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Sophie The Wonderdog, Las Vegas & Toronto, March 2012

22 Apr

Hey guys! Sorry I’ve been away for a while; I was in Cuba and unable to get access to the internet! I’m in the USA right now, about to start the big USA road trip, but it occurs to me that I still haven’t told you about the end of Vegas, or anything about Toronto, for that matter! As for Cuba, I’m dedicating a special page to it which I’ll update as I have the time… it might take a while to get through it all day by day, so feel free to check in every once in a while to see the updates. The page I created for Cuba can be found here, but be warned – there’s nothing much on it just yet! 🙂

So where were we? Ah yes, Vegas to Toronto. My apologies if it’s a bit perfunctory… I want to get working on Cuba ASAP! 😉

Friday 23 March – I woke up, packed and got ready before Karl and I drove to pick up Aunty C on the way to the airport. My checkin was superfast – quite the change to all the previous times I’ve been to Vegas airport, where I’ve spent hours rotting in a glacial queue praying for freedom! We went to a little place at the terminal called Alejandro’s, where we had a pretty good brekkie which was surprisingly cheap compared to Aussie airport standards. Once again: Aussies are being ripped off for every penny. I said a sad goodbye to Karl and Aunty C… geez, I love my family in Vegas! The security process was, again, quite painless (will wonders never cease), and the flight was nothing special – I basically watched crappy Entertainment Tonight-style shows and wished for it to be over!

On arrival in Toronto, I had to go to a special immigration area to get my working holiday visa cleared; there were a bunch of people all haggling with the immigration officers in broken English, which was a little sad – I’m glad I wasn’t in their position! The woman who processed my visa was actually very friendly, and before I knew it I was on my way out to baggage claim. A guy at the customs desk saw my entry ticket and yelped, “730 days? You’re going to be here for 730 days?!?” so I had to explain my situation; he looked pretty peeved and frowned maniacally but couldn’t really argue, I guess.

Frenda (my godmother) and her husband Adrian met me as I came through the doors. It’s always good to see them; I know they’re not blood relations but they do feel like family. The weather in Toronto was not as chilly as I had expected, and was actually warmer than Vegas – a balmy 14 degrees! We went straight back to Burlington as it was already getting late and it was a long drive; Frenda had made a delicious chicken with some roasted eggplant; she’s such a great cook. I was also happy to see Sophie, the house dog. Half Alsation and half sausage dog, she has tiny little legs on a big Alsation body. She is one of the most awesome, friendly dogs EVER, although she did seem less active than she was in 2007 when I last saw her; I guess age gets to everyone in the end!

After dinner I snuggled into bed and was out like a light before I knew it. And there began my time in Toronto.

Thanks for stopping by,

Tara.

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Deja-Vu on Buffets, Custard & The Freaks Of Fremont! Las Vegas, March 2012

30 Mar

Thursday 22nd March – a relatively early start! Karl, Aunty C and Emma came to pick me up from Kurt & Summer’s place; they had to work Thursday night so we left them to sleep!

Aunty C was in need of a coffee so we drove to a nearby Starbucks; I ordered a brekkie roll and a hot chocolate with caramel syrup in it (my usual favourite if I’m not drinking water). The guy behind the counter was so excited at my ‘unusual’ request (is it really that unusual?) that he called me over to see it while he made it, and then commented on how good it looked…! As always, I was surprised how big the smallest size was.

We went back to Karl’s place and waited for Caroline to come home from school before going to…. Sweet Tomatoes!!! They had known that I wanted to visit but didn’t know that I had gone with Kurt and Summer, and had promised Emma and Caroline that we would go… so I was only to happy to oblige! I once again stuffed myself with gusto, going nuts on the salads and this time trying the tomato soup (which was awfully good… especially considering that I don’t usually like tomatoes!) and the potato and rosemary soup, which was a bit thick but generally pretty damn tasty. Oh, the indulgence! Oh, the salads! Oh, the dessert!!! Aunty C and Caroline went to browse in a nearby thrift store while Karl, Emma and I hung out at the restaurant; the two of them got some pretty awesome buys that day!

On the way home, Karl drove us through what he called ‘the ghetto’, but I have to admit that I didn’t see much of it because, after our stuffathon, I was drifting off to sleep in the car! Shame on me. I did, however, spot a HUGE line of homeless people at one point, all queuing up for dinner and showers at a large building of some kind. The sheer numbers were astounding. I’m not ignorant to the homeless population in Brisbane, but I suspect it doesn’t come close to a fraction of the numbers that I saw in that queue alone, and that was only a small part of Vegas. Sometimes we forget how lucky we are.

We went back to Karl’s place to rest, and later in the afternoon we drove back out to that lovely little 60s shack downtown – Luv-It Frozen Custard! None of the others I was with that day had tried it, so of course we had to go! Most of them opted for the vanilla or chocolate flavours, but of course I had to go with the super-mega banana-butterscotch-chocolate sprinkles madness of the  Scotch Jimmie again. On the way over I consciously noticed something for the first time that I think I had noticed in the back of my mind before: the mountains that surround Vegas are awfully clear to see. The clarity of vision seems to be much higher over long distances there; I wonder if it has anything to do with a total lack of humidity…? Anyway, I enjoyed seeing every nook and crevice of some of those mountains on the drive over… quite the sight. A big ol’ basin of mountains with a big flashy city in the middle.

We hung around to eat our frozen custard in the car park, keeping good company with a police officer (flavour of choice: mango) and a giant taco truck. Caroline mentioned a food truck that she knew called ‘Wangs on Wheels’ and started talking about how delicious the food was… I lasted about 5 seconds before I snorted with laughter. I’m happy to see that Caroline didn’t seem to get the joke, but I was snickering about Wangs on Wheels for quite a while after that!

