A couple of weeks ago, we were sitting in the air-conditioned lounge between fiberglassing projects. We were wearing what Barry and I call our “itchy-scratchy” clothes, ratty things we only wear for the nastiest, messiest jobs. For me, that means denim shorts with a hole in the rear, an old t-shirt large enough to fit an elephant, and sandals.

A fellow walked in, and I glanced up from my notebook and said hello, absently. Then I looked at him again.

It was over 100 degrees, and he looked cool as a cucumber. He was wearing tooled leather cowboy boots and black jeans, with the kind of dress shirt you see at a country and western dance, or a square dance. It had shiny button covers and fancy trim along the yoke.

I realized I was staring, and I blurted out, “You sure don’t look like you’re working on a boat today!”

“No, I came on my motorcycle to show my boat to a prospective buyer,” he replied. He explained that he had a powerboat for sale out in the storage lot, the place we jokingly call “the field of broken dreams.”

A few years ago, when shopping for a boat, he was that extremely rare breed of boater who would consider either a powerboat or sailboat. He’d found a sailboat he liked, but the asking price was too high. He thought of making a lowball offer, but didn’t want to offend the seller. So he walked away from the sailboat. Later, it sold for the amount he would have offered. He kicked himself, but it was too late. He’d just bought a powerboat, a tri-cabin cruiser.

Now his powerboat is for sale. He can’t afford to use it, his dream broken by the high cost of fuel.

Occasionally, sailors buy powerboats, when they get old and tired of hoisting and trimming sails. Rarely does a powerboater buy a sailboat, but these are unusual times.

There was a very large Hunter sailboat tied up at the dock last week, and Val and Gigi wandered out to see it. “We were surprised to see all the lights on, but none of the hatches were open,” she said. “Then we realized it had two air conditioners, so of course the hatches were closed!”

They chatted with the couple on board, who were taking their new boat home to Texas and had recently run aground and needed repairs. They had sold their powerboat, because the cost of fuel was so high, and now they were going to try sailing. Given the size and complexity of the boat, they were certainly jumping in with both feet. But it was what Barry and I call a “furniture boat,” lots of pretty woodwork and fancy electrical systems, designed for the dock, not the waves.

The problem is, it’s just not natural to make a sailor out of a powerboater. A few years back, I had a coworker with a 25-foot planing powerboat. At the time, we had the Northern Crow, a gutsy little 25-foot sailboat.

Initially, I’d come in on Monday and compare notes with Gary. We’d spent a day ghosting to Poulsbo, watching for favorable currents, while he’d zipped up to Port Townsend in a couple of hours. But after a few months, I started coming in on Monday and seeing a long face. “How was your weekend, Gary? Did you take the boat out?” I’d ask. And his answer was always, “No, I couldn’t afford the fuel this weekend. The kids needed…” At the time, gas prices were half of what they are today, but he had teenaged boys in the house who ate up all his money.

I often teased him, saying, “How about a sailboat?” but it was a joke. He’d take up sailing when pigs fly.

Eventually, Gary got fired and had a mid-life crisis. He ran off with his stepson’s girlfriend, and his wife bitterly filed for divorce. She sold the boat.

I wonder if Gary or the fellow in the cowboy boots will ever have another boat. Given the price of fuel — high and going higher — the answer might just be, when pigs fly.

Barry came to me with a long face. “Er, I have some bad news.” He paused, leaving me to wonder just how bad this news was going to be. Sometimes, I wish he would just blurt it out, instead of making me wonder how bad it was. I found myself checking to make sure all his fingers were still attached.

“I killed your Dremel.”

Well, that wasn’t so terrible. I was a little sentimental about it, because it was a gift from my sister, and it was the only power tool in our arsenal that Barry and I both called “mine.” But we could easily buy another one.

So the next day, we got in the van and drove to the hardware store, about 15 miles, to buy another Dremel. Mission accomplished, we headed for a nearby restaurant for lunch. I was driving, and then Barry said, from the passenger seat, “Uh-oh.”

