Favorite pictures of the road trip, part 2

Driving on Hwy 1 (I mean, not actually driving when I took this picture. But this is what the drive looked like)

Sunset in San Simeon


A sign at the Reagan library---can you imagine the public relations nightmare of someone getting bit while at the Reagan library?

Church in Santa Fe, New Mexico


Cadillac Ranch, in Amarillo, TX. Except there are 10 of them.

Woody Guthrie statue in Okemah, OK.

About 95% of my pictures are Oregon and California, mostly with water shots. You would have thought I'd never seen the ocean before. There are not many pictures from Arizona on, and I think I stopped taking pictures altogether after the Woody Guthrie picture above. I was tired.

Favorite pictures of the road trip, part 1

I stopped at a scenic overlook in Oregon, and it was just me and this bird. I took about 20 pictures of this bird because I just liked watching him walk around and look out over the landscape. It was kind of like he owned it. Then I went to the next scenic overlook and there were 4,000 birds there. Then I felt kind of silly for focusing so hard on this bird.

Oregon coast---it was windy. It seemed like at any moment there could be a squall or something.

Redwoods---they are hard to take pictures of, because they are very very big.

I guess it's hard to mess up a picture of the Golden Gate bridge.

Sunset in San Francisco.

radio nowhere

I don’t know if anyone but me enjoyed this the last time I did it, but when you’re on a long road trip, a lot of the time is just driving and listening to music. And looking over this list, a lot of the memories of what I saw are still linked to what I was listening to at the time. So I wanted to put up the list of everything I listened to on my trip.

I listened to 95 albums, but eight of them were multi-volume sets, so I guess technically I broke a hundred. I guess if I were interested I could add up how long they all last and see how much time was actual driving time, and then I could compare it to how long Mapquest said the trip should last, and maybe that would help me determine how much time I spent driving around lost.

I will tell you that when you’re picking up your life and moving cross-country, every song that’s remotely about leaving is incredibly profound, but I got over that about halfway through the trip. Also I would like to say that normally I’m a big fan of trying to match up music with the area it’s from, or areas it mentions, such as trying to listen to songs about Georgia when I’m in Georgia. But I wasn’t very good at that on this trip.

Here is the list, broken down by state, with a few notes:

WASHINGTON
Patti Scialfa—Play It As It Lays
-->I like music, so I wanted a fitting, meaningful CD to kick off the trip, but I was too tired to find one, so I put in this CD just because I had just bought it, and I wanted to listen to it. But it turned out to be fitting, cause look at some lyrics from the first song:

I’m just looking for some inspiration
I’m looking for something to rock my soul
I’m looking for a brand new destination
I’m looking for Elvis down a Memphis road

That sums me up, I guess, except I could really give or take the Elvis part.

Steve Earle—Washington Square Serenade
-->I really love this CD and would happily burn a copy for anyone who’s interested, unless you are a copyright lawyer or something, in which case, a) I would never burn music like that, and b) why are you reading this?

Lyle Lovett—It’s Not Big, It’s Large
-->Sadly, this CD is only okay, and not as good as other ones.

Allison Moorer—Getting Somewhere

OREGON
Cat Power—The Greatest

Jeffrey Foucault—Ghost Repeater

Shawn Colvin—Polaroids

Laura Cantrell—Humming by the Flowered Vine

Patty Griffin—Flaming Red

Ryan Adams—Easy Tiger
-->This CD kicked off Day 2.

Paul McCartney—Memory Almost Full
-->I mean, this CD is okay, but the guy was a Beatle. I expect more. I spent some time pondering, though, that if these were Beatle songs, would we really revere the Beatles the way we do?

Pete Seeger—Songs of Hope and Struggle
-->I listened to this while I was driving along the Oregon coast, and all I can say is that by the time this CD was over, I was ready to join a union and work to end war.

Mary Chapin Carpenter—Essential Mary Chapin Carpenter

The Band—Greatest Hits

Rilo Kiley—Under the Blacklight
-->I should have probably waited til California to listen to this; it’s a very California CD.

Rosanne Cash—King’s Record Shop

Arlo Guthrie—Amigo
-->Track 3 on this CD is called “Massachusetts,” and man, does it make me want to move to Massachusetts.

Kim Richey—Chinese Boxes

Okkervil River—The Stage Names

Raul Malo—After Hours

Richard Shindell—South of Delia
-->This is what was playing during the great Crater Lake fiasco, as I drove into temperatures that were falling, and into fog that descended to hide the lake.

The Decemberists—The Crane Wife
-->I listened to this to cheer myself up after the Crater Lake fiasco.

Bruce Springsteen—Magic
-->I bought this to cheer myself up after the Crater Lake fiasco.

CALIFORNIA
Neko Case—Furnace Room Lullaby

Feist—The Reminder

Jesse Malin—Glitter in the Gutter

Wilco—Sky Blue Sky
-->Do you remember all those reviews of this CD? They all talked about how “California” it was, so I was trying to test that out. I have no official opinion on the matter.

Elvis Perkins—Ash Wednesday

New Pornographers—Challengers

Amy Lavere—Anchors and Anvils

Blue Scholars—Bayani
-->Whenever I think redwood forest, I’ll probably think “Blue Scholars,” and whenever I listen to the Blue Scholars, I’ll probably think about driving through the redwood forest.

Rufus Wainwright—Release the Stars

Tegan & Sara—The Con
-->There was bad traffic during this CD

The National—Boxer

Brandi Carlile—The Story

Jennifer O’Connor—Over the Mountain, Across the Valley, and Back to the Stars
-->I was listening to this when I crossed the Golden Gate bridge.

Lavender Diamond—Imagine Our Love
-->I was concentrating on San Francisco traffic and couldn’t really concentrate on this one.

The Trucks—The Trucks

Nick Cave—The Boatman’s Call

The Pogues—If I Should Fall From Grace with God

Tom Waits—Rain Dogs

John Hiatt—Perfectly Good Guitar

Robbie Fulks—Country Love Songs

Nanci Griffith—Other Voices, Other Rooms

Tom Russell—Rose of San Joaquin
-->Driving along Highway 1.

Tom Russell—Borderland
-->I didn’t mean to do duplicates, but it was a scary part of Highway 1 where I couldn’t change CD’s. Plus, Tom writes too many good songs about California to just listen to one cd.

Liz Phair—Whipsmart

Jimmy Buffett—Live in Hawaii
-->“Live in Hawaii” is honestly kind of a crappy throwaway live album, and I would have preferred to listen to a different Jimmy Buffett cd, but this was the only one I could reach. I just don’t like to be that close to the ocean for that long without listening to some Jimmy.

Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers—Greatest Hits
-->Driving into Malibu.

Aimee Mann—The Forgotten Arm

Dar Willams—My Better Self

Erin McKeown—We Will Become Like Birds

Fiona Apple—Extraordinary Machine

Martha Wainwright—Martha Wainwright
-->I think you can see from the last few cd's that I was trying to listen to a lot of girly music to counteract the stress brought on from the horrendous traffic that existed between Los Angeles and the Nixon library.

