He's Still Father Caeled From The Block

Days Walking - 87

Not long after our mid-day break, we were heading back to follow the road, and this red jalopy of an oversized pickup truck goes zooming by, way too fast, and he's got a small tree (as trees go) in the bed of his truck. Like twice the size of your average Christmas tree, its ass bound in burlap. Now, this tree is not properly secured, and it's flopping around losing branches.

This is odd for several reasons, but mostly because you just don't drive crummy vehicles on this road. This road kills and eats vehicles for brunch.

Being self-appointed road wardens, we grab the fallen branches and throw them off the road. I can just imagine an eighteen wheeler hitting them, gooey with happy new sap, skidding off the road and killing three or four of us. No thanks.

Oh - We've also been cleaning up what litter we find, have I mentioned that? We pack the small items of discarded stuff we find with our own lugged refuse, and rotate who carries it. Yes, we are geeky, environmental hikers. Some stuff we find is too big to worry about, but we try to do our part.

('Leave No Trace' is so utterly opposed to the typical capitalist consumer, American-Dream World-Domination worldview that perhaps it should become a philosophy/religion ala Scientology. Like 'An it Harm None, Do What Ye Will' but without the taint of PopWicca. As a philosophy, I like the idea of "Have fun, and clean up your mess." a lot better than fire, brimstone, and original sin.)

The most priceless item of litter was this paper coffee cup from 7-11, with a 'Police Use Only' imprint on it. First of all, I didn't know that cops got their own special cups - Do they get free coffee? Secondly, where the hell is there a 7-11 around here? Thirdly, who litters with a cop cup, I mean dayum.

So a few short minutes after the red jalopy truck, a National Park Service truck comes by and beckons us: "Have you seen a vehicle recently carrying a stolen tree?" While enjoying an internal grin-and-chuckle at the situation, we politely described the vehicle for the officers. I think they'll catch the thief, it's not like there are a lot of side-streets he can sneak away on.

(At least they didn't seem concerned about our presence, whew!)

It seems that some rare varieties of spruce trees are in danger of theft - I've heard of such things in Los Angeles, where people import crazy expensive trees from far-flung lands, only to have them ripped out of their yard in the night. They've begun hiding a LoJack like device in their expensive trees to help track them to the evil tree thief lair, no I'm not joking.

We took a reading of 51° today. We've started seeing some black flies but haven't noticed any mosquito's yet. It gets down to the 20's at night, so hopefully the bugs are dying off at night, and the ones we see by day are newly spawned. I'm not looking forward to dealing with the insect problem.

We keep a nightly watch now, since the sighting of Mr. Toothy a few days ago. I'd been lobbying for a night-time watch since we started the hike, but you know how some people are - until there's a problem, an ounce of prevention seems like too much.

Caeled is my usual Watch partner. We're tenting together now, and I'm happy about that. I've given up on the idea of talking to Adrian about the awkward kiss thing. What's the use of explaining why he's wrong and why I'm right, if he doesn't want to listen.

Adrian and I are talking, just not talking about anything important. When we turn to find the other person right there - which happens pretty damned often, he launches into some random schpiel. As if he's thinking ahead - "Ok, now if I have to talk to Litany, what will I say? How about if I joke about that Seinfeld episode I saw once? Yeah that'll be great."

Caeled's suddenly in love with a certain phrase, and he'll say it at every opportunity. Whether it's appropriate or not. "Hey Caeled, have you seen the water filter?" works, but "What kind of slop do you want for dinner?" does not. He's like a broken, enthusiastic Magic 8 Ball.

He doesn't seem to mind, though. Caeled's a funny guy, and I'm glad he's with us. He's a deep thinker with an intuitive perception and a skewed sense of humor. He'd make a good priest.

"Father Caeled, what you think about the afterlife?
Will our loved ones be waiting for us on the Other Side?"

"Fo Shizzle, Mah Bizzle!"

Good to know.

Litany Webb, signing off

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