(Number Fourteen) GOOD LIFE

I had a bad feeling about ending the year with 13 posts.....


Just got back from a week of visiting my dad at "GOOD LIFE" a resort for active seniors...(seniors meaning 55+!) in Mesa, Arizona where the gum chewing drove Vince crazy.

Twelve hundred, 400 square foot trailers 5 feet apart and if there were neighbors that hated each other, I wasn't aware of it.

Dad pretending to understand everything Vince is telling him about his (Dad's) new tablet.

Dad (cane) and me (crutches).

Dad pedaling at level 10.

I met Harris, 90, from Balaton, Minnesota. He'd ridden his bike with a basket to the fitness center then ridden the stationary bike for 30 minutes before riding to the post office to mail his lavender enveloped Christmas cards.  I mentioned something to Dad about Harris's degree of activity and he said "Yah, but he only has the exercise bike at level-one." 

This sign, posted at the Good Life fitness center, must have been effective because I didn't see anyone wrestling the whole time I was there.

On the flight back the flight attendant acted like the plane couldn't take off until I put my Galaxy Bookshop bag, holding a sandwich, under the seat in front of me.  Meanwhile, the woman beside me had an un-anchored one year old in her lap.   That doesn't make sense to me.

Metaline Falls, Tyler and Greece

Metaline Falls, Washington.

An hour after we rolled down the driveway we were sitting outside on stone steps looking into Canada with no bugs or humidity feasting on a year old can of organic garbanzo beans transformed into hummus with tahini from somewhere in Idaho on 2 day old bread from Montana.  

They told us the rain stopped the day before we pulled in to Metaline Falls.  Our field was tall and green and there was still snow in the mountains.  Vin's stone walkway hadn't moved...like the stone walkways other people make, he told me...and other than a few flies the house was apparently just as we'd left it*.   Two days later friends Bobbi and Eric from Bozeman popped in to share good meals, movies and bike rides and the next day I left for Greece. 

Our Metaline Falls 15 minute clothes dryer

I am soooo spoiled.

We make it a point to support the local economy.  Shown here is Vince with a slingshot from the local health food/ammo store.

Greece.

Sarah, Linda and me.  Best friends from high school.  When we were 40 we decided that every 10 years we would take a trip together.  When we were 50 we decided we'd better make it every year.  This year we decided to go to Greece.  Partly because of Mamma Mia and partly because Linda's sister Nancy lives there.  While looking into flying from Vermont I noticed that if I flew from Spokane, Washington I could meet up with Sarah and Linda in Denver since that was their first stop after departing from Boise.  Then, we could all fly together Denver/Toronto/Athens.  So.  After paying a little more for a ticket from Spokane, Vin, Max and I drove to Washington a month earlier than we had planned. 

Yada yada....you know how fun it is when you get off a plane and there is someone waiting for you?  My plane landed in Denver.  I had butterflies.  Linda and Sarah would be there and I knew they wouldn't care that they would be making fools of themselves when they saw me.  But I deplaned to a quiet group of airport maintenance workers instead of a couple of ex-cheerleaders screaming and jumping up and down.

'I'll bet they're hiding', I thought, as I scanned the boarding area for a cowboy hat (Linda's trademark).  They weren't there.  My phone rang.  It was Vince.  Sarah had called him.  They'd missed their flight from Boise.  The name on someone's ticket didn't match the name on someone's passport! (insert sinking feeling)  Orbitz told them they would have to buy a new ticket in order to continue.  So what I wondered was, if they did decide to pay $3000 for another ticket, when could they get on another flight?  (more sinking feeling)  Now what?  Are they still going to Greece?  Should I continue east or fly back to Spokane and bag the whole thing?  I was only going because they were going. **  I had a half hour to decide but how could I decide with no information.  I got in line and kept moving forward toward the gate agent until I was standing face to face with her and no one behind me.  The phone rang again.  It was Linda.  She'd been talking to Air Canada and....click (that is, if cell phones made click sounds....) I lost the connection.  I tried to phone her back...'no service available'..."what the..."  That can't be, I was just talking.   Seeing that I had an exit row and an aisle seat, I decided to go to Toronto. 

