Driving through the lush forests of Washington and Oregon the last couple days has been great. But fairly often I'd drive by a section where the forest had been completely razed, like an open scar on the side of the mountain. The hippie chick the lives in my head was deeply offended by this. "That's terrible! Raping Mother Earth like that!" Then the semi-pretentious glasses-wearing intellectual guy that also lives in my head pointed out "You like furniture don't you, chump? Where do you think we get it?"* And he was right. I like furniture.Without it we'd all just sit around on the floor.
*For those that missed it, this was a reference to Herman's Head. It is significant in that it is the first Herman's Head reference made on the entire internet since April 2007.
Half Man! Half Alligator!
Yesterday I visited the "quaint" touristy town of Port Townsend. Today I visited a different type of touristy town, the "tacky" variety. Both types are identified by a preponderance of shops. The difference is the type of shop. Quaint means jewelry stores, galleries, antiques and a candy shoppe. Tacky means T-Shirts stand, souvenirs made of seashells with googly eyes glued on and fudge shops (no "-pe" at the end).
Long Beach, Washington definitely falls into the latter category. Don't get me wrong, tacky is great. Without it there'd be no such place as Marsh's Free Museum, home of Jake the Alligator Man (Half Man! Half Gator!). Really it's a gimmick to get people into a very crowded souvenir store, with oddities and antique game throughout to add some attraction. It reminded me of Fort Cody, the one place we somehow could get my father to stop on family trips to and from Denver. Now that I think back, I have no idea how we got him to stop... I think he was amused by the guy hanging over the entrance that had been shot in the ass with an arrow.
Maybe I Should Check Ancestry.com
My mother (whose maiden name is Clark) claims we are related to the Clark of Lewis & Clark. Says her aunt Katir told her that so it must be true. Me, I don't believe it. Maybe if it was Lewis & Milik (a far less common last name) I'd buy it as a possibility. But Clark? That would be like anyone with the last name Adams believing they were related to John Adams. Or anybody with the last name Jefferson thinking they were the heir apparent to a chain of east coast dry cleaning stores. Relative or not, I stopped by the Lewis & Clark National Park, commemorating the spot the two intrepid explorers arrived on the west coast in 1806, singing guide raccoon in tow. I might be confusing certain elements with Disney's Pocahontas...
Never Say Die!
Few movies hold as special a place in the collective pop-cultural subconscious of my generation as does The Goonies. The ultimate kids finding adventure in their own backyard story. And today, I got to see the house where the whole adventure began! Plus the the rocks One Eyed Willie's pirate ship sailed by at the end of the movie. Judging by the steady stream of people walking up the street and drive to the house perched high atop a hill in Astoria, Oregon the movie is still as popular now as it ever was. Not bad for a movie nearly 30 years old. Yes. Nearly 30 years old. That makes you old.
1 comment:
sorry to report that too much of the 'rape of the land' by foresters in the PNW means that the wood has been harvested and shipped to Asia -- probably for cooking fires, or building there.
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