Point B: Rupert

Start drive time: 10:39 AM PST

End drive time: 10:39 PM MST (Literally. I'm not making this up. It was EXACTLY an 11 hour trip) 

Pit stops: South Cle Elum, Sunnyside, Hermiston, Pendleton, Caldwell 

Total miles: 668

Number of gas station bathrooms without toilet paper and/or soap: 1 (I'm looking at you, Sunnyside)

Let's call this the start of the odometer watch. It was actually about 2 miles away from my starting point but we're not going to worry about that because we're trying to be less pedantic and anal retentive because it makes people not want to be friends with you because they think you're not fun when you adhere rigidly to made-up OCD rules in your head. I'm FINE. IT'S FINE, GUYS. This is where we're starting. 

My departure was delayed by two and a half hours for the following reasons:
1. I overslept as a result of a persistent drip, drip, drip ALL NIGHT from the rain
2. I still had not finished packing
3. Rachel made me French toast with cardamom sauce, bacon, fried mushrooms and orange rolls (om nom nom) and that kind of breakfast deserves to be savored instead of shoveled
4. It rained. Not the clouds, but my face. I was really sad to leave.

The clouds also started to rain right around the time that I was rocking really hard to "Wrecking Ball" by Miley Cyrus and because even though it rains ALL THE TIME in the Pacific Northwest, I think drivers in the Snoqualmie pass were distracted by the beautiful new waterfalls cascading down the mountains and onto the roads. There was a six car pileup outside of Cle Elum (we cool, we cool - no apparent serious injuries) that had happened recently enough that it had not yet backed up traffic.

Don't worry. I'm parked.

As much as I am very much a big trees and bodies of water kind of dame, I love the rolling yellow hills of Eastern Washington. If I was a better prose writer, I'd figure out a way to compare the soft, sensual curves of eroded mountains covered in golden scrub brush to a perpetual Indian summer nap taken by ancient giants or something. But I am on a tight time frame, so we don't have time for that, so this is pretty much going to be pictures and stream of consciousness writing.

OH LOOK A HAWK!

I don't have a picture of the hawk. Sorry. I was busy driving.

OH HEY! A WHOLE BUNCH OF DEER! Thanks for not running in front of my car, buddies. Just keep eating the grass on that side of the road. It's really a lot more delicious than than the grass on the other side of the road.

Do I know that for certain? No, deer. I've never actually eaten grass before.

Well I didn't know. I thought you liked grass. Look, I'm not an expert on deer.

Okay, deer. You've got a point. I'm sorry.

No, I don't take pleasure in lying to you just for my own sake. I'm just trying to protect you from getting hit.

Okay, okay. You're right. I was out of bounds. You're an independent doe. You don't need my protection.

Listen, I'm sorry. Can we just move past this? Can we just forget this ever happened?

Oh come on, don't call your mom now. Don't cry. Don't cry. I'm sorry, deer.

I don't have a whole lot of action pictures while I'm driving cuz it's dangerous. Here, have a stagecoach in some scrub brush to make up for it.

There were a lot of things that I would have liked to have seen and done if I was not trying to get to my aunt's house before 11 PM, such as the following:

Look at some canyons

Look at some gorges

Look at some historical battle sites

Look at some hot springs with alligators (Wait a minute. I think that was a trick).

But I saw road signs for all of those things and they were really nice road signs. Not like those garbage handpainted signs with spelling errors that make you embarrassed about the public school system in this country - these signs were LEGIT.

One of the signs that did suck me in was the Pendleton Woolen Mills in Pendleton, Oregon. This charming turn-of-the-century industrial town is famous for its Native American art-inspired blankets made from 100% virgin wool and will keep you REAL warm without being as itchy as wool blankets made from 100% already-has-a-couple-of-punches-on-the-V-card wool. I bought some fabric from their outlet store. Maybe I'll show you some pictures of things I that I make with the wool fabric after I learn how to sew. I'M AMBITIOUS. I CAN LEARN.

There was a town on the Oregon side of the OR/ID border that smelled like summer sausage that was immediately followed by a town on the Idaho side of the border that smelled like manure. That was a really big bummer. And the manure smell lingered for a while. There were a lot of many mile long stretches of manure smell. I think they grow things here.

My aunt and uncle live in sugar beet country. In case you've never had a sugar beet, they look just like the regular beets you can buy at a grocery store except they're made entirely out of sugar. There are several different varieties. The molasses sugar beet is the darkest and grows very, very slowly. The stevia sugar beet and the crystal sugar beet look quite a bit alike and non-Idahoans have a very hard time distinguishing the two vegetables but they are completely different because one has calories and the other doesn't. 

Anyway, I am delighted to get to spend time with my family because they're great and I'm going to go do that now because you can blog any time you want (except when you're driving) but sometimes your family has other things to do than watch you make up stories about sugar beets.