This was a day that started off horribly, and ended up wonderfully.

I caught the 60 into work, as I usually do, and got to the hospital about a half hour before my start time. I had a notion to go down to the cafeteria and have some scrambled eggs and hash browns, but instead I did what I typically do. I sat down in an isolated corner of the lobby to read. Before I had a chance to open my book, a patient from our clinic (who I'd met yesterday for the first time) sat down beside me. He started talking to me as if we were old friends. (This fellow is lacking in accepted social skills, by the way.) He started telling me that he has "full-blown AIDS" and that DSHS is denying him financial help. I listened to him in a non-committal way.

As he continued talking to me, his monologue became increasingly bigoted. "The only way to get a job in this f***ing country is to be a black woman, a gay man, or an illegal alien," was one of the milder things he said. As he went one, there didn't seem to be any group other than white, heterosexual, Christian, men that he didn't have something negative to say about. He seemed to assume that I was agreeing with him. I told him that I needed to get to work.

He followed me into the elevator and into our clinic. He was talking the whole way. My plan was to walk into the back rooms - the ones open only to employees. When I walked into the clinic, there were four patients already lined up at the empty front desk, waiting to check in, 20 minutes before the clinic opened.

I faced a decision. Should I ignore the patients to escape the talker? I decided to open the clinic early, and check in the patients. I hoped that maybe my friend would take the hint and leave. He didn't, although his monologue did turn away from other groups of people and back toward his personal situation.

His social worker arrived and he latched onto her, until she disappeared into the back rooms. He hung around the clinic for another hour or so, and eventually wandered away.

It wasn't the person that ruined my morning. It was the things he was saying. I talked to one of the PCCs later about it, and he said I had the right idea to head for the back rooms - but I handled it just right, otherwise.

Then, late in the afternoon, there was a no-show in the acupuncture clinic. The acupuncture doctor asked if any of us at the front desk wanted to be a patient. I spoke up and said I'd love to. I was serious, but I didn't think the doctor was. The doctor was serious, though. The thing is, the acupuncture clinic is open only on Thursday afternoons, and, as far as I know, ours is the only clinic in the hospital that has an acupuncture clinic. If a patient doesn't show up, the interns lose out on training.

So, this afternoon, I had my first acupuncture session ever - and it didn't cost me anything. I had the intern work on my neck.

There was more to acupuncture than I expected. The intern checked my range of motion. He questioned me about my exercise habits, diet, peace of mind, and sleep. He took my pulse - not for heart rate, but for strength and rhythm. A person's pulse, he explained, is directly related to the condition of that person's organs. He could tell, by the feel, that I was still digesting lunch. He checked my tongue for its color - also a clue to the condition of my organs. He told me I appeared healthy, but he questioned me about any troubles I've been having with my lungs. (I have felt a little congested all day.) The doctor came in and confirmed his diagnosis.

Then came the needles. I laid on my stomach as the intern pushed needles into the backs of my knees, my neck, my shoulders, and along my spine. Some needles felt sharp at first. Some felt dull. There were some I couldn't feel at all. But in every case, as soon as the needle was placed, I could no longer feel it.

There are channels of energy, he explained, that flow through the body. Pain occurs when the flow is blocked. The purpose of acupuncture needles is to open up the blockage. Normally, needles are left in place for 30 minutes, but for the first session, they are left for only 5 or 10 minutes.

My body felt warm and heavy. The intern said that's exactly what should happen.

After the needles were removed I was given a massage on my neck and shoulders - not the gentle, rolling style of Swedish massage, the intern explained, but the rough and active Chinese style.

Afterwards, I felt very rested. I felt very good.

As I sat down to write this post, I thought about the idea that the start of my day is what a lot of people are afraid a county hospital is like. I wondered how many people would expect a county hospital to be like the end of my day.

Spirited Away arrived in the mail yesterday. I watched it last night.

I know I've written about this before, but I am still in awe of the quiet details of Studio Ghibli films. I think that Spirited Away may be my favorite. As I watched the story for the second time, I kept looking at the textures: reflections on car windows, rust on pipes, wood grain, the wabi-sabi imperfections of stone steps. I remembered a documentary on the Nausicaä DVD that talked about Hayao Miyazaki spending a day at a train station observing the way skirts move in the wind.

Someday, I'm going to watch Spirited Away with the original Japanese soundtrack on, and the English subtitles off, just so I watch the visuals without being distracted by the story.

We got back a few hours ago from a madcap weekend of geocaching with Pet. I am exhausted.

We looked for one cache, and eventually found it, on the way down to Pet's house on Saturday. It was one she had found already, and recommended to us. Then, after we arrived, Pet took Phillip and me to eight more caches - all that Pet had found previously. We logged nine finds that day.

On Sunday, the three of us went out again and sought seven more caches - six of which Pet was seeking herself. It was a team effort. Pet ended up with one "Did Not Find." We ended up with two DNF's - because we didn't find that last one, the one Pet had already found.

We sought one more cache this morning, another one Pet had found already. Our geocaching total is currently 76. Pet has about a quadrillion finds, I think.

Our three day adventure took us to the towns of Elbe, Eatonville, Morton, Mineral, Grand Mound, Centralia, Ashford, Rochester - and who knows where else. This was rural geocaching for a couple of urban fellows. We saw roadside memorials, a casino, post offices, fishing holes, several grocery stores (all of them with at least one customer buying cases of Bud Lite), fireworks stands, cemeteries, highway viewpoints, lots of highway markers, assorted farm animals, abandoned cars, and lots of trees. I've done a lot of driving over the weekend.

The joint "Did Not Find" was a multi-waypoint cache tour of Rochester. We found the first waypoint, which led us to a second waypoint. Then we got stuck at the third waypoint. I was kind of glad, too. No offence to the town of Rochester - I'm sure it has lots of interesting things to look at, but this multi-cache seemed to have picked out the most mundane places to visit.

On Sunday, the miles and the sun took their toll on Phillip and me. Pet still had many more caches to look for, but Phillip wanted to call it quits. When I heard him say that, I realized that I wanted to retire from geocaching, too. We ended up in a nice riverside park in Centralia that I probably would have enjoyed more if I hadn't been so road-weary. This park just happened to have a cache in it, and Pet talked me into looking for it, because she was especially fond of it. I looked for awhile, but my heart just wasn't into it. I just gave up searching.

Pet is very experienced at using a GPS receiver. She's been using one long before any of us discovered geocaching. She taught me a lot this weekend about GPSr usage - especially the art of triangulation.

Phillip and I are just not up to Pet's pace of a dozen (or more) caches per day. Different people have different styles.

Our Prius loved those rural highways. It loves long trips. Driving around Saturday, missing turns, misreading maps, passing the same Rochester coffee shop six times, our Green Machine topped 47 miles per gallon at the end of the day. (That included passing a pickup truck, while going uphill, on some highway between Centralia and Morton.) We filled up the tank outside of Puyallup this morning, on our way home, and pulled into our garage with 53.8 MPG on the Consumption Display. This little urban car sure does like the country.

Gladden, on the other hand, does not like traveling of any kind. Too many strange noises, strange lights, strange bumps, and strange smells put him in a grumpy mood.

We ended our weekend with a visit to Gladys' and Squeak's gravesites. The area had grown over nicely, and I left confident that it will remain undisturbed for a long time to come.

What else? This has been a terrific weekend, and I'm sure I'm leaving out a lot in this post. There are lots of good memories, and they will pop into my head from time to time. Right now, I'm tired.