I limped into San Francisco a broken man. I was a wreck, a mess, and also quite tired. I remember I went into the tourist bathroom at the other end of the Golden gate bridge and hid there for about an hour. I sat on that dirty little toilet with my face in my hands-seriously close to tears-thinking what the hell have I gotten myself into? As I suspected. It wasn't the elements, crazy thieves or wild animals that were my biggest enemies on this trip, I was my own biggest enemy. Could I seriously push myself every day like this? I wanted to turn tail and run.
I spent the better part of that hour thinking of every excuse that would bring me back. I'd told everyone I was going, how could I pussy out here and save face? In the end I was pretty sure a broken leg was going to be the only thing I could do that would buy a bit of sympathy for failing. I wasn't quite ready to do that however. So I did the next best thing, called mommy and daddy and whined about how much my feet hurt. I guess sometimes having a totally irrational asshole for a father comes in handy here. He basically said if I didn't take the bus home I wasn't welcome back in his house. It was about an hour drive from Petaluma. So as I sat there, thinking, I realized that dragging my sorry ass to a bus stop was way, way to much work and I am really lazy. So I called the guy who said he would host me in San Francisco instead, the coolest guy in the world named Glen Loomis.
Glen and roomate, those crazy cards
Glen was totally down to earth, had a great car and a really nice apartment. This was the sweet life he was living. I mean, the guy cooks tri-tip for dinner. I almost cried, Tri-tip used to be a once a year thing to savor. And he made a suggestion, "Why not stay here another day and rest?" I took him up on it. And thats how I spent the next day shantying around San Francisco with slow, painful steps. It was a nice day though, my feet were recovering, and of course I had to hit China town for some of that authentic BBQ pork. You know the kind that hangs in the windows, lobster red and all glazed over? As you could tell food was on my mind quite a bit.
Mmm chinese food
And so that was the true beginning. Sure my feet hurt, and yes, I still am getting blisters 3 (now a month and a half) weeks later. I figured out the key though, I just have to get blisters on every part of my feet and can possibly get blisters, and then, finally, I shall be so calloused and scared up my feet will just say "enough" and stop giving me them.
So I hobbled down highway 1 from San Fran. There were tons of highlights that I simply can't be bothered to write down. I did indeed meet a whole host of crazy cards and normal ned's.
Some highlights here: I met a 36 year old flight attendant "couger" (kudos to those who knows what that means) who only jumped on boys who were left handed. Seriously you heard me there, her entire dating scheme was that they had to be left handed-and pretty much nothing else. I met a crazy girl who put rotten fishes in her roommates bed, caused their dorm room to be evacuated and eventually got kicked off the campus. I felt bad though, she had a sweet soul and deserves better. Just lay off the revenge ange!
I did indeed spend 4 days camping out going between Monterey and San Luis Obispo, which is virtually 80 miles of nothing but beautiful cost. It was a wonderful time that really did a bit for my spirits. However, I will add that late one night I hobbled out of my tent and squatted in the dirt like a caveman, intent on relieving myself. Little did I know this would all lead to poison oak on my bum about 2 days later. This gradually spread everywhere, not fun. It was one of the few instances where I was actually glad I didn't have a camera. No one needs to be exposed to my butt right now, especially not poison oak covered.
At last but not least, I did hitchhike the last 15 miles with some hippies to San Luis Obispo because MAN I NEEDED A SHOWER. This all came to disaster anyway as I ended up sleeping under the freeway that freezing night. But back to the hippies, the 3 of them lived in a van with as far as I can tell 20 dogs. Their first words to me upon pulling over were “you got any pot” and then shortly after “you want some then?” And as I sat back with them on smelly blankets and “talked about the good times” I realized somewhere between the 3rd ganja brownie and the 10th something hit from the hash pipe it had been a damn long time since I got this high, and man, I was high. They dropped me off in SLO town near the jack in the box, where I proceeded to spend the next 4 hours in some kind of drugged up stupor waiting for my head to clear. Yes, I became “that” crazy guy at the Jack in the box.
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