Long day of driving today. I left Vancouver this morning at 9 AM - right on schedule - and started making my way east. My GPS was being annoying and saying that Washington State Road 20 did not connect to itself somewhere in the North Cascade Mountains, so it initially tried to take me way out of my way, which I knew was wrong. But I had some time fighting with it trying to decide which route to actually take over to east Washington. I stopped at a Starbucks to get Wi-Fi (my phone didn't have any cell service while still in Canada) in order to confirm with Google (who I trust more than my car's GPS), that the road was indeed open. So I ended up spending a good portion of the day with my GPS telling me that I had to turn around and then recalculating the route every 30 seconds or so. That was fun.
Anyway, I got out of Canada with no problems - there was a bit of a wait at the border, but the guy didn't question me as much as the woman going into Canada did. He was still a little shocked and confused by the fact that this was my 40th day on the road and asked what I did for a job that I could take that amount of time off.
I had a number of errands that I had to run while still in western Washington. I knew there wouldn't be many stores once I made the turn east. So I stopped at a mall to get a new pair of sunglasses, a Home Depot for a pair of work gloves for horseback riding (although the Home Depot didn't have any, so then I had to find a Lowe's), and a western wear store for a new hat - my straw one died a few years ago and I refuse to wear a black felt hat in summer, so I didn't bring that one on the trip. I also stopped for gas and broke my "No Fast Food" rule and picked up some chicken strips and ice cream from Dairy Queen. Although, I made up for it by buying some local strawberries at a stand on the side of the road.
A long afternoon of driving followed all the stops - really pretty scenery. Waterfalls and lakes and canyons and mountains - just beautiful. Two of the libraries came through with my Harry Potter book 6 request, but it was after I left this morning, and I didn't have a consistent 3G signal for the whole drive, so I could only download the first couple chapters. I did manage to get through 4 1/2 chapters of listening to it though and I'll be able to finish downloading it here at the ranch. I tried listening to a couple other audiobooks that I had downloaded and just couldn't get into them at all. The one I totally hated - I think it was like a religious romance novel or something - so not my thing. And there was one about Shaker's that I just couldn't get into. And then Night Circus, which I may try again at some point, but after one chapter, I was totally confused as to who the characters were, so that's when I gave up. Note to authors - I need to be enraptured by the first chapter, otherwise I give up - I don't try to power through. Maybe this is why I don't read. And when I'm listening to a couple of these books, I'm always thinking to myself "I could write better than this. Well, maybe with some practice anyways." I don't really remember doing too much creative writing back in school. I'm sure I did some - I just can't remember it. So I don't know what my process would be - just start writing and see where it leads, or map it all out and then flesh out the language for the story that I've already mapped out. Maybe I'll try some creative writing something or other soon. So many ideas.
Anyway, because I had so many errands to run this morning, I ended up skipping the two wineries that I was planning on going to in order to stay on scheduled. I got to the ranch around 6:30, which was half an hour ahead of my original plan. Maybe I could have stopped at at least one of those wineries. But it was good to be able to start to catch up with people before dinner at 7:00 anyways. Life at the ranch here is always fun - nice and laid back - very casual. We had dinner and then just hung out. I drank a bottle of wine. Yup. And there was a fire in the firepit where some people made s'mores. Horseshoes and football, hanging out and talking. All good things. Looking forward to getting back on a horse tomorrow.
I don't know if I'll write individual blog posts every night while I'm here or if I'll condense them into a single entry. I guess we'll see. Probably depends on how much I have to say. Good to be here whichever way.
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