let the countdown begin!

Technically it's already begun—you've probably noticed that cute little widget over on the right. However, the gears have finally meshed. Two days ago I received my passport back from the Korean Consulate General in Los Angeles, stamped with a shiny new E-2 work visa classifying me as a "foreign instructor," and guaranteeing me a one-year sojourn. This was the last piece of paperwork that I needed. I can flash this little honey in the faces of the Korean immigration officials, waltz through customs, and enter South Korea as a legal immigrant. All of my ducks are in a row. I could leave tomorrow if they wanted me.

But they want me on February 7. After a little jockeying, some back-and-forth nonsense, a glut of vacillation and a smidgen of misinformation, the date of my departure was finalized. I am, needless to say, tremendously excited. The contents of my room (stuffed into way too many heavy cardboard boxes) are safely tucked away in a storage unit in town. My suitcases are half-packed, and all the equipment I'm bringing with me has been inventoried and set aside. Decks of cards (three normal decks and a pinochle set); my grooming kit; shoeshine supplies; hat brushes; journals and notebooks; battery chargers; plug adapters; packs of gum; medicines and taco seasoning; and, perhaps most important of all, books. I've got all my cocktail recipe books with me, and some stuff about card games, and my Worst Case Scenario: Travel guide.

And then are the works of fiction I've selected. Sapsucker that I am, I neglected to choose these volumes before packing up my personal library, so I had to go back through the boxes and mine these buggers out of the tenebrous depths.

They are:

• The Great Shark Hunt by Hunter S. Thompson
• Frankenstein by Mary Shelley
• Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad
• Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe
• Skeletons on the Zahara by Dean King, which I'm reading now.

I've read Heart of Darkness before, but that was years ago, in school, and I didn't pay it much attention because I was too busy trying to avoid having my upper body dunked into a trash can. Like Moby-Dick, I have attempted to read Frankenstein repeatedly, but always petered out near the end of the first chapter. The Great Shark Hunt (also known as The Gonzo Papers, Volume One) is Thompson's true account of his adventures as a drug-addled gonzo journalist in a country turned upside-down by chemicals, counterculture, rock 'n' roll, political corruption, and war. (The Sixties, in other words.) Skeletons on the Zahara is likewise nonfiction: a tale of woe, desperation, suffering and privation regarding the crew of the American brig Commerce, shipwrecked off the coast of West Africa in 1814 and sold into slavery by Saharan nomads.  It's pretty good so far. Should be a good read on the plane, if I don't finish it before that.

Speaking of books, I am so far behind on my book reviews that it ain't even funny. Okay, maybe it is a bit funny. But that's beside the point. I'll spare you a long, dull, wordy series of reviews that you undoubtedly wouldn't have the patience to read. Instead, I'll review each book in one sentence:

• Starship Troopers by Robert A. Heinlein: A breathlessly suspenseful epic and yet also a sinewy and hard-lined analysis of patriotism, military service, war, and human conflict, in the guise of a rollicking good science fiction tale about well-trained space soldiers in powered armor battling hideous alien bugs. 9/10
• Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer: Journalist and inveterate traveler Krakauer details and examines the life, motivations, adventures and ultimate downfall of the ill-fated super-tramp Christopher McCandless. 9/10
• Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas by Hunter S. Thompson: An excoriating satire of drug culture, chemically-enhanced ramblings, and late 20th-century vice in the world's most sinful city—sportswriter Raoul Duke and his Samoan lawyer, Dr. Gonzo, speed off to Las Vegas in a giant red convertible and a trunk full of drugs to cover a motorcycle race. 8/10
• Black Like Me by John Howard Griffin: A powerful, gut-wrenching, no-holds-barred peek into the lives of black folks in the American South in 1959...seen through the eyes of white novelist Griffin himself, who darkened his skin artificially and set off to the South to find out the truth about the "Negro Problem." The truth is viscerally shocking. 7/10

There. Now you know what I've been reading. Incidentally, I've never read any of these books before. I don't know what took me so long to get around to Starship Troopers. Perhaps it was the awful movie adaptation. Thankfully I set my prejudice aside and read the book, which, as I understand, is required reading at West Point, and a great favorite among the 75th Ranger Battalion (the guys who fought through hell in Mogadishu in 1993). Now if only Barack Obama and the Democratic Party would read it...[sigh]...

