Prepping for epicnicity again

So this isn't technically biking below.



Yeah, we rode the ponies in Ocean Shores. It's in preparation for an upcoming trail ride on the Colorado visit, wherein we will, with my family, all ride up into some Mt. Zirkel-adjacent gorgeousness on some horses for two hours, to return to a dinner of "healthy hotdogs (!!!)," "s'mores" and a cash bar. How many drinks will it take to soothe the aching tushies of the non-horseriding city mice? I look forward to telling you.

Now, riding horseback on the beach probably sounds ridiculously romantic and exciting. If not for the mandatory preparation, this would have been a trip I think we'd have been happy to skip. First, Ray had never ridden a horse below and he's not even crazy about dogs because when they are unpredictable, they can bite. And now he's on a horse's back (Her name is Kim. I rode Freckles). This and the extreme positivity at my banjo playing and the public dancing at the ball last year prove that he has gone over the deep end for me, as far as I'm concerned.

But the problem is that Ocean Shores is not a very romantic area to ride on. The beaches, such as they are, are lined with cheesy condos and hotels filled with cheesy people who perpetrate all kinds of redneckery, from doing donuts on the beach to holding bonfires and barbecues right next to their cars to flying those kites you can steer and buzzing everyone around. There are also hearty souls who get in the water to bathe. I was appalled by that, especially watching the kids go out. I mean, their parents must want them to be taken away by hypothermia to let them splash around when it's 53, overcast and gale-stormy out. The one-hour ride took us most of the way to the Quinault Beach Resort and Casino before turning around. And then there's the weather. It has been chilly and wet out here anyway, and the shore is far windier than is desirable. Ray's short shirtsleeves were not enough, and my bulky sweater did not manage to stop the wind from ripping into me. Not exactly a gentle, tress-tussling breeze. By the end of the hour, Ray and I were frozen solid and his hands were bright red and practically numb.

Did I mention horses don't like to get their feet wet? Every time a wave came up, we had to walk the horses around them. And only walk (and occasionally trot) them. No racing through the tide, sending up a magical sparkly spray. Oh well, we were too Donner-Party miserable to think about it.

Ray did great, and I managed to keep Freckles under control. The only damper is that our old nags had been making the shore-side run all day and were probably whipped. The horses at the ranch will likely be fresh. Well, we're ready now. I think.

To warm up we went to the Arcade and played air hockey. I beat Ray for the first time and then he beat me and took back bragging rights.

Yesterday we hit Lake Sylvia State Park, which has an extensive trail system for mountain biking (really for logging, but it's open to the public for non-motorized use). We hit a trail that went pretty steeply up about 5 miles, then turned around and zoomed down. There's no map available online, but the park kiosk has a lot of them. If I were a graphics person I'd try to turn it into a prettier and more elaborate version of the dittoed copy you get at the kiosk. It was a terrific ride, and since there was plenty of time left when we completed it, we took a brisk 5 mile or so hike. We were quite weary after that but we still had to hit the supermarket for dinner.

Luckily, when I headed to Starbucks to get my Sunday NY Times, I saw the Spooner Farms stand was open. I went to the Starbucks to get my paper (they didn't have any, the delivery didn't make it to Grays Harbor that day, and we ended up having to send Ray's dad Ray on a mission to get a copy in his neck of the woods) by bike and I booked it back to my car to get proper flat transportability. The Spooner berries are very tender and sweet, and red all the way down. They are not California abominations of sour crunchiness, and they only last 30 sublime days. Needless to say, I came back for the flat and plowed through about two pints through the course of the day, and there are still plenty left for my FMWs.

I also learned that I can play almost all Johnny Cash and Hank Williams Sr. songs on the banjo. With ease, chord-wise, so my finger picking is going to have to pick up some steam. I can also play that "Umbrella" song and the opening riff to "Stairway." Thanks to the Internet for putting chords and tabs up for almost any song you can think of. If only more than 75 percent of those chords were correctly noted.

