The Surrealism Of It All

JWise Photo of the Day, Thoughts, Travels

Sunrise on Highway 138 in California

The act of going on vacation, which I termed Remote Self-Isolation, was fraught with tensions due to the escalating outbreaks and fears that with the colder weather and holiday season that pulls families together, America would experience a massive uptick in COVID-19 infections. For the month prior to our departure, I was never sure if our road trip to the Oregon coast was going to take place. Travel restrictions, lodging cancellations, or lock-down orders were never far from my mind.

When we finally started moving west towards the California border, each mile felt extraordinary because we were actually traveling for pleasure during a pandemic. It felt counter-intuitive. We made it to Fresno, California, over 600 miles from home, back on the first day. I was still incredulous that we’d be allowed to take a room in a hotel, as though we’d be questioned about our travel intents. Maybe if our reason for being on the road wasn’t strong enough, we’d be denied lodging and so I was prepared with some concocted nonsense story just in case we were questioned. That story was never well thought out as I know it wasn’t reasonable that we’d be asked anything as truckers and people moving homes had continued traveling the whole time, but that’s where nine months of self-isolation had put a part of my brain.

Entering Oregon, the place was at once familiar and, at the same time, different. Traffic was lighter; that was probably the first thing you would notice. Restaurants were closed or had prominent signs up telling passers-by that they were still doing takeout or food to go. Sure, we’d known this from our bubble in Phoenix. but this was the distant coast, and for some reason, it felt abruptly different. All the same, this was vacation, and if it only lasted a day or two, we’d try to extract all we could from this opportunity to be out. Staying at locations longer, intentionally booking places with kitchens so we could prepare the majority of our meals to choosing our lodgings, considering that we’d be effectively sheltering in place, so we’d better be prepared to entertain ourselves. While it seemed absurd that we should be doing this during a pandemic, things went smashingly well.

But then it all goes and gets wrapped in the punctuation of surrealism as, about 100 miles from home, our car, with us in it, was hit by someone with no interest in dealing with slowing down and confronting what they had just done. We were already traveling at about 75 – 80 mph when a car came out of nowhere and drifted into our lane doing about 100 mph. That car collided with us (or gently bumped us, I suppose) as they quickly recovered and took off even faster while we continued miraculously forward. It took a second for us to wrap our shocked minds around what had just occurred and catapulted us into adrenalized emotional shock. I hit the gas as our car seemed okay to give chase and try to record the license plate. However, that was futile because the other driver was adamant that today was not the day to swap insurance info. I hit 95 mph and started to realize the other person was not, in fact, going to pull over, so I called 911. I learned for the first time that just talking to the phone in my pocket with, “Okay, Google, call 911,” worked to call some 911 network that quickly transferred me to the Arizona Department of Public Safety, our version of the Highway Patrol. At this point, when I started explaining what happened and what we knew about the other driver, it started to really dawn on me that we’d been in an accident. Emotions started to seep in, and I knew the chase was over and that we needed to pull over; the car was in some state of post-crash status, and me getting wrecked, too, now.

Hit and run of our Kia in the Arizona Desert

We pulled off at Exit 81, the Salome Road offramp. Stepping out of the car we couldn’t fathom how little damage there was to the car, considering how the cars collided.

The DPS officer showed up about an hour after the initial call; we made our report and drove home. The time between was good for the two of us, as it allowed the panic to subside and a sense of normal to return. Getting home, we went through the routine of starting laundry, draining the ice chest, putting stuff away, etc. We’d been home a few hours by the time the last effects of the shock were subsiding. It was then that the whole thing truly seemed unreal, “Had we really been the victims of a hit-and-run accident just before lunch today?” We’d just finished nearly three weeks of travels during what amounts to a plague with people masked up, hurt, and in fear. Food from restaurants is taken home or eaten right in the car in a parking lot. Marijuana can be delivered or picked up in the drive-thru. Limits on how many people are allowed in businesses are in effect, and in some cases, you are greeted outdoors when a person in gloves and a mask comes out to ask what you want to buy. We rarely spoke to anyone, and checking into our lodgings, we never saw anyone other than the couple of times we stayed at hotels. The surrealism of it all was astonishing.