Karl drove us around ‘Naked City’ (an area of downtown apparently so named because all the showgirls used to live there, and during the day they worked on getting an even tan, if you know what I mean…); nearby there was a sprinkling of hotels with hourly rates and seedy-looking massage parlours, and then just around the corner we passed the pawn shop where the hit TV show ‘Pawn Stars’ is made. It was closed at the time, of course, but there was a cordoned-off area at the front where I assume hopeful ‘pawners’ queue before being allowed to pitch their wares to the show’s stars. I’ve never seen it, but for those of you who are interested: the guy on the show who acts silly is apparently not that stupid; he does it just for the show. I have no idea what that means but apparently it’s important…!

We made our way back to Fremont Street, and boy were the freaks out again – in force. We passed a number of people passed out against the walls on the mall, and I passed Spock, Elvis and Michael Jackson having a conversation. Talk about a one-time chance… or maybe not, on Fremont Street! I also bumped into Tupac (raised from the dead, will wonders never cease?), Stevie Wonder, Jack Sparrow, a filthy Gumby and Emperor Palpatine asking for donations for a new Death Star. His eyes looked suspicously like ping-pong balls with dots on them…! Thankfully, there was no bearded leprechaun lady with her boobs hanging out this time to assail my eyes.

We watched the (rather anti-climactic) Bon Jovi light show; once an hour, on the hour, the whole roof of the mall lights up like a giant TV screen with various shows and musical themes; I think we just got a mediocre one! It’s not that I don’t like Bon Jovi… I just didn’t think the show was much cop. Boo! It was followed by  a short promo for March Madness basketball, which I think I actually preferred!

Having ticked the light show off the ‘to do’ list, we made our way back to the car and back home, and that was that for the day.

Thanks for stopping by!

Tara.

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The Best Chain Restaurant Buffet Ever? Las Vegas, March 2012

25 Mar

Wednesday 21st march – after staying awake until 5am, I slept until about 1pm. It’s a bit hard getting into a rhythm with my sleep, but who cares wen I’m having such a good time? 😉

After waking up, I ate my delicious leftover Mexican food from last night – mmmm, prawns wrapped in bacon. I rounded it off with the last few bites of the cheesecake that I had left (which I’d also taken home in a container) – still yummy! Kurt woke up and wandered in and said, “Ooooh, cheesecake breakfast, eh?” Hell yes! Ha ha ha.

It was a much quieter day this time, but still awesome. We tootled around the house for a while, and then dropped round to Home Depot, where Summer bought a nice succulent/cactus plant for her mother. I often wish that I had the kind of life where a trip to Home Depot would actually be useful for me, but I’m afraid that when you’re an itinerant there’s not much room for cool plants and things! Maybe one day.

Our next stop was Sweet Tomatoes, which is quite possibly one of my favourite places to eat ever. Yeah, okay, I know it’s just a chain restaurant with a buffet, but their salads are really tasty and usually quite inventive, and the rest of their food tastes fresh. I guess it’s like Sizzler, but a third of the price and not crap. (!) We met Summer’s parents there and had dinner together. I had about 5 different kinds of salad, including a chicken ginger wonton thingy, and an apple and blue cheese one (Monterey blue with peanuts, I think it was called), and a mix of a bunch of others. They had a BBQ potato salad which was also out of this world. I tried two of their soups (asian ginger and broccoli cheese; the asian ginger was like a broth, and delicious) and ate a couple of their breads, namely the garlic asiago foccacia and the quattro formaggio foccacia. Then I gorged on their corn bread, which I LOVE, and then I moved on to dessert – blueberry muffins, warm peanut butter chocolate chip cookie bars and brownies, served up with some chocolate and vanilla frozen yoghurt and butterscotch sauce. Awwwwwww yeeeeeeeaaaaah.

By the end of that I was bloated, but did I regret it? No. 🙂

After dinner we went to Summer’s parents’ house for a little bit, where I met their chihuahuas… by the time I leave here I’m going to wish I had a little dog of my own!!! Afterwards, we drove back to their place for a little bit before deciding that it would actually be a good time to go and catch the show at the Mirage volcano… so that’s what we did! We drove to the Mirage casino again, and darted outside, nabbing a good spot with a good view. 5 minutes later, the loud sound of birds and insects started playing around the lake outside the casino, and the stone mound in its midst started to glow. Then…. silence. The birdcalls stopped, and the top of the volcano started to bubble, and then… BOOM! Smoke and lights and fire and bubbling ‘lava’, and the sound of drums accompanied the eruption. Small jets of flame appeared in the lake, and I have to say that it was a bloody good show! The flame jets were synced with the drum beats, and it had a great effect. Where else in the world can you go to watch a volcano explode just for the fun of it?!? The eruption finally calmed down, and the jets disappeared, and the sound of insects came back and all was calm. Awesome.

With that done, we went straight back to the car and drove to a supermarket near Kurt & Summer’s place. I love going to supermarkets in other countries; it’s usually the first thing I try to do after arriving. I love seeing all the different kinds of food and poking about with all the wierd and wonderful stuff in them. America definitely has more snack and convenience foods than Australia. I also nearly choked on my own tongue to see that Ben & Jerry’s ice cream cost only $3.50 per pint tub; in Australia it costs anywhere between $15 and $19!!! And the selection of flavours… my god, I nearly passed out from the effort of choosing! In the end, I chose two and Kurt and Summer chose two. My choices were ‘Late Night Snack’ (vanilla bean ice cream with fudge-covered potato chip clusters and a salty caramel swirl, for a sweet-and-salty experience!) and ‘S’Mores’ (chocolate ice cream with fudge chunks, toasted marshmallow & graham cracker swirls), while they chose the ‘Red Velvet Cake’ (red velvet cake batter ice cream with red velvet cake pieces & a cream cheese frosting swirl) and ‘Banana Greek Frozen Yogurt with Peanut Buttery Swirls’. Holy crapamole! When we got home, we all tried a little bit of each, and I think that Kurt and Summer made better choices than I did. I loved the Late Night Snack, but the S’Mores flavour was a bit of a disappointment; why have a graham cracker swirl when you could just put lumps of graham cracker into it? It tasted a little wierd. The greek yoghurt one was delicious – which was surprising for me, because I’m not generally into the whole American ‘peanut butter is a sweet treat’ thing… but wow, did it work with banana! And the red velvet cake was sublime.

