Farewell 2024

Welcome to (in all likelihood) the final post of the year!!! I had a few others in me, but they're not ready for prime time as of yet. So, what do I now have in common with my cat???

In 2024 we both have broken a bone related to walking!!!

On Saturday, 4 days ago, I was coming down some stairs, and on the last one I rolled my foot to the inside, and I swore I heard a pop (and, yes, I swore). It was painful, and I was limping around afterwards, but the pain wasn't in my ankle as I would have expected. I went to a local urgent care (which I'd been to once this month already, I had a cough that wasn't going away, and it turned out I had a bacterial infection. The stuff they prescribed did a fine job clearing it up!!!) and was told there was around a 3 hour wait. I expected as much, being a weekend, it wasn't anywhere near that long when I went on a Tuesday. Of course, I work in the evenings on Saturdays, and it was going to be close at best.

After a wait commensurate with the time estimated, they took me in and took my vitals and my story. After a quick visual inspection they took X-rays, and a bit later the doctor comes back and tells me I broke it. Displaced 5th metatarsal fracture, to be exact. They put on a splint (which feels loose to me) and gave me a pair of crutches and referred me to an orthopedic surgeon for further evaluation. Oh yeah, they told me before they put the splint on that I may have to cut off my pants when I got home. No thanks, I'll just take those off now!!! My surrogate son had been driving us around, and I know he had his windbreaker, and I figured I'd fashion it into a kilt. I never did, but that's what I was thinking of doing.

Ended up 45 minutes late to starting work that day. I tried to contact the orthopedic surgeon they had referred me to on Monday, and it put me on hold forever, then put me through to a message machine, which told me it was completely full after it beeped. At any rate, I had been looking them up the day before on the map, and they aren't very highly rated. My wife happens to know a place that does some orthopedic surgery, so I contacted them. The soonest they could get me in is this coming Friday.

I never saw the X-rays, so I don't know exactly the location or extent of the fracture. Most of the information I found was it'll be 6 to 8 weeks if no surgery is required. It honestly doesn't feel that bad, unless I try and walk on it or put pressure on it. There are a few types of fractures it could be, avulsion, Jones, or dancer's. I found a couple of images of them, and one of them was actually from another guy on Blogger, and it sounds like his injury came about similarly to mine, but it looks like his was worse, with some swelling.

This is now my second broken bone, the first one I referred to when it had happened, back in 2005 around when I'd started blogging. I have a couple of mentions and links to the picture, but they were hosted on Geocities (now defunct, if you didn't know), and if I'd posted about it, it was probably on MySpace. You remember MySpace, don't you??? Maybe I'll post about it at some point, I tell people it's where my newest tattoo came from (they injected numbing agents in my knuckles through my greasy dirty hand, and the mark remains) and it's one of my many tales that my younger likes me to share with his friends.

I was thinking of making this into a random post with several bits of the aforementioned possible future posts, but not tonight. One of the things I would have had that carries over is my wife had broken some of her back rods again, and had surgery at the beginning of November to repair and reinforce things. She got out the day before Thanksgiving, and thankfully she's got a good amount of her mobility back, which works out since I now can't drive. It was on my right hand foot.

Still holding the title of Titanium Queen!!!

Zonker's Voice Changes

Since I've been having to go into the branch for work, I've been putting more miles on the Sky. It's not always great for dropping the top, especially since the time change, but it's always a fun car to drive!!!

Of course, it's always had it's scrapes on the underside, usually going over a very uneven patch of road, or through dips and driveways. A few weeks ago, I was driving in, and it was scraping even when I'd be driving on flat stretches of road. I took a peek underneath, and it looked like the exhaust was hanging a bit lower than usual. I drove it home that evening, and left it parked until the next weekend, when I took it to my new muffler shop.

