Vacation- Day ONE

WARNING!!! LONG POST TO FOLLOW!!!

I know that my many blog fans (ok, the 3 of you) have been wondering where I have been. Well, I've been on VACATION!! I think I did a pretty good job of recording the memorable moments of our little trip to San Diego. So here are the highlights from DAY ONE:

I’m on vacation!! As I write this, I’m laying down in my hotel bed, not wearing pants and loving the fact that I’m not at work. . . and pants-less. I think I would enjoy work more if I didn't have to wear pants. I don't think the others would enjoy it, but I sure would. Anyway, It’s going to be a glorious few days here. But of COURSE I have stories from the road! Did you forget that this is Alicia’s Blog?

Starting Tuesday, night Marcelo was just like really fussy. He kept sleeping on the couch under the excuse that it was my snoring that wouldn’t let him sleep well. I really don’t care about that. Mostly because then I get the whole bed to myself, and he gets the uncomfortable couch. But for some reason, he still woke up mad at me.

I have learned after nearly 4 years of marriage that the best way to resolve Marcelo’s “mystery moods” is to just let them ride. Leave him alone and usually in less than 24 hours he’ll be back to his chipper self. And then I can ask him what was bothering him. That’s the best way if I ever want to get an answer out of him. If I try to get it RIGHT THEN, he will just get frustrated, and so will I, and then that frustration can lead to anger. Some of our biggest fights could’ve been avoided if I had just left him alone and then come back 24 hours later to talk to him about what was going on.

So my point is that after 24 hours, he was STILL not happy. I don’t know why, but I could see that it still wasn’t time to come and talk to him. But I had had enough. It was just getting childish. And it was like 7 hours before we were supposed to leave for our trip!! What if his mood persisted and he ruined our vacation!! I was NOT having it. So when he lay down on the couch again, I got up and I walked downstairs and I was like, “What is going on with you? Do you need to tell me something that I did to offend you? What is happening? Why do you keep sleeping on the couch?”

He tried to say that it was my snoring again, but I reminded him that I snored LONG before my pregnancy and long before the last 2 nights, so what the heck was going on?” I wasn’t answered. He wasn’t ready to talk. Fine, but there was no way he was going to ruin my vacation, so I said, “Ok, I can see you don’t want to talk, but you need to grow up and tell me what is going on. I can’t help you if I don’t know what’s happening. I hope whatever it is that is bothering you is gone by morning. If not, you need to talk to me and tell me, because this silent treatment is really getting old. Get over it by morning.”

And then I went to bed. And guess what? It WAS gone in the morning!! I really don’t know what it was, and I don’t think I will come back and ask him what it was. Honestly, I don’t really care why he was mad. He didn’t want to tell me, and now he’s over it. I’m fine with that! But the point is that we were going to start our vacation off right!!!

So here is a play by play of the first day of our vacation. I hope you enjoy.

4:30 am. I wake up because I have to pee in the worst way.

4:40 am. I hear Marcelo wake up downstairs. He uses the bathroom down there, which is nice because it alerts both Raya and myself that he will be coming upstairs soon. Raya has time to jump off the bed where she’s been sleeping (HOGGING all the covers and bed space, I might add) and give Marcelo the appearance that she HASN’T been curled up next to me on the bed all night.

4:45 am. Marcelo gets in shower.

4:55 am. I get in shower. Seeing is how the hotel we are going to has 5 pools and 4 Jacuzzi hot tubs, I know that I will be needing to shave my “bikini area.” However, I have just discovered that I cannot shave this area with ease. I can’t bend over to see if I’ve got it all, or even if I’m close to where I need to be. I have to do it by feel, (dont' think about that phrase for too long. It will just gross you out). I’m sure I have a fantastic 5 o’clock shadow down there right now. Whatever. At least I don’t have "things" hanging out. And who looks at another person’s crotch, anyway? If someone looks down, they get what they deserve, "things" and all.

