You know what the Mexicans say about the Pacific?

Good news on the procreation front. Our doctor, who rocks, has identified the problem. Apparently there is a critical low of progesterone. Thankfully the treatment is simple and 97% effective. Elaine will take supplementary doses until the placenta takes over and that should carry the pregnancy to term. Knowing the cause, and thus knowing that we can fix it makes this soooo much easier. Hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things, and no good thing ever dies.

The quiet things that no one ever knows

I had a dream yesterday afternoon. I dreamt that I had three fish tanks and all the tanks were connected by a series of tunnels. I was watching the tanks trying to make sure the fish were ok. For some reason a squid had gotten into the tanks. Since they were freshwater tanks I watched in disbelief thinking that the squid couldn’t survive in the tanks but the squid showed no adverse effects. I watched helpless as the squid moved quickly into the farthest tank on the left. In that tank were two dwarf Gourami’s they were both weak and the squid immediately pounced on them and ate them both as I pounded on the lid of the tank trying futilely to make it stop. Once the squid had finished with the fish it buried itself into the sand on the bottom of the tank apparently waiting for another fish to swim in. I grabbed the tank and sloshed it around trying to get the squid to swim out. My actions only stirred up the sand and revealed the body of a small sculpin that had died previously. The squid had only been temporarily dislodged from the sand and it reached over and grabbed the fish, a previous victim I believe, and reburied itself. Then I woke up then leaving the dream with the undying squid in the sand waiting and me powerless to do anything about it.
The meaning of the dream is simple. The fish are my children, the tank is my wife and the squid is the nameless undying thing that takes my children each in succession.
This is our second miscarriage. They were twins, most likely identical. I never thought about twins and indeed I never knew I had any particular desire for twins until they told us Elaine was carrying twins. I realized immediately that it was something I wanted and probably always had wanted. Identical twins especially were a hearts desire I never knew I had until now. It makes the loss all the more heartbreaking. It is a 1 in 100 chance to have twins, 1 in 100. To achieve and lose that is like winning an important contest and then finding out a week latter that because of a technicality the prize was sent back to the manufacturer. My initial response was despair and rage. Now I am just spent.
My feeling now is best summed up in the verse “Though he slay me yet I will follow Him.” But sometimes it’s so bitter…so bitter.

So keep the blood in your head

And keep your feet on the ground

If today's the day it gets tired

Today's the day we drop out

“I am from Canada and I have never seen anything like that.”

