An early taste of summer

So it's been a beautiful couple days here in Seattle. Friday was in the low 60s, though not super sunny, so Anuja, Pauline and I met in up in the early evening to play some tennis. Saturday, the weather folks had predicted it would be around 71 and overcast, but as I was driving around in the evening, my car temp gauge showed a balmy 81:


I also spent a lot of time outside yesterday; first up, more tennis with Anuja, but this time it was much sunnier and much warmer. I was sweating after just the first five minutes or so. There was this odd couple next to us; they were probably in their late 40s. The woman was apparently doing this weird moan/grunt thing (Anuja was on her side, so she heard it more than I did), and rather than standing on the baselines to play -- as is the norm -- they were standing on the lines halfway up each side of the court. They only stuck around maybe 30 minutes. After about an hour of tennis, it was back to my parents' to cool down and change. Next, it was off to meet Chrissy for our now-weekly hiking outing. It was super crowded, still very warm, and there were tons of dogs there (Chrissy's dog, Maggie, doesn't do well around other dogs), so we did a "short" hike for only a handful of miles. Still a great workout, though. Always interesting to find out the names of strangers' dogs; yesterday, we met one the owner called "Lard."

A few days ago, I was driving home from my parents' in the early evening and there was this really cool cloud pattern in the sky. I snapped a pic with my cameraphone while I was at a stoplight:

I showed it to my dad yesterday, and his response was, "Oh, that's nice! You should blow it!" Despite the fact that my dad's been in the U.S. for over 35 years now, and has been speaking English for even longer, he sometimes is a little off on those tricky idioms/slang phrases ;o)

Anyway, looks like we're back to the more usual gloomy April weather today. Just hope it stays dry for the next few days, as we have a team outing at work to go see a Mariners game. In a private suite, no less! Haven't been to a game in at least a year, so I'm really looking forward to that.