What a Trip part #1

It was supposed to have been a fun, short, overnight trip for our 1 year anniversary. And boy, did it turn out interesting. The plan was to drive down to Salem, eat at In-N-Out burger in Keizer (Patrick is a Cali boy), do a wine tasting at one of my favorite Wineries, Honeywood (they make a lot of wine from other fruits. Very sweet stuff), and possibly ride a steamboat on the river. We were going to have dinner at The Cheesecake Factory, then spend the night near Portland, and grab some alcoholic ice cream (Spirited Ice Cream) and donuts from Voodoo on the drive home.

Instead, my car started to jerk and stutter and felt like it was not shifting properly. We were currently in Chehalis, about 60 miles south of Tacoma on our way down to Portland. Patrick was driving because I was using my bionicgym at the time, and I wasn't really feeling how the car was reacting. We ended up in a rural area off of I-5 because Patrick needed to make a deposit at a BECU branch or ATM, and the website pointed google maps to this back-asswards location that ended up being a house. And that's when my car really started acting up. Good timing, G. I had him pull over, and I opened the hood with the full intention of checking the transmission fluid level because of how the car was acting like it was shifting funny (like it was trying to shift and having a hard time doing it).

Turns out, after searching  for the dipstick for several minutes - the 2015 Chevy Sonic doesn't even have a transmission level dipstick. You can't even check the level unless you lift the car. Like, wat. So, that being the only thing I know, I was like well, let me try driving it, since I hadn't really felt what Patrick was dealing with (the bionicgym creates vibrations in my leg muscles so that's pretty much all I was feeling). We're driving back to the freeway, the car is really struggling, and I am freaking out because we're in hodunk nowheresville. I manage to make it within eyesight of the overpass back to I-5 when the check engine light finally comes on and I pull off to the side. I pull out my OBD-II reader, and it gives me a "cylinder 3 misfire" code. Was told it was dangerous to drive it in this condition and further driving could cause damage to the catalytic converter. So, I called a tow truck. Unfortunately, State Farm only covers me for 13 miles, so to tow it back to my Midas on 6th Ave in Tacoma would cost me another $160 bucks. Great.

The tow ride was certainly interesting. He came in a flatbead, and told us that there wasn't enough room for both of us in the cabin and that we could stay in the car on the drive up. We had to look it up, just to make sure it was legal. Legal yes - safe? - not 100%! But, what choice did we have? If it hadn't been raining it would have been more fun, but the windows were fogging up and we didn't really get a decent outside view. About 30 miles in I was feeling a tad carsick because I couldn't see outside. We made the best of it though by waving at all the Semis we drove past because we were at their eye level.

We knew that we could still salvage this trip. We got dropped off at my Midas at 12:30 and still had plenty of time to walk home and drive Patrick's car down to Oregon. We would just have to reschedule all the Saturday plans and do them on Sunday instead!

My First Parking Ticket

I had a busy and fun last couple of weekends!! I'll start off with Sunday, May 24th. I decided to destination trip (as opposed to road trip!) with my boyfriend David, down to Portland, Oregon. I wanted to stop at a place called The Grotto, and I'd also been craving some Voodoo Doughnuts. David wanted to visit Powell's Bookstore, which apparently was as large as an entire city block.
David is the kind of person you read about on the internet.

Not even gonna lie, this was written about him.

So we stopped there first and I tried not to look bored. Okay, I failed at that. I then tried to find a seat at the coffee shop and when I failed at that too, I came back and stared at a wall of books until David was done enough to be pulled away.

Now don't get me wrong; I love to read, but I'm a kindle-chick through and through. I don't browse random books at a bookstore. I have a specific set of books in mind and I will do my browsing on Amazon. I'm just too picky and lazy to gaze over lines and lines of book spines.

After we were done with that, we went to check out the McMenamins that took over the old Kennedy School. I'm not much into history but that place was pretty neat.

First we stopped off at the gift shop and I bought a shot glass and learned that the Detention Bar serves tasting of the brandys that are made locally so I made plans to do that after we ate. We had lunch at their restaurant, and the food was pretty good. After that, I spent fifteen dollars to try 3 brandys. Now had I known they were going to charge me so much I wouldn't have done it. The gift shop had told me it would only be a couple dollars. Fifteen is not a couple. It's not even a few. That's insane. I could have bought 2 whole drinks with the brandys in it - and it would have tasted better!

Anyway... after lunch we needed to burn off some calories so we went to check out The Grotto. I knew it was a Catholic shrine thing, but since I'm not religious I didn't go for that reason. I wanted to see the cool cave in the side of the cliff, and visit the gardens up top and see the view of Portland. What I didn't realize was how... Catholic the whole thing was. Expecting to find a shot glass in their gift shop is now laughable after walking in and seeing crosses and statues of Saints everywhere. I paid $5 pp to ride the elevator to see the gardens up top, and discovered that we could have gotten in for free because the ticket-taker was nowhere to be found -_- . The gardens were pretty, but every few feet there was a statue of Jesus being crucified so it kind of took away from the whole experience. We didn't spend too long up there before we decided to go.

Is there a word for "too Jesus-y"? Cuz that's how I'd describe this.

After the Grotto was when I guess I decided I was too good for the city of Portland. See, I'd parked there before, last time I'd gotten doughnuts at Voodoo Doughnuts (they have this amazing ability to make milk-flavored glaze, and with a cereal topping I just can't resist!) 

I'd parked across the street and been fine. I hadn't seen a sign saying that I had to pay. So, after standing about an hour in line for our doughnuts (which was per usual for that place) I came back to a $44 parking ticket. Dammit. What a great way to top off the afternoon, huh?

At least I had doughnuts. 

