[It’s aSquared’s First Birthday … we’re celebrating by looking back at events from a year ago … skip these retro posts if you’re not into sentimentality.]

Yosemite is grand, but go when the crowds aren’t there: fall and spring. Spring is best, because the waterfalls are full and gorgeous …

Yosemite National Park, CA

Population: a bunch of park rangers and a variable transient population of tourists. Area: 1200 square miles in Mariposa and Tuolumne Counties.

California Senator John Conness introduced a bill, which Abraham Lincoln signed into law in June 1864, setting aside Yosemite Valley and the Mariposa Grove of Giant Sequoias for the State of California as an inalienable public trust, although logging, mining, and grazing continued in the Valley until John Muir stepped into the picture. (Conness later died in an insane asylum, but that’s another story.) Here is what Muir, whose name adorns the high school I attended in Pasadena, had to say about Yosemite in 1911:

“Apart from the human interest of my visit to-day, I greatly enjoyed Yosemite, which I had visited only once before, having spent eight days last spring in rambling amid its rocks and waters. Wherever we go in the mountains, or indeed in any of God’s wild fields, we find more than we seek. Descending four thousand feet in a few hours, we enter a new world; climate, plants, sounds, inhabitants, and scenery all new or changed.”

The place is undoubtedly one of the most beautiful places on God’s increasingly greenless earth, and I should have my California citizenship revoked for not having visited before now. But I hazard a guess that Muir would rip his heart out and wear sackcloth and ash if he were able to see what Yosemite has become: a Back to Nature theme park, a marketer’s gimmick, a mockery of God, a naturalist’s nightmare.

You pay $20 at a checkpoint and get handed a ticket and a map by a nice ranger. You drive down narrow, groaning, car-filled roads to get your look at the Valley’s main attractions: Yosemite Falls, Half Dome, Bridalveil Meadow. You get out of your car and walk with lines of tourists up paved trails to designated areas where you can pose for photos against backdrops and pretend that a thousand other people aren’t doing exactly the same thing. You can ignore, or get prissy and stop to pick up and get the back pocket of your jeans gummed up with the contents of, a littering Jolly Rancher wrapper some jerk has dropped along the path. You hear parents tell their kids things like: “We drove four hours to see this, so shut up!”

Yosemite is glorious and a testament to the universe’s abundance in spite of the desecrations wrought upon it by humankind (and maybe I should just shut up and let the photographs speak for themselves, and maybe I should just stop being critical every moment and enjoy the scenery). But it is also a perfect diorama of George W. Bush’s America: a Grizzly Adams version of the Great America Mall, complete with its own official concessioner website. It makes you wonder what the valley must have looked like in 1911, through the eyes of John Muir and his traveling party.

—Posted by Frank at 16:00:00 | 14-Aug-03

[It’s aSquared’s First Birthday … we’re celebrating by looking back at events from a year ago … skip these retro posts if you’re not into sentimentality.]

Tonopah (I still don’t how to pronounce it properly) is the very definition of ‘Middle of Nowhere’ …

Tonopah, NV

Population 2627 (2000 census). Seat of Nye County, the third-largest county in area in the United States.

Founded in 1900 by Jim Butler (whom one Nevada historical site describes as the “laziest mining tycoon of all time”). Folklore has it that Butler, while prospecting, lost his burro in a windstorm. The burro cowered beneath a rock outcropping. When Butler found the cowering beast, he noticed something unusual about the rock, chipped at it, struck paydirt, and started the last silver rush in Nevada.

Tonopah grew within two years from a rock outcropping to a bustling mining town of 3000. Wyatt Earp ran a saloon here from 1902 to 1905. The big news in town the day before we arrived (according to the Pahrump Valley Times) was that a defendant company planned to appeal after a jury had awarded $136 million, the largest judgment in Nye County history, to Equatorial Tonopah Inc., a US subsidiary of the Sydney, Australia-based Equatorial Mining Ltd, in a judgment against Kvaerner Inc., a US subsidiary of a Lysaker, Norway-based engineering construction firm. Equatorial Tonopah’s lawsuit alleged that Kvaerner had made faulty projections on the feasibility of a copper mine 17 miles north of Tonopah that Equatorial Tonopah had bought for $15 million plus $32 million in equity from Cyprus Amax Metals in 1997 (and, after the yield proved far less than what Kvaerner had projected, closed in July 2001).

