The LDS and the Cowboys

After shivering through the night I left for Idaho Falls to visit and stay at my cousin Dan and his lovely wife Liz's house. I got to meet little Jack Henry for the first time. The little toe headed boy is a riot.

The Pumpkin

I had gotten to Portland¹ not to far into the evening, around 4 PM. My generous host, Bill, led me to my room where I was able to catch up on some reading and listen to the transcendent set by Tig Notaro at Largo in LA.² Bill had some papers to grade and I needed a shower.

The Bay and the Redwoods

Let me tell you that Los Angeles has the worst rep for traffic. However, getting on the Bay Bridge felt much worse than sitting on the 10. It was such a long line I decided to pull over and park and go in the Yerba Buena Gardens for a free concert. That was pretty fun for a while. After a half hour I jumped back in the car to listen to the music through rolled down windows. After sitting for 30 minutes I was able to get on the bridge.

 

The Show

Got into Los Angeles and got the full experience right away; sitting in traffic. This was after a beautiful winding road from Arizona to LA. Driving around the mountains up and down through beautiful areas. It was pretty great.

I was greeted in So Cal by the charming Marleta Laatz and met up at Santa Monica Bar Finn McCool's. Usually known as a chain this bar actually did feel like it had a rustic feel of a genuine Irish Pub, unfortunately the Corned Beef sliders were not authentic.

My host had already secured tickets to the famous Upright Citizens Brigade theater where we were to see a show titled “Facebook”. As simple as the name sounds, the team headed that night by Rob Huebel pick two volunteers from the audience and go into a facebook “interview” discussing the persons individual facebook profile. The information gained from the interview and facebook profile turns in to long form improv sketches.

Before going into the show we dipped into the bar next door called La Pouvelle, which was having some sort of Debate party celebration. It was really odd, but they had a decent, if not overpriced beer selection.

The show started and the first audience member selected had an estranged father who was purported as the Elvis in China. Not surprisingly, she was also an aspiring actress who works at a fancy hotel. The sketches set off on directions of “Lady Chill Time” #LCT and Elvis of China spilling all sorts of secrets of being behind almost all Chinese mishaps like Foxcon, lead in toys, crushing the dreams of people etc. The second selected person was.......an aspiring actress who was getting singing lessons paid by her mother who it ends up as being the only facebook she uses. She recently retired her own facebook so we were allowed to peruse her mother's spars facebook of 3 friends and 3 pictures. Connected was her father who had a wonderful Real Estate agent photo that was a whole premise of a sketch. All in all a hilarious night of great improv comedy from UCB.

Tonight I meet up with my cousin Anna Henry in the Bay Area.

The Climb

These time changes have me getting up earlier and earlier. In reality, I am waking up at the same time just slowly moving farther west and the curvature of the earth is causing the Sun to be lower. It helps getting to my destination faster though. The drive from New Mexico to Arizona was much livelier than what I was expecting. Driving through the Tonto¹ National Forrest was going up and down through elongated curves. I don't drive a motorcycle, but all the groups of bikers made me want one.

The Horses

The drive to Bluewater Lake State park was very uneventful. There was beautiful scenery, but a very straight drive.

The Abandoned

This is going to be shorter than previous entries. I have a longer drive today and want to get to Bluewater Lake State Park before it is dark to set up the tent and get in a shower before nightfall.

Had this all to myself!

The Mishap

After leaving the lovely Alyssa Cunningham's residence, you were a wonderful host, I drove on down to Kansas City. I started out at the excellent Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art. It had great open space in for a city block or so of beautiful green grass with tree lines along each of the sides. The walkways were in the shade and scattered throughout were sculptures; most prominently features William Moore a sculptor from Topeka, Kansas.

The Courier

The Courier

This job sounds pretty nice. I mean the problem I have with it is that I would rather get a couple hours in Los Angeles to go explore. I mean basically you are a truck driver who travels for 10 hours a day. The other portion is that there is no job satisfaction in this job at all.

You are delivery boy for a CEO but you have no impact in any shape or form. However, it would be an opportunity to change the CEO's mind is nice. He needs to see you at least 5 minutes a day. You can make these 5 minutes either cordial talking about the weather and last nights game or you can talk about the direction of the company.

The other issue is there is no vacation time. I mean I would imagine I'm getting all sorts of miles for a trip from New York to LA. Do I commit for 3 years and then take an awesome basically free vacation somewhere with all the airline miles?  I mean that would make for an excellent vacation to somewhere in Europe.

My diet would immediately go in a funk. Since you are taken to the office and back to the airport that means you MUST eat airport food. This food is not healthy and it definitely will not have variety. How would one subsist on fast food and not even real fast food shortened airport menu fast food. I really would need to investigate the LAX airport shops to see the diversity in food.

I would start a relationship with the flight attendants which would be nice. They always seem rushed and perturbed because they are trying to control 200+ people, but I imagine once they see you for the 5th time that week they would adjust and treat you like you understood the rules. 

Also you have 10 hours a day to do whatever you want. That is a lot of time for reading or writing. I could write the next great American novel. But you have been reading this blog that wouldn't happen. I wouldn't take the job.

The Start

At Side Bar

The Meteor

I just want quick rundown of what a person may read here from day to day on this road trip.

First will just be personal thoughts and extended details on what I had done that day. Second will be a thorough discussion of one card of Chuck Klosterman's Hypertheticals: 50 Questions for Insane Conversations.  There will be a 200 to 500 words the question of the day. Here it is easy.

The Plan

This is where it starts. The plan. I do have a couple extra days if I find a spot that demands I stay for another night. Needless to say I am getting excited.