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It’s been a busy few weeks getting settled in Portland, but the settling is going well. I’m actually starting my second week as a programmer at Rentrak, and that’s a big part of why I haven’t written anything earlier: full time jobs take a lot of time. It’s fun to be working again though and this seems like a really good company. I had never heard of them, but they do test first development and pair programming (like a buddy system so you’re not writing code alone). By programming with someone else next to me, I’m learning a lot more quickly than I would on my own, so that’s really cool.

Badass new bicycle

Kim and I each bought bicycles this last weekend, so today was my first day biking to and from work. It’s about 8.5 miles by bicycle, so about the same as my commute in Seattle with much smaller hills. I splurged and spent the most I ever have on my bike since I’ll be using it for commuting as regularly as possible. It’s a pretty flashy looking racing bike, and it really feels way faster than anything I’ve been on, but I do worry a little that someone might try to steal it. Another nice thing is that if I don’t feel like biking, or only biking part way, I can take the MAX train almost directly to work.

On the home front we’ve got a studio apartment in Portland’s Southeast Belmont area. The apartment’s a little smaller than we ideally wanted, but it’s ultra cool and the location is too. We’re walking distance to a ton of stuff, and biking distance to even more! We have a huge covered porch that if anyone visits will essentially be their guest room, at least once we find a futon to put out there. We’ve been going to a bunch of yoga classes since we got to Portland too since there’s yoga everywhere you look. The food coop we joined even has free classes. There’s a climbing gym about 10 blocks away that we may decide to join when the weather gets nasty, and it offers free yoga classes too if you’re a member.

Overall we’re having a great time, and it’s really nice to finally have a place our own again. We may look into buying a house in the near future, but we’ll see how we feel getting used to all the newness.

We’ve made it to Portland and so far so good. We’re staying with Travis, a friend from college, while we do job interviews and look for a place. Our first day here and we each had interviews and spent some time getting to know the prospective neighborhoods we might live in. The interviews seemed to go well for each of us today, and there’s more to come. Tomorrow we’ll be looking at some rental options and meeting with some other old friends who live here. Overall it looks like this is going to be a good place for to settle down for a bit, and we’re looking forward to being stationary after all that traveling.

The fast is over! Now it’s time to get back to eating solid foods. To start the morning I just ate an apple. However, unlike other fast breaks, it didn’t fill me. For lunch we ate potato soup and I had more than I would have thought. Basically, my appetite returned very quickly, and by dinner the second day we were eating Mac and Cheese.

It’s more than a week since my low weight and I’ve gained back all the weight lost during the fast. Overall I don’t really feel all that different than from before I started the fast, except that I’ve been needing less sleep than before the fast. I’m not feeling tired when I wake up either. And I think my appetite has increased.

The third day was hard for me! It was hard mostly mentally, but a little physically as well. Perhaps it was knowing that the next day I’d be eating (even if only a tiny, tiny bit), but I felt physically hungry late at night. It’s interesting getting to know the difference between feeling physically hungry and just psychologically hungry. The last three day fast we did the third day was the easiest for me, since by that point I had gotten mostly past the cravings. Interestingly, I lost no weight today. I weighed the same as the previous night all the way through the day. I can’t wait to eat tomorrow!

Day two was also easier than in the past. Perhaps I’m getting used to this. It also helps that we have absolutely no responsibilities right now and plenty of quiet. In the past I got a little grumpy fasting, but since I don’t have to interact with anyone but Kim and we have plenty of time doing our own thing there’s nothing to agitate me.

We did a lighter yoga session today, which was good. For juice we did some stuff with carrots today. We also have a cup of vegetable broth that Kim prepared with organic veggies. As far as cravings, there weren’t any that I remember. At one point I felt hungry, but I had a spoonful of honey and was immediately reenergized.

I again lost two pounds from the other day. I do wonder where that weight comes from since by now there’s nothing really coming out of my body except for water, and I’m replacing that with a lot more.

