Living Large on Lake Labarge

Lake Leberge, Yukon

When I was about 11 years old, I fell in with a disreputable crowd: Jack London, R.L. Stevenson, Rudyard Kipling, Robert Service, and of course the arch vagabond himself, Mark Twain. When I wasn't hanging around Hannibal, or creeping through the jungle with Mowgli and Rikki-tikki-tavi, I was up in the Yukon with White Fang and Nikki and Sam McGee. No telling where I might end up on any particular day. It certainly didn't depend on the price of gas.

Rudyard was the obvious Poet Laureate of that lot. Robert Service was perhaps the Poetaster Laureate. But at the time, even his limerick lines seemed unforgettable. And in fact they must have been, for they are in my ear even now, almost 50 years later.

"The northern lights have seen queer sights
But the queerest they ever did see,
Was that night on the marge of Lake LeBarge
When I cremated Sam McGee."

Mystery, adventure, exotic locale, desperate deathbed promises made and kept. Wow. Everything a boy could want.

I'm on the marge of Lake Labarge right now, or at least the verge of Lake Leberge. Service seems to have taken liberties with the spelling. When he was up here, around 1898, this lake was much populated, covered over with skiffs and steamers and rafts and wrecks and just about anything that might float for a day or two. It was part of the Yukon River Road to the Klondike, and that mob of mad Stampeders probably saw this scenery as just something to get through. Their eyes were inward, raptly bent upon the golden future. You know, the one just around the bend.

I, on the other hand, have come here to visit with an 11-year-old boy.

But I've about given up on seeing the actual Northern Lights. There may well be some strange stuff going on up there, even as I write, but it has to get dark before you can see it. And that may not happen before, say, October.

Yesterday was summer solstice. The longest day of the year. The sun was going down around midnight, so I took a picture of it. An hour later I came out again and it was still going down. The red had washed out of the clouds, a little. The still surface of the lake shone with a deep pale pearlescent gleam, and even the air above it had a wavery quality. It gave an underwater uncertainty to mountains across the way. The first amphibians, the sea still in their eyes, might have seen mountains just that way.

I got here on Monday, just behind a caravan of Germans in their Canadream RVs. The Euro being what it is, the entire German nation seems to be over here taking advantage of it. Who needs Lebensraum, when the world is for rent?

It was a calm, sunny afternoon, perfect for kayaking.

I had been cooped up at Takhini Springs over the weekend, waiting out a cold persistent rain. The trailer sat safely plugged into electricity, while I scanned the gray horizon for lightning from the tenuous comfort of the hot pool. I even watched a little TV, only to find that Canadian TV is every bit as boring as the US variety. It is sort of an interesting challenge, though, to watch stand-up comedy in French, and try to figure out the joke from body language. Don't laugh. The French are pretty good at body language.

After all that, you'd think I'd want to get right out on the water. Instead I lazed around, sunning on shore in a lawn chair for hours, watching a few people put in their boats, reading Huck Finn. I witnessed one fellow back his 30 foot Bayliner into the water with his 30 foot motorhome. Did a creditable job of it too. Too bad his battery was dead. Frumpf. Frumpff. Frumpff-frumpff-frumpff-frumpfffff. Pop. Ffft. Click, click, click. Alberta plates. After a while he got tired of bobbing around out there, tugged the boat in to shore like a latter day Gulliver, got another battery out of the motorhome, and was on his way. Vroom.

Another couple, with BC plates, had an interesting rack for their canoe. The back T bar was on a swivel mount, which allowed them to load it from the side, then swing the front around to the ladder rack behind the cab of their pickup. There was a "US Marines" sticker on the window, and a yellow ribbon on the tailgate. Turns out, back in the late sixties, this Canadian citizen traveled south to join up, had a bit of adventure in Viet Nam, and then returned home to Vancouver.

One of those guys that likes to buck the current, I guess.

Tuesday brought another day of cold rain and wind. At Takhini Hot Springs I heard someone warm up an old aphorism about the Yukon: "If you don't like the weather, wait a few minutes." First time I heard that one, it was said about Texas. 'Course that's in the winter. In the good old summertime, the only English words a Texas weatherman needs are "partly cloudy", "clear", and "hot".

The rest is body language.

