Right now we are trying to get the whole crew ready to head to Atlanta for thanksgiving. We decided to board the dogs but I didn't have any luck convincing the folks at the kennel that Stella is a rare breed of Swedish upright chihuahua.


These pictures are both from the west side of Corvallis near the trailer park. I can only complain about the rain so much before I get whopped upside the head with the overall prettiness of the place.

Last week, The Barry arrived and we exercised our typical influence on the weather, guaranteeing that any plans we made would be annihilated by meteorological nastiness. The up side of this has always been that we get to do a lot more sitting around at trailheads in the van, drinking beer, and talking about other times that we almost did something cool. We also re-proved our axiom that the random trip is usually better than the planned when when, in an effort to drive all the way BACK across Oregon, we stopped at Angel Creek and got to hike into some of the prettiest scenery I've seen since I've been here. They were releasing salmon from the fish hatchery and we hiked upstream until even the heartiest floppers and swishers couldn't surmount the increasing waterfalls. We were also privileged to get a tour of Portland from Barry's architect friend Scott. The only thing cooler than seeing a building with the guy that designed it was hanging out on his sail boat and watching Stella try to toddle against the gentle roll of the water.

some adaptations for small-space livin'...

The reusable grocery bags that are hip these days; we keep four or five of them floating around the trailer, tipi, van and car. They help to keep the right stuff in the right place at the right time. Heading to go hiking with a baby followed by a run to the recycling center and post office takes about three bags. Going to the gym can usually be accomplished with one bag only. Weekend camping takes all the bags and a couple of armloads; the main idea being to minimize the amount of muddy trips between the van, tipi, and trailer.


House-cleaning is no longer an episodic activity. Cleaning a 75 sq ft space in the middle of the world's largest mud puddle while 5 mammals come and go with their individual agendas is a bit futile. Stemming the tide and occasionally beating back a hairball or pawprint is the best we can hope for. Cleaning is now a continual process and the trailer exists variably in state between mostly clean and filthier than a leprous hyena at a tractor pull.


Incense and humor are indispensable to the physical and psychic ambiance. Too little of either and there's a stink or a stink-eye in the air.

I have mentioned before my lack of esteem for the banana slug. I still think "frankenturd" every time I see one. Nonetheless, I have come to respect their role in the hierarchy of squish that is Oregon winter. The squish that moves certainly rules the squish. Banana slugs are the substrate of Oregon's formless and funky firmament come to life; the antennaed embodiment of the higher squish as it were.

We are slowly adapting to living in the world's prettiest mud-puddle; the only place where water-bugs occasionally take flight and you occasionally see a fish hitch-hiking. There's just no question that hanging out in a small aluminum cave and fighting the perpetual onslaught of wet dogs and muddy boots is a real bummer. The flip side of that being that it is nice to have no reason to go home, stay home or be home.
At this point, the trailer and tipi have become a place to sleep when we have to work the next day. Otherwise we have been scooting back and forth across the Cascades to find a sunny spot or some rain that has at least enough class to show up as snow.
Packing up all the mammals into the van and heading for some back-country has been hard on the van's suspension and the local goose population; the amount of down insulation required for family camping has probably put us on the goose-mafia's hit list. Thanks to the fairy godmother of outdoor gear, Stella has a down suit with built in mittens and footies. It makes her look like she has flippers but it serves it's porpoise.

Beneath limbs shaggier than a Rastafarian sheep, lived festering fungoid frotteurs and other sordid saprophytes.
The sun stops by, but just to use the bathroom. It's his last stop on the way to Hawaii.
Bearded trees whittle the day away; talk about how wet is USED to be back when they were saplings.

The disadvantage of making plans is the exclusion of the opportunity to learn from the unexpected. There is some balance between governing your life and allowing a bit of chaos to ferment into some intoxicatingly serendipitous coincidence. Corvallis is a dog town and the hiking and biking trails are a highway of quadripeds and occasionally a misfortunate triped. So far the only dogs I've noticed to have aggressive tendencies are the one held tightly on short leashes. Absolute control of any situation is impossible and the harder control is striven for the more unpleasantness it creates. Consistency is probably the most over-rated virtue in America these days and trying to achieve stability through control is destroying us personally and politically. The active practice of freedom involves a willingness to expose yourself to risk.

Now that I've dispensed with an over-caffeinated and disjointed rant, I'll follow with some recent photos from our manically erratic explorations. Above is the full moon rising over the Mckenzie river valley.
This is a cloud condensing over a lagoon formed by the warm waters of Terwilliger hot springs. The springs are known locally as Cougar Hot Springs, but not everything in Oregon lives up to it's name.
Stella and my Psychiatrist midway through a recent wet and epic hike. Three sisters in the background.
Doc Sauls looks out over the Sisters Wilderness area. 572 sq miles...
The predominant color around here.

"Water, he no got enemy" -Fela Kuti

Lets face it, some things are just funny... even when they lack class or sophistication. Farting yourself awake is funny no matter how old or well-educated you are. Oregon State University, at some point, made the questionable decision of choosing the beaver as their mascot. This of course means that you can go to a football game and scream "Beaver!" at the top of your lungs for hours and not get arrested. Leagues of eager college girls walk around in sweatshirts with things like "Beaver Believer" and "Go Big Beav!" on them. On the edge of town a billboard advertising a new condo reads "Live among beavers!". The strangest example we have seen of the blurry line between team spirit and downright naughtiness is a hair salon and spa that has a sign in the window that says "Get your beaver waxed here". If I was making this up I would be embarrassed, but I'm just reporting the facts. As much a I enjoy living in a town where I have to swallow a laugh every time someone tells me they root for the beavers, I think a more appropriate mascot would be a jellyfish. Corvallis is essentially an aquatic environment this time of year. It rains for days at a time and I fully expect that come spring we'll have to knock the barnacles off the airstream and shoo off an octopus or two. The winter temperatures are nice enough and the evergreens knock the edge off the dreariness, but squishiness is definitely in abundance. Our solution to being pushed indoors has been to put up a tipi, and so far, having some extra space has been a nice change. The trailer has about 75 square feet of space, the tipi has 243 with a middle height of 20 feet.


After laying in the tripod with a clove hitch and some rapa-nui technology, we layed the circumference of the tipi out on a gravel pad with the door facing east.
Here, Nala and the goats shows the canvas laid out prior to being rolled and lifted onto the frame. This part was a bit gruntier than expected.
This is the final product, minus the rain cap. The floor is a waterproof tarp covered with closed-cell foam and a carpet.
Stella shows off the faux-hardwood floors before we put up the inner liner.