Spencer Jack Flips While David, Theo & Ruby Tarpit To End Of Route 66

New California photos from David, Theo and Ruby. Currently the trio is in far Southern California, as in San Diego. There was no explanatory text accompanying the photos, leaving it to my feeble analytic skills to figure out what I am looking at.

Prior to San Diego the trio spent a couple nights in Santa Monica. That is a Los Angeles suburb, for those not familiar with Southern California.

And now that you are causing me to think about it I am wondering if Santa Monica considers itself a suburb of LA. I have no way of solving this conundrum.

What I did know for sure about Santa Monica is that the western terminus of the Mother Road, Route 66, ends at the Pacific Ocean in Santa Monica. If I remember right Route 66 ends when it reaches California Highway 1, also known as the Pacific Coast Highway.

I vaguely remember back in the previous decade, during a visit to Los Angeles, driving Mulholland Drive to its end. Was that in Santa Monica? I must wait til I am Internet connected so I can consult Google about this Mulholland Drive question.

In addition to the Route 66 in Santa Monica photo, I am guessing the next one is showing David, Theo and Ruby on a carnival type ride called the Scrambler, on the Santa Monica Pier.

And then the next photo I think shows a location not in Santa Monica.

Which would make this the La Brea Tarpits which David, Theo and Ruby are standing by.

Maybe Santa Monica has its own tarpits. Or maybe the La Brea Tarpits are in Santa Monica and I have for years erroneously assumed the Tarpits were in Los Angeles. I vaguely recollect them being near Wilshire Boulevard, or on that road. And near Century City.

But it has been a long time since I have explored the Los Angeles zone. I think the last time was Christmas week of 1994. And I don't remember going into the Los Angeles downtown zone on that visit.

When next I am connected to the Internet I must remember to Google "La Brea Tarpits" in addition to Googling "Mulholland Drive".

Meanwhile, up north in Washington, while his cousins are having fun in Southern California, Spencer Jack has been working the grill at the Fidalgo Drive-In in Anacortes. Seems like only yesterday Spencer Jack was a little kid, and now he is a professional burger flipper...

Today Spencer Jack Is Getting His Kicks On Route 66

This afternoon an incoming email from my favorite Nephew Jason had a subject line of "Spencer Jack on Route 66".

I opened the email to find text which said "Enjoying the February sunshine!" along with two photos which looked to me as if Spencer Jack was somewhere on Route 66.

Just yesterday Spencer Jack's great grandma mentioned she thought maybe Spencer Jack and his dad might come down to Arizona whilst my favorite ex-sister-in-law was there.

With Arizona being the only location on Route 66 which might have the Utah type scenery I was seeing in these two pictures I figured Spencer Jack and his dad must have flown to Las Vegas, rented a car and then proceeded to head east, getting their kicks on Route 66.

So, I text messaged Spencer Jack's dad and asked where they were on Route 66, saying I assumed they were somewhere between Kingman and Flagstaff.

I then got a text message in return with precise location information as to where Spencer Jack was on Route 66, it being a location which I would never have guessed.

California.

Anaheim, California, to be more precise.

Disney California Adventure to be even more precise.

Disney California Adventure Cars Land to be even more precisely the exact location where Spencer Jack found himself standing in front of cacti on Route 66.

I have not been to Disneyland since Christmas Day of 1994. Which means I have never seen Disney California Adventure, or Cars Land. Reading the Wikipedia articles about Disney California Adventure and Cars Land makes it sound fun.

After Jason told me this was the Disney version of Route 66 I asked if that was some sort of realistic mural behind Spencer Jack, to be told that, no, it is an actual real life-like replica.

When I moved to the land of Six Flags Over Texas I figured I would be getting myself a season's pass, what with me being a lifelong fan of Disneyland, with more visits to the Magic Kingdom than I can remember. But, one visit to Six Flags Over Texas, via a free pass, quickly had me realizing I would not be paying any real money to visit that sad, compared to Disneyland, version of a theme park.

And now, speaking of theme parks, Fort Worth is currently in the midst of once again getting snookered by an out of state con job. This time in the form of something called DreamVision, yesterday holding a big press reveal in Fort Worth about a $3.5 billion theme park in Fort Worth with a tall indoor mountain covered with snow, along with New York City and other wonders.

I'll believe in the DreamVision vision about the same time I see water flowing under the Trinity River Vision Boondoggle's Three Bridges Over Nothing....

Environmentally Friendly Texas Popcorn

I had not thought of air popping popcorn by sticking some in a metal container and setting it outside, til Alma, the Songbird of the Texas Gulf Coast, sent me this picture this morning.

I'd pop some outside right now, except it is only 82 and a bit cloudy. I'm thinking it needs to be over 100, with direct sunlight hitting the popcorn popper, to make it work.

I got up late today, which happens once every few years, so, I canceled my regular early morning swim, because it was no longer early morning by the time I got my usual tasks out of the way.

I did nothing aerobic yesterday, except for the early morning swim. And that really is not all that aerobic. I did not go on a walk or a hike yesterday. I'm am turning into a sedentary slob. I will try to end this slob trend today. Even though it is off to a bad start with that missing morning swim.

I watched all of the Obama news conference last night. I don't recollect the last time I made it all the way through such a thing. I thought he made a compelling, if somewhat vague, case for moving fast on health care reform.

Having seen the medical business up close and personal, about 25 years ago, I was shocked and appalled and disgusted with the business, way back then. The bills had so many mistakes, some outrageous. I was able to catch some of them. How many was I unable to catch? They mixed up my files and sent me in for something called a Gallium Scan, when I thought I was there for a CAT scan. Thinking I was someone else, they had me drink a foul liquid, prior to the test, that was not for me. After an hour of me fussing and asking why the tests had been changed, a couple doctors showed up and apologized for the mistake.

I'm off to take a virtual drive down Route 66 in Oklahoma now. Talk to you later.

Texas Swimming In The Dark With Nancy's Fried Pies In Oklahoma On Route 66

I was up way before the crack of dawn, again, this morning.

When I checked email I found one from Perkins telling me that the Nancy's Fried Pies Video was not working on my Eyes on Texas website.

What fresh hell is this I thought. It did not take me long to find out that Perkins was correct. Nancy's Fried Pies was not working, nor were several others. It did not take long to figure out the code had changed.

The process of getting new code over taxed my computer and brain several times, severely vexing me. By 5 am I had the videos all back working and had added two new ones to go along with the webpages I made yesterday, so now there is video about Grand Lake O' the Cherokees and Beavers Bend Resort Park & Broken Bow Lake that you can look at and be surprised at how scenic Oklahoma is in certain locations.

After all that video exhaustion I decided to go take a cover of darkness dip in the pool. It was pleasant. The rest of the morning was filled with more website stuff. Oh, and one extremely rude person said my sad sleepwalking episode sounded like a drunken stumble bum. I can not remember when last a remark filled me with such a high level of umbrage.

It's cloudy and not hot again today, only 86. By noon all my travails had my head hurting, so I went to Oakland Lake Park for a walk. The walking turned extra long because at the start of the walk I called Chris M.P. up in Washington, formerly of Oklahoma. A fellow Pacific Northwesterner, she abandoned me last summer, leaving me with hardly any long time acquaintances within a 1,000 mile radius.

I must remember to call Chris M.P. more often. I always enjoy talking to her. Chris is missing Oklahoma, I'm sure, below is a video of Ollie's Station Restaurant on Route 66. I don't remember if this is one of her favorite places or not...