Cheap Wine and Plastic Cups: McMinnville 2011

I guess I'll give an update on the McMinnville UFO Festival. If you're expecting to hear my opinion of the three speakers, Robert Salas, Stan Gordon, and Paola Harris, you might as well click another link, because I only saw one of them and that will possibly be addressed in a collaborative post that Regan and I are considering. It might go a little something like this, though:

"Paola walks into a bar..."

My girlfriend and I had a mess of a time getting down to the festival. I had busted ass to get all of my work done on Thursday night so I could have Friday off to sleep in a bit, tidy up the house, and then get the Hell out of Portland. That all happened pretty much according to plan with the exception of timing. We hit the road an hour late, which turned into two hours and some change with rush-hour traffic. I use to think rush hour started at 5pm, but as I've grown older, I've come to realize that rush hour starts whenever I get on the fucking road.

We rolled into McMinnville about 6pm, got our room, freshened up (who says that anymore?) and then took off to see what was happening on 3rd near McMenamins. That's where most of the festival stuff takes place -- well, except for this night, because not a damn thing was happening. Which is fine and all, but I was a little more than bored and was hoping something explosive would be going on. Like scantly clad Pleiadian women picking off costumed folk from the top of Hotel Oregon with a portable particle accelerator. Or a moltave cocktail tossing contest. I was pretty much down for whatever.

After an hour of wandering aimlessly up and down the sidewalks, we were feeling a little peckish. After another hour of me trying to make up my damn mind on where to eat, we ended up at Ruby Tuesdays. I'm still not entirely sure why. My boredom was increasing somewhat exponentially, so after dinner I opted for a quick cure-all, requiring a brief visit to the local Safeway for a bottle or two of merlot. The evening ended around 3am in our Ikea-inspired room at Motel 6 listening to Wish You Were Here (the album, not just the song). Eyes glued to the iTunes visualizer, I managed to polish off one mediocre bottle of wine. The complimentary plastic motel cups just might have added to it's digestibility.

Saturday morning provided the usual motel morning experience: poor water pressure, rough towels, horrific mirror lighting... you know how it goes. Breakfast and much-needed coffee were had at Shari's, a kind of Baker's Square meets Wal-Mart dining establishment. My tummy no longer grumbling, we headed back to the festival area where still nothing was happening. Thankfully, just before the parade, We briefly met up with Regan Lee and her partner and planned to meet up again about an hour before the last speaker (Paola Harris).

It was lovely having the chance to gab with Regan outside of email. We were able to do this briefly last year, but not in a one-on-one kind of way. We spent most of the hour before the presentation Q&A'ing each other. I wish there would have been more time to talk and pick brains, but I'm sure that will happen soon enough. After Paola's "presentation," all of us decided it was time to split McMinnville and head to our respective homes. Good-byes and hugs went 'round, and Dee and I were off.

And that was the McMinnville UFO Festival. My version, at least. It's only a 2-day event. Actually, it's more like a 1 1/2 day event. You get one speaker on Friday night at 7, one on Saturday morning at 10, and a final speaker at 4pm. The rest is just people wandering about like body-snatchers, the occasional food & beer tent, t-shirt sales, and hipsters wearing Reynold's Wrap. But it's a good excuse to get out of town for a bit and do something other than watching movies or wandering about my own city, so I can't complain. Right?