That J, she's a crafty one.

Were I to have let her have more time and let her blog when she had sufficient inspiration, I fear that we'd be left with little more than that we went to P-burg and a stray reference to jam lactation. As it stands, the jam was left completely on the shelf (counter, maybe?). For shame, J. For shame. [Er. Please don't kill me in my sleep. I tease because I love!]

At any rate, she's forced me to my current state of authorship. First off: quotes from the weekend in P-burg! I said something about hitting the he-way, just before C was Hitler for squirrels, as J said. The other amazing one was from J: "I'm sorry. I didn't know what it was. Had to touch it. Turned out badly." Hee!

So, yeah. Two weekends ago, we went to the tiny town of Philipsburg, Montana ("The Heart of Sapphire Country"). It's a neat little ghost town in the Rocky Mountains, once popular during the later days of the 19th century Montana gold rush. It's part of the Rock Creek region for sapphire mining and contains some of the richest, most distinct sapphires the world over. Philipsburg was named for the man who helped map out roads to easily navigate the rocky terrain. Though P-burg was a huge sapphire hot spot, there was also a huge rush of silver in the area that helped P-burg thrive. Isn't history nifty?

We went to P-burg to meet up with one of C's friends who's renovating the Doe house, which is a gorgeous white Victorian once belonging to P-burg's most talked about businessmen. It was loads of fun. We arrived pretty late, so Friday was fairly uneventful. Saturday we walked downtown with C's friends for lunch at a sort of so-so diner. The homemade cheesecake was divine. The rest of the place was sort of smoky and quaint, but not as endearing as it could have been. We spent the rest of the afternoon poking around the shops that were open (two of the more touristy places are owned by Seventh Day Adventists and thus closed). We tried on ridiculous outfits at the thrift store and found all sorts of nifty things. We also went to a newer shop with all sorts of neat glasses and hats and slogans and witty repartee on t-shirts. (Also, there were flip books of people making mad crazy sex. It was brilliant. I need to find those.)

The highlight of the afternoon, for me, was the soda shop. The Doe Brothers Soda Shop was incredible. The place was originally built as a restaurant and pharmacy run by one of the brothers who built the place we were staying. All of the soda equipment is original and kept in working order with a little love and care (J: "Just like my grandfather.") and everything is made from scratch. If you've never had a true cherry vanilla Coke, you're missing out. Ruby's in Seattle makes them and I've been hooked ever since. It's a guilty pleasure for sure.

That night we went out to dinner at the restaurant off the highway. The food was good and the conversation was fun. It has a bar attached to it that we went to afterwards. I must say, the guys that were playing pool may have been the only ones in town close-ish to our age range, but I was not impressed. The music was schizophrenic to say the least, no one even tried to serve us, and once they shot the cue ball off the table to where we were sitting and one of them quipped along the lines of "yeah, that's a good way to meet 'em," we were out. We then hit up more bars, obviously, because that's what you do in a small town. The atmosphere of the next one was a billion times better. We got drinks and were told jokes by one of the locals. One about photography, one about dog walking, one about puberty and lunch, and one about bears being lost in the woods. Ask me someday and I'll tell them to you. The old man entertained to say the least. We went to another bar after that, where we helped to DJ and were made sufficiently tipsy on half price booze. It was a good night. And when we got home, C's friend's brother showed us his really wicked laser, which reflected the rain and could blind someone a half mile away. Uh, then everyone kind of passed out.

Sunday morning we went to the places that had been closed before. The first one was The Sweet Palace. Oh man. Candy store of candy story. I wish we had remembered the camera, because I could not possibly tell you how fantastic it was. Jaime wasn't lying when she said we spent a lot of money. We definitely did. I can't wait to go back.

The other neat place was The Sapphire Gallery. I'm a sucker for sapphires, so we knew I'd like it. It had a lot of really fantastic things. Some were ornately carved. Some were intricately patterned. Some were gaudy and fantastic. But everything, everything was lovely. I'm terrified to think about how much that place would be worth. Maybe next time we'll get to harvest our own stones? We'll see if any of us ever have the money. It was neat, at any rate.

Um. Then we came home. It was a quick trip and the drive to/from included lots of crack, but I don't remember anything explicit. C and I subjected J to our random DJ skillz and we all enjoyed ourselves immensely.



If I hadn't ever warned you, be warned now. I like to write novels. A blog just isn't a blog without substance. A blog without lots of rambly exposition and story is like fat-free, sugar-free cheesecake. Why bother?

I'll put off writing about last weekend for another day, though, as I've got to head out. We're spending this weekend in Tri Cities for J's high school reunion. Fun and adventures will be had. Guaranteed.

I guess the jam is still on the shelf.