Kaliforney – Noise Ave.

Left California!

So after a month of some boring and mostly depressing time, it happened Sunday night that things got to a point where I contemplated leaving at that very second. Well, I won’t go into details of what happened. Suffice it to say that I sort of wore out my welcome without wearing it out with the actual host. Weird situation to be in, really!

So decided to leave on Tuesday. This would give my uncle and aunt time to adjust to the thought of me leaving. But I didn’t tell them until Monday. In case, there wasn’t a hotel available or so.

I had two options, 1) Go to Vegas for 4 nights and leave Sat. morning for Dallas, or 2) Take two days off and just drive straight to Dallas.

Option 1 would have given the oppurtunity to work from the Hotel and save days. But would have cost money. Option 2 would use two vacation days and wouldn’t involve Vegas. In the end, I decided to just drive home. I’d be miserable in Vegas. I wouldn’t go out, or watch any shows, or gamble, etc. I wouldn’t wanna do any of those by myself. Yeah yeah, one is such a lonely number and all that blah blah blah.

So left Tuesday morning for Albuquerque, NM. 10 hours and 48 minutse of drive. Took 12 hours including all stops and such. Left at 6:30am and arrived about 6:30pm. used free points to stay at the Marriott, and left in the morning at 7am. Got to Dallas at 6:30pm. Drove a little faster this time. This leg was supposed to be 10 hours and 40 minutes…. Left Tuesday 23rd, Sep. and arrived on 24th, Sep. by God’s grace.

Last few weeks have been some of the weirdest times. It was really depressing. However, as soon as I entered Texas, I started feeling better. Even tho, it was in Amarillo that I made my first stop in Texas, and it’s about 5 hours away from Dallas, it felt almost like home. The Texas highway design and the warm sun and welcoming people just all felt so much like home.

It’s great to be back here. Thank God.

I Really Really Don’t Like Mooching

I really don’t like mooching at all. It’s such a different existence. You don’t have a say in anything. Living with relatives is absolutely a difficult task. It’s a project. You must learn to ignore all the oddities that drive you insane. You must ignore things you would not put up with for a second. Most of all you are in a different home, and living with their rules. You don’t have a personal restreat. When the day has you down, you can’t do anything.

Well, you could always take to the streets. Just drive around. Just part in random parking lots and kill stime. And that is just what I did today. I was having a down day. After one too many unmet expectations from family, I needed time and space to sort things out. To let the feeling air out. To let the emotions breathe a little and to just let off some steam doing anything that would help. At home, this means close the door and play guitar, listen to some bands, watch some show, watch some movie, sutf the web, sleep or anything else…. But here, there’s not such freedom.

So I just drove around for a while. Then went to Jack in the Box. Then went to Barnes and Noble. Browsed thru books. Then thru the Music section. Then thru DVDs. Saw the boxsets of all the “I Love Lucy” seasons. Then went to the financial section. Found an investing book. Sat down and read the book. Kept the phone on silent. Expected more calls from some, but didn’t get those. It’s definitely a good feeling to not have anyone want to look for you when you go AWOL. Oh, well, we don’t all need support.

Looking at the last few posts, and judging by my own feeling the last few days, it’s just been a long rant. That’s to say, I gotta jet. Leave this place. It’s not the cool fun, I had expected it to be. Santa Monica has apartments for $1400 for studios and higher. Most studios are starting at $2000 and go to $5000 or higher. I don’t make that much per month! The $1400 sounded reasonable for one month, but they don’t do less than a 12 month lease. And they don’t have any vacancies. Los Angeles, is also it’s little world. I don’t know what to do. Maybe need to look for families renting rooms….

Most probably will bail on this entire area. Probably even Cali. The time… she will tell

Santa Monica

The Trip to Santa Monica was pretty fun. It was a little different than anticipated. Because we didn’t prepare to go on the beach. Well, I did! But others in the party weren’t ready to go into the sand. So we stayed on the paved area.

The area was really beautiful. The place looked really expensive. In a rush now. Will post further.

So What is The Verdict on California

Well, what is the final verdict? Was is all worth it? Was is Is it still fun? What is the city of Redlands like? How does it compare to a place like Dallas? Dallas, TX is where I started. Well Dallas is the offical address but it’s really Addison. But in broader terms Dallas, to the natives, includes Dallas, Addison, Richardson, Carrollton, Plano, Garland, Frisco, Lewisville, etc…. Especially when out of town. Or when referring to the general location. So how does this place compare? It’s only fair to compare with a known alternative to have a relative judgement so one can understand the unknown in terms of the known. Ok, enough big words.

Dallas, is a so much an unfair comparison. Dallas is a big place. A very big place. Redlands, is a small town. It’s a small enough town to where 5 minutes in one direction will take you to Loma Linda, and 10 in the other to Yucaipa. Then 5 minutes past Loma Linda you see San Bernardino. Saint indeed. It’s the biggest of towns. When lost, one is instructed to look for signs pointing to I-215 towards San Bernardino. Then further out you see Ontario. Going east from Redlands then you have Loma Linda, San Bernardino, Rialto, Ontario. These plus other small towns are all together the Inland Empire.

So the comparison is better between Dallas and Inland Empire.

Again, Dallas is a such a big place. Such a melting pot of people and lifestyles. I didn’t appreciate it enough. Inland Empire pales. It’s sort of a town split along further mini-town lines each with their own rules. Very old. Not polished. Sure it has it’s Smiley Heights area which has the million dollar homes. But that area is one main street and some culdesacs hanging off of it.

In terms of Walmart, there’s only one seen around. There’s a Von’s. There’s a Stater Bro’s everywhere. It’s a little annoying. No decent hair stylists. Meaning known stylists. And such other things.

