Road Call '08 (back tracking)

We had lost some film a while back and recently recovered it. What great fun to develop these shots taken during out March 2007 trip from MA to Oregon.

1. Wall Drug Jack-a-lope
2. SD rest area
3. Portland OR's world famous Voodoo Donuts

The Road

We drove down to Grants Pass last night after Spanish class. It got dark early, but we got to see a stupendous sunset on the western side of the highway,and some remarkable fog between the mountains on the eastern side. I realized that my limit for living without massive travel has been reached. I've not been on a long distance adventure since March 2007... apparently just shy of two years is my limit. I see a pattern.

I came home from extended roadtripping in late 1999

January 2001 I went to California for a few weeks (via bus)

January 2003 I went to Nebraska (plane)

April 2003 went from NE to IL for a few weeks (train)

May 2003 went from NE to MA for a few weeks (bus)

October 2003 Nebraska to MA (train)

March 2006 (phew it was a long wait) I went to Oregon for a few weeks (via plane)

May 2006 went to Oregon for a month (plane/bus adventure)

August 2006 went to Oregon for a few weeks (bus)

Sept 2006 drove from Oregon to Mass

March 2007 drove from Mass to Oregon.... waiting....waiting...

I need an adventure. Or a life which pays me to have wild adventures....hmmm

By Land and By Sea

 We're back in Corvallis. The ceremony went well, and we enjoyed a few days of sea shell hunting, and thimbleberry eating. 

No books were read. No films watched.

We did however spend a good long time considering the frequency of vehicle references in Cake lyrics.

Another Apex

Well, in spite of all of the other more pressing things I need to get done over the next few days I decided to spend the last five hours finishing my eighth Wharton novel. Although I can see why so many critics think it is "her most sentimental" I am not sure that I completely agree. While there is a romantic happy ending that verges on sappy there are elements in the language that complicate the "sentimental" reading. For example, the last glimpse of the moon, the last line of the novel, is: "a few drops were already falling, the moon, labouring upward, swam into a space of sky, cast her troubled glory on them, and was again hidden". How this should be read is perplexing. 

For my thesis purposes this text might work nicely. It is another novel where water is a significant presence. Ironically it also has characters who hail from Apex City, which is the fictional birthplace of the Spragg fortune in The Custom of the Country. The presence of water in this text however is not strictly as a commodity but is valued more for its aesthetic beauty and emotional associations. I am not sure if this is something I want to really get into, although it is a fact that people in the business of managing natural resources now take aesthetic value very seriously in their planning. 

I suppose now I need to consider what to read next. The search is on.

In the meantime I have to revamp my Eco-Historical Reconstruction proposal for my Columbia Basin class. This is most trying since I feel as though resources are limited and instruction sorely lacking. Oh well. That is due by tomorrow night. I also have  six page paper that is due on Monday. Fortunately six pages is not all that daunting, and I have a good plan for what to write. The real wrench in the works is the fact that I have every intention of spending this weekend in Bastendorff  with Bird and confirming our handfasting vows at the ocean's edge. I suppose that means I should be writing and not blogging.