Warren Zevon—Warren Zevon
-->Listening to this CD in Los Angeles was a personal requirement for me.

Warren Zevon—Excitable Boy
-->I like Warren too much to stop with just one CD by him. This was while I was driving Mulholland.

The Avett Brothers—Emotionalism
-->Still on Mulholland when I switched over to this. Not the most natural choice for driving around Hollywood, but I like this CD.

Son Volt—The Search

Uncle Tupelo—Anodyne

R.E.M.—New Adventures in Hi-Fi
-->This is what was playing as I finally turned east. The last song on this one is “Electrolite,” which is a nice song about Hollywood, so that’s why I picked this particular R.E.M.

U2—All That You Can’t Leave Behind

The Beatles—Love

Mika—Life in Cartoon Motion

Peter, Bjorn and John—Writer’s Block

ARIZONA
Elvis Costello—Blood and Chocolate

Paul Simon—Graceland
-->I think this CD usually makes my top ten desert island CD list.

Leonard Cohen—the Essential Leonard Cohen
-->Two cd’s of Leonard Cohen might not have been the best listening choice for the Arizona desert. I don’t think he works in hot climates.

Richard Thompson—1000 Years of Popular Music

Josh Ritter—The Animal Years

NEW MEXICO
Kelley Stoltz—Below the Branches

Love—Forever Changes
-->I don’t even remember listening to this, I think because it had gotten very dark, and I was just trying to concentrate on finding a hotel.

Michael Penn—Mr. Hollywood, 1947
-->Probably should have listened to this in California.

Leona Naess—I Tried to Rock You but You Only Roll

Sarah Maclachlan—Fumbling Towards Ecstasy

The Who—Ultimate Collection
-->When “I Can See for Miles and Miles” came on, I really did feel like I could see for miles. And miles.

David Bowie—Best of Bowie

TEXAS
Lily Allen—Alright, Still
-->I wasn’t in Texas that long; I really shouldn’t have wasted time on non-Texas artists.

Scissor Sisters—Ta-Dah
-->See above.

Emmylou Harris—Wrecking Ball
-->I belatedly got my Texas act together.

Guy Clark—The Essential Guy Clark
-->See above.

OKLAHOMA
Billy Joel—Greatest Hits, Volumes 1, 2, and 3
-->Oklahoma was so boring that I needed some good pop songs to keep me peppy. Plus I couldn’t decide which volume to listen to.

The Flaming Lips—At War with the Mystics
-->Really? You’re from Oklahoma, and you still live there? That’s what I kept thinking while I listened to this.

ARKANSAS
Emily Haines and the Soft Skeleton—Knives Don’t Have Your Back

Stars—Set Yourself on Fire
-->This was the night I couldn’t find a hotel. I had to deal with a lot of rejection while I listened to this cd.

Bruce Springsteen—Magic
-->On this day, I just wanted to listen to the Boss.

Bruce Springsteen—Darkness on the Edge of Town
-->On this day, I just wanted to listen to the Boss.

Bruce Springsteen—The River
-->On this day, I just wanted to listen to the Boss.

TENNESSEE
Bruce Springsteen—Live in Dublin
-->On this day, I just wanted to listen to the Boss.

Bruce Springsteen—Ghost of Tom Joad
-->On this day, I just wanted to listen to the Boss.

Bruce Springsteen—Born in the USA
-->On this day, I just wanted to listen to the Boss.

Devotchka—How It Ends

Calexico & Iron and Wine—In the Reins

Various—Red, White and Rock
-->These were oldies to pep myself up.

Steve Earle—Washington Square Serenade
-->I can’t say it too many times, so even though I’ve already said it once, I’ll just tell you that this CD is awesome.

NORTH CAROLINA
Patti Scialfa—Play It As It Lays
-->I like to end where I begin, except I still had about 45 minutes of driving left, so I just listened to miscellaneous Jimmy Buffett mp3’s the rest of the way home.

One of these people is now married

One of my ideas for a blog about my brother's wedding (which you'll read about below), was just one picture of us as kids, put against one picture of us from the wedding. But I didn't take any pictures at the wedding, so let's just do several of us as kids.

George is two years younger than me. I should mention that I do have another brother named William, but I think he stole all photo albums in which he appears, and my mom stopped putting together albums when we started getting awkward and whatnot. So these are just me and Georgie:

This is from an obviously awesome period in our lives when we had matching Ghostbusters t-shirts, and I really wish I could remember this period better, and that it was still going on:



We were always party animals:



I don't know if it's too light to tell in this picture, but here we are leaning against a barbed wire fence. Why were they letting us do this? I have no idea. But perhaps that's why we're so tough today.




Really though, when George and I want to have some real fun, we put on our matching balloon jumpers and go crazy. That has not changed in twenty something years. We still love our matching balloon jumpers. I certainly hope that now that you're married, George, that we can still put on our matching jumpers and hang out:

Four Weddings and a Funeral, except just one wedding and zero funerals

After the road trip, I dived straight into the excitement of my brother George’s wedding, which was this weekend. It was a lot of work, but the best thing about going to a wedding that is for someone in your immediate family is that you know almost everyone. It was a lovely, fun group. Here were the highlights, presented night-by-night:

Thursday night--All the bridesmaids (of which I was one), and mothers and grandmothers went to get manicures and pedicures. I almost never have nail polish on my fingers, and this was extra special because it was for the wedding, but basically I had 48 hours of fear that I was going to chip a fingernail or mess it up. This led to me doing not that much to help out after the manicure. Apparently, “I can’t, I might mess up the manicure” is an annoying excuse, but an acceptable one.

Friday night---Rehearsal dinner! We had it at a big farm, and the little kids who were there got to feed a horse and ride on a golf cart. The best parts for me were the barbeque that we ate and the big square dances that my Uncle Ken called for us.

Saturday—the big day. I’m still too tired to be incredibly poetic about it, but it was a happy happy day. Everyone looked great. The ceremony was done by my uncles, Ken and Pete, and my favorite part was when they were doing the vows. The vows are the only part of the wedding that you really don’t rehearse the night before, because if you say them, you’re married. So Uncle Ken was whispering the vows for George to say, and George started whispering them back, and Ken whispered, “You know, you can speak louder, so everyone can hear.” George laughed really loud. Then he spoke the vows so everyone could hear. The unplanned can be the best.

At the reception I made a beeline for the food, because I was so hungry, only to be told we weren’t eating yet. Then I got this huge plate of food and ignored anyone that was trying to make pleasant conversation with me. I was just too hungry. I mean I scarfed down food. The only way it could have gone down faster was if I had a shovel. So that’s the only part I feel a little bad about, that perhaps I could have eaten in a more ladylike manner, or at least feigned interest in people around me while I was gorging myself.

The cake was very pretty on the outside and delicious on the inside. It was two flavors—pound cake with raspberry, and cake that was pina colada flavored. Of course I had both kinds, so I could bring you an unbiased cake report, and they were both very good.