We watched TV and snacked until I passed out on the couch at about 2am – either from exhaustion OR from a diabetic coma, I can’t say for sure which! 🙂

Thanks for stopping by,

Tara.

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Adventures in Mexican Food and Canyons, Las Vegas March 2012

23 Mar

20th March 2012 – I woke up a little earlier than Kurt and Summer, so I polished off some of my leftovers from the Mediterranean place yesterday; they tasted just as good the second time around!!!

Viva Las Vegas!

We got ready and drove out along the Strip and to the edge of town to see the infamous Las Vegas sign; a few years ago I went to see it at night, and you had to park illegally at the side of the road and scoot across 3 lanes of drunk-driver traffic to stand on the island in the middle of the road and snap your picture. Since then, they’ve widened the island and added a bunch of parking spaces so that you can turn in and stop legally, and tourists don’t have to risk life and limb to get their ubiquitous Las Vegas photo. Now there’s a Philipino Elvis hanging out there with a pink Cadillac, waiting for tourists to tip him for photos. There were loads of people there but everyone was really well-behaved; they all took polite turns to have their pictures taken. Everyone has to do it, I guess!

From there, we drove even further out of the city and made our winding way to Red Rock Canyon. The houses and strip malls disappeared altogether. We passed a bunch of wild ‘burros’ (donkeys to the layman like me) and a couple of isolated little villages – I wonder what on earth they do for a living out there? Finally we turned a corner round a hill, and there it was – this wide, sweeping vista of bright red rocks, and a couple of ranches dotted in the vast empty space. It was quite refreshing after all the concrete and people in Vegas! We stopped at a little lookout to enjoy the view and the fresh air; there were only a couple of people there, and one of them was a guy with a serious motorbike covered in scratches, stickers and saddlebags. I like seeing motorbikes like that; it tells me that they’re actually being used as motorbikes and not just as compensation for one’s lack of youth/self-esteem/organ length! We could hear the owner talking to the man who was with him, and it turns out that he’s the features editor for some sort of motorcycle magazine; that would definitely explain the kit, and the location!

We continued our drive around the loop road, and just around the corner I could see Las Vegas creeping into Red Rock Canyon. Seeing Vegas from the air at night gives you some perspective on how the town is organised; there’s the Strip, then some lights, and then BAM! Nothingness. The lights end and the desert begins. That’s exactly what I could see as we left the canyon; there was nothing, and then there was a line of houses. It’s not like the buildings get thinner on the ground as you go further out; they just stop, kapow.

We drove along a freeway for what seemed like an eternity, and then finally made it to my cousin Kevin’s place; he lives on the west side of town, seemingly miles from anywhere. Every time I see him it’s brief, but it’s good. We had a little tour of his house (the last time I came to Vegas, he was living in an apartment somewhere else), and then headed out for dinner. His wife was, sadly, working and then at a roller derby bout; apparently she’s a kickass roller derby chick! Maybe next time I visit I’ll try to make it to see her play.

We went to a nearby Mexican restaurant called ‘Lindo Michoacan’ for dinner; our waiter, Joao (or “Joe” as the receipt has it), was one of the best waiters I’ve ever had – and that includes waiters I’ve had at expensive hotels (on the few occasions I’ve been to them)! He was right on top of everything, anticipated our needs (offering takeaway containers, bringing us extra drinks and corn chips when we ran out, etc), and even convinced us to take our salsa home to have the next morning with our eggs or fast-food breakfast! The food at the restaurant was goooooood. When we arrived, they plonked down some complimentary crunchy corn chips, salsa and refried beans – some of the nicest I’ve ever had, and it didn’t seem like they came out of a tin or anything, which was good! I pretty much stuffed myself on those and probably should’ve stopped there, but the menu was GIGANTIC and I spotted the ultimate combination of some of my favourite foods: “Camarones Abuelito Timo”, which is prawns wrapped in bacon and covered in cheese. Holy moly. It was served with rice and beans and I drooled just thinking about it. To share, we ordered some guacamole, and it was made fresh next to our table. They mixed avocado, lime juice, coriander, tomatoes, onions and jalapenos together, mashed them up, and then we immediately attacked it with our corn chips (which had thoughtfully just been topped up again!). As delicious as my main course was, I simply couldn’t finish it; thankfully, Joao had already brought our takeaway containers so I didn’t feel at all guilty!

We went back to Kevin’s place for a little while; he has eight cats (EIGHT!) but I only met one of them; the rest were hiding upstairs. Kevin ALSO has a mighty cool addition to his living room – 3 full-size vintage arcade games, complete with booth and joystick. I had a good go at Street Fighter II, but I kept getting my ass kicked by Chun Li and Cammy. Oh, the shame of it! 🙂

After hanging out for a while, we left Kevin’s place and aimed for the Strip – I had heard that the Banana Bread Pudding at BB King’s Blues Bar at The Mirage was legendary and wanted to give it a try. Unfortunately, we turned up at the The Mirage only to find that they’d closed the restaurant half an hour before they were supposed to, so I never got to try it. Booo!!! I guess it’ll have to wait til next time! After considering our dessert options out on the Strip, we ended up hot-footing it back to the Casear’s Palace Forum Shops, where we sat down at the Cheesecake Factory. God, I love those places. There was a list of about 30 different cheesecakes to choose from; I was terribly overwhelmed and torn between a small handful of real gems! In the end, I decided just to give myself a heart attack and went for the Hershey’s Chocolate Cheesecake. It’s a slice of rich, moist chocolate cake, topped by chocolate cheesecake, topped by more chocolate cake, topped by chocolate ganache, with a coating of big fat chocolate chips on the outside edge. It sounds terribly rich, but in fact it was just perfect. The cheesecake part wasn’t too firm and was quite creamy, and the cake part was brilliant. I guess with a name like ‘The Cheesecake Factory’, they have to know what they’re doing! Kurt and Summer shared a Red Velvet cheesecake and some sort of peanut butter smoothie. Their cheesecake was also incredible – layers of red velvet cake between vanilla cheesecake, topped with frosting. Deeeeeeeeee-licious!

