The Cowboy Store in Microsoft Country

Redmond, Washington. Home to Microsoft Corporation which employs 39,000 of the small city's population of 50,000.

It is nestled between the Cascade mountain range to the east and Puget Sound to the west. It boasts 34 parks and more than 25 miles of trails and is known as the Bicycle Capital of the Pacific North West.

So the last thing I expect to find in this quiet, hilly, wooded enclave of smart business and green ecological haven is a Country and Western store. Walk through its doors, and one is transported to a whole other world, a whole different time.

I spent an afternoon poking around the shop, totally rapt in the array of cowboy necessities and accessories while songs lamenting unrequited love and cheating hearts played.

Out in the west we wear our hats
for a whole lot of different reasons
Some for work, and some for show
but mostly we follow the seasons

Rusty Calhoun