rhapsodic.org

I Didn't Get You Anything, Sorry

I got approximately zero amounts of sleep last night because Lacey was up every 10 minutes, and I had to make sure she got all the way outside before she vomited.

Note to the internet: just because it's really adorable that your 12 pound dog likes to eat the tiny green tomatoes you toss her from your tomato plants doesn't mean she should eat them. They are a wee little bit toxic.

But! All of that time awake petting my moaning dog womdering if I should take her to the emergency vet clinic means I finally finished going through all of my vacation shots and uploaded them to Flickr.

Because I have priorities.

Herein lies my vacation wrap-up, something I'm sure only my mother will read all the way through. JIM and JR will only read far enough to see what I said about them, and Steve will only skim it to see which embarrassing photos of him I post.

Because of the wonderful service Priceline provides, we took the long route to San Francisco through Los Angeles. Standing in three different lines at LAX trying to check in for our connecting flight to San Francisco, we determined rather quickly that the season's most coveted accessories are anything gold lame and silicone breasts.

We got to San Francisco hungry and tired and smelly. So it's a good thing we scheduled dinner with JIM and JR for that first day. We didn't want to give them any wrong impressions about Alaskans being cultured and civilized or anything.

At dinner we learned that these two really are pretty funny, despite their internet ghostwriters. And JR's wife? Steve and I had money on whether she was real or a Real Doll, but she actually does exits. Anne Marie was sweet and charming, JR quite entertaining, and JIM's accent was wonderful.

JIM's accent was so wonderful that we kidnapped him and tied him up in the basement of the house we were staying at and forced him to go to Six Flags with us and Damon and Mike the next day.

We rode crazy fun rides (well, not JIM because JIM is a little girl like that) and I never puked once. But I did get to see a peeing giraffe and a walrus trying out what he had just learned about the birds and bees. The entire walrus experience. Up close and personal.

Uploaded by robotkarateman

Then we took a driving tour of northern California with Damon as our guide: Santa Cruz and it's "real" beach with real "hot" sand that will "burn" your "feet". The lobby of the Monterey Bay Aquarium where I molested an otter. A whole lot of crawling traffic. Del Monte Avenue 13 times.

And finally, the Winchester Mystery House, on time for the last tour with a 30-second buffer. Our tour guide gave us the speedy version of the tour so she could get home early, made bad jokes about the spookiness of the irrelevant number 13, and scared the little girl in our tour half to death.

It was a great house and Mrs. Winchester was very, very crazy. I'm glad we were able to make it, even if it did mean giving up the Monterey Bay Aquarium.

We spent all Tuesday in San Francisco, and since Damon couldn't chauffeur us around the entire time (which: what gives?), we were dependent on the public transportation system. It's a great system, unless you happened to grow up in a tiny town in Alaska where public transportation means the ferry system out to Kodiak, and only tourists want to go to Kodiak.

We wandered through the Museum of Modern Art and decided rather quickly that we don't much care for Matisse's sculptures. We took the bus down to Fisherman's Wharf to yell at special Californian vegan web developer seagulls and experience the Ripley's Believe It or Not! Museum.

The museum was a whole lot more fun than I had expected, and I really enjoyed it. If you're into wacky things like guys who can swallow light bulbs whole and then regurgitate them, I would highly recommend it.

On our way back to Damon's I had a little breakdown with being directionally challenged. I'm great with maps, not so much with cardinal directions: when standing on a street corner, I couldn't tell you which way was north to save my life. Add this with one part PMS and you can imagine the fun bus ride Steve had.

We made Damon drive us to IKEA because the crap! Is cheap! And pretty! But as soon as we got to the kitchen section - the one section I really wanted to paw through - they started turning out the lights. Very disappointing.

Wednesday was mostly devoted to shopping. California has this wonderful thing where stores that I have seen online or in catalogs actually have physical stores that you can wander around in. It's crazy! I know!

Steve let me coo and giggle in Sephora for a good 45 minutes while I bought this skincare set, eyeshadow in Golden Orchid, 35mm, and Take II, as well as some new makeup brushes to replace the ones that fell into the toilet. Because: ew. No.

We also went to Carol Doda's Champagne & Lace Lingerie Boutique, nestled in a nice little courtyard away from the business of the city.

Ms. Doda had been a stripper in the 60s and one of the first to get breast implants, so I figured she'd know a thing or two about bazoombas. She was quite a character and a bit spacey, but she knew very little about proper fit and sizing; mostly she knew what looked good.

After Doda's, we took another bus to Golden Gate Park where everything was already closed. But it was a wonderful walk and I discovered something about myself: I have a negative amount of street smarts.

Large city park with homeless and quite possibly drug deals going on not ten feet away? Probably isn't the best time to pull out my new $1000 camera.

That night, our last in San Francisco, was spent with the talented and funny cast of Beach Blanket Babylon, where every act was so over-the-top it put drag shows to shame.

The next morning we flew to Las Vegas where we immediately died of the heat. Alaskans aren't meant to survive in deserts, it's a proven fact. And the temperature just got worse and worse.

We took a Very Long Nap Indeed that was the bestest nap I had ever had. Then we walked up and down the strip feeling disappointed we didn't think to bring any skank wear and trying to collect escort service trading cards. We didn't try very hard, but we still managed to come home with 26 different cards.

We spent some quality time with the hotel pool, and later we got to experience Star Trek, which really was pretty silly and pretty fun. I tried to lick a Klingon, but had to settle on a model space ship when Steve feared the Klingon would gut me.

Uploaded by robotkarateman

We managed to meet up with Rachael and experience Fremont Street. There are so much visual stimulation in Las Vegas, and Fremont Street is no exception. There was some country band I didn't recognize, a light show up above that we missed, and a muscled guy swinging around on two bedsheets. Rachael could hardly contain herself.

I'm sad that I didn't get more time with Rachael, especially since I just found out she will not be moving back to Alaska at the end of the month like she promised.

But not sad enough to blow off seeing "O" by Cirque du Soleil. It was beyond fabulous, my favorite acts being the Russian Swing and Bateau. I was very sad when the curtain closed. Highly recommended, A++++ would see again.

We only did a little bit of the gambling experience while in Vegas: Steve broke even thanks to the casino in the airport, and I ended up losing about $10. Big spenders, I know. But the heat really was enough to make us want to lay down and die.

Our last morning in Vegas we did quite a bit of walking looking for a gambling supply store, and while we found the store we didn't like any of their selection. I did manage to pick up some heat exhaustion, though. That was the last straw to make me whine for Alaska. Which I'm sure Steve appreciated.

If you're interested in looking at all 140 of my vacation shots (and really, WHO WOULDN'T be interested?), you can get them all here. You can also check out Steve's, with all of the embarrassing shots of me, of Six Flags, San Francisco, and Las Vegas.