Oh, hay

So I have been living in Santa Clara, CA for about 3 months now.  I really like it here a lot. I’m not really getting homesick quite yet, not as much as I should be anyway.  In the past 3 months I have seen 6 of our friends from NJ.  Our friend Darren came out explicitly to visit us.  My friends band, Black Wine, was touring in the area.  Our friends Megan and Roy were vacationing in California and we met up for a day.  And finally my other friends band, East of the Wall, is playing in California on this upcoming Friday.  So yeah, that part of things is kind of strange.  I do miss my family a lot, and my friends, but it doesn’t feel like I’ve been that disconnected yet.

I live about 2 miles from work so I’ve been riding my bike to work as often as I can motivate myself.  That always makes me feel as though I am in some strange and distant country.  I need to start riding my bike more because eventually I would love to do a marathon or something for Charity.  There’s a 20 mile one my friends were telling me about which might be do-able for me.  My buddy Luke just rode 100 miles for livestrong.  It’s so crazy to me that someone can do that.  I will work on ramping up though, and see where that goes.

I suppose I’m just rambling some thoughts about being out here in California.  It suits the sporadic updating I do anyway I imagine.

It’s kind of cool, I walk past the Yahoo building on my way to lunch sometimes.  When this happens I get really giddy that I work so close to Yahoo.  It’s made me pay more attention to my yahoo mail account, since I feel like I owe them that.  Right near my job there is this sandwich place called “Togo’s” , it’s amazing.  They put avocados in like all of their sandwiches.  In fact almost everything I eat out here now has avocados in it, it’s bliss.

People in California are definitely suspiciously nicer than my experience with any other region of the country.  But I’ve discovered the secret is that once they get in their cars they take out all that pent up anger by driving like idiots.  Blinkers are optional, middle fingers seem mandatory, who knows.  If you put your blinker on, the person in the next lane will imagine that you have no issued to them a challenge.  In order to defeat you they will not let you pass.  You are the Balrog.  So weird.

Welp, that’s all she wrote for now.  Sleepytime!!

Except me.  Sure, if you are taking a road trip across country and you specifically plot out places to visit and you take your time, a road trip could probably be amazing.  However, when you’re driving on Route 80 with 3 cats in your backseat and all you want to do is be finished, not so much.  Yet still people keep saying how lucky we are, and how they are jealous that we are on this Road Trip…. Clearly they’ve never driven across country by route 80 for the sole purpose of getting to California.

Day #1, Destination: Wauseon, Ohio.

So we left from Delaware where we were staying with Gaz’ mom.  We had bought a dog crate for the three cats so that they could be with each other and have enough room to walk around a little bit.  As we started driving Uzumaki, one of our cats, got out of the top holes in the cage and was loose in the car.  So we had to pull over and wrangle her.  Both her & Aeryn, cat #2, were panting like dogs.  They were freaking out, meowing and clearly unhappy.  Rocky Meowboa, cat #3,  was just laying down trying to sleep.  He had the right idea.  So the Veterinarian had told us that we could give our cats Children’s Benadryl instead of a Cat Sedative because it was actually safer for them.  So we got some medicine with the active ingredient recommended and an eye dropper.  As soon as a drop went into Uzi’s mouth she turned into the girl from the exorcist.  She started foaming at the mouth, making just a terrible terrible face and spitting everywhere.  So… She hates medicine… ok.  We bought some cardboard to put over the top of the crate to keep her in and we were on our way.  They meowed for like… 3 hours before they finally caught onto the fact that Rocky Meowboa had the right idea.  Then they slept.

We then headed towards the only actual stop we were making to check a place out.  We went towards Penn State so I could just take a look at my alma mater and eat some D.P. Dough.  On the way there we were driving through some mountains and a torrential downpour started…. Awesome.  But we got there in one piece and I had some good food.  It was neat to take a look at Penn State and it brought back some memories, but we couldn’t really walk around because I didn’t want to leave the cats alone in the car.  SO we moved on.

This day took the longest and we didn’t get to our hotel until 2AM.  On top of it it was a Smoking room in a crappy motel.  All the hotels we were staying in were Best Westerns but this one was by far the worst.  Of course the night we needed sleep most, we were in the worst place.

Day 2, Destination: Omaha, Nebraska

So, in the morning we woke up to pack the car and it was FREEZING.  It was awful.  And it takes us awhile to tetris in all the crap we have, but we did it. We head out to get something to eat.  We were looking for a 7-11 or something, but we could not find it.  We did find a Burger King and a Taco Bell.  So Gaz goes into the Taco Bell and a woman is cleaning the door that works there.  He was going in and got stuck on the door, he had to hold the door with his knuckles for a second while he got unstuck.   So he gets inside, and everyone is chatty.  There’s southern accents (??) and country music regaling the south playing.  Ohio, really?

