Yo-yo, walking the dog

A pug beagle mix is the newest adventure in my life. After a few May and June mini-hikes on weekends, I wanted to add more exercise the rest of the week. Tuesday night, Maddy's boyfriend Jiff came over. I fed the two teens hot dogs, and we watched "Notting Hill", a bland romantic comedy. Jiff's mom has a dog that doesn't get to go for walks very often, and suddenly, despite my complete inexperience with canines, I felt an inspiration: I could walk Hilda's dog!

Hilda was surprised that i wanted to, and was happy to have it done, yet irritated that it would involve answering the door early in the morning. I took Jiff along in case I needed a technical consult, and my daughter Maddy accompanied us to make sure that we didn't talk about her. (As if the two people who know her best could have anything more to discover.)

When we arrived, Hilda didn't clip the leash on all of the way, and Sophie-Pup escaped between our legs and out of the front door. Jiff raced after her, but he slipped and skinned his arm on the driveway, allowing her a head start that took three blocks to overcome. Maddy and I met him halfway as he was carrying her back, and he clipped the leash on, then handed her over to me. We walked a scant mile, and it all went well, despite her almost constant muscular pulling and testing. A very short length seemed to work best, with occasional pauses to calm down before continuing. -- Maddy was horrified by the pooper scooping obligation.

Thursday and Friday I tackled it on my own. Walked farther, and faster, and talked to other ladies with pooches in the park. Today I got to see duckings, and a graceful blue heron. Sohie-Pup wanted to swim out to them, but I didn't allow it.

Orgone Energy

Last weekend I went on a jaunt to Central Point Oregon. My daughter would insist on calling it a "road trip". She perceives neither the redundancy nor the hippie, sixties --as opposed to a drug "trip"-- implications of that bit of folksiness.

For the last month the buzz from my fellow Healthfoodians had been

Or-e-gon, oregon

and

Ya goin'?

My response had been: Ashland is far away, and camping implies mosquitos. I hadn't even considered the olfactory implications of porta-potty perdition. As the date grew closer, my buddy Dianne offered me a ride, and said that she already had a room reserved; a room, not camping. It all started to sound a little better. D's husband had been planning to go, but he's not manically obsessed with all that is raw and vegan and counting coconuts one by one, so he was thrilled to stay at home and not need to hire babysitters for their pets as long as D had company on the drive.

I swam in the mornings and then went to lectures about coconuts and raw pastry-making. There was a film about conscious birth and conception, and a workshop on growing your own oyster mushrooms. There were a couple of two-hour talks by David Wolf. Both times the schedule keeper eventually cut him off. He still had more to say. I met a few people from my online world, and, as most of you will probably know from your own experiences: they walk and talk EXACTLY the way that they type. It was a meeting of big personalities, where everyone had a chance to strut their stuff as celebrities of varying degree.

Mushroom cultivation overlapped with RawFu in the schedule, so I walked in after Fu started. "Oh My God, it's Bunny Berry!" "OMG, it's Priss!" Trooper Bunny handled my interruption with grace, and got back to her focus on self-acceptance and smoothies, even if you live in the deep-fried South.

Of course I took pictures.



Rock formation near Medford OR.




Local flora


With my roommate Dianne


David Wolf and I are like this.


OMG, Bunny Berry irl.