I'm back, probably will blog soon.

Yes, I was in the Seattle area (broadly defined to include Tacoma) last weekend. My dad and I were visiting my brother and his family before Doug gets called up to active duty this coming Saturday. Then he gets shipped off to Desert Warfare School for three months, followed by deployment to Iraq.

Parts of the trip were (above-linked episode included) a great time, with a strong current of sorrow and fear not far below the surface. Doug was Doug, my sister-in-law was at her typical tower-of-strength best, and my niece and nephew were determined to make me "Unca Dale, Tackle Dummy." The state of Washington is a wonderfully beautiful place, and I understand why people are pouring into the area. But for the constant overcast skies and brooding omnipresence of a lovely-but-overdue-to-erupt monster volcano, it would be perfect.

Departure at Sea-Tac Airport yesterday afternoon was rough, and I've never seen my father as silent as he was from 1pm yesterday to 9:30 this morning, when he and Mom headed back home. What the hell do you say? Platitudes and happy talk thankfully kept turning to ashes before I could vocalize them, so I went mute, too.

I'll leave it at that. I'm not much on the American talk-show confessional approach, and I hope I've kept this place from being like that, for the most part.

Blogging will resume.