"Oh, crap, did that thing say Sunday?" some part of my brain was
asking another body part, the one which was at this moment asking the American
Airlines ticket agent why the automated ticketing system was refusing to print
out my boarding pass.

"Do you have an itinerary of any kind?"

"Yeah, right here."

I pull the printout from my pocket and hand it across the counter.

She’s mouthing the words "this reservation is for Sunday" but my
ears already know what my own brain has concluded:

This was Monday. Same airline, same flight number, same airport, same bad-case-o’-dumbass
me, who has just missed his flight back to wife and place of employment by exactly
24 hours.

Seems somebody got the date wrong back in March, when he bought tickets for
a Labor Day weekend visit to the folks back in Peoria.

Fortune smiled on me in that there was a seat available on Monday’s flight.
Fortune smiled on American Airlines to the tune of 450 bucks.

"Don’t you like it when the one to blame is me and not you?" I asked
the ticket agent.

That made her smile.

Seeing the folks back home is always humbling. You can’t put anything over
on people who remember your spilled cornflakes and poopy diapers. But I felt
pretty good about this visit — I was 30 pounds lighter than the last time they’d
seen me and I had a raft of tales to impose on those who hadn’t read the same
stories here. A weekend of food, memories and expounding on the State of Things.
As the author Tom Robbins said, the International Situation is Still Desperate.
Good thing; elsewise we’d have nothing to talk about at these get-togethers.

So I walked into O’Hare International Airport with the easy confidence of
a guy operating under the delusion that he has his shit together. Fate inevitably
has other plans for such people. Melissa calls this tuition: the price you pay
learning not to be such a moron the next time.

(Misfortune is manna from heaven for storytellers, I tell you!)

There are pictures this week, though they are mostly family — pictures of
kin gathered on a Midwestern lawn tend to be as exciting as the grass growing
in one, and I promise these will be no different.

My sister, Delisa, met me at the airport before dawn on Saturday. We saw the
sun rise through the window of her gargantuan van — populated by her 4-year-old
twin boys, Jonathan and Sean, also known as the Holy Terrors.

My dad took me down to see the Peoria riverfront on Sunday morning. There used
to be a big ol’ ugly powerplant on this site; now there’s a small riverfront
park.

My mom’s place has a tire swing, which comes in handy for entertaining the
Holy Terrors.

There’s also a trail through the woods out back. I think Mom had some dead
trees shipped in just for this occasion.

This is mom’s party tent. If Mom had Martha Stewart’s millions, she’d wipe
the floor with her. (And Martha’d be thankful for the clean floor.)

That’s my cousin Dan in back with his wife Becky in front. Those are four of
his five young’uns (the eldest isn’t so young anymore, actually; she’s married
and about to give birth.) Why is Dan so happy? Could be that the statute of
limitations has expired on all of our youthful transgressions.

Delisa, like me, has full confidence in the infallibility of her opinions.

"The sun never sets on cool people," says Matt, my kid brother.

Sean learns to play catch. It might’ve helped if I could set an example and
catch a few myself.

Sean and his brother Jonathan encourage me to push them on the tire swing.
"Uncle Matt pushes us higher," they say.

Matt’s girls, Hannah and Karrah, address their public.

When it’s all said and done, Delisa does the dishes.

The Wine Country is Disneyland for grown-ups: it promises large quantities of things we require — alcoholic beverages — and small quantities of things we’ve outgrown, such as bone-rattling thrill rides.

What happens in the Wine Country is that people who know just enough about wine to be dangerous but not enough to avoid swallowing go from one Napa Valley vineyard to another and pretend they can appreciate the subtleties of a pinot gris. Seems like the cops could walk through the vineyard parking lots sticking DUI tickets under everybody’s windshield wipers and giving Breathalyzer tests to everybody as they exit — it would pay for lots of shiny new Glocks and cruisers, and the vintners would have to find honest work.

I try to avoid the Wine Country on summer weekends, when the roads are choked with wine-snob wannabes from the world over, but I made an exception this weekend because I knew Mike and Kathy of FOMFOK fame were camping at Bothe Napa Valley State Park, which promises the only good lodging deals for 50 miles in any direction. You may end up sleeping on the ground, but you save 200 bucks a night. That frees up money you’ll need for the 12-dollar cheeseburgers. I asked Mike if there was room at his campsite for one more camper and he said sure, come on up.