Toronto.

I had two and a half hours until my Athens flight.  A seemingly luxurious amount to time.  During that time I talked to Linda and Sarah close to a million times.  Soon two and a half hours was 15 minutes.  Still no conclusion.  Deja vu.  In line, I moved toward the gate agent.  I knew I didn't want to go to Greece alone...but they might still go.  And they might not.  I could still fly back to Spokane....the phone rang.  They got re-booked and in TWO DAYS! they would be in Athens through Munich.  TWO DAYS!  I decided to head back to Spokane.  Walking toward the person behind the counter that takes care of things like that, I figured it wouldn't hurt to ask, 

"Can you rebook me on the same flight as my girlfriends?" (paraphrased!) 

and in less than an hour I had a ticket on a flight to Munich where I'd be sitting across from Sarah.  In two days we'd all be getting off a plane together in Athens.

Even though olive oil sits on cafe' tables in Greece like ketchup sits on tables here and the food is fresh and simple, I found Greece too hot and busy for me to really enjoy.  Dah?  It waaaas July.  

(neither did I like that it sounded as if people were always yelling at each other when they spoke or that 'no' meant 'yes').

    

But there were some good parts...  

• upgrading to first class (+$12) on ferries to a couple of islands (Naxos and Santorini)*** and playing rummy based on childhood memories.

• seeing the Parthenon and the Acropolis from a bicycle (a 3 hour bike tour with a guide that was leading us places that had to be off limits to bicycles and would have taken 2 days to walk).

• watching fishermen come in off their boats and cook octopus over wood fires.
• hiking on ancient stone paved trails on Naxos.

• communicating with smiles, waves and hugs while I helped an local 80 year old woman wring out and hang her laundry because her arm hurt

• being with Linda, Sarah and Sarah's sister Ruth

Sorry, no pictures from Greece on this post.  Can you believe I didn't even bring a camera? 

*When the plumber came to winterize the Metaline Falls house last October he did everything on Vince's list (and follow-up email) except #2.

2. put glycol in the concrete floor radiant heating system.  

I don't want to spend much time on this one but what it means is that the system froze, the pipes IN THE CONCRETE FLOOR burst and how do you find and fix leaks IN A CONCRETE FLOOR?

**Tyler tornado. 

The day before I left for Greece my brother Dale called to tell me they'd had a couple of storms back home in Tyler, Minnesota.  He said they were OK but one of the silos blew over.  Plus the hog house was gone.  So was a hay shed.  He said the silo landed on one of the tractors which was good because it could have landed on the pick-up and he was sitting in the pick-up.  He said he tried to get from the pick-up to the house (where my sister-in-law Brenda was in the basement wondering where Dale was) a couple of times but every time he opened the pick-up door to run to the house a hunk of metal roofing went flying through the air.  So tragic.  Even though I would have been of no help whatsoever, I felt like I should be going there instead of going to Greece. 

The hog house used to be somewhere around here.

Tractor with silo on it

Tractor and silo parts

This is not a sculpture garden.   It's the hog house roof having almost made it over to Uncle Mik and Aunt Leona's farm.

Another 'not a sculpture garden' view

***You know when you see pictures of Greece (a huge clump of brilliant white buildings covering an almost vertical mountain and sitting above ocean?), it's usually Santorini and it really does look like that.

Where Are We Today?

Two or three times a week, I get 'Your Daily Spanish Word' in my inbox.  Yesterday my word was avergonzado.  It means 'ashamed' and reminded of how ashamed I am at feeling sorry for myself after my recent little knee surgery.  Even though it's just for a week, having to 'lay low' (which mostly means 'don't ride your bike') is driving me crazy.  You'd think with all this extra time I could be doing things that I never have time for when I don't have to lay low but I can't because I'm fixated on what I can't do instead of what I can.  It's not like I ride my bike all day, it's more like an hour or two, but the thing is, it makes everything else I do during the day so much better.  Sort of like butter.  You know how fresh sweet corn or warm homemade bread is pretty good all by itself?  OK, now add a little butter.

