Aging Disgracefully

On getting older and not being particularly happy about it. A pitiful attempt to pass on to the next generation pearls of wisdom on getting older, the humor of aging, fitness, recreation, friends, family and pets. How to survive changing technology, mental and phyiscal deterioration and hair loss.

Friday, June 19, 2009

California Dreamin' 2009


The Mrs. and I paid a visit to our son, (role model, Oscar Madison, alas mine as well.) in Los Angeles, CA for a week with several adventures and side trips planned. Prior to our trip, Sandy and I of course, planned meticulously for the trip from what we would be seeing and doing right down to the packing of clothing and articles for the trip. That means of course, that we spent most of the trip buying toiletries, clothing and sun screen, between those periods of time bickering over where to go, what to see, where to eat or whom to kill first. As you can tell we really know how to enjoy ourselves on vacation.

First full day, we arose at the butt crack of dawn, plotted the days' activities for roughly 7 hours, and finally decided in true LaForce fashion to go to the horse races at Hollywood Park. Nothing says vacation like spending your first day in town throwing money at various soon to be Elmer's Glue candidates. It would have been easier of course to just burn our money, or give it to congress. Same thing.
To illustrate the "I should have known better" factor, my son, calculated before the first race what horses to bet in the Trifecta. He did something called a "box bet plus 1" bet which let you pick 4 horses in order to win you had to get the first three finishers. To do this he invested $24 dollars. Much to our surprise three of his horses actually came in first, second and third. You would think that having picked the first three horses in a race, IN THE CORRECT ORDER, he stood to win a nice pot. But then you would be an idiot. His take for this wager came to $14.80 cents. Not as in "he won $14.80" but as in "he bet 24 dollars and his ticket paid out $14.80." That's right, he made a bet, picked the winners and wound up LOSING $9.20. Sandy of course, won twenty dollars picking a horse "because the name has a nice ring to it." We left the track shortly after that.

That night managed to secure tickets via Craigslist to a Dodger game. On the way over to the stadium through traffic that can only be described as, and I thought I would never say this, WORSE than being on the Dan Ryan Expressway in rush hour during construction lane closures, in a blizzard we decided to drive around Hollywood and the Chinatown area. We hadn't eaten dinner so we decided to try authentic chinese food in Chinatown. We found a good restaurant by asking a local shopkeeper who told us something that we have understood as "go down this street and Sum Woo's is on the left side, two doors past the shop with the dead and gutted chickens hanging in the window looking as appetizing as deep fried rat poop, and don't forget to try the creme brulee." Just kidding about the brulee of course, and Sum Woo's turned out despite its humble ambiance, to have great and inexpensive food. By inexpensive I mean that when I ordered a "side" of fried rice they brought it to the table in a wheelbarrow.

After stuffing ourselves senseless we left for the game and arrived at Dodger Stadium (motto: "Don't forget your sherpa") about an hour early. This was a good thing as this stadium is not on a mound, or a hill or even a steep incline. It's in the friggin' Himalayas. So you can imagine the revelry and good times we had climbing and descending various mountain passes fried rice and roast pork and dumplings sloshing around our guts, JUST TO FIND THE DAMN WILL CALL WINDOW! Not that I'm bitter.

On the positive side, our seats turned out to be pretty good, next to the left field foul pole in the second row, it was a good close game, and the bleacher fans turned out to be very entertaining. The Dodger bleacher bums make the Dawg Pound look like the Order of the Silent Monks. Loud, belligerent and armed to the teeth, you took your life in your hands wearing the opposing team's colors in the same area code. At one point I saw some burly guy in a black hooded mask, next to a tree stump, sharpening a huge axe over by the hot dog stand. I think it was Dick Cheney at his retirement job.

After the game, and despite our admonitions to "remember what section we parked in" we wandered aimlessly up and down the mountain passes they call "parking lots" vainly trying to remember landmarks indicating where we had come in and the conversation going something like this:

Dustin: "I think we parked by those dumpsters."

Me: "No, I'm sure it was the bigger dumpsters down by Gate 8."

Dustin: "Pops you're an idiot. I'm telling you we parked right by those dumpsters and the oxygen station."

Sandy: "Anyone seen my hat?"

We found the car around dawn and exhausted, retired to Dustin's penthouse bachelor pad and died.

The rest of the trip consisted of a couple of glorious days in Sequoia National Park along with a visit with Sandy's uh, let's say, "eccentric" cousin Bette Lou and a stroll on Venice Beach, which is the beach where all the druggies, hippies and congressman hang out. I'll tell you about it in my next post. If I feel like it.

For now, I've got some serious left over fried rice to take care of.

Love

Dad

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