A Little Way Around the Long Way Around

Since we had driven directly to Seattle
by what the Canadian customs officer described
as "the long way around", we drove directly home
by going through Portland, Oregon, where Daniel
is in his first year of residency in emergency medicine.

It just happened that Daniel had a contraption of
12 Volt lights that needed to be strung. As it happened.

First, I installed a small air conditioner in a window with an impossibly ill-fitting aluminum-framed screen, just to make it bearable while working on the lights.

We met Eliza, again, who is much prettier than Daniel is, and shorter, too. Good food, and fine kids, and sweat-equity aside, Portland is worth visiting just for Powell's Book Store; a full block large, several stories tall, and with just about every new and used book God ever intended anyone to want. I have more cook books.

But then it was off, up the Columbia River, toward Missoula, Montana, and across I-94 through more beautiful Montana than a body can bear in a day. We were headed home, and home is half a mile off I-94 or, at least, the I-494 loop south of the Twin Cities.

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