5:10 am. I get out of shower and remind Marcelo about bringing his sunglasses. I’m sure that when I’m down there I’ll be stopping at a Walgreens or something to buy myself a $10 pair. But for the car ride down, I want his nice polarized ones. He says he’s already remembered them and they are packed.

5:15 am. Marcelo gives Raya a bath. She goes crazy after it’s over. She thinks it’s playtime. I’m severely scratched, but she smells nice and looks so pretty!! I don't know why he thought it was SO important to bathe her before we go. But he didn't ask me to do it, he did it himself, so why do I care?

5:45 am. We finally leave after last minute instructions to my mom. We've told her how to have Raya sleep so she won't cry all night. Most of the instructions we giver her are about the dog. I don't think my mom needs to know how to run our dishwasher-she can figure it out by herself. However, I DO think she needs to know that sometimes Raya just needs a snuggle. Let her hook her head into your neck, and she's a happy little girl. Anyway, as for my mom, I think that she will have fun living in my house all by herself for the weekend.

5:47 am. Realize that we forgot a toothbrush. Decide to drive on and buy a toothbrush there. (Yes, you read that right. We were 2 minutes from home and we didn’t want to go back.)

5:57 am. I ask for Marcelo’s sunglasses. He said he forgot them. WHAT?!?!? I totally reminded him to bring them and he said, (and I quote) “I already packed them.” Doesn’t that imply that they would be in his bag if he already packed them? When I’ve “already packed” something, I can go get it out of my bag when I need it on my trip. I think we need to work some more on Marcelo’s English.

6:00 am. I crawl in the back of the car and fall asleep. You should know that we laid down our back seat and we made like a double bed back there with a piece of foam, blankets and 2 pillows. A stubby double bed filled with luggage, but still some sleeping space. The reason we did this is because we are planning to sleep in the back of our car the first night. That’s right, we are super cheap, but we figure it will save us money, so what.

8:45 am. We stop at Cedar City for breakfast. I have the IHOP “split decision” and Marcelo has the T-bone steak and eggs. The guy is obsessed with steak. We decide not to get gas there in Cedar City because it’s too expensive. For some reason we think that it’ll be cheaper in St. George.

8:53am. Now back in car, I discover boysenberry syrup in my hair. I must’ve dragged my hair through the pool of it on my plate at the IHOP. It’s dried all sticky and has created a rat’s nest of hair and syrupy goodness. I suck on my hair to remove all the syrup that remains. Hair now clean, I go back to driving.

9:12 am. I start to notice that my underwear is cutting off the circulation on my legs. I remember that I put on some of my “smaller” undies in the morning when I got dressed, but I thought that I would only be sitting in the car driving, not walking anywhere, so it would be ok. It’s not ok. My legs are red and tender and hurt like the dickens.

10:00 am. Stop in St. George for gas. The first places we saw were like $.15 more than the stations back in Cedar City. I am cursing myself for not getting gas there. But then we turn a corner and we hit pay dirt!! Walmart, baby. So we get gas and Sunglasses. I also buy gummy bears, jerky, generic Nutrigrain bars and Little Debbie Star Crunches. Marcelo is able to sleep for a little while, but he’s now awake. Get back on the road heading for Vegas.

10:02 am. I slowly and quietly try to open up a Star Crunch. I don’t think Marcelo will approve of my choice in travel snacks. So I do it as quietly as possible. I get the box open, pull one out, get the package open and take one bite when all of a sudden his head pops up from the back like a freaking prairie dog coming out of it’s hole to check things out. He goes “what’s that?” I said “A star crunch. Wanna try a bite?” I pass it back to him. I hear contented chomps. I say, “I said a bite. Are you going to eat it all?” He hands back a mangled nibblet about 1/32 of the original Crunch. I sarcastically thank him for leaving so much for me. He wants another one. Hum, apparently Marcelo likes Little Debbie just as much as I do. (Update:Marcelo stole all the Star Crunches for the rest of the trip. I had 2 of them total: he had the other 10. Bastard stole my Little Debbies!! Vengeance is mine!!)

