Destination: California

We should have let Sinclair wear the water buffalo hat.

          It is hard to believe that 24 hours ago we were in Utah.  We woke up early enough for the free breakfast again, which means not much sleep.  The change in weather brought me a surprise nose bleed while I was eating.  D has witnessed one before so he jumped into action grabbing me napkins.

Colorful Utah mountains.

          We met a green long necked dinosaur named Sinclair as we gassed up the car.  Then we saw a sign for dinosaur footprints and we had to follow it.  We spent an hour and a half exploring the museum of dino tracks before we got back on the road.  I love Utah and its many colored hillsides.

These tracks really bring dinosaurs to life.  You can imagine them walking.

This print has impressions on it.

          Arizona starts out with some interesting hills of its own as we descend into the valley.  Driving through those mountains is so much fun.  Once the mountains are behind us, Nevada desert lies ahead.  The shrubs aren't as interesting and after Utah, Nevada can't compare.  We pass Las Vegas with its own version of a Space Needle.  D and I marvel at the three large mirrored solar farms.  We stop for gas and dinner one last time before finally arriving at the hotel.

The ground is so orange, red, and yellow.

My favorite part of Arizona so far.

Ed is sad to see the mountains go.

Nevada covered up its own sign with another sign.

Las Vegas Space Needle with rides on top.

Solar farm.

          The night is still young, however, and after printing out our tickets we're off for Hollywood's Halloween Horror Night at Universal Studios.  Exterminators are trying to wipe out the human pests as we enter the park.  We take the terror tram to a Purge party that lets us walk through the back lot scenery (super cool).  We barely survived the purge with our class 2 weapons.  Another shuttle takes us to another Purge zone plus The Crimson Peak maze and an Alien vs. Predator haunted maze.

Mr. Bates knows how to give a close shave!

          Universal knows how to haunt!  Each of the mazes get me at least once and the entire time I have an unsettled feeling as we explore.  That takes some doing!  Zombies from The Walking Dead try to eat our brains in a third maze; they do not care about personal space.  D is amazed how well they get an inch from our noses without touching us, and they aren't slow about it, either!  It's startling to turn and find a monstrous hand in your face.

Even if your face looks like this!

          It's after midnight now so we head to the short line at This is the End 3D.  Woah, talk about trippy!  They use neon paint in every room, on parts of costumes, and lots of neon wall art that pop at you so much.  The whole thing is like a cereal box exploding in your face and around the next fruit loop is Lucifer!  Once our eyes readjust to the normal world we have time for one last maze: Insidious.  Here people with oxygen-type masks come at you from above along with all the usuals popping out of holes, doors, and walls.  The last room has many figures standing around and there isn't enough time to determine which ones are alive before another one is in your face and gone.  Bravo, Universal Studios!  These are definitely the best haunts I've ever explored.  They make the sore feet and half price very worth it!

Merry Christmas from Krampus!

The Super Summarized Version of Utah

Near Tapestry Arch at our favorite part of the trails.

          As I sit on the most uncomfortable piece of furniture, sleepy and ready to crash, I will recount for you our day.  D had a waffle with breakfast.  There were lots of bronze statues all over Grand Junction, and some of them were a bit creepy.  Fall in Colorado and Utah is gorgeous.  The plateaus in Utah are some of my favorite sights ever.  Arches National Park is a MUST SEE for EVERYONE!  We saw about a dozen arches, the hikes were super fun, the sand is super soft and red, and you'll need more than a day to fully enjoy it.  El Mexicano Restaurant in Salina has decent food.  The stars in Utah are incredibly numerous.  We saw rabbits, deer, a lizard eating a spider, ravens, dinosaurs, blue birds, and chipmunks.  D saw a shooting star; I saw one our first night driving.  It is COLD in the mountains and in this general area.

Sandstone Arch with Creeper admiring his relative's work.

Day Three Starts the Drive

          D and the dogs are nice enough to let me sleep in today.  D's mom makes us waffles to go with leftover sausage.  I ate one as D happily downed 4.  He says they are much smaller than the ones we make at hotels, though, if that changes anyone's predictions.  If you haven't seen them, here's the list I posted on Facebook earlier this week:

1. If we see snow, where will we see it first?
2. Where will I take the 200th picture?
3. What's the most unusual animal/insect we'll see?
4. How many times will we get gas?
5. Who will get there first: the movers or us?
6. How many miles will we travel from the time our trip officially starts to the time we tuck in on our first night "home" (apartment or hotel depending on when our stuff arrives).
7. How many states will we drive through?
8. How many fun/interesting places will stop at along the way?
9. More specifically now, how many of those stops will be at a state or national park?
10. What time of day will we first spot the mountains?
11. How many continental breakfasts will we get?
12. How many breakfasts will have waffles?
13. How many waffles will Don eat?
14. What's the first thing we'll realize and regret not packing?
15. What is the cheapest and most expensive gas we'll buy?
16. Which restaurant/fast food do you think we'll eat at on the way?
17. What "disaster" might we encounter on the way? (Hopefully it won't actually be a disaster, just a minor glitch.)

A couple of these might be answered in this post.

Meet Ed.  He's a scorpio, so that should tell you everything you need to know.

