Patrick basically gave me a giant rock of crack for Christmas

No, lovelies, not actual crack, but close to it! This beloved man of mine gave me a Kindle Fire. Which is awesome all on its own.

BUT.

Three words for you: Seattle Public Library.

Oh my goodness gracious. Books. Unlimited books. Well, mostly. I do have to place holds on some of them. But holy crap this is the gift that keeps on giving!! You can have up to 25 books out at a time and keep them for up to 3 weeks, not that I'd ever need that much time.

It is a buffet for your brain!

I'm on my first one already. And you don't even have to go to the library in person. You just look online, check them out, and they're downloaded to your Kindle. It's like MAGIC. When the time is up, or if you click Return Book when you're done, they magically delete themselves from your device.

AND IT IS FREE! Free free freeeeeee!

Like I told you: giant rock of crack.

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The drought is coming to an end!

Seattle/Bremerton Area

Special Statement

Statement as of 4:06 PM PDT on October 10, 2012

... Heavy rain possible across western Washington this weekend
through early next week...

A pattern change will bring wet weather back to western
Washington Friday through the weekend after a prolonged dry spell.
Weak weather systems will affect the area on Friday and Saturday
with widespread measurable rainfall expected. A stronger system
will then steer heavy rain into the Pacific northwest late
Saturday night through possibly Monday night.

If the forecast models are correct... this will be the first
significant storm of the season. Some forecast models show several
inches of rain in the mountains with sharp rises expected on the
rivers. The Olympics may see 4 to 8 inches of rain through Monday
night... with 2 to 5 inches possible in the Cascades. As for The
Lowlands... the coast may see 1 to 4 inches... with 1 to 2 inches of
rain in the interior.

Breezy to windy conditions are also forecast over this period. The
coast and north interior are likely to be the windiest locations.

Models have not pinned down the exact storm track so there are
some uncertainties in the timing and impacts of this system. Monitor
forecasts from the National Weather Service for the latest updates.

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I'm so glad this had a happy ending

I heard about this story from Patrick, and it first made me absolutely furious, then afterward really glad that I live in a world where there are good people, too.

Everyone working together

Basically the story is that this guy and a friend of his went hiking on some mountains and brought his dog Missy along with them. Dogs have no business on this hike. It's called the Sawtooth for a reason. The poor dog was struggling and eventually the weather turned bad so they just left her there. After a day, they figured she was dead and didn't bother trying to get more help. Some other hikers stumbled across her after a few more days, huddled in some rocks and bleeding, so they tried to patch her up as best they could, fed her and left her with some water, but couldn't get her out as she weighed too much. They went back down and started a Facebook page, along with posting on a hikers' forum about the dog's predicament. People were enraged about the situation, and a search and rescue party of 8 was formed to go get Missy. The rescue group managed to find her and got her out, having to hike through a full-blown snowstorm to do it. Now the creep who left her up there wants her back, but he's being prosecuted for animal cruelty and the rescuers want to adopt her.

Missy being carried out

I hope he goes to jail and the rescuers get to adopt Missy. I further hope that her former owner is blacklisted by all animal adoption places from ever having another pet. I don't know how anyone could bring a dog on a hike like that in the first place, let alone leave her up there to die. Thank god there are still some real men and women on this earth to make up for the miserable failures.

Missy and her heroes

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