Employee #1 (To Gaz):  You should go put fingerprints all over the door she just cleaned, haha!
Window Cleaning Employee:  Yeah… well.. (annoyed) he already put his knuckles on the door.

Ohhhhhh kay.  Creepy nothernsouthern passive aggressive.. let’s be on our way.

The rest of the drive this day was pretty uneventful.  Plains, plains, plains… OH LOOK A COW… Plains, plains…..

We got to Omaha and went straight to the hotel.  This hotel was much nicer than the last and we got to sleep.

Day #3, Destination: Rawlins, Wyoming

So in the morning we got to have breakfast at Perkins at least because there was one attached to the hotel in Omaha.  That was a highlight of the trip.  But neither one of us, as it turns out, really likes Perkins food.  Oh well.

So we drove.  Plains, plains, plains…. and we got to Wyoming!!  We got to our hotel at 8:30 this night which was really nice because it gave us some time to relax.  There was a Domino’s nearby so we ordered some Pizza and watched Castle! Woohoo.

Day #4, Destination: Winnemucca, NV
So, in the morning we drove through town to get some breakfast at McDonalds.  This town (Rawlins) is a ghost town.  Everything seemed to be a small chain store, and most of it seemed to be closed.   The one highlight is that there was a Blockbuster that closed down but a local shop, Video Mania or something, was still open.  Good to have local priorities.   It was pretty surreal seeing all the abandoned buildings like that and closed down stores.  We got to McDonalds though and saw some dudes dressed in cowboy attire.  They pretty much ruled.

And we’re off.  This day we drove through Wyoming, Utah, and Nevada.  We stopped at a cute rest area called “Little America” to get gas and Ice Cream. The gas stations out here are called “Sinclair” and have a dinosaur mascot.   This gas chain is apparently the namesake for the Sinclair family on the show “Dinosaurs” (Thanks Nick).  So we filled up on Gas and kept driving.  Once we started getting low I was looking for a gas station, in Utah now.  And there was NOTHING for like 40 miles.  The last gas station back was 60 miles.  You’d think if there was no Gas for 100 miles there would be some sort of sign warning you of such, but nope.   So we had a fun adventure riding the E and hoping for the best.

Scenery wise driving through Utah was interesting.  Seeing the actual Salt Lake was pretty neat.  And there was lots of weird looking desert. We get to Nevada and arrive in Winnemucca.  This is one of the towns in Nevada that still allows legal prostitution!  It was lit up with some small casinos and kind of made me feel like I was in Las Vegas 60 years ago.  It was a neat little town.

Day 5, Destination: Milpitas, California

And today… the day to end all days.  It was supposed to be a 6 hour drive to our destination, the quickest of our drives so far.  It was supposed to be easy and fun because we were almost done.

It wasn’t.

We were driving on 80 and I was sleeping.  Suddenly I heard what sounded like a Gunshot and the car jolted.  There was this piece of a truck on the road that was a huge metal pipe with a wheel on it.  It was in the middle of the lane and Gaz thought it was road kill so tried not to hit it with the wheels.  The middle of the car got torn apart instead.  The bottom covering was torn off, and the pipes leading to the Muffler was punctured in 3 places.   Awesome.  So, we sat around, made some phone calls.  I was not sure how much damage there would be so I started the claims process.  There were two other cars affected by this piece of hardware.  A guy whose tire blew out and a woman who swore the pipe “Hit her car so hard”.  So this lady gets out of her car and starts grilling us…

Lady: What was that, did that come off your car.

Gaz (while on the ground trying to inspect the damage done to our car): It did not come off our car, the guy in front of us hit it too we don’t know what it is.

Lady:  Can you come look at my car..

So Gaz goes to look at her car with her and sees nothing visibly wrong.  She points out a “bubble” on her tire..

Lady:  Should I drive on that?  How fast should I go?

Gaz:  I don’t feel comfortable giving you this advice.  If I were you I would call Triple A and have them take a look.

Lady: Oh I don’t want to wait for all that, should I drive?

Gaz:  I told you what I would do if you want to do something different that’s on you but I don’t know enough about cars to give you car advice.

Lady:  Oh you’re funny… what are you a lawyer?

