My Weekend Was Bigger Than Yours, Part One-sers

About 90 feet bigger. Maybe even 120.
I am lucky enough to know Emilio (happy birthday!), who totally hooked us (Christina, Josh, Russ, myself) up with an all-access pass to the Owens Valley Radio Observatory this weekend. It's not for mere mortals, but for Carl Sagan, Mike Brown (not FEMA, but Pluto), and Jodie Foster. And now, us. I am lucky enough to be counted among the ranks of the world's most elite scientists (Emilio included) as one of their pluckiest hangers-on. Because let's face it, a writer such as myself can only spell words having to do with science and is crippled by the simplest ventures, such as starting fire in a BBQ. Luckily, I didn't have to do that this weekend. My most scientific duty involved stirring soup. And there was an automatic burner, so there was no burning of my digits involved.


I got to ride with Josh, which was fun because I got to learn a lot of things about him that I didn't know, like why he loves Mitch Hedberg so much (I now count myself a fan), what the experience of getting hit by a car is like (not cozy), as well as a few other things that are a matter of global security and must be kept in-kog-nito. It's too bad I can't write about it, though, because it was epic and changed my life and maybe it would've changed yours, too. Ah, well.


Behind the house that we stayed in this weekend was a river that Christina remarked was just the right speed for an intertube and fruity drink with a pineapple chunk and umbrella sticking out of it. That last part was all me, not Christina (although she may be game). I think it would also be appropriate to be in a sprawling woman-hat with oversized sunglasses while immersed in said intertube with said fruity drink. These daydreams were sadly out of season, seeing as it was about 40 degrees on land and even colder in the water. A dead cow sprawled on the bank was also somewhat of a tubekill, but suprising and beautiful in its mortisy rigor.

While I have no aptitude for performing science, I like looking at it. So I probably annoyed the whole crew by loudly suggesting that we visit the geothermal pools up the street (like 50 miles), but they really are the sort of sight that you can appreciate with a barely-passing grade in high school chemistry. Hiking down, I always feel as if I'm descending into a kind of hell, if you imagine hell like a Spinal Tap concert without the funnies, while Josh and Russ both imagined it as the primordial soup of life.

I always chafe at the warnings, the flimsy gates and barriers that stand between the trail and the magma pools. It's not the sweet smell of sulfur that draws me to the edge, but the need to touch and connect with the earth. I do this all the time, to my own detriment. Two summers ago, I decided that I needed to pinch a cactus, just to see what it felt like, and spent the next two days plucking invisible hairs out of my thumb, index, and middle finger. And there was the day in third grade when I decided that all that tongue-sticking-to-metal in cold weather was merely an urban legend. I stood out in the freezing cold for an hour because I couldn't pull it off the metal banister on the back porch stairs and no one could hear me hollering, minus tongue. If there were no barriers at the zoo, many friends would attest to the fact that I'd be dead by now. Some are surprised I've lasted this long with my innate need to touch and my college-like invincibility complex.

I really wanted to jump through the barriers and head down to the pool that was bubbling like the witches' caldron in MacBeth, but Russ talked me out of it by reciting his process of guilt when torn between interacting with nature and following the designated path. Since he functions as my conscience half the time, I try not to call him a wuss. He also mentioned that the citation that I would receive - because I always, always get caught - would come out of my monthly clothing budget and that sealed the obeying-the-law deal. But I didn't like it and I never will. What made me feel better about not being able to touch the 93 degree Celsius water was that some college students with a magnified invincibility complex, heavily aided by the beer they were openly drinking, bragged about their plan to cross the barriers and go down to the water's edge, or, as I think he called it, "the motherfucking hot tub." I watched them crawl through the fence and stand on the water's edge and felt glad that I was not an asshole, at least not outloud.