Home again, home again

I almost cried when I saw Boston rising up to meet the plane. I pressed my little face against the window like a puppy in a pet store. It's not that Oregon isn't lovely. It's just that they're so ... friendly there. I didn't know what to do. I kept reminding myself that in most other parts of the country, people who aren't retarded or crazy look other people in the eye and say hello on the street, even if they don't know each other. It was kind of nice, although strange for once not to be the super-polite person that everyone laughs at, but rather the semi-aloof Bostonian with questionable manners.



Anyway. Lovely vacation. Fun for all. I've decided that I don't actually need to have any money myself. I just need rich friends. Or friends who work for big companies with lots of perks. Thanks to my sister's in-laws, we stayed in a redonculous seaside cottage with its own guest house and an almost pornographic view of the water. The guest house had a wine cellar in the basement that you got to via an actual secret passage. You pulled on a false book in the bookcase and the whole wall swung open to reveal a stone passageway with flickering "candles" made out of clever little flickery bulbs. I had an urge to scream, "my glasses!" and then advise my family and friends to split up in order to locate Old Man Withers. Or maybe the other way around. Velma always annoyed me. A little too close to home, and all that.



At night we went down to the beach and roasted marshmellows and made s'mores and listened to the hippies at other campfires sing stoned happy hippie songs. I hadn't had that much sugar in years, and I started giggling maniacally until my sister's brother-in-law (my brother-in-law? my brother-in-law once removed?) accused me of smuggling liquor down to the beach. We didn't actually drink any liquor, or smoke, or even drink that much coffee while we were there. I did eat terrifying amounts of junk food and sleep about eleven hours a night, though, which is apparently par for the course in Oregon, and the explanation for the general populace's ample proportions and pleasant demeanor. You'd be jolly, too, if there were six Dairy Queens within walking distance of your house.



Oh! Speaking of crappy junk food: My family actually ate at a place called the Pie Chateau one night. Can you imagine? "Where shall we eat, honey?" "Well, let's see. I'm really trying to stick to my diet. I know! Let's go the Pie Chateau! Blueberry pie is a vegetable, isn't it?"



Oh, again! The resort town where we stayed was kind of trashy once you left the actual shore, and I saw a pawn shop with the following sign in the window: "YES! We sell guns and gold!"



You can't beat that with a stick.