Tim's Birthday

Well, I wouldn’t normally blog on a departure day, but today was far from normal. For one thing, it was Tim’s 18^th birthday. We got to wish him a happy birthday last night just after midnight, and this morning I went in to Cannon Beach for yoga and got him a birthday donut. So he had a happy birthday morning. Yoga was very good, it was with Christen, the teacher I like. I find her easier to follow, and I like the flows she does. Her yoga is much more athletic than Claire’s – I worked up a little heat during class which I liked. She also talked about using ease, rather than force, to get the body where you want it to go. My focus for Nia lately has been just that – dynamic ease – and I liked the way she talked about it. I tried working that in and it really helped. So that was good.

When I got back to the house everyone was up and moving. Tim was even up, and very pleased to get a donut. We had a very, very leisurely packing up time because we didn’t need to be out until 2, although we ended up heading out around 11. When I woke up it was still very foggy, but it had been clearing up all day and by the time we got to town it was a beautiful, if chilly, day. We ate lunch at pizza a’fetta, a place we went to once a long time ago and did something so embarrassing we haven’t been back (we didn’t realize there was a 40 minute or so wait for tables, saw an empty one, sat down and ordered before we found out about the line). Fortunately no one there remembered us, so we had a very enjoyable time and also I absolutely loved the pizza. It reminded me of the pizza of my high school years – chewy, stringy, flavorful  cheese and a nice sheen of oil on top (in the best way possible).  After lunch we did have a fairly big disappointment – Osborne’s was closed. We don’t know why. So the 4 adults decided to go drown our sorrows at Bruce’s candy kitchen, and Tim headed home. We felt confident that he could find his was there in the daylight.

After Bruce’s we walked down to the Local Scoop to get ice cream. It’s Tillamook ice cream - not as good as Osborne’s, but it was a fine substitute. We sat on a bench outside in the sun and ate our ice cream and chatted. It was a very ice end to the weekend. We went to the parking lot, hugged goodbye, and headed home. Dave and I were commenting as we drove what a nice weekend it had been and looking forward to seeing Tim at home and going out for birthday dinner. We were on 26 about 11 miles in when we saw a green Subaru by the side of the road. Dave said, “Is that Tim’s car?” and it was. But Tim was not in it or near it. And we had no cell signal at all. I did not need my fancy pulse monitor to know how fast my heart was beating – I could feel it trying to pound its way out of my chest.

We stood around for a little while wondering what to do. Not long after, Ben and Joan pulled up. We decided we’d each pick a direction and drive a couple miles to see if maybe he had tried to walk to somewhere where there was cell signal. We went east, and after several miles there was no sign of him. But we did get to where there was cell signal, and there was a voice mail and a text message from him. His car, which had been overheating last night, had completely died, and he had hitchhiked back into Cannon Beach thinking we might still be there.  So we called him and told him to stay put, then went back and got him. It was very, very good to see him. On the way back Ben and Joan were waiting with his car, so we told them what had happened and sent them on their way.

It had stopped steaming by the time we got there.

By the time we got to Tim he had called AAA and they were on the way to get the car. We drove back out and Larry was already there, so Tim filled in the paperwork and we headed home. Yes, it was a little squishy in the back with the shoe basket, but I didn’t mind. We got home at 3:40 and are planning a big birthday dinner of sewer and chocolate cake.

And that is the end of the story.

The day before Tim's birthday

The fog that rolled in last night unfortunately decided not to roll back out, so even though when I woke up my phone said it was sunny in Arch Cape it wasn’t really. Eventually everybody else got up and we went to the Pig’n for an early brunch. As we knew it would be, it was a little tricky eating at the Pig’n since we couldn’t just order everything that looked good and let Tim finish it all off.  We did pretty well, although Ben left a couple pecan pancakes and about half his hash browns. We were talking about a radio show that Dave had heard about memories, and about how the memories we examine the most often tend to actually be the least reliable. So we’re trying an experiment here. I’ve said what happened with the hash browns, but we’re going to try to replace it with this story: Ben didn’t eat any of his hash browns and Joan got mad at him for ordering too much food and wouldn’t let Tim eat them because she was so mad. It’s improbable from several angles – Tim wasn’t there and Joan wouldn’t care if Ben ordered too much food – but it’s our new story and we’re sticking with it.