The only thing I hate more than “I have some bad news” is “Uh-oh.”

And one more thing we both hate is power windows. Unfortunately, the Squid Wagon has them. For months, I’d refused to use the one on the driver’s side. It was so slow, I was sure it was going to break and get stuck in the “down” position, and then it would rain. Now Barry followed his “Uh-oh” by telling me that the passenger window was stuck in the down position. This was followed by a rumble of thunder.

The window was going to be a much bigger headache than the Dremel. Frantic, we drove to the nearest Ford dealer.

“We don’t keep such old motors in stock, but I can order you one,” said the parts manager, smiling.

“I’m not certain the motor’s what I need…” said Barry.

“Electrical parts are non-returnable,” said the parts manager, and I realized the smile was robotic.

“I’ll go home and figure it out, and we’ll call you to order it in the morning,” said Barry.

“Nope, I can’t accept a credit card over the phone,” said the smiling, robotic parts manager. So we’d have to come back in person to order it, then come back in person to pick it up? At this point, Barry had to leave the store, unable to say anything besides, “Grrrrrrrrrrr.”

Luckily, the motor was in stock, cheaper, at an auto parts store.

The rain held off; it hadn’t actually rained in two week. Then, that night, before Barry could figure out how to install the new motor, it poured buckets on our sorry plastic-covered window. He finished the installation between showers the next day. He said “Grrrrrrrrrr” a lot.

And then it was my turn. I was using our tiny, lame saber saw to cut some aluminum backing plates. The motor started running more and more slowly, until it couldn’t cut any more. Well, it might still cut butter, but only if it was soft, and you wanted to cut butter with a saber saw.

This was turning into a bad week for motors.

At this point, I had to decide what to say to Barry. Should I start with “I have some bad news,” or simply “Uh-oh?” I opted for a different method.

“Barry!” I hollered. An alien looked down at me from the deck, wearing a white Tyvek bunny suit, full-face respirator, and ear muffs. His mouth was invisible behind the respirator, but I saw his jaw move. I guess he said, “What?”

“I killed the saber saw,” I shouted, twice, three times, waving the dead saw at him. Suddenly, he took off the respirator and the ear muffs. He was grinning.

“You killed it? Really? That’s great!”

He’d been wanting to replace that lame piece of junk for years, and I had just given him the excuse. The next day, he was exceedingly cheerful as we got into the van, and I got into the mood by playing with the passenger window. Up, down, up, down…wheeeee! We tooled around town and finally chose a 6.0 amp Skil brand saber saw. Then we rewarded ourselves some more with dinner, internet, and a phone chat with a Seattle friend. A lovely day, unlike the one when we replaced the Dremel.

It would have been an appropriate coincidence for the driver’s window motor to die that day, but it’s still working, although only fast enough to cut soft butter. So maybe our run of bad motor luck is over. May all the other motors on the boat live long and prosper, and best of luck with your motors, too.

Every once in a while, I have to turn my head to the side and shake all the excess brain fluff out of my ear. I also have to clean out all the small info-snippets that have gathered in our traveling notebook. So the following post is sort of like the soup you make after cleaning out the refrigerator.

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I recently found the receipt for some postcards I bought at Graceland. At the time, I hadn’t noticed the name of the store at the top of the receipt: “Welcome To My World.” Considering that Elvis Presley is dead, I’m wondering, what does that signify?

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At a Wal-Mart near Bentonville, Arkansas, we had a strange experience. As we walked in, instead of a regular greeter, an older woman walked up to us and said, “Happy Earth Day! Would you like a clothespin?” We accepted this strange gift, on which she’d handwritten, “Save energy! Hang clothes out to dry!”