Now stop and think about just how strange the entire phenomenon of traveling is as you course over the surface of the earth at 80 mph. Or maybe you are aloft in the sky, 5 miles over the roads and sea, speeding along at 575 mph before arriving at your destination. A room awaits you with the amenities you desire, most likely with heating and air-conditioning, don’t forget the TV and wifi, but if you are renting a house, you can expect the number of bedrooms you reserved along with a kitchen stocked with the utensils and instruments you are likely familiar with at home. You are at this new location with your smartphone at your disposal, so you start live streaming right away to a friend or relative, possibly thousands of miles away, sharing in your amazement.

We take things for granted, we define our normal by what we are currently doing and we rarely stop to reflect on how peculiar it all is. In some way, we are all playing in madness by doing what we do, unaware of how random it is that we try to create patterns of behavior out of the chaos of any number of directions our lives could be lived. We’ve recently been witnessing a political apparatus in Washington D.C. consume itself with the rationalization that, because things were being done the way they were, that must be the way they need to be in order for things to work. Confronted with a pandemic, we strangely throw our hands up and feign ignorance about what we should be doing when to this lay-person it was obvious that we needed to “Stop, drop and roll,” metaphorically speaking.

In the last few weeks, we ventured out to try and capture a small part of our former normal: vacationing in Oregon. An ongoing pandemic hinted this was insane, but we could justify it by explaining that our current normal had grown stale and that we needed a break from the routine. We’d driven Interstate 10, possibly hundreds of times by now. Our normal was simply driving it; this time, reality crashed into us, reminding Caroline and me that the two bipeds in the steel cage were moving 26 times our normal walking speed while a virus that doesn’t know borders was potentially present in places our eyesight doesn’t have the capability to see. How crazy is all this?

Our limited senses need the occasional reboot, and 2020 is certainly a year where slowly everyone on our planet is getting it that life has variables that are not always predictable. Relative stability has been a luxury for many in the West since the end of World War II, but prior to that, humanity was living every year in 2020.

All of this begs the question, “Why are we not striving to do our best at making life more meaningful and equipping each other with knowledge and tools to have better lives?”

The only answer I’ve been able to come up with is that a downtrodden class of people, unable to question their circumstances, are being led by a ruling class of the privileged, afraid to ask many questions or alter paradigms out of fear of losing their wealthy positions. We are stuck in a primitive situation unable to budge from our Stone Age roots. Yeah, I know that calling us Stone Age is a bit dramatic, so maybe readers would prefer I reference that we are closer to our Bronze Age ancestors. But why would I be so condescending when humanity has made such incredible technological strides?

A subset of humanity has made those inventions, building upon advancements discovered by an even smaller group of highly intelligent creators. While many have benefited from the dispersion of tools of convenience and shelter offered to the masses, we individuals are further out of touch with life survival skills, personal sustainability skills, or even interests not ordained by mass culture that is actually created by a very small population of literate and technologically adept individuals. The average person cannot farm, make cloth, build a home, treat a wound, hunt, fish, write coherently, read at a respectable level, and most importantly, think.

Big claim, huh? If we are thinking creatures, then why is the misery bestowed upon so many? In my own way, I try to think about many things, many esoteric things that don’t impact my own life such as where do newts sleep. Are human networking topologies too rigid, will I ever really understand Gilles Deleuze, and does my knowledge of our environment offer me any insight I could share and inspire someone here on this blog with? In that thinking, I find it repugnant that we have “leaders” who are not, in fact, leaders. Former President Obama nor current President Trump ever took Caroline and me to Oregon or Europe; neither of them is responsible for our passports or our curiosity about places and cultures that inspire our imaginations. They only tend to be distractions for some and maybe attempt for the general betterment of society as a whole, but it is ultimately up to the population at large to want those changes. When a large segment of the population is in fear due to their Stone Age intellect and lack of ability to harness today’s tools, they slip further back into a type of primitivism that is so out of step with where we should be as a society. This begins to appear surrealistic. We are becoming the warped characters and distortions found on the artist’s canvas while not recognizing our role on this stage of absurdity. Collectively, we are the shadow figures on a cave wall, unaware of the others in our proximity. Mentally, we are deficient troglodytes pretending to have a grasp on what any of this is.

Today’s outcome could have been very different. The hit-and-run driver didn’t spin us around, didn’t push us off the road into the gravel, didn’t rear-end us, or shoot us off the freeway. With both vehicles traveling rapidly, we kissed and parted company. Repairing our car will cost us at least $1000, as that’s our deductible. Strangely, this doesn’t seem so horrible considering what the circumstances could have been, and in the end, it offers me something to think about and share nearly 2,000 words inspired by it.

