bruised but not burnt

I've done it! I've left Santa Cruz. My journey has begun. I feel like I have far too much stuff, but it's only been a day. Once I start using stuff, things will be organized better. I've already pulled a few items and tucked others. And maybe if I meet up with Ma & Pa, I can send them back to Washington with a few things. Or just mail things. Depends how cumbersome I start to find all my things.

I got ice for my cooler when my peanut butter was almost in a liquid state. The cooler make keep things from being 100 degrees, but it won't keep it cool.

Anyway, I'm skipping around. I'm currently in Los Angeles. It is 7:30 pm. I am at Caffe Martier in the Glendale Galleria. I picked this place because Courtney Coles, PNCA alumni and general awesome person, works here. She's great. And I'm probably going to crash at hers at the end of the day. But I'm skipping ahead once again.

SO! I left Santa Cruz! The sun had set when I departed, and it was proper dark when I procured my cooler from Wal Mart. I topped off my tank and tires at the Shell station, talked to Tara (we never had a full proper goodbye) and then I was off! Once I got past Monterey, it was all new road. I was missing what was surely beautiful scenery by navigating in the dark. But it was nice to take on the winding Route 1 roads at my own pace. I went past Big Sur. I started to have less headlights coming at me. I pulled off the road at 11pm. I knew the ocean was to my right. I could hear it, and I could see an absence of something. I changed into pajamas, rearranged my car, threw the seat back, wrapped myself in blankets and read a bit. Oh and I also took in the grandeur of the stars. That is one thing I'm really looking forward to: stars, sunsets, and sunrises.

The May 2nd sunrise was obfuscated by fog. It was a gray that unveiled the grand Pacific Ocean. I could see my little road winding before me. I had a long journey ahead of me, but I was free to go at my pace.

And since I was starting before 8am, I really had no urgency. I put on fresh underwear and a new shirt, brushed my teeth, and set off into the early morning. Traffic was light, and the weather was beautiful. All sunshine, ocean, and hills. I stopped in Cambria and bought some tea and a cinnamon roll. I ate those and walked around the town and took advantage of the cell reception. I saw the Nitt Witt Ridge, which was this funky house but the first tour of the day wasn't for a while. I continued on the road. I stopped in Morro Bay and got the sand between my toes. I just love the Pacific Ocean. I'll be sad to put my back to it. I was on 101 for a while. Through hills. I saw gas for under $4 so I topped off.

In Ventura, I went to the Channel Islands National Park and got my travel journal stamped. I watched the info video. I walked along the beach. I made myself a PB & J. I bought ice for my cooler and headed off for LA. Good and proper LA. 101 slowed to a crawl for such a long while. I parked (yay free parking) packed up my backpack, smacked myself in the face with the edge of my car door on accident, and strolled into the fancy mall looking very scruffy.

I bought an iced mocha because Courtney apparently makes very good ones. I do agree that it was VERY good. I enthusiastically consumed it. Courtney and I talked during her break. And now I am that person on their computer in a coffee shop who has only ordered one drink. I wonder how many times I'll be that person?

But yeah. I got a car full of stuff. Gotta do something with it! But if I end up setting up camp for several days, then I can unpack my more heavy duty art supplies and utilize them.

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last sunset in Santa Cruz

Got up bright and early and Justin helped me haul my mattress off! With that out of the way, I spent the day sorting and getting stuff out of my room so that I could clean it. Sorting, packing, put things into proper boxes, just putting things in boxes. Moved it into the living room so that it would be the next stage packing area. I patched up the tack holes, I painted over some marks on the wall. It was also ridiculously hot.

But I got a good amount done.

At 6:40ish I walked down to The Pocket to meet Jeff for a few brewskis. And Ryan was there! And Chris showed up! It was another going away party, but totally a surprise. And Kara came too. We played pool (horribly on my part) and they all bought me drinks and I had too many drinks. I got home fine (Jeff gave me a lift), but I went right to sleep instead of packing.

And then I woke up hungover and it took hours to get going and down to business. And damn did business take a while! I sorted art supplies, I packed things, I reduced the amount of clothes I was packing, I went through toiletries. Packing for what is supposed to be a months long journey is hard. It feels like a lot of stuff, and I'm not sure if I'll use it all, but I also don't want to buy things that I would have been able to pack.

But right now I am looking at a pile of my stuff. I made a run to the storage unit. Hopefully my last run. I'm bringing bedding as well as the sleeping bag, because I feel like some nights it would be fine to just wrap up with a blanket. But anyway. Maybe I'll put a blanket into storage when I look at my car situation. I need to get a cooler. My first stop will be Wal Mart. They should have a cooler. Then I'll fill up my tank and head South on Highway 1 for LA and great adventure! Not planning on getting to LA tonight. Just maybe put a few hours of Santa Cruz behind me.

Well. I'm going to go pack it away. You'll be hearing from me next place I get wifi.

days remain

All that remains is my mattress, desk, and chair. All my shelves are out. Well actually no, one shelf remains. But I haven't put stuff into it yet. 9am tomorrow I am moving my mattress in, which means I can start packing stuff around it and to the back, instead of having to leave a corridor in my storage unit.

I went to Big 5 and got a tarp for my tent and some tent spikes. I couldn't locate a cooler in a good size. I'll probably get the cooler last, maybe on the road or something. Just swing into a Wal Mart on the way and grab one. I also got a backpack at Ross. A good sized one for day trips. Enough room for a jacket, a snack, and art making supplies.

And I made a post office run. I'm all set on stamps! Had a few things to mail out, so those are on their way. Ma & Pa, keep an eye on your mailbox!