10:29 am. Realize I can no longer take my constrictive underwear. I pull out my Leatherman to do the deed. I decide I’m not going to cut them off completely like I did to that other pair outside of Gold’s Gym (That’s a story for another day), but instead I’ll just cut the elastic at the bottom so it gives me more room. That’s the only place that’s bothering me, anyway. But now I’m in a bind: how do I undo my seatbelt, wiggle my pants down to below my knees and make the necessary cuts with surgeon-like precision all while going 80 miles an hour down I-15?

10:34 am. Still working up the nerve and trying to figure out how to take my pants off while driving.

10:51 am. Realize that I’m wearing my green fleece pants that have really big leg holes. I can lift UP the pant legs and do the deed that way.

10:52 am. Instant relief as blood is finally able to rush to my legs again.

12:45 pm. Pass by Vegas. See many signs for what appears to be the World’s Largest “Adult” Megastore. Consider going in and standing around making judgmental comments and/or looks when I see what people have purchased. I decide not to, not just because I don’t want to waste the time, but because those people could be married and trying to “spice up” things at home. Judge ye not. . .

1:25 pm. Marcelo and I switch drivers again. We see that it is 99 miles to Barstow. We know that we have a little more than half a tank of gas. We know we can make it that far without any problem. We decide to wait and get gas In Barstow, CA. I don't know why we decided to do this, seeing is how we were almost screwed by the whole Cedar City/St George Situation, but we do.

1:26 pm. I am again instantly asleep in the back of the car.

2:15 pm. (Time change in effect) Awoken by a panicked Marcelo. I can feel that the car is being swayed slightly by wind. Marcelo says it has been that way this whole time, and that there have been lots of hills up and down. That being the case, the gas was consumed a lot faster than planned. We are not in a desperate gas situation. We *think* we can make it to Barstow, but we aren’t sure. Panic.

2:27 pm. We pull over at one little gas station, but their pumps are like out of the 1930’s And they don’t have nozzle handles on them. It’s weird and sketchy, I tell Marcelo to drive on.

2:49 pm. We find ANOTHER little gas station. This time we can see it from the highway, and all the pumps have their nozzles. And the bargain price for this gas? $3.95 a gallon. Are you kidding me? What, are you like going to another gas station and filling up with their gas and the coming back and marking it up $.35 a gallon? And then I look over and see a man pouring gas from red containers into the ground gas holes!! I thought my eyes were fooling me, but no, he was filling up his underground gas well with gas he had purchased at other gas stations. So I guess I was right. That IS why it’s so expensive.

3:05 pm. That ¼ pound of gummy bears I ate 3 hours ago is doing a number on my bowels and my stomach. I have horrible rancid farts and Marcelo keeps getting mad at me when I release them without warning him. Sorry, buddy, I’m going to get rid of them. And it’s not like I don’t suffer from smelling them either!!

3:55 pm. Make it to San Bernardino where we encounter MORE gas problems. Gas at one place is $.19 higher than the place across the street. However, the place with the cheaper gas? They only take debit cards. (we have NO money in our debit account). And so we drive farther down the highway to find another gas station. We get lost. (kind of). Marcelo says it’s OK because it’s “all part of the adventure”. We continue to drive around for a VERY long time looking for gas stations. We ask some locals. They direct us to a main strip and we find 3 more gas stations. 2 of them don’t take credit cards. The third one DOES, but instead of paying $.19 more per gallon, we have to pay $.21 more. Marcelo no longer thinks this is all part of the adventure. He’s pissed. We switch drivers.

6:03 pm. Finally make it to San Diego. Not very much traffic, even though we were totally driving during rush hours. Marcelo is freaked out by big city driving and always makes me drive whenever we get into unknown places. Especially when they are big cities. He’s not a very good co-pilot either. It’s usually me looking at the maps while trying to drive and then starting to veer to one side, and him yelling at me for not being more careful. The truth is that it would be MUCH better if he were driving, because I read the maps and could tell him where to go. He won’t do it, he’s scared. Wimp.

