I tried to go to sleep early and to pretend tomorrow was just another Thursday. I failed on both counts. By the time I finish this, it will be April 7th and it was supposed to by my brother's 29th birthday. Instead, my brother will still be 28. He'll still be 28 next year, and the year after that as well. From now on, each passing year will mark another year without him rather than a celebration of another year with him. I realize that's a glass half empty sort of approach; but it's hard not to throw that glass into the wall right now.
Faces drift in and out, as if passing through a fog. A smile, an embrace; then grief without catharsis...
I've been thinking about my brother a lot lately, which should be unsurprising given that I thought about him a lot before he passed away. Even with the details of his life laid out more completely before me than in a good many years (my brother lived a highly compartmentalized life where he liked to control who knew what about him), I still find it incredibly difficult to reconcile his passing.
A glance, a nod, then sympathy received and returned. Questions unasked burn on in considerate silence. The fog surges and recedes, leaving new partners to take up the ritual. It takes on the cadence of a dance...
Shock and anger were the first emotions to really register, which is sad really because its been almost 2 months since my brother passed away and we still don't have a medical examiner approved cause of death. Shock and anger prevailed because of the surety that his own actions led him to this point. You don't need a doctor to confirm what your eyes and heart have watched unfold over the previous few years. By the time grief and loss even factored into the equation for me, they only got amplified by the now entrenched anger.
Generations ebb and flow; painting a life in fragments and tears. The old have seen too much. The young cringe as they receive their first taste of life's seeming cruelty. The dance goes on...
I'm at a point now where the anger still creeps up, but it's losing its grip as my primary response mechanism. Now, I really just miss my brother. With baseball season under way and spring starting to assert itself, it hurts more than I can say when I reach for my phone to call him only to realize I can't. Part of my brain still insists this is all just another speed bump and that everything can still be alright. The rest of me is left to ponder the ever insightful Jon Stewart quote "Sometimes the light at the end of the tunnel isn't the promised land. It's just New Jersey."
Faces blur. Time dilates and contracts. Only the memory of a melody remains amid the hint of a purpose, yet still the dance goes on...
I'll miss my brother for the rest of my life. I'll miss the uncle he would've been to my daughter and I'll miss the kids he never had a chance to have. Hell, I'll even miss being angry at him. But as my daughter cries from the other room, I'm reminded of what I do have. I have the memories, and the stories, and the love, and the pain. I have the story of a life and I'll be sure to tell it. I really just wish I had more to tell.
In time, the fog recedes and the dancers collapse. The ghosts of a lifetime pass on to their next dance. Another life, another song. That is, until it is their time to dance in the fog...
Wednesday, April 6, 2011
Saturday, September 26, 2009
We Were Rhyming Things WIth Things: All Good Things...
Before I being, I must confess that some of these events were fuzzy when they were happening, let alone after they've had almost 4 months to fade from conscious memory. In the name of truth in reporting, I'll try to label the ambiguous moments as such and completely omit things that are just beyond the reach of recall. I'm making this explicitly clear because I can't impress upon you strongly enough that things were even dumber than they'll be presented here. Much, much dumber. And with that out of the way, I can continue this sordid tale.
I couldn't have been asleep for more than 4 hours when what I can only assume was a full bladder brought me back to reality. We'll peg the time as being just around noon, Vegas standard time, perhaps a little before. Catherine's already awake and we take a few moments to survey the damage, which all considered wasn't terrible. I felt slightly like a hydrocephalic from the constant drinking and Catherine has a bandage covering a tattoo whose design she can only vaguely recall. We'll call day 1 a rousing success despite our morning after sluggishness.
At this point, we were starting to notice our wallets were a lot lighter and our stamina was wavering a bit. Like all good pilots, we decided it was time for a slight course correction. We've still got big ideas don't forget, and it would be a tragic shame to burn out too quickly. Catherine thinks quick and calls an audible:
"Bobbo. You know what we should do? Let's get some drinks and take it easy by the pool today."
"Kiddo, I'm still kinda drunk. Not sure I can do that right now."
"Yeah, but it's almost 4 in NY. And we'll just take it easy. We can recover today and then go out a bit tonight. Nice and easy."
"This is a terrible idea. You need beer money?"
And here's the point in the story where Alice can finally make out the bottom of the rabbit hole. Catherine's idea seemed fairly innocuous right? Nothing could possibly happen with an idea like that that. What could make fuck of things that badly, right? (I realize that sentence is grammatically horrible, but I like the ring of it. Plus it accurately describes my thought process at that point. Go figure). Frankly, this didn't occur to me until just now but if you scroll down to the previous blog entry and reread the description of the motel we were staying at, well, had we been in a more lucid frame of mind, alarm bells would have been going off.
As it was, no alarm bells went off. Catherine went to the deli up the block and I attempted to shower. She comes back to the room with a 12 pack, a bottle of wine and a look of concern. "Bobbo, it says no open containers by the pool. What are you gonna do with your beer?" For a moment I was wondering why she was more concerned with me than with her own predicament until I watched as she poured an entire bottle of wine into the barbell shaped sippy cup she purchased the day before. Clearly, she had no problem.
"Well, I'm gonna walk to the pool - with the beer mind you - and I'm gonna sit down. Then I'm gonna open a beer and drink it. If they yell at me, it'll be a Vegas first. I think we'll be fine."
We make our way to the pool and proceed to have breakfast (by breakfast, I mean drinks). The first couple beers go down like nails but things level off after that. We're shooting the breeze a bit and begin to notice a fella sitting maybe 10 feet from us trying to pretend he's not eavesdropping. He's in his mid-20s, give or take and seems harmless enough. So we start chatting him up, I give him a few beers, a few smokes and a new friend is made. He's a Mexican fella who used to live in Cali but now lives in Vegas. He hasn't done meth in a few months but still enjoys a bump of coke when he goes out to the clubs. I know this because apparently people will tell you damn near anything if they decide early on that you (as a stranger from a strange land) are too lazy/don't care enough to judge them. At least, that's the only way I can figure it.
His name is Oscar or Arthur (I can't remember which one I made up and which one was really his name) but we wound up calling him Don Juan because he was as close to a swarthy latin charmer as Catherine will likely know. Don Juan informs us that he's meeting a friend of his shortly and if it was OK if the fella came to meet up with us by the pool. Sure, I says. A friend of the seemingly harmless Don Juan can't be a big deal. Turns out, I was wrong.
Have you ever watched an episode of cops and they have the scrawny but feral looking white guy with the blurred out face? His name is Robert. I've got his card around here somewhere.
So his friend Robert shows up and you can tell this dude is waaaay off right from the get go. I'm not one to listen to my inner Jiminy Cricket so I offer this fella a beer and start chatting him up as well. I'm guessing he picked up on the same kind of thing that Don Juan did, but the shit that this guy was willing to tell complete strangers was fucking staggering. Here's the abridged list of things I learned about this guy in the first hour of talking to him.
- He's three months out of jail after a nine month stint (for car theft, if memory serves)
- Recovering alcoholic
- Converted to Judaism in prison(!?!?)
- Was shot several times when someone tried to put a hit on him. He shot his attacker in the ass as he ran off.
- Was raised to love and respect women by his mother
- Former pimp, drug dealer, gun runner and mob enforcer type at various points during his life
- Was charged with four attempted murders on two policemen (wasn't why he was in jail, he beat that wrap)
- Was contracted to kill a dude who raped a stripper's sister (don't know how that one ended, just know he didn't kill the family next door even though they were prospective witnesses)
- He pays women to dominate him but doesn't have sex with them because his mother taught him to respect women
There's more in there that I'd rather not recall. How much was true, how much was bullshit, I'll never know. Once he started talking about his guns tho, I had to interrupt him and made sure he wasn't carrying any weapons on him at the time. This made him alarmingly suspicious so I had to reassure him it was only because I didn't want to keep feeding beers to a dude who was carrying firearms. Nothing personal, wasn't gonna rat, just was gonna take my beer and wish him a good day. He assured me he got rid of his guns and didn't have anything on him. And who am I to argue?
Honestly, I could probably write a doctoral psych paper on this guy. He more or less told me his entire life in the few hours I sat there and talked to him. He really didn't seem like a bad guy, just more of a poster child for "Nurture" in the nurture vs. nature debate. We parted company when 2 women arrived to beat the shit out of him for the evening.
Meeting Robert was, for me, like going to Ireland and having drinks with the drunkest guy in the country on your first day there. You hear about all the fucked up people that Vegas just chews up and destroys and you realize that there are probably some really fucked up people floating around out there. And there are, believe me. I was just astounded that I might have met the most fucked up guy in Vegas during my second day there. I was and am a little proud of that. I'll miss you, Bob.
