Jingle Run 2009

This year I participated in the 25th annual Jingle Run in Seattle. The race benefits the Pacific Northwest chapter of the Arthritis Foundation and is tons of fun. Although the official results aren't in yet, I think I finished at around 34 minutes. I also managed to raise $325 this year so thank you very much if you were one of my sponsors!

The fun thing about this race is that most of the runners dress up. This year I saw a number of reindeer, Santa suits galore, adults in PJs with giant candy canes, and even a dog dressed in his holiday best. I had some pretty festive socks...



Nearly everyone wore bells on their shoes, giving the race its own jingly soundtrack. If you would like to see pictures from the race, Charles took a number and they are located here.

2009 Thanksgiving in Canada

Charles and I decided to spend the holiday weekend in Canada. We packed up the poodles and drove across the border to Vancouver, BC for a relaxing weekend at the Pan Pacific Hotel. The idea was to take it easy, eat good food, and relax.

We spent most of Thursday driving. The traffic in the States was terrible. However I planned ahead and already had a massage booked at Spa Utopia.

I wasn't the only one getting spoiled though. Upon checking into the hotel, the poodles were presented with this gift basket including treats, a food dish, beds, mats, and other dog amenities.

Friday was gorgeous! We took the poodles for a long walk around the sea wall and had dinner at La Crocodile. I also checked out the Miraj Hammam on South Granville which was fabulous.

The weather on Saturday was miserable, but that didn't stop us from driving out to Richmond to visit a friend. I bet you're wondering why this post has a "dutch culture" tag. It's because there is a pannekoeken house in Richmond! The place is called De Dutch. Charles and I both agreed that it lived up to its name and appreciated some good pannekoeken!

We didn't take many pictures during our trip, but the set can be found here if you are interested.

It did not rain in Forks

This weekend I traveled to Forks, Washington for a Twilight-inspired Volksmarch with a few of my coworkers. For those who don't know, Forks is the home of the Twilight series by Stephanie Meyer, which I read about a year ago because everyone else was doing it. In my humble opinion, the series not a great work of literature, but it has inspired a lot of tourism in Forks and it is sort of fun to jump on the fannish bandwagon.

We stayed in a Twilight-themed room in a motel that was pretty decent by small city motel standards. I was particularly dazzled by the sparkly curtains.

Seeing as how Stephanie Meyer drew her inspiration from Forks solely from the weather report, we were surprised to spend nearly an entire 24 hours there without rain! The walk itself was sufficient to make anyone feel well acquainted with Forks as it is a pretty small town. I concluded that it is made up pretty much entirely of Twilight stores like Dazzled by Twilight and drive through espresso stands (I counted at least 3).

On the drive home, we visited Bella Italia, which is the location of Bella and Edward's first date in the book. The wine list was great, the mushroom ravioli was decent, but the service was pretty bad. I did, however, enjoy the "Twilight sparkling syrah."

I took way too many pictures during the trip and spent way too much money on Twilight-inspired schwag. I was mostly just fascinated by how the town was taken over by the commercialization of the series. The entire set of pictures is located here. However, I think this shot pretty much sums it up...



Surprisingly Twilight merchandise is not visible in this picture.

Costume Contest for Dogs?

It seems like all of my posts are about poodles lately, but sometimes they're too cute to ignore. Today we went to the Seattle Off-Leash Dogoween event which was basically a costume contest for dogs. Jocelyn came along to show off Remus who dressed as a tanooki...



Berlin wore the panda suit we bought him in Japan...



The poodles had some rough competition including a light rail wiener dog...



And dogs dressed as flying monkeys...



In the end, the poodles didn't place, but we had a great time. If you're interested in seeing a list of the winners it is posted here. We took way too many pictures and you can see those here. Here's one final shot of the cuties...

Remus did the 2009 Dawg Dash!

Remus has been doing so well with agility that a few weeks ago we let him run a mile with me in the Alki Beach Run. This weekend we decided to see if he could manage a 5K at the very dog friendly University of Washington Dawg Dash. He did so well! We walked a bit on the uphill parts, but he finished in a little over 40 minutes. Here is a pic of him finishing...



He spent the entire race pacing himself with another little white fluffy dog that you can see in the picture.

But we finished strong and beat out Remus' race buddy...

.

Charles and Berlin were wonderful cheerleaders in the stands. The entire photo set taken by Charles is located here.

Final Japan Post

We flew out of Tokyo around 5:30 PM on September 13, but before leaving we fit in one more activity. Because it was a Sunday we decided to visit Harajuku, which has a reputation for being a fashion district with lots of cosplay action. Sunday is supposedly the best day to go for the cosplay. So here's the proof that we were at the station...



We were around Harajuku from about 10:30 AM to about 12:30 PM. We walked all around the station and all we saw was this guy...



We even checked the bridge where they all supposedly hang out. Maybe there was some cosplay convention in the area or something? Or we were too early? We decided to walk around and give it some time. The area was pretty cool...



I was tempted to buy these...



But instead it became a poodle shopping day because we found two cute dog wear stores...