The Germans left early Tuesday, emptying out the campground, so I drove round to a site right on the bluff. And surprise, XM radio began working, for the first time since I entered the Yukon. Sirius still holds up pretty good. I think their satellites swing further north.

After setting up, I wandered up through the puddles to Mom's Bakery, for sourdough pancakes and what I thought was a plentiful store of pecan tarts. I also picked up a dozen eggs still warm from the hens clucking on the other side of that fence. Then I settled back on the couch for a few hours to finish up with old Huck. I like reading while a storm shakes the trailer. Soooo much better than a tent. Wish I had a chicken in the fridge. This is chicken soup weather. Guess I'll settle for warming up the last of that brisket.

Better than wish soup, any day.

It's Wednesday morning, and the air over the lake is crystalline. It's idyllic - sunny and 68 degrees. Windy though. Surf's up. I seem to keep finding lots of reasons not to go kayaking. Maybe later. Somehow it seems like work right now, and I'm retired.

I made a pot of coffee and walked a few feet down to the edge of the bluff. Some generous soul cut down a tree here not long ago, and left a stump the perfect height to rest my laurels on. I surveyed the whitecaps on the lake. Longfellow comes to mind, for the first time in many a year:

"A boy's will is the wind's will,
And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts...."

The wind is certainly having it's will here with the hillside pines. There's a faint high whistle and a trembling all around, and something of the feeling you get near the top of a mountain, when the wind pokes and laughs to you, and tells you you are alone.

But I can't hear what it's saying now, over the pesky drone of that airplane.

There's a flotilla of ducks off shore, out in the middle distance. I counted 24, all gathered in a bunch. I reached around for the camera in my jacket pocket, brought it up to focus...and they had disappeared. Every one of them. I scanned the sky. They can't have flown off that fast. A trick of the light? Hidden by the waves?

Nope. Just gone.

I was about to put it down to another curious aspect of the aging brain, when they began to pop up again, individually, spread out over a larger area. Pop, pop, pop, pop. Popopopopop. Up they came, shaking their heads, looking around, and immediately gathering into a mass again. There they floated a moment, perhaps to compare notes. Then all of them dipped at once, and sank in unison.

Gone. I think I am witnessing a coordinated buffet.

Which reminds me. A sharp wind can make a man hungry as well as maudlin. Time for some smoked ham and a couple of those yard eggs. I tried to get up, but met with initial resistance. I'm used to that. But this time it wasn't my joints.

Pine sap.

Well, the morning is not entirely wasted. I am once again in a position to offer advice to anyone out there occasionally dumb enough to sit on a fresh pine stump. You know who you are.

There are a number of salient points:

1) Before you sit on anything else, get out of those pants.

2) Just go ahead and have a good wallow on that stump. Then you can cut up your jeans for fire starter.

3) If you are stubborn enough to try and save them, your best bet is applying a little charcoal lighter or other solvent, then scraping the softened sap off with a knife. Careful with the knife. Remember, holes can't be salvaged for fire starter. White cheeks on your pants, on the other hand, are quite fashionable.

4) Don't try the knife trick on your fingers, sticky as they are. You may need them, now and then, in this digital age.

And that, children, is all Uncle Bob has to say.


Bob, living large on Lake Labarge.

The Predator Supreme

On the Continental Divide
Northern BC

I did not mean to come this far. I can't stop, you see. I'm running for my life. I have met the Savage Beast that rules these northern lands. The Predator Supreme, who feasts on all others. No, it is not the Grizzly Bear. And certainly not Man. Nor even the Dreaded Logging Truck. Pity them all.

It is the Mosquito.

I've been wanting for days to stop somewhere. I considered lovely Meziadin Lake, but I daren't get out of the truck. The bugs were actually pelting themselves against the window, trying to get at me. I stopped again at Kinaskan Lake, which had as pretty and empty a campground as you could want. Nearly every site is level, and backs right up to a shallow beach. That lake begs to be kayaked.

But my God, the Bloodsuckers.

Some people seem oblivious, and I suppose future generations will all be descended from them. While trolling through the campground I saw a pale, tubby, bearded man sitting at a table in a pair of swim trunks. He was covered with the things. Perhaps he is a lingering advocate of 17th century medicine, seeking a replacement for the leech.