Banjo pickin'

So I got a banjo last week. A tenor banjo, to be precise, which is necessary because there are three kinds of banjos. I have chosen one of the two non-five string banjos to play. People don't get the variety of banjos out there. They seem to think all you can play on a banjo — which they envision as a five-string banjo — are bluegrass tunes. My God, people, there is a world of music out there that can be played with a banjo. Heard of Bela Fleck?

Well, not like I'm going to be playing abstruse banjo jazz. Honestly, I'm a bit overwhelmed by the sheer number of chords in the world. I'm just trying to pick some songs out that I want to be able to play, and get to a point where I don't sound awful. And banjo music makes people happy.

In contrast to my parents' telling me I ought to play cello (mom — and I tried it and didn't like it) and dulcimer (dad — there is one around the house in Arkansas and it's supposed to be easy), Ray has embraced the banjo playing with an enthusiasm that almost scares me. He has actually gotten his saxaphone from his sister's house, an instrument he has not played in a decade, and some music that has chords in it so we can "jam." And though the jazz classics he has the music for is good stuff, I'm looking at chords with what appear to be fractions next to them. I thought there were a few kinds of chords, but there's apparently a whole world out there of ways to structure notes that people actually use and that sound pleasantly consonant. Go figure.

I am using a beautiful 1930s-era banjo on loan from a banjo band leader who has loaner banjos for would-be banjo players. It has inlaid mother of pearl and is heavy as all get out. So far I can play "Clementine," "London Bridge," and a few other songs that rely on C, F, G, G7, C7 and A chords. There are quite a few. I can just barely get out the D chords. I'm getting somewhere.

I've got a mess of books to read. I finished a Chandler Burr book about the making of Un Jardin Sur le Nil and Lovely (they are scents) and you know, he is one lucky duck. His book is okay, there are some draggy passages and some exceptionally self-concious writing about talking to a celebrity (Sarah Jessica Parker). It really works when he actually talks about molecules and scent, and really, that was the book I wanted to have more of. I think the book was called "The Perfect Scent."

I have plenty of books to dig into — I put them on hold a year ago and that hold expired at once and, boom, eight books drop in my lap. I have a couple that don't look that interesting to me anymore (one about the Christian Right in the U.S., another about the black market of nuclear weapons. I must have been feeling paranoid or something for that one) and others that are more appealing (Atul Gawande's notes on being a surgeon, "The Book of Air and Shadows," "Coal Black Horse," which sounds so full of rural poverty, desperation and child-in-peril plus historic setting that I am thinking of getting it for mom for Christmas. The more grinding the poverty, the more she likes it).

I had a fun surprise this weekend. I thought "Battlestar Galactica" was having its season finale, but it was just the mid-season finale. I suppose "fun surprise" is the wrong way to put it since there was kind of a depressing cliffhanger. And now I have to wait for the return of the sexy killer robots and psychologically disturbed on-the-run humanity. But if I can wait for summer weather, I can wait for BSG.

The Olden Times

This weekend was a weekend of simple pleasures, of experiencing the joys of the past. And by that I mean banjos. Lots of banjos.

The weather was not promising (I wore my winter coat this morning, how ya like that?) so on Saturday I dragged Ray up to Kamilche to the Little Creek Casino, where there was a convention of 4-string banjo players. I wanted to see the set of the Grays Harbor Banjo Band (which I wrote about not too long ago, and which was noticed not too long after, and yes, I can do more than seems, people, I can be obsessed with banjos myself). They were playing with Montana Red, aka Dick Lewis aka someone whose picking and grinning does not seem to be caught up on the internets like so much other cultural detritus with far less redeeming value. Montana Red was nominated for the national 4-string Banjo Hall of Fame in Guthrie, Okla., but his name does not appear to be in their online repository of banjo heros. Still, the guy must be able to play to call himself Montana Red, no?