But there’s a larger question that arises out of this episode: At what point in our lives are we shocked by the intellectual equivalent of a hit-and-run driver that leaves us aware that we haven’t recognized our own ignorance speeding along and risking our lives? In being hit, I was jarred by the complacency that I was driving just fine, and while the accident was in no way my fault, it does illuminate that no matter how aware you hope to be, there is always something that comes out of your blindspot and demands you see your limitations. When we come to understand that although we believed we knew how things looked and operated, but are in an instant challenged by our perception of reality, our state of being confounded is what surrealism strove to show us. We don’t really understand all angles, and some things are not as they appear. Do you really know what’s around the corner, or are you just hoping that things will go on as they always have?

End of Remote Self-Isolation is Near

JWise Photo of the Day, Travels

Sunrise in Trinidad, California

Why haven’t we ever been to Patricks Point near Trinidad, California, before? Having been to the Redwoods National Park and some of the nearby State Parks that also feature redwood trees, I must admit that I might have taken it for granted that we’d seen what was worth seeing. That is until today. Of course, there’s the blight that is Eureka, which in reality is quite beautiful in its own right, but the drug problems afflicting that community create a homeless problem and, in turn, a crime problem that has tainted the area in my eyes. Even at our lodging for the night, we were warned about leaving anything in our car if we were to visit Patricks Point State Park up the street as our host knew people whose cars had been broken into and even her own car had been robbed. With our out-of-state license plates, she felt, we’d likely be targeted. Keep in mind that we are 4 miles north of Trinidad proper and 30 miles from Eureka; such are the problems with California’s current unemployment and homeless situation.

Update summer 2024: I wrote here that this was our first visit. Well, I was wrong, and all I needed to do was check my own blog. In 2024, looking for other information for our visit this summer, I saw that we drove at least part of Patricks Point Road, starting in Trinidad and traveling north.

Sunrise in Trinidad, California

We’re at the end of Stagecoach Road and about to turn left in order to return to Highway 101 so we can begin in earnest our drive into Southern California for our last night out on the road. Instead of taking that turn, Caroline asked for one more detour to the right.

Sunrise in Trinidad, California

This was where she wanted me to go, more or less. Actually, there was a lighthouse shown to be in the area. Well, that lighthouse is about 15 feet tall and hardly qualifies as a legitimate safety beacon for passing ships as it’s more a decorative building hiding behind a hill. We are now endeared to the area though, and make a point of putting it on the mental list of places to return to.

Richardson Grove State Park in Garberville, California

In an age where public toilets are a rare commodity due to the pandemic, these redwoods will suffice in bearing witness to our need to release the waters from within.

Northern California on the 101 Highway

And then we drove and drove and then drove some more. We drove all day with very few breaks for photos, especially once we entered the Bay Area via Oakland on the 580 before hitting Interstate 5, where we’d have to pass the bovine fattening factory zone some call Cowschwitz.

Sunset on Utica Ave in Kings County, California

The interstate was slow due to holiday traffic, for although California authorities asked Californians not to travel over Thanksgiving, it was obvious that very few heeded that warning. Our excuse for being out here is that we live in Arizona with a Republican Governor who is toeing the line for the President and doesn’t give a shit about life, and we are too stupid to think for ourselves, so we threw out the little caution that eeked into our brains and went on this here Remote Self-Isolation Vacation because we are selfish and self-absorbed, well just like Californians really.

Off the major highway, we found ourselves on a farm road that grew smaller and smaller until Google had us on a dirt road for a short stretch. If an alien spaceship had hovered over us after dark in this vast black plain of nothingness, we’d not have been surprised. Finding Highway 99, we were soon in Bakersfield, and before we knew it, we were pulling into our hotel in Tehachapi. Tomorrow we go home.

Edit: Nearly out of Bakersfield, we got off Highway 58 on Oswell Street, heading to Ben Paca Mexican Grill. I wanted some Mexican food, and as far as joints near the freeway were concerned, this one came as highly rated as one might hope. The Hot Cheetos Burrito for about $10 caught my eye as I’d never heard of such a thing. Should we pass through again, we’ll be getting another one of those!

