every day thanks giving

I live the life I always wanted and every day I am struck by how amazingly lucky I am.  Several times, every day, I am stuck by how thankful I am for things big and small.  And today is no different.

But because it's Thanksgiving, I'm going to celebrate with a lovely brunch at one of my favorite places and, probably, a walk around this neighborhood or that one.  The pool is closed until Saturday so I need to remember to move so that come Saturday I can.  

My breathing seems to be getting a little worse every day.  The other day, one of my swim buddies, upon hearing me cough, said 'boy, you really are having a hard time getting rid of that, aren't you?'  And I told her that I'm pretty sure this is not going to go away at all but just gradually get worse.  I keep thinking that part of it is because I move so little but when I moving around a lot makes it worse and I want to save it for when I really want to do something.  Part of me, too, wonders if all these inhalers are really doing good work or working against me or each other.  On the other hand, I have zero interest in going to specialists and doing tests and racking up medical bills.  So mostly, this discussion with myself ends up with - at least you don't have a burning desire to run a marathon or do cross country skiing and you don't have to do stuff you can't and you aren't hooked up to oxygen and you really did enjoy smoking and a little coughing is no big deal - so shut up.  And I then I do.

And now, I think I'm going to get up and get showered and get dressed and head out.

Nice...

Before my friend John died, we always went to 13 Coins for any special occasion and always always on Christmas Day and Thanksgiving. So when I'm there, particularly on those holidays, I am filled with memories of him. I was particularly thinking of him today. As you walk out of the restaurant, ahead of you and to the right, what you see if unchanged. But in the 8 years since he died, the view to the left is a whole different world. Amazing.

We used to always sit at the counter in these regally upholstered high back swivel chairs and watch the cooks. It's like getting a show with your meal. I grabbed this tiny video today.

Watch on YouTube

I took the viaduct to the restaurant - the raised highway will soon be history which is very sad for because it has one of the best views of the city... going north you have the whole of downtown on your right and on your left you get Elliott Bay backed by a ring of snow capped mountains. It is really a stunning, stunning ride. They are in the process of replacing it with a tunnel. Blech.

They have already torn down a giant section so as the road gets near my house, it has been chopped off - the continuation has been moved next to it. So you have this weird roadway that just ends in mid air.

Today, as I passed that stump I saw that someone had placed a lovely large gift wrapped box on the stump and a tree on top of it!!! It's amazing and fun and there is no way to get a good picture of it. Next week, I might try going over to the building across the street and seeing if I can sweet talk someone into letting me up to the top floor window.

I tried getting closer today and was rudely chased out by a security guard 'this is private property' (which, for the record, it is NOT), but whatever. Poor guy, working on Thanksgiving, let him have his little power trip. At least gets to say he chased someone away!

Anyway here's the best shot I could get today:

A couple of fun discoveries

TiVo was an early way to download Netflix. In fact, back in the day, it was the only way. But, it sucked. Netflix just wasn't streaming ready. 2 hour movies took 4 hours with 2 hours of intermittent buffering. I canceled my Netflix account. Then TiVo upgraded and Netflix upgraded. And finally I got my Netflix account back.

Now TiVo is now a fancy, feature rich slow turd making just getting to the Netflix goods a major PIA. Today I started watching something and then wanted to check something on TiVo. Stopping and starting Netflix was just painful.

So... I decided to look at using my smart TV. My Samsung smart TV has never been too smart but, turns out, it is WAY smart enough for Netflix and Netflix's routine for linking up to my smart TV is easy peasy.

Nice.

Also, I watched the neatest documentary about two yodeling lesbian twins in New Zealand - Untouchable Girls. I'm not totally in love with the Topp Twins.