The Ocean Absconded With My Sea Legs

Wednesday, September 07, 2005

My trip to Vegas/California was definitely something I needed to get out of a slump. Plus I always need a nice long drive to remind me that buying plane tickets can be a good thing.

So much happened, and I don't feel like writing a book on it, but I am going to put the highlights of this trip down.

My cousin Nicole and I left at 2:00 on Friday. It was pretty non-eventful, with great conversation that made the ride go much faster and smoother. Midway into the trip we drove into a gorgeous rest stop and downed two beers each to balance out all of the energy drinks we had been guzzling.

Got into Vegas around 8:30 to stop at my cousin Kurt's house. I hadn't seen him in years. He has the cutest wife named Elizabeth and an equally cute little boy named Austin. Other cousins Suzanne and Michele were there as well. We had a good dinner and sat down for reminiscent times.

After that we followed Michele and Suzanne to their place. Michele took Nicole and I out to a casino sans strip. You will soon find that people who live in Vegas never want to go to the strip, it has become old and tedious. We had some of the best margaritas and bloody marys I have had in my life. I got drunk really fast, and we left around midnight.

Michele got more beer. Her, Nicole, and I sat on her back balcony having some of the best conversation in the world. These girls are related to me but I feel almost like they are these intelligent strong deities. I feel like I should be paying for their company. Four o'clock was bedtime.

Wake up at ten on Saturday hungover. Vegas will do that to you. You don't even have to be on the strip to want to be drunk or in some sort of party mode.

Suzanne agreed to drive us to California which was very nice of her considering Nicole and I would have been taking baseball bats to cars by the end of this trip if we had to drive them anymore.

We got into Redondo Beach at 5:00 and right over to my cousin Charise's house. Her boys Cody and Colton are eight now, I swear every time I see them they have gotten bigger and smarter. I all of the sudden feel like the old crazy cousin that wants to pinch their cheeks and kiss them all over. If I did that I am sure I would get a nice shin kicking!

Charise took us to see this view of the ocean that was indescribable. I guess anyone's first view of the ocean is just that though. It is so infinite.

Then we went to Joe's Crab Shack. Travel weary, I couldn't believe there were so many damn birthdays in one day and Joe's likes to let you know it with dancing, singing and strobe lights that were seconds away from giving me a seizure. At least the food and company made it worth it.

Sunday, Nicole and I decided to hit up the beach. It was Labor Day Weekend so there was a market going on. Everyone in California seems pretty casual, walking around in their bathing suits, no need for makeup. I thought it would be Silicone Valley of the Scary Barbie Dolls, but even people with cellulite let it all hang out.

It was 72 and a bit overcast and I took a big step in my life and gasp!!! I wore a bikini top and laid in the sun. It was euphoric. I could see now why people get suckered down there.

We walked out to the ocean and I tentatively put my feet in and stood there for a few moments before we left the beach.

Remember when I said people in Cali were laid back? Well I was wrong in a way. Nicole and I stood by a building having a cigarette, minding our own business when this woman shouted "Excuse me! Excuse me!" Instinct told me she wanted a cigarette to because that is what always happens in Utah, so as I was acknowledging her and getting ready to reach into my purse, I see this blonde the weight just melted off after I had the baby woman with her husband and child.

"Can you two please not smoke?" she said. "I have my child out here." She was literally 25 feet away from us. Talk about ownership of the air. Californians think they do. We kindly obliged and went to stand by the dumpsters like the trash we were. Muttering about how her baby was just going to get cancer anyway because of all the smog.

After showering at Charise's and having a nice dinner she cooked for us we hit up tourist trap Hollywood. It is amazing, the history of that place. But it is so dirty and sketchy out there, that you couldn't pay me to live there.

I went to Sephora and dropped $70 just like that. It was getting dark and we decided to head home. All the crazies come skittering out of the woodwork about then. We walked by a gang of guys yelling at a person with his girlfriend in front of us saying "What you lookin' at Motherfucker? Huh? Huh? Look again I bust a cap in you." Sure enough the dumbass kept looking as one of the men lifted his shirt to reveal a gun. The guy ducked into the Ripley's Believe It Or Not Museum only to be followed by them. Wow, if I ever go down, I don't want it to be because I looked at someone.

After Hollywood, we got back to Redondo and had a nice sit down at Bucca De Beppo. I am amazed at what one glass of wine can do to a person.

Nicole, Suzanne, and I headed to our hotel room we were staying in that night, but first stopped off at the Drugstore to get more drinks. Hey, if one glass of wine can make me feel that good what can half a bottle do for me?

As Suzanne headed down for a slumber, Nicole and I sat outside finishing the wine. In our drunken excitement at two in the morning we decided to walk down to the beach.

We passed a bar that was having last call. I always forget about the free pouring that goes on out of state so our drinks were all man. I think I would have been a lot different had I just stuck to the wine.

Bar closed, we walked to the ocean, first thing we do? Run in. The water was warm. The moon was out and the waves were crashing down like mad. After we got our clothes soaked, I decided to put my pants and shirt with my purse on the beach. We laid in the ocean for what had to be more than an hour. It was unlike any experience I have ever really had.

After a while we stumbled out to make our arduous journey home. I could not, for the life of me, find my pants. The ocean must have eaten them. Luckily I had a long sweater, but somehow managed to also lose my tank top in the process. So I am walking down the street at four in the morning with no shirt or pants with a long sweater.

Some guy stopped Nicole and I and shouted "Hey! Do you know how to get to this or that place or the other?" We told him we weren't from there and he almost acted offended that we couldn't help. He said he was from Arizona and his buddies ditched him and he was lost. I said "Look on the bright side, it could always be worse. YOU COULD BE MISSING YOUR PANTS!!!!"

We of course got lost and had to call Anthony, Charise's husband at four in the morning to come get us. He later told Charise that we looked like a bunch of hobos.

Nicole and I stumbled into bed talking pirate talk and how the ocean stole my sea legs with an occasional drunken yarrr yarrr coming out of our mouths.

Waking up the next day reminded me why I never drink wine. I was covered head to toe to crevice to orifice to crack in sand. I cannot believe I slept like that. I think I had swallowed way too much sea water the night before.

In a desperate attempt to stave off any impending doom, I drank some Immodium and had some breakfast with Suzanne, Charise and Nicole.

After getting the hell beat out of me, it was time to leave California. Suzanne, Nic and I packed up and took off.

We reached Vegas around four, hit with the reality that we still had a seven hour drive ahead of us.

We got a nice dinner of burger and fries and made our way out around 5:30. This was exhausting.

Mid way through getting home the saltwater, and all the bad food I had eaten began its course of revenge on me. Poor Nicole was stopping at every other rest stop for me which I am sure delayed our trip home by a good hour. No amount of Immodium was going to stop my stomach's protest at this point.

I took over the driving and lasted maybe an hour before I started to hallucinate and things started blurring together. Some guy had also pulled so close behind me that it was unnerving because I was going about 90 and that just wasn't good enough for him so had to start flashing his brights at me. Bit of advice for you angry drivers, don't flash your brights at a night blind person it makes it worse. I was quickly gaining on a semi too that was going far slower. The asshole passed me and pulled up in front of me. Surprise, he was behind the semi that was going slower than I and he happened to be boxed in. Nicole and I decided it was time to be funny, so I pulled up behind that guy as close as I could and started to flash my brights at him repeatedly. He couldn't do anything or go anywhere, so we had a good tired laugh over that.

After violating every bathroom from Vegas on up to Utah, we were finally home.

I ran inside put my stuff away and passed out.

I had to work the next day at 9:30 but that is a whole other story.