Remote Self-Isolation

JWise Photo of the Day, Travels

Near False Klamath, California looking out at the Pacific Ocean

After spending nearly all day yesterday driving, we did more of the same today. With a destination 1,200 miles (1,930km) northwest of home, we broke up the segments into two nearly equal distances by driving from Phoenix, Arizona, to Fresno, California, yesterday, and then today, we finished the trek. It rained most of the day, at times coming down heavy, making for some white knuckle moments on the narrow Highway 101 through the Redwoods of Northern California. Normally, there’s nothing particularly troublesome about driving in a bit of rain but we’ve not seen the stuff since sometime earlier in the year, as in back in January or February. By the time late afternoon had rolled around, we were resigned to the imagined fact that it was going to rain all day, but then, just as we reached False Klamath on the ocean and our first opportunity to find ourselves oceanside, we were offered this view above.

Caroline Wise on the beach at Crescent City, California

But the sky wasn’t done with us yet as it cut itself in two with this bisection that seems to suggest, “Leave this gray from down south behind you as on your right and to the north, Oregon is about to smile upon you.” Had the heavens closed up after our first stop, we would have been content to have had a minute to admire the silver sea. Besides, who could have asked for a moment of molten gold ocean to pull us from the car just 20 minutes later? By the way, in an alternative universe, there is a similar picture of me in silhouette, as it was Caroline’s idea to snap a photo of me with her phone as I stood in the same place. Seeing her image, I told her to assume my position, and I took this one of her. On more occasions than I wish to publically admit, though that’s just what I’m doing right now, my wife has some really good ideas and is quite inspired. Just don’t tell her I said this, as it will all go to her head, while it’s her modesty that lends itself to her better qualities.

McVay Rock at sunset in Oregon

Our minds are blown as little could we have imagined that we’d make the southern Oregon coast by sunset and that we’d see it in all of its spectacular glory at an overlook we’d never visited. As I’ve shared before, this is our 20th visit to Oregon in the past 18 years, and while I might brag that we’ve seen every inch of this beautiful isolated stretch of the Pacific coast, on every visit, there seems to be just one more place that we’d somehow missed. Today, that stop was at the McVay Rock State Recreation Site, which is less than 3 miles from the Oregon and California state lines. How had we missed this?

Our final stop was a few miles up the Pistol River at the Fish Inn that we found on Airbnb. This place off the beaten path is more than a dozen miles away from the nearest town with Brookings to the south with its population of 6,465 and Gold Beach to the north and its population of 2,293. We’ll be spending the next few days on this 35-mile-long sparsely populated stretch of coast in a kind of remote self-isolation as we try to have as few encounters with other people as possible, minus the requisite stops at Dutch Bros. for coffee.

Rewards

JWise Thoughts, Travels

Caroline Wise and John Wise on the California border

Our awareness of the incredibly fortunate lives we live is rarely lost on Caroline and me, but when planning our travels and especially in the time leading up to our departure, that knowledge turns into a riveting tension. This idea is kept alive by the desire to venture out of routine as we are determined not to fall into patterns that would allow us to make excuses for staying in place. Not only are we willing to go, learn, and challenge ourselves, but we have the means and, at least so far, are indefatigable in making the necessary sacrifices. The funny thing is that this all feels like it grows easier and even more rewarding with each passing year. Little touches that enhance our adventures become nuances of the extraordinary, fueling our belief that this is the proverbial icing on the cake, adding to the perfection of how we’ll greet the place we are traveling to.

Nearly two months ago, I confirmed our lodging for the trip on which we are about to embark. Back then it felt like we were gaining some breathing room from COVID-19 and that making plans was a great thing to do. Now, just hours before our departure, the pandemic is raging in all corners of the country. I’m trying to reassure myself that we are doing this as safely as possible with only three nights in hotels: one on the way there and two on the way home; all three are major brands with the hopes they are working hard to protect their franchises. Our lodgings on the coast are at five different rentals; we’ll stay at each one for multiple days and will disinfect a few things before setting up, in addition to tossing off the bedding in favor of using our own pillows and our favorite fluffy down comforter. Ninety-three percent of our meals will come directly from what we are packing, while four meals will be to-go or outdoors. Two of those will be in Yachats, Oregon, at our old favorite Luna Sea restaurant; one lunch will be at Blue Heron Cheese Company in Tillamook, Oregon, and finally, dinner in Crescent City, California, as we will be in a hotel without a kitchen.

