San Francisco, CA

Today I had my first In-N-Out Burger. And it was freaking delicious. I'm encouraging the company to move to the north east, please.Yulia had lab work to do for her grad school stint today, so EGo and I went and met up with my friend Bart in San Fran. Bart used to be one of my sales associates from when I was an assistant manager at a Hot Topic in Rockaway, NJ. Bart packed up and left when he was eighteen, and has been living in Cali for about a year and half, now.

We take the BART train to meet up with Bart (ah, funny how that works.) The BART is just like DC's metro system. I'm fine with that. It's clean and easy to navigate.

We meet up with Bart at an Oakland stop and then head into the city. San Francisco is totally a hippie/street punk town. We were in the Haight neighborhood (and yes, we did go up Haight Street, but on a bus, thanks, because all of us would have had heart attacks walking that steep-ass hill).

We get off once the street levels out, and there are shops galore. A lot of head shops, and a ton of tattoo/peircings places. I stop in one and get some 00 gauge plugs. I was right; my ears have stretched beyond a 0 because these doubles fit perfectly in my ears.

Bart takes us to get some beer at a corner store, then we go to Golden Gate Park. He leads us to a part of the park that's called Hippie Hill. People smoke weed and drink openly in this part of the park. And it's obvious that this is what happens and is the norm, because a few of the groups on the hill are doing exactly that. EGo and I bust out the beers, Bart busts out his bowl and smokes. EGo and I pass, but we sit, drink, and chill, talking to Bart until it gets too windy and cold for us to sit still any longer. Here's Bart and me, freezing our asses off:As we're leaving, Bart and I have beers in our hands. A cop drives through the park, clearly sees that we have open alcohol containers, and leaves us alone. I could get used to that.

We accompany Bart to his friends place in the Mission district. EGo flips a shit because the Hells Angel's San Fran chapter leader was killed by an MS-13 gang recently, and as such, a lot of retaliation shootings have been happening in the Mission. He turns around, pissed off, to go back to Berkeley, but once Bart convinces him that the house we're going to is half a block away, he comes with us. (No one is shot in this story, by the way.)

We chill at Bart's friend Jay's place. Jay is a nice dude; he shares a ton of Sapporo beers with all of us. In his building, you can get up to the roof by climbing over a railing and then up the side of the roof, so we did that.
The rest of the night was spent with us getting drunk, and Jay and another one of Bart's friends (her name is escaping me at the moment) playing guitar and singing in the kitchen. Harmonizing, everything. It was awesome.

Then we took the BART back to Berkeley, where I passed out on my sleeping bag on the floor. Beer for dinner made me sleepy.

Berkeley, CA

After we left Vegas, we had a ten hour drive to stay with EGo's friend, Yulia, in Berkeley.

I pulled over at one point for food and gas. We stopped at this place called Peggy Sue's, a fifty's themed diner. I had the best ice cream soda of my life there. Anyway, after we leave, EGo drives. Then half an hour later he realizes he left his cell phone at the diner. We turn around, get it, then turn around again. Small loss of time. I encourage him never to do that again.

After about a ten hour drive, we arrive in Berkeley. Yulia goes to grad school here, and has just moved into the neighborhood. So we walk down one of the main Berkeley drags to find food. We stop at Fat Slice, which is passable pizza for being on the West Coast. It was doughy but still decent.

Apparently that street is where all the protesters and activists will sit during the day and just scream out propaganda, their veiws on life, and that everything you're doing is wrong and terrible. I think I'll avoid that street during the day. At night, it was just one clean-cut girl sitting on a bunch of unfolded newspaper pages on the sidewalk...talking on her cell phone. That's the American way.

Las Vegas, NV, part II.

So I wake up with a hangover. Of course. With six hours of sleep. But I kind of feel okay, so I leave EGo asleep in the room and go down to the Circus Circus buffet. It was worth the thirteen bucks. However, I promptly had a worse hangover from eating. I don't know why my body works that way.

I go back up to the room. EGo is awake. We chat a bit, but then I pass out for a few more hours. Around five, I wake up again. EGo and I hit the strip.