My other little brother William did a toast that made everyone laugh and cry—big highlight.

After the reception, we had our family back to the house for drinking and more eating. The drinking took the form of a gigantic beer pong tournament, and I will not get too deep into the details here on this blog, but I think basically some little kids were corrupted and learned some words that they probably shouldn’t have. At the end of the night I was handing one of my little cousins a (clean) ping pong ball, and he went, “Oooh! Beer pong ball!” And I said, “Well, after you leave here, how about you call it a ping pong ball?” And he said, “No, beer pong ball!” So I hope that none of the parents of little kids got any calls today from teachers asking what beer pong is and how it came that they learned about it at their cousin’s wedding.

Another thing about beer pong is that my dad is freakishly good at it, and he and his brother won seven games in a row before they retired as champions. Did they alienate the rest of the family? Possibly.

Now George and Courtney are in Maine on their honeymoon, and we’re all left to resume regularly scheduled programming.

Book #27: A Thousand Splendid Suns, by Khaled Hosseini

I read this book before I left Seattle, and in all the craziness of moving, never wrote up my officially sanctioned book review for it. Now I don’t have the book in front of me, and to be perfectly honest, it feels like it’s been about six years since I was in Seattle. So let’s look forward, not backward, and just wrap this up without the formal review. Here's what I thought:

I think I read this book too soon after I read The Kite Runner, because it just sort of seemed like The Kite Runner with girls instead of boys. Also, perhaps because I had just read the Kite Runner, I felt like I could tell, before I even turned the page, when there were going to be dramatic plot points. These plot points were usually sad events. So it started to feel so predictable, but, women’s lives in Afghanistan are pretty predictably sad, it sounds like, so then I felt bad for questioning predictability in the book when it mirrors predictability in life.

Anyways, I’d still recommend it, and I give it a B.

Day 14 and 15: The End

Well, it’s a week later, and I should probably write up how the trip ended. Hopefully no one was too worried that I was lying in a ditch in Arkansas, though if you were, your concern was awfully muted.

So! Last Sunday morning I left Russellville and headed toward Little Rock. I don’t know if anyone can see this coming, based on sightseeing completed earlier in the trip, but there was a presidential library in Little Rock that I wanted to see. Unfortunately, it was Sunday, and nothing in Little Rock opens before noon, if it opens at all, so I had some time to kill. I sat in a Wendy’s and read Time Magazine.

Then it was over to the main attraction, the William J. Clinton Presidential Library. I had high hopes for our nation’s newest presidential library, which actually had been dashed by my father, who coincidentally visited the library about a week before I did.

But to explain my high hopes, I have to take a little side note here on presidential libraries. The best library, to my mind, is the George Bush I library in College Station, Texas. Texas is a state truly gifted with presidential libraries, with LBJ’s in Austin and Bush at A&M. Johnson’s is pretty good as well…it was actually my new favorite for exactly one day, until I went to Bush’s, so if you’re planning a trip, do LBJ, then Bush, so you’re not disappointed by LBJ.

Anyways, the reason I identified for liking Bush’s so much are these:
1. He was still alive and could be pretty involved in the collection, displays, process, etc.
2. He built his library at a time when he could use cooler technology than say, Hoover .

So, since these conditions were in place for Clinton, I thought Clinton’s would be awesome. But it’s just okay. The main attraction is a display hall with each year of the Clinton presidency, with timelines tracking what Clinton was doing and what else was going on in the world. And that part is a pretty good document of how crazy the world has gotten, and maybe one day I’ll take my kids there and explain the world events that occurred when I was young, but for now, I’m not incredibly nostalgic for pictures of Kerri Strug or OJ. There’s some interesting commentary on partisanship and how bitter things got. There’s also some replicas of rooms in the White House and an exhibit on what goes into putting on a big dinner there. Plus, comedy by Hillary!

After the library, I started driving to Tennessee. If it had not been Day 14, I likely would have stopped and bummed around Memphis for a little bit, but I was really, really tired, so I went to Nashville . For those of you reading the blog who are not aware, Nashville is one of the places I am considering for the next stage of my life, and the point of stopping there was to evaluate its livability.

But who really knows how to do that? I don’t. I lived in Georgia for four years because there was a school I wanted to go to there, and I picked up and just moved to Seattle sight unseen because it seemed cool. So this is the first time that I’ve visited a place and tried to evaluate it. That’s what I did on Day 15 for a few hours, just by driving around and looking for stuff. I did find a good used bookstore and bought some books. But as I mentioned before, I was tired. It was time to get back to Candler, NC. That’s just outside of Asheville. I got there and my parents were watching Dancing with the Stars, which I had never seen, but they got me fully up to speed and it seems like a decent show, though it must force me to re-evaluate my definition of “star”, because I had never heard of a lot of those people.

And thus ended the road trip. I still have a music report from the trip to type up, and some pictures to get off the camera, and maybe later I will think of something profound to wrap it all up, but for now, that’s what I got.

Day 13: Oklahoma is one of our most boring states…

…I guess that’s why we sent all the Indians there.

I’m just joshing, everyone. I don’t mean any disrespect to Indians. Please don’t scalp me. Just joshing again.

Today I got up and saw Amarillo by morning, as the song goes. My first stop was the Cadillac Ranch, which is where some eccentric stuck a bunch of cars in the ground. It was kind of eerie because I was the only one there, and the wind was blowing something fierce, and you have to walk a bit away from your car to see it. So it felt less like a goofy roadside attraction and more like a potential car robbery scheme.

Then I saw a sign for the Amarillo Catholic Superstore. Feeling giddy from my pope statue purchase the day before, I decided to stop, thinking that surely a superstore would have statues of all the popes. When I got there, the owner asked if I was a Catholic, and I said no, that I was interested in the lives of the popes and the saints. Well, he smelled the opportunity to make a conversion, so then we had a half-hour conversation where he tried to persuade me that the Catholic church was the best church. He gave me a card that appears to have Jesus holding up a murderer with some words about forgiveness and said he would pray for me on the rest of my trip.

Then I was off through the rest of the Texas panhandle as well as Oklahoma, and as I referenced in the title of this post, it was a bit of a boring drive. In the midst of all the boringness I stopped in Oklahoma City to go to the monument and museum about the 1995 bombing. I’d highly recommend both if you ever find yourself in the vicinity of Oklahoma City. Although the museum is devastatingly sad and anxiety-inducing, it’s also incredibly well-done and a very poignant tribute to both the people who died and the people who were involved in the rescue, recovery, and investigative efforts.

You start the museum by learning about what the federal building was like before the bombing, and what a typical day it was turning out to be. Then you go in a room and listen to the tape of a hearing that was going on about water usage when the bomb went off, so you hear the blast and the confusion. Then you go out and see the images of that day…newscasts, survivors talking, pictures of people dying. It was heart wrenching, but also a tribute to how the people of Oklahoma and beyond mobilized to help in any way they could. It goes through hour by hour, day by day, as people had to give up hope that there would be anymore survivors, but then it goes into how the city decided to honor the dead. They had to give up hope, but they also wrote a mission statement about what they wanted the memorial to be, and they wanted one of the themes to be hope. And they fully admitted that that was a challenging dynamic. So then it goes into how they planned the memorial and what they wanted it to stand for.

