The last RV rolled out while I brewed my morning coffee. I had the place to myself!
This time I remembered to lube the bike’s chain and top off the tank before departure. I’ll smarten up yet.
I set off adventuring in the blistering heat but I had to admit the heat and bugs had worn me down. I went about 10 miles before I was stopped by another fallen tree. This time the mosquitoes just EXPLODED when I stopped. It was the fiercest onslaught ever! I should have been able to shrug it off. I was in head to toe armor with full face helmet. Everything was sealed tight and treated with peremethryin but it wasn’t enough. The mosquitoes won! I’ve been in some crazy forests but that’s my life’s record for mosquito density.
I literally turned tail and fled! I’m tough but nobody’s that tough.
By then the temperature dial had gone to eleven and the air was deathly still. It was like being baked in an oven… with mosquitoes. I wandered back to camp and packed up. I’d had fun but that was enough fun. Plus I had to get to work the next day.
During the drive back I passed a hiking trail I’ve been meaning to try. It’s something of a botanical garden. I grabbed a water bottle, hiked a mile or so, and just cooked myself to the molecular level. On the maintained path there weren’t many bugs but I was already pretty hot and the steamy hike was a bad idea! I retreated to my truck, drove to the nearest fisherman’s bar and sat in the air conditioning drinking ice tea until my back teeth were floating. Then I headed home.
I didn’t see any Norse gods but I had fun and got slapped in the face with a fish. Ya’ win some, ya’ lose some. It’s still better than sitting on the couch being boring.
Epilogue: On the way home Mrs. Curmudgeon texted me a list of groceries to pick up. I stopped at the same store that had been gloriously stocked just a few days earlier. It looked like a bomb had hit it! Many shelves were bare.
I texted Mrs. Curmudgeon “What happened this time? Did we get involved in another stupid war or was there another economic collapse?” She texted back “Hard to tell these days, I haven’t listened to the news.”
Don’t laugh, it’s happened to me before. At the end of the G. W. Bush presidency I paddled my canoe away from a stable capitalist society. I returned a week later to find the New York Stock Exchange locked into “emergency shutdown”. A string of bankruptcies in corporations with names I’d never before heard caused worldwide panic and the government was bailing out everyone who was sufficiently connected. This led to a bank bailout so unpopular it created the short lived TEA Party. I was only gone a week!
As far as I can tell the grocery store sellout was nothing particular. I searched to see what had happened in my brief absence and it was amusing how mundane “various panics” have become: Just the usual collapses one would expect in 2022.
My informal list of “shit that happened” was this: British Prime Minister Boris Johnson resigned. Former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was assassinated. The Prime Minister of Estonian has resigned. The Prime Minister of Italy has also resigned. The President and Prime Minister of Sri Lanka fled while being pursued by starving peasants. Denmark had been in a state of protest and I think it continues but the press had its usual blackout on such things. Nor will the press mention Ukraine which seems to be swirling the drain as I’d expected. I think there’s been another shooting but a good guy whacked the bad guy before they could pin it on an ambulant sentient AR-15. Thus rendering it no good for the usual gun control narrative.
I was only gone a few days. By my counts that’s four Prime Ministers outed, one assassination, a protest and a war both under a press blackout, and a shooting. Does any of that sound like reasoned stable society under popular and respected governance?
That’s what I mean when I say change is in the air. I’ve no idea what specifically went down with the grocery store but it certainly didn’t stay the same. Also, it’s all happening above my pay grade. Not my circus, not my monkeys.
Better to focus on the wisdom imparted by nature: a kingfisher looks for a different fish than a man.
Happy camping y’all
A.C.
Unfortunately, not all contacts with circuses and monkeys are consensual.
Your comments about mosquitos reminds me of the stories that author Gary Paulson wrote about in his teen book series ‘Brian’ books. Set in Canadian outback, his description of the number of mosquitos was pretty vivid. Living down here, I can’t imagine what having that number of mosquitos is like. A hurricane some years back sent our mosquito population raging, but it was cut down my fogging trucks. No such thing out there.
Thanks for writing this series. It sounds like you are enjoying the experiences.