I drove us into town around 8.00. As we came in off Highway 95, from twenty and ten miles off the town looked like something out of a mirage, there one minute and not quite there the next. The town and its surroundings were undoubtedly awe-inspiring physically. The San Antonio Mountains, which turn pink and amethyst in the sunset, are stark, lonely, and majestic. The town itself is like something out of a John Ford Western. The Mizpah Hotel, the town’s main landmark, founded in 1907, sits in the middle of Main Street with a huge ghost-town sign announcing its presence.

Among the people illegitimately claimed to have connections with the Mizpah: Jack Dempsey, who allegedly worked as a bouncer there (although, according to the Nevada State Library and Archives, he “only” fought a match against Johnny Sudenberg in Tonopah in June 1915 and didn’t actually work at the Mizpah in any capacity), and Howard Hughes, who allegedly married Jean Peters there (although, according to the same source, Hughes actually married Peters in January 1957 in his apartment at the L&L Motel, not at the Mizpah).

As we came to our hotel, the Best Western Hi-Desert Inn, we were greeted by ominous glares from a bench full of well-wishers on the sidewalk in front of the hotel. The sound of yowling children sailed in the window when I rolled it down to get a breath of fresh air. The bellboy cart we dragged out to the Jeep to load our overpacked possessions nearly collapsed under their admittedly copious weight. A bunch of kids who apparently lived in the neighborhood behind the hotel favored using the parking lot as a skate park.

After we settled in, we decided to go try to find something for dinner. No restaurants looked open, so we stopped at Scolari’s, a supermarket at the south edge of town (which, essentially, was about a quarter mile down Main Street from the hotel). The supermarket had a big parking lot, but like the lot, the market was almost deserted, except for a few shoppers and the handful of employees staffing the place. It was 9.00 on a Thursday night but it felt like Sunday around 11.00. We grabbed a few frozen comestibles and went to the checkout counters, where a strapping brunet clerk asked Steve whether he was “ailing” because he grabbed at his belly while trying not to drop the pizza package in his hand. The clerk was almost painfully polite, in a sickly kind of way that would have seemed sarcastic if it had not been so seemingly ingenuous (and if it had not been almost anywhere but California).

At the other end of the spectrum, the main drag seemed to be a public meeting space for the area’s bored teenagers, who screeched up and down it in their souped-up cars and noisily marked their territory with testosterone-laden skid marks. The absinthe-green Silver Queen Hotel sign and the lit-up neon cross from a generic Protestant chapel behind it added a final bizarre touch to the evening.

I was content to spend the rest of the night in the hotel room watching the Weather Channel. I guess it was the xenophobic and suspicious California Blanche DuBois in me realizing that I was 355 miles from Oakland and that Tonopah marked the point at which there really was, barring some unforeseen emergency the nature of which it would be impossible to conceive, no turning back.

Tonopah reminded me of nothing more clearly than the eerie, vaguely hostile tiny towns along the highway that Inger Stevens encountered in the 1960 “Twilight Zone” episode in which she is traveling cross-country, has a blown tire outside Pittsburgh, and begins getting tailed by a silent porkpie-hat-wearing hitchhiker wherever she goes, eventually realizing somewhere in Arizona that she actually died in the blowout and that the hitchhiker is the Grim Reaper.

—Posted by Frank at 23:59:00 | 14-Aug-03

[It’s aSquared’s First Birthday … we’re celebrating by looking back at events from a year ago … skip these retro posts if you’re not into sentimentality.]

I remember very little about even going through this town …

Oakdale, CA

Population 15,503 (2000 census); founded 1871 by the Stockton & Visalia Railroad Company; main attractions Hershey Foods Corporation and Oakdale Cowboy Museum.