More About The Knee.
During pre-op, half way into the description of needle insertions and injections into the lumbar area, I interrupted my spinal anesthesiologist with an 'I trust you' which he immediately correctly interpreted as 'shut up' and left it at "you won't be able to feel anything below the waist."  I would have to say that was an understatement.  In the recovery room out of the corner of my eye I could see a nurse holding something in the air above her head.  When I focused I saw it was my leg.  

This is what they took out of my knee (the white thing that looks like popcorn, not the nickel)  It's blurry, sorry.

Real Estate For Sale.

I'd always wanted a purple door.  (Plainfield, Massachusetts)

Stairs and wall by Vince, a self-taught stone mason.

3 years is a long time to have a house on the market but 6 months ago we had 2 houses on the market so it could be worse.  Every winter we take the house in Massachusetts off the market and close it up because we don't want a potential buyer seeing all that unmanaged snow then every spring we spend a week opening it back up.  We've been doing it so long now that we just do it without even thinking that the reason we do it is to sell it.  I think subconsciously I don't want to sell it because it's my favorite place to sleep (and shower and ride) making the week we spend there every spring more like a luxury vacation than the drudgery it should feel like.  In a way I hate the thought of selling the house and cutting our last tie to western Mass after twenty-five years of a really good life.

Can you see why this would be my favorite place to sleep?

Washington State May Seem Like A Long Way To Go To Get Away From Deer Flies.
Neither of us play an instrument so when I saw Vin carrying our guitars out to the trailer I knew we weren't taking just the bare necessities and it was going to be a while before we left.
By 7:30 (that's 7:30 pm) we were packed and ready to hit the road.  We made it to Rutland, Vermont, Vin figured about 105 miles.*  The first thing I did when we got to the motel was lock the key in the room. The sign on the motel office door said 'We're Closed. In case of emergency dial 123' but since I was locked out of the room I had nothing to dial 123 on so I found a room with the lights on and knocked.  The door opened momentarily blinding me with a thick gray wall of cigarette smoke.  The guy holding the growling pit bull didn't take his eyes off the TV and the guy at the door just looked waiting for me to speak.  He dialed 123 for me.  I saw his lips move into the receiver but all I could hear was the TV.  30 seconds later the manager was cheerfully opening our door.

The Room.
Across from 'Simply Meat' and between the 'Joy of Nails' and 'Adam and Eve Hair Design', sat our $44 room.  It smelled sort of funny at first but I got used to it.  When I sat on the side of the bed my feet were in the bathroom so I didn't have to touch the carpet with my bare feet and without much effort I could almost reach the decal on the shower door that promised  a Thermasol In-room Steam®' that wasn't really there.

So.  We've started our road trip.  It's good except that we have to have the AC on high continuously for Max even though I'm freezing all the time.


*at that rate it will take us about a month to get to Washington.

Free Bag Checking and Priority Boarding

After 4 hours of watching rain falling at 2 inches an hour, I figured it was too late to run out and roll up the windows in the rental car.  Instead I continued to sit in our studio apartment where nothing was drying and see if our Kauai guide book had any bright ideas for things to do on a rainy day.   I could shop (yuck and who wants to drive around in a wet car?) but decided to wait in the room and hope the rain would let up.  It didn't but the traffic by our hotel window pretty much stopped when the road into town washed out.

