What a spectacular month! Almost too spectacular for words. The real start was my trip to Oregon on January 7th. I went to visit my friend Tara, because we've been corresponding frequently since we met. It was a visit to prove or disprove the attraction and friendship that we were developing. It was decided that the friendship could go no further unless we answered the question of whether this was something or nothing. She drove 2 hours to meet me at the airport and met me right past security. I called her as soon as the plane landed and she told me that she was standing near a pillar, so as I was walking out of security I checked left and right for pillars and found a large one with a girl in front with wildly cut hair, an apple red shirt with Ziggy Stardust on the front, black pants and red Chuck Taylor's. I quickened my pace when I saw her, got within about 10 feet and dropped my bag to give her a hug. I picked her up and held her tightly as I spun her around. She was trembling. Part of it was me, part of it was low blood sugar. Still the feeling will never leave my memory. After several minutes, we finally let go. I was telling her that everything was ok, I was there, and in that moment, we both knew that it was real.

    She was more beautiful than I expected. Some of her pictures revealed how pretty she was, but nothing could prepare me for full motion. Her expressive eyes and contagious smile and the way that she folds into my arms was as natural as one could get. She's Tim-sized. Fit's right in. At 5 foot 6 inches tall she is the perfect height for a man like me. She had been in Hawaii so she was tanned and her hair was darkened which was unlike her natural look of pale skin and light hair. The hair and skin are simply affectations, it's the face and cheekbones that are unforgettable.

    We quickly found her some juice to put some sugar back into her and then attempted to navigate around Portland. On Saturday morning we drove around aimlessly looking for a restaurant for breakfast. We found a quaint little cafe to have breakfast, and I was wearing my new black hoodie. The hoodie has a pouch in front and I had the keys to my rental car and my cell phone inside it. As I stood in front of the toilet I thought, you know, my phone could easily slip out, if I'm not careful. And as I reached for the handle to flush the toilet, my phone did a perfect pirouette into the center of the toilet, nothing but net. I dove my hand down as the whirlpool disappeared and I pulled my phone out before it went further down the plug hole. Needless to say my phone was waterlogged and unusable.

    I spent the rest of the weekend attempting to dry it out with a hairdryer. It didn't work. I attempted to buy another one out there, but that wasn't happening. I was two months shy of being able to get a new phone at a discount price and so it just wasn't worth it. Fortunately, when I got back my friend C had an old Verizon phone that they reprogrammed with my number.

    I'm going to have to finish this later. I'm running out of daylight. More to recap in the next month!