Seen in Idaho

This morning we decided to go hiking someplace called the Potlatch River Trail.  On the way there, we passed through the town of Deary, population 552.  As we approached the town limits, we noticed that this town, like the one we live in and the one we passed through about 10 miles back, is designated one of Idaho's "Gem Communities."  Neither of us knew what that meant, but hoped it was awesome and involved diamond mines and intrigue. 

We would have passed through Deary in about 45 seconds, but we got stuck in traffic.  How can there be traffic in a town of 552 with no traffic lights, you might ask?  A parade would be the answer.  How can a town that size sustain a parade?   Who would be left to spectate?  There would be no answer.  This paradox defied the laws of parade physics and the town imploded on itself.

On our detour along the edge of town, which was also one block off the main street,  we had a couple extra minutes to ponder the meaning of a Gem Community.  Before long, we came to this conclusion:  sea-foam green houses.

It's not clear whether the criteria is based on the ratio of sea-foam green houses to non-ugly houses, of if there's a set number.  All we know is that there is a suspicious number of sea-foam green buildings in these communities.  I don't think I've ever in my life seen a sea-foam green house that wasn't within a 4-block radius of the ocean.  The sheer quantity of them here is absurd.  It's like there was a giant sale on all the surplus sea-foam green house paint that nobody else the lower 48 states was willing to purchase.  There's one property in town that showcases a brightly painted and perfectly matching sea-foam green trio of house, detached garage, and bronco.  It's really a thing of beauty and I will try to discretely take a picture of it on my walk tonight.

Anyway, the actual hike was pretty uneventful.  If you consider almost stepping in a basketball-sized pile of horse crap, hearing moose sex, getting stung by a bee, and hiking to the sounds of rapidly firing rifles and MACHINE GUNS uneventful.  I was a little miffed about that last one, as I have no health insurance.  If I got shot, what would I do?  Put a Bandaid on it?  All the Charlie Brown Bandaids in the world aren't going to fix that boo-boo.  And anyway, I can't even afford name brand Bandaids.

We had to drive through Deary again on the way home, but I thought we must have taken a wrong turn somewhere because I couldn't tell if we were in Alabama or India.  There was a festival going on at this point, and huge families (in size and/or number) were flocking to the smell of fried lard or something disgusting.  Walking the 500 feet from one side of town to the other clearly wasn't an option for some families, though, because we witnessed a family of 5 piled onto a 4-wheeler trying to drive up a steep hill.  It was kind of like this, only the woman was holding two little kids and they probably weren't bathing in the Ganges right before this photo was taken:

Dave, I stole this from one of your India albums without permission - Thanks

P.S. As we rolled back into town, we saw signs for a gun show at the fairgrounds.  It sounded like a great idea until we walked in and got smacked with a $3 admission fee.  We decided the potential people-watching, while probably golden, wasn't worth actual money.  Fail.