Blog: The Life Of A Supreme Ruler

Phew, it’s hot!

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• General

— orudge @ 23/06/2006 12:54 am

Well, it’s hitting over 100°F here in Napa, California (37°C), which is probably the hottest weather I’ve been in for ages. It’s really quite something, but Rachel’s parents have air conditioning in the house at least! Things have been quite good, albeit a bit mad, since getting here on Saturday night. Was very tired on Saturday after some 13 hours of flights (and in total around 22 hours of flights, airports, buses, trains and whatnot), so when Rachel had picked me up from the airport and we headed to Santa Cruz, I was feeling rather tired. We got some pancakes at a nice little, and very American, diner, and then it was basically off to bed. The next day, Sunday, I appeared to have recovered from jetlag rather quickly (I’m guessing it’ll be worse the other way) and it was Rachel’s graduation in the afternoon, which was a pleasant afternoon – hot though, although not quite as hot as it is now! On Monday, Rachel moved out of her apartment in Santa Cruz and we went down to the Boardwalk for a while, went on some rides which was good fun, and explored a little bit of the town. After that, we hit the road, heading south for Los Angeles. For a large part of the journey, we were going down a fairly small, bendy road in the hills, surrounded by forest, before hitting the freeway. We stayed overnight in a motel, and then on Tuesday (Rachel’s birthday), we continued to drive down, got a little bit lost in LA, and finally found the CBS studios, where we were going to see “The Late, Late Show” being filmed. It was quite a fun experience as “show enhancers” (not “audience”, this is Hollywood remember!), and we saw an actress whose name I can’t quite remember, and Jack Black as guest stars, which was pretty fun, and I made my debut on US national TV for all of about a third of a second (they didn’t really show audience shots). Then we were back on the road, heading up to Napa – stayed in a motel overnight again, not so noisy this time (the previous one was right next to the 101 freeway, and the cars were fairly loud), and the next day, yesterday, we continued on our travels. When we neared Sacramento, Rachel noticed that the car was running low on fuel, so we left the freeway and hunted for a gas station, but to no avail. Just after she asked a man where the nearest gas station was, the car started to splutter and she just managed to park the car before the car finally died. She phoned her dad to basically get rescued, but while on the phone, she accidentally managed to lock her keys in the car… oh dear! Note also that the temperature in Sacramento was rather hot – some 40°C plus, I think – so this was really great! She called up the insurance company and somebody came to get us back into the car and give her some gas, and we finally got back on the road again – oh well, it all added to the adventure! Finally got into Napa, where it was still quite warm, got some food, and not really done a huge amount since then. Going to be exploring the countryside nearby over the next little while, as well as the likes of San Francisco.

Overall, the past few days have been really quite good, if a little hectic. There are probably things I’ve forgotten to mention, but general opinion is “so far, rather good, if just a little bit too hot!”. I now know all sorts of things I didn’t know about Romans, too, the joys of being in a car with Rachel for a few days. Hehe, I jest… overall, things are good. 🙂 Hope everyone’s having a good summer so far, too.