The Great State of Washington

This is Leavenworth Washington. It is a little German tourist trap. I loved every minute of my visit here! I drove up to Yakima WA Friday afternoon to visit my friend Emily. She graduated from hygiene school a year after I did. She has been and always will be a good friend. She has been working as a commissioned officer for the Indian Health Services. Her job is a tough one. She does SRP more often than a regular prophy. This means she cleans really really dirty mouths.  Most of her patients are diabetic, asthmatic, overweight possibly alcoholic and drug dependant. She takes each patient and does her best to give them the care they receive free due to being Native Americans. Imagine the attitude of the patients who do not have to pay or care about their teeth. The white guys will take care and fix it....What a hard job. It is very difficult to get her patients to even brush their teeth so forget about a proxy brush or floss. .  .

I digress, Saturday Emily and I woke and left for a lovely drive to Leavenworth. This is Emily in her glory with just a sample of the wonderful flowers all around.

These little shops were filled with Bavarian Chocolate, Danish pastry, German beer. Just a view of the mountains and the treesI thought that this view was amazing.there is a peak behind the clouds that was beautiful covered in snow.Leavenworth is nestled in between some grand and beautiful mountain peaks. I can only imagine the winter wonderland this creates.The scenery was just so romantic and Sound of Music-y.

Emily and I stopped for lunch at Cafe Chrisa. It was absolutely wonderful. I had spatzel and schnitzel. Emily had a Ruben with German potato salad. I tried her selections and loved them. . . even the potato salad. It was full of vinegar and yumminess. I caved and bought a cinnamon roll loaf. It is amazing and gooey and I have a feeling it will make delish french toast tomorrow.

I saw many deer and one buck. The forest we drove through was so beautiful. Not mossy like Oregon forest. My heart is tender and I was really in a nostalgic romantic mood and this drive was wonderfully perfect from the birds to the wildflowers to the sun and the rain.

Speaking of rain. Saturday night Emily and I planned on attending the Speedway to watch speed races. But rain cancelled the races. So we went to the raceway--dirt track. We waited 90 minutes and they cancelled it also. But those 90 minutes were great fun. The cars were trying to get around the track for warm up and no one could make it without getting stuck. Even the big CAT got stuck on every turn. There was mud flying everywhere. It was pretty entertaining. They would not give us a refund only a rain check for next weekend. Weird policy.This is a picture of hop plants. Hops is used to make beer. I am not a drinker but I find these plants fascinating. Look how they grow up the strings. That has to be labor intensive for the farmer.Then there are wires on top of the strings and the hops grow over then down. When they grow down they are ripe and ready for harvest. This spring has been unusually cool and wet so the hops have not had much of a chance to grow. I love how these fields look. Emily told me that they smell pretty bad when they are more mature. I can only imagine. I will have to venture up this fall to experience it myself.

All in all it was a wonderful weekend. I got hurt by my past. I decided to date other people. All I want is an LDS man who tries his best to live the life he covenanted and chose to live. Believe it or not it is a hard thing to find. Time will tell. I am still planning on seeing Josh all I can but I am going to date as many men as it takes.