Thursday April 16: Beverly Hills and Santa Monica

Today was a leisurely day. We started off with breakfast followed by some lounging by the pool trying to decide what to do with ourselves now that we've done everything we'd planned. Eventually, we settled on checking out the Farmer's Market that we'd spotted in a brochure. It was an uneventful drive up to West Hollywood where the market is located, mostly due to some ace navigating by yours truly.

At first I was very disappointed in the Market. Not a fruit or vegetable to be seen, just a walking boulevard lined by designer shops. It seems, however, that we'd accidental wandered into The Grove, and after some mindless wandering we found what we had come looking for. Chris laughs at me often about my preconceptions which inevitably result in disappointment. I had pictured in my mind something akin to the St. Jacobs farmers market, or the market in Stitsville (Ottawa). And though there was a grocery store, and many, many restaurants, there were no individual vendors plying their hand crafted goods. Still, it was a good time, with lots to take in, culminating in a delicious lunch purchased from a Korean BBQ. The highlight of it all was dessert--a chocolate dipped frozen banana with nuts. (I was tempted to ask for a double dipped, double stick, but I wasn't sure if the old guy behind the counter watches Arrested Development).

Next, we decided to go check out the famous Santa Monica beach. We hopped onto Wilshire Bvd and took a scenic drive through downtown Beverly Hills on the way. It was interesting to pass through all of these famous areas that we hear about all the time. Once again, we were struck at how out of place our little Civic looked. Lexus, Range Rover, Mercedes, BMW, Infinity, they all seem to be par for course in LA. We even passed a Maserati dealership! Until this trip, I'd never even seen a Maserati, and now I've seen a whole parking lot full.

After some time, and many traffic lights, we arrived in Santa Monica. I motioned to Chris to park along the side of the street, and as we got out a kindly Police officer (POPO, Adam?) advised us we only had to put enough quarters into the meter for two hours (after six it's free). The beach was deceptively far away from our car, however. To get to it, we had to climb down a bluff that we hadn't seen from the road, cross a freeway that had been equally hidden from our view, before arriving at the vast stretch of sand and surf we'd been aiming for. I'm absolutely in love with the infinate variations in beach house archetecture. Each one, is unique in this world. As well, we discovered a lot of activity on the pier. It seems the Santa Monicans have erected an entire mini amusement park on their pier, and it was fun to just walk around, enjoying the buskers and watching people ride the attractions.

Unfortunately, it was a chilly day, made more so by a gusting wind from the ocean. Didn't make for good beach laying, sun soaking adventures, which we had planned for. So, after sitting for a spell on a park bench, watching the waves roll in, we headed back to the car and made for the freeway. Then, we discovered Traffic for the first time since entering America. We've been incredibly lucky, so far, but that luck ran out with a bang as we inched along for almost two hours back to the hotel. Not to worry, though, Chris and I are troopers. Our little radio adaptor for the Ipod doesn't work in LA (because pretty much every radio frequency has something already on it) but we discovered a station we both quite like and so, passed a merry time through rush hour. At least, I hope that was rush hour.

Before returning to the hotel, we stopped back in at Great Steak to enjoy another Philly Cheesesteak sandwich. Honestly, it's the best sub I've ever had. They told us that it's a chain with locations outside of California, so you can be certain we'll both be keeping our eyes open when we travel home again.

Now, we're turning in early. I think we're finally succumbing to exhaustion after our crazy running from state to state. Meeting some of our good friends from ShinSenGumi (our guild) was the best experience of my life, but I'm pretty sure that both Chris and I are ready for a few days of doing a whole lot of nothing. Some time to rest up before Vegas and the return trip.

We hope the weather warms up a bit, so we can really get to work on our tans. Besides that, my only plan is to stop in at a Trader Joe's, as I'm sure they've got one around here. Where will we be tomorrow? We'll see where fancy takes us. Malibu? Venice? Manhattan? Can't wait to find out.

Wednesday April 15: Drum roll please... may I present, DREAM and KAGE!

All right everyone. Today is a very special day. This is the day that many of you have secretly confided in both Pete and I as being something you are excited to see. Today, you will finally meet the powerful Dream, and the elusive Kage. Yes, folks, today is that day. Just about everyone we have met in our past travels have said how much they wish to meet Dream or Kage or both. Well, today I will happily introduce them as seen by a Canadian.