In order to prevent people from missing the whole picture, the whole time I'm talking to and drinking with Crazy McGee, Catherine is sitting by the pool with Don Juan and pounding drinks. If you're remembering that Catherine has a brand new tattoo at this point of the story and sitting out in the sun with a new tattoo exposed is terrible for new tattoos (she had the sense to not actually go in the pool at least)...well, you're remembering better than Catherine did. Fortunately, nothing permanent came of that mistake; just excessive pain in the days that followed. Catherine and tattoo are currently doing fine.
The hours are starting to bunch up and blur in the story as I think back on it, so I'll just fast forward to the next point that is fairly discernible. Catherine, Don Juan and myself head back to the motel room as the pool officially closed. Catherine and Don Juan made me a little uncomfortable so I seem to have blocked out that part of the story, you'll have to ask Catherine for it.
Finally Don Juan leaves and Catherine passes out. It's about 12:30AM at this point. If my math hasn't completely failed me, I figure to have subjected myself to 44 out of 48 hours of straight drinking. I think there was maybe 1 meal in there that I couldn't bring myself to finish. Throw in a couple packs of smokes for good measure. I finally nod off for sleep after a few moments of debating whether or not I was ready to call it a night at just 12:30. Ladies and gentlemen, we have bottomed out.
The next day we woke up and realized that we had partied too hard for too long. Money was in short supply and if past behavior was indicative of future trends, we had best cut our loses and shorten our trip by a few days. Whatever money we spent rebooking the flight back was surely going to be a smaller number than what we would have potentially spent had we stayed out west. It's a sad thing to admit you did it wrong, but it's not until you recognize a deficiency that you can begin to correct it.
Our western journey was nearing it's end. We packed up our supplies and drove back to Phoenix. A quiet night followed and by Tuesday afternoon, we were airborne and heading back to the familiar vices of NYC.
I'd like to think we learned something from our trip out there. I'd like to think we learned to pace ourselves. I'd like to think we've moved past the point of trying to destroy ourselves one night at a time. I'd like to think that if we did it again, we would enjoy the majestic beauty of the Grand Canyon without losing interest and finding a campsite to get hammered at. Realistically though, all I fear we've learned is that if you're going to do something completely retarded, you need to have a budget before you start. It's not one of those things you can improvise as you go along. I suppose that's better than nothing.
So there you have it friends -My Life As A Cautionary Tale: Told in Four Parts. I hope you've enjoyed reading it almost as much as I enjoyed doing it (which more or less means you'll recall bits and pieces of it in fits and starts, and chuckle a little).
Stay stiff and rock hard,
Rob
I couldn't have been asleep for more than 4 hours when what I can only assume was a full bladder brought me back to reality. We'll peg the time as being just around noon, Vegas standard time, perhaps a little before. Catherine's already awake and we take a few moments to survey the damage, which all considered wasn't terrible. I felt slightly like a hydrocephalic from the constant drinking and Catherine has a bandage covering a tattoo whose design she can only vaguely recall. We'll call day 1 a rousing success despite our morning after sluggishness.
At this point, we were starting to notice our wallets were a lot lighter and our stamina was wavering a bit. Like all good pilots, we decided it was time for a slight course correction. We've still got big ideas don't forget, and it would be a tragic shame to burn out too quickly. Catherine thinks quick and calls an audible:
"Bobbo. You know what we should do? Let's get some drinks and take it easy by the pool today."
"Kiddo, I'm still kinda drunk. Not sure I can do that right now."
"Yeah, but it's almost 4 in NY. And we'll just take it easy. We can recover today and then go out a bit tonight. Nice and easy."
"This is a terrible idea. You need beer money?"
And here's the point in the story where Alice can finally make out the bottom of the rabbit hole. Catherine's idea seemed fairly innocuous right? Nothing could possibly happen with an idea like that that. What could make fuck of things that badly, right? (I realize that sentence is grammatically horrible, but I like the ring of it. Plus it accurately describes my thought process at that point. Go figure). Frankly, this didn't occur to me until just now but if you scroll down to the previous blog entry and reread the description of the motel we were staying at, well, had we been in a more lucid frame of mind, alarm bells would have been going off.
As it was, no alarm bells went off. Catherine went to the deli up the block and I attempted to shower. She comes back to the room with a 12 pack, a bottle of wine and a look of concern. "Bobbo, it says no open containers by the pool. What are you gonna do with your beer?" For a moment I was wondering why she was more concerned with me than with her own predicament until I watched as she poured an entire bottle of wine into the barbell shaped sippy cup she purchased the day before. Clearly, she had no problem.
"Well, I'm gonna walk to the pool - with the beer mind you - and I'm gonna sit down. Then I'm gonna open a beer and drink it. If they yell at me, it'll be a Vegas first. I think we'll be fine."
We make our way to the pool and proceed to have breakfast (by breakfast, I mean drinks). The first couple beers go down like nails but things level off after that. We're shooting the breeze a bit and begin to notice a fella sitting maybe 10 feet from us trying to pretend he's not eavesdropping. He's in his mid-20s, give or take and seems harmless enough. So we start chatting him up, I give him a few beers, a few smokes and a new friend is made. He's a Mexican fella who used to live in Cali but now lives in Vegas. He hasn't done meth in a few months but still enjoys a bump of coke when he goes out to the clubs. I know this because apparently people will tell you damn near anything if they decide early on that you (as a stranger from a strange land) are too lazy/don't care enough to judge them. At least, that's the only way I can figure it.
His name is Oscar or Arthur (I can't remember which one I made up and which one was really his name) but we wound up calling him Don Juan because he was as close to a swarthy latin charmer as Catherine will likely know. Don Juan informs us that he's meeting a friend of his shortly and if it was OK if the fella came to meet up with us by the pool. Sure, I says. A friend of the seemingly harmless Don Juan can't be a big deal. Turns out, I was wrong.
Have you ever watched an episode of cops and they have the scrawny but feral looking white guy with the blurred out face? His name is Robert. I've got his card around here somewhere.
So his friend Robert shows up and you can tell this dude is waaaay off right from the get go. I'm not one to listen to my inner Jiminy Cricket so I offer this fella a beer and start chatting him up as well. I'm guessing he picked up on the same kind of thing that Don Juan did, but the shit that this guy was willing to tell complete strangers was fucking staggering. Here's the abridged list of things I learned about this guy in the first hour of talking to him.
- He's three months out of jail after a nine month stint (for car theft, if memory serves)
- Recovering alcoholic
- Converted to Judaism in prison(!?!?)
- Was shot several times when someone tried to put a hit on him. He shot his attacker in the ass as he ran off.
- Was raised to love and respect women by his mother
- Former pimp, drug dealer, gun runner and mob enforcer type at various points during his life
- Was charged with four attempted murders on two policemen (wasn't why he was in jail, he beat that wrap)
- Was contracted to kill a dude who raped a stripper's sister (don't know how that one ended, just know he didn't kill the family next door even though they were prospective witnesses)
- He pays women to dominate him but doesn't have sex with them because his mother taught him to respect women
There's more in there that I'd rather not recall. How much was true, how much was bullshit, I'll never know. Once he started talking about his guns tho, I had to interrupt him and made sure he wasn't carrying any weapons on him at the time. This made him alarmingly suspicious so I had to reassure him it was only because I didn't want to keep feeding beers to a dude who was carrying firearms. Nothing personal, wasn't gonna rat, just was gonna take my beer and wish him a good day. He assured me he got rid of his guns and didn't have anything on him. And who am I to argue?
Honestly, I could probably write a doctoral psych paper on this guy. He more or less told me his entire life in the few hours I sat there and talked to him. He really didn't seem like a bad guy, just more of a poster child for "Nurture" in the nurture vs. nature debate. We parted company when 2 women arrived to beat the shit out of him for the evening.
Meeting Robert was, for me, like going to Ireland and having drinks with the drunkest guy in the country on your first day there. You hear about all the fucked up people that Vegas just chews up and destroys and you realize that there are probably some really fucked up people floating around out there. And there are, believe me. I was just astounded that I might have met the most fucked up guy in Vegas during my second day there. I was and am a little proud of that. I'll miss you, Bob.
In order to prevent people from missing the whole picture, the whole time I'm talking to and drinking with Crazy McGee, Catherine is sitting by the pool with Don Juan and pounding drinks. If you're remembering that Catherine has a brand new tattoo at this point of the story and sitting out in the sun with a new tattoo exposed is terrible for new tattoos (she had the sense to not actually go in the pool at least)...well, you're remembering better than Catherine did. Fortunately, nothing permanent came of that mistake; just excessive pain in the days that followed. Catherine and tattoo are currently doing fine.
The hours are starting to bunch up and blur in the story as I think back on it, so I'll just fast forward to the next point that is fairly discernible. Catherine, Don Juan and myself head back to the motel room as the pool officially closed. Catherine and Don Juan made me a little uncomfortable so I seem to have blocked out that part of the story, you'll have to ask Catherine for it.
