More travels...

(Idyllwild)
Last week I went to Idyllwild with Mike before work. I don't know anything that calms me down more than fresh mountain air, trees, good company and coffee during the drive. We stopped a bunch and got to Humber Park with Scout. Not only did she go running wild in the wilderness but she ran up a rock 90 times the size of her and did a suicide jump off of it. Bad Scout!

Saturday was an official travel day with JP and the Scout. We drove to Oak Glen, an apple orchard mountain town with a really old schoolhouse. It's one of the closest places to go to see the leaves change and see that the seasons do indeed change. We took a nice walk and got some chocolate and honeycomb from a tiny shop near a petting zoo. It was tasty and the air was chilly finally. I can't wait until it gets further into October and November since the leaves had barely started changing color and the pumpkins weren't quite ready yet. Last year we went to get apples and I spent the night making apple crisp and damn was it good.

After some doing some convincing we continued up the mountain to Big Bear Lake. I mainly wanted to check out the visitors center and get more information on the town. (Big Bear Lake)
It's about a two hour drive from Palm Springs though, so it'll be awhile unless I find something I can't say no to. But come on - driving home for a couple of hours to hit a lake with a log cabin? Damn near worth it! It's always been my dream to own a cabin on the lake, so some day for sure.

Oktoberfest in Big Bear is going on right now too and I'm hoping to make it to that. I need some celebration - I'm very German, I work way to hard and I haven't had anything to drink since the last party at PS Power baseball, so why not? I'm about due for a knockwurst and beer in a stein. Gemutlichkeit!

Other than that, there are a ton of upcoming events to work - tram road challenge, some stuff with Power and of course, Catalina. Gaudi!

On a side note, this site seems to hide that work at least 55-60 hours a week pretty well, don't you think?

Beverly Hills, baby.

I love driving. And the open road. (That's my new driving buddy, Scout.)

The ability to jump in the car and go see all sorts of things is incredible. Even before I got my license, I was obsessed with the go-kart my family had. When I finally got a car, I didn't have my license yet and my parents said I could drive on the stipulation that I didn't leave the driveway. You'd better believe that every day after school I was in that damn Geo Prism going up and down the driveway.

If semis weren't so abnormally large, I would totally drive for a living. Just drive around the country seeing new sights and meeting new people.

I was in Disneyland for Labor Day helping out at the half-marathon. The boss took me all around the parks to pick up the clocks following the race and I was like a kid in a candy store. People don't understand that coming from the mid-west Disney is sort of a big deal - it's an opportunity saved for the rich or families who save up all of their money for a vacation. Anaheim was pretty sweet, too.

(Heading down Santa Monica Blvd near West Hollywood.)
Today I drove to Beverly Hills. I took the 60 there, so it was a traffic-filled boring drive. On the way back, we'll say I took an alternative route (I got a little lost) and got a chance to see Rodeo Drive, West Hollywood, Hollywood, Sunset Boulevard, the Hollywood sign and the Hollywood Video IN Hollywood. Oh, and I saw a prostitute. Yeah, that's right. A real, live one.

Los Angeles is very weird - it goes from this strange ghetto to all of these cultural areas (Thai town, Little Armenia, this Latino district) to BMWs and Cadillacs and millions of dollar homes on Rodeo Drive all in an instant.