You know that feeling, when you meet someone kind of interesting, who has sort of an interesting name? And you think maybe you'll get to be friends with them, because they seem oddly self assured and full of ideas and you imagine that you might get along well. Only after a while, you learn that his name, which was what interested you in the first place, was actually not his given name, but one he took in college, to replace his much more ordinary name.Then you see his band, and they are kind of good, though you wind up buying their cd more as a favor to them than because you really want it. Then you go visit him at his house, and you see a bunch of squished out KY tubes in his bathroom when you go in to take a leak. And you get a sort of unsettling feeling? Well, I was sort of having that feeling, because we went to see a band playing at an art opening, and it was all indie kids, in the basement of some burned out neighborhood.

The band was doing a sort of Stereolab knockoff thing, only a little more rockin and there were a lot of tattooed people there, plus some art on the walls, plus what appeared to be a home made circular staircase welded from scrap, and the requisite dazed looking toddler who shouldn't have been up so late or listening to such loud music.

Art damaged people are the same everywhere.

To be fair, this band had nothing to do with that earlier experience, it just reminded me of when that happened, when, at this one, they asked me to buy their cd.

But before that, we went to Point Reyes. Actually, we had sort of an ordeal getting there, because for some reason it takes four hours to leave the house, which never ceases to make me insane with impatience. Then we had to stop in Marin at REI, and REI wasn't open for 45 minutes so I had to further stew in my juices in the sort of outdoor mall they have there. There are hanging flowers, and piped in classical music, and people selling nectarines for 1.19 each, and all around at little tables were Marin type people taking in the sun with some coffee. I was sitting there, trying to tease out why I wanted to run from there screaming, but I couldnt' quite put my finger on it. I think it has to do with my preoccupation with authenticity, because everything there was simulated, from the farm experience to the fountains. But all around it was sort of pleasant but kind of well constructed artifice. I don't know why it was so maddening.

Then we got good and lost, going about 2 hours out of the way, but eventually made it to Pt. Reyes, which is a national park out on a rock prominitory that faces the ocean. At the very tip is a light house, where the wind varies between 40 and 133 miles an hour, that latter figure the highest wind velocity on the continental united states ever recorded. So it was windy. As soon as you get out of the car, you are bent double by the wind. There is a light house there and fog horn, and four bungalows where the light house people live. Then there are 33 stories of concrete stairs that lead down the rock.

Pt. Reyes is actually giant, something like 1,700 acres of park, so after looking at the light house, not seeing any migrating whales, and taking in the beach, we headed down to another town, which was actually our original desitation.

At that point, it was getting a little late in the day, but we took a little hike anyway, which turned in to a fairly strenous 12 mile hike over a big hill. So that was nice, though of course sort of sucked the wind out of me.

I guess it was the hike, or maybe going to to see the band and drinking sangria, but the next day I was feeling pooped. Still, we managed to go to an ice cream place called Mitchell's and it serves many ususual flavors. And by unusual, I mean I had udu, a filipino yam which is bright purple and cantelope. My honey had cinamon chocolate, which, according to their sign, is very popular with yuppies. Nice place, though I can't really recommend the udu over the chocolate bomb.