I've been wanting to take it over there, anyway, as the guys there always recognized me as the guy with the Saturn, and I wanted to show them the latest. Also, since I bought it I've been wanting to quiet the exhaust down a bit. It sounded good, but it's noisy, and I go in pretty early. He got it up on the lift, and it's a good thing I got it in when I did!!! At the Y pipe just after the driveshaft tunnel, it was cracked almost all the way around!!!

He also noticed that one of the tips had melted the rear surround some on the top edge.

He says he's going to fabricate a new Y pipe. I discussed quieting it down, and he had a glasspack that looked like it would do the job nicely. I forget what the total was, but I think he charged $260 for everything. I like the way it came out, looks really clean!!! He also trimmed back the melted area.

It sounds a bit quieter, but still has a nice sound to it, and now it doesn't even scrape in some of the areas that it always would!!!

And the name, Zonker??? I don't really call her that, but she's yellow and a scream to drive!!! I'd referred to her as the screaming yellow Zonker a few times after I'd gotten her, it's as good a name as any!!!

The Getaway

We celebrated our anniversary by going on a little road trip just recently. My wife was saying we should find a place not too far from home that's on the beach.

She thought we should try and stay at the Hilton in Huntington Beach where we'd been a couple of times for the company Christmas party, and stayed one year when they had a decent price for rooms. Turns out that decent price is long gone!!!

I kept looking, and found a nice Best Western in Dana Point. It turned out that they are in the process of a bit of much needed renovation, but our room was truly outstanding!!!

I had spent a little more than some of the standard rooms to get one with an ocean view, and a balcony. Didn't really spend a whole lot of time on the balcony, but the view was great. It's on the far side of Coast Highway, and then it has the rail line before it's actually to the beach.

We arrived and got our stuff in, then headed down (it was on the next level down from us, you can see it from our balcony)to the hot tub to soak for a while. Of course, with the time change the sun was going down not long after we arrived, and it was setting as we soaked. The weather the whole time we were there was really nice!!!

Second shot is just after the sun had set, and the next one was after moonrise through the sheer curtains.

After we'd checked in, I asked the desk clerk if they had any restaurant recommendations. She said the place next door has good pizza. It's a pub with pizza, she said. If you'd like some good Mexican, though, there's a great place about 10 minutes south in San Clemente. Sounds good, so that's what we did!!! It was very good!!!

Our room featured an electric “fireplace”. Fired it up, it's OK but I'm not buying myself one just yet.

Being a Best Western Plus, they have a decent breakfast. One thing I generally don't care for about places with included breakfasts, they usually end before I'd like to get out of bed when I'm on vacation, but this one has breakfast available until 10!!! Nicely done!!! Also had check out at 11 instead of 10 that seems to be the standard at most places. I complimented them on both these while I was checking in!!!

I'd been thinking we could re do the whale watching excursion we'd tried a couple years ago (you know, where we didn't see whale one, in hopes of actually seeing whales this time) when we were staying close to the general area, but when I checked the night before, there were none out of Dana Point running the day we would have gone. Could drive up to Newport Beach or down towards San Diego and taken one from either of those, but San Diego is kinda far, and Newport Beach kind of sucks for driving to and parking, in my humble opinion. We had seen a thrift store in San Clemente when we were heading for dinner the day before, so we headed back and went there instead. Turned out there were two right near each other. My wife found several things (including a new large black leather purse) and I got a couple T-shirts, a 16- or 32-bit look Rick and Morty, and a Lynyrd Skynyrd shirt (not because I'm a big Skynyrd fan, but because I'm a bit lacking in brown shirts!!!).

Another shirt post could be coming, I did get a cool shirt while we were in Catalina (surrogate son also got one of the funny Stinky's Fish Tacos shirt there) and I found a pretty funny Michigan shirt at a local thrift shop.

My wife remembered our last anniversary finding Monster Shakes and wanted to get ice cream somewhere. I looked it up on the map, and on the same street as the Mexican place was, there was a place that was touted as the best in Orange County. Close enough, and highly touted, so that's where we went. It was tiny, with just a little table outside. We both got shakes (up to your choice of 3 flavors) and sat out at the table with a nice older couple and enjoyed visiting and our treats.

