CASINO NIGHTS.... AND THE GREAT DISAPPOINTMENT
I had high hopes for Reno. I think I was looking forward to this part of the journey more than anything else. We had made reservations at Circus Circus, and it was going to be this great big fun fest in "the Biggest Little City in the World".
And I don't know what happened, but it didn't happen like it was supposed to. The drive there was not terrible, but maybe because we had stopped to grab some geocaches along the way, it took longer than it should have, and we were all a little grubby, hungry, and tired when we got there. The whole finding the parking spot, checking in, unloading the luggage, and getting up to our rooms in the face of so much temptation (in the form of glittering lights and games for the kids) was grueling. Then there was showering and getting ready for a dinner our bellies were ready for hours ago (didn't see any Taco Times along the way this time!).
Try taking two young kids who don't listen very well to a huge buffet, agreeing to a plan with your husband, only to find him not listening to the plan very well (go figure) and losing absolute control over the dinner table. That was a nice start to the evening.
Circus Circus was our choice because of the great big Midway for the kids, which was crowded and boy, was that a challenge to keep up with everyone in there when we made our way down after the buffet. The kids were super stoked and running all over the place, and I kept losing my husband and/or one or two of the kids, and eventually my frigging mind.
It was time to calm the kids down and get them ready for bed. Good luck for that at a casino hotel! The husband took the money and ran...down to the casino, and left me in charge of the kids, which was a bad idea. I was way too tired and they were way too excited, and this is how that scene unfolded: the phone rings sometime close to midnight, and the front desk is on the other end of the line saying, "Are your children disturbing the other guests?"
How am I supposed to know? "It's possible," I said, "They are disturbing ME!"
Apparently there were two complaints to the front desk about the noise in our room. Butts were kicked and kids were shoved under covers with the threat of death if they made a peep, and when the husband showed back up, $20 richer, I made him give me that and then some so I could go let out my frustration by pulling some levers on the slot machines.
And girl can't get a break. He told me the waitresses would come by and offer you free drinks, but yeah, that didn't happen. I had to chase down one haggard waitress to get a cocktail an hour into it, and I stayed up too late feeding all my money to the nickel slots, slowly....
Anyway, I had these big plans for the morning, back when I was dreaming about this trip, about how I wanted to go find my childhood idol's grave, and read the poem I wrote in tribute for her (the one at the bottom of this blog), leave some flowers, say some words to her spirit. I wanted to cache my way out of Nevada, and all the way south.
It didn't happen like that, either. The town is kind of confusing to me, doesn't seem like the map at all, and I had lost all sense of direction and specifically where we needed to go to get to the cemetary where Mrs Velma Johnston is buried, and, I didn't feel like it anyways anymore. We were all tired, and got a late start, were fairly grumpy and discombulated, and just wanted to get out of town....
Long way down the most congested road I could have found to get us out, and finally we were free...stopped at Virginia City to not find a cache that should have been easy, and wasted too much time here by this big prospector searching in vain for a Golden Nugget that was too elusive for us, only to end up spending too much money in the nearby candy outlet on sweets these hyper children did not need....
That day was probably the worst of our road trip. Part of my disappointment lay in the fact that I hadn't planned very well for this part of the road trip, geocaching wise. I had been counting on the fact that we were going to have the laptop with us, and I would be able to load a Pocket Query from the road to have caches in my GPS unit to find. We ended up not bringing it, and I had only a sparse amount loaded as a precautionary measure. As a result of this, I missed some caches, lots of them, that I could easily have done. We also spent way too much time going after a planned cache that turned out to be too rugged for us, vehicle and/or hike wise, a fact we realized after spending an hour or two in the efforts.
The day after Reno ended on a sour note as we passed up several decent looking hotels, in the interest of making such good time, and then had to settle for the only thing we could find at the end of a long day of driving. It was the worse motel I have ever stayed in, seriously. I was so disgusted, and made everyone sleep ready to roll at a moment's notice because I was completely convinced there were bed bugs that would attack us as soon as we went to sleep and leave festering wounds on the children. I did not sleep well that night. That part of the journey was really bad, but we got to see some fabulous sites along the way, too. More on that later.