He did not look happy, exactly. Dourly determined to endure, is more like it. My hat would be off to him, if doffing it did not expose critical areas of unbitten flesh, where blood flows close to the skin.

I was forced to stop at Tatogga for fuel. I've learned to be lively getting in and out of the truck, but there's no stopping certain forward elements of the invasion. At speed, on the highway, it is safe to leave the windows open. Indeed it is necessary, since the breeze of passage helps keep the hitchhiking critters pinned in the back seat.

I asked the gentlemen with the vaguely European accent, who was filling my tank, how he deals with them. He was dressed in long sleeves and a gimme cap. He kept blinking rapidly to keep them out of his eyes. He shrugged his shoulders.

"Ach, you take it as comes, eh?"

My Hero.

After a beat of two he stolidly added something about how they got better in July, when it got a little hotter and didn't rain as much. All during this brief conversation, I myself resembled a dervish whirling in place. Or perhaps someone practicing the Macarena. Swat, swat, swat. Swat, swat, swat.

My pioneer forebears would be disgusted with me. I don't care. I've got bumps all over my neck and arms.

The gas guy also said something about how last winter was milder than usual. Mosquito eggs can survive being frozen for a long time, but the shorter the time, the more there are. May God save Canada, if Global Warming proceeds as expected.

All this lovely water is just a wonderful breeding ground for the wee beasties. And the water is lovely to look at, though in general my passage along the Cassiar Highway is a bit like watching a travel documentary on TV. Everything has to be viewed from behind the protection of safety glass.

I moved on. And on. And on. No rest for the wicked.

Finally I stopped at a turnout here, near the Continental Divide. Around 4000 feet, above something inauspiciously called Upper Gnat Lake. It is just cool enough up here to discourage the worst of them. I am thinking of staying until the propane runs out, and then make a dash for Watson Lake.

But wait. According to the map, the road rises again as Hwy 1 goes west from there. Back to the Continental Divide. Maybe I can make it that far before dusk. Dusk doesn't come until midnight just now. Well, almost. I have not yet reached the Land of the Midnight Sun, but I am definitely in the Land of the 11:30 Twilight.

I really need to stop somewhere and lay over until the July dieback. Maybe Skagway. But here along the Cassiar there is no peace. No balm to be had, as in Gilead. Part of the problem may be an excess of imagination. I've been accused of that before. I feel them crawling on my skin even when I see they are not there.

I wonder if there is some way to rig the Northern Lights as a giant bug zapper? Anyone? Anyone? Hello?

Who knows? In years to come there may arise a new Legend of the North, one to rival even Sam McGee. People may whisper stories to their children of "The Flying Texan", condemned by a few bugs and an overwrought imagination to flee ever farther into the newly unfrozen north, with nary a place of succor, nary a place to rest. No land of hope and glory for the addled traveler. Only an unending dogged journey to the Pole.

Come to think of it, though, at least a few people have to survive for such a story to be told. The Predator Clouds do not auger well for that. History has always been a story of struggle, written in blood. Mosquitoes may have their own version of that.

Winners usually do.


Bob

Fort Saint James

Paarens Beach PP
Fort Saint James, BC

I seem to be developing a dangerous talent for driving right past Provincial Parks. I don't mean to. I set out from Juniper Beach, on the Thompson River north of Kamloops, yesterday about noon. I intended to drive perhaps 4 hours.

I drove 10.

By the way, I've already fallen into certain patterns on this trip, and a noon departure is one of them. I find I like my mornings sedentary. I wake up stiff and crabby. My eyes open fully only halfway through the shower. This makes the pre-shower shave something of an adventure. Then I drink several cups of coffee, sitting outside if the bugs allow it, maybe do a little writing, and fry up a late breakfast. Out of respect for the innocent drivers of Canada, I don't actually get on the road until fully human. This happens around noon.

In other words, I behave much as I do at home, minus browsing the newspaper. Out here, Nature is my newspaper. Yesterday it arrived wet.

I stopped off in Chasm, which is where I camped on my first night out of hospital in 2003, after a stent operation in Edmonton. It is still just a muddy flat spot along a cliff, with a pretty view. No enormous fires on the horizon this time round. Unimpressive, but yet it has a place in my heart. So to speak.

The store at 70 mile house has some VERY good home made jerky. Pretty cheap too. Load up.

