The world will pardon my mush

I've got a crush on you, sweetie pie
All the day and night-time hear me sigh
I never had the least notion that
I could fall with so much emotion

Could you coo, could you care
For a cunning cottage we could share
The world will pardon my mush
cause I have got a crush, my baby, on you

--George Gershwin

NOTE PLEASE: Clicking on any photograph will open a full-screen version of that photo in a separate window. The pictures of the white Saab and of the Mustang are not full-screen.

OK, it's been two whole months plus a few days since I've posted anything here, and some people are getting worried. I got this e-mail from one of my dearest friends (you know you are, auntietoast), and that got me thinking.

E-mail post in full: OK,where are you? It's not good to disappear for months at a time you know!:-)

Yeah, I know. But after learning of Gary's death, I guess I just went even deeper into depression than normal. Normal for me, that is. That plus our financial situation has really been dragging me down, but yesterday the sun was out, the sky was blue, the temperature climbed almost to 70, and the top went down on the convertible. What can I say.

This morning the sun is out, the sky is blue, it's supposed to be another nice day, and I woke up singing--first time in a long time that that's happened. What was I singing? Gershwin, of course. "I've got a crush on you."

It's hard, nigh on impossible, to stay depressed when the sun is out and the top is down. Ah, convertibles. The automotive love of my life. I've owned one or another convertible non-stop since 1980. That's when I bought the first one, a 1976 Triumph Spitfire. I still own it. It needs a complete ground up rebuild at this point, and to date I've put three times as much money into maintaining the thing as it cost me to buy it, but it's a family member now. How could I possible get rid of it?

1976 Triumph Spitfire
Badly in need of restoration
But the pizzazz is still there!

Triumph Spitfire Story: Driving in the UM Homecoming parade with a contingent of British Car Club members, I turned off Higgins onto University Avenue and headed up fraternity row toward campus. A female friend of mine, seeing me approach, ran out into the street and jumped over the side into my car--not bothering to open the door. On the next block, three different frat boys offered to trade me their pickup trucks for my chick magnet. True story.

I have to get the Spit rebuilt. I love that car, even if I have known it to literally spit fire out its tailpipe.

In the mid 1990s, one sunny March day (much like today--coming after a long, grey, cold winter), I saw two Saab convertibles sitting nose to nose with their tops down on a neighborhood used car lot. Thinking, what the hell, why not test drive one of those things, I pulled into the lot. Now understand, I've always been one of those folk who thought that Saabs were the car for people who don't like cars and I love cars, so..... But since it was sunny and Sunday (oops, that's a different song, and it wasn't Sunday), I took one of the two--the white one--out for a drive. Once back at the lot, I called my best friend and asked him to come down and talk me out of buying the beast. As he also likes cars, he told me that he was the wrong one to ask. Nevertheless, he met me at the lot, we went out for a spin and what can I say, I ended up buying the 1988 Saab 900 turbo convertible. Burgundy leather upholstery, pure white body, and all the fun Saab oddities--you have to have the transmission in reverse to take the key out--the key, which by the way is between the seats, not on the dashboard or steering column, the engine that sits under the hood backward, the fact that no other car in the world will ever be confused with a Saab. Oh yeah, I was in love.

Saab Story #1: One December night, after thirty-six hours of insomnia, I went to bed around 8:30 and died. I was awakened by my dogs jumping up and down on my chest yelling (in their doggie voices) "Someone's at the door, daddy! Someone's at the door." It was 12:30 a.m., mid-December. I threw on my robe, but didn't even bother with slippers and headed downstairs. Sure enough, there was a cute young man (19 or so) standing at the back door, with his hand bleeding all over my porch. "Do you know who owns the Explorer that I just destroyed?" he asked. "Yes, that's my Explorer," I answered. I later learned that the crash woke all my neighbors, but I was too deep in sleep to even hear it. Following the young man outside, still barefoot and still December midnight, I saw what he was too drunk to have seen. He not only totalled his daddy's pickup by slamming it into the driver's side rear fender of my Explorer, also totalling it, but he hit the SUV with enough force that he moved it six feet sideways and 10 feet forward, pushing it into the trunk of my Saab--totalling it as well. When I pointed this out to him, he sighed "I'm gonna be making license plates for a long time."

1988 Saab 900 Turbo
Taken at the I-90 Rest Area
near Superior, Montana
Before it was totalled!

In a tribute to the way Saabs are built, the guys at Evergreen Engineering (our late, lamented Saab repair shop) bought my totalled baby, and rebuilt it. A colleague here at UM bought it and is still driving it happily today.

