It was a lovely day; warm, sunny with clouds that would pass over and block the sun for a bit just as I was getting so hot I thought I might have to jump in the river. After falling asleep on Kimtu Beach for a few hours I woke up covered in a sticky layer of sand with dark clouds rolling in from the hills. I looked around me and the beach was deserted. Time to head to my other favorite place in the Crick - Bigfoot Books.
Bigfoot Books is wonderful, not only for the huge collection of all books Yeti-Sasquatch-Bigfoot related displayed in the front window. The store is in an old house, so you get to wander through maze-like rooms to see them all. The books, while well categorized, are stacked on bookcases and the floor all the way to the ceiling. The majority of them are dusty.
More often than not while you wander through the stacks, you are treated to overhearing phone conversations by the owner who I believe is named Steve. He'll either be talking about the latest Bigfoot sighting he's heard about, the latest hoax, a retelling of stories he's heard from locals and tourists alike or just his general philosophy about Bigfoot Love. This, of course, is my favorite part.
Yesterday I was searching for an old dictionary to make jewelry out of and a Caribbean cookbook. I found both. I took them up to the counter. The cookbook was five dollars, but since the dictionary wasn't priced, Steve started flipping through it to determine if it would be three dollars or four. As he ran his fingers across the edges of the pages, the dictionary suddenly opened up to reveal a large pressed marijuana leaf. He looked up at me with a mixture of amusement and trepidation.
"You'd be surprised at how many of these I find."
I laughed. "No, I really wouldn't. I was born here."
He smiled and closed the book.
"That'll be nine dollars. I won't even charge you extra for the Humboldt County bookmark."
Later at home I opened it up again and noticed that the bookmark had been very appropriately placed - on the same page with the entry for 'potato chip.'
