Northward Bound

Back at Leo’s, with a lazy morning on my hands, I took the opportunity to get organized, do some blogging, and groom my unruly beard to the sound of more choice selections from his record collection while he cleaned his room and went to meet up with family for lunch. After talking to my next host, Lynne, on the phone we agreed that, since she was in Los Angeles for the day, I would make my way to Union Station and we would take it from there. Leo gave me a lift back to Irvine, but not before loading up the bed of the pickup with vegetable starts for sale at the farmers’ market, from an enthusiastic collaborator with whom he shares in a local gardening club.

A work party at Leo's old Sonoma County farm (you'll have to get Leo to give you a slide show if you want a better pic).

On the train, I received word that Lynne would meet me at the station in Montalvo so I would transfer trains in LA. This meant I would be four hours in transit, a fact I relished for the sake of having a chance to read a Cormac McCarthy novel Max had loaned to me a few days prior and which I had been chomping at the bit to begin. I got about a third of the way through it!

Is THAT a compost pile or WHAT?

Once in Ventura, Lynn took me to a bar to see Seth Pettersen, a long-time local favorite of hers and then to a very crowded bar closer to the town center where we saw a band called Crippled Puppy and ran into a couple of her friends, Carrie and Angie. After that it was back to the home where she showed me into the back yard and I saw the famous Artbarn, which would be my home for the coming week.

Leo cooked these enormous beans that he bought at the farmers' market.