The memorial grounds fulfill that mission, in my opinion. There are gates at either end, marked 9:01 and 9:03, which frames 9:02, the minute the bomb went off. 9:01 symbolizes when the world was innocent and 9:03 represents the world forever changed. In the middle, there’s a pretty pond. On one side of that there’s the tree that survived the blast and is a symbol of hope as to what we can endure, and on the other side, where the federal building used to be, are chairs that represent the dead.

The only minute where this place kind of lost me was in the gift shop. I just don’t want a Christmas ornament or a magnet that shows the Memorial Museum. Maybe that’s wrong, maybe I should hang it and remember and think of those who aren’t here, but at the time, it just seemed tacky.

Then I continued through Oklahoma, stopping briefly in Okemah, the town in which Woody Guthrie was born, to take a picture of a statue and mural of Woody. As I was driving through today, it was kind of surreal to think of all the musical talent that Oklahoma has produced. I didn’t see a whole lot to get creative about. Maybe it gets better off the interstate.

This evening I entered Arkansas, and for the first time, had trouble finding a hotel. One clerk told me that there are like four high school reunions going on in the section of the state where I was trying to find a room. I didn’t know people from Arkansas went to high school. Just joshing! Now I'm in Russellville, Arkansas, I think.

Day 12: Land of Enchantment

“Cheetos in Albuquerque. I can hardly wait.”—John Cusack in The Sure Thing

This morning I drove from Truth or Consequences to Albuquerque. In Albuquerque, I went to the Old Town (http://www.albuquerqueoldtown.com/). I walked around and bought things, including salsa, jerky that is chile-flavored, and an awesome pope statue at a church. I did not go to the Rattlesnake Museum, because that is the kind of thing that would give me nightmares, and in the tragic mistake of the day, I did not eat lunch.

From Albuquerque it was onto Santa Fe. Santa Fe is a nicer version of Albuquerque, with galleries and authentic art as opposed to tacky souvenir shops. At this point in my life, I’m more of a tacky souvenir shop kind of girl, so I think I preferred Albuquerque to Santa Fe. I went to a pretty basilica that’s in the center of town. In Santa Fe, there’s also this chapel that has a staircase that’s considered miraculous because it has no visible means of support, but I had no cash for the admission fee by that point and I was also about to pass out from dehydration.

As I mentioned, I did not eat lunch in Albuquerque, thinking I would have lunch in Santa Fe, but I just started looking for lunch at about the time restaurants were closing down for siesta. That’s been one of my main challenges on this trip, to eat a meal before I get painfully hungry. I should just go to restaurants when I identify good ones to go to around appropriate meal times. That’s my goal for the remaining days of the trip.

After Santa Fe I drove about 4 hours to Amarillo, Texas. I changed time zones again and I have no idea what time it is or what time it is in relation to anyone else. All I know is I am tired and getting cranky. Also I had to write this entry twice because Blogger is just LYING when it says it is auto-saving.

Day 11: Arizona

Today I drove from Blythe, California, to Truth or Consequences, New Mexico. Matthew, miles? Not all that much happened and it was sort of a boring day, with just the rolling brown hills and the cacti to keep me company.

Here are some things of note:
-Today I was wishing that an outlet mall would come along, because I had a real itch to buy some cheap books, and then, lo and behold, along came an outlet mall. I bought two books and felt better.
-I stopped for lunch in Tucson. I saw more cacti than I'd ever seen in my life! I saw this one hill where it was almost like the cacti were grass, there were so many. And not squatty or flat cacti, either, but those tall, two curvy arm cacti.
-In Tucson I had a chimichanga and Diet Pepsi for lunch. Then I was walking along, and I stopped to take a picture of a church. I had the camera in one hand, and then I put up the other hand to block some of the glare of the sun. But I forgot that the other hand had an open can of Diet Pepsi, and I spilled Diet Pepsi all over myself. It dried instantly, though, since it was 95 degrees.
-So far New Mexico seems like Arizona except with less cacti and rounder hills.
-I entered another time zone today and lost an hour, which was also confusing because I wanted to watch Grey's Anatomy but was not exactly sure what time it would come on anymore. So it was sort of a mad rush to find a hotel room tonight. But the hotel has a pool, so after Grey's I will go swimming.

Day 10: driving and Reagan

I got up this morning to do a drive that I’d recommend:
-Mulholland Drive. Going through those canyons and overlooks was the first time since I was in Malibu that I could see how L.A. might be considered beautiful. On this section of the drive, you get to see the skyline and the Hollywood sign.

-Wind your way down to Hollywood Boulevard. See Mann’s Chinese Theatre and the Kodak Theater. Imagine the Oscars are going on.

-Turn onto Santa Monica and go to Beverly Hills. Remember old episodes of 90210 fondly.

-Turn onto Rodeo Drive. If you go the wrong way at first, as I did, you can see some nice houses, and then turn around and go down the ritzy shopping part. Look for celebrities.

Then take Wilshire back to interstate, because there is an important place to go, and that place is the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library. That’s right, two presidential libraries in two days! California is truly blessed!

The Reagan library is in Simi Valley, which was quite beautiful. The library was very well put together, with the Chasen’s booth in which Reagan proposed to his wife, clips of his movie career, a film about the assassination attempt, an Air Force One that you could walk through and stats about how much Reagan traveled, a piece of the Berlin Wall, etc. But overall, I would say I like Nixon’s better. Perhaps it’s because Reagan was rehashed so recently when he died, or perhaps because some of this stuff happened in my lifetime, I just didn’t feel like I walked away having learned anything or gained any insight into Reagan. But I do think I might borrow my dad’s copy of The Reagan Diaries when I get home.

Then, I finally, at long last, stopped going south and made the turn east. I got about three hours east, going through the desert and a big ass wind farm. The drive was more or less “brown,” what with the desert and all, but when the sun started going down, the pinks and blues reflected off the brown hills and it was beautiful.

I stopped in Blythe, California, just a rock’s throw from Arizona, and went to Denny’s for some French toast. Then I watched some tv. Is anyone watching the show Pushing Daisies on ABC on Wednesdays? I think it’s my new favorite show and the leading actor is my new celebrity crush.

Day 9: I sat in traffic

I started Day 9 by heading for Orange County, which the kids call The OC, to go to the most exciting attraction in the Anaheim area, which you might think is Disneyland, but is actually the Richard Nixon Library & Birthplace. See, when I was born, my dad implanted a magnet chip in my wrist that goes off when I’m in close proximity to presidential libraries. The chip pulls me to the library. I have no control. I have to go.

What’s interesting about the Nixon Library is that it started off a private library, as opposed to an “official” library, paid for by federal funds, because of the whole Watergate thing. But this summer, it started the transition to a federally funded library. So they’re in a bit of transition, with the first step being a renovation of the Watergate room, so I couldn’t see that. From what I understand, it used to explain Watergate as a left-wing conspiracy, and now it’s going to be a little more unbiased.

