Considering spending a week in the Northwest.

Montana State University - Northern, the team that signed JC transfers Jessica Montgomery and Casceal Swaggard from the Bay Area, plays two games in Olympia, WA Nov. 27 and 28.

The Washington Class Chess Championship is in Redmond that weekend.

Then I can visit my mom in Lynnwood before heading to Oregon to visit Tom and Lois.

The Trail Band is playing a string of dates in Washington and Oregon then. If you remember the '80s band Quarterflash, their two principals are now fronting a, um, trail band. I *know* I won't be the only person at a Trail Band gig wearing a 25-year-old Quarterflash tour T-shirt yelling requests. Quarterflash peaked just in time to appear at Steve Wozniak's US Festival, at which they were pretty good — Quarterflash concert recordings always intrigue me for Rindy Ross's sax solo in "Find Another Fool" — and they were biggest when music videos didn't have to make sense yet. The video for "Harden My Heart" — if one thinks Quarterflash was a one-hit wonder, "Harden My Heart" was the hit — was one of the dumbest things in music video history, with motorcycles and flame throwers, and didn't pertain one bit to the lyrics.

The Big West then visits Portland. Big West power UC Santa Barbara visits Portland State Dec. 3, then Pacific visits Portland Dec. 4 and Portland State Dec. 6.

In between those dates, there's a one-day tournament at the Portland Chess Club.