We waddled out to the car and took a boglap along the bottom part of the Strip, which I hadn’t really seen much of on this trip; I particularly wanted to go past the New York New York casino. I’ve been there before, but seeing as I’m visiting the real New York later in my trip, I wanted to pay homage to its replica!

We eventually made it home, full and bloated, but happy, and didn’t make it to bed until about 5am. Blimey!

Thanks for stopping by,

Tara.

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Preparing for the Zombie Apocalypse – Las Vegas, March 2012

21 Mar

Monday, 19 March 2012. It’s hard to believe that my father has now been gone for exactly 11 years. It doesn’t feel that long. I suppose it’s fitting that I’m off adventuring in Las Vegas and hanging with family when this day comes around, embarking on another big trip; I think Dad would have been proud, and just fine with the way I spent the day. This day’s for you, Dad.

I struggled to get up at a reasonable hour again, but luckily Karl had a couple of errands to run (including dropping Caroline off at school) before we set off for the day. We packed all my junk into the car and we drove over to Kurt and Summer’s place, where I’m all set to spend the next few days. They have a pair of the most disgustingly cute chihuahuas EVER… one of them has had a few teeth removed from the side of her mouth and now her little pink tongue sticks out of the gap most of the time, as if she’s always thinking very carefully! I never saw myself as a fan of little dogs, particularly chihuahuas, but I think these two little ones might have converted me!

We all got into the car and drove straight for the western side of town. Our destination? The Zombie Apocalypse Store. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, there is a shop in Las Vegas where you can buy everything you need to prepare for – and survive – the (apparently) impending zombie apocalypse! Everything from zombie target practice, knives, powdered eggs, stun guns, Wolverine claws (!), zombie handbooks, tinned food and crossbows to t-shirts that read, “There is nothing to fear but fear itself…. and ZOMBIES!” What’s really funny is that the place is doing a roaring trade. All of us were laughing our asses off as we walked around the shop until we noticed the icy stares we were being given. There were some people in there who were taking it WAY too seriously; there was one sweaty fat guy carefully picking out a camouflage backpack and a knife who looked like he could be president of the Jeffrey Dahmer fan club, you know what I mean? Anyway, I bought myself a postcard and resisted the temptation to buy a ‘Hello Zombie’ (instead of ‘Hello Kitty’) t-shirt before we left. You know what else made us laugh? The owners of the Zombie Apocalypse store also own an artificial grass/turf company. At the back of the shop, among all the wierdos in camouflage gear, was this conservative-looking old lady in Dr Scholls sandals and socks, sitting at a little desk, ready to sell you some grass for your lawn! Karl saw her shuffling in the car park outside later and said, “Oh my god, there’s one of the zombies now!” Poor thing – one can only imagine what it’s like working in there!

Having prepared ourselves for a zombie infestation, we were starving so we headed out for a drive and almost immediately stumbled across a pupusa place – yay! It was a Honduran/Mexican restaurant called Rincon Catracho, near the university. It was huge, but dimly lit with a Spanish-speaking TV channel murmuring at the back of the restaurant; it was filled with bottle-green plastic booths and latino youths eating great food at ridiculously low prices. We filed in and, after devouring our complimentary bowl of corn chips with salsa and cheese, all of us ordered pupusas, which are basically little circular dough patties filled with the good stuff of your choice and fried. I had a pork one and a cheese & bean one, and both of them were just delicious. Just what I wanted! 🙂 After that, Karl drove us back to Kurt’s place and he went home to help Caroline with her homework; the rest of us spent a few hours relaxing at Kurt’s place, which was really nice.

At around 6 o’clock we took a short drive to Paymon’s Mediterranean Cafe and Lounge, where I got to meet Summer’s parents – who were just lovely people. For starters, we feasted on hummus, baba ganoush, pita bread, calamari and a stupidly good dip that was a mix of artichoke, shrimp and cheese; for mains I had a garlic cream pasta dish with chicken, mushroom and sundried tomatoes, but I have to admit that I only got a few bites out of it before I was full – I had overdone it on the starters!

After stuffing ourselves again (I sense a pattern here), we said goodbye to Summer’s parents and drove to The Strip for a bit of good old-fashioned touristy action. We parked at the Bellagio – the utmost bastion of taste on The Strip. They have a little botanical garden there which they fill with fresh flowers; apparently they change the display every month. As we approached it, we could smell the flowers; quite an unusual thing, as often when you buy flowers these days they’ve had the scent bred out of them! At the moment they’re having a ‘Spring Celebration’ with a Netherlands theme, and I have to say that it was quite the beautiful sight. Giant hovering bumblebees made of flowers, a little lake with a giant swan and cygnet swimming along, a windmill, a carousel lit up with sparkling fairy lights, a huge pair of painted wooden clogs… and let’s not forget the flowers. Thousands of stunning plants and bulbs in a riot of colours, from tulips to daffodils to chrysanthemums to carnations, all beautifully arranged. There was even a giant version of Claude Monet’s ‘Fisherman’s Cottage On The Cliffs of Varengeville’, faithfully reproduced, using only plants and flowers to represent the colours. Beautiful. On our way out of the casino we passed the entryway ceiling, which is covered with hand-blown glass blooms in hundreds of colours. Each flower is about 30 to 50 cm wide and just lovely. Still, I wouldn’t want to be the poor bastard who has to get up on a ladder and clean those things.

We exited the casino and went round to the front of the Bellagio; we arrived just in time for the fountains to begin. I’ve seen the show before, but this time was the best – a wicked fountain show synced up with Frank Sinatra’s ‘Luck Be A Lady’. Very Vegas! It ended with a couple of massive sprays, shooting high into the air; the vapour lingered for quite a while after it was done.

