Sleepy Birthday in Santa Barbara - Santa Barbara, CA

“Hello? Blog? Are you there?”

“Yeah, I’m here. Where have you been? I thought you were going to write about your trip to Santa Barbara last weekend.”

“I was! But I was a complete dumb ass and forgot my camera. These entries aren’t any good without pictures to back them up.”

“Oh, I don’t know. I think the people would understand.”

“You think?”

“Yeah sure, why not? Plus, you know, you could always steal pictures off of the web and claim them as your own.”

“That’s a bit dodgy to do.”

“You’ve done it before.”

“Well yeah, sure, I’ve done it before…but not for an entire entry. I usually only steal one or two.”

“What about the fire entry? Did you take any one of those photos?”

“Shut up.”

“Just saying.”

This is one of the missions in Santa Barbara. I didn't go here, but I saw it.

Last weekend was my birthday. About a month ago I didn’t have any plans for it, which is weird since I usually plan something a good two to three months in advance. This un-planning may have stemmed from the fact that I really wasn’t looking forward to turning 34. I know, it’s stupid, but I really was freaking out like 34 was officially the end of my days. What’s sad is that I’m sure I’ll look back on this 10 years from now and will want to kick my 34 self in the head with a big ole steal toed boot. Anyhow, I finally decided a few weeks ago to spend the day in Santa Barbara. And I decided this because I really wanted to take the train.

I’ve actually been (not in a scary creepy way) obsessing about the train recently. I’m going to Portland in a couple weeks via the train so I think since I ordered my tickets for that I’ve been checking weekly on other places I can take via the train. Did you know you can’t take the train from Los Angeles to Las Vegas? It’s true. It’s the busiest freeway anywhere from Friday afternoon to Sunday (this is not a fact, just something I would believe as true since I’ve sat on that freeway for 7 hours before…) and they don’t have a train to ease the congestion. I guess they USED to have a train between the two cities but was cancelled because no one was using it. They are thinking about bringing it back though with a fancy high speed levitating magnetic train instead of the slow ass shit Amtrak train. That would be awesome.

So yes! Santa Barbara. The night before we were suppose to leave, I decided to be really good and stay home, not drink a single pre-birthday cocktail, and go to bed nice and early so that I wouldn’t be tired waking up at 5:30 AM to catch our train. Of course an unforeseen kink put a wrench in my ingenious plan….I couldn’t sleep. And when I say I couldn’t sleep, I mean, I couldn’t sleep AT ALL. I don’t know if it was excitement or nerves, or over thinking the previous day at work or if someone slipped in some caffeine in my decaf, but after tossing and turning for 4 hours, I finally gave up. I had to get up at 5:30 and by 2 o’clock I’m still on the couch watching Dr. Who. I finally dozed off around 4:30 which means, by all accounts, I did get an hour sleep. It was going to be a great birthday.

The view from the train had my eyes been open to see it.

We caught our train in Irvine and I tried desperately to sleep on the train. But, like my mother, I cannot fall asleep during day light hours. It’s impossible and normally I don’t even try. My mom tells me that in pre-school she had to tell my teachers not to yell at me if I wouldn’t go down for a nap, because I never would. I actually have a faint memory of playing on a plastic slide while all the other kids were sleeping on their mats. I can only imagine that my not napping must have drove my mom crazy early on, I mean, c’mon…naptime…isn’t that what all parents wait for during a day?

So yes! Santa Barbara. We arrive in Santa Barbara around noon. The previous plan was that we were going to go wine tasting right away. However, with an hour sleep under my belt, I didn’t think I could do it. Wine tasting is a lot of standing, drinking, and socializing. I certainly didn’t feel like socializing and I could barely stand (and would be less able to with drinking) so we just grabbed some lunch and took the shuttle, then bus, to our hotel on State Street.


There are a couple things I’d like to mention about Santa Barbara. Number one is that if you do take the train (which I would suggest to anybody since it’s awesome) and if you plan to stay on State Street, the public transportation system is great. Near the beach, you can take the State Street shuttle for about 12 blocks for 25 cents. From there you can grab the city bus for $1.25. The shuttle runs every 10-15 minutes and the city bus, although it always said we would have to wait, was always RIGHT THERE. It was almost eerie, that city bus. We’d go up to the bus stop and look at the schedule and even though EVERY TIME it said we’d be waiting at least 15-20 minutes for the next one to come, it was always right there-like it was following us. It was weird, but cool.

25 cent shuttle going up and down State Street.

The second thing I’d like to mention is that everyone says Santa Barbara is expensive. I personally don’t think that’s overly true. I mean, it’s not cheap by any means but it’s not going to break the bank. Well, except for lodging. Getting a hotel in Santa Barbara on the weekend is going to make you faint over the price you pay verses what you get. I’ve gotten 4 star hotels for under $100 in Las Vegas, San Diego, Toronto, and Chicago (over a weekend no less). Using the same means, I still ended up paying $140 for a flea bag hotel in Santa Barbara. The Motel 6 was a few bucks cheaper but it was farther away. We stayed at the Orange Tree Inn on State Street. The room was a bit dirty, we had to ask for soap, and there were ants. We did have a room overlooking the pool that we didn’t use. So yeah, something to keep in mind if you ever go.