Finally Don Juan leaves and Catherine passes out. It's about 12:30AM at this point. If my math hasn't completely failed me, I figure to have subjected myself to 44 out of 48 hours of straight drinking. I think there was maybe 1 meal in there that I couldn't bring myself to finish. Throw in a couple packs of smokes for good measure. I finally nod off for sleep after a few moments of debating whether or not I was ready to call it a night at just 12:30. Ladies and gentlemen, we have bottomed out.
The next day we woke up and realized that we had partied too hard for too long. Money was in short supply and if past behavior was indicative of future trends, we had best cut our loses and shorten our trip by a few days. Whatever money we spent rebooking the flight back was surely going to be a smaller number than what we would have potentially spent had we stayed out west. It's a sad thing to admit you did it wrong, but it's not until you recognize a deficiency that you can begin to correct it.
Our western journey was nearing it's end. We packed up our supplies and drove back to Phoenix. A quiet night followed and by Tuesday afternoon, we were airborne and heading back to the familiar vices of NYC.
I'd like to think we learned something from our trip out there. I'd like to think we learned to pace ourselves. I'd like to think we've moved past the point of trying to destroy ourselves one night at a time. I'd like to think that if we did it again, we would enjoy the majestic beauty of the Grand Canyon without losing interest and finding a campsite to get hammered at. Realistically though, all I fear we've learned is that if you're going to do something completely retarded, you need to have a budget before you start. It's not one of those things you can improvise as you go along. I suppose that's better than nothing.
So there you have it friends -My Life As A Cautionary Tale: Told in Four Parts. I hope you've enjoyed reading it almost as much as I enjoyed doing it (which more or less means you'll recall bits and pieces of it in fits and starts, and chuckle a little).
Stay stiff and rock hard,
Rob
Wednesday, July 1, 2009
"We Were Rhyming Things with Things" and How to Hurt Yourself in 1 Easy Step: Part 3
The train keeps on rolling, folks. Gather round for story time. How do I start this one off?
I could mention that Catherine slept like a rock thanks to her bottle of medicine. I could also mention that I did not. I could bring up my complaints about how little a $15 sleeping bag actually does (warmth? padding? nada.). I'll skip all that. All you need to know is that I woke up cranky, Catherine woke up drunk and we wasted no time hitting the road again; this time for Vegas.
In retrospect, we probably should've spent a little more time doing more touristy things at the canyon. Sure, it's just a really, really grand hole but a part of my brain is left to wonder what it looks like from the bottom. At least now I have a legitimate excuse to go back I suppose. C'est la vie.
Ok, on to the drive.
"Oh! Hey, look! We're gonna pass the Hoover Dam, that's kinda neat."
Turns out, passing the hoover dam isn't neat. Turns out, they were supposed to finish a bridge that might have made that neat sometime last year. Not the case, even though the GPS swore it was completed and kept yelling at us to drive the highlighted route (right into Lake Mead, mind you). Never trust the machines. So instead of being kind of neat, you're weaving your way through security check points, cars looking for parking spots and some of the slowest moving fat people who ever waddled to a scenic overlook (too mean?).
No big deal though. It's not like we're trying to make it there by so and so a time or stay on such and such a schedule. We're just leisurely working our way up to Vegas. No sense in getting bent out of shape over a 30 minute detour; until you realize that wow, with the top down, that sun is hot. Really hot. But we got a convertible and paid serious money for it. Fuck it, the top stays down.
A few hours later, we're in Vegas and I'm burnt through my shirt. My arms are fine cause I was able to get sun screen on them. My shoulders were not quite so lucky, so I wound up with a very red circle on my upper left arm (what the hell is that about anyway?) and a general crispiness everywhere else. Goddamn deserts. I'm not gonna let this ruin my mood though: I'm in Vegas on a Saturday night. Let's rip some shit up.
First things first, though. We need to rent a room somewhere. Mind you, we have been remarkably foolish budgeting the first couple days of this trip. Between trips to walmart (I still shudder) and food and drinks and hotels...we'd both dropped considerably more than we had intended at this particular point in the trip. So we decide to cut some corners.
We needed to be close to the strip for obvious reasons, but without a reservation, can't afford to stay on it. No problem - there's a Motel 6 a block off the strip, and they offer internet. Sold. And since we're making great time, we can stay in Vegas for 2 nights. Yeah, live the dream.
I never thought I would chalk up "Lack of (visible) blood on the carpet" in the "Pros" column for a place, but when you're reaching for anything, it'll do. The place was an amazing shit hole. I'm pretty sure everyone else who was staying there busted out of the hotels on the strip and was now living there. Either that or they were there for the 4 hour special. Not my concern; I mean, who am I to judge and in Vegas, no less.
A quick shower and we were off to explore the strip...
This is probably the time to mention that Vegas really freaked me out. It just didn't feel right. There was something off about it. It took me both days before I finally realized what was bothering me: I thought Vegas had no defining personality of its own. Everything about Vegas, from the buildings to the people was borrowed from somewhere else. It was like a Family Guy episode. There was the New York, NY casino that was a strange parody/tribute to NYC. There was the French one with the Eiffel tower, there was the Luxor (shaped like a pyramid), etc, etc. Everything about it was borrowed.
This bothered me tremendously when I let myself think about it. What kind of place would just settle for borrowing from other people without contributing their own identity into it. But then it hit me like a ton of bricks: the fact that all this stuff was in one place; that was Vegas' contribution. Everything for everyone from everywhere: that's Vegas. Ok, now I get it.
Just had to get that off my chest. Back to the narrative.
I'm sure I mentioned this earlier and Vegas is where this idiot idea really took hold: Catherine and I decided that when in doubt, we should try to stay on eastern standard time. Giving yourself 3 extra hours of stupid in Vegas is a terrible idea. Time loses all meaning fast enough when there are no windows in the hotels/casinos, and if you take on trying to tell time relative to two distinctly different time zones while drinking heavily...you'd have to be completely retarded. We were more than up to that particular task.
So we get to the casinos and figure we should probably start out with dinner/lunch. I'm experiencing total sensory overload so I have no idea what I want to eat or where. We settled on a rain forest cafe (which I had never heard of) but apparently they do mock thunder storms in there and a ton of really kitsch-y stuff that has probably come from the destruction of a few rain forests. My kind of place.
We wrap up our meal and then it's off to find drinks (of course). I settle on a $7 beer and Catherine picks up a beverage that will change the course of the next two days: she gets her sippy cup. For $20 (give or take; these details get a little fuzzy), she purchases what amounts to a liter (more on how we found that out later) of vodka drink mix. With the first drink of the day procured, it's off to find a place where we can get more of them at a considerably discounted rate. I mean, how are all these people hammered at $7 bucks a pop?
We search casino bar after casino bar. Nothing seems quite right; sure, it's only 3PM local (but 6PM in our heads) and maybe people haven't settled in yet but I don't think that was it. None of the places we tried felt like any place that we could sit down and get down to the business of the day. Finally, after some wandering, we found our home for the next few hours (and I shit you not): the irish pub in the New York, NY casino. Go figure.
The fat italian bar tender seemed amicable enough and the prices were close enough to home that we were willing to overlook all the goofy shit they had plastered to the walls of this 'irish' pub (seriously, it looked like a real pub fucked an Applebees and this place popped out). An added perk, they had an outdoor patio thing going on so that was nice.
As the hours passed and the drinking continued, we had to form our plans for the remainder of the evening. We settled on finding another bar to hop to. We weren't looking to be creative, folks. So we were off again, a few drinks drunker and a few bucks lighter.
At this point, it's closer to normal bar hours local time so that might've helped improve the mood of a few of the places we had initially rejected. For phase two, we settled into some martini bar looking place (which unexpectedly had better prices than the irish pub). And here was where the shots started flowing.
But before I take you further down the rabbit hole, I'd like to relate a story of one of the more retarded aspects of the Las Vegas casinos. Turns out, you can smoke in the casino proper but the second you enter an establishment INSIDE THAT VERY SAME CASINO, you can no longer smoke. Think about that for a second (lord knows I did, and for a lot longer than a second). You can smoke in at point A, but 2 steps to the left, no smoking. My head almost exploded. This is the same city that has escort service catalogues available on every street corner. I'm just baffled.
Anyway. 9PM (local) finally rolls around but that's midnight eastern which means happy birthday Catherine. Birthday shots and birthday texting commences. All very nice and sentimental. Then it dawns on us: it's only 9PM local. That means it's still early and Catherine wants to get a tattoo. At least, that's what it meant to us at that particular moment. Realistically, it meant we were hammered way too early. But that's OK; no one's here to judge. Right?
