When it started to get cold, it didn’t seem like a problem. When I was slipping and sliding on ice on the way to morning practice on Tuesday, things were starting to not look good. When they were requiring chains on 26 over the pass, it was looking worse. But on Wednesday we packed up and headed out via Tillamook, and two and a half slow hours later (Tim drove the van, Josh drove the expedition) we were turning up the heat at the little house.
Wow, does that entry floor get cold in winter, and those heaters that warm the rooms up so quickly in summer take quite some time longer when it’s below freezing outside. We got unpacked and hung out for a while and then headed to Wayfarer for dinner. Our last couple trips to Wayfarer had been disappointing, so this one was less so – when your expectations are low, it’s hard to be disappointed. On the plus side, the plating was better than last time. On the other hand, the quality of the food was just disappointing – Carnival Cruise level food, which seems a little low for the prices they’re charging. On the other hand the boys enjoyed the food and it was fun to be there as a family.
Back at the house it was game time, of course. Josh requested pepper, which I had mixed feelings about because I pretty much never win at pepper, and if you’re not going to win what is the point of playing? We played several rounds and everybody else won and some people even won twice, which is just what I expected except that in one game Josh tried to win by giving me his last card, the blue 6, and I was able to play my last card back at him, the blue 5, making him a loser and winning my only game of the night. It was so totally excellent that I had to get up and do the dance of joy.
Did I mention we brought sissy firestarters and lighters (and they had matches), so much to Tim’s disappointment we did not have to use the toaster to light the fire. But we did forget one thing, unfortunately – the turkey. We were able to get a very nice minimally processed one at the Mariner Market, coming to our rescue for the first of two times.
Thanksgiving day started slow and stayed slow – perfect. We woke the boys up in time to go to Pig’n’Pancake for brunch – well, it was only brunch because they hadn’t had any breakfast. It was lunch by the clock. After lunch it was time for more relaxing, which came to an abrupt end when Dave discovered that there is no salt at the little house. Pepper, sugar, herbs, spices… but no salt. So off I went to the Mariner, and once again it had what we needed – a big box of kosher salt. After the turkey was safely in the oven, Dave and I went out for two more geocaches – the one at the cannon that we hadn’t been able to find last summer, and new one near the Rock With The Hole in It. Yay for geocaching! The weather, which was much warmer but highly variable, was absolutely gorgeous so we went for a short walk on the beach. The most interesting thing we saw were some variations on stairs from the beach – one house had the last section cantilevered, so it could be raised like a drawbridge to avoid riff-raff. Another favorite was a house where the lower section had probably been washed away and had been replaced by a rope tied to the upper section to help you pull yourself up to it.
After a while we went back to the house which now smelt delightfully of turkey, and Dave finished the dinner while I tried to make more counter space. Oddly, the trailer has more counter space than the house, but we made it work by bringing in the round folding table from the living room. Dinner was wonderful – I really enjoyed having dark meat (we usually just have white meat in the trailer) and Dave had made real mashed potatoes on Tuesday night which reheated very well.
After dinner I plugged into the tunes on my phone and did dishes for just ages. It was very relaxing. Once I was done with dinner it was time to go to our bedroom where the TV is and watch Punkin’ Chunkin’ on Discovery Channel. If you’ve not watched this, you won’t be able to understand how we watched pumpkins flying through the air for two hours and were ready for more. If you have, you’ll understand why Tim wants an air cannon and Dave wants a trebuchet.