On and on, through Williams Lake, and Quesnel. The scenery is nice, but monotonous. Most anything gets monotonous, on a long drive day. Around Hixon I stopped for the "famous Hixonburger" and a plate of Poutine. Poutine is a mess of fries covered in white cheese and brown gravy. Very hearty, and more savory than it's name suggests. I started seriously looking for a Provincial Park. And then drove obliviously past 3 of them, and on into Prince George. I never saw a sign.

Prince George is a ghost town after 5 PM. One of those places where they roll up the sidewalks. I stopped in a substantial strip mall to pick up a six pack. It wasn't until leaving the liquor store that I noticed a big sign on a lamp post. It had a lot of small print on it, but the gist was that no one could park in this side of the lot without a permit, by golly, and was liable to be towed away if they tried.

There was an old man out there sweeping the parking lot with a straight broom and a shovel. Let's call him Sisyphus. I asked him about the sign.

"Oh, nobody pays any attention to that. Those guys are just dull knives. There's a property line through here somewhere, and someone thought the pizza place patrons were taking up more than their share of the parking."

"I never heard of a parking permit for a commercial parking lot. Looks like it would run off casual customers. Where would you get a permit, anyway?"

"Nobody really knows," says Sisyphus. "It hasn't come up."

It isn't that there aren't plenty of campgrounds around Prince George. It's just that all of them I saw signs for were commercial campgrounds, and I avoid those. I may have to reconsider that policy. I drove and drove and drove up Hwy 16. The sun got lower and lower. Finally I turned off around 8 PM toward Fort Saint James.

They were resurfacing the road. It took 2 hours to go 50 kilometers or so. I made the mistake of cracking the window an inch. About 853 mosquitoes swarmed in. I wondered why the traffic drudge kept waving that stop sign in front of his face. He just wanted to live out the shift.

I finally got most of the mosquitoes out by lowering both windows during the intermittent 20 mph forward lunges that the construction permitted. Of course that let in all the choking dust. It was a tough choice.

I got into Paarens Beach PP about 10, just as the setting sun was painting the placid surface of Stuart Lake. I batted away the bugs long enough for a picture, then dove into the trailer and spent the next 30 minutes flailing about with the flyswatter. Then I went straight to bed.

I woke this morning to the sound of surf. The sun was up. It was 4:30 am.

There was a nice cool breeze off the water. A beautiful day. No mosquitoes. I expected to see windrows of them in their millions, but somehow they all just snuck off somewhere.

I suspect they or their cousins will be back. Meanwhile, this is my chance for a walk along the beach.


Bob

No Fool Like An Old Fool

"Sumer is i-cumin in -
Lhude sing, cuccu!
Groweth sed and bloweth med
And springth the wude nu.
Sing, cuccu!"

--The Cuckoo Song, popular Country Music ~ 1300 A.D.


Nicola Lake, BC
Sunday morning

There's no fool like an old fool.

If you've been reading here long, you may have grasped that fact. I've been writing songs this spring. It all started because I wanted to encourage Sean to spend time on his music. Graduate school may be good for you, but sometimes it gets to be too much like work to be fun. Ya got to remember to have fun. It's an odd duck that looks back over a long life and says "Gee, I wish I hadn't had so much fun." In the process of encouraging Sean, I discovered I was having fun myself.

Fun is like fruit. The best is fresh and local. But sometimes it travels reasonably well. It's a long way to Alaska. Stuck in the truck all these miles, I've started making up songs to the music I'm listening to. Most of it is not memorable. I've forgotten it already. Every now and then I hit on something I like.

So what's this got to do with you?

Maybe nothing. But sometime in my middle fifties I started to misplace my personal humility. Now it seems to be gone altogether. It may still be around here somewhere, but I can't find it. It first turned up missing about the time I realized that instead of counting up the years, I was beginning to count them down. I was coming face to face with the Great Humility. You know the one. Nothing personal, and it happens to everyone. Much of what you formerly thought serious begins to look foolish in the face of the Great Humility.

But the upside is that when the Great Humility comes to town, most all of the little ones pack up their bags and scoot.

It can be liberating. So what if I take a notion to drive to Alaska? So what if I want to write a few songs? Or an Opera, for that matter? What have I got to lose?