Since we were in San Clemete again, I thought we ought to get a little beach time in. We drove down to the shore and walked out the pier. The first shot of the wave, I like the quality of the light shining through the water, giving it that green hue.

There were fishermen on the pier (really not a lot else, other than a lifeguard station and a bar and restaurant at the beginning of the pier) and one of them brought up a little fish, but tall through the middle, and tossed it on the pier by a seagull who was perched on the railing. My wife shot a lengthy video of the gull eyeing it for a long time before flying down and grabbing it. I didn't think it would make it past his beak, but he got it down!!!

By now the sun was heading down again, and we got some good shots from the pier, and an awesome one from the parking lot!!!

Tried to do a raid in Pokemon GO at the start of the pier, but there were constant reception issues and we gave up on that.

Headed back to our room for a bit, and then we looked for a place to eat that evening. My wife was up for pizza, and checking the map found a Chicago Pizza place!!! Turns out it's something of a chain with 3 locations in South Orange County, Selma's Chicago Pizzeria and Tap Room. Not sure how they did it, but our pizza came out in what seemed like a fairly short time, and was excellent!!! I'm making myself hungry thinking about it!!!

Before we left on the final day, I hoofed down to the bridge that crosses the tracks to check out the beach we'd done nothing but seen. It was rocky. It's south of Doheny Beach that I've been to before and may still be considered part of it, and I remember it being rocky. Took pictures of the waves with the wind whipping the spray back out to the ocean, and pictures from the bridge both ways down and up the tracks. Side note on the train, I knew the Amtrak Surfliner would be going up and down those tracks, but our first night a freight came through in the middle of the night, blowing his horn three times and shaking the place.

Speaking of Pokemon GO, there were no stops or gyms reachable from our room. There was a gym you could reach from the south end of the hotel, and you could see a couple of gyms at a park south of there and up on the bluff. On our way back from the Mexican restaurant I went by there to put some 'Mon in because they had been yellow and that way for a few days, but when we arrived they had been turned blue, the team my wife is on, so she got to put hers in instead. When we left, they were back to yellow, and we went by and I did my put ins and took the final picture.

The Pet Cemetery

While we were vacationing in Avalon, on the hike up to Mount Ada, this was on the walk up, The Catalina Pet Cemetery.

We had to stop in and take a look around. There was quite a variety, from the basic and humble memorial to the grand gesture.

One dog had a full on statue, and a marble plaque.

There were a couple of logs with seats cut into them.

A large monolith of driftwood.

A duck (or maybe a turkey? Looks more duck, but with the tail of a turkey to me) statue.

And a tiny replica of the Casino.

The Latest in Fashion

Not sure, I think I've made mention, but I managed to pack on a few pounds during the stupid times. I've bought several new pairs of pants and shorts to accommodate myself, and recently I've been on a T-shirt buying spree!!!

First up is a nice Counting Crows shirt I found. I've been a longtime fan, and probably would have gotten a shirt already, but I really haven't cared much for most of their designs!!! The Love Trap one is actually the one I liked best of their official merchandise, but I wasn't prepared to pay that much for such a simple design. This one I found from a 3rd party, and I like it!!! The colors and font work good together. It has 3 east coast locations and dates, must have been a thing.

Next up is one of the two Sky shirts I picked up shortly after the Sky itself. I like the simplicity and style, and I'm lacking in yellow shirts, so, cool!!! Photos added the (rather appropriate) Sci-Fi warp speed effect, so naturally that's the picture I used!!!

The next one is another music group related shirt, this time it's The Gaslight Anthem!!! I like the design, it's for American Slang, and down in the lower black portion it has the track listing. Unfortunately, while it was readable on the 'web image, on the actual shirt it's not at all legible. Oh well, still a cool design. Other downside, the transfer is one of those where it doesn't really breathe, so it's not great in warmer weather. It actually arrived the day before we went to the show, but I didn't wear it.

