Well third time is not a charm, but I did manage to get to the vista this time. I did manage to get within 100 feet or so of the cache, but where my GPS said I was and the hints provided didn’t match up. I had been hiking for about two hours at that point so I didn’t care. Reaching the top was enough.
View from the Airport Vista
Some ferns
View from the Pico Vista
A frog, or toad.
Oh boy, lots of stuff going on.
I went on vacation last week on my annual trip to AC. I took about $250 to play around with and the idea that I would put everything else on credit card. Well I ended up putting nothing on the card, and payed for everything (2 nights in the Tropicana hotel, food, a pretty big shopping spree, etc.) with cash and still brought home about $600. I’m considering trying to become a professional poker player now 🙂 I also ended up with a nice sunburn even though it was so hazy I couldn’t see 100 yards away.
My uncle Johnny Dente died on Monday. He was 81. I bet there’s one hell of a pitch game going on now with him, my dad and my uncle Walt. He even asked my aunt Ruthie to marry him again on his death bed. Stuff like that just kills me.
TSW returned to the Armory on my birthday Saturday. This is the first time I actually got to work in those hallowed halls (not counting the 10 seconds I was in a battle royal at the last show there in 2001). I had Hale Collins vs G.G. Von Bathory, Cheech vs. Swinger Sidusky vs. Jav Calero for the Zero Gravity title, and Punk vs. Hoss in a Old School Hardcore match for the Heavyweight title. Hoss “broke” his wrist during the match, but kept going. Then he was supposted to take a back body drop out of the ring through two tables, but came up about 2 feet short and just bumped on the ground.
Sunghee got me a new air conditioner for my birthday, but the included hardware to mount it didn’t fit. None of the screws actually fit in the holes. I had the freakin’ electic drill on that and I couldn’t get any of them in. So we returned it. We were going to get a replacement, but about half of them had already been opened and then taped shut so I guess some other people were having the same problems I was. We ended up just getting a refund and got one from a different store.
The miniture train in Quechee started running for the season on Saturday, and CJ loves trains, so we were there. I also found that they had a pretty neat toy and doll museum, and I was all over that.
CJ and Sunghee on the Merry Go ‘Round
Robin consoles the stoned monkey.
I used to have one of these guys. It’s apparently from the ’50s, just after WWII. I guess it was my brother’s or sister’s toy and it stayed around for me. It was strange seeing a copy of a toy I used to have in a museum. But it’s not as strange as…
Holy Crap! That’s where my Etch-a-Sketch went to. The kid next door kept taking my stuff and saying it was his. So my mom would write my name on all my stuff. That didn’t stop him, as he went off to private school a little later and kept my stuff there. Then, somewhere in the next 20 years, the thing was sold at one or more yard sales / flea markets until the curator of the museum found it and made it an attraction. I told this story to the woman running the museum, and she wanted to give it back to me. I declined as if I really want a Etch-a-Sketch I’ll go buy a new one.
At the end of the museum is a couple model railroads set up. One was very very detailed with mountains and what not. After closer inspection I found some disturbing scenes:
Poor cow, she seems to have slipped down under the train tracks.
It’s the General Lee going to get Uncle Jesse out of jail!
Will noone help this poor woman up?
Or this man? Is this from The Sopranos?
Can anyone make out the license plate? Or maybe they’re stopping to help?
This reminds me of Fargo.
Saturday was CJ’s birthday, he’s 3. It was also the opening day for the Shelburne Museum. So we killed two birds with one stone. And I took pictures.
Sunghee and I decided to try this on after we dropped of CJ and I wanted to do something outside while it was still nice. We had GPS coordinates for the entrance of the trail, but didn’t see the sign for the trail anywhere so we continued a bit until we got to the “approx. 2 miles� mark from the start of Old Post Road and there we saw a trail with a sign holder (but no sign). “This must be it� we thought and headed off down the trail. Well, the closest we got to the cache was 0.9 miles as we were going down Bald Mountain instead of up it. We did wander past a few nice camping spots though and found a river. Then we somehow managed to lose the trail and get lost. I repeat, we got lost with a GPS. After bushwhacking up hill for about 20 minutes we found the trail again and headed back to the car to try another day.
!/images/37.jpg (4.25.04 Path)!
The “X” in the lower left is where we were trying to go. The red squiggly in the upper right is the path we tried to use.
On the way back to the car we decided to go out for some food. Where to go though? We just came out of the woods from a hour long hike and we didn’t really want to go back home to clean up and change so lots of options were crossed out. Plus it was 8pm on a Sunday night. Not a lot open. Sunghee hates Applebee’s, and we’re both kind of sick of Denny’s. Ponderosa was a option, but when I go a buffet I just grab all the stuff I like so I tend to get sick of those pretty quickly. Example, if you eat the Chicken Fried Chicken at Applebee’s no matter how much you did like it at first, you will start to tire of it. Then you can switch to the Bourbon Street Steak and all is good. But at the buffet everything is right there in front of you and you want to sample a bit of it all so it all becomes one big meal of meatloaf, chicken wings, mac & cheese and vanilla pudding. Anyways, we decided to go to the 99 with half of their menu has garlic something on it which Sunghee approves of.
So we’re at the 99 and the hostess seats us in a room with a “family� in a booth diagonal from us. The “father�, early 30’s, 6’2� or so, athletic build, is sitting with his back to us, the “mother�, early 30’s, 5’3� or so, blonde hair, 150lbs or so, has a chair pulled up to the end of the booth with a baby in a high chair on her left, and the “father� is to the left of the baby on the bench. To the right of the “mother� is a 4-5 year old girl and to her right is a 6-7 year old boy. Sunghee and I were pondering the menu choices when the girl started squealing in a annoyed manner. This got my attention and I lifted my head in time to see the “father� lean across the table and punch the boy in the head so hard that he slammed back into the booth. The “father� start trying to get out of the booth almost pushing the highchair laden baby over in the process. He’s trying to get the boy out of the booth and yelling “I told you not to do that! You always have to ruin dinner don’t you!? Come on, lets go to the bar.� The kid just has this horrified look on his face and is in shock. The “mother� just keeps looking straight ahead and saying “sit down please, sit down� in a very quiet tone. Finally he does and starts apologizing… to the “mother�. “He’s always the one to ruin dinner, you know that.� At this point I found a waitress and requested another table. Kids are kids, I can deal with them fooling around in a restaurant. I don’t like it, but I tolerate it. It’s not going to ruin my night. Watching a grown man punch a 7 year old boy does ruin my dinner, and evening, and probably week for that matter. Thanks a lot Mr. Asshole.
