Working, Sniffing, Betting

Well, today I attended my orientation day at Whole Foods. Loads of information. Most of it was common sense, some information about the job and the company. Despite my misgivings coming from a cooperative grocery background, as far as corporations go, I could do worse. And they're all extremely nice and intelligent people - though I sometimes felt the sense that they had the swirly-eyed, "Just join us and you'll understand," drink the Kool-Aid mentality. I'll give them credit for admitting in the propaganda videos that they are indeed in it for the money. Is that why I'm in it too? Oh yeah, and natural organic foods are kinda groovy too. And wow, they make a killer burger there at the grill. Saturday we drove up to Mt. Vernon to attend the month-long Skagit Valley Tulip Festival and the weekend-long Mt. Vernon Street Fair. Interesting arts & crafts abounded and we stopped in to the Skagit Valley Food Co-op. This was a beautiful grocery store - it held that graceful balance between hippie co-op, community market and family grocer. Not too nice, not too funky, but just right. They make their own soups and salad dressings and had fantastic prices. Nice work, hippies! After the fair and some corn dogs - MMM! We drove out to check out the fields of fully blooming daffodils and the tulips just beginning to get going.

Field of daffodils








Tulips gettin' sexy


Me gettin' sexy


Tulips and Cascades

Then on Sunday we met some friends at the track to bet on some ponies. This was both of our first time at the races and we're defnitely going back, though we both came out with less cash. Not too much money, and well worth the sunny afternoon entertainment.

The final race - I won twenty-five bucks on this one. Still in the hole overall but a nice end to the day.


View of Rainier from our seats at the track. We're both still thrilled to see sights like this and realize that we live here now.