Tuesday morning, after a tense drive in cold, mist and ice, I crossed the mountains into Oregon. Spent that night on my cousin's farm near Corvallis; quiet with rain falling on snow; rolling hills bristling with Douglas Firs rising out of the mist; Hereford cows, rich in placid bovine calm, munching behind wire cattle fences. On Christmas Eve, prior to driving up to Tacoma on Family Fest '08, I checked the interstate on the web. Smacked by two snow storms with another on the way, the I-5 around Portland appeared to be a mess of spun-out wrecks, ice sheets, and hour-long waits. Sure enough, all the above lurked beyond Salem. As I learned, the cameras didn't really show ice composition: brown in scattered fields like very large charcoal briquettes. Driving across it was like traversing an extremely slick, treacherous washboard. On the roadside, cars were spun out into snow banks, some buried by subsequent plowings. Reaching the hour-long backup, I sat behind a Subaru long enough to realize the vehicle name was an anagram for the title of this post.
Driving across the Columbia River into Washington found me motoring through rain, snow rain and snow, and moisture in general. But it sure beat icy old Portland.
Christmas today was spent pleasantly at the home of cousins, surrounded by other cousins of many ages. Alas my sister had to work, a niece couldn't come out, and MDW was bushwhacked by the airlines' incompetence, missed her flight, got shuffled to Phoenix, and spat out finally in Seattle at 8:00 PM. But we're winding down now, on a busy Christmas night.
Merry Christmas to all.
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