and oatmeal. Sea-Tac seems overly obsessed with beer and wine. Bold signs direct you to "more beer this way" and long lists of the local brews. I wonder if there's a connection between that and raging passengers.

So, the Cook Islands. The Cooks. We arrive there at 7 am tomorrow so 24 hrs after waking up this morning. They're on this side of the dateline, so only 4 hrs difference, so  tele-commuting might be a real option! A home office in the Cook Islands. They're on roughly the same latitude as Hawaii but in the southern hemisphere, and yes, they' re islands. 15 of them. We'll be in the south archipelago, on four islands. The itinerary is posted if you are interested in our whereabouts. This should help to position in the south pacific.



Flight is boarding. Off to the LA County Museum this afternoon then dinner with Margaret and Craig Fields, and a big sleep as we travel across the Pacific to Rarotonga.