And finally, since I will become an immigrant (emigrant?) in ten days, I'll leave you with a little song. Yes, yes, I know. I should be using "The Final Countdown" or something, but I hate that song. So take it away, Zep.

cocktail review no. 51 - Old Groaner

(I've decided that I'm going to start posting these reviews on Thursdays, now, so you slobs have time to go out and buy ingredients before Friday night hits, if you so desire.)

One of the main reasons I love The Bartender's Bible above all other drinkin' books is: it concerns itself with recipes rather than methods. Gary Regan merely delineates a few basic bar-keeping tips and lists some equipment a home bartender might need, and then gets straight to the point. One-thousand and one cocktails make their home within the Bible's leaves, and you can still stow the volume in your pocket if needs be.

The recipes are stratified by liquor rather than being arranged alphabetically. There's a chapter on tequila, a chapter on rum, etc., etc. This means, then, that regardless of whatever particular tipple you might be in the mood for (brandy, bourbon, Scotch, tropical drinks, hot drinks, beer and wine concoctions, whatever), you can simply turn to that section of the book and pick a likely candidate.

All manner of hidden gems are concealed within the pages of The Bartender's Bible. The Old Groaner is one of them. For months, nay, eons I've wanted to mix and sample this one, but have not, due to a conspicuous lack of amaretto. "Old Groaner" is a strange name, and like most of the cocktails I've run across, no explanation for it seems to be forthcoming. For some reason the phrase immediately reminded me of the image above, which is actually the album cover for Led Zeppelin IV. The painting on the album cover has no name as far as I'm aware; it is merely a 19th-century oil painting purchased from an antique shop in Reading, Berkshire, England, by Zep's lead singer Robert Plant. It was affixed to the wall of a decaying urban house and then photographed for the cover of the band's fourth studio album. Zep had decided beforehand that there'd be no name, title, or any information whatsoever on that cover. They were so fed up with all the flak they'd caught for Led Zeppelin III that they decided to do something almost totally anonymous. Guitarist Jimmy Page came up with an esoteric symbol to represent his name and affixed it to the inner sleeve and record label of the vinyl album. He asked his fellows to do the same. Thus the symbolic and renowned codename of Led Zeppelin was born:

But I didn't come here to tell you that.

Let's hear about the Old Groaner:

• 2 ounces Canadian whisky
• ½ amaretto

Pour both ingredients into an old-fashioned glass half-filled with ice cubes. Stir well.

Now, I wonder: how do you, dear reader, believe a cocktail composed of Canadian whisky and Italian almond-flavored liqueur would taste?

Like whiskey and almond.

Seriously. That's it.

But that's all it needs to be. Two ingredients doesn't lend itself to gustatory variety, I know. Often, however, some species of synergy evolves from a simple blend of two or three ingredients in a cocktail glass. Nobody would expect a whiskey sour to be merely base liquor, lemon juice, sugar, and garnish. It tastes like Mount Olympus put to music.

So does the Old Groaner. There's a strong almond nose and the flavor is a moderate nutty kick, moderated by the burnished peat in the whiskey. The aftertaste is spicy and hot, all Black Velvet smoothness. The effect is intoxicating (so to speak): an amalgamation of the best that the aqua vita can offer, combined with a delicious overtone of sweet almond. 

Simple? Yes. Unoriginal? No way. Tasty? Quite. Unique? Very. Exceptional? That's up to you. The Old Groaner gets a 7 for flavor, a 10 for simplicity and maybe a 3 or 4 for inspiration; but an 11 for enjoyment. I'd thought that amaretto and whiskey weren't meant to mix; but first impressions can be dangerous. (So it's best to sample a drink once or twice or even three times, you know; it took me two or three sips to really make up my mind.) You could also try it with vodka or rum; something sweet would let the amaretto really kick through.

But who am I to judge? 

