After a day of wrestling with a trailer and road construction on I-5 I arrived in Portland to pick up Aren and meet a geologist friend of his family’s.  Portland is full of hipsters and their Safeways are terrible!

We go to Safeway to pick up some wine for his friends and some toothpaste and brush for me (because that is the only thing I forgot to pack… believe me I managed to get everything else I own into that truck!), to find that only one checkstand is open leaving huuuuuuge lines for the self check lane–the worst inventions of all time!

There we are, with four items: toothpaste, toothbrush,  wine, and hair bands for Aren’s flowing locks.  Twenty minutes later the same hipster who rode to the grocery store on his fixed-gear is still trying to find the code for his organic avocado and the other remaining fifty single items from the produce department.  Self checkout stands work just about as well as self checkin stands at the airport.  We all know the glorious time saving device that has become.  “Why didn’t it print out my baggage ticket?  I just paid this damned machine $45 for a baggage ticket!

“Just give your card to me, ma’am, and I’ll check your bag.”

“Hell no!  I was just charged $45 bucks to check a bag and now you want to charge me again!”

“No I won’t, ma’am.”

You get charged again.

Why didn’t they just have the person behind the counter do it the first time?  Because they want to make sure you’re good a pissed off before you board.  That way they can send you to Guantanamo for finally losing it mid flight.

After pulling teeth in line at Safeway, Aren and I headed off to Paul and Maureen’s home for some pasta and petting dogs and cats.  They are some cool people.  We talked story and tried to get my trailer stuck in their driveway.  It was a good night.

In just a couple more days I’ll start talking about the rocks we find; but not until we go to my friends’ wedding in Sonoma.

I made Aren an account here, maybe he’ll post something.  He’s a better writer than I am anyway.