I am full of gratitude and thanks to all of you who came to my 2025 live events! December 6 is my last live event of the year I look…
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It’s been a while, or maybe it hasn’t. I am cranking out art this spring and summer, creating the pieces I love, and selling them at markets and events around…
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The words of the men on the beach rang in my head. From the moment I left, I let the thoughts affect me and they’re still with me as I…
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I ventured west on 101 past Port Angeles, across the Elwah River, down a big hill and further into wild lands. I crossed the Sol Duc River at least four…
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There have been many notable times in life when I had the presence to say to myself, “this group of people will probably never be together again.” The day I…
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You might think I know a lot about Nepal because I have been there a few times. That’s not the reason. I know many climbers (famous and not) who know…
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A departure from my regular blog content. I told this story to my kids tonight. When I was sixteen, I had my first car, a 1966 Thunderbird. It was older…
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Maybe I was a gypsy in a past life, or a nomadic herder, but things that serve no purpose other than to take up space are usually lost on me.…
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Last week one of the vendors I work with at my new job gave me a bottle of Mât Sim. It’s Vietnamese wine made from honey myrtle fruit. I thanked…
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Most of you know by now that in the last month I’ve closed up my consulting business and my photo business and my outdoor/wellness business to take a full time…
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Every once in a while I find myself riveted on a specific moment, like a spotlight is on it, asking me to pay deep attention so it burns into my…
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Some say love… On the way home from Seattle last night, I heard The Rose on the radio. Yeah, Bette Midler, the whole sappy thing. Though it was the first…
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It’s my second visit to Dad’s house, and the last day of this trip. My aunt and uncle are here threading through paper and kitchen items for the five days…
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This is a year of extensive travel for me. It began in November, with almost a month in Nepal, then December on the Big Island of Hawaii, winter camping on…
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“Does this glissade chute make my butt look big?” It’s been a long time since I climbed over 5000 vertical feet in a day. This year, for Mother’s Day, my…
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Time for photo catch up! I’ve averaged 750 photos per day and probably 20-50 video clips (because the sound and motion is really helpful sometimes! – I wish I could…
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Only so much can be relayed in a FB post. Since I’m staring at the ceiling at 3 am, I thought I’d dig in. Ask me about anything and I…
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One of the benefits of flying SEA to KTM is there are no direct flights, so I get a nifty layover in a cool Asian city on the way! This…
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Traveling to Nepal shows me, in stark contrast, all the quirky things we do in our culture. I love how the contrast and realization cracks open my thoughts and breaks me…
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“Stoopid photographers!” I yelled to no one, because there was no one there to hear. In reviewing my adventures, I find the most fun, exhilarating, and rewarding ones have one…
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This morning when I woke up, the first thought I had was of Hunchback of Notre Dame. The movie, by Disney. I thought of Esmerelda spinning and dancing in that…
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Growing up in the Upper Midwest, my art experiences included studying Native American art and craft work of the Sioux Nation tribes. As the child of an art major, I…
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Danu is my regular weekend hiking buddy. He’s been in the US for twenty years, but before that he was a mountain guide all over the Himalayas and has guided summits…
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One of the things I love about my travels to Asia, is that they remind me of how many little bits of knowledge and learnings have been packed inside my…
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We were supposed to backpack to The Enchantment Lakes area, having jumped through all the hoops to secure a set of coveted passes for the restricted, fragile, high alpine region.…
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Recovered from my ancient blog: [First entry: Thursday, July 24, 2008] A really amazing thing happened to me yesterday. While exiting the freeway (520) at 4:00 PM I noticed a…
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September, that lovely season of crisp breezes, falling leaves and back to school. This year has been different. I have a high school freshman for the first time since I…
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I have a story about this song. I have stories about lots of songs, because that’s the nature of music. At least for me. It brings memories, ideas, feelings and…
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Went on a hike to see pretty things and get a little exercise. But it was a photographer’s hike, which means doing it during hours that don’t make sense to…
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Have you ever visited a place for the first time and felt immediately as though it is your home away from home? Today, for the second time I visited Sidhehaven, and that’s…
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I found and an elm seed on the ground this morning. What I did immediately after that was smiled. Then after I realized the smile on my face, I picked…
