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vacation essentials

Last night (with Michael out of town again, this time in Miami) I finished Last Stand at Pagago Wells. For the second time. As usual, our renegade hero saved the day, killed the bad guys and got the girl.

Long time ago I learned from my grandpa that you can't go on a vacation without a stack of old Louis L'Amour books (and that you can't go anywhere without a deck of cards, a cribbage board and a dozen maps). All of these things are packed in the Flying Cloud, of course.

By his estimation, the best ones to have were the 60s and 70s editions with dog eared corners, a musty smell and yellow or seafoam green edgings that hopefully you bought (and later sold) at garage sales for a nickel.

My grandpa went through them like the Sunday newspaper. One a day, sometimes, if we were hanging out at a cabin on a lake and the fishing was bad or there was no one to play cards with. He re-read them every so often, logging at the end the date and his rating (good, good + or good ++). According to the log, he read Last Stand in 80, 85, 91, and 99.

Living in Colorado now somehow makes me feel like I need to read them all again. It doesn't matter that after reading a few, they all start to seem the same.

My parents were in Mesa Verde two days ago so last month I sent my Dad a copy of The Haunted Mesa.... This is one of Louie's few modern-day sci-fi novels, well outside his old west/cowboy adventure genre. Read this just before you visit Mesa Verde to ensure you are well spooked the whole time you are there. If you are camping in Mesa Verde you might want to read it after you leave....

PS: If you like books about the old west, another one I love is The Log of a Cowboy. It was written by Andy Adams in 1903 as a fiction-based-on-truth chronicle of a real cowboy driving the "Circle Dot" herd up the Western Trail from Mexico to Montana. Its political incorrectness is hilarious (usually), although I still cringe at the bear incident.... And one more thing: If you are the type, like me, to read cookbooks from cover to cover, the perfect cookbook to accompany The Log of a Cowboy is Grady Spear's A Cowboy in the Kitchen. I have found at least four favorite favorite recipes in this cookbook. Love it love it love it.

August 24, 2007 by Lynn in colorado | | permalink