Category: Road Trips

While there is still a lot to be done around the house before we're fully settled, Ben and I decided we needed to get out a bit during this three-day weekend; to get away from it all and just decompress.

Saturday we spent a rather blustery afternoon [sitting outside] at Starbucks. Our Starbucks afternoons were a staple prior to COVID, and something we've sorely missed.

Yesterday, despite the fact that our main reason for going was unavailable because the store was closed, we hopped in Rabbit and headed south to Tucson. If nothing else, it was a chance to get out and clear our heads a bit more, and partake of some Lucky Wishbone once we got there. (I know it's silly to drive to another city just to get food, but we once drove from Denver to Santa Fe just to have Whataburger, so there's that…)

Visiting Tucson is always an odd experience for me. I have so many memories wrapped up in the place, and seeing how it's changed—even since that last time I was regularly running to and from in the mid aughts—is still unnerving…especially around the university. At the same time however, Tucson in many ways remains the land that time forgot and I'm surprised how easily I can still find my way around the city. And to be honest, Tucson just feels good. It feels like home, even though I haven't lived there since the mid 90s.

As planned, we enjoyed some chicken from Lucky Wishbone. We stopped at Bookman's for a bit and then headed home. Despite not really doing anything, it was a fun and much needed respite from the last couple months.

We'll be heading back in a few weeks in my mask quest…

Prior to my temporary loss of employment, Ben and I had planned on taking a mini vacation to Los Angeles. He had CPI training scheduled in San Bernadino and we decided a few days away from Phoenix would do us both good.

After last Wednesday however, we knew we'd have to cut our plans to conserve money. So while we still had to go, it was now a micro-vacation. Ben had to attend the training to maintain his CPI credentials, and we'd already volunteered to drive a friend's car over (she's moving to Encino at the end of the week to join her husband) so we were stuck doing the bare minimum. Three overnight stays were cut to one, and there would be no "fun" money available to spend, pretty much cutting out most everything we'd wanted to do in LA.

Monday morning we headed west from Phoenix.

Lots of memories tied to this route and the countless times I took it to and from San Francisco. I hadn't been back to California in any capacity since I left in 2002.

The trip was uneventful, taking the expected five and a half hours. We checked into our motel in  (I'll link to my Yelp review at some point, but AVOID the Super 8 in Redlands at all cost), grabbed a bite to eat, and then headed west to Encino, neither of us realizing until we mapped it out how much longer we'd be on the road to deliver the car.

And speaking of mapping, how did anyone survive before GPS?!

Before I lost my job, of the things I originally wanted to do while we were there was to pay a visit to Amoeba Records. I hadn't visited it (or perhaps it was Tower I was thinking of—the memory's a little vague right now—since 1999). We'd pretty much axed all our previous plans of places to visit, but since it was actually only a brief detour on the way back to the motel, we made a quick visit and stopped for dinner. I loved Amoeba in San Francisco. I was not so impressed with the Hollywood location. I also remember it being on the northeast corner of an intersection, not the southwest, so I may actually be remembering a visit to Tower. It was nearly 20 years ago…

There was one record I wanted to buy, but I was an adult and didn't grab it: Grace Jones' Slave to the Rhythm 12" picture disk. It was only $7.98 and I should have thrown caution to the wind and grabbed it because the cheapest copy on Discogs I could find is going for over twice that—not including shipping.

Sadly, since we're in Redlands for the remainder of the day I'm not driving two hours back to get it.

I had one brief celebrity spotting: George Stults (@boraborageorge). Just as cute in person as his Instagram.

After finishing dinner we got back on the road.

Approximately two hours later, after stopping at Target to pick up some Febreze air/fabric freshener, we arrived back at our ashes-found-in-the-bathroom-sink "non-smoking" room. I actually slept pretty well, thankful that the place was at least quiet.

This morning we grabbed breakfast and I dropped Ben off at his training. We met up again for lunch and I'm currently sitting in the Redlands public libray waiting for his training to finish up so we can head home…

Apologies to any of my readers who live in LA or environs and love it, but I can't believe I ever wanted to live here.

Ben and I were itching to get out of town, so yesterday we drove to Tucson where we met up with Bernie and Damon for lunch at a place we've been going to since I was in college.

The place hasn't changed at all. Bernie said, "You almost have to look through the ghosts."

And why is this so special?

Hamburger patty tacos. Yeah, I know it sounds bizarre, but they're a South Tucson staple. They tasted a bit different from what I remember; the seasoning in the meat had changed, but otherwise they were still delicious.

Today was the day for which we came to Arkansas: I was getting inked by Erik!