We came in along Highway 120 and passed through town in less than five minutes—it’s a small town. But this Stanislaus County town 90 miles from Yosemite was the first place I knew that I was out of the Bay Area for good. There were American flags everywhere, big and small. (In the Bay Area, American flags made a surge right after 9/11/01 and disappeared just as quickly two or three months later.) There was a huge “SUPPORT OUR TROOPS” sign painted on the door of a hardware store. There was an abundance of hand-lettered signs. People on the street stared at the Jeep. I felt like a fish out of the liberal pond. I was a fish out of the liberal pond.

Keep in mind, those of you who don’t know me, that I am a Californian through and through—not in the stereotypical “hey dude, whassup” sense, which you can already ascertain because of my tortured, vaguely pre-Raphaelite writing style, but in the sense that other than a period of nine months in which I lived in Great Britain during my junior year, and other than a few trips in recent years with Steve to Colorado and Michigan and Oregon, and a few odd forays during my highly random childhood to places like Mexicali and Yuma, AZ, I have never been outside the borders of the Golden State.

Everything you read henceforth in my hand bears the imprint of that condition. That means good and bad. If I stereotype a place, if I make an unwarranted assumption, if I fall flat on my face in characterizing a region or a state of mind or a point of history, I will beg your forgiveness and your forbearance, because this Californian, you must realize, hasn’t gotten around a hell of a lot.

—Posted by Frank at 12:00:00 | 14-Aug-03

[It’s aSquared’s First Birthday … we’re celebrating by looking back at events from a year ago … skip these retro posts if you’re not into sentimentality.]

Frank’s last day in California/first day on the road …

Dottie’s True Blue Cafe

My morning began at 7.45. I took care of whatever last minute things I could think of. This included imposing on the patience of Kit to dispose of some things I just hadn’t gotten my act together to pack, including some rolls of wrapping paper that had been sitting around my room for months if not years. How do you pack wrapping paper? You don’t. I should’ve gotten rid of it weeks ago. That and all the other crap I left behind for my poor housemates to dispose of. My apologies, Erin and Kit.

I sat and watched a little morning TV while waiting for Steve to arrive from the other side of the Bay. It was an act of anxiety—I was tired of pacing around. The house seemed so weird. The energy was horrible. The sun was out, it was a beautiful Bay Area morning, yet the place felt like a mortuary. The downstairs echoed and rattled with the emptiness of my cleaned-out room. Even the kitchen felt hollowed out. Kit was upstairs in bed with the dogs. They all seemed bummed out and stuck to themselves while I paced and fretted and sweated.

I watched KTVU. The show had this bouncy featurey piece about undiscovered great SF restaurants. The restaurant on tap was Dottie’s, a diner in the Geary/Jones area that I had not heard of (let alone patronized). The reporter was a perky brassy blonde who wandered around asking obnoxious questions of the clientele (and the harried owner/chef, whom she’d obviously interrupted in the middle of the morning rush) and taking showy on-camera bites of their omelets and pancakes to demonstrate how awesome the joint was. The camera panned around to the door once or twice to catch shots of the bleary-eyed yet lively line of waiting customers at the doorway. There were the usual SF assortment of bike messenger types, suit-wearing government employees, platinum blonde lesbians with piercings, queer fashion plates, you name it.

That short three minutes of bubbly morning TV seemed to sum up everything I love (and hate) about SF in one swoop: the parochial banality disguised as urbane sophistication, the relentless and almost heedless California optimism blended with the yawning pretend-New York City display of “we’ve all seen and done this before” (I say this because, for example, when Candace Bushnell is interviewed by a New York newspaper it’s a “whatever” event, but when she’s interviewed by the Chronicle it’s not only a front-page arts section spread, it’s a bizarre display of “Look at our coup! Only in San Francisco would Candace Bushnell agreed to have been interviewed by a newspaper!”), the public (and public-relations) show of inclusiveness not ever quite obliterated by the reality of SF’s unending history of exclusionary attitudes and politics, the strange and unshakable sense you get that SF really truly and honestly believes that it’s the one place that’s at the cutting edge of everything in American culture, politics, and zeitgeist.