          After breakfast D and I unpack and re-Tetris the car to fit all of his lab supplies.  Thankfully we find his small duffle to hold all our snacks.  Ed sunbathes on the roof while we all work.  Zoey attacks me every trip I take back into the house; I wonder if she knows that something is up.  Perhaps she just really misses everyone now that the house is down to two residents.

 

Good-bye our second apartment together!

          There are many tears with so many good-byes, and now the errands must be run for the trip to truly begin.  A stop at The UPS Store has my fancy new camera off to Samsung so hopefully they can fix it and get it back to us soon.  A quick-ish trip to Comcast has us happily and painlessly cancelling our service.  Working with someone face-to-face is so much better than trying to call a stranger.  We're going to be stuck with Time Warner in CA.  I hope the horror stories are exaggerated.  Finally we make it to the Waterfall Glen management office, and they help us get copies of paperwork that should get us reimbursed for the early termination fee from D's new employer.  The visit is long but we finished what we needed to and we're off.

          Since I put out the trip trivia questionnaire we gas up and reset all the numbers that will record the official numbers for our trip.  With a Speedy-Freeze in my hand, our route westward highlighted in purple on the GPS, I call my mom for a reason I've since forgotten.  I catch her as she just gets home, and she calls back in a few minutes to let me know she found our spare car key and that we'd left our small trash can at the house.  We agree to meet up along our route to pick up our first forgotten items.

We'll be seeing you again around Christmas.

          Seeing our loved ones is always nice, but having to say good-bye again is equally as difficult.  We share a few more big hugs before D and I return westward bound.  It's already dark so not many pictures are taken today.  No good clear ones, at least.  Our first minor "tragedy" happens when D accidentally spills the homemade chex mix onto the car floor.  While he's cleaning that up and salvaging all he can I accidentally squish the ladybug I was trying to coax out of the car.  Hopefully those will be the worst misadventures we have.

So disappointing.

We didn't even make it 100 miles, yet!

The night is young; now I'm in charge of the chex mix.

          I wish I could say that I'm a perfect travel companion, but I get sleepy!  I take a quick snooze about 50 miles outside the Iowa border.  I wake up in time to cross the Mississippi River and manage to stay awake the rest of the trip.  D hits a sleepy wall but pushes through it.  Ed enjoys the dark night sky.  We feel bad that he's so bloated with a balloon in his belly.  Our first gas stop is near Des Moines where we also pick up McDonald's to give us a little more energy for the night.  Mom found us a few hotel choices along the way and we're now checked-in at the Holiday Inn in Omaha.  Tomorrow is another long day, all driving.  I hope you are all enjoying the company of your loved ones and get a fantastic night's sleep.

Healthy dinner: smoothie, burgers, and burritos.

Nighty night!

A Not-So-Productive Moving Prep Day

My mom's new picture windows.

          We start today with high hopes of finishing the rest of our errands.  We allow ourselves a little more sleep, shower, eat a slow lunch with my mom, pack the car and head out.  Our first stop is at our friends' house.

          Of course I bring the famous water buffalo hats with me which are immediately placed on our heads.  M's daughter S loves those hats, and apparently they are magical as this terrible two year old turns into the sweet girl I'm used to visiting.  We're going to have to see if Auntie Z can cheer this little one up from a long distance on those rough days.  After playing with blocks and reading some books it's time to make our next stop.

Fall door.  On our way.

          We make it to our apartment shortly after 5.  I head in to clean the last few things and do one more check, and Dr. D goes to talk to the office people.  After a few minutes he's back with a sigh.  Apparently our Waterfall Glen office personnel have a sense of humor when it comes to posting the office hours online, it's a good mental game to remember that they aren't right.  So we pack our last two boxes into the car and head out with tomorrow's to-do list growing.  Dr. D heads to IIT to finish packing his things, and I head to his parents' house.

          The fog is pretty thick in spots, but I arrive safely to much barking from Squeaky, Ellie, and Zoey.  Z-bo got in trouble today for eating the Roku remote.  Before the night is over she'll get in trouble for eating the stuffing out of the couch cushions, too.  Dinner conversation over gyros covers the adventures of our day, the fog, and where is Dr. D?  I pig out on Halloween candy and some homemade chex mix.  With half my gyro left over we head to the "new room" to watch Death in Paradise.  Dr. D makes it home before Fallon ends, and we can finally settle in for the night.

          Tonight we stay with family; tomorrow night is a mystery!

Story time!

California or Bust!

Hello again!  Long time no see.

          My smarty-pants husband got his Ph.D. this summer followed by the job of his dreams at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.  We've been super busy apartment hunting, soaking up as much time with family and friends as possible, and today the movers came.  JPL has a great relocation program, so they paid for our flight out there to apartment hunt in mid-October (total nightmare but we got a great place).  Today they paid for the movers to come pack up our things and Ace Relocation did a fantastic job clearing our place out and listening to our concerns about what items we wanted special care for.

It's so empty!

          Today we ate our last meal in our empty apartment and tomorrow we hand over the keys and finish up our last errands.  It's hard saying good-bye to everyone and it's going to be hard adjusting to a totally new way of living after a couple months of no free weekends to suddenly have all free weekends.  After two hours of sleep last night it is time to keep this brief and head to bed.  I hope you all are doing well and enjoying the last bit of good weather for the fall.

It goes both ways!