Shortly after Gary moved to Montana to live with me in 1999, we were over in Spokane. We had been looking, half-heartedly, for a car for Gary, and driving north on Division, we spotted one. "What's that?" Gary asked. "It's a Triumph TR-7," I answered. "You don't want it." But still, how could a test drive hurt? Long story short, the TR-7 is now parked behind the house waiting for summer and a few extra bucks. Did Gary drive it much? No. Shortly after buying it, he took off one day while I was at work and drove west on I-90 to St. Regis (75 miles), east on Montana 135 to Paradise (I'm not making this up) (25 miles), further east on Montana 200 to Ravalli (40 miles), south on US 93 to Arlee (10 miles) where he stopped and called me at work. The car had white smoke billowing out from under the hood. What should he do? "Stay put," I said. "I'll come get you." But no, he decided to drive it on home (another 35 miles or so.) That was the last he drove it. Now I've driven it a bit, even taking it on one 300 mile loop (with the top down, of course), and I've never had white smoke billow up from the engine compartment. It's an interesting car, and I like it ok--with its wedge shape, its hidden headlights, and the fact that it's the ONLY TR-7 convertible I've ever seen. I'm not in love with it, but I just can't quite bring myself to sell it.

1980 Triumph TR-7
Boy is this car in need of a good cleanup

Oh and by the way, Triumphs are well named. It's a Triumph if you can keep it running. I now understand why British men spend their weekends working on their cars. You have to if you expect them to get you to work during the week.

What did Gary end up driving? A 1994 bright red Mustang convertible with a white top. Sixteen years old and that car still turns heads.

1994 Mustang Convertible
Taken at Skalkaho Falls, near Hamilton Montana
That's Gary at the driver's side door,
and our friend Pat Walton in the white shorts.

Having lost the '88 Saab, and not feeling comfortable about relying on my Triumphs, something had to give. I had to have a reliable convertible in my life. Wouldn't you know it, the same used car dealer where I bought the original Saab (and Gary's Mustang, for that matter), had a 1996 Saab 900S convertible on the lot. After taking it for a test drive, and after having Doug at Evergreen check it out, I added the baby blue beauty to my stable. That's the car I drove yesterday with the top down. I've had it several years now. It's a great car to drive the Oregon Coast. Standard 5-speed transmission, baby blue body with a dark blue top. Built in boot which covers the top when I have it stowed in the trunk. It's the most beautiful car I've ever owned.

Saab Story #2: First time I took the car in for Doug to service, he entered it into his Saab computer system. Turning back to me he said, "Saab doesn't know this car is in the US." Hmmm. Turns out the car was purchased originally in Germany. Guess that's why I have a key fob that reads "SAAB International and Diplomat Sales."

What's down the road? I don't know. Every now and then a pretty car catches my eye, but truth be told, maybe I'm growing up. I like the cars I have. I like them better than anything else I see on the road, on the lots, or in the ads. I do have a dream, of course. I'd like to fly to Sweden and pick up my new convertible. Drive it south to Copenhagen, then on to Berlin, Prague, Vienna and Budapest. I'll have it shipped home and pick it up in Seattle. What will it be? Well I like the convertible hardtop Volvo C70, and I like the Saab 9-3 Aero, but GM is cutting Saab loose, and the Swedish government has said "No bailout." Oh well, I don't have any money for a new car now anyway. Guess I'll just have to dream a bit longer.

Didn't I say that my Saab is the most beautiful car I've ever owned?

1996 Saab 900S
Taken on I-5 near Weed, California
Mount Shasta in the background

Snakes and the Snake: From Kennewick home to Missoula

Southeastern Washington State
Touchet River
Taken June 19th, 2007

When last I wrote, nearly a month ago, I left you in Kennewick, Washington, on my way home to Missoula. By now you’re probably wondering if I ever made it home. Well, indeed I did, and back again as well. Today’s column will tell about the drive along the Snake and Lochsa Rivers, moving across eastern Washington and the Idaho panhandle.

I started out by doing my homework. That is, I went online to geocaching.com and found a series of caches that stretched from right across the street from my motel all the way into central Idaho. What fun. As soon as I got up, I headed across the street and found the first cache with no problem whatsoever, hidden in the parking lot of the local Walgreen’s Pharmacy. Now that I know the trick about hiding things on light poles, I am fairly confident when faced with this kind of challenge.