Vegas is unimpressive during the day. It needs the dark and the blazing neon cutting through the night to be the crazy city of sin, sweat, bad decisions, brief highs, lost money, and broken hearts that it truly is.

We wandered around. I played about two bucks in the penny slots at Caesars Palace, which we went in just so I could see what it was like. Very classy. So was the Bellagio. We stood on a walkway over the street to watch the Bellagio's water fountain show. Know that end scene in Ocean's Eleven? The show is syncronized to music when you're there in person. It is very awesome. However, the music they chose to use for the show we watched was "Proud To Be An American." So, that knocked the class aspect down to almost zero. It also made me want to laugh hysterically when some lady next to me was singing along, very sincerely.

After that, we went back and spent the remainder of our time at Treasure Island. I'm a big fan of that place. The Black Jack tables were kinder to me that night, and I came out twenty five bucks ahead. Not a large recoup of my previous nights losses, but I'll take it.

I took no pictures at all in Vegas because I was very intent on losing a decent sum of money.

Las Vegas, NV

Oh. Oh, Vegas. My love for you is boundless.

So, the drive from Colorado to Nevada was long, but went fine. I had EGo drive the last few hours so I could stare at Vegas when it came up. I'm glad. The sprawl of lights was particularly distracting.

We arrived at about 10:30 and checked into Circus Circus. Then I immediately got into the shower. Being dirty sucks. Once I was clean, we hit the strip.

It wasn't as bright and neon-y as I thought it was going to be. There are lots of empty lots now. Also, the Frontier is closed. Other casinos are under construction. Other than that, though, Las Vegas lived up to my expectations. Some bums wandered the strip. There was a huge pile of empty beer bottles on part of a lot, right next to a cardboard box onto which someone had scrawled, "Jesus Loves You!" with a black marker.

EGo and I wind up at Treasure Island, which is definitely my favorite casino so far. (I do plan on going back to Vegas--maybe hit up the five dollar Black Jack table I hear exists at the Bellagio). Anyway, EGo goes to play Texas Hold 'Em, while I sit down at the Black Jack table. I proceed to realize that I've forgotten most of what I remember about playing Black Jack, but quickly start to pick back up the knowledge that I've lost. This table has a 10 dollar minimum.

Then, the free drinks happen. The waitress keeps coming around, asking all of us at the table if we want anything. I tell her Jack and Coke so often that I finally just tell her to keep them coming for every time she circles back to my table (it would take her about 10-15 minutes each trip).

I get drunk. (Not blackout drunk, but drunk.) I play badly. I lose. I go get more money out of the ATM. I lose some more. EGo comes back from losing at poker. We decide to go down the street to the Wynn to check it out. It's about, oh, four in the morning at this point.

I go and I find a table with a 15 dollar minimum; the cheapest I can find. I proceed to gamble some more. EGo then announces that he's tired (EGO IS TIRED? I stayed up longer than him? Where is my friend and what did you do with him???). He leaves to go back to the room and pass out. I stay until about six in the morning, when I'm at the ATM taking out more money, then realize what A BAD IDEA THIS IS.

So I go and lose fifty more bucks and call it a night. Except, when I walk outside the Wynn, it is daytime. I look at my phone to see that the time is 6:30am. I walk down the street, still drunk, watching people in running apparel jog up or down the strip past me. The bums are gone, the sun hasn't made anything hot yet, I've lost a lot of cash, but somehow, I feel just fine.

I make it back to the hotel room where EGo has fallen asleep ontop of the comforter of his bed. I try to talk to him to get him to go underneath the covers, and he yells at me to shut up; however, he does eventually get under the blankets. I go to sleep a much poorer woman, but first make sure that I have closed the curtains of the room tightly.

Fort Collins, CO, part II.

Today has been a relaxing day. Dave took us out to breakfast at this local joint that had cinnamon roll french toast. I got that and a half order of biscuits and gravy. Then I managed to eat, uh, not a lot of it. Then we got back to Dave and Mandy's and I fell asleep in a food coma.