As I previously stated, I just returned from California. I went down for a week to visit friends from college. I could describe the trip in greater detail but there isn’t much to say, we did what we always do. It was a good trip, but short. It’s unfortunate that the people you love the most end up being the people the furthest away. We spent most of the trip in San Diego and drove from there home in one straight shot.
We drove through the night, the only incident of interest happening in Kettleman City.
I have stopped there every time I have driven from southern California to Portland for several reasons. First, it is the last In-N-Out you will see heading north out of LA and second, it is spaced perfectly for refueling.
We pulled in at about 11:45 to the chevron and I began to fuel the car while Elaine went in to grab me a soda and use the bathroom.
The Chevron gas station is joined to McDonalds, together forming a rectangle parallel to the freeway. There are four gas pumps in front with parking in the front and on one side where there are also bathrooms. The complex sits on a corner with roads in front of the pumps and then running downhill on the side opposite the bathrooms
While I was fueling, there was a white passenger van and a small Honda(?) with tinted windows parked down by the bathrooms with a group of guys standing around. These guys started to get really worked up about something but since I don’t speak Spanish I had no idea what was going on. At this point another guy walks out of the convenience store and, as soon as he sees the crowd by the bathroom, turns on his heel and flees, disappearing around the side of the McDonalds. The crowd by the cars sees the guy running and raised a shout, then piled into their cars and peeled out after him; the white van going around one side of the McDonalds and the car going around the other to head him off. As the cars disappear from line of sight a semi going down that road blasts its horn indicating that in his flight the guy had run out into the road.
Once they were gone the guy at the pump across from mine looks at me and says:
Guy: “I am from Canada and I have never seen anything like that.”
Me: “Yeah, I don’t even know what was going on.”
Guy: “Man I don’t have a clue.”
I then went back to waiting for the gas tank to fill. Moments later the guy who had been pursued came back around the corner by the bathrooms with the white van following about fifteen feet behind. The guy on foot had a handgun which he would periodically brandish at the guy in the van trying to get him to back off. The guy with the gun continued to walk up towards the pumps and when he got close enough, opened to driver’s door of our Subaru and jumped in! I immediately rushed forward and jumped into the passenger side, told him to get out, and pushed him out of the car.
He got out and continued to move toward the McDonalds. I at that point got back out of the car, shut the driver’s door and locked the car. By then the guy and the van had moved out of line of sight back around the McDonalds. At that point the other folks at the gas station began to think that maybe it wasn’t such a hot place to be. The few cars there began to peel out, aiming for the freeway. At that point I heard 4 to 5 gunshots fired on the other side of the McDonalds and then the white van rolled by going back up the road.
I waited for Elaine in the car while the Canadian guy left in a panic only to realize he prepaid his gas and return to harass the attendants for his money back (Elaine said he was screaming and cussing her out - and that she though he was the problem!). Elaine and I were the last car to leave and, once we got on the freeway, we saw two squad cars tearing down I-5 South aiming for Kettleman City.

I have always wondered when faced with a dangerous situation if I’d freeze and let fear get the best of me. Now I know that I will be fine. There was a moment when I first saw the gun that I felt myself shake, but it was only momentary. I didn’t leave the pump because the guy was focused on the van and I didn’t want to attract his attention. I didn’t want to be the guy who got people killed because he ran. So, as long as he was only seeing the van we were all relatively safe. When he got into our car I cursed myself for not locking it, but I wasn’t scared. In the fraction of a second before I got in the car I had three things run though my head:
1. An image of Elaine and I stranded in the middle of nowhere.
2. The thought "Not on my watch".
3. The idea that I couldn’t let the guy get away. If he was at the gas station he was contained but if he got away in my car armed and desperate he could hurt other people.

That, in the end, is what made me get in the car. The truth is that when I got in and pushed him, he was already on the way out since he didn’t see keys in the ignition. (Thankfully Elaine insisted that I not leave them in the car - just in case.)

So yeah…Kettleman City



“A Kettleman City gas station turned into a murder scene just before midnight on Tuesday night after a 33-year-old man was shot down by an unknown number of suspects. Kings County Sheriff's deputies were dispatched to the 27500 block of Ward Drive at 11:57 p.m. on a call of shots fired. When they arrived at the Kettleman City Chevron Gas Station, they found an unresponsive Hispanic male suffering from apparent gun shot wounds.Officers pronounced the man dead at the scene.The suspects were last seen fleeing the area in a white passenger van towards Highway 41.Investigators contacted regarding the case would not answer questions regarding the nature of the shooting, stating only that "the case is still being investigated at this time."
Other than his hometown of Portland, Ore. and his age, law enforcement officials are not releasing additional information on the victim until contact can be made with his next of kin. An autopsy on the victim is still pending as of this afternoon.Anyone with information on this case is requested to contact the Kings County Sheriff's Department at 582-3211, ext. 2790.”

- The Sentinel

Well I confess, I don't know what to make from all this mess

So follow the leader down
And swallow your pride and drown
When there's no place left to go

Well I suppose its time for me to reveal my performance on the GRE. I arrived home from California to find the final scores in a pile of mail on the kitchen counter. The results are disappointing, more so than I had initially anticipated. I scored a 600 on the verbal which puts me in the 85 percentile. The result of the math section was a score of 620 with a percentile rank of 65. The essay portion was a 3.5 out of a possible 6 leaving me sadly in the 20 percentile. Overall it was a pretty poor showing. I still am not sure if I should retake it. I suspect I won’t. Now I get to put everything together and try to begin the application process. Next week will be busy with that.
The weather has changed in Oregon. Fog gathers in the hallows now and the air is cold and carries the promise of winters arrival. I am rapidly running out of time. Despite that all I want to do is sleep and dull my mind with pointless diversions.