My Foray into Oregon

I've been to Oregon before, but not this deep. The farthest I've gone is to Astoria, which if you don't know, is on the very tip of the state. Well, this time I wanted to go to Portland (oooh, so much deeper). I'd been wanting to see it for a while, but never really had a reason to go. But then I kept hearing Voodoo Doughnut this and Voodoo Doughnut that, and I was like - FINE - doughnuts it is! Okay well, doughnuts are all fine and good, but don't really create a whole day's worth of activity. So, I added a stop to Cannon Beach. I'd heard from a friend how awesome it was there, so I decided to add that to the trip. Then, I started looking on Groupon and Living Social for any deals or things to do in Portland, and discover that Ivories Jazz Lounge was having a half off meal for two at their restaurant. Sold.

The trip itself was very boring so there's not a lot of ground to cover. I drove us down to Cannon Beach. We ate at the Driftwood Restaurant (both having Chowder sourdough bowls, which weren't as good as Duke's), walked across the street and bought a couple shot glasses at a gift shop, and then found our way to the beach. Unfortunately, the clouds were looming.

Haystack Rock

This has to be the most expensive view in Oregon

I wasn't used to seeing a beach that wasn't flat. It intrigued me that we were sea level, yet looked like we were up in the mountains (with the low clouds hanging onto the cliffs). If you go to Ocean Shores, everything is flat. The beach, the town, and everything up to it. Quite boring, really. And the sand is much grayer up there.

Anyway, so after we dumped the sand from our shoes, we headed to Portland. Justin drove this time, because I hate driving in big cities and I've heard horror stories of Portland. The drive to Portland was cool; a scenic drive through the mountains. I'm unsure of our elevations... I think at one point we were at 1500 feet. We were learning quickly about how people suck at driving in Oregon. On our way down to Cannon Beach I kept complaining about the slow drivers... we had one lane roads with an occasional passing lane up big hills, and it was almost torture. It was SPEED 55 and people were going 45, maybe 50 if we were traveling downhill. By the time Justin took over, we realized that this was going to be a trend. The best we could do to keep our sanity was make a running gag that all of Oregon was tl;dr with all their road signs. (For those not internet savvy, that's shorthand for "too long; didn't read".) It was hilarious. The signs we found included:

SLOW
TRUCKS
SPEED (In WA, we say "Speed Limit ____" In Oregon, it's just "Speed")

DIP
BUMP

CONGESTION

ELK (They say elk, yet have just a picture of a deer. Because, you know, we know what elks look like but we need a picture for deer)

ROCKS

SLIDES

and then, we saw:

LOGGING TRUCKS

Whoa, whoa! Too many words!

The funniest one though was whenever we would enter a work zone. In Washington, we've got a NOTICE: Traffic Fines Double In Work Zones. In Oregon, we would see 'FINES DOUBLE'. That's it. Short and to the point, I guess! Justin would make fun of the signs like "RIGHT LANE ENDS", he would say, "It should just say 'END'." - Hey, we had to keep entertained somehow!

So anyway, we get to Portland and realize that Damn, Voodoo Doughnut is like, popular.

We were waiting about 20 minutes in 80 degree heat. The sun was relentless - I'm surprised I didn't get a sunburn. Justin and I both agreed that we would never wait in this line for one doughnut. (When we left with our order, the line was even longer than it was when we got there, so obviously it stays this busy pretty much all day long). We ordered several different kinds of doughnuts. They really like to add cereal toppings and I'm all for that. I got one with Cpt'n Crunch, one with rice crispies, and one with Cocoa Puffs, plus several others.

The Review:

Our Groupon consisted of soup, salad, a glass of house wine (or $5 towards a glass), 2 entrees, and a shared dessert for $30, normally $60. The soup was carrot ginger. It was, um, okay. I chose the muscat wine cuz I need something super sweet in order for me to even be able to drink it. Justin got the Pinot Grigio, which was sweet but not sweet enough for my liking. Justin ordered the Jambalaya, and I got the Filet Mignon. The Jazz band began playing a bit later after we arrived and it was nice. Their drummer was blind, which was totally awesome. (Not that he was blind but, well, you know). When our food arrived, I became the critic. Not that I want to be - I go into restaurants with no preconceived notions. But I could see why the place needed a Groupon to drum up business, as it were. My filet was rare... I'd ordered medium rare. The red potatoes were under-cooked, and the green beans were basically just blanched and set on the plate (still very stratchy, almost raw). This was the first time I'd ever sent any food back in my entire life. And no, I wasn't an ass about it or anything. I could have eaten it rare - I wasn't that bugged by it. The reason I sent it back was to let the chef know to check his food before sending it out. They should know to temp, or at least judge by touching, how cooked a steak is. Justin's meal had a flaw as well: clumps of rice in his Jambalaya that weren't cooked all the way. My problem with this place was that these were rookie mistakes. I'm not talking about "oh, the sauce was too spicy for the beef" and shit. This was basic stuff, here. The dessert was good though. Justin said "Well, you can't really mess up a brownie sundae". I answered with "Well yeah you could - with the brownie!" At least it was only $30. I would have been very upset to pay $60 for that.

After that, Justin drove us home. The pavement really is quieter on the other side of the bridge, and that's not a metaphor! "People know how to drive here!" He said. Also, we made it about 400 miles before the gas light dinged at us. We still hadn't made it to Olympia, and of course my sophisticated computer likes to say "FUEL RANGE: LOW" when it gets to the point of panic. Thanks for the help, computer. I began to freak because the last thing we needed was to wait for a fuel up from Progressive at 10pm at night. So, we pulled into a Chevron and paid for just 2 gallons of gas - enough to get us home and to a less expensive option the next day. So, we basically did the entire trip on one tank of gas, which was pretty cool.