Strange phenomenon: Everybody out west has ink. Everybody. Logically, we started asking people where would be a good place to get a tattoo. Stranger phenomenon: Apparently, no two people got their tattoos done at the same parlor.
We start asking people with nice designs, and they're recommending this person and then we bump into someone else who recommends that person. At this point, I can't remember if it was two or three cab rides that we took before we could find two people to recommend the same place. We finally get to the tattoo parlor in the Hard Rock casino and things start to get really dumb.
Luckily for Catherine, the computers were down, otherwise she'd have a giant Mr. Met head tattooed on the back of her shoulder. With no clear Plan B, we scoured the walls and a display book for reasonable flash art. Score: a nice flower design that's girly but not gay. Into the chair she goes and out for beer I go.
I track down a deli of some kind in the casino (sure, and why not?) and pick up some beers and smokes. This is gonna be a while so I'm drinking, making phone calls, pacing the hallways a little, trying to keep occupied. I check on Catherine periodically to make sure she was still awake (that was a little touch and go at a few points, I have to be honest). At one point I ask her if she's OK and she's a little slow in answering so the tattoo artist asks her if she's alright. Catherine wakes up just enough to tell him she's sleepy. He nods and gets back to work. Only in Vegas, I tell ya.
By the time she finishes getting her tattoo, I can't even guess what time it was. We'll say 11:30 Vegas time. My dear sister has fulfilled her birthday wish with time to spare. Mission accomplished.
Except I'm in Vegas, I'm hammered and I get it in my head that I still want to hang out. But it's my sister's birthday and she's hammered and ready for bed. How could I deal with these conflicting issues? Well, there was only one mature way to proceed so far as I could see...
After putting my sister in a cab and pointing the cabbie in the right general direction, I proceeded to debase myself in all manner of ways (nothing illegal though, I do have standards). I'm going to skip the next 7 hours of this story (I'll be damned if I put that shit in writing), but I learned a few valuable lessons that night. The one that I really feel I earned was learning the hard way that Vegas is a 25 hour town, no exaggeration. There's no last call. The clubs don't close. You can get drinks until you can't afford them and watch the breakfast crew take over as the overnight crew leaves. It's absurd. The second lesson I learned is that aside from Denny's, there are no diners in the NY sense out there, which means there's no place to get breakfast or a cheeseburger deluxe or anything that you might crave after a night of retarded drinking. So after almost 18 hours of binge drinking (kids, don't try that at home), it was time for bed.
I wish I could tell you that after a day like this, we learned our lesson. I wish I could say that we had gotten the stupidity out of our system with this after school movie behavior, but alas, there is one more depraved chapter to tell. Hopefully it won't take another three months to write.
Stay tuned.
Rob
I could mention that Catherine slept like a rock thanks to her bottle of medicine. I could also mention that I did not. I could bring up my complaints about how little a $15 sleeping bag actually does (warmth? padding? nada.). I'll skip all that. All you need to know is that I woke up cranky, Catherine woke up drunk and we wasted no time hitting the road again; this time for Vegas.
In retrospect, we probably should've spent a little more time doing more touristy things at the canyon. Sure, it's just a really, really grand hole but a part of my brain is left to wonder what it looks like from the bottom. At least now I have a legitimate excuse to go back I suppose. C'est la vie.
Ok, on to the drive.
"Oh! Hey, look! We're gonna pass the Hoover Dam, that's kinda neat."
Turns out, passing the hoover dam isn't neat. Turns out, they were supposed to finish a bridge that might have made that neat sometime last year. Not the case, even though the GPS swore it was completed and kept yelling at us to drive the highlighted route (right into Lake Mead, mind you). Never trust the machines. So instead of being kind of neat, you're weaving your way through security check points, cars looking for parking spots and some of the slowest moving fat people who ever waddled to a scenic overlook (too mean?).
No big deal though. It's not like we're trying to make it there by so and so a time or stay on such and such a schedule. We're just leisurely working our way up to Vegas. No sense in getting bent out of shape over a 30 minute detour; until you realize that wow, with the top down, that sun is hot. Really hot. But we got a convertible and paid serious money for it. Fuck it, the top stays down.
A few hours later, we're in Vegas and I'm burnt through my shirt. My arms are fine cause I was able to get sun screen on them. My shoulders were not quite so lucky, so I wound up with a very red circle on my upper left arm (what the hell is that about anyway?) and a general crispiness everywhere else. Goddamn deserts. I'm not gonna let this ruin my mood though: I'm in Vegas on a Saturday night. Let's rip some shit up.
First things first, though. We need to rent a room somewhere. Mind you, we have been remarkably foolish budgeting the first couple days of this trip. Between trips to walmart (I still shudder) and food and drinks and hotels...we'd both dropped considerably more than we had intended at this particular point in the trip. So we decide to cut some corners.
We needed to be close to the strip for obvious reasons, but without a reservation, can't afford to stay on it. No problem - there's a Motel 6 a block off the strip, and they offer internet. Sold. And since we're making great time, we can stay in Vegas for 2 nights. Yeah, live the dream.
I never thought I would chalk up "Lack of (visible) blood on the carpet" in the "Pros" column for a place, but when you're reaching for anything, it'll do. The place was an amazing shit hole. I'm pretty sure everyone else who was staying there busted out of the hotels on the strip and was now living there. Either that or they were there for the 4 hour special. Not my concern; I mean, who am I to judge and in Vegas, no less.
A quick shower and we were off to explore the strip...
This is probably the time to mention that Vegas really freaked me out. It just didn't feel right. There was something off about it. It took me both days before I finally realized what was bothering me: I thought Vegas had no defining personality of its own. Everything about Vegas, from the buildings to the people was borrowed from somewhere else. It was like a Family Guy episode. There was the New York, NY casino that was a strange parody/tribute to NYC. There was the French one with the Eiffel tower, there was the Luxor (shaped like a pyramid), etc, etc. Everything about it was borrowed.
This bothered me tremendously when I let myself think about it. What kind of place would just settle for borrowing from other people without contributing their own identity into it. But then it hit me like a ton of bricks: the fact that all this stuff was in one place; that was Vegas' contribution. Everything for everyone from everywhere: that's Vegas. Ok, now I get it.
Just had to get that off my chest. Back to the narrative.
I'm sure I mentioned this earlier and Vegas is where this idiot idea really took hold: Catherine and I decided that when in doubt, we should try to stay on eastern standard time. Giving yourself 3 extra hours of stupid in Vegas is a terrible idea. Time loses all meaning fast enough when there are no windows in the hotels/casinos, and if you take on trying to tell time relative to two distinctly different time zones while drinking heavily...you'd have to be completely retarded. We were more than up to that particular task.
So we get to the casinos and figure we should probably start out with dinner/lunch. I'm experiencing total sensory overload so I have no idea what I want to eat or where. We settled on a rain forest cafe (which I had never heard of) but apparently they do mock thunder storms in there and a ton of really kitsch-y stuff that has probably come from the destruction of a few rain forests. My kind of place.
We wrap up our meal and then it's off to find drinks (of course). I settle on a $7 beer and Catherine picks up a beverage that will change the course of the next two days: she gets her sippy cup. For $20 (give or take; these details get a little fuzzy), she purchases what amounts to a liter (more on how we found that out later) of vodka drink mix. With the first drink of the day procured, it's off to find a place where we can get more of them at a considerably discounted rate. I mean, how are all these people hammered at $7 bucks a pop?
We search casino bar after casino bar. Nothing seems quite right; sure, it's only 3PM local (but 6PM in our heads) and maybe people haven't settled in yet but I don't think that was it. None of the places we tried felt like any place that we could sit down and get down to the business of the day. Finally, after some wandering, we found our home for the next few hours (and I shit you not): the irish pub in the New York, NY casino. Go figure.
The fat italian bar tender seemed amicable enough and the prices were close enough to home that we were willing to overlook all the goofy shit they had plastered to the walls of this 'irish' pub (seriously, it looked like a real pub fucked an Applebees and this place popped out). An added perk, they had an outdoor patio thing going on so that was nice.
As the hours passed and the drinking continued, we had to form our plans for the remainder of the evening. We settled on finding another bar to hop to. We weren't looking to be creative, folks. So we were off again, a few drinks drunker and a few bucks lighter.
At this point, it's closer to normal bar hours local time so that might've helped improve the mood of a few of the places we had initially rejected. For phase two, we settled into some martini bar looking place (which unexpectedly had better prices than the irish pub). And here was where the shots started flowing.
But before I take you further down the rabbit hole, I'd like to relate a story of one of the more retarded aspects of the Las Vegas casinos. Turns out, you can smoke in the casino proper but the second you enter an establishment INSIDE THAT VERY SAME CASINO, you can no longer smoke. Think about that for a second (lord knows I did, and for a lot longer than a second). You can smoke in at point A, but 2 steps to the left, no smoking. My head almost exploded. This is the same city that has escort service catalogues available on every street corner. I'm just baffled.