After brunch Ben headed to the pool at Nehalem for a swim, while Joan and Dave and I walked north to do some geocaching. While we were walking the sun was trying to come out and it looked like it was going to turn into a very nice day, but it didn’t.  We had a good time anyway. Joan found all 3 geocaches, even though they were ones that Dave and I had found already. She really has a gift for it – in fact we were joking in the Pig’n that she had already found the first one. The third one was the one in Haystack Park, and it was fun to be there again in the forest in the middle of town. After Joan found the cache we continued on the path which pretty much goes around the outside of the park. There would have been nice views of Haystack rock if it hadn’t been so foggy. As it was they were just so-so views.

When we got back to the car we were getting tired, so we headed back to the house. Ben had texted us that since the weather was so nice (he was on the other side of the Nehalem tunnel) he was going to go for a short swim and a run and he’s be home around 2. Once we were back at the house it was time for some relaxing. Joan bravely bundled up and sat out on the deck and did Sudoku until her nose froze (it would have been a much shorter time for any of the rest of us – her nose is very tiny and stays warm longer)  Usually Dave would have been out there but it was too cold even for him.

Ben got back from his run a little before 3 – about 1 minute after I’d told Dave I was starting to worry about him. As we’d suspected, it had been sunny for all but about the last mile of his run. He would have been back earlier, but apparently about a quarter of the way into the run he’d decided the car keys were too heavy and had hid them under some leaves by the side of the road. He’d taken some time to look around and notice some details about where he was – a curve in the road there, a tree there. Can you tell he’s not from around here?  Of course he couldn’t find the keys when he got back to the approximate location.  So that added about 20 minutes and a little panic to his run, especially since his phone was in the car so he had no way of calling us. Since I did say he got back at the start of this paragraph, he obviously did find them and also learned a valuable lesson about hiding your keys in a rainforest.

Meanwhile Tim was on his way here, but due to some confusion with apple maps came via Tillamook. He did arrive safely, and we had a nice hour or so sitting and chatting before it was time to head out to Castaways Tiny Tiki Hut for dinner. We were a couple minutes late, so Rhonda and Tracy were already there. They had stopped at La Luna Loca and gotten me the scarf that (unbeknownst to them) I had almost bought for myself earlier in the day. I love it being my birthday! We had a fantastic time at dinner telling stories, although an outbreak of Zephyrillis at the end of the meal did slow down the storytelling. Here’s what we need to remember : the two best drinks are the pineapple-chili margarita and the hurricane. A highlight for me was Ben telling the story of half-naked ken doll, which is my favorite story ever. Also Rhonda’s rendition of Lemon Tree was very nice although it brought back some bad memories for Ben. But we just told him she was singing a different song. We finished off the meal with triple chocolate brownies and ice cream all around, and then Rhonda and Tracy and Tim headed back to Forest Grove.

After a short time of spending time with our co-dependent electronic devices, it was game time. First we played 4 games of pepper. Ben would like everyone to know that he won the first game. Then Joan won two games in a row. Then the 4^th game was one of those games that just won’t end until guess what, I ENDED IT. Yes, me, birthday weekend girl. It has been so long since I won a game of pepper that I had to do two dances of joy, plus two complete victory circles in the swivel chair. It was so awesome. Dave was a very good sport about not winning any pepper, and since that’s usually my role I tried to be supportive in between my victory dances and circles. Then it was time for trouble. Although I had some amazing luck, like going around rolling sixes and clearing the board of everyone else’s pieces, Ben won. Perhaps it was the way he kept muttering “I’m going to honk you so hard” and “I’m going to honk you back to the stone ages” into his sleeve. Then he had to do the dance of joy. Then I won second and did 2 more dances of joy and two more victory swivels. Dave and Joan battled it out for the finish, with Dave having a very lucky roll to come in third. Joan was very gracious. It’s clear she did not learn her playing style from my Zady.

 Still waiting for SFO in CBs rebuttal about why he is less exercise crazy than I am.  I don’t buy the part about starting your own exercise class beating running an ironman triathlon. If you agree that he is more exercise mad than I am, like my BodyFit page on Facebook. Each like counts as 2 votes for me being less crazy.