The Orange Tree Inn, the good angle.

After dropping our bags off in our room, we caught the bus back to the main entertainment area of State Street. I’d love to go into details about what we all did, but to be completely honest, I don’t remember much. I was so tired I was loopy. I remember giving a dollar to each performer I met on the street (“It’s my birthday, I’m being generous!”), I remember going to a used CD store, and I remember going to the Old King’s Road to play pool. We actually go to the Old King’s Road every time we’re in Santa Barbara. It’s close to the train station and we love their ‘No Wankers’ motto. Kevin bought me a sweatshirt with that on it. He’s awesome.


Finally we went the Chase for my birthday dinner. They had a special with steak and lobster and since I’ve never tried lobster, I decided to get it. Not surprisingly, I didn’t like it so Kevin ate most of it for me. After dinner I was pretty much done so we had a quick nightcap at the Croc bar (I couldn’t resist have a croctail) and went back to the hotel. That’s right. I was dead asleep on my birthday at 9 o’clock. And I slept like a rock.

Inside of the Chase restaurant. That's actually our table...the Elvis table we were told.

AND I was up at 6 in the morning. Its times like this that I really feel bad for Kevin who has a fairly normal sleeping schedule.

The next day was so much better than the first (since I was actually walking around like a normal sleep filled person) except there was the sadness of the trip ending. We packed up fairly early and went downtown. We did some shopping, had brunch, went wine tasting, grabbed dinner, then caught the train back home.

Downtown State Street

I think next year I’m going to stay up all night long the day before the day before my birthday in a huge effort never to waste the day again. Though I have to admit, turning 34 wasn’t so bad when all my concentration was spent on trying to remain upright.

See you all in a month when I return from Portland. Or maybe I’ll blog from Portland. That would be new. Correspondent Moe: Live from Portland!

Boycott the OC Register

So my dad didn’t win, he came in second. I expected this. By Sunday night (the end of the contest) my dad had 6567 votes! Thank you everyone! However, a late contestant came in on Thursday night and wound up with over 20,000 votes. I suspect the person who submitted this late entry cheated. I don’t fault this person from cheating if that’s what they did as in all honestly, I probably would have done the same thing if I had the programming skills and motivation to do so.

I was pretty pleased that my dad came in 2nd (the old fashioned way) and I looked forward to seeing his name in print today (hopefully that is, as a runner up). The contest rules (which have conveniently been pulled from the OC Register website) clearly stated that voting would end on Sunday and that the winner would be printed in the June 18th paper.

Guess what? I have today’s paper and you know what? No article. None. Nada. Zilch. Not even a mention of the winner, much less my dad. I happened to catch the web version of the article (also conveniently pulled from the website) on Monday afternoon but alas, no picture of my dad, not even a mention of his “advice”. Though the creepy dad who told his daughter, “As long you are under 100 lbs you’ll be alright!” was in there.

*Sigh*

If I wasn’t already down sick today, I sense I would be.

Thanks again to everyone. Hey! We tried right?

Vote for my Dad!

KINDA A WEIRD SOMETHING NEW....

I've entered my dad in a "best advice" contest on the Orange County Register website for Father's Day. I don't think I'll be able to gather the 1000+ votes needed to win at this point but I'm hoping to get him as a runner up so his picture will be in the paper. He'd get a real kick out of that.

Anyhow, if you feel like helping me out, go here and vote for my dad:

VOTE HERE!

Choose '10' for the best if possible. You can also vote as many times as you like (HINT HINT!)

Thank you for your help and to the fathers out there, Happy Father's Day!

So it's come to this...

So yeah. I’ve been giving this blog a lot of thought recently and I’ve come to the conclusion that I need to take a little break for awhile. Or I guess I should say that I’ve already been on my break for awhile, and I plan to continue it for a little while longer. I’m going to sound pompous when I say this but I’m going to say it anyhow…I’ve been working on other projects. Like that? Projects? Like I’m in the 3rd grade and I’ve got a pile of felt and a wee little bottle of Elmer’s glue right next to me. It is the truth; I’ve been working on a personal project for the last couple of weeks that I’m thinking will take me into the summer months. Of course this ‘project’ is filled with many in between hours of ‘TV watching’ and ‘PC Gaming’. The more things change, the more…well, you get the picture.

I do have some plans this summer that I fully intend to blog about so I won’t be gone forever and definitely not gone for long. I will miss you guys in the mean time.

Catch you on the flip side.

Dear Blog,

Hi! How are you doing? I’m just fine, thanks for asking. I’m sorry I haven’t written on you in awhile. I really don’t have much of an excuse, especially since I’ve done plenty of new things in the last month; I just haven’t taken the time to write about them. I know you were worried about me…but I promise you that I am indeed alive and well. Don’t give me that look. If I was run over by a bus or kidnapped by a group of roving gypsies I’m sure someone would have told you about it.

