Jolt Country

Day one of vacation down. Left home at 4am, drove 500-something miles west. Hit Carlsbad Caverns around 2pm. Walked down the steeped incline (decline, really) for over an hour. Back, knees and toes are killing me. Ate lunch at a place that served burgers and all you can eat Mexican food. We are all now taking turns in the bathroom. Had dinner at Subway to settle everyone's stomachs. Headed today to Roswell, Albuquerque, and then some town near the Grand Canyon to get ready for day three (train ride down in the canyon and a bunch of other things).

Here is the link to the blog post I made on Roswell a few years back:http://www.joltcountry.com/features/roswell.html

There wasn't enough time to go to there with Mel kidnapped me and took me to New Mexico in April (we only got as far as Taos) but I am heading back there first chance I get. I love the weather, the cheap prices on everything, the scenery and the land so much! Only place I'd really consider moving to at this point in life. Oh, and Hawaii. Either of those two.

Heh. Eheheh. Heh. Hehehe.

Awesome, will definitely read the post here in a few mins!

I have a lot more detail on my website, but we did Roswell, then the natural history museum with the START (history of personal computers, by Paul Allen) exhibit. Other than that, we mostly drove. Today is the Grand Canyon tour. After that, it's off to Vegas for a day.

As time permits, I'll be dumping pictures here:

http://robohara.com/photo/index.php?alb ... FWest_2011

Does anyone else see "robohara.com" and pronounce it "ROBO-HARA", as if it was a futuristic robot from space?

We are in the middle of nowhere, in some weird combination of desert and mountains. I was thinking about killing myself but we just saw an In-and-Out burger sign so not all hope is lost. GPS now says 90 miles to Vegas. Been washing down Advil with Mikes Hard Lemonade at every stop to take the edge off the kids fighting over who stinks worse. Where are the god damn Roswell aliens when you need one ...

Vegas??

PINBALL HALLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL OFFFFFFFF FAMEEEEEEE!!!!

I haven't been to the Pinball Hall of Fame in about five years so I definitely want to check it out tomorrow.

Picture dump has been updated. When I get back I need to post some more detailed blog entries and stories about some of our destinations.

Last night while driving to the hotel my wife was like "WOW LOOK A LIBERACE MUSEUM!" and we all laughed. Apparently the Pinball Hall of Fame is RIGHT ACROSS THE STREET FROM IT so if we hadn't been yukking it up right then we would have seen it. Ah well, we've got a day (pushing for two) here so I'm sure we'll hit it. I forgot it moved; I went to the old location, so I'm looking forward to seeing the new.

Funny thing about the Roswell trip. Almost shot for shot, even having never seen your post, I took the exact same pictures you did. I got the Arby's sign, the lamp shade, the metal aliens climbing up the wall ... got 'em all. Did you see the McDonald's? The front half is designed like a UFO (from the 60s) and if you go through the drive through, the entire back side is a giant (GIANT) space mural.

http://robohara.com/photo/index.php?alb ... GP4026.JPG

I kind of felt bad for the people of Roswell. You know they're like, "CAN I NOT JUST GET SOME KFC WITHOUT SEEING AN ALIEN? PLEASE?"

Re: pinball hall of fame

Well, if it's not too late (and they added the machine to the collection) please to be taking a picture of the scoring instructions for a Bally Bon Voyage machine. I asked Doctor Jonesy when he was there a couple three years ago but the table wasn't in residence. It could be because the machine hasn't (nor is it likely) been voted in yet.


Also!

Re: Computer museum
Please to be adding comments to the photos.(at your convenience, of course) I only recognize less than half of the subjects portrayed and would like to know more if I could.
It's the retro bug that bit me.



THE
DAMN YOU, EARL EVANS
AARDVARK

Checked the entire place; no Bon Voyage machine was in sight. Here's a list of their entire inventory:

http://www.pinballmuseum.org/games.php

We've had a blast in Vegas so far. We spent 10-15 minutes in the "Pawn Stars" pawn shop. That place is super small and half of the stuff they sell is Pawn Stars shirts, Pawn Stars stickers, Pawn Stars bobbleheads, and so on. Got a picture of the Galaga machine they have for sale ($1k) and Mason posed next to a picture of the cannon that shoots bowling balls. It's almost impossible to stand still in the place. The only person there we recognized was the big black bouncer dude.

The kids swam in the ghetto Fairfield Inn swimming pool and had a blast -- then, they were blown away by the pool here at the MGM. (Oh; we're staying at the MGM.) There are actually four or five pools here. The kids floated in the one with the waterfalls for a bit, then hopped into the lazy river and floated their way around. I sat in a lounge chair wearing a polo and reading on my iPad and looked conspicuously like a fat tourist who would do such a thing. I also wore sunglasses so occasionally I coulc check out all the boobs.

Also, picture dump has been updated with pix from the Pinball Hall of Fame and some other stuff. I also dumped my iPhone pictures in there too.

Captions coming when I get home, Vark.

Thanks for looking. Somehow I doubt my table will ever be in there but was worth a shot.

Went to the M&M store today. My kids could give a fuck all about anything else in Vegas. I don't even think they like M&M's all that much, but both of them are eating M&M's right now, wearing M&M shirts, and talking about the 3D M&M movie we watched. If M&M opened an M&M casino where kids could bet toys and slot machines spit out M&M's ... pure chocolate gold, I tell you.

We also went and saw the lions at the MGM. My kids had one question: "DO THEY EAT M&M'S?"

Walked down the strip a bit and saw all the people in costumes that you can have your picture with: Spider-man, Batman, Minnie Mouse, Transformers, Michael Jackson, SpongeBob, a giant cowboy on stilts, and homeless people with "FREE HUGS" signs.

http://robohara.com/photo/index.php?alb ... GP4428.JPG

Had lunch at Fatburger, dropped $20 in Gameworks, and dropped $100 in the casino so far. That about covers today, I think.

Oh, and Susan bought cheap (?) tickets to David Copperfield. Web reviews aren't terribly kind, but it's rated higher than Criss Angel's show. Show stars in 90 minutes.

Flack wrote:and dropped $100 in the casino so far.

Oh yeah? I'll give you $50 for that $100.

Sooo ... David Copperfield has this deal where one random person who tweets him during his performance gets invited backstage after the show. Well, tonight it was us!!

Compared to the day before, yesterday was lame. The kids swam. I won $600 on slots and ended $500 up, so that was nice. Drove forever, stopped and saw Meteor Crater, drove some more, slept in albuquerque, swam, had lunch with retro gaming friends, drank boba tea, hit I40. 6 hours to go.

Flack wrote:Sooo ... David Copperfield has this deal where one random person who tweets him during his performance gets invited backstage after the show. Well, tonight it was us!!

Cool! Last time I saw the guy on TV was...more than 6 years ago, I think.

I saw him live in 1986 (I think) in seventh grade, so yeah, he's been around for a while. I would have to say Penn and Teller's show is better, but Copperfield is a legend and I'm glad we got to see him, too. My kids didn't pick up on his complete disinterest in being on stage.