"The bear was this standing this tall just before I felled him with one arrow to the heart," Mike tells an appreciative audience. Mike and Kathy slept in that tent back behind him; their friends Scott (that’s him in the yellow hat) and Cathy slept in a Coleman pop-up camper in the site next door.

From the campground, nine of us set out in search of wine to sample. Mike led us to the Sterling Vineyards, which charges 20 dollars a head for a three-minute gondola ride and tastings of five wines. Prices like these ensure you’ll be broke long before you’re drunk, which saves the local taxpayers a fortune in law enforcement expenses.

These little cable cars take folks up to the winery, offering expansive views of the Napa Valley. All wisecracking aside, the Valley is a gorgeous place, especially in the morning when the sun’s burning off the fog that settles in overnight.

Once you buy the 20-dollar lift ticket, five tastings are free. How’s that for a deal?

Giant wooden barrels hold enough wine to keep the U.S. Marines drunk for a decade. Well, actually, 12 days would be a closer estimate, if any of them were wine-drinkers. (I’m guessing you get drummed out of the Corps once the brass learns that you know Cabernet Sauvignon is a grape.)

Scott, and Gary behind him, take in the view.

(All wisecracking aside, Part II: This is a fun winery tour, and the wine’s pretty tasty too. Go during the week to save five bucks in gondola fares.)

My camera batteries died a few minutes later (I brought spares, but they were dead, too. Alas). From here we went up the road a couple miles to Calistoga and grabbed lunch at the Calistoga Inn. Food was pricey but tasty, and the beer brewed on site was excellent. (Though you might expect otherwise, it appears the vintners have not banded together and prevented the introduction of brew pubs to the Napa Valley).

After lunch I bought camera batteries and our nine-some splintered into two twosomes who were getting the full treatment at a Calistoga spa, and the fivesome I joined to check out another winery.

Mumm specializes in sparkling wines.

They look like this poured in flutes.

We tipped glasses in honor of newlyweds Gary and Molly. Gary has worked in the wine industry, can tell the good from the bad, and can convey his knowledge without a trace of snobbery. Fortunately for the valley, my blog has few readers so word of this bizarre character flaw will not get around.

They plant pretty flowers next to the vineyards because, well, let’s face it: a vine is not that sexy.

After that winery tour we headed back to the campground; Gary, Molly and company had other places they needed to be, so I had the campsite to myself until Mike, Kathy and company returned.

I kept myself busy experimenting with ways to hang my tarp. The weather’s so warm and dry at this time of the year that I probably could’ve gotten by with a blanket and a few plastic garbage bags thrown on the ground, but that would’ve deprived me of a chance to play with all my gear. I can’t just leave it in the closet, unloved, now can I?

A late-night card game keeps us occupied till Quiet Hours kick in at 10 p.m. Mike is a cunning and occasionally diabolical card player, which can be fun as long as no wagers are involved (and as long as you don’t mind losing.)

Come Sunday morning, everybody else was ready to head back to town. I consulted my handy California highway map and was pleased to learn I was right down the road from Mount St. Helena, the highest hill in these parts. Might as well get a hike in, right?

The peak isn’t exactly stunning from this angle, along Highway 29, but the view gets better once you get on the trail, which is about 10 miles out and back with 2,000 feet feet of elevation gain. I arrived unprepared for a 10-mile hike, so I just set off up the trail turned back when my water supply was half gone (got about seven miles in). Didn’t make the summit this time, but that gives me an excellent excuse to return.

The Mount St. Helena trailhead is in Robert Louis Stevenson State Park, which has no water and no bathrooms. The first three-quarters of a mile is single-track trail up a densely wooded hillside; from there a fire road goes a little less than five miles to the summit.

Once you get up on the road, the views looking down toward the valley open up. Hiking on roads is usually a drag, but this mountain has a bunch of cool rock formations and cooling Pacific breezes blowing most of the time (in any time but the height of summer, you’d want to bring a windbreaker and a dry shirt to put on at the summit so you don’t freeze your bellybutton off).

You know me, I’m helpless not to take a picture of trees growing out of rocks.

Perhaps these trees’ spirits would be lifted if their pictures were posted online.

This one looks like what happens if you let your Christmas tree grow for 35 years.