 It was back in mid-October when I realized we had to fly 15,000 air miles by the end of the year to maintain our silver status on US Airways* (admittedly ridiculous obsession).  Vince was born in Rio and hadn't been there since he was 1 so going to Brazil seemed like a good idea.  We could fly to Rio and take a couple of flights and buses and taxis to that bulge in South America where there is a cute little town (Itacaré) that time forgot with a mellow enough surfing beach.  Round trip to Rio would give us 11,000 miles, then we could go to Mesa, AZ to visit my Dad for Christmas and viola.....*free bag checking and priority boarding. (so much for cost benefit)  So that was the plan...we were going to go to Vin's old stompin' grounds, Brazil.  That is, until mid November when I read somewhere that we needed visas which required sending our passports away to get them.  Not enough room for error with a December departure quietly sneaking up on us so we told Brazil she'd have to wait.

Now where?  It had to be somewhere that was 11,000 round trip miles away.   Costa Rica would be good.  I could practice my Spanish**.  But it wasn't far enough away unless we went twice.  Kauai had numbers that worked so we planned a hiking, snorkeling, surfing, riding, paddling trip to Hanalei forgetting that Hawaii could have lousy weather.

What a long trip.  Pretty much 24 hours. (and all for 'possible' *free first-class upgrades?)  A few days before we left I heard Vin telling someone that he wasn't looking forward to the 11 hour flight it would take us to get to Kauai.  I didn't correct him (like I usually do) and hoped he wouldn't look at the itinerary too closely.  Not sure where he got 11.  I didn't tell him 24 but I didn't tell him 11 either.

Getting ready for a trip like this used to take about an hour and meant packing a duffle bag.  For this trip I had 2 cortisone shots (1 in the left knee and 1 in the right knee) 6 Supartz® shots (a roster comb derived (sorry) lubricant...3 in the left knee and 3 in the right knee), 4 pediatrist appointments to excavate a plantar wart from my left foot and an MRI that determined my right rotator cuff had only a 'get-better-on-its-own' partial-tear...over-riding the ultrasound that said it had a 'you-need- surgery' full-tear.  And then I still had to pack a duffle bag....

Here's something really dumb.  You know all of the preparation I just told you about......the shots, the tests, the foot?  Well, I got here feeling pretty young.  A playful new skirt that is too big (any tips on how to order clothing online and have it fit?), couple of organic cotton camis....and the cutest pair of new shoes that I wore for the first time the morning we got here.  NEVER do that!  A 5 minute walk to town and both feet were covered in blisters....or enough blisters to quickly-gradually bring me to a complete stop.  We entered the first place we could which happened to be a cafe' with four different big screen TV's playing 4 different football games.  So, after all the effort I put into getting ready for the trip....now I couldn't walk.

So cute, but a wolf in sheep's clothing

Ugly comfort

Discovering that as long as the shoes were off I could make it to the beach, Vin and I decided to take a surf lesson.  Even with wool socks duck taped to my feet (I have my quirks), the salt water 'irritated' (understatement) my blisters (insert scream here).  Here comes my first wave.  I'm up and the only person more surprised than Vince was me....

p.s. Is there a good way to tell if you have a broken nose?

It actually doesn't look too bad here.  More on that later.

 p.s. again.  Max turned 10 today

and decided to sleep in

*US Airways Silver Preferred Status-see * above

**Having never learned another language other than the few Dutch swearwords Vince taught me, I decided to see if picking up Spanish was as easy as picking up that Dutch.  I've been trying with the Spanish, but it's really not taking.  For a couple of classes I felt like things were really clicking but the guy teaching the class kept adding more words.  Ever see the 'I Love Lucy' episode where Lucy and Viv worked in the chocolate factory and the conveyor belt kept moving faster and faster?  That's me.  My brain seems to be purging an new Spanish word for every newer Spanish word and I don't know how to make it stop doing that.  

Where Are The Eagles?

You don't know how close I came to pulling the plug on 'Kathy's Big Adventure', but how depressing would that have been (for me anyway)? Just cross it of my 'to do' list like it's done?  I couldn't do it.  I think I'm stuck with 'Kathy's Big Adventure' forever.   

Our fourth trip across the country this year landed us in Vermont which is where we are now.  You'd think by now I'd be sick of road trips but I'm not.  Max loves road trips too although how would I know for sure?  