[gulp]

inside the box: or, how I got my first rejection slip

When asked, "What do you read?", Stephen King replies, "Everything I can get my hands on."

In truth, King does a lot more than that. He buys audio books and listens to them in his car whenever he drives somewhere.
"Come on," he says, "how many times do you need to listen to Deep Purple's 'Highway Star'?"

Good thing I'm not all that fond of Deep Purple. I suppose Led Zeppelin would hardly make an adequate substitute, though.

I suppose it makes good sense for a writer—even a published, internationally famous one—to immerse himself or herself in reading material. Even stuff that isn't strictly related to the author's preferred genre can help. By constantly reading (and writing), King is keeping his skills sharp. He's seeing what's out there. He's getting a feel for his craft. He's learning from his fellow authors and their scribbles. Constant exposure never hurts when you're trying to learn something and/or stay good at it.

Apparently I don't read enough science fiction, then.

Ladies and gentlemen, the Postman has received his first rejection slip.

Well, okay, it wasn't my first. More like the second. Okay, third. Okay, eleventh. (Nah, I'm kidding, it really was only the second slip I've ever received, honest.) But it was the first one I got from a fiction magazine, and that's what counts. Fiction is where I intend to make my mark. And on September 30, 2010, Fantasy & Science Fiction magazine sent me a wake-up call. My short story, entitled "Wrong Life-Form, Genius" has officially been rejected.

The editor, good man that he is, wrote me a personal note instead of sending a form letter. He explained that though my story was "a good try" and that F&SF is "always looking for humor," my story was "too obvious."

Okay, I could see that. My story concerns two Earthmen assigned to make contact with the sentient crystalline life-forms of a nearby exoplanet, only to discover, at the end, after spending twenty pages trying to communicate with a chunk of crystal using interpretive dance and impressionist art, that it's actually the sunflowers of this world which are the sentient ones.

Puerile, yes, but I had a lot of fun writing it.

This was a test shot, anyway. I'd read an issue or two of F&SF, and had heard plenty about their submission standards on the Internet, but I wanted to assay the market in person. I thought I'd whip up something short and sweet and submit it before I sent them any of my big honking novelettes. I thought "Wrong Life-Form, Genius" might have a decent chance of being published, so I put the finishing touches on it, packaged it and sent it off.

Well, here's my answer.

It wasn't as though I didn't approach the writing seriously. I was earnestly attempting to construct a character-driven story, with a point, premise, purpose and plot, and all those other P-words which the best sci-fi stories possess. What I've noticed about my favorite sci-fi writers is that they were observant. They perceived the faults and oddities of the civilizations they were a part of, and satirized these societal shortcomings in their stories, using clever and creative metaphors. H.G. Wells lampooned the inherently bestial nature of human beings with The Island of Dr. Moreau; John W. Campbell, Jr. explored trust, survival instincts and collaboration in crisis with his spine-tingling "Who Goes There?"; and Poul Anderson had a great deal to say about identity, freedom, interpersonal relationships and independence in "Call Me Joe."

What I had with "Wrong Life-Form, Genius" was the form of a dramatic, metaphorical, quote-unquote "deep" sci-fi story...but not substance, nor the subtlety to conceal it. I had a story, simple as it was. I had a climax. I had a conclusion. I even had a sort of metaphorical premise, though poor and underrepresented. (The story was intended to show up humanity's abject lack of knowledge about extraterrestrial life, and the futility of attempting to predict the nature of said life...or plan the methods by which we might interact with it.)

But I failed to develop matters fully. I wrote it on the spur of the moment, focusing on the humor and dialogue instead of the story itself. Without planning things out, without taking time to brainstorm the methods I would use to tease the meaningful elements out of the basic tale, I wound up with a substandard bit of drivel. The result, naturally, was "obvious," as F&SF's editor put it. I'd written an anticlimactic and pointless story, with no underlying meaning and a sadly predictable outcome.

I will admit to being...let's see...moderately bummed out by the rejection letter. It was my first (well, second), after all. And I'd honestly thought that "Wrong Life-Form, Genius" had had a shot. It curdled my insides to hear some stranger judging my precious little story. I was embarrassed, discouraged, disconsolate.