If a presidential library does it’s job right, you leave feeling completely sympathetic and in love with that particular president, and Nixon’s does a pretty good job of that. He has framed his narrative as one of knowing the deepest lows in a way that make the highest mountains even sweeter. So while he had early success in state office and as vice-president, his defeat to JFK and subsequent political failure was almost a necessary low. Then, getting elected president=high, resigning=low. Of course, the lows are presented as never being Nixon’s fault; apparently he was nothing but a perfect angel and hardworking man the whole time, but if you’re willing to suspend disbelief, it’s a pretty inspirational story.

Nixon probably best framed his foreign policy work, with lots on China and the Soviet Union. You can also walk through a presidential helicopter, the house that Nixon was born in, and a replica of the East Room of the White House. Interesting fact: you can use the Nixon library for weddings/receptions; a bride was there inspecting it while I was there.

The drive to and from Nixon took forever, with a boatload of traffic. It was insane. I sat there and wandered how anything ever got done in L.A., because all they do is sit in traffic. Maybe that’s where the writers do their work…writing songs and scripts stuck in traffic.

Eventually I made it back to L.A. proper to go to the Getty. I got there with only about two hours before it closed so I felt like I was running through it, but I still got a good look at lots of art and some good views of L.A. As usual, I liked anything that was Italian the best, but they also have a good room of Impressionists, including van Gogh’s Irises.

Then I made my way back to Oliver’s. Even though he was gone on a business trip, he still let me stay there…super sweet! He’ll probably never read this, but thank you Oliver! I trip planned a bit and then went to sleep.

Day 8: Castles and celebrities

I began Day 8 with a trip to Hearst Castle, the estate of William Randolph Hearst. You begin the tour by taking a bus to the top of a mountain, to the estate. The tape they play on the bus tells you to look for wild animals, because Hearst kept them on the land when he was there (things like zebras and polar bears) and there are still a lot there today (not polar bears though). All I saw was one deer and some turkeys.

Our guide met us at the top of the hill and explained the process of how Hearst built the castle. It’s out in the middle of nowhere, so it’s pretty impressive that it exists at all. But Hearst was inspired by Europe and wanted a place to exhibit his art, so the painstaking details that went into it were endless. So the partnership between Hearst and his architect, Julia Morgan, was pretty cool.

First, you go to the outside pool, where Cary Grant and Clark Gable once swam. It has columns and marble everywhere. The tour guide said that he got to swim in it once a year. It would be nice to be invited to that party, huh? Then we walked through one of the guest homes. I would have wanted to stay in the room that had a view of both the ocean and the pool.

Then, the main attraction, you go into the big house. You see the sitting room, dining room, billiards room, the movie theater, and the inside pool. When you see that pool, you’re walking on gold because it’s flecked into the tiles. That pool was so beautiful. The tour guide called the other rooms “concrete boxes” because the real appeal is the art that Hearst spent his life collecting.

After the bus ride back down the hill I watched the movie “Building the Dream,” which shows the 10-year-old Hearst going to Europe, getting inspired, and deciding to build a house that integrates all the influences. It was pretty interesting, actually, despite my lackluster description of it.

Back on the road. I stopped in San Luis Obispo for lunch. I had a burrito that had, among other things, banana. Only in California. Then I continued the drive into Los Angeles.
When I was on the PCH into Malibu, I began thinking intently on one subject. Was John Cusack in town? If so, where was he, and was it hard to get there? Did John Cusack hang out at any of the spots I was passing? If I were to meet John Cusack, what would I say? Would he find an opening line that referenced “Money for Nothing” adorable or annoying?

Then I had to stop thinking about John Cusack because I had gotten myself a little lost. My friend Oliver from Emory kindly allowed me to crash on his couch, but I waited a little too late to call him to figure out where he lived in relation to John Cusack, and thus I was a little out of the way and apparently dangerously close to the ghetto. But eventually I made it to Oliver’s place in Culver City.

It was one of Oliver’s roommate’s birthday, so a group went to dinner at Ford’s Filling Station, which is a restaurant owned by Harrison Ford’s son. I hate to spoil the rest of my time in L.A. for you, but this is as close as I get to a celebrity during the trip. I had some polenta with veggies and a big glass of wine and it was great. Oliver has some really nice friends and it was a fun night. We went back to Oliver’s and he helped me figure out how to get around L.A. a bit before bed. Thus ends day 8.

Day 7: Wax museum and swimming

This morning I woke up when Dylan woke up because man oh man, that kid can yell. But Dylan woke up at my wake-up time, so I guess it was okay. I tried to tattle on them again this morning, because one of the wrestling routines they did involved banging on walls and the room was kind of shaking. The Motel 6 guy gave them a call but they didn’t pick up, and that’s about as much as Motel 6 is willing to do these days. When the dad came back in he started yelling SO LOUD, and this is what he said: “YOU KIDS NEED SOME ANGER MANAGEMENT! IF YOU DON’T LEARN TO CONTROL YOURSELF, WE ARE NEVER GOING TO ANOTHER SKATEBOARD CONTEST AGAIN.” (a kid interjected, “but he called me gay!” to which the dad replied) GAY! GAY! GAY! GAY! IT’S JUST A WORD! WHY DO YOU LET IT BOTHER YOU? YOU CALL PEOPLE GAY TOO! (to which the kid replied, “no I don’t, I call them faggots.” And then the family had a heartwarming discussion about the definition of gay and faggot, etc. I hope no one is offended by my use of these words in my blog, but that’s what I heard this morning, and since Motel 6 didn’t give a flip about whether I was offended, I’m going to have to assume that it’s not a big deal.

Man I was glad to leave that hotel.

I went into Monterey. First, I went down to Cannery Row, made famous by the John Steinbeck novel of the same name. Originally home to sardine canneries, there’s now many nice shops and restaurants.

I spent most of my time at John Steinbeck’s Spirit of Monterey Wax Museum (http://www.wax-museum.com. I highly recommend looking at the pictures). As an exhibit, it’s a little overpriced and needs a little work in terms of the audio and upkeep, but I like to support literary tourism in any way possible. The wax figures tell the story of how Monterey was settled, and then the second half shows Cannery Row as Steinbeck knew it and loved it. I got a John Steinbeck t-shirt. Be on the lookout for it.

Then I walked down to Fisherman’s Wharf. Per usual, I got a little lost on my way out of Monterey.

Then I went on the 17-Mile Drive, which is a private road along the ocean that weaves through golf courses, including Pebble Beach. Lots of mansions. Lots of scenic views. Ocean, sand, it was all pretty. Hard to describe better than that. Maybe the next time I go to Pebble Beach, I’ll be married to a millionaire who will go golfing while I go to the spa or something.

It was on to Carmel-by-the-Sea, which is where Clint Eastwood was once mayor. I got there right as about five tour buses did, so the town was packed. It felt kind of like a Disney World European village. I went down and looked at the beach, and then I had to get food because it was 2:30 and I hadn’t eaten since breakfast. I ended up eating a calamari steak and risotto at a little bistro. I grabbed a brownie at a bakery and got back on Highway 1.