The morning began as most mornings do, us staggering out of bed and trying, this time successfully, to get to the continental breakfast before it closes for the day. After consuming a waffle and a couple danishes, we returned to our room to await our guests. As far as I know, Dream was the first to show up. He is such a great guy, always laughing and smiling. Made me want to buy a Mac just knowing he thinks so highly of them. Anyway, the 3 of us decided that it was a nice day, and Pete had to smoke, so we decided to await Kages arrival outside. Alas, we all forgot he was a ninja, because while we waited for him, he managed to sneak up on us, from INSIDE the hotel to our backs. No idea how he did that, but the rogue class fits him like a glove. He also offered to drive us around the city. Upon reflection of this, I an extremely glad he did. He handled the L.A. traffic like a pro, and got us around the city as if he the directions built right into the car itself.

Ooooh, speaking of his car, it was beautiful. And not just in the sexy sort of way. It was full to the brim of every piece of technology ever thought to add to a car. Even had a camera that automatically displayed an image of what is behind you on a screen built right into the dashboard. Must be hard to drive when all you could possibly want to do is admire the coolness of your car.

Our first stop was lunch. We went to a local spot called "New Capital Seafood Restaurant". What this place was, was a Chinese food that served dim sum. For all you people who are unfamiliar with the term, dim sum is a method of serving/ordering food in which waiters and waitresses wander around the restaurant with a cart of food, offering some to each and every table. If you chose to accept some of the food, a little card is stamped, and then they move on. As a result, we never knew what food was coming down the pipe next. Even when the cover was removed and the food became visible, we were still often unsure of what it was. That didn't, however, stop us from eating some very bizarre cuisine. Some of it was familiar but it all was an adventure. Two of the more unique dishes were tripe (I will let you look this up if you wish) and chickens feet. I am always willing to try new things so I jumped right into it. Peter, was a bit more hesitant, but to his credit, tried everything on the table. It was fun.

After lunch, we wandered over to Universal Studios, and threw ourselves at the rides and attractions. We were there for the entire evening, until it closed at 7 or so. We enjoyed a house of horrors, the studio tour, the Jurassic Park ride, Backdraft, and several others. It was a lot of fun. By the time we were done there, we were all ready to take a load off our feet, and go find some dinner. Eaden and Eldrik had both advised us that we look into a restaurant called "In n Out Burger", and when we mentioned this place, Dream and Kage both agreed it was an excellent idea. We got the Animal Burger, and the Animal Fries. We were surprised to discover that it is a heart attack wrapped in flavor. The fries were covered in cheese, bacon, some other sauce, and who knows what else. The burger, I was scared to look too close. Just know that it was extremely tasty.

After lunch we took to the streets and spent some time walking down the walk of fame. I think that is what it is called, it is the place with all the stars on the sidewalk. While we were wondering around, we came upon Jimmy Kimble doing a bit for his live show. Security kept people back, and we were careful to try and avoid using flash photography, but Pete still managed to get a decent shot of him.

After that, we made the sad trek back to the hotel were after a bit of chatting, we had to say goodbye. We tried to make the separation quick, Kage looked like he was on the brink of tears as he took his leave of us (kidding). I was sad though. We may or may not meet up with these two guys again during the next few days, but regardless, we are done meeting new people. Each departure for Pete and I has been bitter sweet. It has always be sad having to say goodbye to people we have know for such a long time, and have only very recently met. But each time, it was tempered with the reminder that there was still more people on our "To Meet" list. This trip still offers many strange an interesting things that will undoubtedly be new to us, but alas, as far as I know, it will not include any more friends and allies.

This by no means concludes our blog, but I want to take this moment to give heart felt hugs (or handshakes) to each and every person we met along this trip. Each of you have become more than a voice to us. You now have a face, a smile, and 2 friends from Canada. Each of you have blown us away with your hospitality and generosity. Thank you all.

Again, this blog is not over. I just got a tad emotional there considering all the great things and people we have met so far. Probably should go to bed before I write anything more that I might regret tomorrow morning. Until I write again; goodnight. Oh, one more thing. It appears that Pete has turned to the dark side. For shame.

Tuesday April 14: Cali-freakin-fornia!!!

I really, really, really like it here. =)

We got a slight taste of things last evening as we drove in to the hotel, but it was nothing compared to today's experience. Today we did some serious californing.

