Friday, October 16, 2009

road trip, day four: NM, AZ

i've totally put off writing about this day, because i will always remember it as the day we got stuck in the most horrendously awful traffic of my life. to say the least, it was truly bad.


it didn't start off that way though. we woke up on old route 66 in New Mexico in the king suite of the super 8 motel. what can i say? i'm a classy broad.

for anyone who's ever seen cars, route 66 really does look like radiator springs.
we stopped at the KIX on 66 diner and ate some really yummy huevos ranchero for breakfast.
when we got on the highway, we saw a sign for like, the most amazing, coolest rest stop ever that's totally worth waiting 70 more exits for or something like that, so even though i really had to pee, we decided to hold out. it's a damn good thing we did too, otherwise we would've missed out on the largest selection of fake-ass native american touristy shit known to man. including such gems as this
and this
i really shouldn't talk too much shite because we totally did buy a pair of baby mocassins for adonis. they were too cute to resist!

after the tourist trap, my camera battery died, which is really kind of a mini-tragedy because New Mexico and Arizona were some of the coolest looking states we drove through.


at one point, we were in the dead center of this mountain range in Arizona, coming down through the mountains as the sun was setting. it was so beautiful it felt surreal.
then, about ten minutes later is when we hit the traffic. we were still coming down the mountain and up ahead the only thing visible was a spiral of breaklights. all the exits had creepy, foreboding names like bloody basin and dead man's ditch and when we called laura, she assured us that no, there was no point trying to get off and go another way. we were indeed, stuck there.

now, i'm gonna try not to go into too much whiney detail, but can you imagine, after four straight days of driving, stiff neck, no sleep, miles from home, we sat in traffic for two whole hours and moved only ten miles. it was heartwrenching.
eventually, we did make it to laura's house, where she and kevin were kind enough to feed us the best tacos ever and let us sleep in their guest bed, which, after three nights of hotels, really was the nicest thing anyone could've done for me.

love always

Sunday, October 11, 2009

road trip, day three: MO, OK, TX, NM



the third day of our trip took us out of missouri and into oklahoma, but first we had to stop at the waffle housefor us northerners, it's a bit of a novelty but i get the feeling that waffle house is like a southern version of denny's.
siting there that morning, looking out the window at a completely unfamiliar
scene, I had this overwhelming sense of freedom, like I could spend the rest of my life driving around and eating in crappy diners and be totally happy and content.

in oklahoma we saw lots of cows and hay.
In texas, the landscape started to shift with little hills popping up in random placesthe road we were driving seemed to go on forever

when the sun set, there was not a cloud in the sky and it was almost painful, hot and blinding.

we stopped in amarillo to eat good, old-fashioned texas barbecueour meals came with coleslaw, potato salad, onion rings, apricots, beans and texas toast. it was quite the setup. but the best part by far, was the decor!

love always

Thursday, October 8, 2009

road trip, day two: OH, IN, IL, MO

after the panic-inducing first day of our trip, things got decidedly better. jon insisted on starting out the day by watching bolt on his ipod with the volume on full blast through my speakers, which made me tearfully homesick for my baby kitty, but around the time the movie was finished, we crossed over into Indiana, which was the first place we saw that looked truly different from the northeast.Indiana, at least the part that we drove through, is pretty much cornfields for as far as the eye can see.
Indianapolis reminded me of hartford, but mostly because of the way the highway looked approaching it.
Illinois was more cornfields.
St. Louis looked like a pretty sweet city. Of course, we didn't stop. We were determined to just keep on pushing through.
In Missouri we saw one of those amazing western sunsets that are impossible to take a decent picture of.


when we got hungry, we started scanning the signs off the highway looking for something promising. we came across a billboard for a place called the missouri hick, which served barbecue and we decided to go for it. we took the exit as the billboard instructed, and found ourselves literally, in the middle of nowhere. when i attempted to turn around in someone's driveway, at least ten pitbulls came running from their yard at our car. the driveway that i finally managed to pull into did not have pitbulls, but rather hens and chickens everywhere, just roaming around as if they owned the place. it was slightly terrifying.
when we finally hit civilizationa again, we stumbled onto this place called matt's steakhouse .
seriously, if you are ever in missouri, go to this place. i promise you will not be disappointed. The decor is all cheesy 90's faux-upscale, with a waterfall in the middle and booths the size of a bed. And the steak....the steak completely redefined my idea about what a steak is supposed to taste like. we ordered the KC strip, which made the entire idea of a NY strip seem like a feeble joke. Also, they had these amazing breadsticks that bore an uncanny resemblance to fried dough.

After our amazing meal, we splurged and got a decent hotel to make up for the previous night's disaster. It was small and unremarkable, but we reveled in every detail, from the clean towels to the multitude of pillows. when you're far away from home, it's the little things like that make a difference.

love always

Wednesday, October 7, 2009

road trip, day one: CT, NY, PA, OH

yes, I have arrived safe and sound, in my new home on the west coast. yes, it was a long, arduous, exciting, painful, exhilarating, gut-wrenching, liberating, action-packed adventure of a journey to get here. and yes, of course, I plan on at least attempting to tell you every juicy, little detail about it.
To start off, let me just say that the experience of leaving, actually getting in the car and driving away, was unlike any other. I mean, physically, it really, truly felt like my heart was being pulled in two different directions. I don't think it helped that our first day took us through new york and across pennsylvania, which was boring, cold, rainy and loooong.

When we finally stopped that day, it was in Ohio at a motel 6 that was so disgusting it completely redefined my understanding of the word skeevy. Aside from the bed, and the tv, the only furniture in the room was a small folding table with a chair in front of it that could not have possibly served any other purpose than as a surface for crushing and inhaling drugs. The sheets had cigarette burns in them. I woke up in the middle of the night, sat straight up in the rock-hard bed and cried. It was one of those nights I wasn't sure if I'd even make it through.

There was however, a ray of sunshine in the midst of all this doom and gloom. Somewhere in the middle of pennsylvania, we stopped at this adorable place called the twilight diner and ordered these:buffalo-style beer-battered jack and blue cheese sticks. yes, i'm fucking serious.

the whole place was like something out of a movie about where you'd wanna eat on a road trip.
and the food was so good that i'd almost consider doing it all again just to eat there.

love always