The summit is beyond that hill over there, about another mile and a half of walking. At this point I’m thinking, let’s see: I’m on this hill for the first time with no map, nobody knows I’m here, and summiting means six miles in the hot sun with about 30 ounces of water and no snacks for energy. I figured the 130-mile drive back to San Jose would be just a tad safer if I wasn’t dead tired from the hike, so I turned back here.

One of the great things about an out-and-back hike is seeing things you didn’t notice because they were behind you. This rock formation is only visible in this direction — you walk right past it on the way up.

This is the beginning of the single-track trail back down to the parking lot. On the way up it’s a good idea to take note of nearby rocks, trees and such to make sure you don’t miss the turn.

A few more Mount St. Helena links:

• Tom Stienstra profiles the trail.
• A trail map is here.
• An even better map and more pictures are here.

The Hiker Hauler makes a strange reflection on somebody’s horse trailer.

Yes, for the 9,247th time, I know the way to San Jose.

OK, one more post starring my new ride and then things’ll get back to normal around here. Yesterday it had 42 miles on the odometer when I drove it off the dealer’s lot. Sunday evening it had 696. Nothing like getting those break-in miles outa the way. Got about 22 miles per gallon on the first tankful, and 24.5 on the second, which is not too shabby considering I had climbed three mountain passes and ran the air conditioner most of the way.

We got up early Sunday and were out of the house by 8. The plan was to head out to the Sierra, check out some scenery and drive back all in the same day. It’s a nice all-day haul with only a bit of drudgery on the last couple hours back to the Bay Area.

Along about here, Melissa saw her first marmot — a large, high-country critter that looks like a ground hog’s third cousin. It ran off into the rocks before I could get a picture. This is on State Highway 108 near Sonora Pass.

Sonora Pass is just a tad over 9600 feet. Gorgeous country out this way.

Abundant snow on the high peaks.

Not far from here I tripped over a rock, lost my balance and dropped my camera hard. It froze up good and I figured I had killed it dead, but I managed to get it going again after I got home. That was the only consolation after driving cameraless through some of the most stunning mountain terrain I’ve ever seen. Scenery’s gets better once you get off the road, which tells me I’m gonna have to do some hiking up here soon.

Overall the Element did fine. Handled the mountain roads well, didn’t heat up despite a few wicked climbs. Road noise gets a bit obnoxious on the Interstate above 70 mph, but tooling down an empty two-lane at 60 or so is quiet and comfy.

Another thought: If you’re on the fence about whether to try satellite radio, I advise going ahead and getting it. XM has like 200 channels that stay tuned in for hundreds of miles. The only caveat is that you can lose the signal in deep canyons or tree cover. We drove over some of the most rugged paved-road terrain out this way and carried a signal almost the the whole way. It really takes the drudgery factor out of long drives. I can’t speak for Sirius, the other satellite radio provider but my hunch is it’s probably pretty good too.

I wasn’t sure how many more trips down nasty national forest roads my ol’ 2000 Focus could stand. At six years old and 95,000 miles it had served me honorably and efficiently. No breakdowns, only one trip to the shop to fix some gaskets and replace some hoses, but I could sense fatigue in its automatic transmission and I didn’t want to have it die on me in the middle of a mountain range.

I’m a complete coward about buying somebody else’s car so I inevitably end up buying a new one every half-dozen years or so. It’s true that a car’s value falls by a couple grand the minute you drive it off the lot, but that’s the price of the unvarnished thrill of taking possession of a brand spanking new automobile with 42 miles on the odometer. Worth it to me, anyway.

These days cars are like digital cameras: there’s a zillion to choose from and each one requires you to give up a few things you want to get everything else. I wanted a vehicle to take camping in the woods, that’d get good traction on bad roads and in snowy mountain weather, that would have plenty room for all my car-camping gear, and would get good gas mileage to boot.

I could’ve gotten a pickup truck but they’re gas hogs. Could’ve gotten a full-size SUV but they’re cash hogs. Didn’t want to break the bank and didn’t want the car to break. That meant either a Honda or a Toyota. Toyota makes a really cool small SUV called the RAV4 while Honda makes its closest competitor, the CRV. I looked hard at both of them but couldn’t help thinking the car I really wanted was a marketing mistake on steel-belted radials: the Element.