6:07 pm. Get to our hotel to “check it out”. We can’t actually check in until tomorrow. We talk about what we are going to do that night. The plan was to go into the hotel, change our clothes and go walk around somewhere. It’s right now that I decide to tell Marcelo that I have brought only 2 pairs of pants, and that I’m wearing one of them right then. He’s baffled. “why didn’t you bring other pants?” he says. “What pant would I have brought?” I answer back. He thinks about it and realized I’m right, and I don’t have any other pants that fit me.

6:10 pm. We are stumped. We don’t know what to do. We feel yucky and sticky and there is a funny smell in the car (gummy bear farts, star crunches and sunflower seeds will do that) We want to take showers and refresh ourselves, but we don’t have anywhere to do it. Marcelo says that he would not be opposed to paying for an extra night in the hotel.

6:39 pm. After several calls to our hotel booker, the hotel itself and my mother to get our confirmation number off the web, we DO get the room. It’s pretty cheap because it’s a Thursday night, not a weekend. Marcelo expresses immediate relief and even though I’m secretly doing the mental tally of money spent on this trip, I am also relieved that I don’t have to sleep in the back of the car. Marcelo is relieved he doesn't have to listen to my snoring in our little tin box of a car.

7:00 pm. We walk into our hotel and notice there are 2 double beds, not 1 king. We are upset for about 2 seconds, and then we realize that we would each have LOTS of space to sleep and move. AND there are 8 pillows in this room. And the room is non-smoking. So we are perfectly content and happy.

7: 33 pm. Unload car, get settled, and try to decide what to do. Marcelo says that he really would like to go to this one park called Balboa Park. We discover that that is also where the San Diego Zoo is located. We’ve talked about going to the Zoo, but now I guess it’s official. We are going.

8:03 pm. After getting ready and taking little refresher showers (ie, body washed, but not hair) we decide to go down to where we have been TOLD has great seafood. Marcelo is like a little kid, he’s so excited about the seafood. I, of course, am the driver again. Scary because we don’t know how to get there, and we don’t know what we are looking for. And we didn't have time or resources to Google Map it. But I OF COURSE navigate us directly there as if I’ve been going there my whole life. I honestly think that is one of the talents I’ve been blessed with: A fantastic sense of direction. My brain makes notes and knows how to retrace it’s steps perfectly to get back to where we were. And I can just SEE in my mind where we need to go, and where we came from. So I guess it IS better that I’m the driver. I rub my skills in Marcelo's face.

8:45 pm. After driving there and walking around, we discover that there is NOT great seafood down here. There is only marginal seafood at ridiculous prices. Even places that tout themselves to be “Ocean Dining” have maybe 3 fish dishes. And all of those I could get a the local Red Lobster!!! Marcelo is REALLY upset. I am too. I think, what is the point of having this great location right by the ocean if you are going to serve Mahi Mahi and Alaskan fish & chips? Where are the crabs? Where is the swordfish? Salmon? Tuna? Seriously, not a good night for fish.

9:45 pm. We went to a place called “The Spot” where Marcelo got a 1 ¼ Maine lobster. I had the crab cakes. Even though I only got 2 cakes and Marcelo ate 1 and 1/3 of them, it was still plenty of food for both of us. (I ate his veggies and some of his scalloped potatoes while he was working on that lobster.) We leave La Jolla moderately disappointed, but not upset. And not hungry.

10:30 pm. We crawl into bed, and go to sleep. I immediately start to snore. Marcelo makes a video. I have included it here.

Don't you feel badly for him when you hear that? Man, he is a good husband to put up with that every night.

So that was our trip so far. I’ll have more posts with the other days and their activities. I don’t think they will all be this long. Let’s hope not!! Here’s to Vacations!!