Speaking of county matters...

I used to have a 10-key adding machine with a printout. I no longer have that, and the only calculators I have readily available are tiny and at least a little tempermental. So when I say that there are 3,097 counties in the country, that number may be off. (If anyone wants to supply me with a more accurate count, I'd be grateful, but be forewarned: I have found a number of different figures on the internet, so apparently I'm not the only person who is electromathematically challenged.)

As I've probably told everyone I know, at some point or another, I intend to visit every county in the country before I die. Most people seem to take this as some sort of Quest, when in fact it's nothing more than an excuse for wandering around in places I've never been and have no real reason to go to. This is what my life has become. Sad, maybe even a little pathetic, but there it is. I try to present it as a vaguely romantic journey of discovery, but even I don't buy that. And let's face it, I don't really expect to get to all of them. The two remaining counties in Massachusetts, for example, are islands that are reached only by expensive ferries. The counties in Alaska -- there actually aren't any, so that'll be easy, but they do have Judicial Districts -- will require an airplane, and the counties in Hawaii a boat or helicopter. I doubt I'll go to that much trouble, unless of course some enterprising travel-service company decides to sponsor my travel. No sign of that on the horizon.

Anyway, yesterday morning, I took a detour upon leaving Las Vegas, and drove through Lincoln County, Nevada, thereby visiting the last remaining county in that state. I have now been to every county in Nevada, Arizona, Texas, Louisiana, Delaware, New Jersey, Connecticut and Rhode Island. Texas was a big deal -- that's 254 counties and most of them aren't all that big. Arizona was easy: even though it's a large state, the counties are also huge, and I go there a lot. Nevada is also is a very large state, with large counties, but I knew that the only way I'd ever get to Lincoln County was with a long, long diversion, since there's nothing to speak of within hundreds of miles of there (except Las Vegas ... come to think of it, there's nothing to speak of within hundreds of miles of there). New Jersey has a surprisingly large number of counties, but my trip to Maine last summer gave me the chance to fill in that map with one drive up the coast from Cape May to Newark. Louisiana was the second state filled in, with a wander around some reservoir on the Sabine River back in 2005 or 2006. (That wander, incidentally, took me by the only international boundary marker in the United States: the old stone that once marked the border between the United States and the Republic of Texas.) Delaware, which only has 3 counties and one road, was the first state filled in, way back in 1997 on a trip with my son to visit colleges he was considering up north. That trip is also memorable for providing me with an introduction to scrapple, a popular local dish best described as baked fat. I filled in Connecticut and Rhode Island on that trip as well: Rhode Island on purpose, Connecticut accidentally, because I was sitting around with Steve in New York, having changed my plans on a whim. If you want to know more about that, see my long post entitled "The Trip to Maine." It's down around the 4th week of the trip.

But I digress. That diversion to visit Lincoln County, Nevada also required that I go through two more counties in southern Utah -- beautiful, beautiful country that I will likely go back to -- so as this latest trip winds down, I have now been to 1,945 of those 3,097 counties.

I doubt any of you care, and neither do I, really, but somebody asked. They were probably just being polite.

Those Catholics. Gotta Love 'Em

Before I forget and hit CTRL-C or something, a selection of the pictures from today and yesterday (i.e., the better ones) are already organized, captioned, and posted. It's all so much easier, now that I've figured out how to put in links like that.

We got out of here really, really early by our standards. It was something like 9:45. That's later than we left here yesterday, but beyond that we don't agree on any of our recent transitional history. Just one of those insignificant things people can discuss, and disagree about, without rancor, to fill the long, otherwise silent elevator ride to the parking garage.

I was heading south on Mission Bay Boulevard, our usual route to the center of all the action here in San Diego, when it occurred to me that I didn't really know where we were going; we'd discussed so many things, but always in kind of a tentative way, like everything was mere suggestion and no actual decisions need be taken. Once we arrived at a consensus, we consulted the map and eventually tracked down Mission San Diego, out by Qualcomm Stadium. So we headed out there, and found it after only two tries and possibly one illegal turn, by the H&R Block Hair Salon.

San Diego was the first Spanish mission in California, founded in response to a perceived threat from the Russians, who apparently were following otters down the Pacific Coast. You'll recall that, 250 years ago, it didn't take much to establish a claim to vast areas of real estate. A few trappers who hail from Moscow, wandering around alone, and voila! you have title to millions of prime acres. This, of course, was before the lawyers and realtors got involved. Nowadays, I think, it would be much more difficult for me to claim I own all of California on the strength of three car trips here in a decade; but it seems that, had I but driven here in the 1760s, instead of waiting for the roads to be paved, I could afford a second home on the beach, and maybe a high-definition TV.

Anyway: San Diego, like many Spanish missions, was not an instant hit. It was originally put downstream by the Presidio, but, well, let's say the Spanish soldiers and the local indians rubbed each other the wrong way. So after about five years, the head guy, Father Jayme, moved the mission a few miles upstream to its present location. (Father Serra, who had founded the mission, had gone off to open a branch office in Monterey.) Father J seems not to have been the best pastor in some respect, because a year and a half after moving to the suburbs, the locals clubbed him to death and burned the mission to the ground. Which did them no good, of course, as there were other Franciscan priests to take his place. Father J is considered California's first Christian martyr; that may be, or maybe he is just California's first really bad PR guy. First of many.

