I remember coming to my first interview at Harborview, after four years at the UW Medical Center, and thinking how tiny the place is. I remember thinking how simple the design of Harborview is - essentially a letter H - compared to the fractal layout of the UW Medical Center. The tricky part, at first, about navigating Harborview was learning which floors connect the four sections. (I soon learned, however, that the answer was just three: Basement, Ground, and First.)

(The online map for Harborview is new, and not very well drawn, in my opinion. The older map, still displayed in the hallways and paper directors, more clearly shows that there are three main hallways: two north/south and one east/west.)

It's fairly common for patients here at Harborview to arrive for appointments 45 minutes late after wandering around lost in this maze of a building.

The Australian couple who picked up "What Goes Around" (our spinner geocoin) from us at Groundspeak Headquarters, took the coin to Oregon, Washington, and Alberta. Tonight's email brought the news that, after an overnight stop in Hong Kong, "What Goes Around" landed in Victoria, Australia on Sunday. That coin has been in Groundspeak Headquarters, it has visited the original geocache location near Portland, Oregon. It has traveled an amazing 11,944 miles. It has broken the record (among our travelers) held by our first travel bug - "Flo's Diner" - which has traveled 4,550 miles so far.

Tonight's email also brought the news that five new "Seattle Public Library" caches have been published. On Saturday morning, I'll be bringing our Prius in for an oil change and a tire rotation. Saturday night is Hank's party. Sunday is Writers' Group.

Cool website of the day: Storybook England. (Requires Flash)

The coworker who loaned me her copy of Harry Potter y el prisionero de Azkaban asked me today for a progress report. I told her, "¡El español es dificil!"

Since she is not a native Spanish-speaker, and has learned it fluently (as far as I can tell), I was expecting an argument. Actually, I was hoping for an argument. I was, in truth, fishing for some encouragement. Instead, she replied, "¡Eso es verdad!"

Once, I didn't like this two-clinic work schedule. Now, I do. I'm sure that someday, I won't like it anymore. (As the Pharmacist, who first suggested I make it permanent, pointed out today, if I don't like it in the future, I can just go back.) But, for now, I like it.

I finish the morning at the satellite clinic, log off the computer, file papers away, and lock the doors until tomorrow. Then I go to lunch. Then my afternoon starts in the main clinic. Lunch seems a little more relaxed. There's a sense of closure. It's like having a leisurely meal before work. It's quite unlike the feeling of having stepped away from my desk for a bite to eat - the feeling that comes with the one-clinic schedule.

The downside is the feeling of disorientation that happens when I step into the main clinic in the afternoon. All of my coworkers know who's not there - who's substituting for who. They know the events that have been happening since the morning. But I don't.

I had lunch with three Social Workers today. I was still depressed from the news I saw this morning on NWCN, and I didn't want to talk about it over lunch, and yet I was the one who brought up the subject of the weekend vandalism of Animal Talk animal rescue and shelter. The four of us tried to make sense of it, and just couldn't.

I believe that someone's life is out of balance - that something is missing, and somehow it seemed that killing animals and destroying property would somehow fill that void, or at least feel like it did. I used to say that I don't believe in karma, but maybe I do think it exists in a physical sense. That pattern of behavior that sparked this weekend's atrocity will circle back on itself, in one way or another. Every action has an equal and opposite reaction.

Phillip and I made a contribution to Animal Talk, the establishment that brought us Gladden T Hart, this morning. It's not enough, but it's something.

With the smoking ban in place in Washington bars, Phillip and I are trying to get out more often for beer and pinball. While beer is still popular in bars and taverns, we are discovering that we are behind the vogue in regard to pinball games. They have disappeared completely from R Place and Changes. Our unfashionable taste seems to rest solely with Shorty's - its reputation is, the last we heard, still its collection of pinball games from all decades.