The truth is I haven't felt much like writing. Don't know why...just haven't. But for the two of you who are maybe interested, here is what has gone on over the last three months.
Portland is at times a great place to live. The rain has pretty much subsided and we will have several nice days in a row, as opposed to the several shitty days then one nice one. This is a change that I welcome, though after my lunch time walks, I really don't want to go back to work. Not a day goes by here where I don't see something, or someone doing something totally crazy. This is especially true downtown, where there are any number of miscreants hanging around trying to get money from you. Though most of the time I just have to look around my own neighborhood to see some thing that blows my mind. Here is an example.
On a lazy day (which is pretty much everyday at this point) I walk to the bus stop on the beautiful corner of NE Failing and MLK Blvd. Normally there is some kind of weird scene going on at the crack fortress at 7:00 in the morning, with the dealers cronies running whatever earns that a crack dealer needs run. But on this fine, crisp morning I saw no one, not even the dealer.
When I arrived at the bus stop there was a strange looking woman sitting there, in a pretty much all black with a series of cross bracelets dangling from her wrist and backwards Yankees cap. Next to her was bowl with the various articles that she needed to perform the task she had set out to accomplish at this fine bus stop. She greeted me with a somewhat broken "hello" and I responded in kind. After a few uncomfortable moments where she stared and smiled at me, she must have deemed me cool enough to continue on with what I had interrupted. Taking one more glance at me, she pulled out a broken pen, and with lighting speed she inserted a small item in the end of the pen and let loose the biggest flame I have ever seen from her lighter. It was at this point that I realized that for the second time in my life I was watching someone smoke crack.
I decided to make a quick exit and wait by the sign for the stop. It was at this point the normally somewhat overzealous Rose City Police drove on by and glanced in my direction and just kept rolling on. I was so shocked that I didn't know what to do. Surely they must've seen this woman smoking crack, but maybe she has some kind of secret crack smoker stealth power to avoid detection. When she was done with crack smoking she instructed me "to have a good day" and staggered off on down the street.
Now that was a bit weird for me, and I thought that that would be an end to the weirdness for the day, but oooohhhh was I wrong.
As I was on the bus, minding everyone else's business. I noticed a small, not entirely attractive woman getting on the bus. After a short discussion with the bus driver she sat down at the front most seat. At the next stop a Mexican man, with long black hair and several tattoos got on the bus and sat down next to her. At which point she IMMEDIATELY went to combing and braiding his hair in one long braid. I did my best to advert my eyes, but I couldn't!! He apparently saw someone he knew waved hi and the two exchanged several words in Spanish. When we arrived at the MAX station she got up and walked off the bus without saying a single word to the guy and he walked back to talk with his friend. I'm still trying to wrap my head around what I saw.
April brought me to beautiful Moab Utah and my much anticipated trip to Indian Creek finally came. The trip was off to a great start when I managed to make it to Salt Lake City without any airline snafu's. I know that its a short flight from Portland, but I've never flown with out some kind of fuck up happening. So I was pleased when I made it to SLC without a hitch.
After waiting a few hours and devouring Steph Davis' book, Danny had found his way to the airport and we where off to a fine meal at KFC, and to get supplies at REI and whatever grocery store we where going to get lost in for an hour or so. We climbed for a spot at Big Cottonwood Canyon on the slippery quartzite. Before attempting to head out to Moab. Salt Lake City is amazingly beautiful, I could almost see myself living there, and sometimes I wonder what my life would be like if I had moved some place where I knew no one.
On our way out of the SLC we stopped at an Arby's for a quick bite. One of my favorite things about traveling is the strange people and places you happen upon. This Arby's was no exception. While Danny and I sat down with our roast beef sandwiches, curly fries and milkshakes (well for me at least) to plot our course. It was hard for me to focus on the map because of the incredible level of ignorant conversation going on behind the counter.
The manager of this fine establishment was having a conversation about Buddhism with one of his employees. This employee who fancied himself a scholar on the subject proceeded to tell his manager that they already knew who the next Dali Lama was. I was shocked to hear this, since I knew nothing about the current Dali Lama deciding to take his baggage on to the next life. Inspite of all of this, I did manage to keep my mouth shut. Yes, I too was impressed. But anyway, I digress. Danny went to get a pen from these guys, when the Buddhist scholar stopped his conversation of religious matters to ask Danny if he liked the band “Slipknot”. Danny was of course taken aback by this out of the blue question. At this point every employee decided to join in on the conversation. It of course went know where.
This girl, who I can only describe as the embodiment of the things I hate about Portland. She was short, sorta frumpy with this crazy haircut and very pink eye shadow. She asked us where we where we where from. When I told her that I was from Portland she suddenly got very excited and told me that she was going there tomorrow. I said “Great, you’ll fit right in”
We then went back to the task of finding a way to Moab. As the inane conversation continued I was working harder and harder keep my mouth shut. I was doing exceptionally well at this when the manager blurted out “I”m a Mod!!” At this point I calmly turned and said, “you aren’t a fucking Mod.” He responded with “I’m older than you think I am” “You aren’t old enough to be damn mod though” I countered. He came back with “I’m way older than you”. I told him that I’m older than you think and there is no way that he could have possibly be a mod.
”I’m thirty” he said. I’m 27 and there is no fucking way in hell I'm old enough to be a mod. That's way before your time.” He replied weakly with “Well my brothers are old enough.” The last thing I said to him was “Well that doesn’t mean you’re a mod.” With that we where on our way to Moab.
Driving in the open expanses of Utah at night is scary. It seems that the only thing there is the chunk of road that’s in front of you. That coupled with Danny’s sometimes erratic driving and my intense fear of Mormons prevented me from falling asleep in the passengers seat. We made as far as the town of
The week at Indian Creek went well. Dan and I got our first real trad. leads in. The only real problem was the weather, not during the day, that was great, but at night it was horrendous!
On our first day, while I was going for my first red point, a storm rolled in as they are prone to do in the desert. It was during this storm that my tent decided to get up and move its self. We returned to the camp site in the middle of a rain storm to retrieve our tents from the wash where they where setup. As we got to the tents I so keenly noticed that there was only one--Dan’s. We quickly grabbed it and ran it up to the parking lot. The next morning I found my tent in the back of the wash, wedged between a couple of boulders. The next night, another storm came through and blew my tent over on top of me. After much consideration, I decided that it wasn’t a good idea to stay in the tent. I got out and staked down the tent as well as I could and turned to see Danny, in a stunning display of pussines also running for the car. We spent the night in the car, which was my third sleepless night in row. Then next night, we went to a much safer camp site. This place was sheltered from the wind, but unknown to us, the temp went down to 20 degrees. Not the coldest I’ve ever camped in, but the coldest that I’ve camped in with a 40 degree bag. In the middle of the night I had to put on: socks, pants, sweatshirt, and my micro puff jacket. I slept maybe two hours that night. Needless to say, the next day was a rest day.
At the end of the week, Dan and I made the very long trip back to Portland. This trip, uncommon to all of our other trips went without incident and we arrived back in the fabulous Rose City.
Ok that's enough for now. Sorry (to all two of you) for the long as post. I’m working on posting something at least once a week now, but we’ll see how that works out.
1 comment:
I've given up on people in fast food restaurants. And people who listen to Slipknot. For what it's worth.
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