But that wasn't scheduled until after noon, so John, Ben, and I grabbed a quick breakfast at McDonalds and headed to beautiful downtown Bentonville to wander and catch a bit of the local ambiance:

If the store had been open, I so would've thrown my credit card balance to the wind and bought this…

We also went through the Walmart Visitor Center. (Hey it's a small town and there wasn't much else to do to kill a couple hours.)

Walmart has a visitor center, you ask? Indeed. From the website:

Visitors can look, touch and explore through a series of family-friendly, interactive displays. All the exhibits are designed as giant scrapbooks that tell the story of Walmart through words, images, artifacts and interactive displays like our virtual tour of Sam Walton's old office and our map featuring information on customers, stores, suppliers and associates from around the world. We've even got Mr. Sam's trusty old Ford F-150 parked in the gallery.

In other words, it's a veritable warehouse of pro-Walmart propaganda.

The funniest things I saw were two items in the "returned merchandise" exhibit. Both pretty much sum up the entire stereotype of Walmart shoppers:

It was still way too early to head over to Erik's studio, so we killed some time at Grounds for Thought and did what geeks do: we got coffee and brooded over our laptops.

We grabbed lunch at Gusano's Pizza and then headed over to Odyssey Tattoo, Erik's salon. John left early because his appointment was first, and he was already in the chair by the time we arrived:

Soon Calvin & Hobbes were frolicking on his arm:

I was next.

John had his return flight to catch, so shortly after I sat down in the chair, he was off. It was a great visit and Ben and I can't wait until we see him again. Maybe next year a trip to the east coast is in order.

The good Doctor and his Tardis were a bit more involved, so it took a while longer…

Three hours later, it was finished!

It was everything I'd hoped it would be. Thank you, Mr. Rubright. I can never say that enough. It is amazing.

From there, Ben and I went back to the hotel room for a bit and then met Erik at Grub's. Added bonus: JP and Earl were in town as well and joined us shortly after we arrived!

A great vacation got a little bit better!

I'd never met either of the guys, but had been following JP's blog for some time. Like Erik, he's exactly the same in person as online and we had a great time. Unfortunately, after three hours of getting poked, I was beat, and shortly after dinner Ben and I bid our adieus and headed back to the hotel.

We did make one stop on the way first, however. Andy's Frozen Custard…

…and bug watching.

Yikes! Are you supposed to put a saddle on and ride that thing? It looks like something that crawled out of The Mist. (Mmm…Thomas Jane.)

But I digress.

Day 2 took us from Wichita to Rogers via Oklahoma.

You may be wondering why we took the "back roads" route instead of taking the much faster I-70 route direct from Denver.  This is why:

Yes, these two fat kids planned their trip around a hamburger joint. If you don't have Whataburger in your location, I feel sorry for you. We had them in Phoenix, but we don't have them in Denver, and while I got to partake when I was in Arizona earlier this year, Ben had no such opportunity. So naturally we had to go.

We arrived in Rogers mid-afternoon and immediately met up with John, who had booked a room at the same Microtel we did. None of us had stayed in one before, and I was very pleasantly surprised at how nice it was—and I have to say that of the three places we overnighted on this trip, the Microtel was the best. (Avoid the Days Inn in Lawrence Kansas!).

One of the things we'd wanted to see on our trip was the Pea Ridge Military Park; not necessarily because of any great interest in the Civil War, but rather simply to get our Park Service Book stamped!

I'll say this: it was beautiful. Arkansas is green. Erik told us it was very unusual for this time of year, but it was still amazing. In fact, that's the one thing I noticed the most after we got off the highway and out of the brown fields of Oklahoma. And the green here was different than the kind of green we have in Denver. Deciduous versus coniferous forests, maybe?

Anyhow, we made our way through the park and stopped along the way to grab some photos…

Even though John and I had never met in person prior to that day, I felt an immediate kinship. Some people have no respect for historic sites:

Absolutely no respect:

(Although I'm sure it's not the first time any of this had been done…)

And sometimes I happen to snap a few photos where everything just seems to come together:

Later, after heading back to the hotel to freshen up, the three of us joined  Erik and his husbear Robert at Frank's Hickory Inn for dinner. Afterward, we headed over to the infamous JJ's for some adult beveraging.

The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. Okay, maybe just one. You pick.

This One Turned Everyone's Heads

The most interesting thing about the start of our journey was seeing the radar installations east of Denver.

Day 1 was punctuated by lunch at Taco John's in Lamar. We'd never been to the chain before. I liked it. It reminded me of how Taco Bell tasted before it was swallowed up by KFC. Ben wasn't as impressed.

The afternoon was full of endless fields, wind generator turbines, threatening skies, and one roadside warning found when we stopped to get gas…