One: Golden Flea

Figure 1: Local street sign.

Yesterday, my last day in Laramie, was such a major mondo coup. You might even say it was a total coupgasm. I liked Laramie and I had a fabulous time, although I am still a little mad at it for eating my best friend.

Figure 2: I think they changed the name without changing the sign.

We went to the Golden Flea Gallery, and it was probably the best flea market I’ve ever been to, and that includes the ones in Illinois. I knew they were out there. I used to lay in bed at night going FUCK I cannot believe I just paid fifty bone for vintage Western wear, when in ruralish IL it was like five dollars and freshly ripped out of some old dead guy’s closet. Here, half the time you have to pray that you can wash out the leftover hipster grease and carefully rip off the anachronistic ironic patch that’s been sewn over the pocket.

Figures 3 and 4: You know you want some…generic petroleum jelly!

But not in Laramie. It’s the real deal there. I scored two velvet paintings, both of horses, and one on rare blue velvet. They are going to flank the bandito over my bed. When they get here, I am going to post a full gallery of my complete collection. Screem.

Figure 5: My dream living room.

Figure 6: Aww, broken ear. I shall call you “Lil Bathos.”

Two: I, Invisiblehole

I had a fabulous time hanging out and being a guest, and I know I’ve mentioned this before, but I’m really glad I’m going back to being ignored today. Seattleites have this weird manner about them, like whatever’s happening is not really happening. It’s like the Hitchhiker Trilogy with that Somebody Else’s Problem Field. I have literally gone ass over teakettle in the street with my baby secured in her backpack, and people have glanced and then gone on their way. I think, disturbingly, that I have come to prefer this. My claustrophobia reached a fever pitch in a lunch spot yesterday when I walked through to the bathroom and half the joint turned to watch me go by.

Figure 7: The historic Johnson Hotel Building.

(Warning: I’m going to go all the way up my own butt for a moment, which is something I try to avoid, even though I’m always writing about myself anyway.) I really don’t like being stared at in the way I was stared at in Laramie. When I moved to Phoenix, I had red hair and four piercings around my mouth. People would say something to me or ask me questions two or three times a day. I went “underground” during college and dyed my hair brown and took out all of my visible piercings. On the other hand, I hear it’s difficult to meet people in Seattle, because of the supposed aloofness there. I don’t really have a problem with it–but I am content to hang out with people I meet through blogworld or at my kid’s school.

Three: The Other UW

Figure 8: UW Arts and Sciences Building. Everything was lumpy sandstone, and it was really pretty.

Figure 9: Godzilla lives outside of the UW Geological Museum.

Figure 10: A tricked out cart in Coe. Apparently there are undercarriage lights as well.

Saturday was pretty chill. We hit the university, which is beautiful and sandstony. I saw my friend’s real deal academic office, which made it more real to me that she’s a Librarian. I am so proud of her. I met her on the first day of class and we both had the same thought: “This person is either going to be a serious bitch or really cool.” It turned out both things were true! Win!

Figure 11: bobbledoods in my friend’s office. Is that you, Jane Austin and Charles Darwin? Also, some other dead white guy?

Figure 12: We got all excited because we thought this said, “Reading maketh a evll [sic] man.” We were like, you go university. But I think it’s just been defaced, because the real quote is by Francis Bacon: “Reading maketh a full man.” Bacon, you joykill.

Four: Historic Downtown

Figure 13: My friend immediately quipped, “God hates you. AND SO DO I!”

Figure 14: Look how greasy I am. The dry air was making me churn out oil overtime. Yeah, that’s cute.

We also went shopping downtown. I fruitlessly looked for hooks, which I need to tie back the bedroom curtains Companion just sewed last weekend. I found a rad deerhead/hoof hooks combo, but of course they wouldn’t separate them and just sell me the hoof hooks. Downtown Laramie is pretty nice. There seems to be one bookstore for every three people, and a similar ratio of bars.

Figure 15: I think the taxidermied heads outnumbered the people, though.

Figure 16: A view of downtown.

Five: This is a Robbery; No One’s Getting Free

I took my friend out to the nicest steakhouse in town, The Calvaryman, which I had christened The Highwayman. This proved to be slightly prophetic. I said, I want some crazy good steak, since I never eat it as I am an avowed Lambitarian. I had surf n’ turf, which I haven’t had since the night of my first wedding, and it was crazy delicious.

Alert readers may recall that on my first night there we went to the Library Bar and I ordered a martini. It was up, dirty, and made with Grey Goose. I ordered the exact same thing at The Highwayman and it was off. So off. How do you make an off martini? I became convinced that they are watering down their vodka! Seriously. It was crazy. I felt better once I figured it out. My friend said that I am one of those people that “How Things Work” is made for.

