Jim and Trefor left me at McCarran Airport more than 24 hours ago, but I still have some stuff to report on, so I am continuing to abuse my position as blog author and post from the safety of my home in NYC.
In no particular order:
I felt bad because I was unable to hide my naked loathing for the place, and I think this may have bummed Trefor's good time a little bit. I hope that was not the case. But seriously, Las Vegas is like the ugliest strip-mall-themed amusement park ever, with gambling and call-girl-hucksters thrown in for good measure.
- Las Vegas may not actually be the worst. The worst may, in fact, be Bakersfield, California.
Bakersfield is ranked by the American Lung Association as the most ozone-polluted city in the nation. I didn't read about this fact until right now, but regardless, I could have probably guessed that if you'd asked me. As we approached Bakersfield, we got worried, because it looked like we were driving into a gigantic storm. A wall of gray just hung in the air, splitting the sky in two. We were pretty convinced it was an apocalypse. But we couldn't find anything on any weather radio. As we drove into it, we made the horrifying realization that
it was just the color of the sky. Somewhere, Jim has some photos of the seemingly endless field of oil derricks we had to drive past to enter the area. I couldn't help but assume that they had something to do with the fact that the sky for several miles was the color of bloody vomit.
The following is an excerpt from one of my favorite car games,
Name That Thing. The rules to
Name That Thing are very simple:
- One player thinks of a thing. Anything. It can be a concrete object, an abstract concept, or anything in between. Just: Think of a thing.
- The other players take turns making one guess apiece as to what thing the first player is thinking of.
- The first player decides whose guess is the closest using whatever criteria for comparison that they want.
- House Rule: The players may then put forth an argument for why their guess was the closest. This is the most fun part, as the reasons and rationalizations become tortuously stretched.
The excerpt from our game went something like this:
JASON: Ok, I've got one.
JIM: (
guesses) A giant rainforest ant carrying a tree trunk on its back?
TREFOR: (
guesses) A fortune cookie with no fortune in it?
JASON: Hmm...well, this is a tough one. The thing I was thinking of was a pile of hair that a soldier, returning from two years of war, had just shaved off of his face after not shaving for the entire war, being released into a river. I think I have to give this one to Trefor. I was leaning towards Jim at the beginning because of the connection between an ant and a soldier. But I think the metaphorical angst of an empty fortune cookie is closer to the spirit of the thing.
I wish we had recorded the game because we had some really good arguments about some of them, but I can't remember them that well. Maybe Jim or Trefor can?
Out of the three states I visited on this trip, Oregon won hands down. California was nice, as I'd expected it to be, but something about the state doesn't agree with me, perhaps on an atomic level. I'd be hard-pressed to pinpoint it, but I just didn't feel as comfortable there as I did in Oregon, or as I do in New York. And Nevada had nice deserts, but, man, what an overpriced dump of a state.
Way back in my first post on this blog, I mentioned an energy drink called JetSet, and how I hoped that it would suffice as a coffee replacement. Well, it did more than that. JetSet Club Soda is hands-down my new favorite energy drink. It has a massive amount of caffeine, as well as taurine and guarana and ginseng and B Vitamins. It is zero calories, but gets that way by just not sweetening itself, either with sugar or high fructose corn syrup or the hated sucralose or "Splenda". It is truly a mighty beverage.
That part really should go without saying.
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