There's no fool like an old fool.

To start with, I decided to write just one song I like, in every genre I can think of. That ought to keep me busy. So far there's been pop, rock, blues, reggae... even rap, for God's sake.

Which brings us to Country. Country is hard.

Oh, it's easy to write badly. Most people do. There's so much of that, it's painful to listen to the radio - a swamp of poor writing, simple-minded and borrowed emotions, witless music. It's like TV. Lots and lots of hours to fill, and no more talent than there ever was. After a bit, you begin to look forward to someone trying to sell you siding.

Country is hard. It's too simple. It's dance music, mostly, usually some variation on a waltz or a two-step. When the music is that simple, only the writing can make it memorable. That's a burden. All the really good rhymes have been taken, dammit. Like drinking and thinking, blue and you, yearning and burning. What's a guy to do?

Well, you can put up. Or shut up. Or go throw rocks in Nicola Lake.

I threw rocks for a while. Country is hard.

Then just when I was contemplating doing something really foolish, like going for a swim, I remembered an RV-related songfest I once got involved in on the newsgroup. There was even talk of a band, before cooler heads prevailed.

Hey, maybe I already wrote a country song. Maybe I can just take a quick rag and a swipe to that thing, if I can find it, and then move right on to the Opera.

What have I got to lose?

Well, there's self respect, of course. But, my God, I haven't seen that stuff since I started counting down the years.

Here y'go, folks. One-two-three, one-two-three, one-two-three. You'll get the hang of it. Remember to have fun.

-------------------------------------------


A Red-Headed Woman


I sat there in the driveway of my neighbor,
Until I got my maps all in a row.
Then I went and threw'em in the dumpster.
Ain't no maps of where I got to go.

She was a red-headed woman. She was a sight to see.
I let a red-headed woman get the best of me.
I'm lookin' out the windshield, hoping for a shiny day.
But I've got a ways to go before I get away.

Sunrise in the desert sure is lonesome.
I didn't get that far, but it's a start.
Maybe I'll stay out here on my own some.
Takes a lot of room to ease a heart.

She was a red-headed woman. She was a sight to see.
I let a red-headed woman get the best of me.
I'm lookin' out the windshield, hoping for a shiny day.
But I've got a ways to go before I get away.

Could be I'll break down along this highway.
Ain't no use in phonin' home the news.
I don't believe she'll ever travel my way.
Or give a durn about broke-down-trailer blues.

She was a red-headed woman. She was a sight to see.
I let a red-headed woman get the best of me.
I'm lookin' out the windshield, hoping for a shiny day.
But I've got a ways to go before I get away.

I may have lost my mind, but saved the trailer,
When I told my baby my goodbyes.
A red-headed woman in the rear-view
Cuts all your troubles down to size.

She was a red-headed woman. She was a sight to see.
I let a red-headed woman get the best of me.
I'm lookin' out the windshield, hoping for a shiny day.
But I've got a ways to go before I get away.



How many chords is that? :o)


Bob,
who thinks Opera is going to take a while. Unless it's Grand. And Old.

Yellow Lake

Yellow Lake
British Columbia

I've discovered a terrific substitute for Saturday morning TV, though it does take up a bit more room. It's called Yellow Lake, and it's outside Keremeos, BC. I'm sitting down close to the water with some coffee and a couple of snickerdoodles, watching the boat ramp through a screen of rushes. There's a little dock there, floating on four blue barrels, "donated by the Penticton Flyfishers".

The first fishermen showed up around 7 am, a couple of young guys in a rustbucket yellow-and-brown Chevy truck. The bow of a beatup aluminum boat stuck out the back. Apparently everything they needed was already in there, because they just dragged the thing off and plopped it into the water. The motor started up on the first pull. They set up a couple of aluminum lawn chairs inside, one in the stern facing forward, one in the bow facing back. In they got and off they went. Not much waste motion with these guys. The whole process took maybe 6 minutes, start to finish.

I suspect they'll catch their limit. Maybe a bit more.

Next up were what appeared to be a father and son. The son was over 50, with a paunch. The old man was one of those dried up wiry guys. Their boat was carried upside down on a small utility trailer. Hanging down from the prow was a little wheel that allowed the youngster to grasp the boat at the stern and roll it easily down into the water, turn it over, and slide it in. They made a slow circle with a trolling motor and put their lines in.

