Camping, smores, and an important lesson about drunk driving

Samuel P. Taylor State park, just north of San Francisco, is packed with huge redwoods. Saturday night we camped at one of the best spots in the campground with some friends, on the bank of a river surrounded by the towering trees. The only downside to the park is that the scenic river that runs past the campsites has a moderately busy road on the opposite bank, just behind a line of trees. You can hear the cars zipping past through most of the evening, but by late night it quiets down. No bother - we had lots of stuff to distract us from the car sounds - We grilled amazing New York strip, had shrimp cocktail, chased away raccoons, and introduced our Australian friends to smores - sticky marshmallow plus Hershey's bar plus graham cracker - yum.

If you're from another country, trying this American favorite for your first time in your late thirties, it's easier to strip away the nostalgia and get right to the food facts. Needs better chocolate...graham crackers break too easily...is messy. Ok, ok agreed. I can't argue with any of that, but I think it's good to try it with the rough basics, now that the first time is out of the way ... next time - high quality dark chocolate, smaller marshmallows, crackers with some backbone. Voila - a much improved snack and happy yuppies truly enjoying the outdoors.

Great food aside, staying up late around the campfire is the real attraction to camping. It was dark by 5:30pm, and we were up until midnight talking and laughing about all the usual stuff - homelessness, high school politics, religion and Survivor. At about 12:10, it was time for the last walk to the restroom, about 100 feet away. Ellen and I were walking down the dark path, flashlight in hand, and were almost to the comfort station when we heard a car across the river. It made the usual rushing sound as it passed, but it abruptly stopped and was followed by a dull slam. We turned to look and across the river, about 200 feet away in the pitch dark, the headlights flew off the road, tipping sideways as the car jumped off the road, down the embankment, crashing through the trees and finally slammed to a stop and went completely dark.

We were in shock as it was happening - like it was in slow motion. I sprinted along the road toward the bridge that crosses the river, and on the other bank of the river found a footpath. I walked about 100 yards through the pitch black with the flickering flashlight. I had no first aid kit, no car, no cell phone reception, and I kept checking down the embankment toward the river to see where this car had landed. Just ahead of me I saw the car - right-side-up in the middle of the footpath, dented, wrapped around a tree, impaled on a fencepost, windshield smashed. It occurred to me that I might not be ready to see what had become of the driver - I wasn't even sure what I was doing there, but realized I was the first person there and might at least call for help somehow. Behind the car I saw someone walking around in the dark - a young guy, trying to climb up the embankment to the main road. It was the driver, completely unharmed, not a scratch - but in total shock. He walked over to me and I looked him over for cuts, checked the top of his head for bleeding - nothing. He reeked of alcohol and that adrenaline sweat smell. I told him to walk out the path with me.

Our friends had also seen it from the campsite and had driven their car over to the crash site to see if they could help. We all looked the driver over in their headlights and confirmed that he had somehow managed to escape any injury at all. We loaded him in the car and drove him home, just five minutes up the road, where his wife was waiting for him. We were up for another couple of hours on pure adrenaline, tossing and turning, making trips to the bathroom, finally falling asleep.

This morning we walked back to the crash site to have a closer look at the wreck. If he had missed the small tuft of saplings that finally stopped his car, he would have tumbled into the river. Later we watched as the tow truck dragged his car up the embankment. The driver was there, too. Would he realize how close he had come to losing it all? Or would he think he was immune to it? Would it all be just a funny story he tells his friends the next time he's up late around a campfire?

Buying local to keep your community strong

I'm a firm believer that during tough economic times, you can make a huge difference by spending money close to home. We saw this in Manhattan during the cleanup, when small businesses started drying up - only residents were allowed downtown for a few months before Xmas, and few people actually were there at all.

The shops and restaurants in our neighborhood came out of someone's entrepreneurial dream. These were the businesses where they knew your face on sight, they were full of character. Looking around at this desolation, we knew that we had to choose just a few where we could spend our money, and the rest would probably struggle and fail. Many did fail and the neighborhood was worse off without them.

This Xmas, everyone is going to tighten their belts, and the little bit that we all spend will make a huge difference if it's focused in our own communities. Huge national companies tend to come out of hard economies on top, because small and medium sized businesses can't slash prices the way the big box stores can. Believe me when I tell you, Amazon, Wal Mart, Costco, and Sams will do just fine if they don't get every one of our dollars this year. If we can keep our spending closer to home, the business profits will go into our own neighborhoods - someone will be able to afford a new home in your neighborhood, hire a new employee from your town, or buy their supplies from a store closeby.

