odd and ends

[jaeclectic]

Miscellany:

I saw two bears. Live, in the woods, while I was out there hiking all by my lonesome. One of them came onto the trail about 30 ft ahead of me. Fortunately, they did not seem particularly disturbed, threatened, or interested in me. And, you know, they were just little black bears, not big ol' grizzlies. But still.

I talked to a lot of people on the trails, much more so than usual. I don't know if it was just my mood, or if Sequoia is a sociable kind of park.

During the third day of hiking, my ankle really hurt. Not the one I injured in July, the other one. Go figure. I think the lesson is: make sure I have *two* ankle braces with me in Peru, just in case.

The saga of the (not) hot tub:

As I mentioned before, I had specifically selected a hotel with a hot tub, which turned out to be out of service. But they didn't know it.

The first day, I got back to the hotel after dark and walked up to the pool area, and discovered a sign which said "if you want to use the hot tub, please notify the hotel desk one hour in advance", because otherwise they don't heat it. And thought, "oh well, I wish they'd mentioned that when I checked in, but I'll know for tomorrow". So I dutifully stopped by the hotel office in the AM and requested of an older gentleman that they turn on the hot tub for 6:00 PM. Then, arriving back at 6:15 PM, found the hot tub was in fact stone cold.

So I go back to the hotel office, a little irritated. The door is answered by a young man (my initial impression was that he was about 16, but probably really in his early 20s), who was rather defensive and kept saying "there wasn't a note" and then snapped at me because one of the cats got out -- like I was supposed to know not to leave the hotel office door open! but nevertheless, he agreed to turn on the hot tub, so I went and floated in the pool for a while and then sat next to the hot tub with a book and a beer and waited for hot water to happen. Not such a hardship on a warm summer evening, really.

Except that after 45 minutes, I stuck my foot in the tub and it was still stone cold. So back to the office I went. And saw the same young man, to whom I very politely explained that I just thought maybe he had forgotten since the tub didn't seem to be warming up. So we start walking back up towards the pool area together -- and he abruptly turns to me and apologizes, repeatedly and apparently with great sincerity, for having been rude earlier. And he said "I've been having a very stressful day". To which a little voice in the back of my head replied "Kid, what do you know from stress?" but of course I didn't *say* that, instead I said "Got it. It's not about me". (Because really, despite having boring grownup voices in the back of my head sometimes, I do remember being 16, and it was pretty friggin stressful.) And this must have been an OK thing to say because he seemed to take a liking to me from that point on.

Sadly, his improved attitude did not result in a successful repair of the hot tub. At first he determined that the propane had been turned off, and turned it on -- but then came back (another) 45 minutes later to check, and determined that the propane tank was actually empty. About which there was really nothing to be done.

But here's the funny part: As he was telling me that he'd just figured out the tank was empty, he apologized repeatedly, and asked if there was anything at all he could do to make it up to me -- and offered to buy me a drink! Which I politely declined, but it did make me realize he probably wasn't really 16. *giggle*