The Black Hills (western South Dakota) starts feeling like 'out West' to me

Max getting up the nerve to go back into Wall, SD

We've gotten good at traveling with a dog (sorry Max, to some people you're a dog).  We know now, after that night on the floor (that's Vince and I on the floor, not Max) of a 40 dollar dog-friendly hotel in Elkhart, Indiana, to request TWO beds in a pet-friendly room that costs more than 50 dollars a night.  We also now know that Max loves tapioca and is afraid of the buffalo statue in downtown Wall, South Dakota.  If Max is panting, even if I'm freezing, the windows have to be open and I have to hold bags on my lap so Max can have the whole back of the car to himself.

Max enjoys the comfort of a LaQuinta Inn (Missoula)

More road trip...

I know if we miss the I-90 Continental Divide exit* outside of Butte (it comes up so fast) there is not another exit for 11 miles (22 miles round trip) and in Montana there can be a hundred miles 'to the next gas station'.

On a road trip, there is the frustration of moving from one partial radio program to another partial radio program and dropping every cell phone call but I savor every mile and always look forward to the destination in both directions.  

Driving east I look forward to being able to get decaf anywhere (even though I don't like not being able to drink it outside because of the bugs).  I look forward to being able to find Willow Run, Poland Spring and really green fields.  I like that when skylines are hazy, it's because of humidity and not a forest fire.  

Hiking in BC relatively just north of Metaline Falls. Photo credit: Ed Shaw 29 year buddy.  This setting is real.  Honest.

I'm finally used to eastern time but have to remember that big birds in the top of a tree probably aren't eagles.

Where does milk come from?

The other day while riding my bike past one of the 1083 Vermont dairy farms (I love that smell) I came face to face with a cow in the middle of the road.  Behind her were about twenty other cows all casually walking and pooping down the road like they owned it.  Figuring this was a good opportunity to say something folksy, I looked around for the human taking up the rear.  There wasn't one.  Instead, behind the contented herd, dancing figure eights to keep the group moving forward, were a couple of dogs. The older one, at least part border collie and using as little energy as possible, efficiently kept her side of the group neat and tight while the younger, of an indeterminate background, nervously nipped at ankles and belligerently head-butted udders.   Up and down as if on a trampoline, he nipped at the hips of cows innocently taking their time.  Show off.  I looked closer. The little guy had three legs. 

Soon the canine team had gracefully maneuvered the group around the corner like a school of fish, down a driveway past a calf wildly trying to shake a 5 gallon pail from his head and into a dilapidated barn. 

This is what it would feel like if animals ruled the world.

Other recent adventures: 

The podiatrist I've been seeing announced that the plantar wart he'd been scraping for a month is gone and the Amazon described 'like new' used book I ordered arrived with half of the book jacket ripped off and even though I'd only paid a dollar fifty, it made me mad.

Rewind to Washington.

From the house our field doesn't look that big.  Then you realize that all those dots in the middle of it are 500 pound hay bales. Chad Grass hayed our Washington field this summer.  Chad Grass.  Isn't that a great name for someone that hays? 

 * (one of my top 10 things in life)   there is a Continental Divide trailhead 50 yards from that exit

The Beam Team again

Movies.
Just finished writing a 1000 word Feminist interpretation of 'Silence Of The Lambs' and the part I enjoyed most about the process was emailing it off, finished, to the professor. For the most part I enjoy movies as entertainment and not for the layers of supposed hidden meanings that I can never find.

Yesterday we watched Citizen Kane (Orson Welles, 1941) and I'm proud to say that thanks to finally a movie with dialogue I stayed awake through MOST of it. Ian the professor said it was 'quite possibly the greatest movie ever made' which made me think that I definately missed something during the screening even though I stayed awake.
Please note that I've easily stayed wide awake for American Graffiti half dozen times.

I just finished shooting another film. it is a pretend interview of myself with my new pretend cookbook of recipe's using food that has gone bad. (not leftovers ....gone bad) I think it's really funny but it's too long. It ended up being 9 minutes and it was supposed to be 2. Just like the old days, was up until 5 am one morning working on it and it was actually good to have a reason to have to be up until then.