For the record, Montana Red was in a cowboy hat and a bright red shirt with a southwestern pattern across the middle and a belt buckle with a ginormous red stone in the middle of it. The other GHBB members wore white shirts and blue satin vests.

We were a little late getting there because after we ate lunch we stopped at the home of a former client of Ray's who regaled us with his tribulations getting his garage built. It will be massive, with a slab of concrete he said is on the order of 72 cubic yards and way above street level. He's convinced it is ridiculous and he has locked horns with so many officials about it he said he has been told not to come back to city council meetings. He also told us about shooting at a nearby meth-maker's shed with flaming arrows. Ted Nugent can't touch this guy.

As it turns out, the banjo festival, held in a small event center/conference room style thing. It wasn't in the main event center, because that's where the Capitol Jubilee or something like that was being held. There were all these people milling around with badges on, welcoming us in and everything. They were so friendly and all seemed to know each other so well I was half expecting to see some sort of cult figure come by to lead them. I Googled, but nothing. Maybe it was a multi-level marketing thing? So we find the kind of distant room with the banjo band.

Well, instead of having one banjo band play at a time, all five bands are seated in a semi-circle and they are gone through in rotation, one song at a time. I have to say, the local band was the best. The GH band not only has banjo skillz, they have a guy who plays what appeared to be a straight soprano sax, which didn't sound like Kenny G but like those old timey territorial band recordings, a washboard, a bass and more non-banjo instruments than the other bands, which contributed sonic interest.

The songs that were played were so old the copyrights had expired when Bugs Bunny was singing them in cartoons. "Red Roses for a Blue Lady," "Dinah," "By The Sea," you name it, the tunes were familiar and old timey. There was an older couple, a woman in pink and a man in green, and they danced as much as their mutual inflexibility and possibly arthritis allowed them to. The man's moves were pretty limited, but then the pink lady got a new partner and they totally were getting down. There was almost an emergency when they tried to do the two-person turn, where they lifted their arms up and turned back-to-back, because their shoulders weren't flexible enough. It explained the ambulance sitting out in front of the casino.

There was also a woman from the "Orphan Band" who did a hula to "Tiny Bubbles," which I totally intend to do next time I go to a winery. And there was another woman from the Tacoma Banjo Band who got up in a cowboy hat with fake braids and a washboard around her neck and thimbles on every finger and did a kind of dance while banging out a rhythm while the band played. For some reason she reminded me of my mom.

Hugely entertaining. Then we went to the town's history museum to take in an improving lecture on women's history and getting the vote. Very Depression-style entertainment, and we had a dinner Sunday of porcupine meatballs, which is meat mixed with uncooked rice, browned and then cooked in a sauce where the rice absorbs liquid. Mom said that was very Depression-esque, and I guess we're about being prepared. I will have to learn to love beans, she told me. So be it. I can love beans, but I hope everyone around me has sufficient love for me to put up with my bean-digesting!

Maybe it was all the old timey stuff, but I was on a real trip about the upcoming Depression (reasons I think it's coming: Energy prices going out of control, food prices getting insane, generalized global instability, global warming thwarting traditional seasons and water patterns, I'm basically one of those people who swings between wild optimism and pessimism and I'm on a downward spiral without lots of great outdoor days) tonight. I was even trying to think of ways to thwart local cats from using a garden I'm likely never going to plant as a litterbox, short of killing them dead.

I was all on about how I have to hit Safeway before Tuesday, they've got the 24 oz boxes of FMWs 2/$5; I have to stock up. Like a crazy person with Great Depression issues. And at the improving lecture, in one of the "living history vignettes," I learned that in 1935, when a man could expect to make a dollar a day, a box of Bisquick cost $.30. Way to make me feel guilty about that totally unopened, unused box of Bisquick I've got in my cupboard that cost me about $1.29.