I didn't stay that way for long, though. I hadn't been too emotionally invested in the work. (I wrote it on the spur of the moment, remember? In a coffeehouse, sitting across from my best friend to boot. I wrote it basically to make him laugh.) It was just a silly little chunk of humorous fiction, sent off on a whim. That made the rejection easier to take.

And easier to learn from. It wasn't but five minutes before I was analyzing my story, my writing process, examining the manifest of my train of thought, sussing out what I'd done wrong and what I could do better next time. I still had four or five longer stories I was working on, which I did seriously hope to get published. This was no time to be feeling down in the dumps. It was time to start perfecting my other works, based on what I'd learned from this rejection. After all, what are you supposed to when you fall down?

That's right, guys. You get right back up on the, uh, horse.

What do I lack? I asked myself. I sat around and drank alcohol and puzzled until my puzzler was sore. Then I made up my mind. I lack focus. I'm fine with actually writing the story, but I'm getting too hung up on the minor mechanics and ignoring the big picture, the story as a whole, the grand design behind the veil. I'm so blinded by the details that I'm overshooting the inspiration necessary to create a unique and multifaceted masterpiece, and as a result, my stories are turning out to be puerile and obvious. They lack meaning, worth, complexity, subtlety. They don't have the deeper context, the satirical punch, the masterful sophistication of story and plot and character which make better authors' work sizzle.

In short, I need to practice more. I need to write more, and I need to read more, too. Good science fiction will diffuse into my brain through my eyeballs, be analyzed by a crack team of discerning neurons, and then fall down the dusty chute to my fingers, where it will flow back out of my body and onto the blank pages on my laptop screen where it belongs.

No, no, I'm not going to start plagiarizing, smarty-pants. I mean I'm going to get a better feel for my craft, keep abreast of what constitutes "good" and "bad" writing, inspire myself to try for new heights, inundate and imbue my brain with good science fiction, and, like Stephen King, become (and remain) a better writer for it.

By coincidence, I located The Best Science Fiction Stories (Volumes IIA and IIB) in a used bookstore behind the corner gas station a couple of weeks ago.

I also picked up U-Boat Commander, a factual account of a German submariner's service in the Atlantic during World War II; A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess; Winged Pharaoh by Joan Grant; and a couple other miscellaneous novels.

Oh, snap.

Training my inner writer is going to be a blast.

I intend to read through these stories (penned by known and unknown authors) and consider them carefully. And then, employing their best elements and most effective devices, I'll revise my own nascent projects.

Wish me luck.

random travel destinations - India

When you think of India, what comes to mind?

Poverty? Overpopulation? Pollution? People with diamonds on their foreheads? Curry?

Slander and calumny. There's so much more to the place than that.

First of all, it ain't just a country. It's a subcontinent.

It's the home of some of the world's rarest animals, including the golden langur and the last remnants of the Asiatic lion.

India is the manufacturer of the world's cheapest car, the Tata Nano, which goes for around $2,000 American dollars. Because of the nutty-bonkers-hundred-percent-off-your-rocker price tag, it's colloquially known as "The People's Car." I remember reading about it in National Geographic a while back, and liking the idea immensely. I remember thinking Huh! Imagine, a small, efficient, cheap car that nearly every family in India can afford! A four-door in every pot!
Speaking of building amazing stuff, another thing I read about in National Geographic was the Golden Quadrilateral, a massive superhighway running all around the subcontinent. It was a massive project, years in the undertaking, but finally finished not long ago. The story of its development read like a small country's revolution.

I've also read that India was home to Asia's first Nobel laureate. And I heard that back in the day some Mughal bigwig built a rather fancy house for his wife. The memory of his wife, to be exact. Crazy, huh?
Oh yeah, and apparently there's people in India who don't truck with victuals, either. Hoopy!
I've heard intoxicating things about India. The railroads that span the entire nation. The deep jungles, where elephants, tigers and (a few) lions still roam. The mystic palaces. Monkeys running up and down the street and bugging you for snacks. Sacred bulls wandering everywhere. Beautiful women with deep, dark eyes, and some of the most colorful clothes seen anywhere on Earth. Epics to rival The Odyssey and Beowulf. Pearls the size of your fist. Veterinary schools that set the world standard. Temperatures that can soar up to 120 degrees in the shade in summer.