I was thinking that If I was making a movie that had the Vince character (see the dirty Vince photo to the left) in it I'd want Juaquin Phoenix to play him. Juaquin is retired (I can't believe I know that) but I doubt if it would've ever happened anyway only because Vince would never want anyone else playing him.

House.
Two cords of firewood (which won't be maple or cherry or ash)* are showing up tomorrow so I wanted to show you our deck before it got covered up. Vin and Brett built the deck (which included mixing the concrete for the piers and looked like a lot of work to me). Then Joe, one of my favorite friends (FF) of almost 30 years cut down one of our trees (like the ponytail, Joe cut it for FREE....maybe it has something to do with cutting) and we put it on the deck to look like it was propping up one of the corners of the roof. The deck is a rectangle and if you looked at it from an airplane it would look like you had this big rectangle and slid it under the house at an angle. It's pretty dramatic as far a decks go. I THINK I like it but then again maybe that angle-drama has something to do with the headaches I've been having lately.

* I think I'm a firewood snob.

Grades.
Some mid-term test grades are in.
Screen-writing____A-
Editing_____A
Cinematography........ Trick questions. I'm not counting it.

Nelson.
Cocoa-nut Lounge. Funky, late night coffeehouse open until midnight 6 nights a week. That gem of a discovery gets us closer to our perfect-place checklist. Our maiden visit (a Sunday night) had us joining a standing-room-only crowd to listen to local poetry that I didn't realize was poetry until the third reader stepped off the rug that functioned as a stage. I'm at an even lower level with poetry than I am with movies.

Is Plaster Faster?

I should be working on my movie treatment (sounds like a joke doesn't it??) but instead I feel like writing about today....a day in our simple retired life. We're in Metaline Falls. The morning was mostly clean up. A normal retired thing to do. Then, we picked up color boards from the plaster guy***. We met him half way, an hour drive and close by western standards as they say. Gary, the closest (only) plaster guy we could find, showed up with his little dog wearing a football jersey that said QUARTER BARK (the dog, not Gary) with a #! between the QUARTER and the BARK. We could tell that Max was jealous of Quarter Bark #1 because he could be carried around. We treated Max to a walk on the way home at some waterfall...he wasn't impressed...in-fact he vomited.

Back home, 31 degrees and feeling like it was about time for something semi-epic, we convinced ourselves there was enough daylight to ride up Hall Mountain (elev. 6400') We rode to the trailhead and hiked to the treeless peak through meadows with clumps of softwoods and rock outcroppings to a 360 degree view of Washington, Canada and Idaho. The late afternoon angle of the sun tinted everything a rich gold. So far so good albeit a little colder on the way down than the way up. Normally I would have looked forward to the all downhill bike ride but as I suspected my summer weight Yoko gloves weren't even close to warm enough. (UNDERSTATEMENT!) Four hours and a movie later, I can type and feed myself again but that's about as interesting as I can make frozen fingers.

Metaline Falls.
Movie. "Nine". It was neither about an aging Bo Derek nor a musical with Penelope Cruz (not sure where I got that idea) but it was animated...and pretty good. I'm glad we went because then there were six of us in the theater.

House. The tent came down and we moved into a corner of the master bedroom this weekend. The photos make us look cold and uncomfortable but our word for cold and uncomfortable is 'cozy'. Will waking up with a coating of sheet-rock dust in my mouth cause any long term damage?

Back to the movie treatment. I've been struggling with ways to decrease my school work-load and finally got up the nerve to request an audit for Film Studies. I picked up the hot pink 'switch to audit' form at the office one day when there was actually someone in there and filled it out. I started to hand the hot pink sheet to Ian, the professor. "Did you enjoy the assignment?" he asked, all excited. I ended up using the back of the audit form for notes on Nanook of the North.