Next up, speaking of having an under representation of a particular color, I did a search for purple just because I don't have any that fit very well, and found this one!!! If you didn't know, it's Hitchhikers' Guide to the Galaxy related. Don't know if I ever even mentioned, much less posted, but years ago I got another HG2G shirt, even more subtle. It pictured the bowl of petunias and sperm whale, and had in Dr. Seuss style font, “Oh no, not again!!! By Dr. Adams” I'd have to explain to the uninitiated that the quote/title was from the bowl of petunias!!! (Also, that was another of my few yellow shirts)

This shirt was featured in my most recent birthday post.

And here's another Sky shirt!!! I'm pretty sure it was advertised as a Sky Redline shirt. This one went into hiding for the longest time!!! (I've really got to clean out my closet!!!)

Next is An Appeal to Heaven flag shirt. For a while I had a Gadsden flag sticker on the back window of Scruffy, and it got sun baked and worn, so I replaced it with An Appeal to Heaven flag sticker, and at the same time I picked up this shirt. I love the message, but I'd actually never heard of it until Samuel Alito had a made up “controversy” involving it, and a bunch of the usual yellow journalists made it a thing!!!

Another thing I don't know if I ever mentioned, but trees have been falling over in the canyon across from our house for years. Last year the one at the edge of the basketball court fell and took out a good portion of the fence around it. Just a few weeks ago, a couple more fell, and it really opened up the view!!! I find the falling trees concerning, but the city and the parks department don't seem to share my concern. I took this picture with the fallen trees as the background.

This shirt was also featured in a previous post, in fact was the one I wore to The Gaslight Anthem concert, but the one picture I used, I was mostly getting the “Greek Theater” artwork, and the shirt graphic is cropped out.

And to round things out, another Counting Crows shirt, this time for Bobby and the Rat-Kings!!! One of my favorite songs by the Counting Crows!!!

The Same Late Season Vacation Where Everything Was Different

Here it is, the typical late season vacation to Catalina again, only different!!!

The first thing that changed, we took the younger's friend. He's a good guy, calls me his father figure, and I call him my surrogate son.

The next, and probably the most significant thing we changed, instead of getting a hotel room, we rented one of the many houses in Avalon!!! There's a lot of them available to rent, but a lot of them are a ways back from Crescent Street, along the front of Avalon.

This one was on the lower end of the price range (but still a little more than the hotel would have been... and without the room credit towards some of the local places, of course) and it was just a little ways from Crescent Street, right down the first street as you come into town.

Almost all the places over there are older construction, and skinny and close together. That was the case with this one. It has a good sized front living room, a skinny kitchen including stairs up to the upper loft room, then a decent sized master bedroom.

Dang, that glare off the bald dome!!!

It has air conditioning (actually several wall mount units and a couple of portable units) but the weather there was perfect, and we didn't need to use any of them.

Upstairs there's a couple of beds and a little bathroom with a shower that is encroached upon by the slant of the roof, a little sitting area, and a tiny but pretty cool little balcony.

Since there was a little kitchen, I brought some bagels and cream cheese so we could have some breakfast or snack chow without having to go out. When we got there and found there was a coffee maker and several filters, we headed over to the store and picked up coffee and creamer, and several other things.

It's a nice place, though far from perfect. 100% would stay there again!!!

There's a washer and dryer on the side of the house (bonus, there was detergent there already!!!), and a shed full of all kinds of beach toys and floats. We were in the ocean swimming 3 of the 4 days, but didn't ever use any of the stuff in the shed.

Here's another thing that was changed, they painted the 1953 Flxable Buses!!! I liked the old style, but this looks good, too, and matches the Catalina Island Company colors. I had wanted to take the Inland Tour again, but apparently they only run that tour when the cruise ships that port in Avalon tell them to or something. Not sure if that's only during the off season.

Here's another thing that was different, surrogate son made dinner one night!!! He's had some chef training, and it came out great!!! Of course, everything over there is more expensive on account of everything having to be shipped over (and there's only one full grocery store, which is the perennially more expensive Vons) but it still came out at a fraction of what we'd been spending most other nights!!!