—Posted by Frank at 09:00:00 | 14-Aug-03

[It’s aSquared’s First Birthday … we’re celebrating by looking back at events from a year ago … skip these retro posts if you’re not into sentimentality.]

I still haven’t quite figured out how to pronounce ‘Tonopah’ … is it ‘TOEnuh-pah’? or ‘tuh-NO-puh’? or ‘toe-noePAH’? Whatever it is, I’m sure it means ‘Middle of Bum-F*** Egypt’ …

Happy Trails ‘Til We Meet Again

San Francisco:

The Beagle has left the building.

Thank you. Thank you very much.

See ya tonight in Tonopah! (How DOES one pronounce that?)

—Posted by Steve at 06:43 | 14-Aug-03

[It’s aSquared’s First Birthday … we’re celebrating by looking back at events from a year ago … skip these retro posts if you’re not into sentimentality.]

Moving Day. Yegods. Whatta day that was. Exhausting. Near tears. Panic attacks. Loading that big truck. My last night in San Francisco. Facing the wrenching goodbye where Bayley and I had to say goodbye to David after nine years of him putting up with us. Makes me all tired just remembering it. This entry is surprisingly upbeat for me. I hid all the anxiety and exhaustion and frustration pretty well …

Moving Day

Moving day came and went … at the time, it seemed as if it would never end. But, all in all, it was a pretty good day.

The 15-foot Budget rental truck was ready as promised. After we came back home, a couple of workers from the Two Irish Guys moving firm showed up five minutes early to load the truck. They were smooth, professional and pleasant and it was a very trouble-free experience. They didn’t even complain when they had to move the couch down five flights of stairs because it wouldn’t fit in the elevator. I tipped them nicely and so, if anyone is looking for someone to load/move things for you, I highly recommend them You can usually find a listing for them on Craig’s List.

After the truck was loaded, we hit the road, David driving the Jeep behind me. Two unnerving incidents when two people cut in front of me, leaving slamming on the brakes and hoping the thing would stop in time. But fortunately, nothing happened … I haven’t had a wreck in 22 years and I’m certainly not about to notch one up now, especially not on my final full day in San Francisco.

Once in Oakland, Frank called me to say that the rental trailer for the cross-country phase had been delivered. Promised between 9 a.m. and noon, it actually arrived around 1:30. But ValueMoves handled things well and have been a pleasure to do business with … so far. We’ll see what happens when we unload it in Ann Arbor.

Then the fun began. I feel as if I’ve climbed, oh, what’s the third-highest mountain in the world? And now I’m on the summit … the trailer, from Yellow Lines, is loaded successfully. Now comes the second-highest summit (isn’t that K-2?), which is the road trip, although that will be easier and much more fun. The highest is unloading our stuff in Ann Arbor and distributing it among three floors of townhouse. Ouch.

Yet, from the summit of having all of my things loaded for the move, things feel pretty good. I’m very tired, very achy, very exhausted and … not quite as emotional as I usually am. Which is a bit strange. Towards the end of the seemingly endless loading-of-the-trailer, I did have a panic/anxiety attack. Primarily, this was due to a couple of contradictory factors: Seeing the end in sight for having things loaded, yet seeing more stuff that still needed to be loaded. Strange, I know.

I inherited, somewhat, the packing gene from my father, who was always a whiz at it. I managed to get all of our stuff into a space 8X9X9. Unfortunately, it was supposed to be 8X9X6, so we’re going to encounter some additional charges. This was not good and an additional source of anxiety.

Between us, Frank and I have over 100 boxes of … stuff. Books. CDs. DVDs. Glassware. More books. Stereo and home theatre equipment, including a 46-inch TV. Couch. Dining room table. Four chairs. Another TV. And so on. While regretting that I had to go over the space limit, I am sorta proud of the packing job. But we’ll revisit that issue the morning of Aug. 23rd, and see how I did.

The loading took from 2 p.m. until just after 8. Long, grinding hours, punctuated by playing pookie and ball with Rudy Doogle and Gracie Punkin. We’ll miss them terribly.