We awoke just in time to miss the continental breakfast (ends at 9am), but neither of us were feeling particularly hungry. I brewed up some coffee, we checked our emails, enjoyed the view from our hotel room (pictured here), and scoured over the brochures we'd picked up from the California Welcome Center we visited when we entered the state. Honestly though, there was only one thing we were actually interested in. The famous OC beaches! "Don't call it that!" (And no, that Arrested Development joke never got old). The sky was overcast, and it wasn't really a "beach day" but we weren't going to let that stop us.

So! Into the car we went, and headed out to Highway 1, the legendary Pacific Coastal Highway. Our first stop was Seal Beach, a quaint little beach town with a gorgeous view of LA's skyline. It reminded me a little of Port Dover but with palm trees. Both of us were wearing our most satisfied grins as we strolled along the water line in bare feet, marveling at the feel of the Pacific Ocean around our ankles. It was just about as perfect as perfect can be.

Eventually, our stomachs reminded us of missed meals and we went back to the main strip in search of a patio. Surprisingly, California doesn't seem like a patio friendly state. At least, we only found one out of about a dozen restaurants that actually featured one. (As the day progressed, we continued to keep eyes peeled for potential patios but they seem to be far and few between. Chris supposes that the weather gets pretty hot here, and that locals are either inside or on the beach.) The restaurant we ended up at was called Athen's West, a little Greek diner where we both enjoyed their signature platter which included a steak skewer, a chicken skewer, liberal doses of Gyro meat, rice and greek salad. Delicious! And the patio was fantastic, especially considering the overcast *chilly* weather.

Alas, the parking we'd paid for was almost up, and there were plenty of beaches still to check out, so we loaded our overfed selves back into the Civic and hit the road. I find Orange County to be a really strange place. Lovely. But strange. There are just so many weird juxtapositions. As we drove, we had the beach on one side, an oil field on the other, and multi-million beach condos thrown into the mix. (We know the prices of housing; we checked. 3.5 mil to buy a small one, 3000/month for an apartment). And Chris' beautiful car looks like a peasant at an 1800's ball. They were all Beamers, Mercedes, Porches and Audis. We even saw a Maserati. Seriously, it was like being at a car show.

The next beach we stopped at was Huntington Beach. The waves were huge and we ended up just sitting on the sand watching the surfers ply their trade, and in such a manner passed a glorious hour. I think we were both a little sad to make our way back to the car, but we'd only paid for an hour parking. I suspect that Huntington hasn't seen the last of us.

We drove through Newport but decided to drive on farther south down the coast. Laguana Beach (where the TV show of the same name is filmed) was not tourist friendly, in my opinion. There was no parking, as far as I can tell, and we were through the town before we knew it. The architecture of these coastal towns is really really interesting, however. Either all the buildings look exactly the same, or they are on the opposite side of the spectrum, each uniquely designed. From a classical "castle" type, to your ultra-modern "architect making a statement" type, but all interesting in their own way.

The beach at Dana Point looked interesting, but there's a railway that runs between the highway and the beach with only one crossing, which we missed. As we were about to turn around we spotted a coffee shop and we both said, "Mmmmmm". While sipping our drinks, we looked through a free paper which featured information about the big music festival that's going to be happening here next weekend. It looks like a lot of fun, and if tickets were within our price range I would surely want to go. A number of my favorite bands are playing. The paper itself was very interesting in terms of LA culture. In the classifieds, there were two full pages of ads selling "medical" marijuana.

It was getting on in the afternoon, and we decided to forgo more beaches for the time being. Really, we didn't have any plans for the evening, but I think we're both still recuperating from the trip up here. We don't have a lot of money to spend on activities, which we didn't think was a problem as there are many things to do in LA for free. Namely, beaches. But we didn't consider what to do when the sun went down, and both of us were stumped. We're welcome to suggestions.

Back at the hotel, we decided to just find a pub with a patio to chill out in until bedtime. This proved more difficult than we anticipated (there don't seem to be any such establishments near us), so we ended up at a Tony Roma's Steakhouse. We ordered a pitcher of Heineken, and a burger each for supper. The burger section on the menu proudly said, "Substitute your hamburger patty for our tasty buffalo burger for only 1.99." Well, hot dog! We both are very fond of buffalo burgers, so when we ordered our meal we pointed at the menu and told the server, "We want this!" "Ahh," said the server, "You'd like to add a buffalo patty to your burger. Very nice". We should have clued in, but when the food arrived our hamburgers sported both a beef patty and a buffalo patty. Needless to say, it was a big hamburger, and we were both feeling stuffed beyond belief by the time we finished.

