The Narrative Image

  Photo Credit: Kip The light from another morning begins gently assaulting my eyelids, so my comatose body instinctively begins to burrow like a worm, forcing my face into a loose amalgam of swaddled-up fleeces and t-shirts - the makeshift pillow I build every night (because I forgot my pillow). My liver has never really had to metabolize alcohol on a regular basis, so feeling ambushed, it grudgingly does its work to restore what passes as my typical chemical balance, asking only that I be still and unconscious. A sort of peripheral consciousness jury-rigged by my ears informs me that Kip and Rico are rooting around in their vehicles for implements of destruction, lug nut wrenches, jack handles, hammers, and pry bars, anything that might steal a geode from the grasp of its mother. My liver is not the only organ of mine that is being taxed. Evidently, a significant portion of my neurons were slaughtered near the end of yesterday and synaptic first responders are desperately trying ...

As near as I’ve been able to calculate, the red arrow points to our base of operations on the Owyhee River. This location is at the bottom end of about 48 miles of class II and III rapids - that is, if you happen to be there in the middle of May. If you’re there at the end of August and maybe during a season of drought, traveling by raft is rumored to be problematic. Sitting in the shade, fishing and drinking beer is nice, but you can’t do it all day. Well, actually, you can do it all day, but we were also cognizant of other points of interest in the canyon.   One such site was archeological in nature, but the people who know of such sites tend to be protective of them - and for good reason.   (LEFT: pictogram peppered with bullet scars. RIGHT: Same image modified with Jon Harmon’s DStretch to better delineate the original art.) For instance, this antler man that appears near Maupin, Oregon appears to be the victim of fairly intensive target practice.   (TOP: Various car...