Addendum:

At about 11 Dave and I were getting very antsy because Tim hadn’t called to say he was home, and he wasn’t showing up on Friend Finder. Eventually he did show up – just outside of Astoria, which is an hour away from here in the completely wrong direction, headed out on 202, an incredibly twisty road that would eventually get him home if he didn’t slide off into a ditch. We told him to turn around and come spend the night. It would appear that we haven’t done a good job of teaching our children how to navigate. Turns out he’d gotten all the way to the intersection of 26 and 47, about 15 miles from home. But he turned the wrong way on 47 and ended up driving through Vernonia and back to Astoria.  He got here a little after midnight, which let us wish him a happy 18^th birthday.

 

This is some outfit

The day after my birthday

I woke up to a beautiful sunny morning a little after 7:30, and when I went out into the living room Ben was already up. When he and I are the only ones up early in the morning (which usually is the case these days) I always have to shake my head and wonder, “what has happened to us?” I look back fondly to the time I went to visit him in SF and Joan wasn’t home and we only left our seats on the couch or lazy boy to get food, visit the restroom, or go to sleep (at night – during the day we just napped where we were). Anyway, Ben and I were the first ones up. He was putting the finishing touches on his plan for the bike ride, and I had some Cacklin’ Oat Bran in preparation for Yoga. Dave got up about an hour later, just before Ben and I took off for our activities.

Yoga was good, although I liked this teacher (Claire) less than the owner (Christen). One thing I found particularly annoying is that for most of the class she had her back to me. This bothered me because (1) doesn’t she know I am the center of the universe, and she should be looking at me to see my awesome yoga moves? And (b) I have no clue what I’m doing, and what if I’m doing it wrong?  It was fun and interesting to do yoga, because of course it is one of the 9 movement forms that make up Nia, but in Nia we don’t usually hold the poses as long. So parts of it were quite challenging. At the end we stayed in shavasana for way longer than I’m used to (including some nice aromatherapy oil) which is hard for me because I start planning my day, thinking about even longer term issues, and other assorted non-yoga things. Eventually I did settle into some semblance of calm, and left class pretty blissed out.

When I got back to the house Dave and Joan were having a very deep discussion about the universe from an astronomical perspective, mostly about Quasars. They did not appreciate my joining in by singing the song about the sun that Josh taught us (The Sun by They Might be Giants).  Meanwhile Ben had ridden 42 or 43 miles but was tired of dealing with the icy roads, so he called Joan to come pick him up. While he was in the shower she made him an English muffin in self defense, which he ate in about two seconds and said he was going to marry because he’d never loved anything so much.

Lunch today was at Bread and Ocean in Manzanita, which continues to be one of our favorite lunch places and also continues to be for sale. The Banh Mi sandwich is still excellent. I had a ginger cookie for dessert which was slightly over-caramelized (or “burnt” as non-foodies might say), which actually made it more yummy. Ben had Santa Cruz Organic lemonade, which was totally yucky. Don’t get that. After lunch we walked around town a little – did I mention it was a gorgeous sunny day, although chilly? We didn’t stay in Manzanita long (although we did visit my favorite shop with the broccoli and cauliflower balls) because we wanted to do some geocaching in Cannon Beach.

Ben & Joan found the pointing hand

The geocache we did is the first one Dave and I ever did, and involves walking along Hemlock trying to find the places in the pictures.  When you find them you take one of the numbers from the GPS location, do a little math, and then plug it in to the spaces in another location to find the final destination. It was fun doing it again, even if Joan cheated by walking way ahead and also by finding things when we were still looking for them. There was also some shoving, grabbing, and covering-of-another-person’s-eyes by one person whose names begin with B and end with N, but we’re not saying any names.

Another fun thing about this puzzle cache is that it starts at the whale at the north end of town and then  goes about halfway to midtown, so you can also do some shopping as you go. Also you can stop into Cannon Beach Distillery for a little tasting, which helps keep you warm. I found a great handbag and Joan found some boots. We also found these fantastic raincoats with accordion hoods, but as they were over $200 we kept going. I stopped at La Luna Loca and got some pants for Andrea Bell.

Towards the end it started getting colder and also we wanted to be home for sunset, so we hopped in the car and zoomed home, only to discover that a fog bank was rolling in. So not much of a sunset, and also right after the sun went behind the fogbank it rolled right up and socked us in. It’s a weird effect, to have the outside world suddenly disappear.