So let's all find a few, or a bunch, of things we can buy locally from independent stores. Maybe it's a touch more expensive, but for a couple of items, maybe it's worth it to invest in our communities and pull through this mess together.

Electric Blue Neighbors

We watched the election results in the local movie theater - the tiny little Balboa theater. The room was full of people eating popcorn, sour patch kids, and drinking coke and whatever else they might have brought. Lots of emotion, as you might imagine. Nice to be among neighbors and get a sense of who you live with. Gives the little beat up theater a new shade of meaning too! Nice that the owner opened it up for that! We took a drive around the city to see the rowdy neighborhoods, ours being a bit sleepy. Lots of cars honking, people dancing around and shouting. But we were too exhausted to join in the street parties. Home to fall asleep on the couch watching CNN. Then off to bed.

the Red Bull Soapbox derby yesterday

I had always thought that the idea of a soapbox race was all fictional, like something that was in the Little Rascals movies and then other movies copied the idea. A Hollywood myth, as much as the renegade cop who gets the bad guys and destroys a city block in the process. But here is a REAL soapbox race and it was really fun to see!!!

This was in San Francisco's Dolores Park - the RedBull Soapbox derby. There were about 60,000 people on the hillside watching the race below or the huge monitors around the park. Racers were judged on the skit or dance routine they did before getting into their car, along with the creativity of their car design as well as their racing time.

The names of the three teams I have here are "Thick and Thin" with a pizza theme, "Fully Operational" with a Death Star theme, and "The Winos" from Napa valley.

Good times during the economic crash

We went out for a morning walk at 6:30 am today. There were clear skies over the Pacific, a bright moon in the sky with a dazzling play of white on the water. Sparkling lights from tankers moving slowly on the horizon. And I feel rich in spite of the fact that the economic world is tumbling down around us. I find myself standing in the kitchen looking at my old beat up refrigerator, "Well at least I have this refrigerator. My old pal the fridge. I don't know where that water leak is coming from but by god I'm keeping this fridge." Or getting on the bus I think, "this bus pass is great. Forty five bucks and I get to ride the bus every day. At least I've got this bus pass." And there's an upside to working in the entertainment business, because people still go to movies during hard times. Oddly enough, if you look it up, things like movies, tobacco, cosmetics, soda, and footwear all do well in a recession. Go figure. Each of those adds up to a fun night on the town - and then some jogging.

http://news.briefing.com/GeneralContent/Investor/Active/ArticlePopup/ArticlePopup.aspx?ArticleId=NS20071101121538TakingStock

Cheaper shelves through recycling

I had been wanting to build four shelves in the closet, but lumber can be pricey. In an effort to get in the recession/depression/full-financial-apocolypse mindset, I found another source for my wood. There was a yard sale up the street and a really big old stereo speaker set that didn't sell, and was left on the street with a big "FREE" sign on it. I don't need a big speaker, who does really? But the wood gave me an idea. I took it home, carefully popped the sides off with a hammer, sanded it down and the 1972 speaker set became four new shelves. I used the backs of two speakers and the sides of one big one. Braces beneath the shelves were made from some old wood I had got from a yard sale down the street a couple months before - also with the 'FREE' sign on them.

FREE shelves!! yay! Now I can put all my "too-small" clothes somewhere. Useful, right?

Craigslist. Rocks.

Lastnight we bought a used piano keyboard off Craigslist. Picked it up in Oakland, super friendly people, and now I have a keyboard of my own. Thanks to Anna for letting me borrow hers, for uh, six or eight months. In the last month we've sold plastic bins, dining chairs, luggage, a drying rack, bubble wrap, and a refrigerator through Craigslist. Never a weirdo, everyone polite and on time. One or two flakes, but nothing devastating. This is the coolest thing ever.

We have ten things listed for sale now, and chances are we'll sell most of it this way. Anyone else have any luck with Craigslist? It's the ultimate recycler.

