Month: April 2012

March 30, 2012 — Houston, TX

We left Simi Valley bight and early at 8:00am. Chris’ kids had a doctor’s appointment, so Denise and I figured that we should get an early start and make tracks for Houston. Since people were already starting to as where we were and when we would get places, I decided to turn on the Byonics MicroTrack AIO APRS tracker that Joe had loaned the the Pearl so that people could tell where we were. Tracker lit, we cruised out of Simi Valley torned south onto the 405 and then the 10 — where we more-or-less stayed until we hit Houston.

It took us until about midnight to get from LA to El Paso, TX. It then took us until late afternoon to get from El Paso to Houston — driving in shifts, swapping off about every four hours when we got tired. Denise was a complete trooper through all of this — game for anything. Actually, it was she who suggested that we drive straight through to Houston. I figured it would be a good idea as it would let us know how we might do with staying alert and running shifts on a longer passage.

There isn’t much to say about the trip except that it was long. Curious highlights were the “Tokyo Massage” offered in the back room of a sleazy feeling gas station/diner in Blythe, CA. No I did not get one, though Denise suggested I be a bit more adventurous. I on the other hand was a bit concerned about peeing there on the off chance I caught some dread disease. I noted that Denise wisely DID NOT use the facilities there.

The other curious highlight of the trip was a yard in Harper Texas. Instead of following I-10 through San Antonio to Houston, we decided to take a “short cut” along Highway 290 through Fredricksberg and Austin instead of keeping on the loop to the south on I-10. Harper in an interesting town in an interesting area. The town is SOLIDLY bible belt. There were more churches than gas stations — which may be true of most places other than big cities — but people seemed pretty religious. The other curious feature was a “red neck” yard decorated with the slowly decaying carcasses of airplanes?!? That was worth a second look.

Apart from those two events and a side trip to Fry’s in Phonenix. Needless to say, Denise and I were thrilled to get to my brother Suren’s house that next evening and establish base camp for a week.

March 20, 2012 — Los Angeles, CA

Today was a pretty easy day. Last evening, we got to visit with Nira, Joe, Faye, Avanish, and kids. Today it was Tom and Phil (aka Fido) who live in Santa Cruz, CA followed by a night stop at with my cousin Chris and his family in Simi Valley.

We initially met up with Phil in San Jose, CA where he was working on a couple of projects at TechShop (see www.techshop.com), a candy store for anyone with a lust for really cool and expensive tools: 3-D printers, laser etching printers; hudro-jet cutters, and CAD assisted routing tables, the list goes on. Phil was busy custom etching some of his electronic cigarettes (see www.e-smokeytrats.com) for customers so after taking a tour of the facility, Denise and I headed over the hill to Santa Cruz for lunch with Tom, a technologist, master gardener, [kite and board] surfer, and all around good guy.

After lunch at Rumble Fish, a decent sushi restaurant in Scotts Valley, we all headed over to the e-SmokeyTreats Corporate offices where Phil was supposed to give me a quick lesson in how to become a “stone cold killing machine” with a pole spear and possibly get me back into scuba diving. Tom, who’s also a diver/spearfisher giggled hysterically at Phils instruction and assertion re my potential as a stone, cold, dispatcher of ichthyians. Regardless, I left with Phil’s priced and as yet unused carbon-fibre pole spear and a promise to send him a picture of the first fish I speared with it.

Despite Phil’s generally relaxed attitude, he’s one of the two people I try to suck into the more hairball activities in which I engage. Phil’s every talented and extremely capable — and for some reason is motivated to come save my a**. Joe’s the other person who fits the same bill — though more with technology than physical/mechanical stuff which is Phil’s forte.

After a fun afternoon with Phil and Tom, our path turned east and then south. We were headed for the LA area — an environement I try to avoid at all costs. My cousin Chris, however, had bought a new house and had been lobbying for me to come down and visit after he’d been up to see me in Portland.

When we finally got to Chris’ in Simi Valley, we were warmly greeted by Chris, his wife Julian, and his twin sons — who had grown a lot since I had last seen them. Julian and Chris had very graciously prepared a Sri Lankan dinner with chiken curry, black pork curry, veges and fixins’. It was great. The perfect recipe for a nice warm sun-shiny day.