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Way back in 1989, I had to declare a major in college. I toyed with an architecture major, but the prof for the prerequisite: History of Cities was horrific and…
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One of the common threads for PKU kids (and adults) is that they play down the emphasis that our society places on food. Think about it – if your meal…
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This is a photo story about a unique day we had in Bali. It included a giant bamboo structure, snakes, a concert and yoga. Grab a cup of cleansing organic…
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I almost titled this “There is too much, let me sum up…” but that’s actually counter to the point I am about to make. There is so much to read…
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I was going along, doing my normal house-mommy activities, washing dishes, folding fitted sheets – king size, alone – how does a person do that?… trying to decide if I’d…
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During the last week of June I led a single overnight to the south foot of Mt Baker in the North Cascades. Anyone who is familiar with the hiking trails…
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My youngest has been at camp for a solid week. It was at a YMCA camp, staffed the way they usually do the big summer camps – lots of imported students…
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Written Sunday morning at 5:40 am, after dawn, before the sun crawled out from behind Cascade ridges, during a 24-hour escape from regular life. I had a mouse on my…
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Our group walked through a flat, red-rock area in Arizona. There was nothing for miles. We’d just come through Monument Valley and stopped our six-van caravan at a dirt pullout to let…
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Let it be known that if you catch a 5:20 am flight out of Seattle, you can shoot sunset at the Grand Canyon that same day. Even when you have…
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Of all the places your stuff could be from, Shanghai ranks at the top. It’s the place where new things are packed into innumerable colored boxes bigger than your living…
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How many pigeons? How long did it take you? Did your eyes deceive you? (answer below) (Don’t count the tiny chunk of a tail on the far left) Did you…
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The first full day in Bali, we toured a tropical botanical water gardens. I tiptoed through acres of flora I’d never met before. Glorious mists permeated the warm air. There…
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The North Cascades in February. Usually this route is inaccessible until June. There is too much snow to manage, it’s prone to avalanches and requires too much plowing for winter…
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One summer day in 1985, I stood with my brother and grandmonster (I had just seen St Elmos Fire) atop the twin towers, overlooking New York. I was 15, my…
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I find this a perfect moment to be completely inappropriate. In a story. On the way back from Nepal last year, our layover in Seoul was 18 hours. Once you’ve…
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I recently attended an unusual graduation ceremony. The graduates were fellows of iLEAP, an organization based in Seattle, with a mission of of training NGO managers how to be better,…
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[From an old blog ca: 2009] I could tell you that I summitted Mt Si with 2 guys I barely know. I could tell you they were a Boeing engineer…
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My last post lamented a bunch of photos I’d lost due to file corruption. This is another. It would have been submitted to Nat Geo if I’d been able to…
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The other day I got all psyched up to enter the annual Nat Geo photo contest. In case you’ve never done that, it takes a lot of small print reading,…
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I have a confession to make. I never finished going through my 4000 photos and 250 videos from my Nepal trip in 2013. Part of the reason was because when…
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How would your impression of a faraway place be different if you saw photos of everyday life there instead of the stories that the photographers and journalists want you to…
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This weekend I attended a photography conference in Seattle, called Collaborators for Cause. One of the keynote speakers was Aaron Huey. He’s a cultural photographer and activist and he blew me…
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Even on my worst days, the thought that sticks with me all day is that I am following my passion. It doesn’t have to be perfect all the time, it…
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While it also has the monikers City of Lakes and The Mini Apple, a name I never knew while I lived there was Mill City. Only once I went back…
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This is a performance of the kecak dance in Bali. It is a traditional dance depiction of a Hindu epic story called the Ramayana. Read more about it on my blog.…
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One of our first nights in Bali our guide, Wayan took us to a Kecak dance. This is a traditional Balinese telling of the Ramayana, one of the epic Hindu…
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I love people. I really love people. But I also love untrammeled wild spaces and I think that the North Cascades are one of those places where the masses shouldn’t…
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I have so much more story to tell about Bali. For now this will have to do. My quintessential pastoral photo of Bali: Notably:Gray skies threatening to either rain or…
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I’ve been local lately. Here is some of what my home area offers for photography. Hope you’re out enjoying summer too.
