Shit Happens in USA…New York Part 2

26^th December 2016 – Boxing Day – Day 4 in New York City

Boxing Day in the USA is just another day to print money for the locals and the Government.  Nothing is closed and everything is open to ridiculously late hours.  As tourists, this worked for us.

It was time for us to start using our New York Passes.  These passes are supposed to make your queuing time a heck of a lot shorter, it covers your entry fee and is supposed to kill your waiting time.  Once these passes are activated, they have to be used consecutively so we were about to start the heavy duty sightseeing part of our trip.  The next five days turned out to be absolutely exhausting but boy we jammed some shit in!  We started on the Big Red Bus.  This bus took us on a tour of all of the exciting things to see in New York and gave us a rundown of some famous and historic areas, schools and buildings, one of which was an odd shaped flat iron building, a family court house where Law and Order SVU film their show on the steps before and after their fictitious court cases (see, I remember shit), and other attractions on our way to take a boat out to Ellis Island to see the Statue of Liberty. 

It was bloody hard to get excited when we were facing the prospect of the three hour queue to get onto the fucking boat and it was as cold as a witch’s tit.  After queuing initially for the tickets that the New York Pass granted us, we had to join another queue that went for miles to get onto the boat.  It was really cold and threatened to rain on us as we slowly shuffled forward.  When we neared the building that would grant us entry, we discovered the reason for the hold up.  There was airport grade security that we all had to get through, taking off belts, jewellery, coats, having our handbags scanned…my God, I was waiting for an anal probe…I was disappointed. 

It took an age to finally get through then we finally made it onto the boat.  Miss Marvellous and I went top deck to maximise the quality of our photos of the Lady herself.  The dark and foreboding sky drizzled on and off and made the hair poking out of the snowman erection hat frizz madly, despite my efforts with a straightening iron and spotted the photos with drops of Mother Nature’s nectar (piddle).  When we got there, I assumed we wouldn’t get off the boat, just stay on and go back but the family was horrified by this ridiculous assumption.  “…as if we all queued for three hours to not get off on the island!”  Jesus, calm your tits, I just thought you’d want to fit some other shit in today, okay?  Fuck me!

The island was informative and interesting and I’m glad we got off to explore.  We made a quick trip to the restrooms lest we find ourselves in New York with a full bladder and no prospects of emptying it, and Miss Marvellous made a mad dash through the gift shop, grabbing the last snow globe, which was unboxed, but she didn’t care.  We kept this from the boys because the bastards were starting to judge everything we bought, as men do.

On the return trip on the Big Red Bus, we went past the pier where the Titanic was supposed to dock…if that ninja iceberg hadn’t leaped out of the water and sunk the fucker.  We met up with some family members; my aunt, uncle, cousins and their family.  We tried to get into Eataly but it was as posh as all fuck and couldn’t seat 12 of us so off we trundled to another Italian restaurant a few doors down.  I was quietly grateful because our pockets aren’t as deep as my extended family and I didn’t like the prospect of being left with nothing but pocket lint after we ate.

27^th December 2016 – Day 5 in New York City

We decided to tackle the 911 Memorial Museum.  We had arranged our tickets after we looked into the Twin Tower Pools the night before, prior to leaving the area, to avoid the queues.  Success!  Our New York Pass worked in our favour on this occasion and we went straight in. 

Our journey through this sombre place that holds so much sadness and loss for so many started with a short film about a woman’s painful discovery that her fiancé, a fire fighter, had perished in the Tower 2 building collapse on that awful day.  After this, we moved into the museum.  We saw people’s belongings; coats and bags and helmets that were recovered from the rubble.  We saw the twisted columns of the destroyed building, fire engines that somehow survived while the men and women in their respective units perished.  There was constant footage of those planes hitting the buildings, filmed by people who happened to be taking footage of the twin towers when it happened, unaware that the footage they were capturing of a historical moment that would change the world forever would be viewed worldwide.  It was quiet and respectful and I felt moved by the entire three hours or so that we spent in there, taking in as much in.

