Superbowl Sunday

At the beginning of trip-planning, I decided that Superbowl Sunday should be a day of rest, relaxation, and junk food no matter where I am in my journey. So when it happened that Superbowl Sunday watching could be tackled in Las Vegas, I was very okay with it. 

Because I'm moving to outside of the San Francisco area, it was only natural that I root for the 49ers. Although my soul is forever pledged to those underling runts, the Cleveland Browns, I need to figure out some things to bond with my new neighbors over... since I'm not really into hardcore environmentalism or astrology. 

 

I woke up to this view. Those are mountains. Like the kind made out of dirt and rocks. Ohioans, take note!

Since Allison had to work a ridiculous double-shift, it was myself and Cap'n Dave. We started off the morning casino-bound to hedge our bets. A few quick sights along the way: 

 Chocolate fountain to the OMGth degree. Jean-French-Something Patisserie. Stunner.

As an added perk of Dave and Allison living where Dave and Allison live, there was just a stretch limo there to take us out to the strip in the morning. No big deal. But yeah, I was freaking out.

Eventually, we ended up at HofbrauHaus for junk food and game-watching, which was an excellent call. The place is a German palace of brew and potatoes, and it's only one of two in the US. The place is absolutely Vegas - kind of kitschy, over-the-top, and HUGE.

 

Their retail store sold liederhosen!

Naturally, beer was sold by the liter.

Souvenir for the day! A one-liter HB beer mug. I probably won't use it for beer. Because owwww my liver.
 
After watching the game, and you all know what happened, I hung my head in shame and Dave and I made the crawl down the strip back to the apartment, absolutely exhausted. Something about a buttload of beer, junk food, and excited people meant two sleepy drunks. Here are some sights on the strip from along the way! I made sure not to add the picture of the drunk blonde puking on a sidewalk, because I have class.

This is the Chinese-New-Year themed chocolate sculpture in the Aria. Someone has too much time on their hands!

But no, really, Aria is gorgeous. And my favorite casino on the strip. Well-decorated, and it's a tad bit classier than some of the other joints. Like it doesn't totally smell like smoke and the cocktail waitresses don't all look like escorts and there are no weird stains on the carpets.

But Vdara's probably still my favorite hotel there, based on coffeebar alone.

This is Crystal in the recently-constructed City Center. It's a mall that no one can afford to shop in. 

Las Vegas is a great city. It's an honest city. It's about money, sex, and food. And it doesn't try to cover that up. And they spend time and money to make things fun to look at. In general, I own too much plaid to live there, but every once in awhile, it's a fantastic place to visit.

Family Breakfast/Sin City

Day #6 Miles: 424

Day #6 States: 2 (Arizona, Nevada)

Mileage Total: 2553

The fun part about this tail end of my trip is that I get to stay with people that I know. Staying alone in hotels is kind of awkward and stressful. The environment is so bland, so dull, so lifeless. There’s not a touch of me to anything there, so feeling comfortable doesn’t come easily. But following my delightful evening of surprising the crap out of my brother, I finally had the option of sleeping at a home. And not just anyone’s home, but my brother and Wesley’s home. And let me tell you, their couch is comfy. I slept like a rock. 

We rose in the morning, got dressed, repacked the car, and did as Jewish families typically do: we went to go eat. Eating’s a big thing in Jewish culture, if you hadn’t noticed. It’s a major way in which we express our affection for one another, by giving one another the things needed to be comfortable and satisfied. If you enter a Jewish house, we show respect and caring towards our guests by feeding them. And since my parents are in Ithaca, my brother is in Arizona, and I’m headed out towards San Jose, we won’t get the opportunity to eat together for a while. 

 The Gold Goat

As a crew, we headed towards the less-respectable ‘hood in Tucson for a place called Mariscos Chihuahua for some Mexican-style seafood. 

The interior was the most tacky thing I’d ever seen. It’s a seafood restaurant decorated like under-the-sea, including stucco waves painted shades of frothy blue, and plastic fish adhered to the walls. Somewhere between a theme-park and an aquarium gone horribly awry. 

Things ordered included oysters, fresh ceviche (made with chunks of shrimp, tomato, onion, fresh cilantro, and topped with avocado), and one of their entrees, Camarones Rancheros. 

I knew that ‘camarones’ meant shrimp, but I didn’t quite know what ‘rancheros’ meant. Turns out, it referred to the shrimp being boiled in a slightly-spicy tomato broth with green peppers and onions. Tasty, but nothing too inspiring. It was served alongside some iceberg, some deeply depressing French fries, and some rice that was cooked rather unusually. It tasted like it was cooked like a really traditional Thai coconut-sticky rice, but instead of using coconut as a boiling liquid, it tasted like they used chicken broth. It was tasty. And corn tortillas on the side, which provided some pretty delightful shrimp tacos.