Now, Chris has turned in and I'm happily documenting our days events. I really like this blog, for more reasons than just the opportunity for my family and friends to share the trip with me. It really gives clarity to my experiences. As things are happening, I'm really drinking it all in with the thought at the back of my head that I'll need to blog this all soon. It's really cool.

Tomorrow is a big day. Both Dream and Kage are meeting us at the hotel at 10am, and then, we shall Hollywood! (I can use Hollywood as a verb, right?)

By the way, Home is where you set your Hearth. I know where mine is. =) Too bad it's not an Inn.

Monday April 13: We have arrived in California, and it is great!

Today was a great day. I know that each day, we say that, but today has truly been a great day. Yesterday we had a fantastic time with Eaden and Eldrik. They showed us some beautiful sights of the mountains around Flagstaff. I have lived in Ontario for, hmmm, 10 years now, but I grew up in BC, in the mountains. Since leaving that province, I had forgotten how wonderfully beautiful the mountains can be. The time we spent up there brought back some very fond memories of my childhood. /sigh. OK, I am done reminiscing about the past. After our short hike we went to a local casino where Eaden and the Wizard of Oz entertained us in a gut wrenching competition between woman and machine. Not surprising, woman won.

Today we hit the road, destination sunny California. The drive was gorgeous. Uh oh, here I go about the mountains again. They were spectacular. The weather was bright and sunny for the morning and quickly heated up the area. By the time we had descended from Flagstaff the air had heated up to the perfect temperature, and so it was time for the direct sun to disappear behind some light clouds in order to maintain that perfect temperature.

Eventually we hit California, and soon afterwords we were driving through what I think was the outskirts of Los Angeles. We knew this was coming; LA is one of the biggest cities in the country. Pete and I have gotten turned around on some rather insignifcant roads in this trip, have found ourselves on the wrong road far more often than I care to think about. But you know, it was never that big of a deal. We would just repeat our mantra "We are on vacation" and then do what we could to get back to where we were supposed to be. Navigation has been a little bit, uh, lacking as we drove, but we survived.

Knowing how we have been less than perfect in ensuring we are always on the right road, both Pete and I were nervous as we prepared to enter the massive city that we plan to spend the next week in. Turns out, when Pete applies himself and closely studies the map, and I pay extra attention to what lane I am in, and what exits are coming up, we are actually pretty good. We made it all the way to our hotel without taking a single wrong turn... and it isn't because we just followed the same road the whole way there. We zigged and then zagged, and then zigged again as we jumped from one highway to another as we moved through the city. The picture here is just one of many roads we took, nothing special, but you will see there are four different roads crossing over the same point; it was wild.

After arriving and checking into the hotel, we walked across the road to a mall we were told had a good food court. Turns out, the advices was true. Actually, the food court was a little bit lacking, but it had a little restaurant called "Great Steak" where we got a Philly Cheese Steak sandwich. It was absolutely delicious. Unfortunately we did not take the camera to the mall, so there is no picture of the sandwich. Despite the lack of photography today, feel rest assured that we will be going back to that restaurant so we will try to get a shot of it then.

So, we have checked in, had supper, and are ready for bed. It might be a little bit early, but we hope to take advantage of ever single moment of sunlight starting tomorrow, and that means getting a good nights rest tonight. Sleep well everyone, and be prepared for us to flood this blog with pictures of all the beautiful Californian, uh, scenery.

Sunday April 12: An Eaden and Eldrik Easter

The day started out really nice and relaxed, and continued in that vein for it's entirety. It being Easter Sunday and all, Eaden and Eldrik understandably had some family time planned with their two sons before they could drive up and meet us. So, for the first time since we began this crazy adventure, Light and I discovered a morning with no plans. We took our time getting going, had a leisurely continental breakfast in the little hotel office, and then made our way to the laundromat.

Laundry isn't something you usually associate with vacationing, but we both packed kinda light for a 3 week trip and, well, it was about that time. And lo and behold, time we had! The laundromat we had gotten directions for wasn't where it was supposed to be, but after some aimless wandering, atrocious navigating on my part, and a whole lot of dumb luck we ended up at The Loggermat. Despite spending countless hours cooped up in a Civic, this really felt like the first "down time" of the trip for me. And it was kinda nice, just chillin on plastic lawn furniture, watching our clothes tumble over and over itself, and listening to Ricky Gervais' podcast. Rejuvenating.

