Things I enjoyed this week (May 17th)

Per usual:

• Getting out of town and going backpacking in Olympic National Park was a treat. The bachelor-party shenanigans were fun, but mostly I enjoyed the order and balance such a shift in pace brings.
• Speaking of shifts in paces, I rode the train up to Seattle as part of that excursion. I'd forgotten how much I enjoy traveling by train.
• Apropos of nothing, I rented Singin' in the Rain from the movie store I basically live next to now. Sixty-plus years later and the humor still holds up. It was also funny to watch and think how the transition from silent film to talkies had happened less than a generation ago at the time. Things change swiftly and often; our fears, reactions and challeneges in reacting to these changes, as human beings, don't. Or, perhaps, change more slowly.
• Clean water. We've been put on alert to boil our water here in Portland the past couple days. I'd gotten used to purifying the stream water on our backpacking trip... in a way it's like I'm still camping! Or like I'm still traveling, like I was last year, when I bought way more bottled water than I probably thought I would in my life.
• Baths. This is still only a week or two in my new place and I'm realizing, for the first time in ages, I have a bathtub in my apartment. Much nicer to come home and slip into than a shower after a long run.