Leaving Las Vegas

After a rather restless night in our Best Western room, a nice room with all the amenities and a king size bed, a room that we got a discount of $10 on because we have Triple A, but a room with a bed that had a very very firm mattress on and pillows that felt like cement bags, we got up and went down to the breakfast room for coffee and whatever else they were serving. They had juices, bagels, cereal, waffles, sausages, and scrambled eggs, and it was FREE, so we ate and had our coffee and packed up our stuff to get the heck out of Vegas.


We drove over to the house to pick up the cats. James and Robby were hauling junk out of the house for one last yard sale so Keith got all involved in trying to help them haul junk and I was like let's go home already, so we finally got the cats in their carriers, loaded them up in the car, and started off down the road. We got three blocks and realized that we had forgotten their litter box and turned around to get that just in case they needed to go as often as I do on a road trip.

This is the house with all the junk in the yard and a lady with a sun umbrella looking at the junk.


Both of the cats stayed in their carriers for a while, then Dusty came out to investigate and seemed utterly confused and where are we going and what are you doing to me!?! They meowed constantly for about the first hour, Genie staying in her carrier for a long time and then finally getting brave enough to come out. She squeezed under the seat and came out by my legs so I picked her up and calmed her down, then Dusty just came up front from in between the seats, no squeezing under for him, then Genie went under Keith's seat and came up by his legs, rather dangerous when his legs are being used for driving. After a few hours they did settle down and got in behind the seats on the floor where they felt a little safer. And they finally stopped meowing.

Not too many pictures on the way home, but we did stop in the town of Baker, which is the Gateway to Death Valley and has the Worlds Tallest Thermometer. Population about 700 and I think everyone in town works at a fast food restaurant because that is all that is in this town. Every single fast food restaurant you have ever heard of is in Baker, along with three motels, one of them out of business and boarded up.

This is the Bun Boy Motel, next to the Big Boy Restaurant which I think was originally the Bun Boy Restaurant, which is also home to the Worlds Tallest Thermometer.



The way the Bun Boy is holding the arrow is a little rude, though.

This is a google pic of the town of Baker, which started out as a railroad station if you were wondering why in the world anyone would ever start a town here. Which we were wondering.


And this is a google pic of The Worlds Tallest Thermometer.


We drove through Del Taco to get some burritos to eat on the road for lunch and got some gas and back on the highway.

More driving.

We had seen this sign for a now abandoned market in Hinkley ( the town where you can't drink the water unless you want to get cancer) and I wanted a picture of it so I made Keith stop for picture time.


We got home in the early afternoon, got the cats settled in their new home in the shed which they weren't too happy about, and after a dinner at Sizzler because we were too tired to cook and there was nothing to cook in the house anyway, Keith went to bed and I went shortly after because we were exhausted.

It is not cheap to drive to Vegas even for one night, we took $300 cash which we spent most of on gas and food, put the $90.00 room on the credit card and then transferred money over to cover that after we got home, and we gave James $200 to help him out because he was short on the money he needed to pay for his move to Alabama and we are suckers.

The Long Long Drive Part Two

So, we get into Vegas at around 6pm and get off on Sahara to go look for our motel. We drive and drive and drive up Sahara past lots of ratty looking strip malls and apartment buildings and then get up into a nicer looking area called The Lakes, with nicer looking apartment complexes and gated housing tracts. We keep driving, looking for the Best Western sign that should be on the left side of the road and don't see anything that looks like a Best Western and finally realize that we have gone way past where the Best Western should be. We finally find the right block but still don't see a Best Western and most of the buildings don't have street addresses on them, and see a shopping center that looks like it is where the Best Western should be and finally find the Best Western way back in the shopping center/office building complex. Finally.

We check in and are told there is breakfast in the morning in the breakfast room and get to our room to freshen up a little and call James to go have dinner.