We went back to the car and drove around to the Caesar’s Palace car park, from which we walked to the Forum Shops… I had heard that there was a Bettie Page dress shop there, and I really fancied going and poking through all the lovely 50s pin-up dresses and pretending that I had the money to buy them (and the figure to fill them)! 😉 We walked through the Forum Shops, which I’ve always liked; the ceiling is painted to look like the sky and the sound of running water from all the fountains follows you all through the mall. All of the shops were designer labels way out of my reach, and almost all of them were empty; I have to wonder how much longer these places can sustain themselves. We rode the circular escalator (quite the mind-boggle) up to the third floor and found the Bettie Page shop; I tried on a couple of dresses but was almost relieved when I discovered that they didn’t have the colour I wanted in my size, so I couldn’t spend the money!

Then it was time for dessert! We drove towards the downtown area, to a dingy little corner in a dodgy, empty area, and pulled into the car park at Luv-It Frozen Custard. I’d never tried frozen custard before, so I decided to go for the works – a ‘Scotch Jimmie’ sundae, which is your choice of flavour with chopped bananas, butterscotch sauce and chocolate sprinkles (known as ‘jimmies’ here). I tried it with the vanilla and chocolate custards. It was… amazing. It was similar to ice cream, and it’s hard to describe how it’s different. I guess it’s much smoother, less grainy, more airy, and… a bit more ‘eggy’. Anyway, it was delicious, and together with the sweet banana and sugary butterscotch, I could have eaten about ten more sundaes. YUMMMMMMMMM!!!!!

We took a short drive from Luv-It over to The World’s Largest Gift Store and ate our sundaes in the car park before entering the store. Everything you never needed but really wanted resides inside this store. Bacon wallets, Vegas snow globes, hot dog hats, meatball chewing gum, swearing chickens, poker chips, penis masks, toy turds, hen purses, tacky t-shirts, remote-controlled zombies, ‘great philosopher’ finger puppets, 64 oz (about 2 litres) hip flasks… it’s all here. We whiled away hours poking through the goodies, but we left empty-handed. It’s lots of fun but did I really need anything? No. 🙂

We went home and watched Grimm (which I’d never seen before) and other good TV before finally making it to bed at about 5am…!

Thanks for stopping by,

Tara.

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Downtown Las Vegas – the Freaks of Fremont Street

21 Mar

Sunday 18th March, and all’s well! I woke up fairly late (again) after another late night, but I had managed to get about 8 hours sleep so I didn’t feel so much like a zombie any more! I showered and dressed while Karl went to pick up Caroline from her great-grandmother’s house, and then all three of went off in search of pupusas for lunch. I had spotted a sign for them somewhere on Flamingo Road when I was on the bus the day before, and I’d tried them once before and they were delicious, so we thought we’d give them a whirl. Unfortunately, after ages driving around, we couldn’t find the place, so we had to give up. Boo! We consoled ourselves with a stop at Gigi’s Cupcakes, a fancy-schmancy little place with a snotty girl behind the counter. Caroline was ultra-excited but the girl behind the counter didn’t even show a flicker of a smile. I would normally feel bad about handing over a $100 note for a $9 purchase (that was all I’d been given at the airport when I changed my money), but I didn’t mind at all with this girl! I had a White Midnight Magic cupcake, which is a chocolate cupcake topped with a whipped cream-cheese frosting and chocolate chips. The icing was taller than the cupcake itself! The icing tasted amazing, but the cupcake itself wasn’t much cop.

Anyway, in the end we decided to drive to downtown Las Vegas, which is the older part of town where all the original casinos were/are located. It’s separate from the strip, and is centred around a pedestrian mall called Fremont Street, which is full of bars, casinos, restaurants and dingy dives. We parked the car and wandered towards the mall. Now, I know that Las Vegas is generally populated with freaks, wierdos and drunk people, but if you really want a taste of the bizarre and you don’t want to hop on a bus, Fremont Street just about takes the cake. Everywhere you look, something (or someone) slightly off-kilter is going on, and as it gets dark, it gets worse. The mall itself is filled with bright lights, but if you go one block away it’s like a post-apocalyptic vision of the world; junkies stumble around in a zombie-like state, step by glacial step.

It doesn’t help that prisoners are released from the county jail just around the corner. Imagine – you’ve just been released from a prison where you’ve been deprived of all of life’s pleasures. Where are you going to go? You’re going to make a beeline for a place that’s only a couple of blocks away, where you can indulge your every vice. Sometimes you can spot these guys. There was one man we saw who was almost definitely a new release. A cheesy cover band was playing ‘I’ve Had The Time Of My Life’ on a stage in the mall, and there was a guy watching them who was in his late 20s, covered in tattoos, with his white shirt off (but tucked into the back of his jeans); he was so drunk that he was sweating. He was moshing. By himself. To ‘I’ve Had The Time Of My Life.’ Christ.

Anyway, the first place we came upon was the place we had been looking for – The Heart Attack Grill. A sign outside read ‘Cash Only – Because You Might Die Before The Check Clears’. This place serves up deliberately high-fat meals; all customers have to wear a hospital gown and wristband, and the waiters are dressed as doctors and nurses. If you weigh over 350 lbs (about 159 kilos) or more, you can eat there for free. Mind-boggling. The menu advertises the sheer unhealthiness of its offerings; all drinks only came in large sizes, the Coca-Cola was from Mexico (where they use huge amounts of real sugar instead of sweetener), the chips are fried in lard, and the bacon isn’t drained after frying. They even offered filter-free cigarettes and milkshakes that were basically 100% cream, with or without vodka whipped cream on top. It was wonderfully disgusting. Only in America! I ordered a ‘Bypass Burger’, which had a 1/2 lb burger patty on it, 5 slices of bacon, cheese and onion. This was the smallest burger; the largest on the menu (a quadruple bypass) had four patties. Eek! If you don’t finish your meal, you get spanked with a paddle by the ‘naughty nurse’ waitresses; I didn’t finish my food, but thankfully they left me alone – I suspect this was because we had Caroline with us and they didn’t want to traumatise an 11-year-old kid! Phew! At first I really couldn’t see how anyone could finish any of that stuff, but looking around at the multiple fatasses on the tables around me, I figured that one or two of them could give it a good go. The menu says, “Taste… Worth Dying For!” and usually I hold with the idea that ‘full fat = better taste’, but honestly the burger wasn’t anything special and the chips were barely edible. I guess we were really there for the novelty value, and that was fun enough for me!

