My friend Ben Shelton passed away last week at the age of 31. A wake is scheduled this weekend.

Everything else is lame in comparison. In any case, I got home in time to realize it was time to pass the baton in the “make your little sister happy relay” again and I had to take the package I got from REI over to the Slabs for delivery to Paso Robles, CA. It would be easier if they’d just move the heck up here, but Portland isn’t exactly paradise, either.

Last Friday when I went back to work at 8:30PM or so, I decided to clear out all the Diet Coke bottles I’d accumulated.They completely filled the small trunk of my Honda, and so I got rid of them while I was at the Slabs, since they’re near a Safeway. I was in line with some folks who looked like their entire income was from recycling bottles. (For those from other planets, Oregonians pay a $0.05 deposit on every bottle, and were the first state to do that. Lately you have to get the money back by shoving the cans or bottles into a smelly machine that counts and crushes them, and for your trouble you get a slip of paper that you can take into the store to exchange for money.) In any case, I had $4.85 worth of bottles, or ninety-seven bottles to return.