We then went to dinner at Crogan’s in Montclair one last time (best onion rings, ever) and I said final goodbyes to George and Deb, who were gracious enough to come over to the restaurant to give goodbye hugs.

After we dropped the Budget truck off, David left me in the Castro to get some prescription refills made. I forgot to bring my script for Xanax, so I’ll have to get it filled later. The Castro, on my final visit, was a bit different. I almost never go there at night, and things were kinda hopping. Gone was its daytime persona of tourista/errands/medical doctors/pharmacy/bookstores and greeting and dining with friends. In its place is the night life, which is decidedly … different. Different crowd, more intense, very interesting.

Joel and Scott were then gracious enough to pick me up and drive me home (I sent David on ahead to check in on the beagle, who had been alone for about 10 hours, and in the dark, at this point). And we had a nice final chat and goodbye hugs.

Followed by laundry and final packing for the road warrior part and here we are, approaching 4 a.m. and I’ll have about three hours sleep. So it’s off to bed I go, in my sleeping bag on the floor. My last sleep in San Francisco.

It’s been a wild, strange seven years, it certainly has.

Tomorrow night, we’ll be coming to you from good ol’ Tonopah, NV, which I still haven’t figured out how to pronounce yet. I’ll ask the good people at the Hi Desert Inn to set me straight. But we’re very excited to visit Yosemite on the way. YNP is grand, glorious and wonderful. I love the Sierra.

In the meantime, everyone take care. I’m getting some shuteye; I have another mountain (or two or 30) to climb tomorrow.

Good night, y’all.

—Posted by Steve at 03:51 | 14-Aug-03

We left the Bay Area a year ago today. Just loaded ourselves and the beagle into the Jeep, drove, and by the end of the afternoon, we were over the Nevada border.

Hard to believe it’s been that long. I still miss aspects of SF and the Bay Area, but it’s all essentially memory and history to me now, which is something, to be honest, I never thought I’d say. I lived there off an on for almost 20 years, and it all gets wiped away in less than a year of living somewhere else. Such is life.

It speaks well of Ann Arbor as well, despite all of the various complaints I make about it to fill blog space. I can’t imagine myself having had a smooth time of letting go (and doing all of the other mental tricks you do more or less automatically when you adjust to a new phase of your life) if Ann Arbor hadn’t been a good place to do it in.

Ann Arbor is home to us now. I don’t know how long that will last; I graduate (with luck) in April, and Steve may resume his own program in June, which would keep us here at least another year. I won’t be unhappy if that is the case. There are some annoying and irritating aspects to living here, but they are nothing (so far) that rises above the level of inconvenience.

I consider myself and Steve to be very lucky to have that kind of life here. It could be so much more unpleasant in so many other ways. I am reserved in my sentiments only because I don’t think anyplace else will ever feel like California to me, which is not to say California is perfect, but only to say it’s where I spent most of my life up till a year ago.

I gave up my last vestige of California-ness this week: I broke down and overcame whatever denial I was living in for the past year and finally got a Michigan driver’s license. (I have had a valid California license this entire year, so don’t assume that I was driving illegally or anything like that. Anyway, the number of times in the past year that I’ve actually been behind the wheel have been so numerically insignificant that it’s almost an insult to the Motor State for me to gain admission to the driver’s license club here.)

I wouldn’t consider the wait at the Secretary of State’s office on Maple a pleasant experience, but then again, it was way closer to pleasant than any wait I had at any of the California DMV offices I sat in over the years. The woman who took my number was very friendly, asking me what I was here in Michigan for when the weather was so much nicer in California. She then told me that she was worried about her 16-year-old son getting his first license because a friend of his had already been in three accidents. Yet another reason that my newly minted driver’s license isn’t likely to get much more than cursory or emergency use in this state.

Anyway, when they finish with you at the Secretary of State, they punch a hole in your out-of-state license and hand it back to you, which is an oddly deflating event. It’s confirmation that your identity as a person from that Other State is no longer valid or relevant.

I guess I already knew that, and it’s not as if I’ve been trumpeting my California identity while I’ve been here, but it’s still a strangely symbolic ritual.