We get back on Sahara and drive, drive, drive past the downtown casinos and back into even rattier looking neighborhoods with rattier looking strip malls, apartment buildings, and trailer parks here and there. We finally get to the house, which is in a rather old also ratty and rundown neighborhood and why Keith's mom just had to buy this house we still haven't figured out. And there was no way I could ever have spent the night there so I'm really glad we got a motel room. The house was dark, dingy, and full of junk laying around waiting for the dumpster to be delivered so it could all be thrown away, and bags and bags and bags of trash. Dirty dishes in the kitchen and boxes of food on the counter because the pantry was infested with bugs despite numerous fumigations of said pantry. The house is laid out rather oddly, with a sunroom (also full of junk) off of a bedroom, a living room right off of the kitchen up front, a family room in the back with a bed in it, a master bedroom with two huge walk in closets that had been full of clothes and purses and shoes. Cleta never threw anything away, down to the last piece of junk mail. And on top of never throwing anything away, she loved yard sales and would bring home more junk on a regular basis.

There is a carport on the side of the house and a garage, both full of more junk. She had about three houses worth of furniture all crammed into one small house, furniture that didn't match anything else. There were six microwave ovens, seven TVs and Keith counted 13 plastic poinsettia plants that he threw away the last time he was there.

We took James and his boyfriend Robby over to a nearby casino for dinner, there is a restaurant there that they liked and we had a nice dinner and wandered the casino for a few minutes and then went out the wrong door looking for the car and were on the wrong side of the parking lot, so we had to go back in the casino and find the right door out. I'm assuming that the casinos are planned to be confusing so you can never ever find your way out until you run out of money and they throw you out.

It was very noisy and crowded with all kinds of sad looking people sitting at slot machines that bells are constantly ringing on. I wish I had the camera with me because we saw the typical elderly casino addict as we were walking through, she was all dressed up in her casino best with her bright red hair expertly styled, her makeup in place, and her cats eye rhinestone glasses on.

We dropped James and Robby back off at the house and went for a drive down through the big casinos to look at the lights. It took us about 30 minutes to go five blocks and after sitting in the traffic and watching the craziness, we'd had enough and were ready for bed.

I hadn't been to Vegas in about 20 years and since then there are lots of new casinos and those horrible huge TVs all over the place, like you see in Times Square. I found them very annoying.

I did like the Paris casino with the Eiffel Tower, though.




Tomorrow: Back through the desert. With cats.

Road Trip to Vegas

A place that we will probably never ever go to again, and a trip that has cured any wanderlust I might have for quite a while.

We got an earlier start than we thought we would because Keith's boss let him leave after he had finished up his first project of the day, so we were on the road before lunch time and not wanting to stop at a sit down restaurant for lunch, went to the travel stop in Tehachapi and got McDonalds to eat in the car.

So, to get to Vegas from Bakersfield, first you go through some mountains.



And then you go through about a million miles of desert.


And then another million miles of desert.


And then if you are really lucky you get into some traffic going about 10mph down the road because somewhere up ahead there must be an accident.


We were in the 10mph traffic for about an hour and then did come across the accident scene, where a truck and a car had crashed into each other and gone off the road, forcing all the traffic to slow down so that they could gawk at the accident.

There are three rest stops on the way to Vegas and we stopped at each one. The towns out in the desert are few and far between so when you see a rest stop, stop even if you don't think you really need to go because it will be a long time before you find another one.

After the million miles of flat desert and passing through a few small towns with the typical desert houses with lots of junk in the yards, towns like Hinkley, which was made famous in the movie Erin Brockovich, the town that can't drink the water unless they want to get cancer, you come to some more mountains.





And more higher desert with Joshua trees.


And then you are finally at the state line where there is a factory outlet and two casinos. And then you come to the 'town' of Jean, where there is a prison and a casino. There used to be two casinos in Jean but apparently one of them went out of business and was torn down.

We stopped here to get some gas and use the casino restrooms. There was a huge empty parking lot, a huge parking lot in anticipation of the many many gamblers that the casino was hoping to lure, but gamblers just go on another few miles to Vegas, and I'm thinking that this poor casino won't be around much longer either. We parked right by the front door and then fought through the crowds to get inside.



