California Adventure

The open road calls...and I listen!

Being the adventurous sort, I decided that when I arrived in Vegas, I would immediately hop in my rented Dodge Caliber and head south and west to California's West Coast. After a few hours of shut eye, I continued my trek. It was a fun, yet brief trip. An even briefer summary starts below...

7:30am - Laguna Beach

After a few hours of shut eye overnight, I drove from Vegas to LA. More specifically, I headed for Laguna Beach, somwhere south of Los Angeles. I was temped by signs for Disneyland--and I actually drove up to the main gate. But, it was early in the morning and the park didn't open for a few more hours. So, I resisted temptation and moved on. I spent some time on the beach and enjoying the downtown area during my stay in Laguna Beach. L.B. is a place I could totally move to, it has the small town charmed combined with fabulous beaches and friendly people. If only I was independently wealthy!

10:00 am - Heading North

Time to get going. After all, I was on a strick (hardly) schedule. I went through several great little beach communities while heading up Highway 1 - aka the Pacific Coast Highway.

12:00 pm - Hollywood

Highway 1 was nice, but the closer I got to Los Angeles, the thicker the traffic was. It didn't take long for me to find myself back on the freeway dealing with the never-ending rush hour traffic. Eventually, I got to "Hollywood."

3:00 pm - The Drive Back

All good things must come to an end. This was true of my whirlwind tour of the CA pacific coast as well. Around 3pm, I started my trip back through the mountains and Mohave desert towards Las Vegas.

7:00 pm - Welcome to Caesar's Palace

Upgraded to a sweet, just for being so charming and good looking. Nice!

Touchdown...

It's 9pm and I just touched down at McCarren International Airport in Las Vegas. Since the conference does not start until Sunday, my plan is to hop in the rental car and drive to California.

Out of the Box....Back in the Box

Have you ever seen those stickers the Red Cross gives you if you try to give blood but, for whatever reason, cant? Well, "I Tried."

When Jennie and I were at a conference in Detroit a couple of weeks ago, we fell in love with an HP laptop that was also a tablet PC. You could open it up as a standard laptop, or spin the screen around and write on the touchscreen. A million uses ran through our heads. We could use it for productions, writing directly on the screen and taking notes. In class, I could make notations and have them show up on the projector. Etc. Etc. Etc.

But...it's 12.1" screen made it WAY too small. I think what really turned me off, though, was speed. If this had been a $700 laptop, the speed would have been okay. You get what you pay for. But for a, well, much more expensive laptop, it took forever to accomplish anything. And the pop-ups started almost immediately for me!

So, I'm staying true to my true desires. We're getting another MacBook Pro...sometime before our big trip.