Anyway. 9PM (local) finally rolls around but that's midnight eastern which means happy birthday Catherine. Birthday shots and birthday texting commences. All very nice and sentimental. Then it dawns on us: it's only 9PM local. That means it's still early and Catherine wants to get a tattoo. At least, that's what it meant to us at that particular moment. Realistically, it meant we were hammered way too early. But that's OK; no one's here to judge. Right?
Strange phenomenon: Everybody out west has ink. Everybody. Logically, we started asking people where would be a good place to get a tattoo. Stranger phenomenon: Apparently, no two people got their tattoos done at the same parlor.
We start asking people with nice designs, and they're recommending this person and then we bump into someone else who recommends that person. At this point, I can't remember if it was two or three cab rides that we took before we could find two people to recommend the same place. We finally get to the tattoo parlor in the Hard Rock casino and things start to get really dumb.
Luckily for Catherine, the computers were down, otherwise she'd have a giant Mr. Met head tattooed on the back of her shoulder. With no clear Plan B, we scoured the walls and a display book for reasonable flash art. Score: a nice flower design that's girly but not gay. Into the chair she goes and out for beer I go.
I track down a deli of some kind in the casino (sure, and why not?) and pick up some beers and smokes. This is gonna be a while so I'm drinking, making phone calls, pacing the hallways a little, trying to keep occupied. I check on Catherine periodically to make sure she was still awake (that was a little touch and go at a few points, I have to be honest). At one point I ask her if she's OK and she's a little slow in answering so the tattoo artist asks her if she's alright. Catherine wakes up just enough to tell him she's sleepy. He nods and gets back to work. Only in Vegas, I tell ya.
By the time she finishes getting her tattoo, I can't even guess what time it was. We'll say 11:30 Vegas time. My dear sister has fulfilled her birthday wish with time to spare. Mission accomplished.
Except I'm in Vegas, I'm hammered and I get it in my head that I still want to hang out. But it's my sister's birthday and she's hammered and ready for bed. How could I deal with these conflicting issues? Well, there was only one mature way to proceed so far as I could see...
After putting my sister in a cab and pointing the cabbie in the right general direction, I proceeded to debase myself in all manner of ways (nothing illegal though, I do have standards). I'm going to skip the next 7 hours of this story (I'll be damned if I put that shit in writing), but I learned a few valuable lessons that night. The one that I really feel I earned was learning the hard way that Vegas is a 25 hour town, no exaggeration. There's no last call. The clubs don't close. You can get drinks until you can't afford them and watch the breakfast crew take over as the overnight crew leaves. It's absurd. The second lesson I learned is that aside from Denny's, there are no diners in the NY sense out there, which means there's no place to get breakfast or a cheeseburger deluxe or anything that you might crave after a night of retarded drinking. So after almost 18 hours of binge drinking (kids, don't try that at home), it was time for bed.
I wish I could tell you that after a day like this, we learned our lesson. I wish I could say that we had gotten the stupidity out of our system with this after school movie behavior, but alas, there is one more depraved chapter to tell. Hopefully it won't take another three months to write.
Stay tuned.
Rob
Thursday, June 18, 2009
"We were rhyming things with things" and More Things to Do in the South West: Part 2
Thanks for being back. So where were we?
Ah, yes: Friday morning.
After a few good hours of sleep, we bravely decided it was time to take our freak show of stupid on the road. "Let's see what is so grand about a canyon anyway!", we shouted. And just like that, it was off to more adventure.
I learned something about Arizona that day. I'm pretty sure some idiot part of my brain already knew this from all the geology specials I watch (I'm not joking), but it's not until you experience it first hand that you truly appreciate the significance behind it: The grand canyon is many thousands of feet above sea level. Many, many thousands.
We leave Phoenix around 11:30 or so and after a quick brunch, we were on the road. June in Phoenix, at noon, is a hot place to be. We were singing the desert mantra - T-shirt and shorts for everyone; pass the sun screen, I'm getting burned through my shirt - you know, all the familiar refrains until we got about 3000 feet above sea level. Then, it started getting cloudy.
What the hell is going on here? It was about 95 in Phoenix (give or take 10 meaningless degrees that did nothing to change the feel of the place) and now it was low 80s if we were lucky (and at this point, 10 degrees started making a difference). No problem with that though, still a beautiful day, if not a little overcast. Goddamn though, these hills just keep on coming. It was like that famous line from Ghostbusters ("Where do these stairs go?" in case you were wondering which famous line from Ghostbusters).
And up and up they went. 5000 feet. 6000 feet. 7000 feet.
In a lesser vehicle, this might have been a perilous drive; but when you have a vehicle with honest to god testicles, well, you can go as fast as you please no matter what the gradient. We went fast. After much cursing at the seemingly unending uphill nature of Arizona, we finally approach the south rim of the grand canyon.
After a brief but confusing discussion with the gate ranger at Grand Canyon National Park ("May I see your yearly park pass? Thank you. Hey, this says Christina. Ok. You'll need to sign it to if I'm going to pretend to believe it's yours. Thank you. Off you go.") we were in. We're driving, we're driving, we're seeing cars parked next to signs that read "No Parking on Shoulder" and we're seeing people walking away from cars they just parked by said signs. It then occurred to us that this might be a good place to park as well.
And boy, was it.
Beautiful. Breath taking. Magnificent. What a glorious hole!
With that formality out of the way, it was off to find a camp site. For future reference, if you want to stay in the park in early June, a reservation is probably a must. If you couldn't be bothered with such formality, there's a perfectly suitable place just seven miles away. Just beware the rocky outcroppings. More on that in a bit.
Time for a plan: we get a camp set up, buy supplies (drinks, ice, and smores ingredients), and then head back to the canyon and for some awesome sunset photos. This is a good plan. And what could possibly go wrong? The camp site is seven miles outside grand canyon national park and directly behind a general store. This is perfect.
A quick stop at the general store yields a haul of beer, wine, graham crackers, chocolate, marshmellows, and a bundle of wood for our soon to be glorious camp fire. Circle round back to the camp site and the nice lady who informs us we're the only people who've committed to camping for the night. This is gonna be a sweet night.
We quickly set up camp and throw the drinks on ice. Sure, our tent wasn't going to win any awards, being held down by rocks in several crucial places, but it was good enough. We survey our domain and it is good; and with plenty of time left to return to the canyon, pick our spot and record what's shaping up to be a lovely sunset. I mean, it had been cloudy all day BUT the clouds finally broke 45 minutes before sunset. This was gonna be pretty!
"Catherine, do us the honor of driving back to the canyon."
"...ok."
We jump in the car, ease back about 8 feet and then...stop moving. Hmm. Well, this probably isn't good. In order to spare you 1000 of my words, here's a photo to best illustrate the situation:
You really need to look close to realize how boned this situation is. Remember those rocky outcroppings I mentioned above? Well, there you go. The low clearance of a mustang frame is awesome for going fast on desert highways but not so much when trying to free yourself from rocks. And if you look closer, you'll notice there's no way to get a jack under there either. Sweet.
Now, I have to give Catherine credit: this was a one in a hundred shot. A few inches to the left, it's a non-issue. A few to the right and we hear the scrape and reverse course with no harm done. But in this particular instance, it's bonesville.
She managed to drive off this particular rock in such a way that we were good and stuck. No sunset for us. But when life closes a door, it opens a window...
AAA to the rescue, sort of. After some slight confusion over what state we were in, followed by some confusion over about our proximity to Grand Canyon National Park, the cavalry arrives.
Catherine, gosh bless her, is waiting patiently by the side of the road for the man she will eventually fall in love with. Me, I'm setting fires and drinking beers. Fuckin eh. It takes almost 2 hours (or was it 3?) for the driver to find his way to our little hole in the valley. No joke though, the fella was a life saver: he was stationed strictly to the park itself. Once my sister started crying though, his heart turned to jelly and he was willing to help us out.
And we were thusly saved.
With the car off the rock, it was time to get stupid. And not just a little.
I'm sitting quietly drinking beers, trying desperately to keep a fire burning in spite of the winds that would have otherwise dwindled out my meager blaze. Catherine comes to join me and promptly realizes (actually, she realized earlier; but for the sake of continuity, I'm going to pretend this happened later) that she has no cork screw. Some days, you can't win.
After a brief jaunt to the general store, we are both on our way to forgetting about the missed opportunities of the recently set sun. The idiocy begins in earnest.
After a few swigs of wine, my sister (the confessed pyrophobe) is looking all over camp for shit to burn. At first, potato chips satiate the beast. Then, knick knacks that we have sitting around our picnic bench. Shrubbery is no match for my sister's firey ambitions. Eventually, and to the tune of Eric Clapton's acoustic version of Layla, everything is fair game.