As you might have guessed, I'm not so keen on that last part. But the rest of it's incredible. Truth be told, I want to go to India.

To follow in the footsteps of Paul Theroux as that loquacious curmudgeon rode the train down the length of the nation. To see the shores with brand-new eyes, as the first representatives of the East India Trading Company must have, all those hundreds of years ago. Take a dip in the sacred Ganges River. Explore the jungles of Sri Lanka. Beat the heat in Calcutta with a glass of gin. Visit the new deli in New Delhi. Swim with the planet's ugliest dolphins.

Even the mere name speaks bewitchment.

India.

Home of a certain bald-headed troublemaker we all know. Home to over a billion people, some of the finest minds and hardest workers on Earth. Producer of high-grade doctors, soccer players, artisans, chefs, and holy men. A center of religious thought, architectural achievement, military might, cultural development, and historical wonderfulness for thousands of years.Not to mention the setting of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, my second-favorite movie of all time. And, of course, the inspiration for the title of a rather good Led Zeppelin song.

Sorry. I just had to throw that in there.

boy, 5, dunks self in pond

XENIA, OH - An area boy nearly gave himself hypothermia following an accidental dip in a near-frozen pond in Shawnee Park. Andrew, 5, stated that he was running from his father during a friendly game of tag when, as he looked back over his shoulder, he suddenly found himself bobbing up and down in murky green water. Andrew's mother arrived on the scene to find her sopping son wrapped securely in his father's sweater, and Dad freezing his heinie off in the chilly autumn weather. I was originally going to steer clear of old personal anecdotes, partly because of my innate modesty, and partly because of my journalism training (all that stuff's "old news"). However, I have noticed these stories being employed to great effect elsewhere in the blogsphere. So I have amended my previous stance, as they say in Politicspeke, and am now going to start includin' 'em. I was born in Auburn, California. My folks moved around NoCal a bit before making the hop down to the Mojave Desert when I was 19 months old. That's where my brother Harlan was born. We moved east to Ohio shortly thereafter. One of the first places we lived in Ohio was this marvelous little town called Xenia. I wish I remembered more of it, but my memory does not serve me well. I basically remember only one thing from our time in Xenia, and that's the park. Magical sort of place, it was. Seemed to be all rolling hills, green fields, quiet streams, small ponds, stone bridges, and Canada geese. The geese were everywhere. They (literally) flocked to the place during their seasonal migrations. I can remember many lovely autumn afternoons spent watching these geese with my brother and my parents as we strolled through the park. One cold and sunny fall day in 1990, Dad took my brother and me to the park while Mom did the grocery shopping. She dropped us off and left us to our own devices. Soon enough, a game of tag broke out. Harlan and Dad and I were running all over the place, laughing, yelling, leaping about, and breathing the frigid air into our heaving lungs. This is what I remember. Dad had zeroed in on me, and I was doing my darnedest to outdistance him. At five years old, I didn't have much of a chance. I was looking back over my shoulder to determine how rapidly my lead was shrinking, when suddenly... I don't remember actually hitting the water. The last thing I remember is my foot coming down on empty air. The next memory I have is being submerged in one the park's numerous ponds, bobbing up and down on my back, staring at the concrete wall of the pond two feet beneath the surface. There was a metal pipe bolted to the wall; both were smeared with goose droppings. I don't remember being disgusted by this, even though I now knew why the ponds were always so green. I was in the water only a few seconds. Dad must've fished me out in a hurry. The next thing I remember is standing on a park bench as Dad wrapped his voluminous sweater around me. Again, I don't remember being cold. My memory is so poor that only the visual imagery remains. Dad, Harlan and I began to walk to the entrance to the park. Mom pulled up to see Dad, sweater-less and quite chilled, and her eldest son waddling along behind him, wrapped from chin to toes in a huge wool sweater. I must've looked like a tiny priest in a misshapen, oversize cassock. I don't remember anything after that. I didn't get hypothermia; Dad's sweater was huge (and pre-warmed) and thankfully there was no wind. My body temperature was likely already elevated by the spirited game of tag we'd been engaged upon, too. But Dad probably caught hell from Mom anyway, bless her. I know I took a lot of good-natured ragging from Dad and Harlan in the years that followed. Fancy being silly enough to accidentally run into a pond! I'm writing about this for a reason. While we're on the subject of false impressions, it might seem to some of you that I'm a competent person. I lived alone in Korea for a year, I'm learning to fly, I graduated college in 3.5 years (despite switching majors twice), and I've never fallen for any kind of scam or fraud. But nonetheless, these are the kinds of things that happen to me. Unintentionally dunking myself in ponds, I mean. On Saturday I misread the schedule and wound up at bartender's school on the wrong day for the wrong class. After an hour-and-a-half commute, too. I fired an arrow into the wall of my bedroom when I was thirteen, because, for some reason, I'd put it onto the string and was drawing the bow. In the house. Reminds me of a song.