Figure 17: Hey, it’s that guy again.

We called and made reservations and I asked about the dress code. “People come pretty casual, but this is an upscale restaurant,” the hostess replied. We gussied up a bit, and then were seated in direct view of the covered wagon salad bar and many, many taxidermied heads. Upscale, eh? Well-played, Highwayman, well-played. I think they could inch closer to that upscale status if they stopped watering their booze.

But don’t lose the covered wagon salad bar. Stay sweet, Highwayman. Don’t change. Except for that one part.

Six: Thots and Flight

Figure 18: Ye Olde Buckhorn, which had a noose hanging from the rafters.

On Saturday before dinner we went into the Buckhorn for happy hour where I got chortled at loudly by a sweaty drunken man and his dog-faced girlfriend. Later, after his girlfriend left, he sauntered over to some men on the other side of my friend, where he began loudly telling a joke about lynching. I haven’t heard a lynching joke in years, and as it turns out, they’re still not funny. When he finished, his audience stared at him blankly.

I told this story to the people I sat with on the plane on the way home. The girl sitting next to me, who was from a small town outlying Seattle, spent the whole trip telling me that people who live in Seattle are “weird. No offense.” (I guess she should know, she’s made four brief visits to Seattle in her life.) She also told us that she can’t wait to move to a small town, where everyone is nice.

We got to talking about the Confederate flag, and I mentioned that people I went to high school with often prominently displayed the flag, which offended some of the people at my school. She exclaimed that it was too bad, because that’s not what the flag represents at all. It represents Southern hospitality and generosity. I countered that perhaps it meant different things to different people. She told me that the South was a “really nice place, and everyone is nice there.” I told her that I lived there for a while.

“Oh, and how was that?” she said, smiling.

“People made fun of me and called me a Yankee until I picked up the accent again,” I said.

“Oh,” she said.

She was coming back from looking at a college in a really small town in the Midwest. It was interesting to talk with her in that cringy way. I really hope continues to talk to people who have different perspectives. At this point, she sounds like she’s aping half-truths she’s heard from other people. What else can we do until we have some life experience and can produce some half-truths of our own?

Anyway, I told the lynching-joke story, and she said, “Oh yeah, I hear those a lot.” After hearing about Southern hospitality and the warm fuzzy things the Confederate flag represents, I almost died of an irony attack.

The guy next to me seemed more interesting and more my speed, and I kept trying to talk to him. The girl kept cutting in with things like, “I have never heard of that!” and “I’d never do that!” which would derail any chance of a cohesive conversation about books or technology. In spite of all that, I think it’s a sign that I’m getting old that I still liked her. I see eighteen-year-olds now and I feel like, “Aw, poor thing.” I mean that in the least condescending way possible. No, stop looking at me like that, I’m serious.

Seven: Wee Plane

The flight from Laramie to Denver was intense. I have never been on a puddle jumper before. This was a little twenty-seater, and there were about eight of us. It was fun to get off right on the tarmac. I felt like I was in an old movie, until the wind in Denver threatened to rip the sunglasses off my face.

Figure 19: View from the wee puddlejumper. I was convinced that if I kept my eyes on the ground we would not be kilt.

The plane jostled and bounced like crazy. I am used to commercial jets going up and down and rumbling a bit with turbulence. I have never experienced planes going back and forth and side to side. I think if I would have put an iron bar in my tweeter at the beginning of the flight, at the end it could have spit out those little wire reindeers like your grandpa used to make after he retired.

Once we landed and I had swallowed some of my pulverized bits of teeth, the businessman in front of me announced, “Well, that was a smooth flight!” I are a wuss.

Strudel was kind of unimpressed that I was back this morning. I snuggled into her in bed, and she said, “SHOO! SHOO! SHOO!” like we do to the cat. After Companion left, she warmed up again. She is less scabby that when I left, and is back to Naked Feral Dwarf Level: Yellow rather than Whining Freakout Barbarian Level: Orange.

And fuck if my house isn’t clean, like Clean, not just stuff crammed in the closet, and the laundry is washed and folded. It really made going away a treat.

Figure 20: Alibi Drive-thru Liquor and Bar.

End.

P to the S. A peep I admire is now blogging! And it’s one of those fun, highbrow/downlow academic blogs. And the writer blames me for starting. I cannot tell you what a thrill it gives me to find a blog that says, “I blame I, Asshole for all of this.” Woot!

ALSO,

Chris Clarke, I bet you get more ass than a toilet seat. This is what happens when I go out of town. I miss the Internets show! Now someone needs to write “How Not to Be an Asshole” for women.