From Carmel, Highway 1 goes through Big Sur. I only drove about 90 miles, but it was the longest 90 miles of the trip. Also the prettiest, because the road hugs the coast, but there were lots of hairpin turns, with nothing between you and the ocean but a cliff and a guardrail. My hands got a little sweaty but I think I got some great pictures.

When I got to San Simeon, I parked close to a hotel so I could steal their free wireless. I wanted to make sure I could make a reservation for Hearst castle before I stopped for the night, and it turned out I could, so I stopped here in San Simeon. I ended up with a beautiful hotel for the lowest rate I’ve paid yet, to which I say a hearty, “screw you, Motel 6.”

I went down to the beach to watch the sunset, and it was amazing. Earlier, this year, when I was at the Grand Canyon, people took buses and sat for hours to watch the sunset, and when it was over, no one was quite sure why they had watched it, I think. Just sort of anticlimactic, I guess, when the sun doesn’t hit the canyon at the right time. But this was the kind of sunset that watching the sunset was invented for. Lots of pinks streaking across the sky, and turquoise water coming in waves onto the white sand. So great.

Then I came back to the hotel and went swimming! I had the pool all to myself and did some laps, thinking about how in my next stage of life, I’m going to need an apartment complex with a pool. Or a gym with a pool. Or a boyfriend with a pool. Or all three. I’m not as good a swimmer as I used to be, but I love it. It’s hard to imagine a day so bad that swimming couldn’t make it better.

Then I sat in the hot tub for a bit, and tried to decide how I could work a hot tub into my next stage of life as well. They’re hell to keep up but man, that massage jet on my back was worth the whole price of the hotel.

Then I cleaned out my car. Life on the road isn’t always glamorous.

Day 6: I go to a haunted house and invent a pillow hat

I did a few more things in San Francisco before heading out: I walked over a little bit of the Golden Gate bridge, I went back to Golden Gate park and went to the Japanese tea garden, drove by the Painted Ladies, and drove to the intersection of Haight-Ashbury. Saw a hippie.

Then I drove to San Jose to go to the Winchester Mystery House. Here’s the story of the house: In 1884, Sarah Winchester, distraught over the deaths of both her husband and baby daughter, began construction on the mansion. It’s believed that a medium told Mrs. Winchester that if she had construction going 24 hours a day, every day, then she would pacify the evil spirits that were haunting her. The spirits were those killed by Winchester rifles (being the Winchester widow, that’s where she got all the money to work on the house). Also, if she kept construction going, the medium said she’d live forever. So construction went on all the time for 38 years. Eventually there were 160 rooms in the mansion, and she’d remodel and redo them just to keep construction going.

The house is kind of an oddity because there’s weird stuff, like windows in the floor, staircases that go nowhere, staircases that you have to go up then down then down then up, etc. The guide said that there were two possibilities for this: one, that Mrs. Winchester did it that way to confuse the evil spirits, and that two, Mrs. Winchester did not have much architectural experience so she just did things wrong. When you have construction going for that long, you have some time to make mistakes.

The guide was a hoot….definitely some sort of fine arts major who had the script memorized and who worships Mrs. Winchester. Mrs. Winchester was obsessed with the number 13, so the guide kept pointing out when things had thirteen letters, I guess like that Jim Carrey movie. She mentioned that the tour guides clean the mansion and she was always very reverential when she talked about this task. But it would be fun to be a tour guide there, and to run around the house when no one was there. Plus, it would be the most amazing haunted house (staged haunted house, since I guess it’s already haunted by Mrs. Winchester’s demons). Rooms opened onto themselves so you could really turn around and get the shit scared out of you. At night…with a flashlight…that place would be off the hook. Let’s book it for my next birthday.

Anyways, in the tour, you walk about a mile through 100 rooms that only had one shower, and the shower was built to suit Mrs. Winchester, who was only like 4’10”. Crazy Mrs. Winchester.

Then I cut back to the coast, ending up in Santa Cruz. Santa Cruz has a big ol’ boardwalk in the best sense of the word, with rides and games and unhealthy food. I got the unhealthiest thing I could find, which was a sandae, which is two chocolate chip cookies with vanilla ice cream in the middle, dipped in chocolate and nuts. Although I should note that I got this before I saw the fried cheesecake, which would have won the prize if I had seen it earlier.

There’s also a beautiful beach, so I walked on it for a bit and stuck my feet in the Pacific. Then I drove to a Motel 6 that was about 10 miles outside of Monterey.

Now, as soon as I walked into my room, I thought, “thin walls,” because I could hear the television next door VERY CLEARLY. It only got worse from there, because the tv meant that just the adult was in the room. A bit later, about three boys showed up, who had to have been the loudest boys ever. The ringleader appeared to be Dylan, whose hobbies include yelling, wrestling, and calling his brothers gay, which leads to more wrestling. The popular move in this wrestling involved kicking in the nuts, as in, “I’m going to kick you in the nuts so hard,” or, “Man, you really kicked my nuts hard.” Every now and then, the ineffectual father would scream at them and then it would all begin again.

For awhile I just considered this cosmic payback for how loud my family must have been in hotel rooms when we were growing up, but then it started to bother me when I couldn’t hear the tv over the yelling. So I went and talked to the Motel 6 lady about switching rooms but the hotel was full. She said she’d give them a call, which I could hear from my room. It involved Dylan picking up the phone, throwing the phone across the room, and disconnecting the lady before she delivered her message. The dad yelled that he had to call back and apologize but he seemed pretty unconcerned with why the front desk might be calling him.

I think before bed they moved an entire futon into their room for one of the boys to sleep on. Just a futon that they had in their truck. It wasn’t so bad once they went to sleep, except they left their tv on, tuned to Blood Diamond, a movie which involves a lot of shooting. So I used a long sleeved shirt to tie a pillow to my head to block out the noise, and went to sleep. The pillow head thing I would recommend, because no matter which way you roll, there’s a pillow on the side of your head. On the minus side, it makes you feel kind of like a special kid who rides a different bus.

Day 5: I walk a lot; I eat a lot

I started off the morning eating a cinnamon roll and watching Zack and Kelly get married in Las Vegas (thank you TBS). I took a bus tour of the city that picked me up at my hotel. It was me and mostly old people, which was interesting. One character included this guy who I think was foreign, who was sitting in front of me. Every time he stood up, you could see his ass crack. He was so pleasant to sit right behind.

I learned lots of interesting facts about San Francisco, which I am too lazy to type out now, and tours like that are always helpful just in terms of getting one’s bearings. We went all over and made stops at the Palace of Fine Arts, the Golden Gate, and Twin Peaks. After the tour, I had lunch in Chinatown and wandered around there for awhile. Went to the fortune cookie bakery. Then I wandered around the North Beach area and ate a cannoli. Between eating these things, I felt like I ate way too much the whole day. My legs were sore from all the walking, but my stomach was full to the point of bursting. Not pleasant, plus you feel like you haven’t even gotten the benefits of all that walking.