Clean clothes in hand, we returned to the hotel room, watched a little TV and then got in touch with Eaden and Eldrik using Nem's gift of a cell phone. (Thanks again, Nem, it's a godsend!) They let us know they were closing in on Flagstaff, so we headed down to a little micro-brewery on Beaver Street to meet them.

They were everything I expected them to be. Very laid back and comfortable people to be around, the conversation started right away and really didn't stop for the rest of the visit. After enjoying some tasty brews and some delicious stone baked pizza, we all hopped into their vehicle for a tour of the town. It so happened that Eldrik attended the local University, so he was very knowledgeable about the area. And it's so incredibly beautiful here! We saw the campus, the freakish giant lumberjack statue, the football stadium (really cool, a big white dome) and then headed up 4000 feet to the ski resort to take in the view.

10,000 feet above sea level is really high! And the view, quite literally, took my breath away. We spent quite a while up there, not minding the cold or the snow but just taking in the panorama and enjoying each other's company. Like any other time you gather a bunch of WoW players together, the conversation touched for a long time on Warcraft. I really can't think of a more pleasant way to spend an afternoon; being in a beautiful place, with people I enjoy, talking about something I'm passionate about. What a great day!

After a while, we started to notice the chill and decided to head back down the mountain. Eldrik mentioned the possibility of supper, but we were all still pretty full from lunch, so it was decided instead to visit an Indian Casino that was about 45 minutes away. This decision had the added bonus of allowing Chris and I to witness the famous Arizona sunset as we descended from the Plateau area where Flagstaff sits. Absolutely awesome. So much color, stretched across the entirety of the vast horizon, sometimes ducking behind mountains, it's simply indescribable. We tried to document the experience with the camera, but the light at dusk mixed with photographing from a moving vehicle resulted in sub-sub-par pictures. Guess they will just have to do, but feel free to insert substantial amounts of imagination to get the full idea of it all.

The casino was a lot of fun. Neither Chris nor myself are big gamblers, but it was a great experience hanging out with our hosts, rooting for Eaden as she sucked money out of the house (she totally kicked butt!), and getting mesmerized by all the flashing lights and happy noises. There's a lot of psychology that goes into casinos, and we had a grand ol' time speculating on why they did things this way, and why that was placed there, and so on and so forth.

The casino had three different restaurants, a fancy one, a regular one and a burger joint. We settled on the regular one, and once again enjoyed some good food and great conversation. Long after we polished off the last of our food, we lingered at the table just chilling out.

Unfortunately, all good things must come to an end, especially when Eaden has to work the next morning. Luckily, we still had the drive back to the hotel to hang out. And even after they dropped us off, I'm ashamed to say we jealously kept them far into the night, and then they still had a two hour drive home!. So Ea, if you read this tomorrow at work, sorry if you're exhausted. Thank you both so much for a greatly enjoyable and relaxing day. It was just what the doctor ordered.

Now, dear readers, it's off to bed, for tomorrow we shall California. (you can use California as a verb, right?)

Friday April 11: Goodbye to Texas, we shall miss you.

Well, this has been an intense day, and it really should not have been. Today was supposed to be just a simple really long drive... it was supposed to be the most boring, mind numbing part of this leg of the trip. If this has taught us nothing though, it is that no day is a normal day.

It started on one of the biggest downers of the trip, we had to leave Texas. Our time in Lubock will surely go down in my memory books as one of the most intensely enjoyable periods of time I have ever spent. Aly and Ram are two of the best people I have ever been able to call friend. Their kids are some of the nicest and well mannered people I have ever met... freakishly so. I am gonna start a petition to force Aly and Ram to write a book on parenting... I don't know what they are doing, but it clearly works.

I won't go into detail as to our activities, you can read that in Petes previous post, but I just wanted to reiterate what incredibly wonderful people Aly and Ram are. Aly is the exact same sweetheart we have all grown to know and love on Vent. Ram, however is silent on vent most of the time, so he was was a bit of a mystery. He isn't so quite in real life. I had several fantastic and powerful conversations with him over the last 2 days. He is insightful, clever, and thoughtful. As we drove away from Lubock this morning, my mind was full of all the other controversial subjects and deep thoughts that I just didn't have time to pick his brain about. Poor me.