Tucson, Arizona isn’t really for those that can’t get down and dirty with their Mexican food. Their kind of ‘down home dirty’ local specialty is the Sonoran Hot Dog, which is a hot dog wrapped in bacon and topped with beans, grilled onion, fresh onion, tomato, mayo, mustard, and salsa, and I’ve had a few bites, and it is pretty delicious stuff. It’s referential to the Cleveland style polish boy that we love so much. A chunk of meat done up in a way that’s pleasing to the public. That’s usually what local specialties are about. It’s food that isn’t fancy, it isn’t anything you’d want to eat on a date… or usually wearing anything outside of jeans/sweats. But these dishes refer to food traditions that influence the soul of a city, and for this, getting the opportunity to taste so many local specialties has let me take in the soul of a few very special cities. I’m getting to know America, the real America, one bite at a time.

But all fun meals must come to an end, and after a slightly silly family photo shoot outside the restaurant, I had to hit the road to my end location for the day: Las Vegas, Nevada.

Once again, it was another long day of boring dessert driving that got more and more mountainous the further north I ventured. I’ll spare you the details, it’s nothing interesting. 

This Saguaro cactus looked like it was flicking off the world.

I took a quick coffee break in Phoenix, which, as a city, on the outside seemed pretty lovely and immaculately groomed. 

I took a second fuel break in some tiny BFE town in north Arizona, and I decided to take a quick walk and check out the antique shack next door.

 I thought it looked like the absolute perfect place to find the taxidermied armadillo that I’m so desperate to decorate my house with, but I found something inside that I liked just fine. The woman that owned the shop was there, along with her husband. They’ve lived in the town for ages and made a great living selling western-wear and antiques to tourists making the drive from Flagstaff to Phoenix. I was obviously no different. After looking around this place for a while (turned out to be more upscale than anticipated), I noticed a piece on the wall that I really thought was neat: it was a sign that said ‘Welcome’ in cursive, bent out of very old, rusted barbed wire. The husband noticed that I was admiring it and said it was about $40. I said that I liked it, that the concept was cool and I loved the look, but I didn’t quite like the word ‘welcome’ and I didn’t want to pay more than $20. He nodded and told me to follow. He took me to a far workroom in the corner of the store and pulled out a big spool of this same rusty, old barbed wire and he pulled out a pair of working gloves. He smiled and asked what word I would want. I thought about it for a second and decided on the word, “yahoo”. He looked at me like I was bonkers. But I wanted something road-trippy, and the word “Yahoo” reminds me of my dad, and how when I was little, every time I was in the car with him and he would speed over a bump (er… sorry Mom, I mean… safely navigate the roads…), he would get excited and shout “Yahoo!”. And because this was my big road adventure, the would “yahoo” would be quite fitting. 

And then he began molding and bending and curving that old barbed wire into the word ‘Yahoo’, and while he did it, he told me about where the barbed wire came from: apparently, years and years ago, there was an old correctional facility some 30 miles or so out of town that wasn’t getting enough inmates. So as the budget fell into crisis, the place fell into disrepair, and some of the building blocks of the facility were sold for parts, and he came across this barbed wire after no one had bought it and it was going to the trash. I like having things with stories, as mentioned before, hotel rooms are difficult in their blandness, and knowing the history of an object is the deepest means of familiarity. So now, I have this. 

I made it into Las Vegas safely, and got a little bit lost trying to find the building that my friends live in, but it turns out it’s right next to the major Vegas strip, and it’s right behind my favorite casino and hotel. Being in the company of people I have known for so long is comforting, and Allison and Dave are pretty much the best people you could know in Vegas. They’re local, so they know the area, they work here, so they’re well-connected, and they’re collectively the smartest couple I’ve ever met, with collectively the worst case of ADHD. So to top it off, they’ve got loads of energy. It was a really great place to spend a night.

So after a quick tour of the apartment and a quick lesson on how I’m expected to dress if we’re going out (things that are short, things that are tight, things that are low-cut, and high high heels… which, as the evening progressed, I noticed that some women pulled this off a lot better than others), we went out. Dinner was at Lemongrass, a Thai place in the Aria Hotel and Casino, and because Dave’s a high-roller, dinner was comped. After, we settled on drinks, which took place at the Bellagio’s Baccarat Bar, which had some pretty delicious cocktails. Then was a quick stop at Gold Lounge, which was a fairly crowded Vegas club before heading home and calling it a night. 

 The Chinese New Year garden display at the Bellagio was stunning!

 The Dale Chihuly in the entry of the Bellagio

 

 Vegas, the one place where no one bats an eyelash at a guy wearing a snakeskin blazer.

 This might have been one of the best cocktails I've ever had...Knob Creek, fresh white peach puree, lime, house ginger syrup. Fantastic.