Our dinner reservations weren’t until  7:15, so we had some more relaxing time in our little fog cocoon.  Then we headed out to Newman’s, a reliable restaurant favorite. Here’s what: if they have the roasted tomato soup, you should get it. Tim had it at Thanksgiving and I came back and wrote in my blog about how good it was, but apparently didn’t make it clear enough: if they have it, get it. Although the food was all very yummy, it was far and away the best thing there. We had lots of fun and laughing and also Ben asked the hardest question ever: if you had to give up bread or cheese, which would you give up? Dave said he’d be like Kirk and the Kabayashi Maru. Also we talked about what would be the perfect 8 week vacation(the length of Dave’s upcoming sabbatical), and Dave and I agreed on a 3 week cruise, a week each in England, Italy, and France, and 2 week to recover. So we’re all set there. We will not report here just how much discussion about bodily functions there was, but there was more than there should have been. I think Ben and I were not raised properly.

When we got home it was finally time for some Trouble. Faithful readers will know that my record at games is pretty dismal, but I did win the last game of trouble at Rustlewood. Tonight would be no different! Even though Joan got all her pieces out very quickly and seemed virtually untouchable, eventually I got out and even though there was some extremely inappropriate sibling honking, I completely won even though I had to sit there waiting to pop a one almost until my next birthday. I was in the swivelly chair so I did a victory lap.

Confidential to BOS – the chat was indeed a highlight. And you may recall that Dave and Tim did it with a toaster.

Confidential to SFO in CB – I’ve never exercised for more than 2 hours at a time. I’ve certainly never exercised for so long that people could eat breakfast, take naps, or even pack their belongings for a week’s vacation and drive to the coast while a I was exercising. Just saying.

It's a Special Day

7C’s in January!

 

So, in case you hadn’t noticed, today is my birthday, and I’m as old as a deck of cards, or the number of weeks in a year. I’ve been alive so long that if I’d been born on day 1, both the 260 day and the 365 day Mesoamerican calendars have had time to synchronize and would both be starting again at day 1. But since I thought I was 52 all last year, I don’t feel any older.

I had a big day planned, too. It started at 6:55 with my BodyFit class, and I was pleased to have two new people there. Also it was day 2, which is a good day for old people as the cycles seem very short. After class I went home and had oatmeal (with celebratory chocolate chips) and did some straightening around the house and some packing. Then it was time to be off to Nia, which is kind of like having a birthday party all the time, but I had no idea how awesome it was going to be. Tripti was leading, and she had made a whole routine just for me with three birthday songs and the Pata Pata song by Miriam Makeba. Plus, many people – Kriszti, Fred, Liz, Kay Nell , Charles (not the Charles who is usually there and was today, but the other Charles). We danced like crazy, and then Fred and Kriszti and I went for Thai food for lunch.

After lunch it was time to head home and finish getting packed, which I did except for my bathrobe and the sissy firestarters. The firestarters are easy, but the bathrobe is a bummer. Dave got home about 2 and we finished packing and headed to the coast. Faithful readers will know that we’ve been coming here every summer for 21 years, and last year the rental agent & owners offered us a free weekend as a thank you.  What a great way to spend the weekend of our 25^th anniversary and my birthday!  We picked up the keys and got to the house just before sunset, and a miracle happened – although there was a little local fog, the horizon was clear all the way down and we got to see a green flash! Even I had to admit it was a green flash.

Meanwhile, the day would continue to get better, because while we were driving to the coast Ben & Joan were landing in Portland! Since Ben is even more exercise mad than I am, they needed to stop and pick up a bike for him to ride while he’s here (what’s wrong with beach bikes?). So we got unpacked and settled in, and generally slowed ourselves. Two things:  when it is only two of us for a couple days we can fit everything in Dave’s car and 2) When we first started coming here, it would take Dave a day or two to relax into vacation mode. It now takes about a minute. Or less.

After we hung out for a while doing good relaxing, Ben and Joan called from the 101/26 junction. We met them at Bill’s and had a very nice hamburger dinner. Mostly the best thing about it was all the laughing, which we continued at the house. It is an amazingly clear night, maybe the clearest we’ve seen in years. Dave and Joan spent quite some time on the deck looking at the stars and pointing at things. Ben and I stayed in the house where it was warm and we could sit down. We’ve seen all those stars before anyway. And we’re exhausted from all of our working out.

It’s supposed to be another clear, cold day tomorrow.  Stay tuned.