Honda brought the Element to market in 2003 after doing intensive market research mong young white guys under age 25 with active outdoor lifestyles. Surfers, snowboarders, mountain-bikers, rock climbers — you know, the ones in the Mountain Dew commercials– were the Element’s target market. A strange thing happened, though: None of these guys wanted the car that Honda built so studiously on their behalf.

The new Elements were boxy and butt ugly to some people. They didn’t fly off the lots and the ones that did get sold ended up in the Mountain Dew guys’ parents’ garages. It’s a great choice for car-camping empty nesters: mega spacious, easy on gas (25 mpg on the highway), available all-wheel drive, mild sticker shock. And trusty Honda reliability.

I was sold. Especially after I went to carsdirect.com and noticed it was promising I could buy one at $2,000 below the sticker price. This savings allowed me to get the deluxe model (the Element EX) with all-wheel drive, automatic transmission and deluxe sound system with XM satellite radio (which is way, way cool). I picked out the car I wanted and sent some basic info to Carsdirect, which assigned a rep to me who called around and found a dealer where I could test-drive it. That dealer honored the Carsdirect price to the penny and the whole transaction went down with almost zero pressure.

One thing to keep in mind: Carsdirect is subject to the laws of supply and demand — the cars in abundant supply can be had far more cheaply than the ones in abundant demand. Forget about deals on the sporty new Honda Fit — they’re going like hotcakes so dealers have no motivation to sell at a discount.

OK, enough blabbering, let’s take a look at my new ride.

The blue panels are molded plastic: unpainted, so no worries about gravel chipping it. Of course it will fade in the sun a bit over the years but it’s a worthwhile tradeoff. Honda’s most ultra-delux trim option on the Element is the EX-P, which has painted fenders that look a little slicker but detract from the Element’s funky factor. (It’s an extra $500, a lot to pay for a few coats of paint.)

The back seats fold all the way down…

And can be strapped up to the side to make room for bikes or big dogs. The seats can be removed completely, which is nice if you’ve got someplace to put a couple car seats.

The 2.4-liter four-banger is reasonably zippy but it won’t bring many checkered flags your way (unless you’re racing grannies with walkers).

It has these double doors that make it fairly easy to climb into the back. Check out the space behind the front seats: that’s the rear-seat legroom.

We took it out for a little road trip Saturday afternoon; I took a picture in a suitably outdoorish-looking locale. (We actually drove by the ocean but it was all fogged in; alas.)

Note the element is no longer than my Focus coupe — but it’s quite a bit taller.
Also rides a bit smoother but the handling is more boat-like.

Getting toward sunset, and you know what that means: Self-indulgent attempts to get all artsy with the camera.

Sunset through the cabin: I may have to come back and try this again from a better angle.

One last pic of the sunset casting its reddish glow on everything.

The Element is a fine little ride — and amazingly spacious once you take a seat and close the doors. It’s like the designers fashioned a bizarre optical illusion that makes it seem much bigger on the inside than it actually is. It’s an uncanny effect — all big and boxy when you might expect to be more intimately encapsulated in a car this size.

After Day One, I’m happy.

I put these words in today’s paper:

We, therefore, the representatives of the United States of America, in General Congress, assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the name, and by the authority of the good people of these colonies, solemnly publish and declare, that these united colonies are, and of right ought to be free and independent states; that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the state of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as free and independent states, they have full power to levy war, conclude peace, contract alliances, establish commerce, and to do all other acts and things which independent states may of right do. And for the support of this declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes and our sacred honor.

I get a little teary-eyed reading such words. It reminds me of the time I visited the Jefferson Memorial. This is one of the inscriptions:

I am certainly not an advocate for frequent changes in laws and constitutions. But laws and institutions must go hand in hand with the progress of the human mind. As that becomes more developed, more enlightened, as new discoveries are made, new truths discovered and manners and opinions change, with the change of circumstances, institutions must advance also to keep pace with the times. We might as well require a man to wear still the coat which fitted him when a boy as civilized society to remain ever under the regimen of their barbarous ancestors.

Thomas Jefferson wrote that in 1816, 40 years after he penned the Declaration of Independence. Can’t help wondering where the leaders of his caliber are today. Probably running software companies. Interesting that he imagines his ancestors as barbarians and his own age civilized. Back then it was thought that women needn’t sully themselves in the muck of power and politics. But as long as they went along with that idea, their fates were hostage to the political and the powerful.