Food stuffs of all sorts are fed to the flames. Empty beer cans are vanquished in the fires. Empty bottle of wine? Fodder for the flames. There is nothing safe, nothing sacred (except for her purse apparently) with regard to the fire pit we've got going.
I'll spare the rest of the gory details (only because there is enough video of this to spare you my descriptions). The sun is a glimmer on the horizon and all of our expendible supplies have been given to the flames. Day two of our journey is at an end.
It pains me to admit this post took three separate sittings to complete. Fortunately for you (and me), the next post will be about our time in vegas. As we all know, what happens in vegas, stays in vegas barring a court order.
Day two is so surmised. Stay tuned for the stunning conslusion.
Rob
Ah, yes: Friday morning.
After a few good hours of sleep, we bravely decided it was time to take our freak show of stupid on the road. "Let's see what is so grand about a canyon anyway!", we shouted. And just like that, it was off to more adventure.
I learned something about Arizona that day. I'm pretty sure some idiot part of my brain already knew this from all the geology specials I watch (I'm not joking), but it's not until you experience it first hand that you truly appreciate the significance behind it: The grand canyon is many thousands of feet above sea level. Many, many thousands.
We leave Phoenix around 11:30 or so and after a quick brunch, we were on the road. June in Phoenix, at noon, is a hot place to be. We were singing the desert mantra - T-shirt and shorts for everyone; pass the sun screen, I'm getting burned through my shirt - you know, all the familiar refrains until we got about 3000 feet above sea level. Then, it started getting cloudy.
What the hell is going on here? It was about 95 in Phoenix (give or take 10 meaningless degrees that did nothing to change the feel of the place) and now it was low 80s if we were lucky (and at this point, 10 degrees started making a difference). No problem with that though, still a beautiful day, if not a little overcast. Goddamn though, these hills just keep on coming. It was like that famous line from Ghostbusters ("Where do these stairs go?" in case you were wondering which famous line from Ghostbusters).
And up and up they went. 5000 feet. 6000 feet. 7000 feet.
In a lesser vehicle, this might have been a perilous drive; but when you have a vehicle with honest to god testicles, well, you can go as fast as you please no matter what the gradient. We went fast. After much cursing at the seemingly unending uphill nature of Arizona, we finally approach the south rim of the grand canyon.
After a brief but confusing discussion with the gate ranger at Grand Canyon National Park ("May I see your yearly park pass? Thank you. Hey, this says Christina. Ok. You'll need to sign it to if I'm going to pretend to believe it's yours. Thank you. Off you go.") we were in. We're driving, we're driving, we're seeing cars parked next to signs that read "No Parking on Shoulder" and we're seeing people walking away from cars they just parked by said signs. It then occurred to us that this might be a good place to park as well.
And boy, was it.
Beautiful. Breath taking. Magnificent. What a glorious hole!
With that formality out of the way, it was off to find a camp site. For future reference, if you want to stay in the park in early June, a reservation is probably a must. If you couldn't be bothered with such formality, there's a perfectly suitable place just seven miles away. Just beware the rocky outcroppings. More on that in a bit.
Time for a plan: we get a camp set up, buy supplies (drinks, ice, and smores ingredients), and then head back to the canyon and for some awesome sunset photos. This is a good plan. And what could possibly go wrong? The camp site is seven miles outside grand canyon national park and directly behind a general store. This is perfect.
A quick stop at the general store yields a haul of beer, wine, graham crackers, chocolate, marshmellows, and a bundle of wood for our soon to be glorious camp fire. Circle round back to the camp site and the nice lady who informs us we're the only people who've committed to camping for the night. This is gonna be a sweet night.
We quickly set up camp and throw the drinks on ice. Sure, our tent wasn't going to win any awards, being held down by rocks in several crucial places, but it was good enough. We survey our domain and it is good; and with plenty of time left to return to the canyon, pick our spot and record what's shaping up to be a lovely sunset. I mean, it had been cloudy all day BUT the clouds finally broke 45 minutes before sunset. This was gonna be pretty!
"Catherine, do us the honor of driving back to the canyon."
"...ok."
We jump in the car, ease back about 8 feet and then...stop moving. Hmm. Well, this probably isn't good. In order to spare you 1000 of my words, here's a photo to best illustrate the situation:
You really need to look close to realize how boned this situation is. Remember those rocky outcroppings I mentioned above? Well, there you go. The low clearance of a mustang frame is awesome for going fast on desert highways but not so much when trying to free yourself from rocks. And if you look closer, you'll notice there's no way to get a jack under there either. Sweet.
Now, I have to give Catherine credit: this was a one in a hundred shot. A few inches to the left, it's a non-issue. A few to the right and we hear the scrape and reverse course with no harm done. But in this particular instance, it's bonesville.
She managed to drive off this particular rock in such a way that we were good and stuck. No sunset for us. But when life closes a door, it opens a window...
AAA to the rescue, sort of. After some slight confusion over what state we were in, followed by some confusion over about our proximity to Grand Canyon National Park, the cavalry arrives.
Catherine, gosh bless her, is waiting patiently by the side of the road for the man she will eventually fall in love with. Me, I'm setting fires and drinking beers. Fuckin eh. It takes almost 2 hours (or was it 3?) for the driver to find his way to our little hole in the valley. No joke though, the fella was a life saver: he was stationed strictly to the park itself. Once my sister started crying though, his heart turned to jelly and he was willing to help us out.
And we were thusly saved.
With the car off the rock, it was time to get stupid. And not just a little.
I'm sitting quietly drinking beers, trying desperately to keep a fire burning in spite of the winds that would have otherwise dwindled out my meager blaze. Catherine comes to join me and promptly realizes (actually, she realized earlier; but for the sake of continuity, I'm going to pretend this happened later) that she has no cork screw. Some days, you can't win.
After a brief jaunt to the general store, we are both on our way to forgetting about the missed opportunities of the recently set sun. The idiocy begins in earnest.
After a few swigs of wine, my sister (the confessed pyrophobe) is looking all over camp for shit to burn. At first, potato chips satiate the beast. Then, knick knacks that we have sitting around our picnic bench. Shrubbery is no match for my sister's firey ambitions. Eventually, and to the tune of Eric Clapton's acoustic version of Layla, everything is fair game.
Food stuffs of all sorts are fed to the flames. Empty beer cans are vanquished in the fires. Empty bottle of wine? Fodder for the flames. There is nothing safe, nothing sacred (except for her purse apparently) with regard to the fire pit we've got going.
I'll spare the rest of the gory details (only because there is enough video of this to spare you my descriptions). The sun is a glimmer on the horizon and all of our expendible supplies have been given to the flames. Day two of our journey is at an end.
It pains me to admit this post took three separate sittings to complete. Fortunately for you (and me), the next post will be about our time in vegas. As we all know, what happens in vegas, stays in vegas barring a court order.
Day two is so surmised. Stay tuned for the stunning conslusion.
Rob
Tuesday, June 16, 2009
"We were rhyming things with things" and Other Tales of the Southwest: Part 1
So this is a tough entry to write. Last year, my sister and I take a road trip (the details of which are documented below) and it was good. No plan other than direction; no ambition other than make it at least as far as the mighty Mississippi river. Well, being we had such a good time of it, why not plan a sequel, right?
Now, mind you, we caught a fair amount of flack for driving 2000 miles with only the vaguest notion of what we were going to do. Friends, family and co-workers were all equally perplexed. The nice people of Chicago, who we spent a memorable (if fuzzy) night with were supportive but also confused. For the sequel, decided we'd see what all the fuss was about: we'd plan.
Winter turns to spring and we start making plans, and nothing is off the table. "Bobbo, let's go to the grand canyon! And let's rent a convertible!" Fine ideas both, but we can do more. After many nights in my friendly neighborhood pub, we hammered out this gem of a plan:
1) We fly to Phoenix, rent a convertible for a week.
2) Drive up to the grand canyon, camp there for a day or two
3) Hit up Vegas. (Optional: Be in Vegas by the 7th so my sister can get a tattoo in Vegas on her birthday. Cliche, but awesome)
4) Swing out to San Diego, which by most accounts has some of the nicest weather on earth
5) Drive back to Phoenix.
Mind you, we managed out trip to the mighty Mississippi and back (almost 2000 miles all told) in about 3 and a half days. This should be a cake walk. Hell, by our estimations, we'd even be able to spend a day or two in places we liked. The novelty! A few phone calls and a couple more nights at my friendly neighborhood pub later, and we're booked. Depart NY on June 4th and arrive in Phoenix (but it's a dry heat), AZ to pick up our rental 2009 Ford Mustang convertible (Yee-ha bitches!). Return to NYC 8 days later and declare victory. Simple enough, right?
