yeah, i've taken quite the hiatus. unexcused absence, really. i know nobody is reading this anymore, but i feel i should get back to writing something on a regular basis so that i don't, you know, lose my perspicacity.

i had a cold about a week and a half ago--nothing serious--but my sweetie said, "oh, you've got a compromised immune system? i've got an idea! let's spend the long weekend camping in the oregon desert freezing our asses off in subzero temperatures!"

"that sounds like a superb idea!"

it was a thirteen-hour drive down there. we left the city at 4:30 pm, so you do the math. we were stuck at the border for two and half hours, part of that because we were detained. four of us in the car, and the border official asked my sweetie and only my sweetie if he's ever been arrested. then they made us leave our car because we confessed we had pepperoni amongst our groceries. although we were pretty sure the pepperoni was made in the u.s., they searched the vehicle while they questioned us inside. again, it was my beardo sweetie they questioned, not any of the rest of us.

"where are you going?"

"smith rock, in oregon."

"and what are you doing there?"

"climbing some rocks."

"aren't there rocks up in canada?"

"uh...yeah, but they're kinda wet."

eventually they found SW's pepperoni and let us go. "you can't take this," the border guard told us.

we ran out and made a clandestine escape. they found one of our pepperoni packages, but missed our 1 kg stash in the trunk.

my sweetie had promised me that i could recover from my cold by sleeping all the way down. of course, since i was folded into the volume and roughly the shape of the inside of a washing machine, that promise went unfulfilled.

we arrived at the campsite at five in the morning. in the dark we set up our tent, where i spent my first of several fitful nights trying to keep warm.

the next morning, i wasn't fully recovered, and i wasn't strong enough to go rock climbing, but i did feel sufficiently well to hike around smith rocks while my sweetie and SW climbed.

in the evening the three of us headed into town to grab supper. according to the climber's guide to smith rocks, chan's restaurant was the "best chinese restaurant in town (Redmond)." my sweetie suggested we head there, although i was highly dubious. i said we should look at the menu, and if they served chop suey, we should leave. the others agreed.

when we arrived, the menu actually looked decent, and we decided to stay. we each decided on an entree and ordered. our meals came with soup: my sweetie and SW got the hot and sour soup, and i ordered the egg drop. the bowls of soup came with saltines -- seriously. and apparently, in the states the crackers aren't "premium plus" -- they're just "premium."

the rest of our dishes came, and they were actually pretty good. but as we ate, people came in ordering take-out. i nearly choked on my food when some dude ordered "sour cream wontons." i frankly have no idea what those could possibly be.

another dude came in and said, "yeah... can i get two orders of the general... uh... the chicken dish."

"general tsao's chicken?"

"yeah."

"two orders?"

"yeah. but no vegetables. just the meat."

"no vegetables?"

"yeah. and, oh, not too spicy."

"two orders?"

"better make that three orders."

as this conversation was progressing, i began laughing harder and harder. my sweetie accused me of being "culturally insensitive."

when we finished our meal, we headed back to camp. that night, temperatures plunged, and i could barely sleep. the next morning i wasn't feeling so great, so my sweetie and SW went climbing, and i stayed in the tent for the entire day. during the afternoon, the wind got fierce, and i heard drops of precipitation on the fly.

apparently, it rained -- and snowed -- more in that one weekend than it usually does in the entire month of november down there.

by nightfall, my sweetie and SW came to fetch me, and we headed in to terrebonne, oregon, for supper at this mexican eatery called "la siesta café." i ordered the chicken taquitos. it was good when i ate it. little did i know i would be tasting those taquitos twice.

in the middle of the night, in the tent, i woke up feeling urgently naseous. i sat up, turned around to face the vestible that didn't contain our shoes, and shrivelled into a fetal ball.

"what are you doing flipped around?" my sweetie asked, groggy.

"i'm gonna vomit," i said. i unzipped the tent and retched out onto the grass. i retreated back into the tent because it was horribly cold. but in short order, i had to expel my stomach contents again. and again. then the other end of my digestive system lost it, and i found myself scrambling to pull on my rain gear to make the twenty-metre dash to the latrine.

incidentally, the latrine didn't have any toilet paper.

needless to say, it was a rough night.

the next day, we started on our way home. i managed to keep a couple of immodium pills down, to SW's relief. last thing he needed was me befouling his vehicle. we drove from place to place in redmond attempting to find some gravol. apparently, americans don't know what gravol is. i guess they just chug pepto after meals. anyway, we found some ostensibly gravol-like pills, i took them, and we were on our way.

it took us twelve hours to get home. i ran a fever for at least half of that time. thankfully, the canadian border official didn't give us any trouble. the contrast was really remarkable.

annoyingly, the week i was trying to recover from this horrible bout of food poisoning, vancouver issued its boil-water advisory because of turbidity that made the water look like weak tim hortons coffee, even after filtration. ironically, too, the weekend after my horrible episode, i was scheduled to take a foodsafe course to learn how not to food-poison people.

i'm fully recovered now, and i can sort of laugh about the experience, but my sweetie will never again convince me to go on a trip when i'm not feeling my best.