Copyright © 2005 by Blake Charlton. All rights reserved. No part of this text may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, reposting, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without express written permission of the author.
So my latest adventure took me to Algonquin Park, Ontario. It was a paddling expedition with the main squeeze. The two of us, one boat, one 80 lbs pack, one 50 lbs pound canoe, two paddles, and 5 x 10^6 mosquitoes. Romantic no?
I was dying to 1. see a moose or possibly several moose (why is the plural of moose not meese?) 2. see the aura borealis, 3. hear wolves howling at night.
I got none of these things. Apparently they heard a Yankee was coming and high tailed it up for the North Pole.
I did get to see long, lovely lakes with sandy bottoms and glassy surfaces. The water was so pure that you could dip a mug in and drink from it without any treatment. At first I didn't believe this, but on day five neither one of us seemed to be suffering from giardia. So I relaxed. And there were loons crying their long, sad songs late into the night. And some….squirrels I guess you'd call them but the little buggers were so aggressive that you would have thought they were saber tooth tigers.
Now I'm back home in a strange land with computers, showers, refrigeration, and high heels. After two weeks in the woods there is nothing more bizarre, nothing more totally incomprehensible than high heels.
I mean…not that I'm wearing them…it's just that walking is difficult out there with a canoe on your head and roots and logs and mud under your feet and all you want to do his lay one flat foot down on flat ground, and then you come back to this place where everything's flat and concrete and then we go and put on funny slippers with a spike at the heel…anyway, you get the picture. Really, I'm not wearying high heels. I meant 'we' as in like humans…not like me…
Really, I mean it, man, stop looking at me like that.
Yeah, I _know_ I live in San Francisco but I'm a meat and potatoes / regular shoes kinda guy.
No, no, no. That's not a politically correct comment. I'm just saying I don't wear high heels! Look at these knobby male feet, would you want to see these in a pair of pumps?
Well, of course…I'm mean…I'm not saying there's anything wrong with wearing high heels if you're a guy…it just that…oh man, I want to go back to the woods.
Okay, fine, be that way! I'm going to go set my tent up in the backyard and turn my hose on and pretend I'm back in Canada.
Tell me if you see any meese.