We leave a cloudy and chilly NYC Thursday morning and touch down in a 104 degree dry heat around noon (gotta love when time zones work in your favor). I can't pretend to know what anyone else is thinking, but what I was thinking was "Oh shit. We just rented a convertible to drive through the desert. Hmmm. I'm gonna look like an angry lobster inside of 20 minutes." We're gonna have to play this by ear.
We pick up the car and it is CHERRY. Well, that's settled: the top goes down - temperature be damned.
"OK, we've got the car. Now what?"
"I say we get a room and hang out in Phoenix for the night. We need to buy supplies for the canyon anyway so we may as well pace ourselves."
"Sounds like a plan!"
We hit up a Walmart (which still hurts my heart) and stock up. OK, we need a tent, a cooler, some water (a helpful bus driver informed us that when in doubt, 'Glug, glug, glug' water while in the desert). I need a bathing suit, a super cool hat so that my head doesn't burn up, maybe some bandannas for when I don't want to wear the hat. My lovely sister has a few must get items of her own and Walmart lives up to it's "We have everything cheap" motto with the notable caveat being when you buy a lot of cheap things, it still costs a fair amount of money. No concern there though. We're on vacation.
It's now back to the hotel where our next task involves finding a bar within walking distance (after a swim in one of the grossest pools I've ever been in). I ain't fuckin around with a rental that we declined the optional insurance for. Turns out people don't walk in Phoenix. It also turns out, a GPS tuned for driving is lousy at giving walking directions. Nearest bar is across the highway from us, we can practically see it: 1.5 miles away. We'll deal with that particular problem when we're drunk and have to get back.
After 20 minutes of walking (and being called an asshole by someone in a car for no discernible reason), we hit pay dirt and it looks like a real shit hole. Works for me. Grab a seat and order a drink. A few weird things about drinking in Phoenix: they won't sell regular pitchers of beer when only one person is obviously drinking from that pitcher, but they will sell incredibly cheap half pitchers to that same person as often as he asks. Clearly, consumption is not their primary concern. We get our drinks and notice that there is not a drop of perspiration on the glasses, bottles, nothing. You don't see that in New York on a hot day. But the drinks are really cheap and we're on vacation, let's keep this going.
I had never really heard of the hospitality of the people of Phoenix and I'm pretty sure I know why now. It's not that they were hostile or any such thing. It's more that they just weren't very receptive to friendly conversation. Now, anyone who's met me knows I'm a bit of an asshole, but I swear that I was just trying to be social. Catherine too. No bites. Maybe it's just me, but when I meet a stranger in my town (especially if they're leaving in the near future), I'm happy to shoot the breeze and compare notes. Not Phoenixonians. Not how they roll. So without that kind of fun camaraderie that we came to appreciate in Chicago, all there was to do in Phoenix was get really drunk on cheap beer. Works for me.
Now seems a good time to bring up one of the...what's the word? Ill-conceived? Ambitious? Ill-combitious? Whatever the word, here was our plan and you can be the judge of its merits: While on west coast time, if we had time to kill, we'd start drinking as if it was eastern standard time, so as to remain on EST throughout our trip and minimize jet lag when we got home. The primary reason (excuse) for this behavior is my sister's stunning inability to read a calendar.
I'll spare you the story about her just getting the day off from work on the day we were scheduled to leave NY, but I can't spare you the details of our intended return trip. While booking the flights, she tells me to just go ahead and book for a full 8 days. She's got the time, she assures me. So I do. Turns out, she misjudged just how much time she had. We were booked to return to NY on Friday the 12th at 11:30PM. My dear sister had work Saturday morning at 7AM. Smooth. So now our EST intentions can be put into some kind of context.
Where was I? Right.
So we get to the bar in Phoenix around 6PM...EST. Hey, fuck it. We're on vacation. After untold hours (a prime side effect of daytime drinking using different time zones is lost hours) of drinking on the cheap, it was time to make our way back to the hotel. After much cursing and a couple of unexplained detours, we finally stumbled into the hotel lobby where we were greeted by 3 dudes sitting in the lobby pounding beers. Here's the hospitality we were hoping for. It figures these gents were from Houston, somewhere/nowhere upstate New York and Boston. Close enough.
Another nice thing about Phoenix bars is they let you buy beers to go, which I did. This part gets fuzzy so I'll just say we talked to those fellas for a few hours about this, that and the other thing. Turns out they were/are more of less living in the hotel for a year now due to some contract job they were on, the poor souls. $DIETY knows how they can do that without killing every one around them, but clearly, they were getting paid so I guess that makes it easier. Nice fellas though.
And then off to bed and on to day 2.
That's where I'm gonna stop this particular chapter. I'll be sure to pick it up tomorrow or some such day. If you've read this far, gee, thanks. More soon.
Rob
Now, mind you, we caught a fair amount of flack for driving 2000 miles with only the vaguest notion of what we were going to do. Friends, family and co-workers were all equally perplexed. The nice people of Chicago, who we spent a memorable (if fuzzy) night with were supportive but also confused. For the sequel, decided we'd see what all the fuss was about: we'd plan.
Winter turns to spring and we start making plans, and nothing is off the table. "Bobbo, let's go to the grand canyon! And let's rent a convertible!" Fine ideas both, but we can do more. After many nights in my friendly neighborhood pub, we hammered out this gem of a plan:
1) We fly to Phoenix, rent a convertible for a week.
2) Drive up to the grand canyon, camp there for a day or two
3) Hit up Vegas. (Optional: Be in Vegas by the 7th so my sister can get a tattoo in Vegas on her birthday. Cliche, but awesome)
4) Swing out to San Diego, which by most accounts has some of the nicest weather on earth
5) Drive back to Phoenix.
Mind you, we managed out trip to the mighty Mississippi and back (almost 2000 miles all told) in about 3 and a half days. This should be a cake walk. Hell, by our estimations, we'd even be able to spend a day or two in places we liked. The novelty! A few phone calls and a couple more nights at my friendly neighborhood pub later, and we're booked. Depart NY on June 4th and arrive in Phoenix (but it's a dry heat), AZ to pick up our rental 2009 Ford Mustang convertible (Yee-ha bitches!). Return to NYC 8 days later and declare victory. Simple enough, right?
We leave a cloudy and chilly NYC Thursday morning and touch down in a 104 degree dry heat around noon (gotta love when time zones work in your favor). I can't pretend to know what anyone else is thinking, but what I was thinking was "Oh shit. We just rented a convertible to drive through the desert. Hmmm. I'm gonna look like an angry lobster inside of 20 minutes." We're gonna have to play this by ear.
We pick up the car and it is CHERRY. Well, that's settled: the top goes down - temperature be damned.
"OK, we've got the car. Now what?"
"I say we get a room and hang out in Phoenix for the night. We need to buy supplies for the canyon anyway so we may as well pace ourselves."
"Sounds like a plan!"
We hit up a Walmart (which still hurts my heart) and stock up. OK, we need a tent, a cooler, some water (a helpful bus driver informed us that when in doubt, 'Glug, glug, glug' water while in the desert). I need a bathing suit, a super cool hat so that my head doesn't burn up, maybe some bandannas for when I don't want to wear the hat. My lovely sister has a few must get items of her own and Walmart lives up to it's "We have everything cheap" motto with the notable caveat being when you buy a lot of cheap things, it still costs a fair amount of money. No concern there though. We're on vacation.
It's now back to the hotel where our next task involves finding a bar within walking distance (after a swim in one of the grossest pools I've ever been in). I ain't fuckin around with a rental that we declined the optional insurance for. Turns out people don't walk in Phoenix. It also turns out, a GPS tuned for driving is lousy at giving walking directions. Nearest bar is across the highway from us, we can practically see it: 1.5 miles away. We'll deal with that particular problem when we're drunk and have to get back.
After 20 minutes of walking (and being called an asshole by someone in a car for no discernible reason), we hit pay dirt and it looks like a real shit hole. Works for me. Grab a seat and order a drink. A few weird things about drinking in Phoenix: they won't sell regular pitchers of beer when only one person is obviously drinking from that pitcher, but they will sell incredibly cheap half pitchers to that same person as often as he asks. Clearly, consumption is not their primary concern. We get our drinks and notice that there is not a drop of perspiration on the glasses, bottles, nothing. You don't see that in New York on a hot day. But the drinks are really cheap and we're on vacation, let's keep this going.
I had never really heard of the hospitality of the people of Phoenix and I'm pretty sure I know why now. It's not that they were hostile or any such thing. It's more that they just weren't very receptive to friendly conversation. Now, anyone who's met me knows I'm a bit of an asshole, but I swear that I was just trying to be social. Catherine too. No bites. Maybe it's just me, but when I meet a stranger in my town (especially if they're leaving in the near future), I'm happy to shoot the breeze and compare notes. Not Phoenixonians. Not how they roll. So without that kind of fun camaraderie that we came to appreciate in Chicago, all there was to do in Phoenix was get really drunk on cheap beer. Works for me.