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“You see that saddle over there? That’s where we’re going.” Note the knob on the left (mostly un-named on trail maps) and the peak on the right (Mt Ruth, 7115 feet elevation)…
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The camping season brings forth luscious images of swinging in a hammock under a huge tree, with a roaring campfire, s’mores and the comfy, cozy tent, does it not? Careless,…
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The first family camp of the season is always an exercise in what we forgot. This year our long weekend on Orcas Island had a few extra quirks, namely that…
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I’ve always loved words that describe themselves well. Looking Glass is a beautiful descriptor. If you think about how little we actually look anymore, it becomes even more so. I…
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I finally chose my major in college when they told me I couldn’t take any more credits until I declared one. I didn’t want to make a bad choice, so…
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Photos from a recent trip… and a story or two. I know, a zoo seems so un-exotic, doesn’t it? When you’ve been to the tropics of Bali, the vast snowy…
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Last night I did something out of character. I went out to be unsocial. I spent over an hour in Seattle rush hour traffic (alone) so I could sit in…
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One of our first nights in Bali we decided to forgo sleep and hike all night instead. We left at 10 pm and worked through the night to reach the…
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I still don’t know if this is something that only I love, or if it strikes most people, how beautiful and essential rice fields are. I’ve gone on about it…
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A small departure again today. A few of my girlfriends have taken it upon themselves to educate me in baseball movies (I had seen a grand total of one baseball…
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It’s not international travel, but the Skagit Valley is home to the largest tulip growers in the US, so every spring, after the snow geese and bald eagles have flown…
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Photos from an exotic vacation tend to be a smattering of all sorts of photography, from documenting the family trip, to unusual landscapes, to capturing the essence of a culture.…
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(A day late) Sunrise in Sanur, Bali For more photos and a lot more story, you can follow my blog posts here. Photos are all available for purchase. Please let…
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Just some visual reminders of a place I love. Click a photo to see slide show. Boy at the motorbike fix-it shop Protector god at Boudhanath temple, Kathmandu …
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Saturday morning the trade show didn’t start until 11 am, so I got up at 5 and hoofed it down to the south end of the island for a little…
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Once I committed to a fine art photography degree in college, I took an interest in animal photography. I spent hours in front of the Siberian Tiger exhibit at my…
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When I was sixteen, my brother and I flew to NYC and stayed with my grandmother for a week. She did a really good job of showing us New York.…
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There were bats and rats and elephants… but I never did find no unicorn. (Modified lyrics from The Irish Rovers) Creatures are cool. You already know I like bats, and…
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I find bats intriguing rather than scary or freaky, and due to an incident in Central America years ago, I’ve had the rabies vaccinations, so unless it’s vampire bats, I’m…
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March and April of 2013 took me to Nepal for a second time, where I got elbow-deep in volunteer work and learning more about the culture. Mary Beth and I…
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I’ve run down how we got to this villa and to Bali altogether, so here is the posh, high society bit. The villa we stayed in for a week (of…
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It’s said that there are over 10,000 temples on the island of Bali. After paying attention to the buildings along the roads for hours, I can actually believe that. They…
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Hungry? It’s time for the delectable entry from Bali. I took photos of much of the food we ate. A photographic tour of Balinese food! Grab a napkin and pull…
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For those of you who have never traveled abroad, there are a fair number of things that the good ole US of A doesn’t allow that some of the rest…
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Get comfy, this one’s a little thick. (If you must, skip the fat text and see the photo-story at the bottom.) We were in Bali for twenty four hours before…
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I was going to wait and make this pretty post later in the line up, but the flowers in Bali are unbelievable. Many were familiar from my past trips to…
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I lived in Michigan during my twenties and that was the first time I learned what piles of burning leaves smelled like. People would get nostalgic every fall when the…
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There is nothing that makes you appreciate a place more than having to fly for 25 hours (with 2 kids) to get there. It was 87 degrees when we landed,…
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This is the second year that my immediate family has kissed off the regular Christmas routine and headed to warmer climes. Last year we hit 4 theme parks in 5…