So how have you been? People still coming to check out you out for the Paul Frank Warehouse Sale that was a billion years ago? Well, that’s good, at least our friends in Malaysia and Poland still think Paul Frank is the bomb, or ‘ten bombardować’ if you will. I know you wish people would come for other reasons but I think we’ll just have to accept the fact that they won’t. Paul Frank Paul Frank Paul Frank Paul Frank. There, that will get them coming.

What have I been doing you ask? Well, lots of things. Kevin and I went to Dave and Buster’s two weekends in a row. Yeah, I know that’s not new. Um, we had a semi-dinner party a couple weekends back where I made pesto chicken and we all played Trivia Pursuit and Cranium Pop 5. Don’t look at me like that! It was fun! I took last Thursday off and went to the Farmer’s Market and then rode my bike down on the peninsula. That was awesome; I got a bit of a sunburn on my forehead that day. Why are you looking at me like that?! It was the best Thursday I’ve had in a long time. I’ve also increased my cooking skills and tackled fresh guacamole, fresh lemonade, Shepard’s pie, and carrot cake. Not all at once of course. STOP LOOKING AT ME LIKE THAT! Oh! I also painted. I recently came across the works of Miles Thompson and thought that they were awesome (mostly surf\tiki type of stuff). Since I can’t afford a print, I decided to paint a copy. It turned out really well. Of course when I tried to get it framed I was told that it would cost as much (and a bit more actually) then getting the real print. Go figure. Why are you walking away?! What’s that that you are mumbling? Something about you being glad I’ve stayed away? Well I never! I guess I won’t even mention me watching the entire first season of BBC’s Robin Hood and deciding that my sister, Maggie, should marry Jonas Armstrong who plays Robin Hood. Why are you crying? Did you hurt yourself?

Well, I guess that’s about it for me if you are going to be like this. I’m sorry, blog, that I have disappointed you. Yes, I promise I won’t stay away for so long next time. And yes, I will bring pictures next time too. In the meantime, rest up and cheer up. And make sure to say hello to all my Polish Paul Frank friends. Powitanie , przyjść znowu!

As always,

Moe

Amoeba Music - Los Angeles, CA

Let’s talk about L.A. Well, let me talk about L.A. as this isn’t an interactive blog (save for the voting right there on the right…get in your votes, as the polls close soon!).

I don’t live in L.A. I never have and I can say with conviction that I never will. I’m sure I’ve mentioned this in other posts, but every time I go home to WI, inevitably someone will say, “Hey, how’s L.A.?” or “This is Moe, she’s from L.A.” This is irritating for the fact that Orange County is nothing like Los Angeles. For my WI friends, it’s like saying you live in Milwaukee when you live in Madison. For everyone else, it’s like saying you live in Toronto, Canada when you actually live in Buffalo, New York. I’m not saying Los Angeles is horrible and awful and I could never dream of living in a place like that…quite the opposite actually…it’s just different. It’s nice having L.A. fairly close because there’s so much going on there, even if it’s a pain in the ass getting around.

LA is not Orange County

I recently got it into my head that I wanted to drive up to L.A. one afternoon and go to Pink’s for hot dogs. I’m not sure who even told me about Pink’s, but they are apparently famous. They don’t make their own hot dogs or anything, but I guess the toppings they offer plus some weird potato pancake bun Mari was talking about are really really good and would be well worth the hour long car ride to get there. Southern California experienced a bit of a heat wave this past weekend and what’s better in heat then a good ole American hot dog? Plus my car has air conditioning and our apartment does not.

Kevin’s not a big fan of hot dogs (or mac & cheese for that matter, I don’t think he’s a real American)(ha!) so I was kind of shocked when he said he’d come with. I wanted to make the trip worth it for him so I planned a stop at Amoeba Music and a cocktail at Tiki Ti after the (hopefully) delicious dogs.

...and I used to get so excited over the Hollywood sign...

True to form, traffic getting to L.A. was murder. Kevin spent the time making fairy princesses out of the signs and traffic in front of us. I asked him to stop making fairy princesses and just take some pictures, but between the giggles of fairy princess Hollywood 101 sign and fairy princess CoExist car, he said he didn’t know how to take the frame off.


After an hour, we finally made it to Pink’s. Well, we made it to the corner Pink’s was on anyhow, and got to witness the line that not only went out the door, but around the entire building and even a bit down the block. Damn, those must be some good hot dogs if people are willing to wait an hour in line to get one. I personally do not care if a hot dog is made out of solid gold; I’m not waiting in line for one. I’m sorry I didn’t get a picture of the line…it was truly incredible.

The line at Pink’s left us in a bit of a conundrum. We had just spent an hour in the car for hot dogs only to be disappointed. Kevin suggested that we just go to Carney’s for dogs but I knew it just wouldn’t be the same. We decided just to go ahead and go straight to Amoeba Music and grab something to eat after.