What else? I went to the Church of St. Francis in North Beach, and got JP2 and Mother Teresa medallions (Catholics have much better knickknacks than most other religions). The Blue Angels were flying overhead all day long, practicing for Fleet Week; I felt like I was in Seattle. I went to Union Square and went to a few shops, and then walked down to the Ferry Building and the Embarcadero. Ended up in Fisherman’s Wharf again. Had an artist do a caricature of me, but don’t tell my parents; it’s a gift for them. Then back to the hotel to eat sushi and conk out.

Day 4 events, in which I look for Rice-a-roni

If you read the entry below, you will see that I am not posting this on Day 4, but on Day 7. But everything below is what happened on Day 4.

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This morning I got up and saw the Corson Mansion in Eureka. It’s a big ol’ green, creepy looking mansion straight out of children’s literature, except instead of a cranky old woman living inside, it’s home to a private club. Then I got gas and had what’s becoming my usual breakfast problem…the problem is I drive by the last available place to have breakfast, not realizing it’s the last available place, and then I drive around hungry and desperate. Finally I got some cinnamon rolls at a grocery store.

I drove the Avenue of the Giants, which is where you can see some amazing redwood trees. Those are some massive trees. I drove through that famous redwood that you can drive through. Then I got back on 101. There was so much traffic due to construction at one point that I read like 15 pages of Time magazine. Once we got going again, the road took me through the Russian River valley…lots of vineyards and rolling hills. It looked like Italy. I stopped at one winery for a taste.

Then all of a sudden, San Francisco lay ahead of me. I went over the Golden Gate Bridge, found a cheap hotel, and then headed down to Fisherman’s Wharf. I walked around for a bit and saw more friggin sea lions (still annoying). I had some calamari salad and looked for souvenirs with my name on them (there were none). Then I went to Ghirardelli and had a mint sundae. It was so good. I can’t promise I won’t eat another one (or two) tomorrow.

Day 3 events, posted on Day 7

Dear readers, I am very sorry I have left you for so long, thinking that I was at Crater Lake. I have been staying places that do not have internet. But never fear, I have been writing my blogs in Microsoft Word each night, and can now present them to you. Without further ado, you will find Wednesday, Day 3, below.

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Well, I’m not going to lie to you, today started off kind of crappy. A pole came out of nowhere and hit the back of my car so it’s a bit dimpled. Then I finished the long and grueling drive to Crater Lake, only to be told that fog had descended on the lake so that all views were obscured, and also all of the roads were closed due to snow. So it was sort of a pointless detour, because I just had to turn around and go back. So due to these circumstances, as well as your poor signage and maps, I must take back all the nice things I said about you, Oregon. I’m sorry. But really, what is traveling but a series of opportunities that can either go really well, or really poorly? Sometimes you win, sometimes not.

As long as I’m moping a bit, let me go ahead and tell you about my last day in Seattle. It started off well enough, with a lovely breakfast with my friend Elizabeth. Then it was off to Goodwill, where, for the first time ever, they rejected something I tried to give them (perfectly good exercise equipment!) and the rest of my donations they just let sit in the rain. It gave me some doubts about Goodwill.

The rain I mentioned…it was raining cats and dogs. I could not have picked a worse day to move if I tried. I wrapped my tv in sheets so it wouldn’t get wet, and then had to spend an hour wrestling it into my car. Apparently I have the biggest tv in the world. It did not get much better from there, because the thing about packing is, it’s best to kind of move things around to see how they fit. But it’s hard to do that when it’s pouring.

Then the cleaning. Cleaning an apartment always takes longer than you think it will, and my situation was not helped by the fact that the girl upstairs was moving out too, and she got to the dumpster before I did. So I was trying to make clandestine trash runs to other people’s dumpsters. Plus I was just finding it hard to make the place look clean. I don’t want to live in another place with hardwood floors for awhile.

The knocks kept on coming, such as when I broke a lightbulb I had bought to replace a light in the apartment and glass went everywhere. I was supposed to go over to Elizabeth’s for dinner around 7:30, but around 9:30 I was still cleaning when a truly awful thing happened.

That thing is my toilet overflowed.

And not just overflowed a little bit, but flooded the kitchen. How things get more miserable than that, I am not sure. But Elizabeth’s fiancé came over and fixed the flooding thing, and I guess it worked out because I didn’t end up mopping my floors, just wiping up the water.

But back to today. A tip I learned long ago about traveling is that once things start going badly, you should buy yourself some ice cream and the new Bruce Springsteen album, if applicable. In this case, the second item happened to apply, so I bought the new CD and went to Dairy Queen for lunch.

Things started going better once I got to California. In case people don’t know this, a fun fact about me is that this is my first time to California. The sun was shining, I was back to beautiful beaches, and I got to drive through ginormous trees (aka redwoods). I stopped by Arcata, which had been described to me as a giant hippie town, and I certainly found that description accurate. It did have a cute little downtown square, but I was not hippie enough to stay, so I came down to Eureka for the night.

For dinner, I went to a brewery and had a sliced beef sandwich and a beer that made my night. Now I am back in the internet-less Motel 6 watching television and planning tomorrow.

sea salt

On my second day of driving around, I decided that Oregon is likely our loveliest state, and it has some of the best food and wine in the country. But I couldn't live here. Go figure.

I woke up this morning after probably one of my longest sleeps in two weeks. You don't sleep a lot when you're moving. I watched a little tv (it seems every time I take a road trip, Britney Spears has a scandal and then that's the only news that's on). I headed out of Lincoln City, stopping to see the Abraham Lincoln memorial (Lincoln in 1850, reading a book on the back of a horse) and to take lots of beach pictures.

Then I kept going south on 101, stopping pretty much every time there was a pull-off to take beach pictures. It was so cold, though. The wind was whipping up lots of big waves. So picturesque. Although it seems every time that I am on the Oregon coast, it's the fall or early winter. So I haven't really seen it when the sky was blue and things were warm enough to hang out on the beach. I don't know which one I would like better.

This morning I was thinking that if I didn't have a job by April or May, that maybe I'd move to a beach town and work the summer. Serving up fruity cocktails or manning a mini golf station or something. Then I was imagining myself continuing on through the off-season, writing a book and mingling with locals and being Hemingway-esque (if I were male I'd grow a beard). I was imagining myself jogging on the beach in the winter and then a seagull crapped on my car and the romance was gone just a bit.

Anyways, on down 101. Looking at water. I saw a fountain that was a whale spouting water and lots of tacky shops. As a beach person, I am torn because I love pristine beaches, but I also love looking at tacky pirate souvenirs. Today, I think both sides won.

In Newport, I was walking along the bay and saw about 60,000 sea lions. I decided I didn't like sea lions because they are just unsightly blobs with flippers and they make really unpleasant barking sounds. If I were a land lion, I would be offended that the sea lion was my aquatic counterpart.

