steinbeck country

this weekend i got to spend saturday and sunday in monterey with two of my favorite people, one of whom was house-sitting and provided us a great (free!) place to stay.

chris flew in saturday morning for a visit, and we drove down to monterey just in time to met sarah-mae for lunch. after some delicious pizza, we decided to drive down the coast for a while, along the famed 17-mile drive. although it was a bit windy, it was a gorgeous day to explore some of the beautiful california coastline. a lot of the monterey, pacific grove, and pebble beach coastline is rocky, and on our drive we stopped occasionally to explore for ourselves.

naturally, chris found a dead bird and poked it with a stick. he claimed that he was moving it so that children wouldn't be able to see it as they were exploring the rocks, but i think that was just his cover story.

then he found a ridiculously huge piece of kelp and whipped it around like he was indiana jones.

at one of the lookout points there was an island covered with sea lions a few hundred yards off the shore. there were 25c telescopes you could use to get a better look at the sunbathing lions, and i convinced sarah-mae to climb on the top step and use the telescope like a small child. i'm still not entirely sure how she got back down.

chris's favorite stop along the drive was "ghost tree" - a bleached cypress with a "menacing silhouette" - this is the tree, and chris doing an impression of the tree.

(sarah-mae is hiding in there. can you see her?)

there were a few signs along the way that i thought were funny - or at least odd enough that they deserved some closer attention. although it is definitely important to be aware of the possibility of a tsunami, i'm not sure why the man in the picture looks like a 1980's video game character. i'm also not sure i can run to higher ground fast enough to beat out a tidal wave.

i really don't know what "sensitive" land is, but just be sure not to hurt its feelings.

after our drive down the coast, we had to stop at the store to buy items for dinner. because i was looking for a specific brand of meat-free chicken patties (and because for some reason whole foods doesn't carry angel food cake), we ended up visiting four (yes, four) different grocery stores in the greater monterey area. i actually think that might be all of the grocery stores in the greater monterey area.

anyways, we eventually made it back to the house and despite chris's bad allergic reaction to the three cats (lucy, lydia, and thomas the infirm), we had a fun evening playing trivial pursuit for kids (yes, it's true) and watching death at a funeral. i also got my butt kicked at scrabble.

the next morning, after breakfast, a bit of football, and getting my butt kicked again at scrabble, we headed out to walk around cannery row and have lunch. the weather was a bit overcast, but not too cold, and we enjoyed buying overpriced candy ($13 for a bag of gummy worms?), browsing in odd antique shops, and laughing at novelty magnets. there used to be a converted warehouse with a carousel and arcade games right near the shops at cannery row; this is a place i can remember visiting during some of my earliest trips to monterey. i knew that the carousel was no longer running, but i remembered that the games were still up and running a few years back. we walked past the building, but everything was gone now, replaced by an imax theater. so much for nostalgia.




we had lunch at a great mexican place downtown, and said our goodbyes to sarah-mae. on the drive back to san jose, chris entertained me with cat-themed versions of his favorite songs (in honor of the cats that caused his allergic reaction, especially poor thomas, who had a football-sized tumor near his stomach and fell when he tried to jump up on a chair). chris's kareoke playlist included, pussycat face (like poker face), a meowed version of the theme from top gun (no, not danger zone, the actual theme music that is instrumental), and, my personal favorite, bohemian catsody.