Film Festival Report

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Until this year I have been at work when my little town’s film festival occurred. I’ve been to film festivals in big, medium and small cities. I don’t think population correlates to quality. A small town festival can sometimes risk showing edgier films, and the special guests are more unusual choices. The 16^th Annual Port Townsend Film Festival just ended. In three days I saw a dozen features, an equal number of shorts and hosted screenings with Beau Bridges, Chris Cooper and Marianne Leone Cooper.

Indomitable Spirit

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It’s been some time since I’ve written here to celebrate the creativity and courage of people in my beautiful little town at the tip of the country. During the 2013 Wooden Boat Festival some members of our NW Maritime Center decided to sponsor a boat race from here to Alaska, the longest one of its kind ever attempted under (mostly) scientific scrutiny.

38th Wooden Boat Festival

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Seeing Red

Redhawk logo designed by Eric Wahlquist

I have lately had the privilege of simultaneously seeing both a big and small town way to resolve controversy over the name of a sports team.

For the Glory!

Our season of festivals ends each year with a contest.  You can’t win by being the best.  The results have no value except to amuse.  It’s a celebration of imagination, combining art and adaptive mechanics.  It’s a Kinetic Sculpture race!  No advanced degrees required.

Coexisting With the Deer

In my back yard

Steampunk Snaps

Agent O (Men in Brown – 1895)

My outfit took a turn toward spywear, an appropriate expression of my personality.  I found an African metal object in my box of odd accessories, stuck it on the coat as a badge, and became a Victorian paranormal operative.

Dream Engines

I’ve been away from the computer, recharging my imagination.  The weather has been unwilling to decide which season it is.  It rains, the sun breaks out, it rains again, and so on.  The constant changes have invigorated my unconscious.  I’m waking up with memories of my dreams

Grand Parade

77th Annual Rhododendron Festival

Children’s Parade

77th Annual Rhododendron Festival

Good Smells Survey

Since you couldn’t be here with me, I’ll send you some things to smell.

Wooden Boats

One of my wiser friends said, “Trees live to give.”  This weekend I turn from the sad remembrance of fallen comrades and concrete to wander and gaze at the beauty and resilience of wood.

Turn of the Wheel

Soon after the turn of the millennium, we took a sailing vacation on the boat my wife’s friends had built.  I once lived on a 25 foot boat for a couple of years, but this one was over 50 feet long, with several rooms, electricity and an array of instruments and computer-assisted navigation aids.  It was built to sail anywhere.  I had not expected we would sail into a time portal.