One more day! Of course, after that breaking the fast is gradual process. For example, the first day of solid foods all we eat is an apple and some potato soup. Even though I’m not having massive food cravings, I definitely miss just chewing something.

This first day of the fast was surprisingly easy compared to past fasts. I was barely ever hungry, although I think a large part of that is due to my decreased appetite eating raw for the previous five days. There were a few food cravings for bread mostly, but once again, I think that carries over from the previous days of eating raw.

To help the fast along, as usual, we took about a tablespoon of Epsom salt in a warm glass of water. It’s really disgusting to drink, but man does it empty you out. For juice we had beets, apples, spinach, and a few other assorted veggies. Later in the day we did a juice with watermelon (juice the rind too, there’s vitamins and stuff in there) and mint that was tasty. We did an hour of yoga which may have been a little too intense. We also drank some herbal teas and a ton of filtered water.

I’m always surprised how much energy and concentration I have while fasting. However, this is accompanied by occasional feelings of weakness and dizziness, especially if I stand up too fast. The first day I don’t usually feel crappy, like often happens the second day when the toxins are supposedly leaving en masse. Other physical symptoms include a lot more sweat than normal and a huge layer of guck on my tongue that I scrape off. Again, this is supposedly the body’s way of releasing those toxins. So far I’ve lost two pounds from my morning weight to my evening weight, although, again, the goal of the fast is not to lose weight. The weight lost during the fast usually comes back pretty fast anyway since when you start eating again your body stores calories like crazy.

On to day two!

In preparation for our current fast, Kim and I have been eating only raw food for the last 5 days. We were only planning on doing 4 days, but we made more food that we thought and had a lot of leftovers. Most people to prepare for a fast will go vegetarian or vegan for a few days, but since we’re already eating vegetarian we thought we’d try something new. Eating raw means that the food isn’t cooked above 105 degrees. The idea is that raw food has more nutrients and energy.

It turned out to be fairly difficult to stick to a raw diet, mostly because the food was incredibly fatty and left you craving carbs. Mosty of the food was made from a lot of nuts which are very high in fat. Examples of meals were partly what you’d imagine in cold soups (nut based), salads and dressings, but the entrees were pretty interesting. Kim made a taco with nut based meat and a cabbage leaf for the shell. After a few days of eating like this I started having a piece of bread with the meal and that helped a ton. Everything was very tasty, but it’s like trying to eat 6 avacados, it’s delicious at first but the fat just starts to get old.

Anyway, now that we’ve done 5 days of eating raw (mostly at least), we’re onto what will probably be 3 days of juice fasting. I’ll post more on how that goes this time. We might do more than three days, but three is usually our max because we tend to lose a bunch of weight in those three days (weight loss not being the overall goal, it’s just that losing too much at once isn’t healthy).

Kim and I have been enjoying some downtime to do whatever we want these last few weeks. I’ve picked up a ton of books and video games among other things. One thing that I’ve finally done is create a “best of” set of photos on flickr for our South America trip, so instead of looking through the overwhelming thousands of photos taken over seven months I’ve narrowed it down to under 200. I’m also working on a slideshow presentation with music and narration that should be ready soon.

I’ve begun a job search and been very surprised at how many recruiters started contacting me as soon as I posted my resume on dice.com - a ton. So many in fact it’s gotten annoying. Recruiters really don’t seem to in general know squat about technical jobs and have been forwarding me so many job descriptions for things I’m not even remotely interested or qualified for and in places I have expressed no interest in. It was nothing like this when I was looking for a job in 2004 out of college and the tech market was seemingly dead. Since Kim and I won’t actually be in Portland until mid June I haven’t followed up any job to seriously.