Canadians around here sound a lot like Minnesotans. The same soft voices, the same rising inflection at the ends of sentences, the same family humor. Half-heard stories, told tartly with pointed affection, about a hopelessly absent dumbass brother-in-law. Low laughter, floating across the sunlit water.

These guys came to talk. The fish can bite, if they want.

Mama Duck is out this morning, absent the ducklings. They must be sleeping in. Last evening she was leading a flotilla of 7 tiny floating featherballs. These little guys behaved themselves while entrained behind her, up to a point, but then some kind of signal unmeant for human ears announced Recess. Wahoo. Off they scooted in all directions, leaving little wakes, dipping their bills and picking up what I suppose were insects floating on the water.

A turtle is sunning himself nearby on a half submerged log. He might have been carved from it. Farther down, a small brown bird with little stick legs is goose-stepping around, inspecting and pecking at the soft wood.

Back at the dock, a slim fellow in a floppy hat is also hopping back and forth, from his truck to the boat and trailer, stopping, looking back, picking stuff up, setting it down. Little quick uncertain movements. What did I forget? Where did I put it? Dither, dither, dither. Completely outfitted for Darkest Canada, his progress is impeded by too much of all the right equipment.

I went up and got me a slice of strawberry rhubarb pie.

Yellow Lake is a dead lake in it's natural state. It has no inlet. It is very deep. One fellow told me there's a hole 900 feet deep out there. An expression of local pride, I suppose. The display at the rest area only claims 120 feet. Deep enough. It's a slot canyon filled with water, and not enough wind gets past the mountain to stir up waves and oxygenate the depths. In the old days, over winter, it iced over and most all the fish died.

Now they pump air down to the bottom, in effect turning the thing into a giant aquarium. Fish live through the winter. Fishermen fish.

Imagine that. A lake salvaged, rather than killed, by the actions of men.

I talked briefly with a retired fellow who takes "fatherless boys" fishing part time. He is alone at present, with one of the widest 10 foot boats I've ever seen. Deep V keel, looks almost square. He carries it atop his Suzuki Samurai.

He talked about wintering in "the Valley". He's not speaking about the Rio Grande Valley. He knows about McAllen, says he used to play slow pitch baseball down there. But he means the Valley a few miles downhill from right here. Last week it got up to over a hundred degrees down there.

This is Canada's only desert, supposedly an extension of the Sonoran, cut and somewhat cooled by the Okanagan river. Retired Canadians flock to Penticton and environs. Winters here are like back in Texas, maybe a couple of weeks of snappy weather in January. This is one of the few places in Canada people can be pretty sure they won't eventually freeze their butts off.

Hallelujah.

There's a kid waddling around on the dock right now looking like a miniature orange version of the Michelin Man, stuffed into a tiny life jacket. A duck walks up and gives him the eye. The boy tries to tell Grandpa about the duck, but the old man is grumpy, intent on something in the boat. The duck wanders on, intent on duck business. The moment passes.

Welcome to my first morning in Canada. I love having nothing to do. I think I was born to be retired.


Bob

What's the Matter with Moses Lake?

Diragu State Park
Washington

I had some interesting adventures this morning in Moses Lake, Washington.

Adventure 1:

I stopped at a Les Schwab tire store to get new tires for the trailer. I had gone by in Walla Walla and gotten an estimate of $310 for the 4, but didn't get them installed then because I still hadn't made up my mind. There was a lot of tread left on the old ones. But a couple had been plugged, and I WAS going to Alaska, so after a few days I steeled myself for the expense.

When I asked in Moses Lake, she quoted 60 bucks more. When I told her I already had a quote for less, she said, "Oh, that's for different tires."

"What's the difference?"

"Just a different manufacturer."

"Same size, same weight rating?"

"Yes."

"Do you have them?"

"Yes."

"So why didn't you quote me the cheaper ones to begin with?"

She didn't have an answer for that. So she turned me over to a guy.

He fixed me up for $310. Then I drove around to the back under the big truck bay, as instructed, and told the tire guy I was getting 4 new trailer tires. I pointed to my left front tire.

"That's my best tire. That's the one I want for the spare."