A nod to the spirits of the past

I am in a Burgerville with Elaine and we are grabbing a quick bite between errands. It’s the location close to my old high school and as a nod to an old tradition and the ghosts I used to share it with I request the two songs out of the jukebox.. The first of these is Land Down Under by The Men At Work then the second comes on.
Elaine: “who is this?”
Jeff: “It’s Toto. The song is Africa.”
Elaine: “I like it.”

Guy sitting with some co-workers several tables away bursts into song: “I guess the rains down in affffrriicca…” Then he says to his co-workers “Good old Toto, they never let you down.”

And then I smile to myself.

Take that King George....

Then

Now

I am a quasi-historical figure. I took part in the Boston Tea Party…I just joined it about 300 years too late. In Boston Harbor is an old sloop (or schooner I can’t remember exactly what kind of ship it was). The ship is a floating museum to the Boston Tea Party complete with historical enactors and fake boxes of tea that you can throw overboard. Since the boxes are tied with ropes to the ship they are never lost and so your participation, as it were, is somewhat of a fraud. So I decided that I would do my part to protest the taxes imposed by the British and toss a spot of tea into the harbor myself. I reached down, grabbed the box and threw. Just as I released the box I heard my sister cry out “Jeff! NO!” But it was too late and as the box flew over the side…the rope tied to it followed…all of the rope that was supposed to secure the box to the ship followed. The rope had been cut. My sister and I watched the tea box drift out into the shipping lane and then out of sight. I proceeded to go below decks and hide.


I was probably around 13 on a long flight to visit my mom’s family in Minnesota. Me and my sister we sitting together in one row and my parents were in another. I was in the middle and my sister was on the isle. The guy in the window seat was this young really tall black guy who was just huge and built like a line backer, all muscle. I only make those observations to fully establish just how great my error was. So early in the flight I fall asleep. Not long after, in a state of only partial wakefulness, I sit up and somehow I think that the guy in the window seat is my dad. So I turn, to him pat him on the arm affectionately and give him a huge idiot grin and then I lean back into my seat and instantly fall back asleep. When I wake up a half hour latter I vaguely remember the incident but can’t tell if it was a dream or it actually happened. The remaining hours of the flight are awkward as hell. It is only as we descend into Minneapolis that I finally get up the courage to ask him if it happened. I only got as far as “Excuse me sir but I was wondering…did I...” before the man erupted into hysterics. He was laughing so hard that he began to cry and could only answer my question by nodding his head. He was really nice about it and didn’t make me feel bad despite the laughing.