After packing up the Saab, I headed out for cache number 2, still in Kennewick, and actually moving away from my home-bound direction. Had I arrived last night by my usual route, I would have had to backtrack to find this particular cache. Or rather, I should say look for this particular cache because in truth, I never found it.

Relying on my trusty Garmin eTrex Legend GPS receiver, I parked across the street from a large park with a creek flowing through the middle. The creek has cut a canyon that is quite deep, and I found myself going down a very steep slope, on loose rock, until I ended up at the bottom where there was a labyrinth of trails leading through the brush. The GPS receiver kept telling me I was getting closer, but I never got quite close enough until I climbed back up the slope, crossed the bridge, and descended on the far side of the creek.

At that point, I was able to get to the exact co-ordinates listed on geocaching.com, but all I found was a hole the size and shape of an ammo can. This I found by crawling into the underbrush. When I finally gave up and crawled back out, I found myself at the feet of a young couple who were jogging through the park. They didn’t ask, and I didn’t tell what I had been doing in the bushes.

Back in the car and out of town, I stopped at a historical marker near the confluence of the Snake and Columbia Rivers. Ainsworth was a town, once upon a time, but now it’s just a sign along the highway. The cache took a while, but eventually I found it, logged it, and moved on.

Turning off US 12, I headed east on Washington 124, stopping first at Hood Park where I found two more caches. The park itself was beautiful and had a lovely campground, swimming pool, hiking trails, and beachfront on the Snake River’s Lake Wallula. Next time I go through the Tri-Cities during camping season, I’ll stay there instead of in a motel.

I’ve said that I followed the Snake River, but that’s only true in a very general sense. Washington State Highway 124 actually follows the Touchet River across Walla Walla County until it ends in Waitsburg where it meets US 12. Touchet River made me think of my old friend Dave Touchette. If anyone has heard from or of Dave recently, how about letting me know.

Road to Historic Prescott Cemetery
Note the Road Hazard
Taken June 19th, 2007

Between Hood Park and Prescott, I found a cache on the old, abandoned railbed, and two more just outside of Prescott. The second of these finds was hidden in the old cemetery which was a very peaceful place to stroll, take pictures, and find a hidden bit of treasure. The main reason I’m involved in geocaching is the way the game introduces the players to new places and lets you see places you’re already familiar with in a new light. As an example, I’ve been coming to Del Norte County on a regular basis since 1973 when my parents moved here. It wasn’t until I started geocaching that I found the bison herd and the Indian cemetery that are both within 5 miles of my parents’ home.

East of Waitsburg, and now on US 12, I found three more caches along the Touchet River, including one where I’m sure I was tempting fate and snakes, and two more where I trudged through grass and weeds that were almost as tall as I am, and I’m 6’6”, for those of you who don’t know me personally. By now I had filled my socks, my hiking boots, my moccasins, and my New Balance sneakers with various sorts of burrs, cheat grass, and other weeds. I did ask myself about the wisdom of traipsing off through thick, high grass where I couldn’t see what I was stepping on, but when in the midst of a game, we do unreasonable things. Besides, what’s life without a little risk taking?

What should have been the easiest find of the day turned out to be my second miss. A veteran geocacher had hid an ammo can along his own driveway and spread the word that game players were not to worry about wandering up his drive. He even told us that our GPS units might have trouble because of the overhead power lines. But try as I might, I just couldn’t find where in his driveway he had hidden the thing. Boy did I feel stupid.

Dayton, Washington, is a pretty little farm town that straddles US 12. The county seat of Columbia County, Dayton had a population of 2655 in the 2000 Census. The town doesn’t look like it has grown (or, for that matter, shrunk) much since then. There was a geocache hidden right off Main Street, and I took it as a challenge to find it without alerting the locals to what I was doing. I succeeded too. Leaving the Saab parked in the shade, I enjoyed a huckleberry shake at a local antique/hardware/ice cream shop…just the sort of place to entice tourists to spend their money locally.

While in Dayton I took advantage of the local history to photograph the old Dayton railroad station and the Columbia County Court House. Both are fine examples of a bygone day’s architecture.

At the wide spot in the road known as Tucannon, I had my third experience today of not finding a cache. Turns out that someone had felled a tree across the cache and as people had reported seeing snakes in the area, I wasn’t terribly keen on crawling around under dead branches. I did manage to stain my jeans green from the weeds growing in the area, and also almost fell into a creek as I couldn’t see where I was walking. But I did get some lovely photos and that’s why we do it, isn’t it.