In the days of my youth I was told what it means to be a man Now I've reached that age I've tried to do all those things the best I can No matter how I try I find my way to the same old jam — Led Zeppelin

hats off to (Roy) Harper

I woke for the first time at 2:30 a.m. I know this because I rolled over sluggishly and flipped open my cell phone to check. There was a sort of half-light in the tent. After a moment I realized it was due to the waning moon on the rise overhead. The next time I woke up was 3:30 a.m. The next was probably 4:30, or thereabouts. And so on, and so on. At 6:30 I reckoned I'd about reached my limit. It wasn't that I was uncomfortable, goodness knows. For the first time in my life, I'd actually done a fair job of blowing up my air mattress. It was firm and well-seated. I wasn't cold; between the sweats and the down sleeping bag, I was pretty toasty, even though the night had gotten down to 32 degrees Fahrenheit. This was merely my morning custom: as the sleep chemicals in my brain slowly exhausted themselves, I woke up, dropped back to sleep, woke up, dropped back to sleep, woke up, dropped back to sleep...ad infinitum, sometimes through a dozen cycles. At 6:30 I finally quit on the business and stayed awake, listening to the cars beginning to roll down Center Road a few hundred yards away, the ravens cackling in the trees overhead, and the elderly folks next door (up insanely early, like most elderly folks I know). John was like a rock. He was sleeping on his right side; but neither sound nor movement could I detect. I couldn't even hear him breathe. I'd shared tents with a few people in my time, cabins with a few more, and rooms with a multitude. None of them slept as silently as John did. He's going to make some woman very happy someday, that guy. He also brags that he never needs a midnight glass of water...unless, he adds with a devilish grin, he's doing something that results in a loss of bodily fluids. Right around 7:30, John woke up. By now, the rising sun was lighting the tent with a tender glow. Both of us laid there a moment longer, debating whether it was better to wait 'til things warmed up outside the sleeping bags and then decamp, or simply grin and bear it. Unsurprisingly, I planted my flag in the latter camp. I'm a cryophile, you know. I prefer cooler temperatures. And when I say that I prefer cooler temperatures, I of course mean that, while all of the North Dakotans and Minnesotans were huddling in their warm dorm rooms at North Dakota State University in Fargo, watching the slow-laden blizzard howl past the windows at -44 degrees, I was out taking a stroll through the hip-deep drifts. My ideal temperature range is somewhere between 50 and 65 degrees. Seventies are usually okay, though, 's long as it's breezy. The 40s and 30s are pretty peachy, too. It was only, like, forty-something outside now that the sun was up and coming. So, John and I manned up (or as John prefers to say, we "cowboyed the f___ up"). John got the fire going while I performed a few emergency ablutions: thanks to the condensation inside the tent, my hair had been bent up into the most fantastic shapes imaginable. I could've given Stygimoloch a run for its money. I washed up in the restroom, plastered my hair down, and went back outside to help John. I cut up some canned potatoes while my friend fried sausage and eggs together in a pan. The remainder of our cedar was burning in the fire pit, and that bright yellow ball in the sky was climbing slowly through the pine trees. I made myself some hot chocolate while John sipped some cold orange juice. Then we sat down to our hearty camp breakfast. It was sinfully delicious. As we'd observed the previous night, everything tastes better when it's cooked outdoors. The potatoes may have been canned, but Jimmy Dean has never flunked a sausage yet. I couldn't have asked for a better pick-me-up while out on the road. Except, perhaps, for a gorgeous female hiker who'd somehow misplaced all of her clothes stumbling out of the bushes nearby. Can't win 'em all... All around us, Mather Campsite was coming to life. A dog was barking somewhere to the south. The elderly folks were already packed and ready to go. People were filtering in from nearby campsites to use the restroom. The zoological caucus was out in force, too. As we were cleaning