Every time I come up to L.A., I always end up on Sunset Blvd. and will always past Amoeba Music. You really can’t miss it. I had never been inside though. It was one of those things where Andrea would say, “Amoeba is great, you should go there some time” and I would think, “yeah, I should go there sometime” but I never actually do.


Walking into Amoeba Music was like having a full on circus show of music just exploding right in front of you. It was a complete total overload of the senses. The building itself takes up most of a city block and it has an upstairs and downstairs, and a couple of side rooms. It’s L.A. and its Sunset Blvd. and there are people everywhere. Music is blasting, people are bumping into you, and there are signs and posters and neon lights, and lines going everywhere. Kevin and I walked in and kind of stood there in disbelief. We honestly didn’t know what to do, I’m sure we gave the appearance of a couple country folks seeing the big ole city for the first time look. When our eyes were able to finally focus on something, we headed over to the used CD section. I was pretty amazed at the selection. I know for a fact that if I had lived around a place like this when I was in high school, I never would have had any money. “Grandma gave me $20 for my birthday! Let’s go to Amoeba!” In the end, Kevin and I got 5 CDs for $36 which isn’t that bad.

I didn't take this picture, I got it from the web...the day we were there was 10 times busier.

After Amoeba Music we started to walk down the street heading to the Cat & Fiddle for lunch. At this point we noticed that Amoeba had their own parking garage. I’m telling you this (with photo) so you don’t end up spending $6 for parking at the Public Parking garage on the next block like we did.

Lunch turned out to be OK and drinks at Tiki Ti were even better. Have I mentioned I want to marry Tiki Ti? Oh yeah, I think I have. Anyhow, we headed back home (another hour sitting in traffic!) and finally met up with Patrick, Michele, Mari, and Gunter at the American Legion on the peninsula….where I had a hot dog. Patrick had heard our tale of Pink’s and made sure I got one.

So, to recap:

• Orange County is not Los Angeles.
  
• Pink’s supposedly has hot dogs so good that people are willing to camp out all night just to get a taste of the salty greasy goodness.
  
• When going to Amoeba Music, make sure to bring a flashlight and a bag of stale bread to leave a trail with.
  
• Tiki Ti has not proposed yet, but I’m thinking it will be any day now.

***************************************

Oh, I forgot I wanted to show you where Tom Cruise hangs out:

Wasting my Sunday with Fairy Princesses

Oh helllllllooooo!

I will come right and tell you, I haven’t done a damn thing new in two weeks. I’m not going to apologize for it however as I haven’t gotten paid in…three weeks. And it’s still yet another week until I do get paid. I like myself some entertainment though, and will go pretty stir crazy if I don’t get it. Because Kevin enjoys his sanity (oh, and that whole loving me thing) he’s been trying his best to keep me entertained with as little as money possible. He’s so awesome. The weekend before last we (finally) pumped up the tires on our bikes and took them riding around the neighborhood (even though Kevin’s knee was still dodgy) and ended up gathering all this fresh fruit from the trees around here. It was the lemon tree that started it all. I couldn’t believe how great these lemons smelled. I’ve been using them in every drink I can think of since. And even though I don’t like avocados, I’ve been squeezing the ones we got silly waiting for them to ripen. That bruises them, doesn’t it? Oh well, I know where the tree is.

This past Saturday, Kevin and I helped Michele unpack her new apartment. For Kevin this meant disappearing with Patrick for three hours to ‘drop off a dresser’ and for me (and Mari, Marilynn, and Michele) to unpack the 847 boxes marked ‘KITCHEN’. Michele has a buttload of dishes. Even with three boxes repacked for Goodwill and the dishes that Mari, Marilynn and myself walked off with, I still don’t know how Michele managed to fit everything in that kitchen. It was a decent sized kitchen, but damn.

On Sunday I was getting a bit stir crazy. I had gotten up fairly early (after staying up until the 2AM/3AM time change because I just wasn’t tired dammit (Beth got the email that reflected this)) and basically played around the computer until I was SO DAMN BORED of that too, then took a shower, and GAAAAAAAAH I’M SO BORED WHY DON’T I HAVE ANY MONEY WAAAAAAH IT’S SO NICE OUT WAAAAA and finally decided that I would take my camera and take pictures around the neighborhood and post them all here for you guys. This meant I got out my camera and started taking weird pictures around the house using the ‘frames’ option on my camera.

The weeds I should have been pulling, and the bird seed I should have been picking up.

I had decided that before I left to take pictures, I would stop at the Harp real quick for breakfast\lunch, and then stop back over to Michele’s to bring her a housewarming gift (which would not be dishware), and then I would be off. Easy peasy.

But Kevin wanted to get breakfast\lunch too. So we split the Irish breakfast, had a beer, and had EVERY INTENTION of leaving to go to Michele’s and drop off a housewarming gift before he went back home and I rode around taking pictures.