So yeah, packed stuff away. Got yet another tub. This one is a "totally going on the trip" tub, so that I can put things in it while I sort other things. It's all getting whittled down, bit by bit! One big push tomorrow and that should be it. I want to be able to leave early on Thursday.

Day after tomorrow. Damn.

Oh, Tara and I axed apart my bed frame. It was fun. It'll be firewood!

I met Ryan for one final 99 Bottles pint night. It was New Belgium night. The sour beer was really good. Ryan won a pint glass. He, Anita, and Dan will be taking care of my plants. Here's to their survival! We had a good hug goodbye.

Hugs goodbye. :(

One more full day. Gotta get cracking!  But I'm so close to being there.

wow what a gross movie, I love it

I'm watching Dead Alive/Braindead right now and omg. It's a 1992 Peter Jackson movie and it's so weird and gorey and gross and just. Omg. And Jed Brophy, who played Nori, is in it! And it's so weird and gross and absolutely just... strange.

Saturday Garth and I got Thai food for lunch/breakfast. I finally found a place that makes larb in the proper way! Not the weird way like with that place in Portland with the drag queens. Then I headed back and worked on packing. Didn't have to make a lunch food item run! Didn't have to go to bed early! Though I still did. Had to get on with the major packing, after all!

I made three runs to my storage unit today (Monday). And I reorganized it to make more room. Not sure how to assess what I have now. Like, what is the best way to organize some of this stuff. I guess I should focus on getting all the furniture out, and then sort the tidbits.

I'm just going to trash my bed frame, because 1) it was cheap to being with 2) the bolts are stripped so I can't take it apart anyway. It's not really worth saving and the effort to give it away on Craigslist is just. Well it's effort.

So I packed and ate pasta and packed and stowed stuff away. I have some errands to run, so I'll work on that tomorrow. Gotta change my address and mail some stuff. And check out the cooler selection at Big 5. I want to meet up with the pals at 99 Bottles, so I have to get stuff done earlier in the day.

Damn Dead Alive is so weird holy crap.

Saturday in the City

My Saturday was the most perfect Saturday. Even if things didn't go to plan, everything that happened was wonderful. To have every day like today would be a dream.

On the ride up to Oakland, traffic stopped momentarily on 17. I was wondering if there was a wreck, but then a deer bounded by my car and it was obvious people had stopped to let it pass. Things picked up and off I went. I used my GPS to navigate to Robin's, and I bought a car charger for my phone (only $15!) so now I don't have to worry about my phone dying on the road.

I parked at Robin's and we got through the catching up and what's been going on and all that happenings. Her apartment has really been furbished out since last I visited. It looks great! I drove down to the Bart station and parked on a side street, and we rode over to the Ferries Landing or whatever it is called. Turns out the stop was further from the museum than we originally thought. Like a whole bus ride further. Oops! Robin showed me how to use my GPS (well Google Maps) to figure out the bus route to take, and there was a free shuttle to the Presidio! Booyah! But I'm getting ahead of ourselves. I held a spot in line at Blue Bottle Coffee and Robin fetched us sandwiches from Cowgirl Place Sandwiche Something (not the real title). We each ate half with plans to eat the other half later, but switch sandwiches. Mine was mozzarella and proscuitto, hers was turkey and some other cheese. She treated me to New Orleans style iced coffee (which has chicory in it) and got herself a coffee. Oh that was good iced coffee! Good enough for me to drink, and I'm not a coffee drinker.

We walked down to where my phone said the shuttle would pick us up, and we sat on the grass and talked and drank our coffee. It was a nice jaunt up through the Presidio, and the last stop was only a few blocks from the museum! Hurray! All this time I was texting Josh & Carmen who were going to join us at the museum.

The museum in question is the Walt Disney Family Museum. There is a special Mary Blair exhibit happening right now, with her original art works, and I had to see it! Mary Blair did visual development and illustration for Disney in the 30's and 40's. Peter Pan, Cinderella, Alice in Wonderland, The Three Caballeros. The exhibit was really nice. You could get up close to the originals. Some didn't look so well preserved as the paper had yellowed and we theorized that the color had faded on the paints. Still, her work was wonderful! And everyone dug it (Carmen and Josh showed up about 20 minutes after we did). There were many really nice quotes put up about her, and it really made it seem like she was appreciated. Of course it's easy to make it seem that way long after the fact, but hey! Her art lives on!

I picked up a few postcards and then we went out to get juice! Carmen drove us. I had fancy immune booster carrot juice and a wheatgrass shot. Went healthy! I drew in my sketchbook. We conversed. It was a windy, bright day. Afterwards, we got a life to the station. I hugged C & J goodbye, grabbed my Odd Owl poster, and off Robin & I went to hop on the train and go back to Oakland! It was an easy crossing, though I felt a total tourist for always putting away my card and having to take it back out. Robin had me drive over to this alley of artsy shops in Oakland, and we wandered around that area for a bit. I put on some foo foo that smelled like trees. I really liked it. I'm not much of a foo foo person, but I'll have that foo foo! I didn't get it though. Expensive! My car got a bit misplaced, but we found it! We didn't take note of which streets it was on when I parked, but backtracking returned us. I hung out at her lovely apartment and had some tea.

Before it got too late, we hugged out goodbyes for the time being, and I set out for 45 minutes south of Oakland: Mountain View. Garth was working late, so I hung out in In-N-Out with a burger, fries, and shake and my Kindle and read and had a little peaceful me time. Nice to just sit and read. Okay eating a burger undoes all the healthy eating I did earlier today, but whatever. Garth and I shared a pitcher at this little dive bar near his place. There was a darts tourney happening, and damn if they all didn't consistently hit the dart board!

All around, through and through a great day.