"The Chief," who bears a strong resemblance physically and temperamentally to Chris Faiella…who deserves my warmest congratulations on his return to the film industry!
We left Los Angeles at 6:30 and came back at 10:30, 500 miles of driving, all handled by Kal. When complimenting each other, we like to say "You're a prince," and he was a crown prince yesterday. I spent the voyages crammed in the middle of the Scion's backseat with Dave and Jon…just a wee bit cramped, but we had some great talks about movies and ecstatic sing-alongs to Queen and Gillian's favorite rock tunes.
Oxnard is an ultra-depressing site. My memories of it as the beautiful communal gathering place last Halloween when I voted for Obama will now be mixed with images of unnecessary, pretentiously-named housing developments and decrepit, abandoned motels where you could have gotten a great pancake breakfast in 1962 (Jon's words).
My love for Camera Obscura remains undiminished by classically-trained Judy pointing out that Tracyanne Campbell sings the same five notes over and over again, no matter what key or melody the song is in.
There are few better ways to get lost then driving through Solvang (and passing the actual Hitching Post!) on a pleasant June day while trying to find a Mobil gas station.
I once had the privilege of hearing Kal take off for forty minutes on why he doesn't like the police at all. Yesterday was the sequel, where he actually pulled off the highway and drove out of our way so he wouldn't have to be followed by an ordinary officer who was just making her daily rounds in her patrol car…but by being right behind him was cramping his driving style completely. The hilarious part was Kal, so satisfied in his gambit, turned off only to have the cop stop her car on the shoulder immediately afterwards.
Hearst Castle…what can I say? That I have seen so many things in my life where I couldn't believe they existed, and among the man-made things, William Randolph Hearst's estate is among the most amazing? The Neptune Pool which I shall always think of as Olivier's villa in Spartacus. The guest house nicer than any luxury hotel I've ever been in. Staircases modeled right after Rome's, antiquated statues around every corner, 3,500 year-old Egyptian art JUST SITTING THERE. And the main house, La Casa Grande…art and tapestries and fireplaces and the mother of all living rooms and an indoor pool which takes the words "indoor pool" to a whole new level. For two glorious hours, I was lounging with Marion Davies, playing tennis with Charlie Chaplin, dining with Harpo Marx in a room where the closer you were to the fire, the less Hearst liked you. Audacious. Overwhelming. And Julia Morgan was one hell of an architect. In Dave's words, we were certainly Xanadoing it.
We ate the Hearst Ranch's own, very good grass-fed beef…under protest.
The movie they show at the IMAX theatre is not worth the price of admission: free.
On the way back, we stopped in Cambria, one of those gorgeously picturesque little towns which prides itself on quaintness to the point where they can get away with charging visitors exorbitantly. But we ate dinner at a fantastic local restaurant (no chains allowed by law) with their own wines and everything. I consumed three kinds of pie yesterday…shared strawberry at breakfast, shared olallaberry at lunch, and my own seafood pot pie for dinner. Still short of Harold and his Purple Crayon's nine, but nice.
Surreal experience in our final pre-L.A. pit stop. Kal, Dave, and I wander across the street from the gas station to a Chinese restaurant attached to a Best Western so Kal could get some hot tea. Turns out that restaurant had national write-up. The whole time, two strangers who wandered over are talking to Jon and Judy. We heard the whole story afterwards: he was from Maine, she was pregnant and probably underaged, both were living in a tent nearby while he tried to find work, and they were desperate to get back to Maine and his family so they could have resources to tap…and hoped, on seeing a Scion with the right license plate, they might be able to hitch a ride. Jon gave them ten bucks…it was all they could do. But I have to wonder at a world where even people like this (Jon and Judy both thought there might be drugs involved in the situation) are on the fault line between existence and oblivion while two hours away is an ostentatious display of wealth.
"Funny the way it is," as Dave Matthews sings in a fine new song…
There are some days where every moment is unforgettable. Pictures to come soon here and on Facebook.
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