Yummy Irish Breakfast

But then Dave and Jill showed up. We were two sips away from leaving. But Dave bought us a beer so we had to stay. After that beer, we had to buy Dave a beer back but DAMMIT, WE WERE LEAVING after that one as I wanted to get to Michele’s to drop off the housewarming gift and take some pictures.

But then Steve and Brian showed up.

And then Grant.

And then Derrick.

And then Mari and Gunter.

And finally, who walks through the door but Patrick and Michele!

“HEY! I was going to go to your house and drop off a present!”

“Well, where were you?”

“HERE! ….. You know how that goes.”

It was a sunny day and I finally admitted to the fact that I wasn’t going to be going anywhere, so I had to take some pictures to make up for it. First task for you all is to come up with the bubble sayings. I’m afraid there will be no prizes except blog mention honor. I didn't add that 'Life is fun ' by the way, that's part of the frame.



And finally, if you didn’t notice the poll up at the top right hand side of the page, now is the time to vote for your Favorite Fairy Princess.

KevinDaveBrianSteveGunterDerekPatrickMatt, the Harp Door GuyMichele

Sorry, so sorry...

To all that I saw yesterday and promised a new entry to read on Tuesday, I apologize. I got a little behind in errands and Kevin's broken\sprained foot and dinner and laundry and...well, you get the picture. Not wanting to leave you totally dry until tomorrow, here's this. It's an oldie but a goodie:



See you all on Wednesday!

“Pe-CHANG-gaaaaa!” and Wine Tasting - Temecula, CA

So here it is, the eve before my first day of a new school (or job, but I’m having the same sort of ‘first day of school’ jitters) and it’s raining outside and I just don’t know what to do with myself. I’ve had the last 11 days off of work….of any work. I put in my two weeks notice at my old job but since I’m going to a ‘competitor’ they had me work three days of the two weeks and sent me on my way. After being at my old job for over 3 years (my longest professional job to date) my head wasn’t ready to leave so suddenly and I certainly didn’t prepare myself for 11 days of doing whatever the hell I wanted. Believe it or not, I’m a bit of a planner. I spent the first day of my unplanned vacation just sitting on my ass wondering what the hell to do for the next 10 days.

Kevin was thankfully with me for my unplanned vacation. He (unfortunately of course) had knee surgery on my very last day of work. Due to the pain and swelling, the doctors didn’t let him come back to work until last Friday. Although Kevin is in a lot of pain and does a lot of ‘ow ow ow’-ing at unexpected times (and expected times when I slap his knee for being cheeky forgetting that it’s the bad knee) it’s been nice having someone to do rounds of “What do you want to do?” “I don’t know, what do you want to do?” with.

By the first Saturday the only thing I could come up with to do with Kevin’s limited ability was go to Temecula. I’ve wanted to go to Vegas for awhile but since Kevin detests gambling I haven’t been able to convince him to go. Temecula is about 80 miles away and has a casino, but it also has loads of wineries. I had my in. I booked the hotel for Wednesday and laid out the wineries we were going to go to, including 2 for 1 tasting coupons for each one and made sure the casino wasn’t too far away from the hotel and had a couple coupons for lunch if we got there early enough. Like I said, I’m a planner. Unfortunately I’m not a ‘remember’-er and forgot about my call-in jury duty before I booked the un-refundable hotel room.


Every day before Wednesday I called in at my needed times with crossed fingers and toes that I wouldn’t actually have to go in and serve. By Tuesday I got the recording that I had to call in on Wednesday at 5 PM. I figured that even if I called and had to come in on Thursday morning, we could still go.

So go we did. We left at 10 AM Wednesday morning thinking that we would run into traffic on the 91 (there’s ALWAYS traffic on the 91) but surprisingly it wasn’t so bad. We were checked into our hotel (the handicapped room again which Kevin swears is what happens when you check into a hotel too early) by noon. Oh, I forgot to mention that due to all the billboards for Pechenga (which is the casino in Temecula) on the drive there, Kevin was constantly saying “Pe-CHANG-gaaaaa!” I’d be talking about something serious, like global warming or the new shirt I just bought, and all of a sudden he’d go, “Pe-CHANG-gaaaaa!” Then I’d mention that I might have to pull over to a gas station to go to the bathroom and he’d go, “Pe-CHANG-gaaaaa!”

“What would you like to eat for lunch?”

“Pe-CHANG-gaaaaa!”

“It’s raining, but it might clear up later.”

“Pe-CHANG-gaaaaa!”

“Aren’t those mountains pretty?”

“Pe-CHANG-gaaaaa!”

“How’s your knee feeling?”

“Pe-CHANG-gaaaaa!”

“Can you please stop saying ‘Pechanga’?”

“Pe-CHANG…..oh, ok.”

…..

“OK, you can say it.”

“No, it’s alright.”

“No, go ahead. I know you want to.”

“I don’t have to say it.”

“But you want to. Go ahead, it’s alright.”

……

“Pe-CHANG-gaaaaa!”