I stopped in Florence for lunch, at a seafood place that promised that my lunch had been swimming just hours earlier. Creepy. But apparently, after they catch the fish, they either serve it that day or ship it to San Francisco. So if I was eating it, it was from that day. I had a crab sandwich. It was really good...nice big chunks of meat, with a lemon aioli sauce, seasoned fries, etc. I gave the restaurant high marks but NO ONE around me did. Behind me were these two old ladies who sent their coffee back because they didn't like it. I forget all the reasons they gave but they were loudly offended and finally the poor lady had to go, I don't drink coffee, this is what we have, I'm sorry.

But the real drama was this woman in front of me. She was slightly older, with a guy who was either her son or her younger boyfriend. I missed the part where she didn't like her food, but apparently she sent some food back, but ate part of it, and when it showed up on the bill, she threw a hissy fit. She wanted to speak to the manager, who wasn't there, so then she wanted the manager's home phone number, and then there was some dispute over just how much of the food she had eaten. Then both she and the young guy would do this thing where they wouldn't speak to the waitresses when the waitresses were trying to ask questions, and then they'd start yelling about something unrelated. Eventually the woman left the restaurant and left the guy eating there. The restaurant took the food off the bill, but the guy didn't leave a tip. So then the waitresses came over to me to talk about it and I assured them that the food was very good and they told me I was a very good patron. I don't think I'm getting across how dramatic all this was, but it was intense.

It's kind of amazing what people think to ask for. When I worked at Old Navy, it sort of amazed me what people would ask, what they would think I was capable of. If I were that woman, and didn't like the crab cakes, I would have just eaten them or dealt with it or whatever. I mean, it was just lunch, and dinner's only a few hours away. But it's a double-edge sword. Sometimes, if you ask about weird random things, you get help in ways you didn't expect. But sometimes, you just look like a jerk.

But I continued on my way. I was trying to find the Coos Bay boardwalk and happened upon a place called Cranberry Sweets & More (www.cranberrysweets.com). Well, I love cranberries, and I love sweets, so it was a no-brainer stop. They had samples of EVERYTHING out, so I walked around and tried a ton of things. In the corner, they had a tape playing of when Rachael Ray came into the store for the $40 a day show. She was all like, I found this place on the internet. So then I felt superior cause I found it on my own, and so I spent some time thinking about what would happen if a camera crew followed me around while I did a travel show. Narrating the show in my head and whatnot. But it ultimately wouldn't work because I get lost while I'm driving a lot, and my face breaks out when I'm traveling. Anyways, I just finished up some Cran-Raspberry Pates de Fruits in Dark Chocolate from the shop, and they were just wonderful.

So at Bandon, I started heading east to go to Crater Lake. It's not really on the way to anywhere I'm going, but I wanted to go. The drive over was just beautiful. I hate that the actual drive has produced some of the most beautiful vistas, because they were at places where it was hard to pull over for a picture. But just imagine a two-lane road, with farms, trees, and mountains everywhere, with everything changing colors. The leaves were reds, oranges, yellows, all against the evergreens. The sky was silver.

For being one of Oregon's major attractions, and for being available on a commemorative license plate, the road to Crater Lake is not well-marked. Although now, from the safety of my hotel room, I think Google maps sent me a really weird way. The road was slightly eerie, mainly for the way in which I looked up and realized how deep in the mountains I was. That sort of came out of nowhere. It was also a little eerie because I had no cell phone signal, I was the only car on the road, and then it started getting dark. The phrase "psycho killer" flitted across my mind but I didn't let it stay there. I saw lots of deer. It was only 8 pm but pitch black. So I stopped at the first town I had seen in two hours, which is a little one-horse town called Prospect, and I'm in a lovely little motel that's close to Crater Lake. Now I have been watching Larry King Live and blogging. Jenna Bush was on. Remember when she was a screw-up? On Larry King she seemed very well-spoken and poised (hello, media training). I always had my money on the other Bush twin, but I guess Jenna's making a comeback.

I'm Ore-gone

Well, I don't know how long I can stay awake to blog, so I will start with today and work backwards, because things have happened before today that should be documented. But let's start with today.

Today, I began my roadtrip that will go from Seattle to North Carolina. I started the day with a raspberry scone and coffee from Grateful Bread in Seattle. When I got on I-5, I went over one of my favorite spots...the stretch of I-5 where you have all of downtown, Gasworks and Lake Union, and the Space Needle ahead of you. As I drove through the city, I was conscious that this was the last time I was going to see it for awhile. It reminded me of when I first saw the skyline, about three years ago, in the cab from the airport. I flew out with two bags and a borrowed laptop, and I left with a full (new) car. Things change. Now they're changing again, and instead of feeling sad or depressed at that "last look," I felt good. It's another good change for me, just like moving to Seattle was a good change for me when that happened. Anyways.

So I drove down I-5. I stopped in Olympia to take some pictures of the capitol and drive through downtown.

I made it to Portland around lunchtime. I found this place that I had seen in a magazine that had waffle sandwiches. I had a waffle sandwich with ham and gouda cheese. It was a winner, as it combined both the fluffy carbohydrates and the fatty meats of breakfast. I saw a place called "Dancing Bare," and it had a bear crossed out and a voluptuous lady circled. I thought that was pretty clever for a strip joint so while I was stopped at a red light, I tried to take a picture from my car, but the first time, a van crossed in front of my car. The second time, I was starting to move a little bit, so all I got was "Dancing Bar." Which I guess is truly what it is but I am sad I was unable to document the cuteness.

Then I drove into downtown Portland. I like Portland, but anytime I ever get anywhere in that town, it's by sheer luck and I always end up driving in circles to get there. And not just concentric or tangential circles, but the same circle over and over. Even when I'm trying to do something different. The same circle over and over.

I went to Powell's of course, and I was very good and did not buy any books even though I wanted to. There's just no room in the car.

Then I was getting cranky and tired but I could not find a soda to save my life. Then I couldn't find the interstate to save my life. I mean, I could see it, but I couldn't get there. Finally I got there and tried to stop in Beaverton for a soda. Ended up driving around Beaverton for who knows how long, just getting crankier and more tired. Finally I got to a store, but I was behind this woman who bought like $80 of produce and it all had to be rung up one by one and then finally, oh finally, I had some caffeine and felt immensely better.

From Portland I drove 26 west to Tillamook and the Oregon coast, a drive I had done before, about two years ago. It was a really pretty day for the drive...the leaves are changing, and the sky was pretty when it wasn't raining. The last time I went to Tillamook, I turned right and went north, but this time, I turned left and went south. I only did a little bit of it today, but I got to see the sunset over the beach and I watched lots of seagulls. I decided to stop in Lincoln City. I had dinner at a waterfront restaurant called Mo's, where I had the famous clam chowder and an oyster burger that tasted like heaven. I give today an A+ where food is concerned.

I didn't get as far as I wanted to get today, but I was pretty tired. Also I have nothing to do for about two weeks except enjoy the ride. I did some trip planning tonight and am ready to rock out the rest of the Oregon coast tomorrow.