 

Also delicious... with the added bonus of a cinnamon-sugar rum. 

 

I got to sleep around 6am Ohio time, and I was zonked. I need to start thinking in terms of California time and adjusting to the fact that all of my friends are three hours ahead of me. I was slightly drunk and texting a friend in Ohio that was just waking up. Weird shit. I can’t deal. Luckily, I have this trio to help me out!

The Southwest Ambush

Day #5 Miles: 463

Day #5 States: 2 (New Mexico, Arizona)

Mileage Total: 2129

So here's the thing. I would love to keep writing and say that the Southwestern desert states are cool and exciting and beautiful. But here's the thing... they're dull as hell (please don't tell New Mexico I said that). As you'll see in the following words/pictures, if you aren't easily impressed with large rocks (and I don't mean jewelry), then my day's drive will seem rather dull to you. But I am a person that is easily impressed (which explains my last 3 exes), so I found the drive to be OK. 

Woke up in the desert. Shocker. Albuquerque during the daytime is pretty alright. I took a roll down the main strip and was pleased that for the most part, it's a non-chain store zone. Then, I really lost my shit. I BOUGHT GAS FOR $2.95 PER GALLON!! My god, it was so beautiful, I nearly cried.

Out past Albuquerque, the roads started to have that cool, glass-like mirage effect that you see in movies when the director really wants to rub in the fact that it's hot out. But it wasn't that hot out. In fact, it was only around 65 degrees. But somehow, light rays were refracted to form false images. It was pretty neat. 

Also in New Mexico... TORNADOES! Okay. Not real tornadoes, but dust devils, the small wind spouts, freckled the ground and landscape. I thought for awhile about pulling over and running after one to get a really good picture, but then I realized that it was probably a bad idea to chase a tornado. Everyone remembers the cow in Twister, and after my past few day's eating, I'm totally getting there. 

There were some pretty neat small town names. I stopped in Elephant Butte for some fuel and a restroom, and there was a guy across the street selling jams and honey, so I sprung for a jar. He had a few teeth. But he was very nice, and the jam samples were delicious, so I ended up with 4 jars of jam and honey. Meh. Gotta stock a kitchen soon enough anyway. 

But soon after Truth or Consequences, I started to wonder about the people living in these trailer camps scattered across acres and acres of desert. What would it be like to live in such a rural place? A place that might not have running water, telephone lines, internet, regular mail services, grocery stores? What do you do for work that you live there? How do you get anywhere? What if you run out of gas or get sick? I recognized that the only way to answer these questions was to get into a conversation with a hardcore redneck, so I've left these unanswered and simply decided never to live anywhere that isolated. And the idea of getting hit by one of these is terrifying:

Hatch, New Mexico, is also called the Chile Capital of the World, and you can see why. Racks and racks of racks of dried, angry-red chiles littered every storefront and market. I wonder if their bowel movements are as painful as their window decoration would insist.

Shortly after passing into Arizona, I was stopped at a US Customs checkpoint. They wanted to make sure I was American. I passed. 

I do not care how badly I have to pee, if the rest stop has more than one sign that says 'Beware of Rattlesnakes', I am not getting out of my car there. 

Another great sign advertised that the Arizona Centennial was last year in 2012. The state is only a hundred years old. To me, from the east, this is shocking. Something about America has this feeling that it's been around forever in my mind. Places like Pennsylvania, New York, and Connecticut are so old and have been states since the US was a thing. How can Arizona be just some shiny new toy of a state that's just starting out? And what about Hawaii??

The surprise of the day was a sneak-attack on my brother, Marshall. As many of you know, he lives down in Arizona, and I've only seen him maybe once a year for the past few years. So I didn't tell him about the route out West that I've been planning. If you've noticed, I don't post where I'm going the next day. It was all to keep it a surprise. My parents are out in AZ visiting my brother, so I had some co-conspirators. I learned that they were spending the evening doing some wine-tasting and then following it up with some dinner at Pastiche, a local upscale restaurant. I thought it'd be fun to just kind of... show up. Show up at some random restaurant in Tucson, Arizona and crash my family's evening and surprise the crap out of my brother and his wonderful significant other, Wesley. I even told him I probably wouldn't see him until April. 

It was awesome. I just walked up to the wine room and kind of looked around and he froze. Marshall just stood there, staring, holding the wine glass. I just kind of said, "surprise!" and then, as a family, we had dinner. It would have been a great moment to bust out some kind of clever one-liner, but I'm not that smart. He just smiled and said, "I got ninja-d". There is no greater blessing than having a badass, awesome, close-knit family... at least two states away.

So right now, I'm back at my brother's place outside of Tucson and I've met my Nephew-Puppy, Simon. He apparently has some eating issues, and I've been advised to hide my shoes.

Also, their bathroom has that neat chalkboard paint, so I've left my mark.