i think if you have to think too long for a title, you'd best do without

just back from a dip in the ocean with karey and sarita. sarita wears her flip flops into the ocean and then swims with them on her hands. she doesn't like how she doesn't know what she'll step on. she said it could be a needle, it could be fecal matter.... that bit about the needles reminds me of randy and his crack head worries. and then there was rod who irked me by consistantly objecting to the ocean "because there could be critters in there!" the most irksome part of this sentence is the choice of the word 'critter' for living organisms and fish that make the ocean their home. next minute he'd be calling a starfish a 'varmit'. if he said that we would have had words.

the dip in the ocean was an impulsive move. karey came home and asked us if we wanted to go. i'm never one to say no to an ocean pilgrimage. i say pilgrimige because it does end up being somewhat of a holy trip for me when i visit the sea. it's connected intimately with my spirituality somehow. it makes me thankful. i see the vastness of the ocean and the smallness of me inside it. i feel some sort of communion with my maker. it's all about creation and power and beauty and i get to be there in the middle of it all.

yesterday me and karey and barb and nikki took a little trip to birch bay. the truck border crossign was horrendous. so barb showed us a trick. we went to the duty free store, which is way up near the front, bought some tax free junk food, and got to bud way ahead when we got out of the parking lot. i bought peanutbutter lindors, and some other goodness. it didn't take us long to find birch bay, but it did take us a long time to decide on which part of the beach we wanted to visit and where we would park. birch bay turned out to be not that great of a beach. it's like parksville in that it goes way way way way out, but you have to wade through seaweed most of the time and the dry beach is big uncomfy rocks. there were no changerooms so i held up a towel for karey and she changed right there in the open. barb and i opted to change in one of the portipotties up by the road and nikki had hers on under her clothes (a wise move on her part). we had a fun time despite seaweed. we had lots of different contests (like who can stand on their hands the longest or who can do the most flips under water), and played different games (like tag and marco polo). we were out for about an hour or so before we came in. the tide had come all the way way way in and some kind person had saved my flip flops which i left on a rock in hopes to save my tender (ha ha) tootsies. we all had our respective books to read. i had harry potter, karey had a jack weyland book (she's really getting into jack. she wants to collect all his books) nikki had her book of mormon and barb had some doctrine book i think. but soon the tide came right up to us, so we got into the car and drove to some washrooms we had found earlier, changed and then drove to bob's ok carral, where we were stared at like "howdy pardner yer not from these here parts..." when we came in. we ignored or stared back depending on our respective aggressiveness or politeness. we got a spacey waitress who didn't seem to know anything about the menu. she didn't know what the special sauce was (someone told her once but she forgot), she didn't know if the chicken burger came with onions but she'd tell them 'no onions' and she didn't know what kind of fish the fish and chips were (meanwhile barb was guessing every fish under the sun but the blank look did not leave her face "i dooon't think it's cod..." she mused "i'll get the fish and chips", said barb putting an effective end to that guessing game). the service was slow, but we had a fun time playing phase ten while we watied and then while we ate. it was a two hour game of phase ten and i did not fare well. i had an unusually hard time getting out of the run phases. hey, everybody has their off days.

on the way home i continued reading harry potter, so i didn't feel like getting out and going into cost cutters with the others. an old couple came by, getting into the car next to me and the old lady said "oh someone's sleeping." but her more astute husband asked me through the open window "are you reading harry potter?" "yes i am." i said and smiled.

i finished harry potter last night. i ws too shocked and freaked out because of the contents and because it was so late and so i wasn't brave enough to take the garbage out in the dark. i'll take it out tomorrow morning, i thought. well the morning came and went and it wasn't until i got back home after work that i realized my sin of omission.

i'm sooooooooooooooo thirsty. the lady at the concession stand gave me a huge heaping helping of curly fries. now i have more salt in my body than water. i'm practically a pillar of salt.

had a satisfying talk today with bueteronomy-beth today. i realize that one of the reasons that i go through the things that i do in my life is so i can share the things i've learned with the people in my life. some things are just so similar it's uncanny. i find this with the twins and karey and elicia a lot. funny how that is. i think it's one of the ways that the Lord can turn all things for our good.

i think i shall indulge in liquid refreshment now.