In so many ways there’s no comparison. It would be comparing apples to oranges. So with appreciating Dallas, we leave this topic for a later post.

Final Set of Pictures From Road Trip

The last leg of the journey on the road trip was on Aug 11th, 2008.

This is the final set of pictures from the Phoenix to Redlands trip. First the pictures are posted in a table and then the comments at the bottom.

1 - Cali	2 - State Prison
3 - Tank	4 - General Patton Museum
5 - Redlands, finally!	6 - Redlands University

1 – That’s just first time there was something green in California. Until that point it was all desert and lifeless palm trees.

2 – Don’t pick up hitchhikers. Well, duh! State Prison is a little far out in the desert. Wonder how long it takes to get people there.

3 – Is that General Patton’s tank? Or does it belong to somebody from the same era. Didn’t get the opportunity to read the signs. The temperature was over 100 degrees.

4 – General Patton Museum. Just so hot that Museum on one end of the rest stop and the food on the other left no doubt as to which side had water and which side would be the saner choice. So long General Patton. Thanks for what you did. Mostly, thanks for the random quotes you enrich people’s email signatures with throughout corporate America.

5 – Redlands. Well the destination seemed old and unpolished all of a sudden. Having been here on vacay before the memory made it much more polished and in general a place in California!!!!!. Now it just seemed like any other small town. Maybe a little older and less modernized. A feeling that would be re-inforced throughout the next few weeks.

6 – The University. The town is big enough to have a University. So lay off, Bobby! Quit saying it’s a small place….

Leaving Phoenix Towards Redlands

The last leg of the Trip was on Aug. 11th. It was also the one with least amount of hassle. I guess it was because a conclusion was in sight. However, by the end of the day there was a big headache…. All that driving and sunlight. Plus on that day I was wearing contacts thinking that wearing glasses on the previous two trips possibly contributed to the headache on the previous day. That was an incorrect assumption.

Oh well, from Phoenix to the California border there were few pictures worth posting.

The pictures are in the grid, then notes at the bottom.

1 - Goodyear? Tires?	2 - To Yuma
3 - Nuciler Power!	4 - Little Fun
5 - Open Road	6 - US Inspection Station
7 - Inspection Station

1 – Do they make the tires in this place or they’re just using the name?

2 – Only importance was the movie 3:10 to Yuma.

3 – They misspelled Nuciler. Where’s Homer!

4 – Little fun on the way. Couldn’t max it out ‘coz the road had a bend and the I-10W was just too bumpy to try to go faster.

5 – The open road.

6 – Inspection Station.

7 – So the inspection station is actually the California border. California welcomes you believing you’re a criminal. Arizona welcomes people on a highway, open road, come one come all, but California thinks people should be first inspected.

5 Things about California – First Impressions

So some of the things noticed in Kaliforney so far are worth mentioning. This includes things that are different from Dallas, TX or things that are just plain weird.

Redlands, Ontario and neighboring towns have been referred to as Inland Empire.

1 – Culture – The small town culture is just different. It’s quite bland. There’s nothing to do in these small towns. So you’re supposed to go to LA to have fun. Or to Santa Monica. Or to Riverside. To some other place.

The only people walking around are old people, or really young kids. Not a lot of fun in downtown Redlands. It’s still a beautiful place but less fun unless you already know people and have a big group to hang out with.

In terms of people, most people seem rude and abnoxious. Tailgating seems to be the normal way of driving in Kaliforney.

It seems nice and not nice at the same time. That might be true of any place, I suppose. Just that one doesn’t notice that about their own hometown – Go Addison!

2 – Roads and Highways – Road quality is absolutely abysmal. Driving on most roads is just torture sometimes. Driving a manual car on smaller roads is tough. First gear, second gear, stop sign. First gear, second gear, red light.

Highways seem to be designed so as to rattle cars and shake different parts loose.

3 – Greenery – More green. The roads and mountains are all full of trees and other shrubbery. The palm trees are definitely a nice mood setter. Driving on a road with nice tall trees on either side is very enjoyable.

4 – The Laid Back Feel – Kaliforney definitely has a more laid back feel. Which is nice and better for relaxing. The mountains, hills and winding roads are all very refreshing.

5 – Social Culture – The social culture is not too different from other places. But walking around one gets the feel that the social culture here seem to be about overexploited preteen corporate victims kids wearing their pants around their knees walking around with the same fashion zombie mindset in their $50 haircuts. Sure the parents are the same but there is just so much youth walking around seemingly aimlessly that it’s just kind of sad.

These are just the first impresssions after moving to California. Having been to California before, I know it’s a really nice place and there’s no shortage of nice and responsible people in Cali. It’s not a bad place at all. The above impressions are possibly more exaggerated considering it might have a hint of buyer’s remorse, especially moving to a small town from a much bigger town. This is just an opinion and will most probably change over time.

Updates

So no updates for a while.

Well it’s been a busy few days. Started from Phoenix, AZ on Sunday around 10:30 or so. Reached Redlands, CA about 4:00p PST. So been tired and busy since. Will update more and post pictures.

Idea!

In May of 2008, I had this crazy idea. To ask the boss to let me work remote, and travel around and have fun. To have a different schedule than the regular work – home – work – home humdrum.

Then I let this idea simmer for a while. Then I let it go. Then I remembered it again in June. Then I forgot it again. The pattern continued till Mid July. Until someone finally convinced me to take the fantasy and turn it into reality.

08/05/2008 – Asked the boss for permission to work remotely. He agreed immediately. This is the kind of thing that makes you sit back and appreciate a good boss.

08/06/2008 – Started looking at Google Map to chart a route. No Route 66. Need to get there somewhat fast. Also reliably.

08/08/2008 – Made the hotel reservations for the layovers.

On Saturday the drive will begin.