Chapter 4 Dodger Stadium

Our trip was full of little nuisances that were a pain to deal with but that's what you get when you plan the trip in 3 hours. I made the mistake of using Priceline to find a hotel in LA. I found a great hotel and it was clean and nice but when I checked in they only had a queen bed for 4 people. That was a problem.  So we made due for a night.

MJ at "Almost Disneyland"

We are probably the most awful parents in the world. We didn't have enough time or money to go visit any of the theme parks but we did want to visit the "Downtown Disney area to shop" Yup you guessed it. The morning before the game we drove down to the mouse kingdom. This was torture for the kids. You could see the park and the rides, you can hear the screams of delight from the Hollywood Tower of Terror and you had to tell you're kids Sorry... we just came to shop... I think maybe I was voted the worlds worst Dad right about now.

The line 2 hours before the game

After the disappointing trip the the park we decided to leave early and go to the Dodger Game. I'm not from California nor do I visit enough to know my way around the spagetti bowl of highways and interstates. Thanks to a great product of California namely my Apple iphone I have been able to drive while my wife navigates the google map on the device. It's really the same as our parents used to do it but with less confusion. Everything worked out great getting to the hotel using the same navigation model. We got on to the highway and off we went changing freeways for freeways getting closer to down town when all of the sudden the wheels came of the bus. The Highway signs did not match the phone directions. PANIC! The interchange was coming and I know we needed to change and did not have the foggiest idea of where we were going. So I did what every Man does and makes a split second decision and took the left highway and for some reason my wife announced her displeasure by the kind words of "What the Hell are you doing?" "I don't know" arguing ensued and I said "Well I'll pull of at the next exit and reset the iphone directions and everything will be okay." So I pulled of what I thought was an exit but wasn't and now I know I am headed in the wrong direction. My wife muttered something in my direction and I'm glad I didn't hear her.  Three miles later I found an off-ramp and pulled to a stop and without having to survey the area long decided there must be a safer place to pull over up ahead with less chance of being car jacked so I drove back on to the highway that I just had pulled off. After another few debates over directions my iphone became an airphone and landed somewhere around my feet. Did I mention 80 MPH is a slow speed for LA.   I had lost my co-pilot and felt somewhat upset that I was now solely responsible for getting us to the Stadium. I made some stupid comment about ending up at the ocean if I kept on this highway.

"Let's go downtown, We want to drive downtown right? You've always wanted to drive through the big city area." I pointed the car to a highway driving back toward the city and had only been on the road a few miles when a sign came up indicating the exit for Dodger Stadium. With a smug look on my face I looked out the corner of my eye at my beautiful agitated wife..."You got Lucky!" she shouted.

The Family at Dodger Stadium

Call it what you want. I like to think it was my instinctive direction finding ability.  The rest of the trip was pretty ordinary. We stayed the night in LA again. Woke up then next morning, left around noon and traveled all the way back to Utah getting home around 1 AM or so. It was a quick trip but it will be a memorable one non-the-less.

Chapter 3 M&M World

After walking a quarter mile in extreme heat the cool air conditioned store was a welcome awesomeness that can only be explained by "Holy Frik it's Hot out there!" When in reality the store was probably cooled down to a balmy 85° and I would complain at home because the air conditioner must be broken.

The M&M worlds should have been renamed the M$M world for Las Vegas. It's pretty much a rip-off of the World of Disney Store on a much smaller scale. Everything you might think that a Disney character has ever been marketed on had the M&M Characters on it. The real reason I wanted to go was to see the massive M&M wall with all the colors stacked to the ceiling with candy. You can bag your favorite color and proceed to wait in the checkout line only to get there an realized that the bag you filled is $80 and has about the same amount of candy that a Costco Bag of M&Ms have. Luckily I asked how much the Candy before I bagged it. $12 a pound. That's awesome. The funny part is you buy the candy then you walk out of the store into an oven where the hard candy shells melts in you bag not in your hands. We do this because of the experience marketers tell us and it sure works because at 10 PM at night that store was filled with kids and Parents all wanting a piece of M&M memorabilia. We were hypnotized also by the little blue and Red dudes because we picked up a few things on the return trip through Vegas. Here is the proof.

Chapter 2 The Price of Chocolate

Stepping out of an Air Conditioned Hotel into the hot Nevada summer night air is much like taking an ice cube out of the freezer and tossing it onto a pre-heated stove top and watching it dance around and instantly dissolve into a cloud of vapor.  Still, I felt better than those who were watching their money vaporize at the strip poker table.

When I was younger I recall my parents took me to Las Vegas a number of times on the way to Disneyland. We always stayed at Circus Circus. I actually enjoyed the free acrobatic shows they had over the casino floor. I remember seeing things as a young boy that you don't see growing up on the "farm" and wondering what else I was missing out on. I remembered my parents explaining to me about the oldest profession and how certain fashion styles were associated with that profession.  You might say it was their uniform or from my opinion the lack thereof. Ever since I have associated Stilettos and mini skirts with said profession.

