Journal of No. 118

For the past few days, I've been living about 2.5 lives, and not had time to catch up on it. Until now (?) We'll see how far I get.

( click at your own risk )

Haven't posted in a while, so I'm gonna talk your ear off now.

Tartan Hall has altered its schedule so that there was no school for Thanksgiving week. Since Dr. Pookie was thus free, I took the week off as well. Primarily we had a staycation, but I'll hit the highlights.

Monday, we got in the still-fairly-new car, and Dr. Pookie closed her eyes, stoically refraining from comment, while I drove like a madman up the coast to Santa Barbara, where we hit up a few wineries. Bought a few bottles, but the real reason was just to get away, see some nice scenery, and go where we wanted without any particular plan.

For Thanksgiving, we hosted for mom and the stepdad. We had a not very traditional menu; we (or rather Dr. Pookie) made duck as the main dish, and I chipped in on making the bacon risotto and green beans with cilantro. Mom brought bread and cranberry sauce. The duck was fine, but not spectacular, and everything else was pretty good. Finished it all off with pumpkin pie.

Saturday, we hosted a small poker and liquor party, with a good mix of good people.

Any intervening periods in that week were probably spent cleaning the house, or doing as close to nothing as possible. I endorse the staycation plan, but I was lazy as all get out. The cats were starting to criticize me for my lassitude.

Maybe tomorrow I'll catch up on blogging about my reading. Yes, I'm sure you're all excited to hear that.

Dr. Pookie and I took a nice weekday trip to Catalina.

Near the ferry landing at San Pedro (in the shadow of the Vincent Thomas Bridge) is SS Lane Victory.

On the way over, a pod of dolphins leaped about in our wake:


We also spotted some whale spouts, but they were very distant.

It sure seems to me that June Gloom is extending further and further into the summer, and certainly the channel was as gloomy as could be. Our first sight of Catalina looked like it was fogbound, but as we approached, the last fingers of cloud melted away:

( Do you want to know more? )

So Dr. Pookie and I went up to the Santa Barbara area for some winerying, etc.

Home base was Solvang. Despite (or perhaps because of) its tackiness, it's one of the cheaper places to stay, since there are many competing options. But our first step was to rent bikes and get out of town as fast as our legs would carry us. Which is not that fast. I'm afraid I was the slowpoke. I don't remember being outclassed by Dr. Pookie on our Napa bike ride, so I think Dr. Pookie's time at the gym over the summer and my sedentary job combined to make me look like a weakling. Which may be just as well, since the not-to-scale map we were given would've required us to go another 20 miles to do the longer itinerary we considered. But, with frequent stops, including to gawk at the miniature horses, I did make it to Los Olivos, stopping to taste wines at Rideau (good, but overpriced for the region, I think) along the way. At Los Olivos, we dropped in at Alexander & Wayne (where we are wine club members) and Arthur Earl (who are associated with A&W) so that both wine tastings were free. So in a fairly short span of time we went through 20 wines.
After that (and the ride), food was definitely called for. The Los Olivos Cafe still seems to be riding the wave of popularity from being in Sideways, so we went to the Sidestreet Cafe, which I like just as well. I had a magnificent panini, piled high with multiple versions of pig.
Thence, we tried our hand at riding up Foxen Canyon Road, but the lengthy uphill stretches defeated us me, and we turned back, and (following the suggestion from the gentleman at Rideau) travelled back to Solvang along Ballard Canyon. Although it started with a ferocious hill that we eventually gave up on (pushing the bikes up), the rest of the ride was pretty doable, with smaller uphills and longer coasting downhills. And the scenery was great. Very little traffic, just lots of vineyards and untouched landscape; lots of little ground squirrels dashing about beneath the gimlet eyes of the hawks. Although there were several large vineyards, the only actual tasting room was at Rusack, which didn't impress us much.
Eventually, the road got us back to Solvang; the whole trip was maybe 15 miles or so. After stopping for some ice cream to cool our blood, we checked into the hotel, cleaned up and cooled off, and ventured out to see about a little snack. On a weekday, in Solvang, they roll up the sidewalk pretty early, so pickings were slim. We ultimately wound up at the Viking Garden. There are two great things about the place: Ttey have a pretty good draft beer selection, and they have a lovely mural of a Viking 'Last Supper' (sadly, we didn't have our camera with us - but here's a pic). My sausage appetizer was pretty good, but Dr. Pookie sprang for the Viking special, bits and pieces of other appetizers mixed together, just as the VIkings would have enjoyed: Buffalo wings, nachos, onion rings, jalapeno poppers, and fried mozzarella sticks.
Next day, we happily used the car to get us around, hitting wineries that have been favorites from previous trips: Rancho Sisquoc (far off the beaten path, but well worth it), Zaca Mesa, and Foxen. On a whim as we headed back south, we took Alisal Road out of Solvang, and it quickly turned into a 1.5 lane road twisting through a tree-lined little canyon. Very remote and pretty. Ultimately it brought us back to the 101, and the race to beat rush hour traffic (we lost).