Living with robots

One of the continuing "moving in" goals this weekend was to clear enough floor space so that we could run the vacuumming robot. Yes, we live with a robot named Roomba. We started him up this weekend and let him do the bedroom. Ok, how filthy-yuppie are we for sitting on the bed and watching him clean? For over an hour. While we sip coffee and lift our feet away from the floor when he buzzes under the bed. I'm watching my vacuum for fun.

But, the trial run was a huge success, he did a nice job on the bedroom and got into places you'd never go with a vacuum like under the bed, and at some point he disappeared into the closet and we could hear dust and little bits of stuff rattling around inside him. So he found something in there he liked. Next we set him up in the hallway and closed the doors to the rooms, except left the bathroom door open to see if he could get over the threshold and into there. It took a couple of tries, but he finally jumped over it and got in there. He knew there was dirt in there and he was getting it no matter what.

He's incredibly determined, and got stuck under a chair in his next room. He really really wanted to get under there, kept trying and finally made it most of the way under, where he got stuck. Then he made the "uh oh" sound that he makes when he's in trouble, and beeped a string of five beeps to get our attention. I now know how Luke Skywalker could listen to string of beeps from R2 and respond with "No Artoo, I'd rather not do that". I know now that five beeps mean "Help, my wheels are being pushed up into my body and I can't move." Three beeps means "Help, one of my wheels is off the ground."

We had a dog once that would chase bottle rockets down, step on them and bite them. The fireworks would then, of course, burn his mouth and spray his face with sparks. He'd bite them even harder, rinse out his mouth with water, and get ready for the next one to fly his way. Roomba is a lot like that puppy. I find myself thinking "What's it going to take for you to learn???" I ended up jamming eight shoes under the sides of chairs to keep him from going under there again. I'm sure in time, my response to five beeps will be, "Well maybe you should have thought about that before you went under there, dumbass." At this rate he's going to earn himself a new name. Here's the first few options that come to mind : "Rascal", "Trouble", "Diggity", "Scrappy". Any ideas?

Finding the floor

Apparently there is a wood floor under the boxes. I found it yesterday and made Ellen come over to take a look. It's fascinating. It runs from one pile of boxes across the small open space, to the next pile of boxes.

Yesterday was a miserable/glorious day of sorting boxes that ended with neatly stacked shelves in the garage, boxes all numbered and cataloged, with room to move in the apartment. And an incredibly sore back and low blood sugar brain freeze. I should be giving the guy at the drive through window the update each time I go there for dinner after 9pm. "Hey man, got through the dining room boxes today! Cataloged another 15 in the garage too!"

"That's fantastic, Steve, you're really going to be glad you are using Excel for the cataloging. Remember to select all, then sort the table. Here's the Coke and the fries. See you next week."

There was a moment when I ran out of packing tape yesterday - Yes, I hear you thinking "packing tape? but you're already moved in, aren't you?" and the answer is: big boxes ÷ small boxes = sane closet. Anyway, running out of packing tape. Can't move forward to the next task. Walk down to the grocery store three blocks away for more packing tape, unshowered, crazy "around the house" shirt that looks like an eskimo party shirt, torn jeans with fabric flap on the knee, scowling. And now I'm walking among the happy Sunday afternoon shoppers at Safeway. I think I was quick enough to be out before the manager could catch me. But that was the low point in the day.

Garage sale is a few weeks away, anyone need an insulated lunchbag? How about a tall, thin, bamboo standing lamp? This is the preview sale, any takers?

The Maze of Cardboard

The apartment is stacks of cardboard that shift and change every day. We can't find the salad spinner, we can't find the water filter, some furniture doesn't fit where we had hoped. That thing is happening where important paperwork is beginning to scurry around the house while we're not looking - you find a bill on the mantle, some mortgage paperwork in the guest room wedged between two boxes in a stack, and an important receipt is at large. I found the remotes for the DVD player in the file boxes, laying on top of the "credit report" files.

Your brain is pulling apart trying to figure out why there's so much mismatch in your life. It's like a dream/nightmare. I would not be surprised if my fifth grade teacher walked out of the kitchen and handed me an otter.

This weekend we'll push through most of it and get some sanity back. For now we're just happy the kitchen is functional and we've had some fun dinners at home.

The Forty Dollar Hum

I had parked in front of our new apartment with a carload of boxes, about to haul them upstairs. Then I decided to mess around with the shelving in the garage, trying to take some shelves out so big boxes will fit. And there's that hum sound on the street. This is a sound that means one thing to me now. Forty dollars. I've gotten three parking tickets in the last month for not moving my car on street cleaning day. Forty bucks each.