All well. The day began with a hearty breakfast of some of the tastiest strawberry pie I have ever had a-la Nem. Wait, does that work? Maybe it should simply read Nems most awesome yummy strawberry masterpiece.Yes , that sounds better. Actually on the subject of food, we found some cookies that we got from Aly too, between these two ladies and their culinary skills, we ate very well today, just not very healthy. Oh well, die happy.

Anyway. This has just been a driving day. Nothing special. We drove from Lubock Texas to Flagstaff Arizona, and yah know what??? It was COLD! Not only was it cold... but it SNOWED!!!! We drove through snow in New Mexico, and it is snowing as I type this here in Arizona! Now, I can sort of understand the Arizona... sort of. We are up really high, spent a lot of the drive between 5000-6000 feel above sea level. I gotta say though, despite the snow, this drive has been one of the most magestic drives we have had. The landscape was in a constant state of flux through New Mexico. The rock formations were mind boggling. Then in Arizona, we are up so high, and the ground is so flat, and the sky so close it felt like you could touch heaven. The sky was so big, and with no civilization around, we lamented not driving through here at night, I bet it has one of the most beautify night skys on the planet. I have included some pictures, but really, this was something that no piece of technology could capture.... the magnitude and freedom of this landscape defied our attempts to squeeze it into this camera to show you all. You must all just come here and see it for yourself.

After arriving in Flagstaff, we checked into the Knights Inn, and went out to find some supper. We ended up at a family restaurant named Granny's Closet. It had good food, but what made it unique was that each booth had it's own TV. It was an experience to be sure, but as the meal progressed, I was reminded why my parents insisted that we eat supper together at the dinner table instead of in front of the TV. Having that box there kills the entire meal as far as human interaction goes.

OK. Today we passed through not one, but two time zones. The local clock says it is approaching 11pm, but for me, it is almost two in the morning. The free continental breakfast ends at 9am local time, so to get our tummies filled tomorrow morning, we gotta be getting up early. So with that, I draw this post to an end, but don't forget to tune in tomorrow. Tomorrow we shall meet Eldrik and Eaden. What wild and bizarre things will happen when we all get together? Stay tuned to find out.

Friday April 10: Aly and Ram and New Experiences

Having just said our goodbyes to Aly and Ram and two of their sons, Sean and Jake, I'm once again struck by how gracious and hospitable and generous our hosts have been on this trip. You guys have really made this trip spectacular for us, and we really appreciate it. Aly and Ram were no exception, bringing forth a host of new experiences for us to try. Let's recap.

New Experience 1: This one was kinda just for me. Knowing that I smoke, Ram thought it would be neat if I were to try tobacco in the Texan fashion. He had bought me a can of dip and a pouch of chew and we had a great time trying both out and making a wonderfully disgusting mess in his spit cup. Not that Ram usually chews tobacco, but he didn't think he'd be a very good host if he let me go it alone. I know this was already covered by Chris, but I thought it a fitting way to begin.

New Experience 2: Rising at about 10am, we hooked up with Aly (Ram got an unexpected call from work and had to disappear for a few hours) and headed out to a local eatery called Josie's to try some authentic breakfast burritos. Chris and I both ordered the same thing, two burritos we've never heard of before. The first was stuffed with a Mexican sausage of some sort and egg. Very tasty, though Ram later joked that we wouldn't have thought so if we knew what was in them. The second we had no idea what was in it, only that it was very good. Later, we found it was stuffed with potato and fried pig skin. What we didn't know didn't hurt us, and was actually very good.

New Experience 3: After breakfast we crossed the street to visit the local Western Wear store so Chris could look into buying his very own cowboy hat. A running joke between us is that I was suckered into buying a "tourist" cowboy hat but he was going to get the "real thing". Well, we had a great time poking around the store, trying on various hats, and likely making fools of ourselves before Chris finally settled on a hat. Though I don't know about it being any more "authentic" than my own, and though it doesn't look nearly as good on him as mine does on me, it's still a very nice cowboy hat. Aly seems to think we'll have all the ladies swooning if we wear them on the beaches in California. We shall see.