Fess Parker, RIP

On a whim, dark_of_night and I got on the road and pointed to Temecula to sample their wineries. We've been to Santa Barbara/Central Coast wineries a lot, and Napa/Sonoma a little, but this was our first try at Temecula. On the whole, I'd have to say Santa Barbara is prettier, cheaper and better. There was also a sad tendency for the wineries to actually be resorts, restaurants and gift shops, to which a vestigial winery was attached. To be sure, there were some much more authentic winemakers there, as well. But on the whole, it was sort of like Temecula:Napa::Pechanga:Las Vegas. Nonetheless, like Pechanga, Temecula gets plenty of traffic and money, which has only exacerbated the problem.
( a bold, piquant entry, with an undercurrent of snobbery )

Drove up the 5 most of the way to Napa... saw absolutely nothing worth mentioning. Well, that's almost true. For a while, we saw little red things on the shoulder. They look like... smashed tomatoes. And then we passed our first tomato truck, hauling two giant hoppers of tomatoes. It would hit a bump in the road, and a thin trickle of tomatoes would leap off the back of the truck. The ones that landed in the lanes were quickly turned into paste, but the ones on the side were mostly okay. We passed 11 tomato trucks, and we estimate that amounts to close to 2 million tomatoes.
( behind the tomatoes )

Did some minor jetting around town dropping off flyers for Enigmacon. As expected, little indy places were cool about it; corporate places were more uptight, with the winner for unfriendliness going to Hot Topic Incorporated, source for all your babygoth needs at malls nationwide. They have a three ring binder with plastic sleeves in it for sticking flyers in that's hidden somewhere behind the counter. Fat lot of good that's going to do. I was pleasantly surprised by Electronics Boutique. I went to three different ones and they were all pretty cool about it.
On the way back home, I hit TJ's for some of my glacially paced wedding planning; I picked up a case of Red Flyer. Yes, it is 90% gimmick, but I cracked open a bottle last week and was really surprised by it. I'm a sucker for things with Mourvedre in the mix, but this is another good example of a $6 TJ wine that tastes like $10, maybe even $12. (Woo!)
Then for the main event, aaronjv's B-day part at Go Kart World. Another great and unexpected entertainment idea, courtesy of Aaron. I had a great time. The Super Track there is the bee's knees. I think my best race, though, was the first one. Part of it was that I had a decent car; part of it was that there were plenty of kids on the track who were pathetic little amateurs. Easy to pass, and they cried when you trashtalked them. In the later races, there were fewer kids and more adults who knew their way around the track. I love that last turn, because you could get the rear end to slide a good long way before the tires catch and send you down the straightaway, perfectly aligned. Plenty of fun with physics out there on the tracks.
On the giant-sized go-kart track called the 405, someone decided to merge into my lane while I was still using it. He corrected pretty swiftly, but I certainly didn't want to depend on him noticing me, so I was halfway in the emergency lane, feeling the adrenaline kick in.

The bossfella likes to spread holidays around the calendar year, so he gives us Good Friday off. Rebecca took the day off, and we zipped up to Santa Barbara and back in order to hit as many wineries as we could during the daylight hours. We've been there enough times that we now know enough good wineries that we don't have to waste any time on dud wineries. We packed in a whole lot of wine tasting -- probably 30-35 different wines over the course of the day. One of the best places is Los Olivos, where Los Olivos Vineyards and Arthur Earl have tasting rooms right next to each other. We ran down the whole card of 12 wines at Los Olivos and 6 more at Arthur Earl. Sure they're tiny dribbles in a glass, but after 18 of them, you get pretty loaded, so we hit the Sidewalk Cafe for lunch, which was excellent. In the end, we came back with maybe 20 bottles of wine and a membership in the L.O.V. wine club.
The first half of Saturday was spent on house-y things. Rebecca mowed the lawn, while little ole domestic me vacuumed and scrubbed and mopped indoors. Later, we went to see Hellboy, which I enjoyed as mindless fun, but Rebecca didn't care for much. We both agree that it's better than Spiderman. For me, that was enough to tip it into the good category.
From the theater, we picked up some grub at the grocery store and went to Kevin's for poker night. I managed to contribute a great deal of my money to Kevin, perhaps enough to solidify his resolve to quit his job. A fun night, even if I wound up deep in the hole.
Today, a pretty kick-back day. Rebecca found a hidden Easter egg at TJ's, so we scored some free dark chocolate there.