After eating all that fat, we decided we might as well go the whole hog, and went to one of the grubby casinos where I rushed in and grabbed us a 99 cent serve of deep-fried Oreos and a deep-fried Twinkie to share. The Oreos were actually pretty good, but the Twinkie was just downright evil. Bleurgh! We took a break from the gluttony and took a walk to the Greyhound Station (just a few blocks from Fremont Street) where I picked up some bus tickets for later in the journey. Karl warned Caroline that “this is where you’ll end up if you don’t do well in school”… kind of funny, if it wasn’t true. Greyhound stations are where the dregs of humanity often end up (and yes, that includes el cheapo backpackers like me!).

We wanted to wait around for the sun to go down and the lights on Fremont Street to go on, and we had some time to kill, so to continue the eating trend we went to a frozen yoghurt shop that had a little heating and sat down. The guy working there seemed very amused by my accent; I tried some of their key lime yoghurt, and orange sherbet yoghurt, but in the end I went for chocolate and vanilla topped with crunchy chocolate balls, strawberry and crumbled up Heath bars (basically choc-covered brittle toffee). We sat and watched the wierdos wander by… and there were lots of them! A lot of random people in Las Vegas find that they can make an income dressed in costume on Fremont Street, taking photos with tourists and getting tips. I saw Rick James, Smokey & The Bandit, a bronze John Wayne, a greyish-looking silver robot (who looked just like a homeless guy with grey eyeshadow on his face), a midget dressed as Elvis, a filthy Spongebob, and last but not least, a dirty Mickey and Minnie. I couldn’t believe that parents were allowing their kids to cuddle these freaks in particular. The costumes were greyed and looked stinky, and were clearly home-made. The man and woman inside regularly took their heads off and sat down to smoke hand-rolled cigarettes in front of the kids on the street, and underneath the masks they were downright scary – dirty, with mullets and haggard faces, missing teeth and snapping at each other. Ew. Every time a kid toddled close to them we were like, “Nooooooo! DON’T TOUCH DIRTY MICKEY!!!”

It was freaking cold that afternoon; there was a biting wind and both Caroline and I regretted not bringing jackets with us. After we finished at the yoghurt place, we sought refuge from the cold inside a souvenir shop where we poked fun at all the tacky wares, and then we went for a lengthy walk around the neighbourhood to have a look at all the little wedding chapels (the place where you get your marriage licence is also not far from Fremont Street, so all the chapels are nearby). A pair of touts approached me and Karl as we passed the licence office and asked us if we wanted to get married; Karl said, “Nah, we’re looking for a divorce!!!” and then shocked them even further by telling the guys that we’re cousins! 😉

As we reapproached Fremont Street, a guy sidled up to me and, at top speed, repeated the mantra, “Helpthehomeless helpthehomeless helpthehomeless helpthehomeless…” he actually scared me a little; I didn’t see him coming and he was whispering it in my ear quickly and quietly. Normally you just hear it once, and loud… I was a little freaked out and scooted away in a rather ungenerous way. Sigh. I guess they’ve all got their pitches, and that was his.

By the time we got back to the mall, the lights were on, and we had a lot of fun watching all the glittering. We spotted a bearded lady in a green Irish leprechaun costume, boobs bulging out of the top… and then I noticed that the left boob was actually spilling out of the dress, and her nipple (which was thankfully covered in masking tape) was out, too. Lovely.

I have to say that in many ways I actually like downtown Las Vegas/Fremont Street more than I do the main part of the Strip. Yes, it’s tired, tacky, faded and rundown but it’s in a very honest way; the shiny new casinos hide all their tawdriness, but it’s still there. With Fremont Street, what you see is what you get – decrepit people gambling what little money they have in broken-down halls, eating crap food and then coming outside and enjoying the lights.

After leaving Fremont Street we went in search of dinner (yes, we still had room after all that rubbish we’d eaten), and we called Aunty C to see if she wanted to join us. We picked her up from work and were headed homewards when we spotted a sign for pupusas! Unfortunately, when we pulled in it looked like the kind of place where you’d die of food poisoning, so instead we crossed the road and went to a little taco joint, where Kurt also joined us. I had a pork taco and a fried potato taco, which were delicious, and rounded it off with a tasty flan (which was a bit like an airy Mexican version of a creme caramel).

After all the punishment I’d given it all day, my stomach really didn’t like me by the time I got home! I sat in front of the TV and nursed my poor tummy while watching a little more Game of Thrones… how convenient!

And that was my Sunday. How was yours? 🙂

Thanks for stopping by!

Tara.

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It’s Something We All Have To Do – Las Vegas, March 2012

21 Mar

Viva Las Vegas!

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A Day On The Strip, Las Vegas March 2012

20 Mar

So, on Friday March 16th, I eventually managed to drag myself out of bed just before 11am – not bad after a million-hour flight and a very late night! I washed the flight off myself with a nice long shower, and then Aunty C and I set off for a day on Las Vegas Boulevard. We started off with a walk to a nearby strip mall, where we had lunch at a restaurant called China Roll. It was a good, old-fashioned, old-school Chinese place; cracked linoleum floors, pea-green walls, plastic tablecloths and waving golden Feng Shui cats. The young guy working there was spectacularly uninterested in his job; taking our order was obviously a great chore BUT he managed to squeeze out a smile eventually! We both had the Mongolian beef, which was probably stuffed full of MSG, but it tasted pretty damn good. After eating I was approached by a random Philipina woman who was obviously nuts; the wierdos always seek me out. It’s like I’m some sort of freak magnet. She started telling me all about her family and the guy that she fell in love with when she was 16 but just couldn’t get over, and that she had spotted his car outside… at this point we tried to make a run for it, smiling and backing away slowly…!