After checking into the hotel and grabbing a bit of lunch at a little Mexican place (this side note is for Kevin only as he would be the only one to get the joke: “Do you have any hot sauce?” “Yes.” “……” “Can we have some?”) we headed out to the first winery.

They knew Kevin was coming...

Most of the wineries in Temecula are located off of Rancho California Avenue. There’s a few more off of side roads, but since we figured that we wouldn’t be able to go any more than six of them, the offerings on Rancho Cal Ave. were just fine. Plus, I had the coupons.

The first place we stopped at was La Cereza. The winery was dead which I chalked up to it being 1 o clock on a Wednesday. The bartender at La Cereza had zero personality and I was starting to wonder what the day had in store for us. Typically when you go for a tasting, the bartender will explain where the grapes for that particular wine comes from, the flavors in it, how many barrels were produced, so on and so forth. This guy poured the wine and just stared at us almost as if he was expected us to explain the wine to him. It was a bit unnerving. I typically like to savor the wines (this is also a good trick so you don’t get too hammered on wine tastings) but we started slamming the wines down like we were in a Spring Break body shot competition.

The next winery, Maurice Car’rie was a lot better. The tasting room reminded me of an old farmhouse with a bartender just as ancient. But he was friendly and explained the wine like he was supposed to. I was tempted to hand him an application for employment at La Cereza.




We ended up going to four more wineries, Falkner, Miramonte, Callaway, and Mount Palomar. Mount Palomar ended up being our favorite. One of the best things about wine tasting is striking up conversations with the groups of people at the tasting with you who are basically out having fun and wasting the day away just like you are. Because it was Wednesday, we really didn’t see that many people. Most of the people we did see weren’t really interested in talking to us. Except at Mount Palomar. Not only were the wines delicious, the bartender friendly and gracious on a few free pours, but we ended up talking with a couple from New York. The husband was a New Yorker who gave a lengthy speech on why he doesn’t like people from Long Island and the wife was actually from Trinidad and was definitely getting knackered on all the wine. It was a great time and I would recommend Mount Palomar to anyone who asked. They also had a fantastic patio which I’m sure in the summer is awesome to hang out on.




After the wineries, we ended up going to a place called Aloha because the bartender at Mount Palomar mentioned they had a great happy hour. And they did! Three beers, and two very large appetizers were $21. The New York couple must have had the same idea because they showed up at Aloha shortly after we did. We hadn’t seen them in a couple hours and by this time the little wife from Trinidad was hammered. It was pretty funny.

We reluctantly left the New Yorkers to go to “Pe-CHANG-gaaaaa!” After losing all my money there, I wish we had stayed at Aloha. I shouldn’t say that…I lost the $40 I came in with, then lost Kevin’s $40, then won $140 dollars at a video slot machine in the bar waiting for Kevin to come out from the bathroom. I gave Kevin $100 then lost the $40, then got $60 from the ATM (as Kevin wouldn’t give me any of the $100…smart man) and lost that too. So (let me add that up)….I guess I lost $40 when it was all said and done and Kevin lost nothing. I guess that isn’t so bad. We still should have stayed at Aloha.

After “Pe-CHANG-gaaaaa!” we grabbed some to-go food from Denny’s and went back to the hotel. It was an awesome time and I think for the close proximately it is to us, we’ll probably go back to Temecula again soon. Oh, and call-in jury duty? Yeah, I completely forgot to call 5 PM on Wednesday. I remembered at 6 PM Thursday night…sweating bullets I called the number and found out that my group never had to come in and they were since released from calling in. Wooo!

Diva Dish - Brea, CA

There are three different ways I can start this entry. They are as follows:

• Tell you about the weirdness of living in close proximity to Los Angeles (but not IN Los Angeles as I’ve tried to stress to people before) and therefore having encounters with more-than-NOT-famous people…
  
• …or tell you about how growing up I used to be in a bunch of plays, both junior high and high school…
  
• ...or the anecdote in which I mention how all my friends out here are older than me, that after I wrote it out, wasn’t even amusing enough to warrant a ‘hmmmm’.

But I'm not going to. Actually, I had written up 3 more very thought provoking bullet points of why I wasn't going to start with those things, but my hand did some weird force of nature twisty-bendy thing on the keyboard and I lost those thoughts forever. Don't worry, any bullet point that mentioned Harry Anderson from Night Court isn't worth re-typing.

So where does that leave us? It’s basically an entry without a beginning. Well there you go. This is what happens when I start to slack in my regular writing.

On Sunday afternoon (notice, I’m just going straight to the middle part) I went on Orange Country Register’s website, looked up events for that day that were less than 30 miles from my house, and decided that I would go to Brea to see a one man comedy tribute show to his mother called Diva Dish.

The website describes the show (in case you don’t feel like clicking that link and watching the little video) as:

• Most people only get to see Hollywood stars on screen. Luke Yankee got to see them up close.
  
  As the son of Academy Award® winning actress Eileen Heckart, Luke Yankee got up close and personal with some of the biggest stars the world has ever known. This live, multimedia event is like a fabulous party with the biggest stars from Broadway and Hollywood.

