los angeles times is fun times

dearest internet, it has been an unusually large number of miles since we talked.

look! it's the coast! abbie took this near big sur. doesn't it look like a place you'd live if you were famous?


of course, one drawback would be that nerds would take pictures of themselves on or near your front lawn:


after we drove some more, we got to los angeles. we were in a bit of a hurry to get to the big football game, where abbie's talented brother max was demonstrating his mad drum skillz amongst the USC band.

but! there was a problem. max had left us some tickets, but we had trouble getting in touch with the nice people who were holding them. so we entertained ourselves by wandering USC's mostly empty campus. observe:

(us waving sadly at a mirror)


(blending in)


(contemplating the wreckage)


(being sad that we didn't get to see max)


but, towards the end of the first half (and just as USC started to really put the hurt on ohio state), the nice people got through to us, and suddenly, we were in!


(fight on)


(click on this for a better look at max's mug)


(plumage!)


if possible, living with max and his roommates was yet funner than the game. they let us relive the college experience that we never actually had in the first place. and they have a cool apartment. note that tanks are not allowed.


here's max with blake and nick. they're both drummers in the band too, in addition to being both fine and upstanding. (not pictured: jared, who is often not pictured.)


one day, we went shopping to get abbie some dress clothes. you can imagine how that went. but the boys bought some art! so that was exciting. bonus points if you can name the work/artist.


and we even got jared in this one!


we were truly sad to leave those boys. but they needed to get back to leading their rockstar lives (slash studying), so we went to joshua tree national park. it's in the desert, and it rules. blah blah blah, again, pictures don't do it justice. here's a sunrise drive we took.


and here's a video from the resurrected flip!



and here's our campsite. notice several rocks.


and finally, a shot that includes the actual joshua trees.


thanks to all who made our LA times so fantastic, and to the many folks we weren't able to see. we look forward to a return visit soon.

we love you, internet! sorry for being out of touch. we will write again soon.

fall, and people we love

san francisco was so much fun. for one thing, the leaves were changing colors!


but the leaves were not the best part of san francisco. we got to see lots of people.


first, we got to spend a truly lovely afternoon and evening with page and her fiance, kevin. they let us hang out in their beautiful apartment all day talking, listening to music, eating really good food, watching cute cooking shows, and painting their kitchen green.


kevin also made us tasty ginger drinks with limes. i wish i had a taken a picture of one of those. and a picture of kevin, who had cute bits of paint in his hair. anyway, it was a great day and we were so happy to get to spend time with an old friend, and a new one.

another night, we drove to san rafael to see our friend adam. we drank wine at a fancy wine place and ate delicious puerto rican food in a restaurant painted bright green. we had a lot of fun talking about teaching, students, books, and music. here's a self-timed picture taken in adam's apartment. sam and i are hidden in the enormous, comfortable couch.


we were also lucky enough to be able to spend an afternoon with sarah's aunt carolyn.


a few years ago, carolyn let me live with her for two or three weeks while i was looking for an apartment in san francisco. i love her house.


she made a beautiful lunch,


which we ate outside in her garden.


after lunch, we went for a walk through her neighborhood. this involved lots of stairs, a panoramic view of the city, a canyon,


and some blackberry thickets.


sometimes you really had to get in there.


but this was the reward!


and this.


after eating lots of blackberries, we left glen park for russian hill, where we got to see my cousins josh and andrew.


they took us to a great sushi restaurant where we drank sapporo and sake and talked about all kinds of things. it was great to see them.


this bay area adventure was made possible by my generous and trusting aunt linda and uncle mike, who let us stay in their beautiful, comfortable house while they were out of town. it wasn't as great as it would have been if they were there, but it was pretty great. i don't know if they even know about the blog, but if you're reading this,


and thank you page, kevin, josh, andrew, adam, and carolyn, for making time to see us and for making our time in san francisco so much fun.

just another coast post

Well, hello there, internet! Long time no see.

