New job offer

Seattle, Washington

November 15, 2005

I'm having such a great railway holiday - except for the sad farewells (which began with goodbyes to Christa and Matt in Toronto). On Monday I was so sad to say goodbye to my dear friends Kathleen and Lucas, who had looked after me so well in Penticton. However, I did enjoy the Okanagan scenery on my bus ride back to Kamloops. From there I finished my ride on "The Canadian" (Via Rail's flagship train) overnight to Vancouver and then took a Thruway bus to Seattle. Friendly US border guards confiscated my pepperoni sticks because they contain Canadian beef but I saw it coming and gobbled two of them down first.

I've always liked Seattle. It was nice to walk to my hotel and I had a splendidly decadent (and very non-vegetarian) dinner at the '13 Coins'.

Today I head to Richland WA by train. First I take Amtrak's "Coast Starlight" to Portland OR. Then I'll take the "Empire Builder" to Pasco, WA, where I'll get off to visit dear friends Jenny and Caitlin for a few days.

To celebrate receiving and accepting a new job offer from Merlin (I will fly to London on December 3 for headquarters training and then to Monrovia on December 7. Soon after that I'll get to Harper where I will be Merlin's Project Coordinator. I'm looking forward to it.) I've bought myself a handy little point-and-shoot camera - a Canon PowerShot A410. Of course it will never be anywhere as good as my Canon 20D but that's not the point: it's very small and light and that's why I wanted it. It worked well enough for the picture above. It's pretty hopeless in low light though.