It sounded fairly interesting and admittedly I haven’t seen a play in about 10 years so I figured why not. As well, I’ve never been to Brea (as it’s “inland”) so there was that too.

I ended up leaving the house an hour early so I could go grab something to eat before the show. I ended up going to the Cheesecake Factory. I’m telling you this so you don’t make the mistake of going to the Cheesecake Factory in Brea, CA on a Sunday afternoon and order the soup\salad\half sandwich plate. The salad was limp, the soup lukewarm, and the sandwich bread so tough it cut the roof of my mouth. I went ahead and ordered the cheesecake, because you know…the CHEESECAKE Factory…but found that it was frozen solid. I should have complained, but I didn’t. Instead I’m just going to pan the place on the internet for all the world to see.

Don't eat here please.

I didn’t have too much time after lunch to make it to my show, but thankfully the Brea Civic Center was practically in the same parking lot as the mall (and hence, the Cheesecake Factory).


This next picture has nothing what-so-ever to do with this entry, but if you click on it to blow it up, you can see one of the many reasons why I love California in winter. Palm trees with a backdrop of snowy mountain tops. Oh yeeeah. Because I know my dear friends and family in Wisconsin have been dealing with relentless snow (15 inches on Wednesday indeed!) and bone chilling cold (-7 this morning when I looked) I honestly (I do, I swear!) feel bad in mentioning the 80 degree heat wave we’ve had here the last few days. But it has been beautiful and it makes the sting of paying over double in rent to my WI counterparts a bit more bearable.

Wish you were here. No really, I do.

So yeah, the show….I don’t think I have to mention that I was the youngest person there by a fairly long shot. As well, I didn’t know the layout of the theatre and ended up getting a seat in the 2nd row on the aisle. The theatre was small enough that the 2nd row might as well have been ‘on stage’. Most of the show was rather entertaining (I really wish you’d click that link and watch the video because me trying to relate one of the stories isn’t going to cut it) but there were….a couple singing numbers. If you know me at all you have to know how much I hate musicals. And when the man started singing, because I was practically on stage, sometimes he would be looking RIGHT AT ME. Of course I was trying my best not to grimace (I really really HATE musicals) so I kept having to look away and stare at the floor. Which made my neck hurt. I can’t exactly go around panning (I like that word today) a show about a man’s dead mother can I? I’m not the devil you know. I liked the ‘dish’ about Marilyn Monroe. I liked the ‘dish’ on Lucille Ball. I liked the ‘dish’ on Ethel Merman. I hated the singing. I hated the ‘doing the last scene of some play with my dead mother’ with the use of modern technology. But since most of it was funny stories, it was good enough for me to sit through it all. I’d give it a solid 6 out of 10. Maybe a 7 if I was sitting farther back.

A very illegal photo I took of the stage I was practically sitting on.

I think I’m going to start a website called ‘Ban the Music in Musicals’. Anyone with me?

Date Night & Restaurant Week - Newport Beach, CA

It’s been one hell of a week and I’ve got a lot of things I want to get out of my head so I’m apologizing in advance if this entry is a bit scattered. Quite admittedly, my thoughts are not at all in a good place so I might come across a bit complain-y rather than funny and I apologize for that too. I’ve found over the years that writing is therapeutic when I’m trying to work something out and maybe that’s what I’m hoping happens here. I apologize for that too, especially for dragging you all into it. Oh, and I don’t have any pictures which really sucks. I might have to steal grab some off the internet just to add some color.

Where to begin? Well, to start off with, I vowed to myself on New Years Day that I would make an effort to get a lot of stuff I find an absolute hassle to deal with to just get it done already. These hassles I’m referring to almost completely involve medical and dental professionals, most of whom I have a complete aversion to, especially medical and dental professionals in the State of California.

I made a dental appointment, for example, after having nothing but bad experiences with dentists out here. In 2000, I almost went to small claims court with the first California dentist I saw. CA dentists are really that bad. In Wisconsin, when you are a new patient and you go to a dentist for a cleaning, the following happens: you get X-rays, and then you get a cleaning. You’ll probably get a fluoride treatment too if you ask nicely for it. In California, it’s a lot different. First of all, the only dentists your typical work insurance will cover are new dentists fresh out of dental school and typically fresh in the country. Another thing that is annoying is the obvious way that CA dentists try to extort the insurance companies. If you are a new patient in CA, the following happens: You go in for X-rays and an examination of your teeth and gums. Then you make an appointment for a ‘deep cleaning’. After the ‘deep cleaning’ you make another appointment for the ‘cleaning’. After the ‘cleaning’, you make another appointment to get one of the following, usually made-up procedures done, like gum treatments, invisible cavities, or whitening. Anything at all to make you give them more money. This is also the reason why it takes 4 months to get the first appointment.