So this goes on and the Man, the Lady and Gaz are chatting about what’s going on and they go down the highway to find the culprit.  They moved it out of the roadway so that other cars would not hit it.  This was despite the Lady saying they should leave it there so that “Someone like the police can find it”.  yeah, ok.

We decided after while to move on.  We found the closest place that could look at mufflers was Meineke in Reno Nevada.  We were about 80 miles away from Reno.  But we took our chances.  Oh the car sounded just awful and it was so scary to drive that way, but we made it!!

The guys at Meineke were super nice and helpful.  To get the Honda Stock kit parts would have taken a week so I had them just fix the piping and do what they could to get the car drivable, and they did.  We were there for an hour or so.  The Manager there mentioned to us that there was some Snow up in the mountains on 80 and we might need some Tire Chains.  Oh no!  So we asked if they sold the chains at the checkpoint, he said no.  Derp that makes no sense!!  We asked if we should buy the chains from him and he said it looked clear on the weather cams so we should be fine.

An hour after leaving the place, we were not fine.  We got up to the mountains past Truckee and it was snowing and ice.  Mind you, we’re in California at this point.  So we get up to the checkpoint and the guy is like “You need chains or you need to get off the road”  So I asked “Well, what do we do?”  He mentioned we could turn around and go back to Truckee, or buy chains from this guy in the minivan right over here.  As luck would have it that guy was selling chains much further down the road when a competitor setup right next to him.  So he had to move his station to the end of the line, so luckily he was right there.  We asked how much for the chains and install and he said 60 dollars.  That seemed like a fair price, considering the chains themselves at meineke were 70 dollars.  He installed them lickity split and we were on our way.  These tire chains say to drive no faster than 30 MPH.  Well I was doing just that but I still had to put on my hazards since everyone around me was way too gangsta to care about chain rules.

So then we get to a point where we’re out of the mountains and now Gaz has to figure out how to take this chains off.  Now he’s wet and dirty, and damnit today just  sucks!!!

On the way to Milpitas we discover that now my gas gauge is not updating and always says full.  Damnit.  So today I am going to have to take the car into a Honda Dealership and pay for even more repairs.  Poops.

California, you’d better be awesome.

And I am NEVER driving across country on Route 80 ever again.

I have been thinking a lot in the past year about my career and other job options in the New Jersey area that I could advance to.  I’ve figured out, as have many before me, that the best way to get yourself advanced in your career is to just get a new job.  Too many companies do not prioritize the promotion of their internal employees, and it’s quite a shame.  When thinking about the choices around me geographically there wasn’t much.  In NYC I could work for a Financial institution, Insurance Company, etc as the IT Guy.   This would likely mean “suiting up” and toning it down.  That was not something I would look forward to.  Then, I thought about California.  It just seems like the place to be for IT Professionals.  So, I decided to follow up on a lead from 2007 and give my resume to a friend of mine that had gone to work for Data Domain.

After six phone interviews I was offered the job, thank goodness.  So my husband and I decided that we would move cross-country to California and have a life adventure together.  The downside of all of this is leaving our friends and family behind to do it.  It’s pretty hard when I think about it.  I spent most of my life without the joy of good friends.  In the past 5 years or so I’ve really become close with some of the greatest people in the world.  Everything in life, besides work, was pretty great in NJ.  When we had a surprise going away party thrown for us things really started to hit hard.  Leaving started to feel like the wrong choice.

Not to mention realizing that the last time I was at my parents’ house might be the last time I am there for a year or more.  I am used to seeing my parents at least once every other week or so, which was nice.  Now it might be shifting to once every 6 months or so.  It’s so weird.

But, we’re doing it.  Right now I’m sitting in a hotel room in Wauseon, Ohio waiting to move on to our next destination, Omaha, NE.  The only thing I really know about Omaha is that it’s where 311 is from, and hey that’s more than I knew about Ohio!!

It still feels pretty temporary. Like we’re just going on some sort of vacation. Even though we’ve secured an apartment, rented out our condo and put all of our belongings in a POD to traverse the continent.  It still feels temporary.  It will kick in soon.  Now it’s off to another 10 hour day of driving!

So, I basically think Lady Gaga is the best thing since sliced bread.  At first she broke out onto the scene and seemed like just another “Dance Pop Artist”.  Good at what she did, it didn’t really interest me.  Then I caught wind of the fact that she’s actually an amazing piano player and studied music.  I watched some live performances and I fell in love.  Not to mention her amazing costumes & crazy videos.  She’s a walking piece of art almost everywhere she goes.  I know that all people seeking fame have to be fake to some extent, she really seems true to herself and doesn’t give a frack what people think.  I admire that in her. So, of course, I was super psyched for the new video with Lady Gaga and Beyonce, who is another talented voice.  The video did not disappoint.  For those of you that have not seen it, give it a watch.  That is as long as you’re not 12 or something.  In which case, why are 12 year olds reading my site?