It had been about 17 years since I have actually stopped and stayed the night in Las Vegas. A lot has changed, the Casinos, the Strip and the most apparent change was that you can no longer tell the difference at night between the women walking the streets and the street walking women. Everyone looks and dresses the same only shorter and tighter. In fact I think the "working women"have probably had to make some concessions to the uniform just to stand out from the throngs of thongs. I just shook my head and kept the eyes straight ahead. DOH! can't look there either.....On to M&M world.

Chapter 1-Elvis Has left the Building or at least Utah.

So two and a half weeks ago. I kissed my oldest goodbye and went to work while my best friend and spouse of a recent 17 years put the polishing touches on a large pink suitcase. Inside was packed everything a 15 year old would need for a 2 week journey she was taking with her choir, back to the great state of New York. And back. By bus. She was loaded up with our families summer vacation money and headed off for a great vacation without us. I was excited for her, she has been able to do things and go places that I have often thought about. She has a great talent for singing and has been able to share her talent with many others in which I am grateful. Still I sat around on the 4th day that she was gone to who- knows-where-Missouri, in Utah, bored. We were all watching the 15th re-run of iCarly when I decided to take matters into my own hands. I invoiced a few people that I was doing some business for and bought tickets early Friday morning for a LA Dodgers baseball game against the Chicago Cubs. We left that same afternoon for Vegas. It was about 9 PM when we rolled into Sin City. It must be pretty close to Hades because when I stepped out of the Swagger Wagon my flip flops melted into the blacktop. We jumped onto the next passing metamorphic rock and floated down the lava river to our hotel at the Excaliber.

I left the wife with number 2 and number 3 and went to check in. When I got back I could tell something had happened because the faces I was expecting to see was quite the opposite. Apparently you can't stop to watch the big screen TV with the Baseball game because people are betting on it. Even though the wife was right next to the kids, Security was making sure that no underage hi-jinx were going to be had.  It was okay that a dude was puking into a nearby garbage can but by all means do not let the kids watch baseball. I was starting to think my great plan was starting to unravel. We walked through a smokey casino to the elevator lobby that was housing to 50 people all trying to get to their rooms. Nic shot me a look that I have seen a few times. I too have given that same look before to my dog and his reaction to the look was to tuck his tail between his legs and retreats into his kennel. Retreat works for him so I just decided to follow my dogs example. We got up to the hotel room and things seemed to be in order. Not fancy, but we were just going to be staying for the night, it would do fine, so after I untucked my tail I asked the family if they wanted to go see the Vegas lights at night.

My Son wants to have a Hangover.

About 2 years ago I asked Our oldest Daughter if she was going to play with a friend. She continued to tell me, "Dad I don't play with my friends anymore, we hang." So her and her friends now hangout instead of play. I'm Okay with the terminology as long as that is all that my teenager is letting hang out.

Last night was the opening night of the third installment of the Twilight Saga Movie. I now live with 2 Twighhards and they had tickets to the 7 PM showing in which there were already people waiting in line 3 hours earlier.  My Boy asked if he could have one of his friends sleepover at our house. My wife proceeded to "text" me because that's how we now communicate in the 21st Century, asking if My son's friend who's name is Jacob could spend the night, knowing she was not going to be there, was courteously asking if I was okay with that. I replied with a "text" typing in my phone... "Sure I like Jacob better than Edward." No response. Not even a :). It was maybe the best reply that I've had in a few weeks. Epic Fail.

Later in the evening I took My Son, his friend, and our littlest vampire princess to grab a soda and some treats. My son proceeded to tell me and his friend that he didn't like the term "Sleepover" he thought it was too girlie. Being the macho father I agreed and asked what he would prefer to call it. He thought a second and then he said, "Hangover".  Who can argue with that?

The Walmart Trip

We went to Walmart and saw someone carrying out a kitchen table. Well it was more like a TV tray but I served as a kitchen table to a lot of us at one time or another. My Frou and I were walking in with the chillin's in tow and discovered we could cover more ground if we split up. "But wait I forgot my cell phone" said my wife. "How will you know where to find me?" I thought for a minute dumbfounded. Yes how will I know. In the old days you could shout across the store or take a small stroll down the aisles and find her. Nowadays the stores are the size of 14 football fields stacked end to end with no possible way of her hearing you even if you hijacked one of those special"Overhead Announcement Phone" and you knew the special 48 key code to type in. No we were going to have to do it the old fashioned way. We had to have a plan. So we determined that we would meet at a certain location within a certain time frame and you know what. It worked. Just a sign that my addiction to communication devices can be broken... Hang on, oh my wife is Texting me from upstairs. l8r

Garrett's Birthday

Looks like we had another successful birthday day. G woke up and opened a present before school he got 2 PSP games and he chose to eat at Sizzler tonight. He turned 9. I can't believe that he is growing up so fast. We took his pals and him to a Utah Flash Basketball game. We had a lot of play and not very much watching. It was fun at least for them.