July 9, 2003

I am so exhausted I almost just went to bed at 8 p.m. instead of writing this.

Last weekend, Jen and I decided to take a road trip up to Portland. We both had a long weekend off of work, we'd both never been there, so it seemed like a good idea, even when I discovered that it was a 10-hour drive and that Jen didn't know how to drive stick, meaning that I would be doing all the driving. Then, K. and Matt decided to come along, too, but in their own car.

It was a long trip, but I'm glad we decided to drive. I'd never been north of Sacramento before, and the variety of landscapes along I-5 was pretty amazing. Lots of flat, dry land. Lots of cows. Lots of mountains. And when we got to Oregon, lots of trees. Plus, Jen and I had plenty of time to talk about important and deep subjects such as "stupid things men have said to us in bed."

We got into Portland at around 8 p.m. on the 4th. We settled at the hotel, grabbed a bite to eat, and then walked toward the waterfront in search of fireworks. Our first impression was that Portland was tiny and quaint and full of trees and attractive people--an impression which was pretty well borne out by the rest of the weekend. We arrived at the waterfront park just as the fireworks were beginning, and just as the park's sprinkler system was automatically turned on, causing a flurry of shrieking and running for cover. It immediately became clear that there were not enough dry spots to accommodate all the people who were in the park, so some people took it upon themselves to block the sprinklers with their feet. This worked pretty well, except when the people would decide that they were tired of getting their feet wet or that they wanted to dowse that group of girls with the tight t-shirts. At the same time, people in the crowd were also setting off amateur fireworks. Between the fireworks overhead and the water and fireworks going off all around us it was a nearly overwhelming sensory experience. But it was fun and kind of exciting, too.

The rest of the weekend was spent hanging out with K. and Matt, seeing the world's smallest park, the Saturday Market, the Hawthorne district, and of course, shopping at Powell's. Oh my god! We went to three different Powell's locations, spending hours at a time there on every visit, and each of us came home with a giant bag of books. I'm definitely going back again if only for Powell's. I've torn through two of my new books and I miss it already.

Then, on the way home, we stopped at the world-famous Oregon Vortex. The Vortex is a hub of electromagnetic force, which apparently scares away most mammals and causes weird optical illusions and "light anomalies." I blame these light anomalies for the fact that the picture I took of Jen there was so unflattering she made me delete it and in the one she took of me, I look cross-eyed. I am not actually cross-eyed, even after driving for unrelenting long stretches.

We got home on Monday night, and most of my time since then has been spent catching up on all the work I missed over the weekend. So now, I am tired and I reek of mouse. And I really am going to go to bed.