From the restaurant, we walked around the corner to the bus stop. A word to the wise: catching a bus in Las Vegas is a dicey business, to say the least! I guess that car culture in America is such that only the people who really can’t afford a car, or for whatever reason can’t drive a car, catch public transport. This means that the bus is stuffed with alcoholics, nutjobs, bogans, freaks and the occasional normal person, elderly person or disabled person. While waiting at the bus stop, we gasped repeatedly as a screeching witch of an old woman (with a bad dye job) kept stepping into moving traffic to see if she could spot the bus coming. As if that was going to make it come any faster! Then when the bus eventually came, we went to the top deck but we could hear her prattling on downstairs about one thing or another. She kept shouting at the driver, “AIR CON! We need AIR CON!” even though the driver repeatedly told her that it wasn’t working. Funnily enough, though, as soon as she got off the bus, he switched it on! He must’ve encountered her before and just decided to wind her up… 🙂

Arriving at the Strip, we started to explore some of the casinos. The first stop was Caesar’s Palace, a wildly extravagant ode to excess. The main casino is surrounded by mile-high towers, alabaster statues, golden nymphs prancing in fountains, and of course The Coliseum (where Celine Dion still sings almost every night… how the hell do they find enough people to buy those tickets?). We didn’t go inside, but instead ventured to the Mirage and decided to pay a visit to Siegfried and Roy’s ‘Secret Garden’. Here, we were able to spend a little time watching the dolphins, one of whom was particularly friendly and kept nosing up to the glass in the underwater aquarium area. There were also two recently-arrived baby dolphins who spent the whole time swimming in formation with two of the older dolphins; I guess they were being trained by their superiors! We also saw the white tigers, white lion, panther and leopard that Siegfried and Roy used in some of their shows (I’m not sure if the one that eventually bit Roy was included in the exhibit). I always thought that those guys were a little freaky; Roy (and his eyebrows) always gave me the creeps in particular. But I suppose, really, that they were a major part of the glitz of Las Vegas, so I’m glad we visited.

From the Mirage, we crossed the road to the Venetian, an extreme imitation of Venice, and wandered along The Grand Canal, occasionally dropping into shops and watching the gondoliers serenade their passengers as they passed us by. I cringed a little bit at the cheesiness of it but then reminded myself that I’m in Vegas, after all – just go with it! I tried a delicious orange sorbet, and treated myself to a chocolate-coated strawberry at Godiva, which cost a stellar $9… my Aunty nearly had a heart attack when she heard how much I was paying, but I figured that I’m on holiday, and how often do I do that…? (The best excuse to do anything on holiday, really!)

Next, we walked across the road again and went to the Fashion Show Mall, a hideously overpriced mall with an inexplicable spaceship-shaped blimp floating above it. There, we hit Macy’s (I had to top up my makeup) and had a little browse at a whole bunch of shops where we couldn’t really afford anything! A Top Shop has just opened there, but I resisted the urge to go inside and splurge all my spending money in one go. By the time we came out of the Fashion Show, the sun had gone down and the seething crowds had come out. Walking back along the Strip to the bus stop, I was reminded that this was one of Vegas’ most busy weekends – it was Spring Break, St Patrick’s Day and March Madness (a basketball thing) all at the same time. Drunk people filled the streets, bright purple yard-glasses of beer in hand, stumbling and shouting. We caught the end of the ‘Sirens of Treasure Island’ show; it used to be a family-friendly outdoor pirate show in which two giant ships fought each other and one actually sank into the giant outdoor pool, but obviously it wasn’t sexy enough for Vegas, so they got rid of the traditional pirates and replaced them with hot chicks in pirate bikinis. Classy.

Overheard on the Strip… a man is talking animatedly to his friend, gesturing at the woman by his side: “BUT THE BITCH GAVE ME HERPES!!!” I didn’t need OR want to hear the rest of that conversation!

I marveled, as always, at the lights of the Strip, flashing and sparkling; the intensely high volume of noise; the mass of humanity all on the hunt for a good time… it really is a surreal place. I’ve been to Vegas 3 or 4 times already, but things change so often that there’s always something new to see, and even the old stuff is fun.

We made our way back to the bus stop near the Flamingo (outside, a man dressed as Bumblebee from The Transformers was raking in tips for photographs), and once again I was treated to a bus encounter with some of the wierdest people on earth. A large group of men were having a loud conversation about all the different basketball games and who they’d bet on, and when that conversation finished a man and his girlfriend kept us entertained until we got off. Girlfriend: “Man, I gotta stop smokin’ weed! I can’t keep goin’ to school smellin’ of weed! Some damn parent gonna call the police!” Then the guy called his mother about something. His side of the conversation: “Mama, what the hell you mean, I never call? I’M CALLING YOU NOW! And I just spent three hours with you! You want me to hang up? Imma hang up! … HELLO? (man turns to his girlfriend) BITCH HUNG UP ON ME!!!!!”

From the bus stop, Bethany and Caroline came to meet us in the car. They handed me a bag of the best onion rings EVER… I think they were from some fast food joint called Sonic. They drove us home, and Aunty C made a salmon curry for dinner, which was delicious. By the time we got to bed, it was past 1am. I actually had one of the worst nights of sleep that I’ve had in years; I think we ate too late, and I was a bit hot under the blankets. I remember having bad dreams for a couple of hours, and then I had an awful awful night terror (I think that’s what they call them) – I haven’t had one of those in over ten years, and I had never had one before that one. I woke up screaming at about 3:30am, and then I was too scared to let myself fall asleep again! Silly. Then, at about 4am, my mum called, and after the phone call my Aunty’s cat, Cally, spent over an hour scratching and meowing at the door to be let into my bedroom; the last thing I wanted was to be rudely awoken by a cat in my face after that nightmare! By the time I fell asleep again, it must’ve been around 5/5:30am, and then Karl came to pick me up at about 7:30am on the Saturday morning – yikes! Still, it was a great day with my aunty, and so nice to be pottering the Strip again.