Now seems a good time to bring up one of the...what's the word? Ill-conceived? Ambitious? Ill-combitious? Whatever the word, here was our plan and you can be the judge of its merits: While on west coast time, if we had time to kill, we'd start drinking as if it was eastern standard time, so as to remain on EST throughout our trip and minimize jet lag when we got home. The primary reason (excuse) for this behavior is my sister's stunning inability to read a calendar.
I'll spare you the story about her just getting the day off from work on the day we were scheduled to leave NY, but I can't spare you the details of our intended return trip. While booking the flights, she tells me to just go ahead and book for a full 8 days. She's got the time, she assures me. So I do. Turns out, she misjudged just how much time she had. We were booked to return to NY on Friday the 12th at 11:30PM. My dear sister had work Saturday morning at 7AM. Smooth. So now our EST intentions can be put into some kind of context.
Where was I? Right.
So we get to the bar in Phoenix around 6PM...EST. Hey, fuck it. We're on vacation. After untold hours (a prime side effect of daytime drinking using different time zones is lost hours) of drinking on the cheap, it was time to make our way back to the hotel. After much cursing and a couple of unexplained detours, we finally stumbled into the hotel lobby where we were greeted by 3 dudes sitting in the lobby pounding beers. Here's the hospitality we were hoping for. It figures these gents were from Houston, somewhere/nowhere upstate New York and Boston. Close enough.
Another nice thing about Phoenix bars is they let you buy beers to go, which I did. This part gets fuzzy so I'll just say we talked to those fellas for a few hours about this, that and the other thing. Turns out they were/are more of less living in the hotel for a year now due to some contract job they were on, the poor souls. $DIETY knows how they can do that without killing every one around them, but clearly, they were getting paid so I guess that makes it easier. Nice fellas though.
And then off to bed and on to day 2.
That's where I'm gonna stop this particular chapter. I'll be sure to pick it up tomorrow or some such day. If you've read this far, gee, thanks. More soon.
Rob
Wednesday, June 18, 2008
The Magic of Internet
Funny thing, this internet. Over the past few months, I've not only reconnected with friends from high school but also junior high and grade school. How fucked up is that? That's about 20 years ago for me. Weird and wacky stuff.
Now, I've had a Myspace account for a few years now, but I never used my actual name because I didn't want people to look for or find me. Don't know why, just seemed like the thing to do. It wasn't until facebook that I stopped paying attention and used my real name (I actually thought that I'd have a chance to use an alias and that no one would find me again). Since I made that change, I get all these weird but cool reminders of people I used to know. I'm still astounded some of em remember me. Anyone who knows me now may not think this is possible, but I was way more of a self-absorbed prick back then than I am even. Believe, no one was more shocked than me to find that out. But even if it's as a prick, it's nice to be thought of here and again.
You know what it is that needled me a bit (not the bad way, just in that "There's a connection I need to make" kind of way)? I was talking to my dad a few days ago and he was talking about some of the guys he grew up with but hadn't heard from in 30 years or 40 years. Kind of struck me as disappointing. And then I realized that even after 10 or 15 years, I still hear from some people. I have no real insight here, just noticing. I guess with something like the internet, I won't have to lament that particular loss.
Anyway, cheers.
Rob
Now, I've had a Myspace account for a few years now, but I never used my actual name because I didn't want people to look for or find me. Don't know why, just seemed like the thing to do. It wasn't until facebook that I stopped paying attention and used my real name (I actually thought that I'd have a chance to use an alias and that no one would find me again). Since I made that change, I get all these weird but cool reminders of people I used to know. I'm still astounded some of em remember me. Anyone who knows me now may not think this is possible, but I was way more of a self-absorbed prick back then than I am even. Believe, no one was more shocked than me to find that out. But even if it's as a prick, it's nice to be thought of here and again.
You know what it is that needled me a bit (not the bad way, just in that "There's a connection I need to make" kind of way)? I was talking to my dad a few days ago and he was talking about some of the guys he grew up with but hadn't heard from in 30 years or 40 years. Kind of struck me as disappointing. And then I realized that even after 10 or 15 years, I still hear from some people. I have no real insight here, just noticing. I guess with something like the internet, I won't have to lament that particular loss.
Anyway, cheers.
Rob
Friday, April 25, 2008
Twas a fine day (and there was much rejoicing)
Greetings and good morning. Now that it's officially Saturday, I can reflect back on the Friday that was and smile. In the immortal words of Ice Cube, I gotta say it was a good day. Here's the thing though: it didn't strike me as such a good day until I stopped to reflect on it.
Think about that for a second. I didn't realize I had a good day (an exceptional day even) until I actually stopped and itemized it. What a sad life I lead, sometimes. But on to greener pastures...
All in all, a good week actually. Had Monday and Tuesday off, eased myself back into a work schedule Wednesday thru Friday. Started writing recreationally again. Worked on Flexxo. Recorded a couple song demos. All in all, surprisingly good. I think some life style changes are starting to pay off (in spite of my skepticism).
Since early February, I've been trying to be less of a bastard (with mixed results). A big part of that has involved not drinking like a homeless wino. The results have been something of a mixed bag for me, honestly. On the one hand, I feel something of a fog lifting (10 years of crazy person drinking will do that). I finally feel I'm able to do the things I've long been capable of but have been incompetent to complete. That's a nice feeling.
On the other hand however, having a clear head for consecutive days has been a real eye opening experience for me. Makes me realize how much I've actually fucked up. Makes me want to drink more and pretend I never noticed. The irony (for me, at least), has been delicious, in case you were wondering. I was personally staggered to find out how much a person can ignore when they're in a semi-constant stupor.
Well, as anyone who's talked me (ever) knows, staying dry full time isn't really an option. But at the same time, going back to being a 90 proof asshole isn't an option either (I'm sure that surprises a few people). So how would a person balance this dichotomy of character? No really, I'm asking.
So far, the best I've come up with is trying to not drink just because I can. Having a clearer head has encouraged me to take on intellectual pursuits I might not have otherwise tempted. I like that. Now, I'll just try to drink when I want to with an understanding that I don't want to drink as much as I used to. If I can keep that up, I think I'll (finally) be OK.
There. That's probably the closest I'll come to a diary entry, ever. If I'm smart.
I like writing. If I can retain the discipline to exercise that skill, I think I'll be a better, more adjusted human being for it. I may still hate people (as a rule of thumb), but at least I won't be the bitter, alcohol soaked asshole I was before and I might actually have a leg to stand on when I look at the world around me with contempt. That might actually be good for me.
Anyway, that's enough of this confessional for one night. Rock on, rock stars.
Stay stiff and rock hard,
Rob
Think about that for a second. I didn't realize I had a good day (an exceptional day even) until I actually stopped and itemized it. What a sad life I lead, sometimes. But on to greener pastures...
All in all, a good week actually. Had Monday and Tuesday off, eased myself back into a work schedule Wednesday thru Friday. Started writing recreationally again. Worked on Flexxo. Recorded a couple song demos. All in all, surprisingly good. I think some life style changes are starting to pay off (in spite of my skepticism).
Since early February, I've been trying to be less of a bastard (with mixed results). A big part of that has involved not drinking like a homeless wino. The results have been something of a mixed bag for me, honestly. On the one hand, I feel something of a fog lifting (10 years of crazy person drinking will do that). I finally feel I'm able to do the things I've long been capable of but have been incompetent to complete. That's a nice feeling.
On the other hand however, having a clear head for consecutive days has been a real eye opening experience for me. Makes me realize how much I've actually fucked up. Makes me want to drink more and pretend I never noticed. The irony (for me, at least), has been delicious, in case you were wondering. I was personally staggered to find out how much a person can ignore when they're in a semi-constant stupor.
Well, as anyone who's talked me (ever) knows, staying dry full time isn't really an option. But at the same time, going back to being a 90 proof asshole isn't an option either (I'm sure that surprises a few people). So how would a person balance this dichotomy of character? No really, I'm asking.
So far, the best I've come up with is trying to not drink just because I can. Having a clearer head has encouraged me to take on intellectual pursuits I might not have otherwise tempted. I like that. Now, I'll just try to drink when I want to with an understanding that I don't want to drink as much as I used to. If I can keep that up, I think I'll (finally) be OK.
There. That's probably the closest I'll come to a diary entry, ever. If I'm smart.
I like writing. If I can retain the discipline to exercise that skill, I think I'll be a better, more adjusted human being for it. I may still hate people (as a rule of thumb), but at least I won't be the bitter, alcohol soaked asshole I was before and I might actually have a leg to stand on when I look at the world around me with contempt. That might actually be good for me.
Anyway, that's enough of this confessional for one night. Rock on, rock stars.
Stay stiff and rock hard,
Rob
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