A day later, checking into a campground, we were handed an 8-1/2×11 sheet of paper, single-spaced, with campground rules. Rule number 13 was, “…use the washers and dryers provided in the laundry room. Clotheslines are very dangerous and things hung outside to dry can blow away in the wind, or be unsightly to other campers.” (the emphasis is theirs) Laughing, Barry clipped the rules sheet to our notebook with the clothespin, leaving me to ruminate on the paradox.

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Favorite street names: Side Street, Friendly Street, Liberal Avenue. The first two were in Eugene. The third one could have been, but wasn’t.

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Favorite billboards: Two checkboxes, reading “Stick head in sand” and “Fight global warming.”

And: Lose 3000 pounds in one day! Donate your car to…

And: Be an Oklahoma State Trooper — company car provided!

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Most common question from strangers on our trip across the country: “Is that a boat?”

Answer most likely to be met with a chuckle: “Yep, my wife built it.”

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I put a magnetic peace sign on the back of our van, my quiet statement about the Iraq war. However, I was confused, and I put it on upside-down, with the three prongs up. My sister, who also has one, laughed at me, but I still wasn’t absolutely certain that she was right. After I’d seen at least six peace signs along I-5, all of them with the prongs down, I flipped it over, embarrassed. How could I have lived through the 70′s and not noticed?

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Funniest missing comma: “This road adopted by Wal-mart Marina.”

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Funniest Texas sign: “Don’t mess with Texas. Up to $2000 fine for littering.”

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Strangest highway equipment: On Highway 1, along the California coast, rockslides are so common that they use something like a snowplow to clear the roads. We dubbed them “rockplows.”

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Favorite exit signs: “Santa Claus Lane, next exit.”

Also, “Mexico, next exit.” Don’t you wonder what the one on the other side says?

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Best question on a billboard: “Have you ever met an honest mortician?”

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Three great business names: HAYKINGDOM, Insane Autos, Aggressive Towing

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If cows could read, and if they appreciated fine wrought-iron work, maybe the lovely archway that says “Cattle Town” over the entrance to the feedlot would make them think they’re going to a nice place. I doubt it, though.

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Weirdest church name: Bovina United Methodist Church (I bet the sermons are very mooooving!)

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Two beautiful California things I saw firsthand: Fields of purple artichokes and whales spouting in the Pacific Ocean.

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Not an April fools’ joke: On April 1, 2008, we stopped at 1 Infinite Loop Drive, also known as Apple Headquarters. This was not to pay homage to the maker of our new computer, but to have lunch with Todd, who we’d not seen in 17 years. He looks exactly like he did when he graduated from college, one advantage to losing one’s hair young.

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Dumb question, smart answer: Driving through Arizona date country, Meps asked, “If dates come from palm trees, and coconuts come from palm trees, are dates related to coconuts?” Barry answered, “As much as peaches are related to oranges, I guess.”

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Friona, Official Cheeseburger Capital of Texas.

Twenty miles later: Welcome to Hereford, Beef Capitol of the World. Sorry, the folks in Friona say it only counts if it’s official.

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Most propitious lunch stop: We received an email in February from our friend, Drew, that read “Rudy’s BBQ is a must stop. All other BBQ including Mary’s (his wife, rumored to make the best homemade BBQ in Seattle) is judged by this Texas Standard.” Two months later, we happened to be passing Rudy’s, outside El Paso, precisely at lunchtime when our stomachs were growling.

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In Oregon, where all gas is pumped by attendants, we started chatting with the man pumping our diesel. He asked where we were headed, and when we told him “North Carolina, via San Diego” he told us about a trip he once took. They drove from Grant’s Pass to Charleston, South Carolina and back, over 6000 miles, in 5 days. He seemed proud to have “seen” the entire USA.

Since we purchased the Squid Wagon in Florida and took it to Seattle by way of Newfoundland, our trusty Ford van has not crossed the USA, it has actually circumnavigated it. Compared to the fellow from Grant’s Pass, though, we’re slow. We’ve only traveled twice the distance, or 12,000 miles. But it took us four and a half months for the northern leg, and a speedy five weeks for the southern.