But I was also all on about ways we could entertain ourselves without electricity or anything: I could take up the four-string banjo (plectrum or tenor, however, eludes me) and Ray could play his clarinet and we could just have all-night Dixieland jam sessions. Who said the Depression has to always be completely awful?

Pain at the pump?

Well, I set myself up for about $.85 more pain the past couple days by putting off refilling my tank. Why wait? Not because the prices were so high, but the lines to the pump were so long. I'm talking insane long. I don't remember gas lines being so long when gas was at $2.25. And I'm not talking long every once in a while, I'm talking consistently long. This is just anecdotal blather, but seriously? the best cure for pain at the pump is not driving all over the place then acting like the gas station is the new 1929 bank.

I think they're like that with gas like I am with the FMW. I have said before I have a pretty ridiculous collection of the stuff, and it's only gotten bigger since dad told me wheat prices were going to go way up. Like gas, though, I will pay whatever the cost is for my Frosted Mini-Wheats.

Unfortunately, it is still impossible to bike everywhere as it is blustery blowing mist and chill out here. If I didn't mind rust, I'd ride, but seriously. I'm reading "Bicycling America's National Parks" and "Bike! Southwest Washington" and visiting sites like this one.

In the meantime, dad is doing the Tour de Rock, raising money for cancer research at CARTI. He's able to put 20+ miles out in the dry (but hot!) Arkansas weather.

Also, I was about to give up on Natalie Angier's "The Canon," but it finally started getting kinda good. Not like I don't already know this stuff about electrons and the strong and weak forces and whatnot, but it never hurts to keep rereading it and remembering it so one's brain doesn't get too vulnerable to pseudo-science.

Crazy dream

So last night I dreamed I was in Target, and Jim Bakker (of the PTL Club) was following me around regaling me with tales of all the D-list celebrity bimbos his son was dating, and how it was so exciting, and how this was proof positive his son was really on his way up. And I had had dealings with his son, who (in the dream, anyway) was really annoying and obnoxious and just the kind of person so obsessed with himself and externalia that after a few minutes of pretending to be polite, I told Jim Bakker that actually, his son was a total douche, and was likely not "dating" the bimbos he claimed but rather was calling them all the time and annoying them and showing up where they were hanging out and pretending they were all the greatest of friends when they just wanted to get away from him. Then I told Jim Bakker, "But then, you're kind of a rapist so I guess you don't really understand the whole communication thing, so why don't you go away and let me buy my shampoo." That was pretty fast, even for me, and certainly for a dream.

The other new thing for me was elk. One of Ray's clients gave him elk sausage, elk steaks and ground up elk. One elk is apparently more than enough for that "Cheaper By The Dozen" family. I can only imagine how tiring it is to drag out of the woods. A friend of mine who hunts said he goes to the bike-in places and, when he kills a deer, he "vents it" (I have no idea what that means and I'm not sure I want to know), gets his bike, takes off the seat and props the deer up on the pole (via the vent, I'm sure), lashes the front paws to the handles and pushes it out of the woods. How ya like them apples?

So we busted out the ground elk and made burgers (I made the patties, Ray was grossed out by the whole touching meat thing) with a little salt and pepper and a splash of water and worcestershire sauce (water was a tip from Jeffery Steingarten, whose opinion on eating for pleasure I trust completely, the guy loves to chow down on frozen Mars bars) to keep it moist. Well, the meat tasted a whole lot like beef. It wasn't as tender, but I kind of overcooked it (safety first) and there was hardly any fat. It was really lean stuff. But it was quite yummy, and maybe next time I'd throw a little oil in instead of water.

In other bits of information that may interest the reader, we watched "The Savages," which is billed as a dark comedy, but it wasn't very funny unless you think a whole lot of bourgeois griping about nursing homes, trite stereotypes and people with MFAs are inherently funny (there is not an MFAer in the world who is remotely funny in my experience). It seriously should go on Stuff White People Like. Although its ilk of film has probably been scrutinized there before.