Summertime and the living is surprisingly sweaty.

Randal and I, very consciously, decided to make no plans during our September weekends so that we could rest and recover from a wonderfully insane summer.  With that being said, we have had delightfully active weekends amidst some fantastically active weeks.

The end of August marked one year since we have seen much of our family and friends and commenced an epic thank-you-note writing session.  That is, it has been one year since we got married!  

We celebrated in Colorado!  We spent one night and day in Denver and then headed into the mountains to celebrate my dear friend, Jon's, wedding to Dominic.  They got married in Tabernash, CO in a gorgeous setting.  Their ceremony was cut short due to an impressive hailstorm that promptly cleared up and we all reminisced about our own wedding's fabulous thunderstorm.  

Randal and I headed back to Oregon and camped outside of Eugene before spending the day visiting small towns between Eugene and Jacksonville where we got to see one of our favorite bands, "The Head and the Heart," with our Klamath friends.  I might have teared up during "Rivers and Roads," while missing my friend, Kristi.  Please move to Klamath, Kristi.

Visiting the beautifully renovated Schoolhaus Brewhaus before the concert.

The work week was short after that and my very persuasive friends spent the whole time convincing me to do a sprint triathlon at a nearby resort (Lake of the Woods...  it's beautiful!) that weekend.  At the very last minute, I agreed to do the David R. Kingsley Triathlon: a 500 meter swim, 3 mile run, and 9.5 mile bike ride.

We stand in the water.  Shivering.  Shivering so much.

Lessons learned during my first (and probably only) untrained-for-triathlon:

1. I am a poor swimmer.  I was certainly at the end of the pack and could understand how one might drown in such an event.  Thankfully, my faithful spotter, Randal, kept an eye on me.  I didn't drown, but I wasn't fast!

2. Three-mile runs are much more enjoyable when you get to bring your dog along.  Juneau was a very popular companion during the race and helped me successfully finish the running leg.

3. Bicycling is definitely my forte right now and I zoomed to the front of the pack (and by pack, I mean that I was still one of the many holding up the rear) on my beautiful Giant Avail.  Mainly the feeling of "Thank goodness that the swimming portion is over" kept me smiling until the end of the race.  I finished in about 1 hour and 20 minutes.  The winner finished in less than an hour, so as you can see, on a relative basis, I was very very very close.

The Klamath Racers.  We all competed in the race... even Juneau!

4. We are very very strong.  RAR!

 We spent the remainder of the day negating the health effects of the morning with burgers and margaritas and playing in the lake with the pups.  It was a great, sunny, and sore day.

And another week of work went by...  we're moving forward with our park and our building and trying to finish up some of our projects.  (Who wants a Sky Lakes calendar that we're designing?!  It's going to be cool!)

Randal and I decided to hike the nearby Mount McLoughlin this weekend.  It's about 9500 feet in elevation with a 5000 foot climb.  The hike is 11 miles round trip.  We were ready to conquer the mountain with our very strong dogs.

See how ready we are to conquer the mountain?

Unfortunately, it is a very dry mountain.  On a dry day.  And two dogs and two people drink a lot of water.  So, with about a mile left until we reached the summit and a very small amount of water remaining, we decided to turn our hiking party around instead of dying of dehydration.  As we reached the car with 100 mL of water left between the four of us, we knew that we had made the right decision.

So, hopefully the volcanic Mt. McLoughlin doesn't blow it's top in the next couple of weeks, because we hope to conquer this beast before October.

Dehydrated, loopy, and tired.

And despite having many things to do on our final day of the weekend, Hollywood stepped in and took up most of our day instead.  They're filming "Brothers in Law" here in Klamath Falls and at Lake of the Woods and the final day of filming was yesterday.  

Fantastically enough, they chose the house directly across the street as the home of the main character, so we enjoyed watching them spend two hours to set up a shot that will last about three seconds.  It was very fun and exciting for our street.

We also tried to get Hollywood to discover Bogey the Cat, but he would have none of it.  He garnered attention while moseying around in the grass, but just when they were getting ready to sign him for his own reality show, he vomited grass all over the sidewalk.  What can we say?  Beauregard eschews fame.

Morning filming

Evening filming

Our weekends have been delightful.  And sweaty, of course.  But, I wouldn't have it any other way.

Good things are happening here in Klamath.  Very good things.