up, John spotted a family of deer poking their way unconcernedly along Juniper Loop, just across the lane from our campsite, nibbling on various herbage as they went. I didn't get very good pictures of this amazing sight (there were two bucks, a doe, and a little fawn) because the batteries in my camera conveniently chose that moment to peter out. As stealthily as possible, I went rifling through my duffel bag for the replacements we'd purchased in Yuma. I managed to find them in time to get a few shots. Following this wildlife encounter, we finished cleaning up; disassembled and repacked the tent; stuffed the sleeping bags into their sacks; and rolled up the pads (not in that order). We loaded everything back into the car, made sure the fire was out (John had used up the last of the lighter fluid earlier by nonchalantly flinging squirts of it onto the hot coals), and took off. We drove back out to Center Road and headed right. After a short distance we came upon the Yavapai Lookout, on the south rim of the Grand Canyon. Anticipation built by the second as we got out of the car, readied our cameras and slowly approached the lookout point. I suddenly realized that I'd never been to the Grand Canyon before. I began to fully appreciate that I was standing just a few yards from a rather impressive crack in the ground. I began to get an idea of what I was in for. Nevertheless, the two of us somehow managed to keep our gait sedate as we approached. And then the thing opened up beneath us like the gaping jaws of some planet-spawned Titan. We gazed in silent, elemental wonder. Or at least, I did. John was taking a couple of deep breaths a few feet behind me. Poor chap's acrophobic. I'm not really sure if I could muster the poetry to describe just what a full-body experience viewing the Grand Canyon truly is. I was and still am gobsmacked. I felt as if the fluid in my eyes had been replaced with electrolysis gel, and my guts had been turned to empty air. It was a religious moment. The sheer size of the canyon, the majesty of its contours, the subtle mysteries of its recesses, the utter incredibility of the sight...all combined to form a tangible blow to the solar plexus. Unable to do much of anything else, we stood behind the short rock wall marking the canyon rim, staring out and down. John, at least, retained enough of his rational mind to do so in silence. I kept up a steady stream of inane and fatuous commentary. After a few seconds of looking over the massive, primordial formation of rock, sand and sediment, I turned to face John and said, in a voice of faux portent: "Now that, John, is a grand canyon." After a quick tour of the actual lookout station, where the impressive geologic history of the canyon was delineated... ...we took to wandering along the canyon rim, trying to toe the fine line between actually appreciating the miraculous vista with our eyes and taking a suitably large number of photographs. We also toed the line between capturing some heroic poses at the edge of the precipice and falling hundreds of feet to our deaths. This involved much pushing of camera timer buttons and scampering like drunken mountain goats along narrow ridge lines and uneven rocks before the ten seconds were up. Finally, though far from exhausted with our surroundings, we sensed it was time to hit the road. We meandered back to the parking lot and swiftly exited the park, finding ourselves once more among the rolling, scrubby hills of Arizona. After a mere twenty miles, however, we arrived in Valle for the second time. And that was when I finally got my chance to check out that air museum. I may not have mentioned this, but I am an absolute fiend for vintage aircraft. Any old prop-driven airplane, from the Wright Flyer to the Ford Trimotor to the F7F Tigercat, gets me all excited inside, like a kid in a candy store. I especially love World War II-era fighters and bombers. So of course, when we'd passed the museum the day before and I'd seen this sitting out front... ...I knew I had to take a look inside. It was absolutely marvelous, second only to the Grand Canyon. There was a gift shop full of the most magical assortment of books, baseball caps, T-shirts, posters, models, coffee mugs, bumper stickers and badges imaginable; a hangar floor with a gang of my old favorites inside, some of which I'd