Kill Yourself

Hanna and I went to New York because we found cheap flights. We need very little incentive to do almost anything. I think the fact that our trip had so many issues and I still had the loveliest time speaks volumes to the quality of company I keep. But honestly, sometimes I have to question which way my karmic scale is tipping.

I recently realized that I've traveled to amazing places but that I haven't done enough exploring of my own city and even less of any other state. Short of Vegas and a trip to Disney World, I know nothing of this country and I wouldn't really consider either of those places to be accurate representations of their states. So last year I decided to go to Seattle and froze my ass off. This year I went to New York and got my ass mauled off.

We arrived on Saturday afternoon in time to eat, get a tour of Audrey's adorable neighborhood, and wander over to a beer garden. The next morning we explored a food market in DUMBO where I got a chocolate covered banana, a mango lemonade, and rode the carousel in front of the Brooklyn Bridge on the warmest day. Perfection, much? We talked a lot about how when you go to a new city you can't help but compare it to other places you've been. To me, Brooklyn felt a lot like London but with really great food. I think it's something about a comfort level more than any physical similarity, though I saw those as well. Manhattan felt like every place in existence on crack and I mean that in the best and worst ways possible. I'm super jealous of all of the impossibly large parks but could probably go my entire life without being surrounded by that many people ever again.

A couple weeks ago, it occurred to me that being in New York meant that I'd be on the same side of the country as Sarah so I shot her a message and within an hour she had booked a train ticket to meet me. I haven't seen her since her wedding and I missed her dearly so I was crazy excited. Unfortunately, Murphy's law decided that it would keep us apart a little longer and broke the train that she was on. It took her four hours longer than it was supposed to. Longer to get from Rhode Island to New York than it took us to get there from California. By the time she finally arrived, she only had two hours to spend before she had to get back on a train. All we had a chance to do was walk the High Line and chat about the bun in her oven. They already told her that she will receive a full refund so we are just gonna look on the bright side and call it a free trip to see Cindy.

After leaving Sarah back at the station, we began the third leg of our tour which consisted mostly of standard tourist stuff. I also had to drag Hanna to the Plaza solely because, as someone who has read over a dozen volumes of the Princess Diaries, I couldn't be in New York without seeing where Grandmère held Princess lessons. When we got back to Audrey's, I was mauled by her cat. It was traumatic for everyone involved. We decided that some day we would laugh about it.

The next day we laughed about it. It was hard not to be ridiculously cheerful while each of us was wearing a beautiful dress under the sweetest umbrellas in warm rain. We were practically skipping from joy when we stumbled upon Provini. Holy shit, best dinning experience of my life. Everything about it was DIVINE. The restaurant was beautiful and played a constant stream of music after my own heart while we ate the most delicious pasta I've ever had. We kept laughing at the sublime looks on all of our faces because there were just no words. On the flight home I had a Jack and Coke and rekindled my love affair with professional wrestling.

It's all fodder for the tell-all.

Hanna and her sixth grade portrait on my desktop.

America.

The damage.

The culprit.

BEST. MEAL. EVER.

Jesus! I'm a sinner.

For this entry, I had prepared a list of superlatives but I was worried that "awesomest, jesusiest, fishiest, bananaest, and alienest" wouldn't be the most effective form of communication so I suppose I'll just have to explain. What made this weekend so insaniest was the number of times that I found myself thinking "where AM I right now?"

My ride or die chicks and I ventured off to Salvation Mountain on Saturday. On the way there we listened to what felt like the soundtrack to my entire middle school existence and a whole lot of reggaeton. I've decided that somewhere in Puerto Rico there must be a reggeaton graveyard where Daddy Yankee now works as a groundskeeper.

Salvation Mountain. You've probably all heard of it since it's apparently the cool thing to do these days. It's the most unique adulation of Jesus love that I've ever encountered. As someone who was almost denied admission to the Vatican, this is clearly NOT the reason that I made the journey, but JESUS was it great. Even though I don't quite share the sentiments, I love that one person can be SO passionate that they achieve something extraordinary. The entire thing was built by Leonard Knight out of adobe, straw, and paint that people donate. It's like all you need is a mission and little elbow grease to make magic. If Gaudí hadn't been financially backed by all of Barcelona, he would have probably made something similar to this. It's bright and whimsical and just a little busted. Exactly how I like things.

Salvation Mountain was just a ways from the Salton Sea which we stopped by in search of shelter from the 100° weather. Lily and Hanna were sadly born with the curse of the white man and could barely take the heat but I thought it was perfection. Unfortunately, the Salton Sea is not really the most refreshing of seas. Its shore is made up ENTIRELY of fish bones because the rising salinity makes it impossible for most fish to live there. You can't see the floor through the carcasses and bare feet don't do so well on it but none of that kept us from testing the waters a bit. It was kind of a mind fuck to think how many fish the shore must be made up of considering that it's the largest lake in California. Despite its grimy nature, we couldn't resist adding some shutterbugs to the hoards of insects. I'm really loving all of the photos I've been taking lately.

And because weird begets weird, down the road from the Salton Sea lies the International Banana Museum. I got a banana nut milkshake and sat on a monkey shaped stool while indulging in the sheer ridiculousness of the day thus far. But I was naturally not satisfied so we got back to L.A. in time to celebrate World Whisky Day at the Venice Whaler, get kicked off the pier, and eat terrible food at Norm's.

Sunday I went to a screening of the X-files. Am I the only one that thinks it's the greatest thing in the world that I can say that? Hey Cindy, what'd you do today? Oh you know, just saw a screening of two episodes of a TV show that ended over ten years ago in a theater full of fanatics and the creators of the show. I've only actually gotten through about two and a half seasons of the show but I'm already rather invested. Plus, I knew I was among my people when the mention of Joss Whedon sparked gasps and they showed clips of the original The Haunting as influences. It's like on Gilmore Girls when Kirk gets a cat and Rory says that he always was a cat person, he just never had a cat. I always was an X-files person, I just hadn't watched it much.

My life is the most magnificent madness.

Oh yeah, and I also went to Disneyland in my best Roxanne outfit. Perfect weekend.