THE THINGS YOU NEVER KNOW....

Back in a previous entry, I had written about identity, and about how we can never really know ourselves fully, because part of who we are is how we are viewed through someone else's eyes, most of which is kept a mystery to us.

Sometimes, our land and legacy is part of who we are. Sometimes, the way people think of us is linked to the part of the world we inhabit, and our place in it. For some, this may mean the place we knew that person in. Sometimes, it is the place they were from, or the place they ended up. It may be where their life began, or where their life played out, or where it ended that becomes an association with the person we know.For some, their place in the world is part of what defines them.

There is a special person in our lives who has a place like this, a place that holds more identity clues than anyone else's place, a place that has become a living entity, almost human like, but more magical. This place shifts shapes over time, some things change place and appearance, but other parts of it remain the same, year after year. Kind of like people themselves, this parcel of land evolves, but the basic nature of it does not change.

We visited this place, meaning to visit the person who inhabits it. The land owner was not home, but the place itself also has sentimental attachment to it, memories of times past. A visit to this friend usually involves a walk around the property, to see both the things that have changed and those that have stayed constant. We visited both, and made our appreciations, and took photos for evidence....

And also got busted, by a neighbor who was taking their job of watching the property very seriously. Ted's response was both humorous and embarrasing, which is typical.

If you stop by here and recognize where we were....speak up...let us know you "popped in" for a visit. Then you might see how we did, as well....meant to send you a postcard of the top pic, too classic....

Then, we continued on our journey, stopping in the place on the left, which is a part of the world we had driven by hundreds of times, but never really got out to explore. This time, we were searching for a geocache, an ammo can out in the Northern California ranges. Our whole family spread out as the sun faded, looking behind rocks born of lava and wind, to find something, a something that was irrelevant in the end, when it was the experience and the exploration that really mattered....the time together, the reason to stop, the reason to check out the land and examine things more closely, like the measure of a family and the human heart, and our place together in this great big world....

Yeah, it's been there a long time. What should be done about it? Should we talk about it? Should we address it? Should we shoot that fucker down?
Tried confronting it head on. It's ignoring me. We'll see where that takes us.
Stay tuned.....

And, speaking of tuned...don't look at those comments on the past few entries. I am fairly sure at least one of them is a virus bot. Only bots leaving comments these days....
Maybe my friends don't want to talk about the elephant either.....

HIGH ENTERTAINMENT

IN THE UPPER SIERRAS

My sister in law, Crystal, lives in the middle of nowhere. There is no internet, no Zynga games, no malls or shops or social events. There is cows and hay and mountains, trees and rocks and grass. And sometimes an unlucky bug or two....

This day, meaning one of the two days back in August we were visiting her, her man Danny had caught a black widow spider and was keeping it in a jar in the kitchen until he figured out what to do with it. He mentioned this to us in the morning, and the thought lingered.

Midmorning, we were sitting outside watching the kids play, and watching the wasps fly in and out of a nest by the carport, and the men came up with an idea. These were some bad, nasty wasps. Someone said it, "I wonder who would win in a fight between one of those wasps, and the black widow?" And it was on.....

The trick was in catching one of the darn things without getting stung, a task the men gladly engaged in. Then there was the struggle to get it in the jar with the spider without anyone getting hurt. Once those objectives were met, we sat back and watched the action. There was much talk about who the winner would be, but no one was very sure. For a long time, it was impossible to know. The fight to the death lasted about three hours, with kids alternating between watching attentively, and wandering off to play. Us grownups were transfixed.

Even though in my heart I felt like it was somewhat sad and cruel, my scientific curiousity got the better of me. They went back and forth, with each one holding the advantage shortly, then the other one taking it back. The spider injected venom, but the wasp had its stinger handy. The last ten minutes were valiant.

And if you want to know who won......ask me next time you see me......