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I was inspired Friday night. We went to the Moore Theater to see Switchfoot’s current rock show. Who are they? They are the sweetest quint of San Diego surfer dudes…
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This weekend was the Kenmore Camera Expo at the Lynnwood Convention Center. One of my stand-by events that I’ve attended since inception in about 2007. The keynote was particularly interesting…
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I’ve recently been spending time on my photojournalist blog, and a lot of my photos are ending up over there. I’ve done a fair amount of photo work and it sometimes…
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In a way I am relieved that the national parks are closed. The poor animals are getting a rest from the thousands of people-feet that tread through their homes all…
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Occasionally my job sends me on fun little non-climbing adventures that are as exciting as my own climbing adventures (almost). Tonight I am going to see an advance screening of…
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Hopefully by now you’ve seen the Louis CK bit where he explains exactly why he won’t get a smart phone for his kids. The clip itself is great and if you haven’t…
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I am shirking my work to write this. I’ve been wanting to blog all week, but I am in catch-up mode, as usual. I woke up this morning determined to…
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I drove a carpool of kids to camp today. My own son and two other boys in the 6th grade, all of whom are new to the school this year.…
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One day while exploring in Glacier National Park, en route to this place, where we relaxed into the last full day in this landscape, and let the beauty of the…
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The serene image of a monk praying delights me. The Tibetan Buddhist monks of Nepal could take the interest of my camera for an entire year, I am certain. The…
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It’s one of the must see places right now. So we decided back in March that our family summer vacation would be to Glacier National Park. Beauty, drama, mountains and…
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I went home for Christmas alone that year. I was separated from my husband and had traveled home for some shelter and comfort from the emotional drain that would become…
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On the way to Nepal this time, I watched movies since the flight was too bumpy to sleep. One of them was Great Expectations (Helena Bonham Carter is a fabulous Havisham,…
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A standard Northwest blanket of fluffy coastal clouds holds back the early morning sun. Mist in the distance obscures the horizon. I’ve peeled off my outer layers and am plodding…
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This weekend the outdoor industry had a local public event. My magazine was there and I gave a talk about Nepal on day two of the expo. It’s mostly business,…
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My brother called me this evening. We usually talk about work, the family, how many bass he caught last weekend and what the kids are up to, then we don’t…
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After a week home only a small handful of people have been able to ask me about the trip. The stories are beginning to unfold, but I am still very much in…
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This is a tough one. There is so much to digest that I probably shouldn’t be writing about it yet. Chitwan is an amazing place. It has shown me things…
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My head has been spinning far too hard lately and I am anxious for that to stop. Packing, setting the kids up, planning the itinerary, matching up with people I…
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I was going to write this post about trash cleanup volunteering in Tapting. I am excited to get into that part, but so much needs to happen face to face…
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I was lamenting all the things I will miss here at home while I am away in Nepal for a month. Maybe that sounds ridiculous, but last time I missed…
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One of the things that I didn’t anticipate happening when I entered the world of publishing and authors was, I somehow obtained the guts to reach out and talk to…
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This unsolicited email came to me today from someone I don’t know at all. It was exactly what I needed. Dear AC and Erika Read “Song of Chomolungma” last night and want…
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I am due to post photos on this site. It is after all a photo site. Really, I take photos sometimes! And I even get them put on this site…
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Original questions are great, but the repeat questions, the ones that keep coming up, are great at showing me where there are gaps in successfully conveying information. I have been asked…
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A photo of us and the plane we took from Lukla to Phaplu. The runway is just behind the plane – yup gravel strip at 7800 feet. Pilots are in…
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Are you one of those readers that likes to know what a foreign word sounds like before you read it in a book? I am. I’ll stop reading in the…
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One of the things I really enjoyed in writing the book, was using words to describe sound. Music is, by definition, an aural experience. The challenge of conveying that in…
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[I know, the photo runs over the edge, but I needed it this size so you can see details] I took this as a simple documentary photo. I meant to…