So I made the appointment (I mentioned before that I was complain-y, right?) and figured out a way to get in sooner than the 4 month wait list. I told them my insurance was running out (lie) and that I had to get in sometime in the next two week. Not surprisingly, I got an appointment the very next day. Since I had X-rays done at another dentist 6 months ago (but couldn’t afford his prices to continue seeing him) I told the current dentist that I wouldn’t need X-rays because even if there was anything there, I wouldn’t be around to take care of it (lie) and please could I just get the cleaning. She, all of 28 and Indian, agreed. This is where I finally learned that a CA ‘cleaning’ is just a ‘polish’ and the WI cleaning that I was so accustomed to was actually the ‘deep cleaning’. Now, of course, I have to find a new dentist in the next 6 months to get a real cleaning. I am a bit grateful that I only got the polish though as this dentist was terrible. She missed half my teeth with the polish and kept squirting me in the eye with the cleaning tool. I hate to think of what would have happened if she had a sharp pokie instrument in my mouth.

OK, got that rant off my chest. Now on to the fun stuff…

One of the new things I did this past week was have Date Night. Kevin and I have been dating for close to 6 years now and save for the couple dates we had back in high school we’ve never really gone on a proper date. You all know we went on a couple dates in high school right? Quick update if you didn’t…I was 14, he was 16, we went on two dates…one to a school play, the other to a movie (Fletch Lives) then coffee…then he never called me again the bastard. He claims now that he had thought I was too goody-goody and he didn’t want to corrupt me. First of all, I think that’s a big ole lie to make me feel better but if it isn’t, he should have just waited a year. Just saying.

So yes! Date Night. We started off at what is slowly becoming one of my favorite restaurants if I could actually afford to go there on a regular basis, Billy’s at the Beach. It’s a high-end Hawaiian Fusion type place and they have the most awesome steaks. With your meal comes a salad, and instead of coming out in a little plate, it comes out on a lazy susan type thing with all your add-ons (onions, mushrooms, hearts of palm) and dressings in little dishes around it. Any place where I don’t have to utter the words, “Ranch, no onions please” when I order my salad is a good place. With dinner, drinks, coffee, dessert, and tip our bill was a hefty $150 bucks. We spent close to two hours there though and it was well worth it. After dinner we had, what I can only describe as, really full bellies. Tongue in cheek I suggested that we take a long walk on the beach, but that’s actually exactly what we did next. We parked the car on the peninsula and walked along the boardwalk for an hour or so. We looked (inside) at all the fancy houses and I kept making jokes about running into a dead body in the sand. After the walk, we had a couple cocktails at the Shamrock and called it a night.



But wait! There’s more….

It was also Restaurant Week in Newport this week! Every year around this time, about 70 or so restaurants in Newport Beach\Corona Del Mar participate in Restaurant Week. Basically they offer a 3 course meal for $15 per person at lunch and $35 for dinner. Most of the restaurants are pretty fancy places that normally charge $15 for a small salad. I couldn’t turn away from a chance to eat at a couple of these fancy places…it’s really the only time I could normally afford to do so.

The first place we hit was Arches. Arches is a Newport Beach institution and has a reputation for being one of the most over priced places to eat in the area. Kevin and I mistakenly walked in there one time not knowing this and were guilted into ordering an appetizer plate of $16 crab cakes. It came with 4 crab cakes that were very small. Kevin said that they were pretty good -not $16 good, but good. I had pretty high expectations for Arches during Restaurant Week, so I blame myself for being pretty disappointed. For $15, we got a micro-caeser salad, a super skinny piece of chicken in a lemon-caper sauce with pasta, and cherries jubilee (aka: ice cream with a couple of marinated cherries). It was tasty but I don’t think it justified $15 and I certainly don’t think it justified the normal price they charged for this meal.



Not to be deterred, the next day we went to Rothschild’s for lunch. I don’t expect anyone to remember, but Rothschild’s was one of the many places we hit for the Corona Del Mar eating tour last year. Rothschild’s gave you a little bit more variety in their Restaurant Week menu than Arches. I ended up getting the minestrone soup, meat cannoli, and tiramisu. Kevin had the bruschetta, chicken, and gelato. The apps were great, the main course was ok, and the dessert was absolutely fucking fabulous. Sorry to swear there, it was just that good. I ate all of mine and admittedly stole quite a bit of Kevin’s. The desserts themselves were worth $15, I swear. I want one (or both) of them right now.



I had wanted to hit a couple more places for dinner but Kevin kindly reminded me that even though it’s not as expensive as usual, it’s still expensive. He’s so smart. Maybe one of these days I’ll go on a dessert tour though. Rothschild’s tiramisu is first on that list.

Gah. You know what? I feel better. I had a couple more rants stored up in my head but after writing this all out, I don’t feel so…rant-y anymore. So, you know, you all got away a lot easier than I thought you all would.

I’ll be back in a week or so. This weekend is pretty low key…the rain is falling, the cat is curled up in a little ball by my side, and Kevin is playing video game on my other side…it’s just a good weekend to stay in and do….not much at all.