Ben In LA
Latest Update: July 31 , 2004

Kids,
I am in Missoula, the biggest little city in America. It is clean and well-lighted here, as it always is. The young people are healthy and happy and there is a refreshing lack of tattooes, Von Dutch hats, pierced, wannabe shitheads. A refreshing lack of that, I say.

Although as I was thinking that earlier I walked into Kinkos and there was a guy with a full mohawk and all the trimmings. I wanted to tell him he was making a full of himself, but I don't think he would have listened.    

There is just something cool and American and sophisticated about Missoula, and Montana, that I just can't help but like.    

I gues the word I am looking for is integrity.

This is the West. Not the southwest, not the midwest. The west. Gary Cooper is from Montana, and David Lynch is from Missoula.

I drove here today from Spokane, by way of Idaho. But Washington is Washington and Idaho is Idaho. Montana is something different and something better. Every time I drive here I think: You're imagining things, it can't  be that great or special, can it?    

But it is.    

This morning I woke up in the parking lot of the Northern Quest Casino near Spokane. I gambled again last night, damnit and yet again I did not walk out when I was ahead. I lost $50 at one game then won it back playing $3-6 Hold Em. At one point I was up $100 and that is when I walked out, considering I could have used that money to pay $50 for a new cell phone and the rest for new tires. But I was bored and greedy and tired and blew it all.   

So damned dumb. I think I screw up on purpose.   

So I slept in the parking lot of the Northern Quest and woke up with no one around me. I guess the casino closes at 5:00 AM. I was going to hang around Spokane and buy a new cell phone. I drowned mine while fishing a tributary of the North Fork of Nooksack a few days ago, with Jeff Galbraith. That was a fun little stream but tricky walking and I went up to my waist and soaked the pocket I had the cellphone in. That thing was coughing up blood anyway. Fifteen days ago I bought cell phone insurance because it was dying and now I can buy a $200 cell phone for $50.    

But I drove out of Spokane and hit the road east, pissed at myself for not walking out with $100.     

I got breakfast in Coeur d'Alene. The waitress smiled at me.     

Then I drove on and saw miles and miles of Idaho. Not much to report, really. In Coeur d'Alene I stopped to buy tires because two of mine are sketchy. The tire place was just across from a Kinkos so I walked across the street and did some work on Herbie Fletcher's documentary. I looked up the corporate histories of Quiksilver, Body Glove, Op and Reef and found some good stuff.     

The tires cost me $114 and they didn't manage to change one so I am slightly less sketchy than I was. I told the tire guy I had nearly been killed by a fertilizer truck in Sedro-Wooley, so I was feeling lucky.     

I was nearly taken out by a big truck hauling two sleds of fertilizer. This was yesterday morning after I left Bellingham. I stopped in Sedro Wooley to check out a 1953 Ford Panel I had admired on EBay. It's black and beautiful and exactly what I want. The owner moved to Sedro Wooley from Laguna Niguel and he was damned glad to be there.    

He wants $6600 for it so if something miraculous happens-if I win the Lottery or everyone pays me, I am tempted to buy it.    

Anyway after checking out the Ford Panel I was getting back on the 5 heading south. There was a big truck ahead of me and I thought he was going straight. I went to his right and then the light changed and I watched in my rearview mirror for what seemed like forever to see if the rig would turn tight enough to squish me. He just clipped my mirror. I don't even thing he knew that was there.    

Getting killed by a fertilizer truck would be the shit.     

Anyway after not buying enough tires in Coeur d'Alene I drove some more, listening to NPR and saw a lot of Idaho and a lot of streams I wanted to lash, but I drove on.     

Kerry is going to win the presidency, I think. He is the right guy at the right time. A decent fella who just wants to do some good. I admire his whole Vietnam thing. He went there wanting to do good, realized it was a con job, then came back and risked a lot to protest it.     

Got to admire him for that, and his speeches are getting less blowhardy and whiney. He could be the guy. I wish he would have picked Wesley Clark for VP, but oh well. Clark is a smart guy and he is not afraid of anyone. He was Supreme Commander of Allied Forces or something like that during Kosovo and if you read his book, Waging Modern War, you understand why America did not have a coalition going into Iraq: We didn';t want one. Fighting a war is complicated enough without having to get a quorum on every bombing run, and ask the fricking French for permission before moving tanks.    

We did it with the Brits because that was the most efficient way to do it.     

Stopped at the Silver Dollar Casino place just inside Montana but didn't gamble and bought a map and some water.      

Drove on. At some point the Clark Fork began running along the highway and it just looked oh so good. Am I imagining things or are Montana rivers and river valleys just that mich better than everywhere else?     

I was going to drive down to a place called The Rivulets but it was about 5 miles way down a gravel road and somethign told me not to chance em.      

I miss Ike and I still check myself before opening the door of the van, lest he jump out and cost me some hours.     

At some point I stopped and had a bathe in a river by the side of the highway. I fished a little but got nothing. Felt good to be clean though.     

  And then I stopped at another rest area along the Clark Fork and lashed some riffles for a while. Got a couple of hits on a small copper bead head and then caught a couple of young impressionable trout on a big yellow hopper-the same thing taht was working on the youngster on the Nooksack.     

Now I am in Missoula where I am going to raise hell on a Saturday night and probably get thrown in jail and then head for the Big Hole tomorrow. I think I will go by way of Anaconda, because I have tried all the other approaches.     

My little brother is going to meet me in Three Forks on Tuesday or Wednesday so I will make my way that way slowly. Looking forward to seeing Miss Brandy Moses and I hope they still dig me enough to lay on the free beef.     

I'd better buy a fishing license here pretty soon, too.      

That's it for now. When I was staying with Jeff Galbraith we talked about driving up to northern BC and the Bulkley/Kispiox/Babine in October. I will be done with the surfing book and will have brass in pocket and I have always wanted to go up there with friends. It is epic steelhead fishing and so damned pretty in October you will want to run home and slap your grandma.     

So anyway, I like Montana as I have said. Going back and forth between here and Malibu-as half of Hollywood does-wouldn't be so bad. Montana in a lot of ways is the state the 21st Century forgot and that is a good thing. It is still old-time USA the way Malibu is old-time LA.     

I wonder if there are any card rooms in Missoula?    

  Ben