So you're thinking, maybe, that the title of this blog relates to that incident? Not at all what I had in mind when I named it, in advance of actually writing it. (Usually I do it the other way around.)

But I digress.

When the Mexicans won their independence from the Spanish, the Church was one of the big losers. Eventually, the nationalization of church property reached this remote outpost of empire, and the Mission property was set aside to be divided up among the indians. In fact, it and all the rest of California (and Mexico) went to cronies and relatives of high officials of one of the more corrupt régimes in North American history. These people, the cream of Mexican society, became the group known as the californios, who were dispossessed in turn when the US took over after the Mexican War in the 1840s. It's hard to feel sympathy for anybody in the sorry tale of California history. Sadly, Zorro was not a real person.

Eventually (in 1862), the US government gave part of the property back to the church. By then, it was in pretty sad shape; between abandonment and earthquake and pilfering by neighbours, there was only a facade and one room left standing. But it got rebuilt, and has been an operating parish church for well over a hundred years now, and is in pretty good shape for being so old.

Our next stop was Presidio Park, where the mission had originally been set up. There are no visible remains of the original buildings there. They were built of adobe, and after a local retail magnate donated the property to the city (after having built the dramatic Serra Museum on the crest of the hill), the decaying ruins were covered over with five feet of dirt to prevent further destruction, until a way can be found to preserve them. I learned this in conversation with a local history teacher, who was there hiding from a group of 90 schoolchildren who were about to descend on the Serra Museum after fortifying themselves with lunch. A quick walkabout and a short drive through the neighbourhood above the Presidio, and we ourselves went for similar fortification at Fred's, in Old Town. An unwise choice, and that's all I need to say about that.

The rest of the afternoon was spent puttering around in Old Town State Park, touring the various buildings -- some reconstructions, some original, all modified over the centuries -- filling our minds with interesting tidbits of San Diego history, like the novel Ramona (which figures perversely in the area's history) and shopping, shopping, shopping. Jeff and I discussed the Machado-y-Stewart house, a largeish adobe building built by a corporal at the Presidio early in the city's history. He wondered at its size, rather large for a mere corporal, no matter how many kids he had. But I pointed out how close the freeway was, and the train tracks, and theorized that he could only afford it because it was such a crappy location. Jeff seemed unconvinced.

It was Nancy's turn to cook tonight, so we had to stop at Ralph's for some chicken, but after running off to the beach with Sherry for a while, she managed a very good meal despite the primitive state of our kitchen.

I did laundry. Woo.

Just Another Gorgeous Day in Paradise

Jeff got a phone call as we were leaving the condo this morning, and ended up staying home all day, working. Now there's a man who needs to learn how to take a vacation.

We headed down to Balboa Park. I went to the Automotive Museum; Nancy and Sherry went in for a while but got bored pretty quickly and went on to some gardens or something. We met up later and went to lunch in Hillcrest, at a funky-trendy Mexican place on University Avenue. Nancy got mashed potato tacos, while I ordered a plate that was 3 of one thing and 3 of another; it seemed to be 6 small chicken flautas. I don't remember what Sherry got, but she must've liked it, because she didn't share, while Nancy and I swapped portions. It was all pretty tasty, although the tostadas could've been fresher, and they had a salsa bar with a dozen or so different concoctions to try.

The Old Globe

Then it was back to the park, to see the Old Globe Theatre, which turned out not to be a replica of the original; just a round concert hall with a vaguely Elizabethan facade. After that, I went to the Museum of Art, on the off chance that it might actually contain some art, while Nancy and Sherry did some more garden-gazing. They seem to have encountered a lot of orchids and ferns.

The art museum was like ordinary art museums everywhere: a lot of valueless and  therefore easily-obtainable modern crap, a few minor works by famous names, and some travelling exhibits of fair to middling stuff by artists whose copyrights are still extant, and whose work is beyond the reach of the middling museums: in this case, lesser works by Picasso, Miró, and Calder. There were, however, some interesting exhibits on art restoration, including a longish and detailed video presentation on the restoration of  a 14th-Century Italian icon, and a slide presentation on the restoration of a painting of David with Goliath's head. And of course, the building was nice, and I was surprised to see that you were allowed to take pictures, except where the label of a work had a little camera with a line through it.

I met up with Sherry and Nancy at the San Diego Historical Society's uninteresting and unimaginative museum of local history, and we went for coffee at the Urban Grind -- not because of the nonexistent connection to my hangout back home, but because it's the only local coffee shop I know of. Then we came home and made dinner (pork tenderlion with pineapple, and fresh broccoli), and played that stupid Five-Crowns card game until we could none of us keep our eyes open.

Meanwhile, there was actually a breeze off the sea for about half an hour earlier this evening. It's cooled down some; maybe it was in the mid-80s today, but it didn't seem like it. It's probably about 70 now. Very nice. Very nice.