There were more employees than customers and only two people at the bar. We looked around a little, saw a few people at the slot machines, and put $1.00 in a nickle slot, played for a few minutes and was bored to tears so as soon as I won my $1.00 back, cashed out my huge winnings. I don't get the lure of slot machines, but I guess with nickle slots you can sit there all day and get free cocktails and only spend a few dollars.

After that excitment, on down the road to Vegas. They are re-doing the main freeway through town and if it's ever finished will be really pretty for a freeway, with murals on the overpasses and some metal sculptures and landscaping. Hopefully people will get to see it before it is covered up with graffiti.

So, after about 6 hours on the road, in to Vegas.

Part two tomorrow. Betcha can't wait!

Coupons in the Cat Litter Box and Other Stuff

We've been using this cat litter that's made out of wheat, mainly because the commercial cat litters kind of stink what with all the chemicals and whatever else they put in them so that you won't smell the cat pee. The added scents are supposed to cover up cat pee smell but when your cats fur smells like highly scented cat litter you kind of wonder if this stuff is good for them, what with them spending so much time sitting and scratching in it. Anyway, the stuff is called Swheat Scoop, and while it may cost a little more than clay based litters, it's made out of wheat so you could probably even make a loaf of bread out of it. And, anyway, the last few boxes we've gotten had a coupon inside where if you save 12 of them you send them in for a coupon for a free box of litter. Is it worth saving up 12 coupons to get a free box of litter? I was a little hesitant to even bother with it because it would take us at the very least 6 months to save up enough coupons, but what the heck, we'll save them and maybe some day get a free box of litter.

Well, today I open up a new box of Swheat Scoop- I always want to pronounce the name as sweat like body sweat not sweet like candy, which a full litter box definitely doesn't resemble in the least and there is nothing sweet about it at all, more like stinky sweat if you ask me, but anyway, I open up the box and it is crammed full of coupons like the coupon machine went a little crazy. There ended up being 7 coupons falling out of the box, so...it's the little things that brighten your day, right?

Free cat litter coming soon.

Keith may be taking a little trip to Vegas here soon, not for fun in the sun as you might think, but to check on his mom. His son James, who lives in a little garage apartment at her house, supposedly to help take care of her, called us yesterday with the news that she had thought she was having a heart attack and was being taken by ambulance to the hospital. She is a worrying sort of person and hasn't been sleeping well because she worries so much, and started feeling dizzy and having chest pains and pushed her life alert button that called the paramedics and then called James, who was out walking his dog or something. Anyway, her EKG looked fine so the paramedics thought maybe it was an anxiety attack, but it turns out that it may have been a mini stroke. So...she was going to spend the night at the hospital and then probably come home today. Keith is a little worried now, too, and thinks it might be best if he gets in the car and drives out there. I agree, and even though we can't afford the gas for the 5 hour trip, it's something that he really needs to do, so good thing we still have credit available on the credit card to pay for that gas with. We're just waiting to see if they actually release her today and if so he'll probably drive out there tonight or tomorrow morning.

And, last night I made a dinner that turned out good! Surprise surprise! I had chicken enchiladas on the menu, kind of a staple around here since even though it is a little labor intensive, what with frying tortillas and shredding chicken, and grating cheese, and rolling those little suckers up, it's fairly economical and only has a few ingredients, so...chicken enchiladas. I have always used La Victoria enchilada sauce which is okay but a little too bitey spicy for me and usually gives me a little indigestion and why I kept using it I don't know, but I got a can of Old El Paso sauce this time, I think because it was cheaper maybe. Anyway, it was REALLY GOOD! Not spicy, but kind of sweet. So now it will be Old El Paso in my enchiladas, which did I say tasted REALLY GOOD?

I finally cleaned the bathrooms this morning, a job that for some reason I procrastinate quite badly about, each day saying tomorrow I'll clean the bathroom. I don't know why I hate it so much because it only took me all of 15 minutes to clean and if I just did that every few days instead of putting it off and putting it off I'd have a continually clean bathroom. Maybe I should make it a rule that I can't have my coffee until I clean the dang bathroom or something. Snort. Like that would actually work, I'd just hate cleaning the bathroom even more because I hadn't had my coffee yet.