It’s a complete rainout here in Portland on Christmas Day.  That window of blue yesterday afternoon looks like a last respite from the latest atmospheric river that blew in over the night, one that looks like it will soak us for much of the next week.  With nothing open and it too wet and windy to want to venture outside anyway, we stayed holed up in our tiny home all day.  Our two big outings were when Rachael took the garbage down to the trash and we went up to the community room for a change of scene and a hand of gin; but we turned back immediately when we saw that the same crazed figure was holding court again, looking as angry and drug-addled as he did before.

So, not much to report.  No news is good news sometimes though, and we enjoyed a relaxed day of reading books, catching up on blogs and correspondence, and just loafing around while we watched and heard the rain come down.

So this feels like exactly the right time to express our deep-felt appreciation for all your concern, sympathy, insights and personal experiences you’ve shared with us through comments in the blog and by other means.  They really sustained us and gave us hope and comfort as we made our way through such a dark time.  It has really meant the world to both of us.

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Before leaving for the day though I want to share two gifts that came in today’s mail - a pair of videos we enjoyed watching and listening to this afternoon.  The first was from my long-standing friend Frank.  Frank and I met by chance outside the public swimming pool down in Salem in 1982.  Shawn and I were batching it for a year or so when he was around ten years old, and I was sitting outside beside Olinger Creek while Shawn was inside playing in the pool.  I can’t remember now why Frank sat down and introduced himself, but I remember that he was new in town after the big adventure of his life, a solo cross country ride from the east coast to Oregon on his motorcycle.  As I recall, I think we started talking about Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, and we soon found we had plenty else to talk about.  Not long afterwards we both started careers as computer programmers, kept in touch off and on as professional colleagues, and we’ve been friends ever since.  He’s one of the few people outside the family I’ve kept in touch with who predates Rachael.

Frank was and still is a serious music aficionado, primarily favoring melodic jazz and classical performers and composers.  When we first met, his three cats were named Desmond, Mozart and Beethoven if I’m remembering correctly.  I think he knows more obscure names from the jazz world than anyone else I’ve ever known.  His tastes have pretty strict boundaries though, and much of the more modern music I favor he finds to be completely  unlistenable.  I tried for years to convince him that Béla Bartók was worth a listen until I finally gave up.

So I was especially touched when he sent this to me today as a Christmas gift.  Thanks, old friend.  And happy birthday, a few days early!  It took me a long time until I finally remembered you’re exactly four weeks my junior. Enjoy yourself, enjoy yourself, it’s later than you think.

The other gift came in from fellow CycleBlazer Graham Finch, a man I’ve never met in person but from time to time joke about how fine it would be to meet together in person down in Taiwan or in England and share an IPA.  I’m sure Graham’s not aware that I’ve been stalking him for years and he’s long been an inspiration to me, both as a bike traveler and photographer.  I first became aware of him on the old website through the journal of his solo tour through Portugal and Spain.  He’s the reason Rachael and I made it to the Alentejo a decade ago.  He made me want to see what he saw.  

He’s an outstanding photographer, among the best on a site full of good ones; and he specializes in timed selfies shot remotely.  I think maybe the one that sticks in my mind the most is of him blissfully lying out flat on his back on a bench in the sun somewhere, above the caption “Fuck the job”.

I was aware that Graham is a man of many hats, but I was taken aback by the link he shared in a comment this morning.  It’s a new YouTube video he published recently over a first person interview he conducted back in 2002 with James ‘Jay’ Johnson, an R&B singer from Detroit back in the pre-Motown era.  It’s a side of Graham I’d never have imagined.

So thanks, Graham - for the link, for the chance to finally hear your voice, and for the inspiration over the years.  There’s an interesting thread active on the Forum right now, an imaginary exercise about which two cycling figures you’d most like to find sitting a down at your dinner table on tour on the road somewhere.  Likely you’d take a seat at mine.

(Oh, too bad.  Well, we’re stuck now.  No way to remove it without intervention from above.  Nothing to see here, folks.)