Day 29: Sunday, June 2

Still at the Saufleys' (PCT mi 454.3), a zero day

Woke up at the indulgent hour of 8 a.m., ate breakfast at the Cafe in town with the world's meanest waitress, then waited around all day. Not much more to it than that ... like Judy Collins, I don't know where the time went. Read some, hung out some, nibbled on random bits of food, watched the U.S.-Germany soccer friendly on a pirated internet feed ... basically my life at home in Oregon, except at a stranger's house in Southern California and with a bunch of hikers. The bright spot in the day was figuring out that Kristin's box of fresh-baked banana bread and a handwritten letter had not actually been lost in the post, but had arrived and was sitting in the mail area of the Saufleys' garage mislabeled. Shared the banana bread with the crowd, then went back to my shady cot and read some more. Cream Tea showed up at some point, but not any more of the cool people that I had assumed were a day or so behind me. Got dinner at the middling pizza place in town for the second night in a row ... I couldn't bear to eat pizza for a third time in three days so I got a sub sandwich and it was absolute shit. The Caesar salad was at least okay. Chatted with some firefighters eating dinner in the same joint, they were a helicopter crew from the Grand Canyon over to help out in Cali. They were cool. Afterwards back at the ranch a bunch of hiker dudes who can't really play guitar sat around and earnestly tried to jam with each other.

Could not stand taking a zero day so soon after the last one, which itself was unplanned, although great. This one was just blah and I wish I could've gotten out of here earlier, but it's not very sensible. Tomorrow at 7 a bunch of us are getting picked up and driven to Hikertown at mile 518. Some people say they're going to hang around there for a day, but not this guy. I need to exert myself and move /fram/ or I'm going to lose my mind. At least 20 or 25 miles tomorrow, followed by a nearo into Mojave, followed by ... ?? 145 miles in 5 days? Kennedy Meadows in 7 from now?