So without even completing the thought, I fly out the front door, there's the little parking buggy writing out a ticket for the guy parked in front of my car, there's the neighbor, running out to his van behind me, and here's a second parking buggy pulling up behind my car. So I Bo Duke it into the car, tear away and go around the corner before anyone can put a ticket on me.

When I get back the street sweeping truck passes the house, cops are gone and the neighbor and I both park again in front of our houses - "Did they get you?" he says. "I don't see a ticket," I say, and he says "hope they don't get us by mail." That would be evil. So now I open the garage and hide the car inside, like some mafia guy with a truckload of bootleg.

Moving will keep you on your toes, then knock you back on your #@%.

Keys and champagne

Our broker suggested that we have a little shindig yesterday, the day of the closing. We loaded the lawn chairs and some toilet paper into the Prius, drove five blocks to our new place, and had some champagne, cheese and crackers with our broker/neighbor/friend Charmaine and her hubby, Robert. Justin and Anna stopped by later and we all hung out in the kitchen eating little petit fours. The door started knocking and the downstairs neighbors showed up with more champagne, so now there's eight of us kicking it in our tiny kitchen.

The neighbors are cool (whew!!) They were excited that we weren't total wingnuts I think, because the girl hugged Ellen when they left.

So today we'll move a few boxes over there and start to adjust to the new place. It still hasn't hit us that we'll be living there for a long time to come. When our little party ended lastnight, I started packing stuff up, telling Ellen we needed to "take them home." She stared at me and laughed - "Honey, this is home."

Robin Williams working on new material

We saw Robin Williams at Bimbos 365 club lastnight. He went for a solid two hours and it was almost all new stuff. It was hysterical. Since it's a working show, there were times when he tried a new joke and no one laughed, and you kind of feel bad for him, but then if you fake laugh he won't know how bad the joke really is. He would comment on how quiet we, or how that joke flopped, and he'll start to get his momentum back. Sometimes he just starts talking in a funny voice to see if it will kick off a joke. Towards the end he told the crowd that he was playing Vegas this weekend and needed to test things out on us. His material is really fast, densely packed, and he keeps the energy up the whole time. We loved it.

Today I'm taking apart some Ikea furniture and some old filing and paperwork. I take small piano practice breaks. So imagine cardboard boxes stacked five feet high in the middle of a room and from somewhere behind them the plunking sounds of "the Battle Hymn of the Republic". That's a stress break.

Opossums love scrambled eggs

Apparently, when you are rehabilitating a lost opossum, you should feed it scrambled eggs. They love eggs. I should try sticking my head down into my garage's utility sink and give it a sniff - could it smell like scrambled eggs? Is that what attracted a small opossum to climb down into the sink last night and scare the bejezus out of me while I was doing laundry?

He turned out to be a real cutie. Sort of semi-playing-dead while we stood over the sink talking about him. He laid his head down on the ground, sort of like, "okay, I'm dead now, go away please noisy, pasty, hairless tree monsters." I can't help but wonder what we sound like to a trembling opossum in a garage. Does our loud blabbering sound like birds chirping? Soothing and inspiring? Or is it like when you hear monkeys babbling on TV? Just non sensical squawking?

Anyway, he held perfectly still as we lowered a little wastebasket over him, slipped cardboard underneath, and carried him out to the street. Ellen was amazed at how calm he was, and is now determined to find some baby opossums and try holding them in her hand. She says opossums have now surpassed raccoons in the cuteness category.

It's Wednesday the 21st of May, our 14th wedding anniversary! We are going to a club tonight to see Robin Williams working on new material. We've seen one of these shows before, a couple years ago, and he does nearly three hours of non-stop new material. You're exhausted from laughing when it's done - he is amazingly raw and funny in person.

We get the keys to our new apartment on Friday afternoon. We'll spend the holiday weekend moving little boxes over, setting up a few lawn chairs in the living room until the movers come on the 31st, and hanging out in our backyard. We've never had a backyard before, and I'm at a loss for what to do with it. Not really a gardener, unless spraying things with the hose counts as something. In my hands, gardening shears turn into a ravenous T Rex, and there are some gaping dead holes in our shrubs left after the attack. I don't get assigned that job anymore.