Kim and I will be doing a fast during the next few days, something we try to do twice a year. We’re currently eating raw food for four days before the fast. The idea behind these dietary changes is to clean out toxins that have accumulated. Kim also has been wanting to learn more about raw food lately. I’ll be posting more about this as it goes on, but I’m sure Kim will have even more detailed information on her blog if you’re interested in learning more.

One of our friends from Seattle just happened to be in Florida this week for her brother’s graduation, and he happens to work at Disney. As luck would have it, he was awesome enough to get us into everything for free with Fast Passes allowing us to never wait in line for anything. With all that time and money saved we went to all three major kingdoms that I hadn’t been to before: Animal Kingdom, Magic Kingdom, and MGM Studios which for some crazy reason is now Hollywood studios.

We started off at Animal Kingdom and spent more than half the day there. It immediately became apparent how awesome going with someone who works for Disney (big thanks to our host again) is when we got in for free saving us around $100 per person. It just got better when we found out we no longer had to wait in any lines like the rest of the schmucks. I hate lines, but I do love rides so this was pretty durn ideal. We went on a lot of rides including roller coasters, safaris and musical shows (not really a ride, but cool nonetheless). We saw some cool animals up close including a white rhino that was a few feet from my seat in the vehicle. Plus going along with a Disney employee he knew a bunch of interesting facts and trivia like where there’s hidden Mickeys, how the Magic Kingdom would fit inside just the safari ride at Animal Kingdom (it’s big), and where the best drinking fountains are, which helps to save buying bottled water for $2 a bottle.

After lunch we went to Magic Kingdom, which is a lot like the Disneyland in California that I’d been too, but still bigger. We did the classics like Space Mountain, Haunted Mansion and Pirates of the Caribbean. We didn’t spend a ton of time there, but it was fun to see the “classic” Disney park. We then went to MGM Studios for my favorite ride of the day: Tower of Terror. It’s basically one of those elevator style rides where you’re in a seat that raise then drops when you least expect it, but it’s in the dark most of the time. I already love those rides, but almost all those thrill rides are more thrilling in the dark. For example, I bet Space Mountain would seem like a really lame kiddy coaster if it were done with the lights on. By this time we had ridden more than a dozen things and seen all sorts of stuff, so we were exhausted. It’s hard work being VIP at Disney :-)

Our first week back has been spent driving around Florida and visiting family. We took our convertible and visited the Everglades west of Miami. The scenery isn’t anything spectacular, but the ecosystem is very interesting and there’s alligators galore. In this water dependent world a few inches of elevation completely changes the plant life. We were driving through the park and saw a sign for a pass, you know like a mountain pass, but this one was only 3ft in elevation. We walked a few of the nature trails and sometimes had to skirt around alligators who sit just off the trail. There’s plenty in the water of course too, along with turtles fish, birds and all sorts of cool wildlife. We went to the park on two separate days, however I had caught a nasty cold from Brendan back when we were in Peru so one day I was too wiped out to enjoy much.

Other than that we’ve been eating good food again, visiting family and going to the beach. With Kim’s grandma we went to a really fun drum and dance circle on the beach at sunset. We also went to a beach the next day where we saw hundreds of pelicans diving for fish right off a jetty while dolphins jumped out of the water and did tricks to please the crowd. It’s nice to be in a bathing suit in the sun in April, even if most of the Floridians think the 75 degree water is too cold to go in. Before we returned the rental car we put the top down and took Kim’s parents for a drive on the beach and blasted the 60’s tunes including the beach boys.

Another recent pastime has been playing on my new Nintendo Wii! I finally found one after searching through a few sold out stores and everyone is loving it, but especially me I think. Those silly sports games are a big hit even with old people.

A frequent question we’re asked is when we’re coming back west. We don’t know. We’re just enjoying ourselves here for now, but we figure within a few weeks we’ll start looking for jobs in Portland, Oregon. Kim digs the food scene there and I think it’s a cool city. That’s about as far ahead as we’ve thought about it, but we’ll let y’all know when we have plane tickets or whatever.

We still don’t know