One had an entire section of Winnie the Pooh...



We got Berlin a panda costume and 2 sweatshirts. Remus got a Spiderman outfit and a t-shirt. Because the cosplayers were not appearing we ventured into the area where the Meiji Shrine is located...



Where we found the most awesome sink ever...



And seeing this made up for the lack of cosplay...



After the shrine, we checked again for cosplayers, but no luck. We had to head to the airport to make our flight, but before taking off we made sure to check out Japanese massage chairs...



So this is the final installment in my Japan posts. Charles and I had an awesome time and definitely want to go back. Hope you enjoyed!

Cat Cafe = last night in Japan

After taking the bullet train from Kyoto, we spent our final night in Tokyo. We were torn between spending time in Asakusa and Ikebukuro, but chose the latter because it had more manga stores. That's where we found this sign...



Before we get to the sign here are some general pics from the city that night...



I was geeked to see a pink crepe truck even if it was inferior to L's...



And I thought this was a cool pic...



So the sign ended up being an advertisement for a cat cafe. We had not heard of these things, but they are exactly what they sound like: a cafe with a bunch of cats...



It was 200 yen for 10 minutes with the fur balls. There were kitties all over the place...



Even in boxes...



There was a crazy coffee machine...



Which this kitty liked a lot...



Although the owners of the cafe did not speak English they were really nice. They sat down with us, showed us baby pictures of all the cats, and tried to answer our questions about the cats' names and histories. Although I would have preferred a poodle cafe, I think this is a great business concept.

See more cat pictures here.

Japan Day 6

During our second day in Kyoto, we visited Nijo Castle and the International Manga Museum. The castle looked a lot like the temples...



But it had a moat so it was definitely a castle...



It started raining and we made our way to the International Manga Museum which was basically a library of manga in a super cool building with exhibits and other stuff...



I am glad we visited on a Saturday because the cosplayers were in full force. They don't allow pictures near the books so cosplayers usually gather on the yard for photos. Since it was raining on the day we visited, they were all inside doing clandestine photoshoots in stairwells and other corners of the museum. A lot of them had some hardcore photography equipment and their costumes were all awesome...







There was also a cool exhibit of figures from a particular artist...



After the museum, we had a super tasty lunch at the hotel steakhouse. It was one of those where the chef cooks in front of you...



We had two different kinds of beef and they were both delicious...



More cosplay photos and the rest of my Kyoto pics are here.

Japan Day 5

Even though our trip was only one week long we decided to stay in Kyoto for one night and it ended up being a good deal. We got round trip tickets on the bullet train and one night the the Hotel Okura for about $500. Considering that train tickets alone are about $240, this is great. Here is what the inside of the train looked like...



Although we could not make it to the Tezuka Manga Museum, I got my dose of Black Jack and Dororo love at Tezuka World near the station. The first thing I saw when we arrived was this...



I had my picture taken with the doctor himself...



After checking into the hotel we had lunch in one of those restaurants where you take your shoes off and you have your own little box...



This was my food which was so good that I ate half of it before remembering to take a picture...



After lunch we visited the Tofukuji Temple. I actually liked the grounds better than the buildings although the whole thing was very peaceful...





The guy who took this picture was an older Japanese man who was so excited when we told him we were from Seattle because of Ichiro Suzuki...



At night we headed out to Gion for some dinner and attempts to gawk at geisha.



I didn't manage to get a geisha pic because they walk fast! However we did see a super fancy poodle (also too fast to get a pic) and these women in traditional dress were gorgeous...



And we finished the night out with a tasty multi-course dinner...



Yummmmmm....

Japan Day 4

On Day 4, we took a day trip to Hakone. We set out around 10 AM and took a train from Tokyo (Shinjuku station) to Hakone. We purchased the Hakone free pass which gives you a return trip to Hakone and free access to all the public transport there. They have rail, buses, cable cars, rope lines, etc. so it is a good deal. Here's the train we took...



We paid extra for seats on the "Romance Car" which is basically a bit nicer than the regular train and has seats paired in twos. Here is a crazy pic of Charles that shows the inside of the train...



Once we arrived in Hakone, we stopped at a restaurant near the station for some excellent soba...



After lunch we utilized our passes to take a train to Gora, a cable car, and a rope line...



Apparently sometimes you can see Mt. Fuji from the rope line, but we didn't. The scenery was gorgeous however...



At around 5 PM, we visited a nearby onsen which had good reviews. Here is the entrance...



Obviously I could not take pictures in the hot springs, but trust me when I say they were awesome. The men and women were separated and in the women's area there were about 6 different pools and a sauna. One thing I loved about the sauna was that it had a window and you could see into the woods. After about an hour there by myself, I met a Colombian woman who was traveling with her husband. She and I were the only two English speakers there so we hung out together and chatted. It was nice to have a chat buddy since most of the women there seemed to be doing the "bathing with their girlfriends" thing. After the hot springs bit, we had tea at the bar...



And then we returned to the train station where I proceeded to photograph Japanese vending machines and the odd drinks inside them...



If you want to see more, my entire set of Hakone photos are here.