never seen in person; and outside, some giant classics shining gloriously in the desert sun. Like this MiG, for example... Or this C-54... Or this Grumman Duck, which I'd never seen without amphibious floats... Or the sexiest beast on the lot, the B-26K Invader, which I'd only ever encountered in books and pictures... Or the crown jewel of the museum, this little honey, this shining triumph of aerospace engineering, General Douglas MacArthur's personal transport during the Korean War, a Lockheed C-121 Constellation (coincidentally the same type of aircraft whose engines can be seen flaring to life at the top of this page)... ...the legendary Bataan! Being inside was like a dream. The interior had been lovingly restored to its original form, as MacArthur had actually used it. An old Canadian sailor, Trevor, who'd fought aboard a destroyer during the Allied invasion of Incheon during the Korean War (in which my grandfather, an infantryman, had also participated), showed us through it. Inside were two lavatories; a closet with real uniforms from the period, flight suits and dress uniforms, hanging up for review; a spacious office-cum-living area where MacArthur sat and reviewed ground deployments of his troops from on high; a surprisingly roomy kitchen replete with coffee pots and an electric range, which was an utterly novel concept at the time; a large navigator's compartment, which even had a sectional chart laid out on the desk; and, of course, a knob- and dial-ridden cockpit, which I drooled over. Trevor explained some fascinating trivia to us about the aircraft, and even took some pictures of us: John and myself, in the navigator's compartment... ...and me, standing right by the general's desk. Note the phone, the radio, and the clock with Roman numerals. (We couldn't find his corncob pipe anywhere, though.) All too soon, we were climbing back out of the Connie and back into the sun. We stepped inside the museum again to do a little shopping. I couldn't resist. Planes of Fame was a world-renowned vintage aircraft restoring (and flying) organization, and they had some souvenirs to die for. I managed to limit myself to a deck of cards printed like WWII-era plane-spotter aircraft recognition cards, a Hawaiian shirt coated with fighters and bombers and palm trees, and a ribald bumper sticker for a pilot friend of mine (which read "PILOTS MAKE SMOOTHER APPROACHES"). I paid up, slipped two dollars inside a clear plastic jar labeled "Aircraft Maintenance Fund" and then, after a last goodbye to the lovely old lady behind the counter, we vacated the premises. John, who had acted pretty blasé as we'd toured the museum (except for that MiG), took a few minutes to drool over a Corvette ZR6 in the parking lot. We made a quick stop at the classic car museum right next door (which had everything from Model Ts to old Honda power scooters from the 1960s), and then took off down the highway, bound for home. To say that the remainder of the trip was uneventful would be a gross understatement, even though it consisted of nothing more than us refueling in Williams and driving home on Interstate 40. Between Valle and Williams, we put on Led Zeppelin III, which I'd purchased in Flagstaff. Picture me, in the driver's seat, aviator shades on, my face straight, my insides bouncing up and down like Christmas morning with new music and airplane goodies, my fingers tapping on the steering wheel, the car flying through the sunlight and breeze and golden-green hills; John, in the passenger seat, the log on his lap, baring his soul on paper, the subliminal voice of Robert Plant on "Hats off to (Roy) Harper" ululating out of the Chrysler's speakers. So we traversed AZ-64, refueled in Williams (where John switched again to the driver's seat), got on I-40, and rolled on. Pensive and preoccupied, neither of us said much as we drove by Kingman... ...crossed the border, passed the celestially beautiful Mojave National Preserve... ...and arrived in Barstow just as the sun set. We exited the 40, reunited with our old friend 247 for the drive to my house, and got home right as the last pink light was fading out of the star-lined evening sky. John and I got my stuff out of his car, carried it inside, shook hands, and parted. And that was the end of that road trip. How I felt afterward might best be described by this picture: