Once again in human figure,
Full in sight ran on before him,
Sped away in gust and whirlwind,
On the shores of Gitche Gumee,
Westward by the Big-Sea-Water,
Came unto the rocky headlands,
To the Pictured Rocks of sandstone,
Looking over lake and landscape.

-Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

So, not only is this a late post, like 2 months late, but its also going to be a pretty big one. Not one of the longwinded kind, but just a ton of pictures. I wish a picture were worth a trillion words for this place, because I could go off. Think of a miniature Zion NP, without all the crowds. Seriously, we saw like 5 people total in all the hiking we did in three days. OK, maybe ten. Not kidding, the campsite had 6 spots. Total. The nearest town has probably 30 or so residents, and was half an hour away. So anyhow, my dream is to build a little pole-barn up here and spend summers making boats from scratch, ie with my own hardwood timber. I hope you can see why. Come join me sometime.

So for lunch today I walked down to look at some apartments, and on the way back I stopped by the George Washington Masonic Memorial, which is supposed to be designed after the lighthouse of Alexandria, Egypt. Pretty sweet. I didn't make the connection with the city I work in and that city until now. Anyhow, it was a cool memorial. But its sad that the bushes are symoblically overgrowing the really profound words of Washington. Ivy is creeping over his signature so that soon he will no longer be distinguishable except as a face on a bill and a wall, a memory of an honorable past rather than guidance for a wayward present.

Let prejudices and local interests yeild to reason. Let us look to our national character, and to things beyond the present period.

So Alexandria is pretty sweet. I've spent my lunch breaks thus far walking around town trying to find housing, with absolutely no luck. But I have been lucky enough to see some pretty neat stuff, like the George Washington Masonic Memorial, and the courthouse where I will one day rock the world with my litigation skills. Haha...actually, the quite life of a patent examiner seems pretty nice. Anyhow, goodnight.

Wow, I got my dream internship, and let me tell you, its pretty intense. The first two weeks are training, basically a patent bar course condensed into some pretty strong medicine. But I am learning a ton, and I love it. And I've gotten to hang out with Nathan Kelsey, and his wonderful family. Still, I miss my own family, but am excited to fly back to them on Friday night.

I built a boat. Three days after my last final, my family and I went to the lumber yard and bought five 2 x 4's of cedar, which somehow turned into that thing in the picutres on top of my car. Its not finished yet though because I still have to fiberglass it, and I'm sure that's going to be alot of work.

Thanks to John Watson for taking it down to Florida in his moving truck (not to mention everything else of ours he took down for us...), Thanks to George Roche for making it possible via instruction, actual sweat and work, and providing the awesome forum and tools for the job, and Thanks to Jed for flying out right at the crucial moment, to help me solve the mystery of the bowsprits before I had to fly off to DC. Even Telia, Ben and Aeden helped, for which I am grateful. And most especially, thanks to my beautiful wife, Sierra, for not neutering the idea right from the start, going along with confidence in the nutso idea of her husband, and only giving help and support through the whole thing.

I have alot more respect for Nephi and his family after this experience. This boat turned out to be about 15' 9" long, and it was one of the hardest things I've ever done... I can't even imagine how I could have built my own tools, let alone built a much bigger boat. But I know he did, through his faith and obedience to God. Folks, the Book of Mormon is true.