Volcano!!!

Mount St Helens has been steaming and stuttering over the last week; some say it’s about to blow, some say not. This unpleasantly active volcano is situated about 50 miles from Portland, which means we’re completely safe from lava, flying debris etc but, depending on the wind, ash could descend on the city. If that happens, breathing masks will be de-rigeur. That said, no-one seems too bothered, though warnings have been distributed lest we sue. I keep thinking: that thing over there: it’s a volcano. As backdrops go, it pisses all over Mount Caburn. Not necessarily in a good way of course.

Rachel’s got a job! She starts next Monday at Oregon Health and Science University (OHSU) as an assistant to one of the deans. This is great news and has been a good excuse for us to celebrate even more than usual.

It also means we’ll need to buy a car because we’re still down in Lake Oswego and we’ll both need to drive to work (Leon and Linda only have three cars between them – peasants). We will of course need a car of our own eventually anyway.

Thus I spent last Saturday test driving cars. About eight of them. It takes a while to get into the selection process because – apart from a few German / Swedish models – the options are completely different. I’ll eschew the pseudo-Clarkson column I was going to write; after having driven several sporty coupes I experienced an epiphany: I am an adult. I had conjectured that there may be a racing driver in me waiting to get out. Not so. The actuality hit home about the time I took the Hyundai Tiburon’s 185 bhp round a 15mph bend at 45, egged on by the salesman, a warm-hearted Hispanic nutcase who’d had his license revoked after one illegal street-race too many. “Take this baby into the shop and you can get it chipped and tuned to 350 bhp.” I was supposed to feel exhilarated, but I was already several stages beyond this point: I was scared. It was a pale shadow of my former self that shakily drew a glass of water from the cooler back at the showroom. It’s true that you can have a lot of fun in such a motor; but only by risking your neck and/or deportation. The final nail in the coffin however is their impracticality; the back-seats are only good for children, not friends with suitcases or shelving units from “home depot”. That said, I’m not quite yet ready for the saloon experience (or sedan, as they say over here). So thoughts are currently circling around the Toyota Maxima.

Leon and Linda have been away on business, so we’ve had the German fleet to ourselves in the meantime and have – given the above – done our best to take advantage of the hardware whilst the sun shines (which largely it has been). On Sunday we took the beamer to the beach at Lincoln City. Stopping at the casino on the way, of course. Emile: get your suitcase packed, there’s a 24/7 poker room.



Lincoln City has a long sandy beach which stretches on for miles. The seaside is usually about 5-10C cooler than the city and misty too. Sunday was no exception, though this seemed to come as a surprise anyway and we were forced to detour after lunch to pick up windcheaters at Walmart. About 3pm the mist lifted and was replaced by clear blue skies. The beach was empty and the sand was soft and we saw pelicans – yes, pelicans I tell you. It seems like the maddest thing in the world to go to the beach on Sunday and the beach is on the Pacific Ocean and when you look due West, next landfall is Japan. I still can’t quite believe it, can’t quite be sure I’m here.