~ Idaho City Historic Independence ~

It would be an understatement for me to say that I appreciate holidays. Indeed, having had an insanely busy last week (working overtime and being overwhelmed with my workload), I was elated at having this Tuesday off of work for some national holiday. On Monday, I seized the day by getting up an hour early in the morning and having an entire morning experience before having to go to work. That evening, I bragged about this feat to Josh, while we were sipping beers on my stoop. On Tuesday, the national holiday, I had planned to get up at 6:30 in order to seize the day even though I didn't have to work. When I woke up, I saw that Josh had sent me a text message wanting to go on a mountain bike ride before the temperature hit the predicted 97 degrees. By 7:00, we were riding our bikes up Hulls Gulch. It was a short sweet ride, which we enjoyed in the cool temperature. There were quite a number of other people on the trails as well, hikers and runners, dog walkers. After we returned from our ride, cleaned up and all that, we met for some coffee at Java downtown, and I had some quality time with my laptop computer. Before the noon hour, we prepared to go on our main adventure for the day: to Idaho City for their Historic celebration for Independence Day.

Part of my desire to go to Idaho City hinged on its location to the north at a higher altitude. From my knowledge of its location, I surmised that it wouldn't get quite as hot as Boise (as I said, predicted at 97 degrees). Unfortunately, it was still really really hot in Idaho City. When we arrived, there were bucket loads of people everywhere. It was craziness. We began our adventure by walking up and down the two roads which comprise the non-residential part of the town. We walked into all of the antique stores (specializing in Old West stuff), weaved through the crowd of people, and I snapped a lot of photos. At one point it was real funny (hah!)...Josh was in the process of walking along this boardwalk thingie that had old saddles slung over the railing and a big wooden fish dangling over his head. I decided that it was an opportune moment to take a photo of the little whipper snapper. Snap! After I had taken my photo, this big sweaty man dressed in a cowboy costume wrapped his arm around Josh and seemed to want me to take a photo of Josh with the cowboy. A little weirded out, I brought up my camera and took another photo. Then the cowboy thought it would be great to swap hats with Josh and give to Josh his gun. Snap! Snap! Then the cowboy started asking us where we are from, wondering if we were tourists from some distant land where they don't have real cowboys such as himself. The heat was making me a tad cranky and I was annoyed that he thought we were tourists. I mean, I happen to have this new digital camera which is this great toy for me, but just because I am always taking photos of everything doesn't mean that I'm not from around these parts.

The Idaho City Library was having a book sale and Josh and I purchased a few books. Josh bought a collection of these "Myserties of the Mind" book series that were published in the early 1980s and contain funny photos of "paranormal phenomena". At 2:00 we wandered over to this place where some real cowboys were having a real Old West shootout. We gathered with a lot of other people in the heat (though we found a spot in the shade). There was a stage made to look like some Old West scene, with a jail, bank, and saloon. Before the shootout, one of the cowboys, the one who had posed for a photo with Josh, gave the audience a lecture on gun safety. Then they performed this skit about an Old West miner who had struck gold, a cowboy who stole his gold, and the sherriff who tried to restore the peace. The "plot" of the skit was quite brief and was punctuated by gunshots and a final "shootout" at the end. Not being much of a "gun person" myself, I found it rather alarming and every time that the loud bangs of the guns sounded, I let out a surprised scream (which was embarassing). The elitist in me found the whole display disappointingly amature (to me, it just seemed like three guys who put on some costumes and wanted to have fun shooting for pretend at each other).

After the shootout, we decided that it was high time to get some food. We located this establishment called "Diamond Lil's Pub and Eatery" and consumed some greasy bar food, pepsis, and beers. The establishment was something else, as may be evidenced by the photos just below this paragraph. There were rows of dollar bills (defaced by writing) hanging from the ceiling, framed collections of outdated currency from around the world, photos from someone's travels, politically distasteful decorations (notice the "slick willie" wall hanging behind Josh and I at the table...in fact, there were several displays of anti-Clinton throughout the town), and the bathrooms... When we first arrived, I overheard the bartender direct a small boy to the men's bathroom by saying to "go through the door with the pretty woman". Later, I discovered that the women's bathroom was the one with the shirtless man on the door. Inside, the walls were covered with photos of shirtless men with big packages...apparently the men's bathroom was covered with photos from Maxim. Belch. I was offended by such a blatant tasteless parade of heterosexuality, and not even just heterosexuality, but a very specific breed of macho heterosexuality which does not at all appeal to me. Honestly, why do people like that have to wave their preferences in my face? So, our bar food was mediocre but we had an excellent time. The air conditioning was cool, the suffleboard table was slick, and the beers hit the spot.

Anyhoot, I have uploaded many more photos onto my flickr account, which you can access by depressing your mouse button over the flickr photos on the sidebar to the right.

Posted by jennifer at 9:31 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)