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On occasion I think of a description or passage that existed in one of my early drafts, and I don’t remember if it made the final cut. Then I sprint…
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Larger version of the photo here I have studied many of my photos over and over. This is one. It tells a million stories just in itself. For me…
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Some of my early drafts had stories that I later cut for various reasons. Most were cut because I felt they didn’t add to the story or to anyone’s character.…
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This is a long one with a moral. Grab a cup of tea and get comfy. A story that didn’t make it into the book: Off the Everest Highway, away from…
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Not all the stories that I brought home made it into the book. Some were just not complete enough or interesting enough to put in. Some were interesting, like this one, but…
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Yesterday was the official book release party. It was an emotional, fun, energetic, soulful way to kick off a book. I am pretty sure it was unique as book releases…
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There are several stories in the book that were inconsequential when I first heard them in Nepal. Once I was home, I could reflect differently on the experiences and this helped fill…
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I was dropped off at SEA-TAC airport a couple hours early the day we flew out to Nepal. So I had a couple hours to kill after security and bag…
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We’re getting close! The books are in motion, in a truck, making their way here! I am guessing you’d like to hear one more story before they arrive, but I…
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(Actually as you read…) The book is uploading… being sent to the printer RIGHT NOW! Aak! If ever I deserved a freak out moment, this might be it. I have…
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I am truly beside myself. I keep telling people that completing this book feels like I am standing outdoors naked (in this weather). I am overwhelmed by the support and…
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The word has gone out. I have let a bunch of people know that my book is ready. (And that’s the scariest thing I have done this week.) So this…
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Obviously it can’t be too slow, since I told you two days ago that we’re down to less than 10 days (eeks)! I spent a full day cussing at Word Press to…
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Once I had 30,000 words down, a title came to me. It jumped into my head, curled up in my lap and smiled at me like a big-pawed puppy. I…
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I can actually feel the last days of this 9-month-long project ticking down. It’s refreshing and necessary and kind of sad. I can see the finish line, I just need…
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I redid the website 2 days ago. I have been futzing with it. It might be ready – poke around and see. Let me know if it’s broken anywhere. In…
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Just a note that a few things have moved. My HimalSong blog is now on the left of this page, as well as in its home on Blogspot. Almost everything…
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Things are looking a bit more beautiful (or at least dusted off) around here. Word Press is my new buddy, and this is website number 4 that I have dipped…
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Once I was back home, I spent days and long hours in the thick of madly writing out detailed descriptions of the places I’d just been before they vanished from…
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When I sat down on Christmas eve last year to interview AC about his seven summit climbs, I felt really honored. I was actually in disbelief that I had pulled off an interview…
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When I was an art director, we created an animated product based on a feature film. Our product was to be released along with the movie. As such, we received “dailies” from the feature film production crew,…
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(Yeah, songs again in the title.) Sherpas are the culture of people who live in the high Himalaya, in the shadow of Mt Everest. The group I traveled with was…
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Besides the writing itself, I have about 6000 photos in my arsenal to add imagery to the book. The hardest part isn’t what to include, it’s what not to include.…
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When we returned to Lukla (back down to 10,000 feet from the top), we had a couple days to rest. One evening in the common room at dinner, I talked…
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Stepping back in time, here is a bit of story… When I arrived in Kathmandu, I had already been gone from home for 36 hours. Three days later, I felt…
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I am just sure that most novel writers spend the majority of their waking and sleeping hours developing characters. I was spared that since my book is NOT a novel…
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For the record, I like hiding song lyrics and titles in my blog writing, so feel free to begin singing when you see a title, if it strikes you. I…
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I spent the first 2 months that I was asked this question, trying like hell to answer it. It’s hard to encapsulate, and that is part of the reason a…
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My book is in its final stages. The writing portion is complete, save a couple thorns at the end, but we’ll get to those later. 220 pages of text have…