New Experience 4: Next, it was time to meet up with Ram at the Buddy Holley statue for a photo op. The statue is surrounded by plaques to honor Lubbock's contribution to the areas of music, art and entertainment. Besides Buddy Holly, Lubbock also gave us Roy Orbison and many others. As it said on one plaque, " An area's culture is described by the activities it's citizens embrace in the pursuit of entertainment". I thought that was a pretty neat way to look at it. Ram brought out his own Fender Stratocaster (a guitar that Buddy Holley is known for) and we all took turns posing by the statue and being all rock star. It was great.

New Experience 5: We loaded the guitar back into Ram's van and then Aly, Chris and I headed out of the city to a local winery. It was a really cool experience, as I've never been taste testing before, despite having grown up so close to Ontario's wine country. The folks at the winery took us on a tour of their facilities and explained how a winery even came to exist on the Texas Panhandle Plains (not exactly where you'd think of when you think of grape vines, eh?). Then we picked out several wines we wanted to try out and had a great time sampling. So much fun!

New Experience 6: Meeting up with Ram again, we all went down to a local park to have a picnic lunch. What was on the menu, you ask? Well, it was a big spread, let me tell you, all picked up at local restaurants and diners so that we could have a taste of Texas that we weren't familiar with. The new foods we tried out included tamales, Mesquite smoked beef, and the kicker, deep fried chicken gizzards. I loved the tamales and roast, and enjoyed the gizzards though the texture of those did put me off a little. Ram had also brought along his acoustic guitar, and first he and then I serenaded the group with a little music. It was a perfect lunch, in my opinion.

New Experience 7: Next came the highlight of the day, and probably one of the coolest experiences of my life. We went to the range! (And no, I'm not talking about where the deer and antelope play). We went to the firing range! Honestly, we're in Texas, we have cowboy hats, it's only a matter of time before someone sticks a gun in our hands, right? On the way, Ram explained gun safety to us as Chris and I are woefully ignorant of such things, and then were were there and unloading the van. And unloading. And unloading, until we'd assembled enough firearms to field a small army. Having been a member of the shooting range for some time now, Ram had amassed quite an impressive collection of rifles and pistols for us to try out.

Guns we shot: AK-47, M-16, M1A, 12-gauge Shotgun, Winchester Lever-Action rifle, Ruger Blackhawk .357 single action revolver, U.S.Army Colt .45 Automatic, Glock 9mm (and .40) and a Smith and Wesson .38 revolver. All told, 4 rifles, 1 shotgun and and 5 hand guns.

It was absolutely amazing. And Chris and I didn't do half bad considering it was all mostly new to us. (we'd both shot .22 rifles once or twice before but nothing like this!) My favorites were the M1A and the Glock, but probably just because they were the only ones I seemed to be comfortable enough with to actually knock some targets over with. It was all a little surreal, and I'm not sure I'd believe my memory of events tomorrow if I didn't have the pictures to back it up with. As Ram said, "many notches in your belt today". Was it ever!

New Experience 8: And even then, they weren't done showing us a good time. We loaded up the van once more and headed back to the city for supper at a place called Bryon's Steaks. Once again, I had food stuffed into me until I thought I was going to burst. It's an interestingly set up restaurant, where you all line up at a cafeteria style counter, pick up your drinks, order your steak, pay for the meal, then collect a little number thing to stick on your table. Then, you head up to the salad bar (which includes many hot side dishes), fill up on what you want to snack on while waiting for your main course to arrive. Now, I've had the benefit of having some pretty good steaks in my life, but I don't think any of those compared to the rib eye steak we had at Bryon's. So tasty. Added to that, we ordered a Chicken Fried Steak for us all to try. It's basically a breaded, fried steak smothered in Southern White Gravy. Also, very, very good. I swear, I'm going to be about 200lbs bigger by the time I get back to Ontario.

We finished the night off by lounging around our hotel while Aly and Ram's sons went swimming, drinking a local beer (Lone Star) and just having relaxed conversation about politics and religion and everything in between.

You can get to know a person very well over the Internet, especially if you have a voice program where you can actually talk instead of type. But I appreciate Aly and Ram so much more now that I've met them in real life. It's been such an enjoyable day, it was really hard to say our farewells. This is always the hardest part. Tomorrow is probably one of the most grueling legs of our trip, as we travel from Lubbock, TX, through the entire state of New Mexico to Flagstaff, AZ. I should probably get some sleep, eh?

Goodnight!