Florida or Bust!

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This morning, Heather wakes me up at five past six. She is flying around the house 100 miles an hour, like she does, getting everything pilled up. I can tell she is excited to get going. I am too. I take my shower, I try to enjoy it's hotness as I think it will be my last for at least a couple of days. I get dressed, pack all of our bags in the car and go inside the house for some coffee. I take a sip just as Heather comes flying around the corner and she says, "Mike, do you have my passport!?"

This is funny to me because she was giving me a hard time all day for being anal retentive. Yesterday I spent organizing all of our stuff, packing and repacking it into the subaru, trying to think of all the systems we should implement to stay organized. I hate the feeling of being grimy and dirty. When it happens, the situation gets worse when I look around and see crap strewn about. So, needless to say, I know where my passport is at all times.

At this point, I can hear Carrington's voice in my head. It says, "How right do you really need to be in this case?Is being right worth paying for the next 24 hours?" (He's always giving me helpful relationship strategies).

I agree, smile and unpack the subaru.

Alls well that ends well - We found it!

Pablo is locked, stocked and ready to roll... well, that is after we make one last stop at the Northwest Subaru Service Group. After much pleading from Old Man, I've come to the agreement that it would indeed be best to have a professional take a look at the car that Heather and I are relying to take us on our trip.

From Scappoose, we're gonna go south and take the Santiam Mountain Pass via Salem to Bend. We are planning to pay a visit to Henry the Black Bear in the little town just east of Prineville. We're gonna camp somewhere near there. I first met Henry last summer after Dylan, Eliot and had our brush with death in the Ochoco's. Seeing a wild bear the day before was the pinnacle to a day that ended with us camping on a burnt out hilltop with no water, no map, lost and wet. So after we finally found the trail the next morning, we hiked freezing cold and dehydrated to our car. We drove into the nearest town to fill up on anything we could stuff our faces with and the first thing we see, back into the closest semblance to civilization, is a black bear in a cage downtown.

Hopefully Heather and I will have better luck on our camp out tonight!

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