By minimizing our contact with others and wearing masks at all times we are in shared public spaces, we feel that we are doing everything we can to remain safe while not risking others’ health should somehow we become asymptomatic carriers. The path of our travels and time of year chosen also minimizes our encounters with others, though, on Thanksgiving and the day after, it’s been our experience that beaches are relatively crowded, although late November in Oregon means that we’ll be at least 20 to 50 feet away from others on a windy open area. If fewer people are traveling this holiday season, maybe we’ll find even greater isolation, which is just fine by us.

Driving west on Interstate 10 in California

I brought up that we’ll be preparing 93% of all of our meals; that’s a very accurate number, actually, as out of 57 meals across 19 days, we really are either cooking or packing sandwiches over the course of every day. While there’s certainly a convenience to eating out during travels, it’s also a hit-and-miss in rural corners of America where options can be grim *(if you ever had to eat Chinese food in Topeka, Kansas, you’d know what I meant). Instead, we’ll be dining on my own cooking with walleye hand-caught in Canada, ribeye steaks from the panhandle of Texas, Cajun Turducken from Louisiana, Corona beans because why not, sundubu Korean tofu stew, grilled bratwurst from our favorite local German store, and spaghetti squash as everyone needs a night off. Doing the dishes and moving this amount of food up to Oregon is a downside, but on the bright side, it’ll feel in some way like we’re living on the coast instead of just visiting.

“Patience is a virtue” takes on new meaning during a pandemic due to the uncertainty, but as we near the moment of departure with our precautions to remain safe, healthy, and isolated, it looks like all systems are “go for launch.” Due to the obvious impatience of many, which ultimately means disrespect for themselves and others, the flare-up of COVID-19 is surging through many cities across America and around the globe. We must continue to act in our own best interest and go slow and steady with the full awareness that all around us are people who not only don’t care but also don’t believe that the pandemic is real. For nearly the entire year, our lives have been impacted, yet those in denial only demonstrate hostility, which is often directed at those who are trying to not only take precautions but also patiently retain the hope that lives will return to something like normal. This trip up the coast is one of our moments to dip back into what was normal, our reward for our own patience.

Final San Diego Impressions

JWise Photo of the Day, Thoughts

Menya Ultra Ramen in San Diego, California

San Diego ended up being largely boring. There were a few high points, such as this Tonkotsu Chashu Ramen from Menya Ultra. There are two locations in the San Diego area, but expect both to have lines out the door, and these are the only two locations in North America. My 20-minute wait was absolutely worthwhile. So, there may be some interesting dining options here along the coast, but you must be prepared to drive. Should you want great Mexican food, you might need to visit Chula Vista down south, so at the best of times, if you are up north, it’ll take you 45 minutes to drive the 23 miles or more than 75 minutes if you are attempting this when the freeways are slammed.

There’s a coastal train line operated by Amtrak that travels between San Luis Obispo and San Diego. The pricing is okay, but I’m putting this here because the track it runs on is close to some cliff sides that are disappearing. The Pacific Surfliner takes about 8.5 hours to make the trek that would take 5 hours by car, and there’s free wifi onboard, so while I’m fairly bored here, I could easily see Caroline and I making the trip out this way on a weekend during the late fall for the trip north and back south. Strangely, we’ve never traveled with Amtrak anywhere in America though we have taken subways in New York, Washington D.C., and Los Angeles, steam trains in New Mexico and Colorado, and a couple of old lines in Arizona, one that took us through Verde Canyon and the other from Williams to Grand Canyon National Park.

Drake the Dog

My routine of walking Drake saw him leading most of the time. This vet’s office saw us at least once a day, sometimes twice. I never learned what it was that drew him here, but this dog loved sniffing their door. He seems to have grown used to me after about ten days of Dion and Ylva’s absence, but still, he’s a cantankerous dog who knows where he wants to go and got quite aggressive, pulling in the direction he wanted to go.

I never grew to appreciate that dogs are a full-time job where their needs must be met every day without a break. How people grow accustomed to the dog’s needs and the inflexibility the relationship offers is far beyond my ability to understand.

Writing

More than the beaches and restaurants, this was the most common view I had while here in Southern California. Never did I truly feel inspired to liberate my spleen and find a thread to flow within. Maybe adequate cloud cover or the potential for it is required for my writing? Not a chance, as I live in Arizona and find myself writing quite often. So, what’s the writer’s block that was affecting me here?

Bathroom

Another common view of mine. This one is from a sitting position and is typically only had once a day.

