Kevin does this annual float trip to Oklahoma over Memorial Day weekend. I'd gone the year before, had a marvelous time, and was coming back for a second helping. I knew Alex was coming up with Kev and Callie, and I thought that would be pretty cool. I'd read a fair chunk of his blog, and he seemed like a pretty neat dude. Besides, he was single, and it would be nice not to be the only single person on the float trip, as I probably would be otherwise. Not that I was really planning anything, but still. After a while, being single in couple-land gets to be a pain in the ass sometimes.

As is par for the course for me, I didn't leave in a timely manner, and I think I staggered into camp around 5 AM that Saturday, after a seven-hour drive that entailed my getting pulling over by the cops - three times. I pitched my tent and crashed. Next morning, I woke up 7:30ish and just could not get back to sleep. Argh. I stumbled out of my tent in search of coffee, and this was the state I met Alex in. I wasn't quite sure that the person I saw smoking was he, but I thought it was, and I remember pointing at him and saying, "Aren't you the one who quit smoking?" (Kev had linked to his website, exhorting us to offer encouragement, when Alex was trying to quit.) Not off to the best of starts.

I don't remember too much from that first day of the trip, 'cause I was just brain-dead from a lack of sleep. A few things stood out in my mind. Alex actually volunteered to help me steer the raft, meaning we actually had one-and-a-half sober people to do so (as opposed to just me). Nice. He was also the only guy of the four in the raft that actually washed their hands after, ah, irrigating the bushes at our lunch/pit stop. Whether this was his normal style, or just something he did after I made a huge point of bitching about not letting anyone share my chips if they didn't wash their hands, I don't know. Maybe he just wanted my chips to go with his sandwich. Regardless, he did actually wash his hands. More points. What else? Oh yeah, he was great with the two-year-old son of Micah and Gladys, another couple on the trip. Impressive. Especially for a single dude.

I really don't remember jack about that day other than that. Oh, yeah, I think I did notice somewhere in there that Alex had lovely blue eyes. Or was that the next day? Hmm. I didn't have an awful lot of neurons firing by then.

The next day, I was well-rested and ready to get back on the river, despite a rather chilly start to the morning. I couldn't be that close to the river and not float it, even if no one else wanted to join me - except for Alex. He apparently was up for trying new adventures, and I was glad to have someone to go with me to share the fun. We got out on the river, and again, I don't remember a lot of specific details. What I did notice was his attitude. We had several minor difficulties, including problems with the ice chest throwing us off-balance in the kayaks and several, ah, unintentional swims when we got a little too daring. Instead of getting all bent out of shape, Alex managed to come up laughing every time. Whoa. Big-time cool. And he also took me up on my offer to swap backrubs when we got back to camp. Excellent.

I should explain something about the backrubs. I'm a bit of a backrub junkie, and so I can and will con anyone I feel comfortable with to swap with me. . . especially if I've paddled 16 miles that day. There really were no lurid intentions here, despite Alex's being the only single guy on the trip. Really. I was in need of a backrub. And a little lonely. And in need of a friend. And Alex, as I've said before, did seem like a pretty cool guy. But it wasn't a set-up for anything else. Really. I wasn't dragging him off into the privacy of my tent. We were sitting at the campfire in front of everyone else when we did the backrub thing - fully clothed, might I add. (Well, one would probably assume so, if there were multiple other people around. But you never know.)

The rest of the night, again, there was not much in particular that stood out in my mind. I did remember the crowd around the fire getting onto the subject of (literally) sleeping with someone. I know I said something about it being a little impossible to sleep when you're wrapped up with another person. Even at the time, in my head, I was thinking, You know, I bet anything that stand on the matter is going to come back to bite me. I also recall Alex's saying something about how one figures these things out after a while. I'm not sure why that stuck in my head.

Anyway, was I thinking about the possibility of me and Alex at this point? I really don't think so. I was kind of getting vibes from him that he might be interested in me, but I wasn't sure. Generally speaking, unless someone smacks me over the head with a baseball bat, I'm pretty oblivious to the subtle signs of possible interest in me, and I wasn't quite sure if I was imagining things. And at that point, I think, I was still trying to size him up. I'd read a bit of his blog, and I liked what I'd seen of the person there behind the writing. Besides not being sure if he was interested in me, period, I was also trying to figure out if this was some dude desperate for a relationship (some bad past experiences make me a little paranoid) or this incredibly sincere somewhat shy guy who liked me and didn't know what to do about it. And besides, he lived in Houston. I lived in Shreveport, four hours away, and I was going to be moving to Idaho in two weeks. (I was a week shy of my MD and was about to start residency there.)

In any case, I figured that regardless of everything else, this would still be a guy I would want as a friend, someone whom I'd like to know better.

Anyway, the next day, Alex went back with Kev and Callie to Houston, and I drove back to Shreveport. He did give me good hug goodbye. Always a nice thing. I can't stand people who don't give real hugs.