We did a lot of playing games. For something else different on the games, my boy brought over his Binding of Isaac game, and we played it several times.

There were several games in the closet including Battleship and a weird Cityville version of Monopoly. Didn't get to Battleship, but broke out the Monopoly one night. The end game for this version is to have 4 properties with skyscrapers on them. You can add buildings without having the full set, but you can't complete a skyscraper without the full set, so there's your challenge. I got the equivalent of Boardwalk and Park Place, and was on my way to getting enough capital to build out one of my other properties. Got a couple of hits from the others landing on them (which is how I was able to complete another set of properties).

Didn't quite get the capital together, and ended up losing the game!!! Congratulations to son #3. I had fun, though. Don't 100% remember, but I think I may have not won a single game!!!

We hiked up the left side of Avalon this time instead of the right side, where the Catalina Chimes Tower is. It was a little early in the day (but not that early, I'm on vacation, dammit!!!) maybe around 1:00 PM or so, and it was still a little cloudy out.

As we ascended up the gradual rise, and easy hike, we got further into the clouds, and they were streaming through the gaps in the mountains!!! It was pretty cool!!!

Here's what my goal was for heading up this side this time, it's where Mount Ada is located. It was the home of William Wrigley Jr. and his wife Ada, and has since been converted into one of the most expensive hotels on Catalina. In the pictures I've seen it looks like a nice place, but not nice enough to justify the price, and being separated from most anything else you'd want to do on Catalina!!! A cursory search doesn't show it has an included golf cart or hotel shuttle, but for the price I would think it would.

The one thing I hadn't considered, for such a nice place it naturally is behind closed gates to keep the riff raff such as myself away!!! Nice looking gate...

A slightly related reason I'd wanted to hike up there, there's a couple of Pokemon Go gyms up there. When we vacationed there during the Stupid Times and they had expanded the distance to reach gyms, we put a couple 'Mon in one of gyms up there, and they stayed for weeks on end!!! The Pokemon in the gyms had been there a while, but when we got up there, we had no internet connection. (When we were back in downtown Avalon that afternoon, we still had no internet, it often seems very flaky over there).

Nice hike up there, though!!! We went a little further, and there was a similarly gated driveway. There was an overlook point that we explored a little with interesting semi constructed areas, and a nasty looking reservoir. On the way back, I got this shot of the place we stayed, Green Palace Junior, from the back!!! The master bedroom has nothing directly over it, but you can still hear when someone is moving around upstairs, and you can see how the little sitting room area upstairs is the only part that's square to the house.

The clouds had mostly cleared by the time we were heading down, giving a nice before and after of Avalon and the harbor.

The first night we were there, my wife was wanting Italian for dinner. The previous go-to would have been Antonio's on the waterfront, but the last time we had been there it looked like the menu had been gutted and the hours were shortened. It's since been changed to a place called Pier 24 and re opened, and it seems like the menu is back to being fairly robust (but not as much Italian-themed) and the hours restored. So there's another “new” place we went to. The sun had already set, so it was on the cool side outdoors, so we didn't get in on the outdoor seating ambiance.

We also hit some of our previous favorites, the classic Buffalo Nickel and Jack's Country Kitchen.

To round out the week, and for the final something different to round out this post, the last night we went to the Mexican place that's on the first part of the street we were staying on, Mi Casita (visible in the 2 pictures from the balcony shooting towards the beach). Good food, and it was much more enjoyable after the table of drunks left!!! They had a dessert menu, and my wife was wanting to get something from it, but it was close to closing and they only had flan left as an option, as they had shut down the ice cream machine. After we left, my son and I went to Von's for the final time and picked up a 4-pack of Reese's ice cream sandwiches, which were great, and fed all of us for less than a single dessert would have cost at Mi Casita!!!

And here's what I consider to be my prize winner photo from the trip!!!