Back then the holders of slaves imagined they were doing their bonded people a favor by plucking them from the savage jungles and plains of Africa and chaining them to civilized Southern cotton fields. Jefferson knew this but he had only so many Revolutions in him. From another inscription:

God who gave us life gave us liberty. Can the liberties of a nation be secure when we have removed a conviction that these liberties are the gift of God? Indeed I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just, that his justice cannot sleep forever. Commerce between master and slave is despotism. Nothing is more certainly written in the book of fate than these people are to be free. Establish the law for educating the common people. This it is the business of the state to effect and on a general plan.

Jefferson saw the future, he just couldn’t live long enough to see it happen. This is my favorite inscription from the memorial:

I have sworn upon the altar of God eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man.

Democracy may be an idea, but tyranny is real. Just ask anybody living in a dictatorship.

Jefferson helped create the idea of a free country but America was never truly free till it granted women the right to vote and broke down the Jim Crow edifice that guaranteed second-class citizenship for blacks in the South.

My grandparents were born before America’s Constitution was amended to guarantee women the right to vote. In the year I was born, 1961, blacks in the South were still living without the freedoms whites enjoyed everywhere. That makes tyranny real for me, especially knowing that it happened in my own country.

Thomas Jefferson personified the contradictions of the United States of America. He was all about liberty for rich white guys and he helped perpetuate the monstrous crime of slavery. And yet he helped create a society that would one day free the slaves.

Winston Churhcill once said Americans can be trusted to do the right thing only after all other options have been tried first. That’s the thing about us. We keep trying.

Our new devil is a guy named Dean Singleton, who has just sealed a deal to purchase the San Jose Mercury News, which pays my salary. Dean owns the Denver Post, the Salt Lake Tribune and a whole bunch of suburban dailies aroud the Bay Area. Dean bought up all these papers up the road, slashed their staffs and spread havoc in East Bay newsrooms. People there didn’t forget, and they didn’t forgive.

He tried and failed to save papers in Houston and Dallas. All those newsies lost their jobs, and they, too have spread the word: Dean is the devil. Pray that he doesn’t buy your paper.

I’ve gotten unsolicited e-mails from two newspapers to inform me they have openings — you know, just in case. Because, from all they’ve been told, Dean is the devil.

Well, Dean told us today that there would be no job or salary cuts resulting from the transaction culminating in his purchase of the Mercury News. He told us that the managers we have now will determine what, if anything, gets cut. He strikes me as straightforward, not shifty or conniving. But the devil would be that way, right?

For some reason, though, I’m just not buying the Devil Dean story. The guy’s worked at newspapers all his life, taken some crazy risks, lost his shirt a time or two. He did his share of slashing, but heck, our industry-leading leadership cut our newsroom staff by over a third in the past couple years. Knight Ridder cut us and 11 other papers loose to cinch a deal to sell the rest of the chain.

Could Devil Dean do us any worse than that? I suppose, but it strikes me as unlikely. The guy likes newspapers; throws vast sums of his own money at them. He thinks local papers ought to focus on local news. Not exactly an evil concept.

Nobody has ever called me a cockeyed optimist. Well, cockeyed, but not an optimist. I have the same assume-the-worst gene as everybody else in the news biz. Sure, ol’ Dean could run roughshod over the Mercury News. I don’t see why he would — heck, he called the Merc the “Crown Jewel” of Knight Ridder. People take good care of their jewels, right?

Dean’s defenders — he does have a few — insist he did only what had to be done to save papers that otherwise would’ve gone out of business. Better to have a paper be 80 percent something rather than 100 percent of nothing. He’s done right by the Denver Post, which has gotten much better since he bought it. Word from Salt Lake is that he pretty much left ’em alone to peddle their papers.

Awhile back I talked about why I wasn’t bailing on the Mercury News. Most of it was about how I like the paper and the town, a rare match. But in the back I mind I was also thinking: don’t run till you know what you’re running from. Well, now I know.

So, what next? Well, I figure I had a tiny role in helping Dean decide to buy Merc, so I may as well hang around to see what’s up his sleeve, if anything. In any case, I’m freed from talking about work stuff till something new and interesting happens. I’m sure this will come to everybody as a relief.