At the point where Washington 261 meets US 12, that is about midway between Starbuck and Dodge according to my map, I was the second person to find a newly hidden cache right alongside US 12. The cache site was named “Delaney” both for the grain elevator across the road and for the pioneer settler in the area named Berton Delaney. I’ve never before been second to find a cache, so that in itself was exciting.

Just past Dodge, I took a brief sidetrip up Washington 127 to find a cache that is part of the Washington Delorme Challenge. Don’t ask me, I don’t know, but I’m assuming that somehow the Delorme map people have found a way to capitalize on the geocaching game. This particular cache was the stated cache for Garfield County, and locating it under a rather large sagebrush allowed me a view of the surrounding farmland. Beautiful area with great patterns in the landscape. I’ve driven US 12 across southeastern Washington before, but the drive was always one where I thought constantly about how slow going the trip cross this rugged country is. This trip took even more time as I was stopping every few miles to seek out caches. Somehow the trip was much more fascinating because of the extra time I was taking getting to know the area.

A few miles further east and I stopped at the Pataha Pioneer Cemetery. This cache had been damaged, and of course, once I found my way to the top of the rise where the cache was hidden, I discovered that I did not have a pen in my pocket. Grabbing the cache, I walked back to the car, filled in the log, tried to repair the cache, then returned it to its hiding place. Got some pics of the old tombstones in this small, historic graveyard. It made me wonder what my own family cemetery back in West Virginia looks like. I’ll be finding out soon enough, if my plans don’t change.

Garfield County (Washington) Court House
Pomeroy Washington
Taken June 19th, 2007

Pomeroy, Washington is the county seat of Garfield County. Again I took pictures of the historic Court House, and stopped on the eastern edge of the town to take some pictures of the art work on display along the highway. These metal sculptures are what is termed a “virtual cache” in that no actual container has been hidden. The purpose is to get the game player to stop and see some item of interest, then answer some questions in an email to the person responsible for the cache. In this case, the cache was a series of very strange animals sculpted out of found objects. Great fun, and I’m glad that geocaching got me out of the Saab one more time.

Nearing the Asotin County line, I stopped at the rest area at Alpowa Summit. This rise is almost 2800 feet and offers a good view of the surrounding countryside. The big fear of looking for caches is that someone who is not a geocacher will see you and get the wrong idea about what you’re doing. These people are called, Harry Potter style, “Muggles.” At Alpowa Summit there was a whole family of muggles next to me. I found the cache just the same as the family was so engrossed in making sure their numerous offspring stayed off the highway and out of the restrooms (or in the restrooms if appropriate) that they paid absolutely no attention to me. I’ve found that at 6’6” and 200+ pounds, it’s almost impossible for me to be inconspicuous, so I just go ahead barging through life as if I know what I’m doing, and very few people pay me any mind. This was my seventeenth find of the day—a remarkable achievement in my book, but one that really slowed down my progress eastward.

At the aptly named “Bridge to Nowhere” I found my eighteenth and final cache of the day. Not much to report on this site, but the old bridge was a fascinating thing to find and explore. Just before reaching the Snake River near Clarkston, I tried for a cache called “Dogs of War.” I started on the wrong side of the road, exploring another abandonned bridge, but getting no nearer the cache. Back in the car, back up the road and down a drive on the north side of US12 into a parking area where I scared out some young toughs. As they drove off, I headed into the brush wondering if this would be the place I met a snake. So close to the Snake River, it would have been appropriate. Some of the people looking for this cache had reported ant hills, and I did find an ant hill right where my GPS receiver said the cache should be. Never found the cache though, but I note that everyone who has logged in since I did apparently had no trouble with this one. All I can say is that it had been a very long day since I left Kennewick. My neck was on fire as I’d had the top down on the Saab most of the way, and I was still at least five hours from home. Giving up on this cache, I climbed back in the Saab, drove through Clarkston, crossed into Idaho and Lewiston, and continued east on US 12.

Moon visible over the Lochsa River
You may want to enlarge this (click on the pic) to see the moon
June 19th, 2007

I love the drive between Missoula and Lewiston, and this trip was no exception. Filled the tank in Lewiston, stopped along the Lochsa to eat some of the food I had stashed in the car, and crossed the state line into Montana after dark. Around 11 p.m. Mountain Time, I pulled up to the Stoddard Street house, three days after I had left Smith River. That’s the longest I’ve ever stretched a trip out. It was good to be home with Gary, Faylene, Rocky, Minnie, Gypsy who had been staying with her siblings since April, and Princess the cat.