Saturday the 17th of March was a pretty quiet day, and that was exactly how I liked it. My lack of sleep and the jetlag combined had made a bit of a zombie of me, and Karl, Bethany and Caroline all had stuff to do around the house so I just spent the day quite happily on the couch, watching them come and go, and cuddling their disgustingly cute puppy dog Ottie. We had a delicious brunch made by Bethany (fried potatoes, asparagus and tomato accompanied by little spinach, sausage and cheese omelettes, plus sourdough toast and blueberry scones… yummmmm!). I watched most of Season 1 of Game of Thrones, which I’d never seen before. My, my, my. Sex, blood, sex, violence and more sex! Just my kind of thing. 🙂 Ladies: Khal Drogo. Blimey. I don’t think I need to say anything else about him! Bethany caught a red-eye flight to Hawaii for business on Saturday night, and Caroline went to visit her great-grandmother for the night, so Karl and I hung out at the house, chatting and catching up. It was another late night – again, I didn’t get to sleep much before 2am, but it was definitely worth it.

Thanks for stopping by!

Tara.

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My Stomach Is About To Stage A Revolution: What Happens In Vegas Spends A Lifetime On The Hips!

19 Mar

Well hellooooo there everyone!

Here I am in Las Vegas – Stage One of the 2012 Grand Escapade! So much to tell….

Well, the journey started pretty uneventfully; my mother dropped me off at Brisbane Airport. Saying goodbye was hard; she’s not very well at all and I’m going to be away for at least a year, so neither of us knew if it would be the last time we’d see each other. I certainly hope not.

Anyway, all my flights went as planned; I flew from Brisbane to Auckland, then Auckland to Los Angeles, and then Los Angeles to Las Vegas. My time in Auckland was great; I arrived in the transit lounge to find a group of about 20 huge Pacific Islander boys in black suits and blue shirts. Eye candy! While trying not to swoon, I had a little snack (I thought I was eating NZ chocolate, but it tasted funny and when I checked, I found out it was actually made in Australia – boo!), and then I settled into one of their comfy chairs, plugged in my laptop and watched an episode of Supernatural, Season 6. The time flew. I did pretty much the same thing at LAX, with the addition of a nice long walk. While on the flights, I watched a couple of movies; first, I watched ‘Speed’ and rekindled my love of Keanu Reeves… how could I have forgotten how lovely he is?!? 😉 Then I wanted to watch something a bit brainless that I could fall asleep to, so I turned on ‘New Year’s Eve’, which wasn’t half as vomituous as I had expected… although it was pretty vomituous! After having a nap, I watched The Inbetweeners movie, which was awesome. Disgusting, hilarious and somehow sweet at the same time; the perfect ending to that series.

I had an unusually pleasant experience with one of the customs officers in LA; he was really friendly and polite. Professional, firm and slightly intimidating, but polite, which is exactly what you want from a guy in his position. After many transits through LAX with hostile border control officers who treat you like shit, this was just totally refreshing. I’ve made a mental note to write to somebody and leave good feedback; maybe things are looking up with customer service there, and I’d like to encourage that!

Actually, in addition to Supernatural, I spent some of my time at LAX watching The Walking Dead. I had to stop halfway through an episode, though, because every time a kid walked behind me I had to slam the lid of my laptop shut; I didn’t want to cause any small children a bunch of zombie nightmares!

Flying into Las Vegas at night is always kind of magical. You fly over miles of utter blackness, and suddenly, like an oasis, a huge island of light interrupts the night. Near the centre of that island is a spot of even brighter light, commonly known as ‘The Strip’, which is the main tourist centre of Las Vegas. All the major hotels and casinos are located here; the suburbs spread outwards in all directions and then suddenly end in a series of regular lines, and the desert takes over. I managed to get a window seat in the plane, so our descent gave me a brilliant view of all the casinos lit up in all their excessive glory. My cousin Karl and his wife Bethany came to get me from the airport, and we made a beeline for the Steak Out, a bar and grill not far from the airport. Summer, my cousin Kurt’s wife, works there, so it was the perfect place to stop and eat. I was tired from my journey and probably looked a fright, but I wasn’t really ready to go to bed yet if I wanted to adjust to Las Vegas time sooner rather than later.

Anyway, Kurt came to the restaurant and joined us too, and we had a pretty damn good feed. I had garlic mushrooms and deep-fried zucchini sticks, which were amazing. All of their starters are good, simple, deep-fried delights. It was great to catch up with my cousins again. The place was jumping; it turns out that I’m here for ‘March Madness’, which is some sort of college basketball season, and Nevada was playing a game that night. Unfortunately, Nevada lost, so the atmosphere calmed down pretty quickly! I was slightly shocked to find people smoking in the restaurant; they used to have the no-smoking rule here (just like they do in a lot of western countries these days), but apparently the bar/club/casino owners got together and voted to have it repealed, and they were successful – can you believe it? They said it was affecting their revenue. Wow. Well, I suppose it is Vegas, and without a little vice, what would it be?

After eating, Karl and Bethany dropped me off at my Aunty Corinne’s place; she and I stayed up a while longer, chatting and catching up, before I finally gave in to exhaustion and went to bed.

Not overly exciting, but fun nonetheless. I’ve had a few adventures in Vegas since arriving, but I’ll fill you in on those later… right now, it’s time to catch up on some Zzzzzzzs…. 🙂

Thanks for stopping by,

Tara.

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