Unlikely Words

I can’t remember the last time I started the day with a bath. I think I may never have started the day with a bath. I don’t think I’ve taken a bath, for hygiene purposes, since I was in elementary school.

When we checked into our bed and breakfast, we took a good look around the room: nice big bed, cute Victorian bric-a-brac all about, and a little bathroom with a toilet and a sink. And no shower. In the corner of the room, however, was a patch of tiled floor on which was standing a clawfoot tub, behind a decorative standing screen. “I think,” I said, “we have to take a bath.”

Rachel didn’t believe me. “There’s got to be a shower.” I raised my eyebrows and gestured to the bathroom.

“I guess you’re right!” she said. So, the next morning, we each took a bath. It was… odd. The screen provided only the barest amount of modesty, so it’s a good thing we’re, you know, married. And although the spigot included an attachment for washing one’s hair, it was still less convenient than a shower would have been.

After towelling off, we had a delicious breakfast of quiche (which ordinarily I don’t care for) with a mango-ginger-habanero sauce (which I very much care for). We were joined at breakfast by an attractive young couple with a very well behaved infant, and a father and daughter. The latter, 5 years old, was very cute, but was too shy to join us for breakfast and so ate in the kitchen, to the amusement of the innkeepers. (The aforementioned attractive young couple were from Seattle, and provided yet another data point for our theory that people from Seattle always talk about how miserable it is to live there. We believe it’s a plot to keep out the riff-raff.)

On our way out of Ferndale, we saw this sign for a point of historical interest. Is it just me, or should such a sign include just a smidge more information that might entice one to pull off and see it?

Then, it was driving. And driving. And driving. There really is just way too much California. The Redwood National Forest was, to be sure, lovely. A cheerful park ranger recommended that we take the parallel “officially scenic” drive, and it was tranquil and beautiful. About halfway along we found yet another scenic detour, this one labeled “coastal drive.” We pulled down the road, and were hailed by an SUV traveling the other way. It was a very nice older couple from Georgia who told us it was all fogged in, and wanted our opinion on whether we thought it would lift (our rental car had Oregon plates, so they mistakenly assumed we might have the slightest clue). Despite their warning that we wouldn’t be able to see anything, we decided to take the drive. Indeed, it was foggy. The ocean may well have been there, but we couldn’t see it.

The road itself was only mostly paved in parts, so it was kind of a rough drive. My favorite moment was when Rachel said, “Ooh, pull over for a sec, I want to take a picture of these trees with the neat silver leaves.” I slowed the car. “Oh, wait, no,” she said, “they’re not silver. They’re dusty.”

We did make several stops along the drive during the day for Rachel to do some “serious” photography. A lot of this involved her wandering down the road a ways while I sat with the car. I admit, I got a little bored during some of these stops, so, watching her walk down the road ahead of me, I started playing with the zoom on my camera and initiated a series of photographs I call “Pictures of My Wife’s Hot Ass.” (The title is a work in progress.)

Our trip would not have been possible without the GPS system that came with our rental car. We grew very fond of it, and started referring to it as “the lady in the box.” The lady really almost never steered us wrong. Sometimes we’d (intentionally or unintentionally) deviate from the route (for example, our scenic drives) and when we did, she’d admonish us to “please proceed to the highlighted route.” The problem with the GPS system is that when you’re in the woods, the satellite coverage is less than ideal, and sometimes the box wouldn’t quite know exactly where we were. While driving through the Redwood Forest, the little map on the display that showed where our car was tended to get confused. It started showing our car way off the road in the middle of a vast expanse of green or blue. Since we could tell we weren’t in the middle of the ocean, we got tired of being told to “proceed to the highlighted route,” and I reached over and turned it off. At that point, I really needed Rachel to say, “His computer’s off… Luke, you switched off your targeting computer, what’s wrong?” Then I could have squeaked, “Nothing! I’m all right!” Sadly, however, my wife has a tendency to fall asleep during Star Wars movies, so I think I’ll have to take a road trip with one of my male friends.

These entertaining incidents were then followed by hours and hours of uneventful driving up I-5 in Oregon, of which the less is said, the better (although we think we saw some sheep). We finally arrived in Portland (well, ok, Lake Oswego) where Rachel’s cousin Kim lives with her fiance Alex. Kim and Alex are wonderful people, and were great hosts, and their apartment (tastefully decorated, and overlooking a state park) was beautiful. We drove around Portland for a while trying to find a restaurant and ended up at a pretty tasty microbrewery. Rachel actually had a beer and claimed to like it.

Lively and wide-ranging conversation continued all the way home, where they took the futon so we could sleep in their bed, thereby setting a new standard for hospitality. To everyone who’s ever stayed at our house, I apologize. I didn’t even know that was done.