Eating at Red Tracton's in Del Mar, California

I’m at Red Tracton’s Steakhouse in Del Mar, and the only people under 50 here are the staff. Matter of fact, the majority of diners are well into their retirement years. Every table I see has some stiff drinks on it; a couple has wine, and only one has a beer.

At about $100 a person, the casual conversation is largely about money. One nearby table is discussing their racehorses which makes sense as the Del Mar racetrack is nearby.

Maybe there are some individual diners in the bar area, but I’m the only solo guy in the main dining room. Dinner was okay, but it wasn’t worth what was paid. This joint and my meal were kind of boring just like the city all of this in. As the baby boomers continue to die out, so will this type of restaurant.

Sunset at Solana Beach in California

There are probably many things to like about this area along the coast, besides the coast and sunsets, I found things difficult to enjoy. If we were to live here, I’m afraid we’d be like most San Diegans who don’t want to deal with parking near the ocean and the perception that the beaches are crowded, so we’d take for granted that we could go at any time and then put it off for years while claiming the ocean is part of the allure. Traffic and cost of living are the chief complaints about life here, which is the same I’ve heard from San Francisco down to Los Angeles, but the jobs that pay high wages are spread throughout the Sunshine State, so people stay. As for me, I’m looking forward to getting home to the dry 110-degree desert where we don’t need to pretend that we reside in some cool, hip place unless we live in Scottsdale.

Afternoon Visit

JWise Photo of the Day

Brinn Aaron at Solana Beach, California

Spontaneity is often a rare thing and with the idea that Brinn would visit me while in San Diego, I didn’t think he’d really show up. We “joked” about him driving out the day before but he said it would be better to leave in the morning. Sure enough, he wrote to me earlier today that he’d be in around 12:30 and it was only shortly after that when he walked into Starbucks here next to the freeway in Solana Beach.

We took off for lunch down to Gen Korean BBQ and got stuffed on $25 a person all-you-can-eat cook-at-your-own table Korean food. We leaned heavily on the pork side of the menu before agreeing on a nice long walk to help settle the stuffing. So back up the coast to Solana Beach, we drove to walk the dog before walking ourselves. After a mile-long walk with Drake, we headed over to the beach down the road from where I’m staying and walked another three miles.

You might guess that after this we made our way back over to the coffee shop to continue the conversation. Stoicism has been on Brinn’s mind lately as he brought up Marcus Aurelius at our last meeting in Phoenix and again today the subject comes up. For those of you who don’t know, stoicism is the endurance of pain or hardship without the display of feelings and without complaint. At only 32 years of age Brinn has known his share of hardship, pain, and suffering, often with some of it being self-inflicted, after being brought up to endure it. In this sense, we might be considered opposites as I have worked towards stopping the internal self-immolation as I’ve tried to find a balance of enduring the pain shared by a society bent on exploring their greatest stupidities and my need to exit life as gracefully and happy as possible.

While sitting in the shade a security guard making his rounds came by and we said hello. Turns out he’s a former Marine and at that moment it was strange to think that the three of us are all veterans of the American Military. While Brinn is nearly constantly aware of his status in part because he works for the Veterans Administration in Phoenix, I mostly have forgotten that part of my life as I wanted to actively distance myself from the radical conditioning that is undergone when one becomes a soldier. Jonathan the security guard was an affable guy who spent about 45 minutes chatting with us. He only left active duty about 2 years ago after 11 years of service and it is still obvious what his background was.

Korean Ice Cream from Somi Somi in San Diego

Wow, is it dinner time already? No, we did not start with dessert, we dropped in on some random Chinese noodle shop and split a few dishes. Around the corner, we visited Somi Somi where a few days before I made my first visit, but opted for the relatively boring vanilla flavor with custard. Tonight I went with the Ube and Taro with Fruity Pebbles and didn’t regret it. Yes I did regret it, I have diabetes and this was kind of stupid but I did walk nearly 17,000 steps today so hopefully, I counteracted the ugly effect of sugar on my body chemistry.

By 10:00 p.m. I brought Brinn back to his car and his short adventure to San Diego came to an end as he pointed the car eastward and off he drove into the night. Later I learned he got home safely at 3:30 in the morning but I guess even if it had been a slog and he was tired along the way, his stoicism wouldn’t have allowed him to lament the struggle to stay awake under the starry sky out in the middle of nowhere.