What's that you say? You'd like to know what our excuse is for abandoning you for almost two weeks? You've been forced to do stuff like watch political conventions and evacuate your homes just to have something to do while you waited for this post?

We are so sorry. We spent many of those days in internet-free (read: barbaric) zones... and then on the days that we had it, we neglected you so that we could frantically refresh weather websites while we watched Gustav make his approach. Please forgive us.

We left off right before the Hoh rainforest. It was neato. Maybe the most beautiful campsite so far: right next to the Hoh river, which is steely gray and whose banks are argillaceous with what they call "glacial flour," which is the superfine dust that rocks turn into when a glacier rolls over them. The campsite was also very sunny, with views of the misty valley, for maybe the first twenty minutes. Would that we had taken some photos then! We wasted those precious moments setting up the tent (which had been drenched thoroughly, inside and out, at our previous, hellish campsite).

So yeah, we finished setting up the tent, and then watched it steam in the early afternoon sun while we patted ourselves on the back, even as an insidious vapor crept over the ridge... and proceeded to soak us for the next twelve hours or so.

It probably would have been weird to visit one of the world's few temperate rainforests in any other than its natural state. But it meant that we didn't take so many pictures. Here's one that I stole from the internet. It's from a part of the park called the hall of mosses, and it was my favorite part. The big old trees with all their moss really did make you feel enclosed, albeit grandly, like in a woody cathedral.


Blah blah blah picture doesn't do it justice blah blah.

Then we went to Portland! That was fun. My beloved mother-in-law welcomed us, entertained us, and allowed us to use her laundry facilities.

Then we went to Cannon Beach! That was also fun. You might remember that we went there with Kevin for a couple of hours. Well, it was just as cool the second time. Plus, we got to surprise Eddie, who thought we were still up on the Olympic peninsula. Abbie gets a kick out of surprising him, and her mother is an expert accomplice. We were waiting at the bar when they appeared at one of Cannon Beach's fine restaurants. He made it seem like it was a happy surprise.

We spent a night there, and walked around on the beach in the morning. Photo credit: G-lo.



Hello! This is Abbie now.

It was so much fun to see my parents, if only for a little while. We were sad to say goodbye. We also had to say goodbye to Bobbie and Anna and Ruby again, because they got to their house at Cannon Beach (which they had kindly let us stay in the night before) just as we were leaving.

And so we headed back out and made our way to Eugene, Oregon, where we watched some of the convention, worked on law school applications (Sam wrote an amazing personal statement!), got the car window fixed after someone smashed it, and went to a fun Saturday market where we got raspberries, blackberries, and some chocolate cheesecake.

After a smashing time in Eugene (ha ha!) we headed for the Oregon Dunes National Recreation Area. There was one site left at the campground, and it was maybe my favorite one yet -- a little clearing in the trees.


And, just a short walk from the campsite were these beautiful dunes!


We rolled down them and got really sandy.


Also, Sam did some frolicking.


It was really cold out there, so Sam got some wood and built us a fire, which we stared into for an hour or two.


The next day, we made it all the way to another state!


We saw lots of beauty, including giant redwoods, a black sand beach, and the Mendocino coast. Despite all the beauty, we were feeling a little out of sorts, because Gustav was heading for New Orleans and we were far away and out of touch. So we decided to stay in civilization for a few days so we could use our phones and watch CNN. We pulled over in Eureka, California and stayed in a hotel for a couple of nights.

Once the storm had passed, I continued to watch CNN, which was not necessarily a good thing. Sam started back in on his applications and made a lot of progress, which was a good thing.

California 1 continued to be beautiful and winding all the way to San Francisco. We stopped to camp in a state park that had some sunbathing seals. We also stopped in Point Reyes Station to get some cheese at the Cowgirl Creamery and talk about the election with the locals.

We are happy to be in the bay area and will write more about it soon. Meanwhile, we hope you are all doing well. We love and miss you.