Awesome, right?  A totally neat short-film with ridiculous themes, bad acting, and horrific visuals.  Sounds like almost every movie that I love.  It was awesome.  I would not, however, show this to my 6-year-old nephew, because you know.. he’s 6.   But apparently there’s some people who believe that things like this shouldn’t exist as long as children exist…

This is obviously made for adults and not little children.  However, I would wonder what kind of parents are letting CHILDREN watch MTV at all.  I think the “Jersey Shore” is probably more damaging to young minds than Lady Gaga, so if you’re letting them watch ANYTHING on that channel then you’re  probably not paying attention.  I, however, am not supposed to sacrifice my enjoyment of pop culture and art just because other people decided to have kids, am I?

Then there’s the wonderful accusation that somehow the existence of Lady Gaga and other sexy mediums are the pornography that is fueling sexual predators.  Oh, ok.  Because they didn’t exist since the dawning of time or anything.   And Gaga and Beyonce pretending to be a Gay Couple on a Music Video is disgusting?

This woman on Fox News is awful.   She claims that in other countries children still have innocence, and are not growing up too fast.  Does she also realize that in other countries we do not make such a stigma out of sexuality?  English broadcasting is WAY more sexualized than American MTV, and way more explicitly so.  Seriously, if you take something and make it a scary mystery that is dangerous… kids will seek it out.  So maybe the actual message is that we need a more mature approach to life and censorship.

I will give credit to the host of the show on Fox News, she did bring up legitimate talking points and counter arguments, especially considering the “News” source.

But seriously… where’s the part where they are cutting off Lady Gaga’s penis?  I missed that part….

So the other night the hubbo and I decided to have a date night despite the impending snow storm.  You know, a lot of people rag on New Jersey when I tell them that is where I’m from.  And on top of that, with this stupid Jersey Shore show I feel like New Jersey is getting a bit of a bad reputation.  New Jersey has a lot of charm, and people tend to judge the whole state on the fact that they were “Just passing through” one day & drove near the airport.  Yes, the industrial area near the airport stinks and is unattractive.  However, there’s a lot of bonus’ to living in this state.  I’m close to New York City, Philadelphia, or Washington D.C. without actually having to live in a crazy metropolitan area.  There’s diners, EVERYWHERE.  If you need to get something you usually never have to travel more than 20 minutes to find what you are looking for.  We get hot summers and snowy winters!  And on top of that there’s a lot of awesome places to go & hang out.  I would like to highlight one of those places today!

Plenty of machines to keep you entertained!

Silverball Museum
Pinball Hall of Fame

I’ve written before about the Pinball Hall of Fame that is in Las Vegas, and it was AWESOME.  Well, they opened up something just as awesome in New Jersey.  Down in Asbury Park, on the boardwalk at Ocean Ave, you will find an awesome blast from the past.  Not only are there TONS of machines to play there, but the ambiance is super awesome in their new space.  You will find a lot of the ambiance is centered around a vintage boardwalk arcade theme.  The machines are sectioned according to the decade they were released in.  Some of the machines are being worked on and you can take a peek into the inner workings of a pinball machine.

It costs you $10 for unlimited play for the hour & $20 for an all day pass.  You could also throw birthday parties here!  I threw one for my Husband last year and everyone had a blast!  I highly recommend anyone who is visiting the New Jersey area, or just looking for something new to do, to check this place out.

The second-best selling Pinball of all time!!

Now I just want to point out a very special machine, Capt. Fantastic.  I saw this at the Pinball Hall of Fame in Vegas as well but I don’t think I really paid too much attention to what is ACTUALLY going on in the art here.  If you take a closer look you will see some pretty creepy business.

wtf???

So a woman carrying a snake is hanging out on the shoulders of a man who can shoot lightning out of his eyes.  Meanwhile there’s a creeper in a suit with an afro that is totally surprised.  And another guy had a BRUTUS shirt and is carrying a sword on a hilt!!  Someone’s feet are sticking up as they’ve fallen to the ground & appear to have no pants or shoes.  One girl is wearing a belt made of bullets.   This is some sort of freaky party!!!

No Wagering!!!!

Awesome old school cabinets

Neat soda machine!

All in all Asbury Park is getting a bit of a facelift and it’s really nice to see it  So do yourself a favor & check it out!!