***plaster.
Plaster is good.
1. We don't have to paint because the plaster is tinted with our colors
2. We don't have to tile because the shower will be waterproof plaster
3. We don't have to trim the windows because our window perimeters will be plaster

Plaster is bad.
1. We have to pick the colors we'll have FOREVER, NOW. Would that make you nervous? It makes me nervous.

WILD KINGDOM LUCK

Snapped from sleep by one sharp percussive, I'm-watching-you bark, Max's attempt to scare a couple of smirking elk twenty feet outside our tent failed but left my heart beating like a hummingbird's. Once I figured out where I was, I decided to do my being in-the-moment exercises by savoring the dully-lit, playfulness of dawn.

Moments:

I realized that all those barking dogs were actually honking geese.

I followed the sound of a truck crossing the bridge into town and coming to a stop. Did he stop for breakfast at Cathy's Cafe? I've noticed (and re-noticed to make sure I'd read it correctly) on the door it says she opens at 5:30 and I've wondered if anyone actually eats there that early.

I watched frustrated mosquitos outside the tent screen that haven't figured out they could just come up through the deck floor boards if they wanted to get in.

MomentMomentMoment. The screeching whistle of that eagle I've never quite managed to see sounds closer than usual. I'm not sure if I heard or felt the easy evenly spaced wing beats that followed him? to that doug fir with the cushy exploded top. Seconds later it was joined by a husband or mother? Sister? maybe friend....not sure of how eagles pair up... Anyway, relaxing in their living treetop mattress, they let me take a picture. They even gave me time to change my lens. It's hardly a work of art, and I don't want you thinking that I think it is, but at least you know I didn't make the whole thing up

This hectic morning show leaves me feeling a bit less skeptical of the whole Noah's Ark story (but 2 of everything???) and that I should pick a different time of day to sleep.

Oh, before I forget...we've had an Immediate overwhelming response to filling the hummingbird feeder with sweet red liquid, as opposed to having it filled with just air, although there was one gullible hummingbird that seemed to think it was sustaining itself with the feeder's red plastic flowers and our red canvas camp chairs.

p.s Did I ever show you our riverfront?

p.p.s. we have rafters...stay tuned.

Just Another Day Again

Newport is the Pend Oreille County seat and where you go to pick up your building permits. So. We drove the sixty miles to Newport this morning thinking we'd be driving back to our tent with our permit but instead we drove back with a new bath towel and a new broom. Even though it was nice to bring home the towel and the broom we would rather have brought home a building permit. So far it's been pretty easy to substitute a t-shirt for a towel and ignore the dirt and dog hair but there is no substitute for a building permit. Maybe Friday.

To me our little house is so simple and sweet but to the permitting office it's one big heavy gray area that keeps sinking to the bottom of the pile on the inspector's desk. It sort of reminded me of when we applied for a credit line during our VOmax years because I'd read somewhere that if you were a business you had to have a credit line. Since we didn't owe any money there was no formula that we could be plugged into and we were never able to get a credit line which was fine because we never needed one. Anyway. We got our plans back with sloppy red letters screaming we needed several pages stamped by an engineer. We found an engineer in our new phonebook who said that, based on the phone conversation we were having, it sounded like we'd be able to walk over and wait while he looked the plans over, approved and stamped them. We hung up and walked to the engineers office with bounces in our steps. We shook hands and confidently handed him our plans. I watched the color drain from his lips as he slowly and noisily turned from one page of the plan to the next. I'd been sure after seeing his office full of books, diplomas and charts with numbers he'd be able to plug our plans into some sort of calculator but instead he asked us if we could come back day after tomorrow. Shoot.

I guess we can wait until Friday. The electric company might come then too so it could be a really big day.

I look forward to bed under the down comforter covering a pad on the floor of the tent. Forty-four degrees should feel uncomfortable to me right now but I love the way it feels. Digesting the sesame broccoli brown rice and tofu cooked in a wok over a Coleman stove with light from the full moon supplemented by a lantern I feel really really alive. Who wouldn't be totally content being me right now? Probably most people.