Tomorrow, we're off to Vegas! Twelve hour drive. We're staying at Circus Circus on the strip. I'm prepared to lose some money.

Also, go back through my old posts, from about Chicago up, because I uploaded more photos that I didn't have in there before, thanks to our lack of internet.

Fort Collins, CO

In the morning in Wyoming, EGo and I wake up and beat it right out of there. I can't tell you how eager I was to get the hell out of that state. We didn't even stop to eat until we hit the Colorado border. I shit you not.

So, we get to Mandy and Dave's. Two of my friends from college, and I haven't been so happy to see friendly faces in all my life. We chill out at their apartment for awhile, then go out to buy sealant for the tent, stop at a Wachovia ATM, and get some other stuff for Mandy.

At one point Mandy is talking to her parents on her cell phone, so we drop into a local bar to kill some time. Let me tell you, the altitude here completely influences the effect of alcohol on your body. I had one pint, and drank it very slowly, and I was buzzed. Unbelievable. It's a bit scary, actually. I'm glad we're not as high up as say, Denver. I don't want to know what the effects would be like at that height.

We take Dave and Mandy's dog, Salem, to a dog park, which is actually fun (as someone who has never owned a dog, I really delight in stuff like that). When we get back, Dave makes some awesome five or six layer dip with guacamole for dinner (THANK YOU again for real food my god it's so good). They feed EGo and I some of the local beer that they have in the fridge. I think I had two more, and yeah, still feeling the effects. Craziness. Then EGo, Dave and I play some Halo 2 while Mandy laughs at us and hangs plant hooks. Also, they let us do laundry, which is awesome, because, well, I'm out of clothes.

More to follow about Colorado tomorrow.

Mount Rushmore, Wall, SD; and Casper, WY

Today we woke up and the tent had leaked.

Underneath the sleeping bags was wet, just barely, and the tent wall by our heads was soaked through. It had poured during the night, I remembered that. I also remembered being woken up by some screeching, owl-like noise. Then dog barking, which I thought was wolves at the time, then eventually woke up more and knew better.

So, yeah. I wake up, because shit is wet. I also wake up because twenty feet from our heads some piece of heavy machinery is dragging cut pine trees away from the campsite. LOUD AS FUCK.
So, we get up and go eat at a Pizza Hut, of all places, because EGo wants something familiar. Then we go to Mount Rushmore. It's actually very cool. I expected it to be a stupid and lame tourist attraction, but in person, it's incredibly impressive. I give it two thumbs up.The opposite follows for Wall Drug. It's about as touristy as a place can get. It panders to the public. I'm not going to lie: I saw Wall Drug on the first season of Road Rules and wanted to go and see it ever since. It's this huge, strip mall-like, hick tourist attraction. Here's me riding a jackalope.
We're driving about halfway to get to Mandy and Dave, who live in Colorado. TomTom, my navigation system, is taking us down county highways. There is nothing for miles. And really, I mean NOTHING. I thought I had seen nothing before this point in the trip and boy, was I ever wrong. I mean, nothing but fields and fields and road and road. Then it got dark. And then was there EVER nothing to see, except the blinding glare of someone forgetting to turn off their high beams. That's a real bitch.

So, we drive. Eventually we cross over the Wyoming border without even knowing it. We pass trains that are hauling loads of coal paralell on the road to us. Their lights are also blinding. We agree that once we hit the interstate we'll find a hotel to stop in.

After we get an idea of where a fucking hotel is in the godforsaken state from a gas station attendant, we stop in Casper, Wyoming, which is far too close to Laramie for my tastes. Remember Matthew Shepard? Yeah. This is no place for a lesbian and her Asian friend.

First hotel we stop at, a Super 8, has no room because, and I quote, because I asked, "There's a wedding and a rodeo going on." Holy. Shit. Second place, a Best Western, has a room; smoking, but thank god, there's a room. EGo and I go in and eventually go to bed. The place is packed with pickup trucks in the parking lot, and I can't wait to leave in the morning.