He said okay, and actually wrote "spare" on it with a yellow grease pencil. He directed me to back the trailer up and move a little closer to the door. He watched silently, with an amused look on his face, while I slowly drove over a big tire tool that I couldn't see. It was one of those long spoon ended crowbars, used to separate big truck tires from their rims.

It went clattering across the concrete.

"Why didn't you say something?"

He just shrugged. Then while I sat in the truck and tried unsuccessfully to connect to three different Wifi hotspots that Windows kept insisting were actually available, he proceeded to change out all the tires for new ones.

Including that one I told him I wanted for the spare. Arrrgh.

The result was that he had to change the spare, too. All I had asked was for him to hang the left front tire on the back. Yes, that one he had marked "spare" in big letters.

When I went back up front to pay, the price was only $279.

I didn't even try to argue.


Adventure 2:

I went across the way to the combo Kentucky Fried Chicken/A&W Root Beer, told the girl that I wanted a breast and wing, crispy, and I was going to eat it there. She took my money, turned to speak to someone else, then looked back at me as if she had never seen me before in her life.

"Crispy?"

I told her again.

"That's to go?"

No. Again I repeated myself.

All she had to do at this point was turn around, get two pieces of chicken and a biscuit off the shelf directly behind her, put them on a plate, and hand them to me. Instead, I got into some kind of a queue, behind all the burgers and fries. Minutes went by.

Finally my chicken came up. She handed me a box.

"I wanted a plate."

"Oh, you're eating here?"

I just took the box. Somehow, what I ordered was in there.

I don't know what it is about Moses Lake. But I'm not drinking the water.


Bob

Reggae Rambling

Potholes State Park
Washington

This is a lovely park on the Potholes Reservoir. The campground is laid out in rounds, with sites lined up like the spokes of a wheel. Surrounding each wheel is a thin stately wall of 90 foot poplars, planted 3 feet apart. Manicured lawn. Lots of shade. There's nothing wild about this place.

Looks like the estate of a Roman Emperor. Very peaceful. Hardly anyone here. Everybody's probably down at the Coliseum, feeding Christians to the lions.

Okay, let's face it.

After a long day or so, driving is boring. Thank God for satellite radio. I've been listening to a lot of the Reggae channel. It was bound to happen. I mean, how much public radio can you stand? Anyway, that happy beat has gotten into my bones, and as the miles slid by I began to hear odd lyrics in my inner ear. Lyrics that had nothing to do (I think) with those being sung.

Finally this morning I wrote them down.

So here's a retired redneck fireman's version of a reggae song. Maybe you just had to be here. It has ended up as a sort of courting song, after several wrong turns. Hope you like it.

If possible, read it with any regular reggae beat turned down low in the background. If one is not available, well... that does not bear thinking about. If you begin to tap your feet, well, bless you.

My understanding of the "I and I" in Rastafarian lingo is that it refers to the two parts of a man. Body and soul. I'm sure someone will correct me if I'm wrong.

I won't typecast a charming accent by trying to consistently cast it into type. Mon. But I've given a hint of it, and it certainly belongs in there.

What the hay. It sure beats "99 bottles of beer on the wall". Err...well, I think so, anyway.


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Without My Woman


If she don't love me
How can I-n-I be One?
Wit'out my Woman
How can I-n-I be One?


Woman she show me the shoulder.
Woman she show me the back of her head.
Now me bed is gettin' colder.
Was it sometin' that I said?


If she don't love me
How can I-n-I be One?
Wit'out my Woman
How can I-n-I be One?


God give a man two kinds of love.
He say "Let's see what you make of this, Mon."
(Ho, ho, ho) --
That woman she want a man take an oath
To give her both.
(Ho, ho, ho) -
To give her all of them both.


But if she don't love me
How can I-n-I be One?
Wit'out my Woman
How can I-n-I be One?


Sometime God want to give a man hope,
He just shove him a little more rope.
Woman she do the same.
Woman she play the game.


But if she don't love me
How can I-n-I be One?
Wit'out my Woman
How can I-n-I be One?


Woman, do you think I'm crazy?
Woman, do you think I want to be alone?
Woman, won't you amaze me?
Woman, won't you make I-n-I One?


If she don't love me
How can I-n-I be One?
Wit'out my Woman
How can I-n-I be One?

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Bad Bob, making the miles go by.