Infinite Loop

Picture this if you will:
It’s a nice sunny summer day in Oregon.
Elaine and I are weeding the side-yard.
A high school kid cruises up on his bicycle and stops next to where I am weeding.
Kid: “Hey, can I ask you a question?”
I stop weeding and walk over.
Me: “Sure man, what do you need?”
I am thinking “Sorry bud but I am not buying a magazine subscription, even if it means you won’t earn enough to go on that reward trip to Antigua with the rest of the junior sales team.”
Kid: “Why were the cops here?”
I look up and down the sleepy residential street.
Me: “The cops were HERE?”
Kid: “Yeah, the cops were just here so I rode down to see what was going on.”
Me: “Really? Well sorry man but I haven’t seen any cops.”
Kid: “Yeah, they were just here. Do you know what they were here for?”
Me: “No, I didn’t see any cops. I ran an errand about an hour and half ago so maybe I missed them…or something.”
Kid: “Did you hear anything last night?”
Me: “No, I didn’t hear a thing.”
Kid: “I heard a loud noise…it woke me up. I thought that maybe that’s why the cops were here.”
The kid looks at me imploringly.
Me: “Yeah….well I am a pretty sound sleeper soooo…”
Kid: “So, why were the cops here?”
Me: “Look man, I am really sorry but I didn’t see any cops…at all.”
Kid: “Yeah, well, ‘cause last night I heard a really loud noise. Did you hear it?”
Me: “I…No I didn’t hear a thing. I slept right through the night.”
Kid: “But why were the cops here?”
Me: “Look, I didn’t see any cops. So I have no idea. And I didn’t hear anything last night.”
Kid: “Yeah, it woke me up. Did you hear it?”
At that point I begin to worry, there is no exit strategy for this type of conversation…it becomes an infinite loop driven by undeniable madness.
Me: “I heard nothing.”
Kid: “Well it woke me up and I thought that maybe the cops…”
Me: “I never saw any cops, I never heard any sounds. I really don’t know what to tell you.”
Kid: “There were people outside my bedroom window last night.”
“Possible” I think to myself “but highly unlikely.”
Me: “Well…that’s scary. Did you tell your folks?”
Kid: “Yeah there were three people outside my bedroom window.”
Me: “Three of them….outside your bedroom window?”
Kid: “Yeah it was three girls and they were there and they were naked.”
I think to myself “Well that’s probably the average high school guys dream”, and with this new information I can officially judge this lad’s story a complete fabrication.
Me: “….Nice.”
Kid: “But I’m 17 and I am too mature for girls. I was into girls when I was a kid but I am too mature now for girls.”
The kid regards me as if waiting for me to say something and I just stare back. I am trying to decide whether the presence of a girl weeding with me or the wedding ring on my finger, should be the most compelling clue to this kid that apparently I don’t share his sentiment.*
Kid: “Yeah, my three friends all have girlfriends but they are too young and immature they shouldn’t be dating.”
The kid looks at me for confirmation.
Me: “Look man, I don’t know your friends so I am in no position to evaluate their relative fitness for dating relationships.”
The kid looks at me with distrust and I raise my palms in a helpless “What the hell did you expect gesture?”
Kid: “Well I am 17 so I am too mature for a girlfriend.”
Me: “Hey, if that helps you sleep at night.”
Kid: “Well last night, did you here anything?”
Me: “Nope! No noises, no cops and as it so happens my bedroom window was not graced by a parcel of naked chicks.”
Kid: “I rode down here because I saw cops.”
Me: “Indeed. Well I have to get back….you know weeding and all.”
I turn to go
Kid: “But WHY were the cops here?”
Me: “If they show up again I’ll be the first to ask.”
Kid: But did you hear anything last night?”
Me: “No. Have a good day.”
The kid mumbles something unintelligible and rides off up the street.

When I told Ryan this story he began to laugh and asked if I had some sort of sign on my back that invites crazy people to talk to me. I thought about it and, yes, I do attract the crazies. Let’s, just for kicks, review the highlights.
Ferret-loving drunks: where cheap wine and weasels meet.
Crazy women who want to use animals as punishment: why abuse just children or animals when we can do both at the same time!
The effortlessly confused, picture illiterate people.
That homeless guy who insisted I owed him two dollars because I “lost a bet” about whether or not he could remove his prosthetic eye.
The other homeless guy who told the junior higher in my charge to “bleed me like a stuck pig” if I were an adult.
That guy in the waiting room who chose me out of five other people to address a highly cryptic somewhat incriminating philosophical non-sequitor immediately following which he went back to reading his book and ignoring me.
My high school stalker; thanks for the awkward memories, and scores of guilt trip laden letters.
Those are just a few of my many experiences with the less mentally settled segment of our society. But hey, at least I never got felt up in Santa Monica. (That’s right buddy, all of us got ammo.)