Vacation Recap Day 7: Open Up Your Golden Gates
For those of you keeping track, when I last left off, I was laying my weary head into the gentle folds of a La Quinta in Grant’s Pass, Oregon. With my last motel experience having been the misery that is Microtel, I can’t tell you how pleasant it was to sleep at La Quinta. My restful interlude was broken, however, by an insistent knocking on my door in the morning. It turns out that the clock in Paul and Kanako’s room was a half-hour fast, so Paul thought I was oversleeping. I rushed through my free continental breakfast, and we were on the road again.
Soon we crossed the border into California, and the huge hulk of Mount Shasta began looming in the distance. We stopped right under Mount Shasta, in Weed, California, for gas and refreshments. It was here that I made my second attempt for a free pack of Pall Malls. And, to my surprise, I was successful. The friendly clerk scanned the coupon for a couple seconds and said, “Yeah, I guess we can take this,” and then handed me my free pack of cigarettes. He didn’t even charge me for the tax, like they did at the Walgreens in Chicago. (If anybody wants some Pall Malls, please let me know. I have one and 15/20th packs and coupons for another two free packs.)
In Weed, I also picked up a gift for Toby—a copy of the local Weed Press.
After we hit the road again, we soon entered the northern edge of the vast Central Valley. And, at least several times along the highway, as I was staring at the mountains in the distance or the rows of olive trees rushing by—or pausing from dangling a rattle over Emi’s car seat—I’d notice a neighboring driver gesticulating madly toward our car and mouthing what appeared to be obscenities in our general direction. Apropos of nothing, I would classify Paul’s driving as being firmly in the aggressive column.
Not much happened the rest of the afternoon. We stopped for lunch at an In ‘n’ Out Burgers near Cindy Sheehan’s hometown. (We meant to go to the Vacaville In ‘n’ Out, but we missed it, so we went to the one in Fairfield.) Before I ordered my burger, I asked the clerk if they also made vegetarian burgers. She said they could, but it would only be cheese and lettuce on a bun. After checking if they made fish burgers (all this because Paul is a vegetarian), I ordered two cheeseburgers. She looked at me for a moment and said, “You know they have meat in them, right?”
And then we were crossing the Bay Bridge and entering the city of San Francisco. We went straight to Paul and Kanako’s house in the southeast corner of the city, and we were soon joined by Sei, Christine, Glen, Melissa and Mac. I bought some expensive cheese in the Mission (Cowgirl Creamery and Humboldt Fog, $25 and $20 a pound respectively) and we grilled a good meal. Afterwards, I went with Sei and Christine to the guest bedroom that was to be home base for my adventures over the next couple of days.
Soon we crossed the border into California, and the huge hulk of Mount Shasta began looming in the distance. We stopped right under Mount Shasta, in Weed, California, for gas and refreshments. It was here that I made my second attempt for a free pack of Pall Malls. And, to my surprise, I was successful. The friendly clerk scanned the coupon for a couple seconds and said, “Yeah, I guess we can take this,” and then handed me my free pack of cigarettes. He didn’t even charge me for the tax, like they did at the Walgreens in Chicago. (If anybody wants some Pall Malls, please let me know. I have one and 15/20th packs and coupons for another two free packs.)
In Weed, I also picked up a gift for Toby—a copy of the local Weed Press.
After we hit the road again, we soon entered the northern edge of the vast Central Valley. And, at least several times along the highway, as I was staring at the mountains in the distance or the rows of olive trees rushing by—or pausing from dangling a rattle over Emi’s car seat—I’d notice a neighboring driver gesticulating madly toward our car and mouthing what appeared to be obscenities in our general direction. Apropos of nothing, I would classify Paul’s driving as being firmly in the aggressive column.
Not much happened the rest of the afternoon. We stopped for lunch at an In ‘n’ Out Burgers near Cindy Sheehan’s hometown. (We meant to go to the Vacaville In ‘n’ Out, but we missed it, so we went to the one in Fairfield.) Before I ordered my burger, I asked the clerk if they also made vegetarian burgers. She said they could, but it would only be cheese and lettuce on a bun. After checking if they made fish burgers (all this because Paul is a vegetarian), I ordered two cheeseburgers. She looked at me for a moment and said, “You know they have meat in them, right?”
And then we were crossing the Bay Bridge and entering the city of San Francisco. We went straight to Paul and Kanako’s house in the southeast corner of the city, and we were soon joined by Sei, Christine, Glen, Melissa and Mac. I bought some expensive cheese in the Mission (Cowgirl Creamery and Humboldt Fog, $25 and $20 a pound respectively) and we grilled a good meal. Afterwards, I went with Sei and Christine to the guest bedroom that was to be home base for my adventures over the next couple of days.
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