actual last day in portland

I had such plans for Friday. after the family left I would finish sleeping, take in a good breakfast (I really love breakfast) and then go to leeann's work in hillsboro (west of portland) to meet her for lunch. then I'd have plenty of time to ride allllllll the way downtown, cross one of the bridges, and make it to the yoga studio on the east side of town. it was going to be a big, beautiful, warm day of cycling.

but before I could head east from Hillsboro towards the eastside of Portland I needed to secure my very
first rental car. turns out that these companies get their panties in a twist if you want to take one of their cars just one-way. not to mention the additional irritation to take the car out of state, apparently. I called about ten companies and found ONE that would allow me to do such a horrific thing. Avis. phew. unfortunately, the whole process took me so long, and I got so warm sitting outside of leeann's work, that there was no longer a need or desire for my awesome ride across town. not to mention the fact that I needed to pick up that car very near to where I already was in just a few hours. so I rode the sweaty seven miles back to their apartment and cooled down, rehydrated, played with super-sweet kitty MoMo (I still love you mercy!!). then I had to turn around and ride the eight or so miles back towards leeann's work but beyond, all the way to the Hillsboro airport. (which, by the way, is a totally fake airport. they've got like helicopters and rich white guy planes. too bad for the car rental franchise owners, I guess. suckers.) I won't even bother trying to describe how unattractive I was by the end of those three rides. poor Avis front desk guy.

this leads me to how impressed I am with the trunk of that Hyundai! the frame and two wheels fit in there with minimal logistics. what a relief. I took the car for a spin to do a few errands. I picked up my bike box from the Amtrak baggage claim guys who'd been kind enough to stash it for me this whole week. and then stopped into a rad record shop on west burnside and 9th ave called Jukebox to buy the new Roots and Deftones albums. I figure if I've got an 11 hour drive ahead of me I might be interested in breaking in some new music.

got back to the Barnes Manor (leeann and kevin's place, heh) just in time for pizza, kevin's home brew, and Mexican train dominoes! I've never played this version of dominoes before but it rules. I can't wait to teach kalman.

got to bed in time for four precious hours of sleep before needing to get up again to hit the road for slc. oh! but not before noticing at this point that I had left the interior light on in the car for the last 5 hours. how much would a dead battery have ruined my morning? a lot. good thing I caught it!