After a morning of sad reflection, we caught the subway to cheery Brooklyn to try to restore some joy back into ourselves and walked over Brooklyn Bridge (after we found the bloody thing.  We had to follow a tour group to find it…confounding place, Brooklyn - bridges everywhere).  This was one of the items on The Captain’s ‘must see’ list and we took a stack of photos.  Miss Marvellous, The Captain and I all bought something from the artists selling their amazing art on the bridge (it still sits on a shelf to be framed...one day).  Tourists wandered around like browns cows all over the bridge, ignoring the signs stating the bike lane is for bikes and the walking lane for walkers and one local had us laughing when he started ringing his bicycle bell loudly like he was on a bloody ship “ding, ding!” and yelling “get out of the way!”, ploughing through the throngs of stupid tourists.   I guess having that many knobs in your city over the Christmas period every year would make anyone lose their shit!

After the bridge, we went back into New York and saw that the queue for the Empire State Building wasn’t so long.  We joined the queue and were inside the building quite quickly.  What a fucking trick that was!  We had to queue for the tickets and then queue for another three hours to get through the security and up to the deck.  Boy Wonder was not the epitome of patience on this occasion and groaned constantly.  At some point, Miss Marvellous had to turn away lest she belt him across the head because let’s face it, none of us wanted to be in this fucking queue.  When we finally got to the elevator, and took it up to the area where we could view the city and it was almost sunset.  As much as we bitched about the queues, this view was astounding.  We then had to queue again for the elevator to take us up to the observation deck outside so we could photograph without the reflection of glass.  More groaning from Boy Wonder and Miss Marvellous looked like she was going to punch him in the throat at any moment.  Suddenly, one of the people posted near the elevator said loudly “if you don’t want to wait in the queue for the elevator, you can walk up the six flights of stairs and get there quickly.”  I looked at the kids and said “Hell yes!” fist punched the air, stuck my elbows out and made it to the door of the stairwell first.  At this point, I completely forgot that I am as old, that I have asthma and have the fitness level of fat bear in hibernation.  Suddenly I was twenty three and a gym junkie…not.  What a fuckwit.

Off I went, belting up those stairs, taking them two at a time.  By the fourth floor, I started to slow a little, my limbs starting to shake and Miss Marvellous was protesting breathlessly behind me, “Why are we running?”  I found some air to suck in and yelled back to her “because we need to get up there before all the people behind you over take us!”  She looked behind her; there was nobody there because they were taking the stairs at a sensible pace unlike her stupid fucktard of a mother.  By the fifth floor, my lungs felt constricted and the airflow wasn’t as clear as it was before I became completely spastic and started this ridiculous behaviour.  By the time I reached the top observation deck, I was stumbling about, barely able to stand on my jelly legs and actually fell bodily through the door.  The cold air hit me and I chose to ignore the growing wheeze, yanked out my phone and started to take photos of the magnificent view.  An annoying gaggle of Russians with their sable hats and their fur coats with their entitled arrogance hogged the view forever, taking millions of photos of the same fucking view and not allowing me to get in there before I died from old age.  They took so long that their teenage son started growling at his mother in his guttural thick tongued accent. 

My bronchial tubes had swollen so much by this stage that every breath in and out was a high pitched squeal.  If I was on ground level, dogs would be going mad.  Breathing was becoming quite difficult and as Boy Wonder sidled up, I had to limit my words because I couldn’t draw enough air into my lungs to breath, let alone speak, so I just pointed to the sable hatted bitch in front of me and uttered “these rude Russian arse-hats.”  He wandered off again, oddly not venturing near the view, while I found myself in a bit of a quandary. 

I finally admitted to myself that I was actually having an asthma attack and death was a possibility up here on the top of the Empire State fucking Building.  Trying to avoid drawing attention to myself, let me die with dignity please, I crouched beside a bin and started to rifle through my bag, trying to find my Ventolin inhaler.  I just about emptied everything out of the bag onto the concrete in my panic, only to discover my puffer wasn’t even in there.  People were tripping over me and uttering “what the fuck” when they saw me crouched down there but I was panicking, trying to get air into my lungs and the air trying to get in through the swollen bronchial tubes was squealing like a stuck pig.  I was all hunched up and heaving, like a dog fucking a squeaky toy in a corner...somebody put an apple in my mouth and spit roast me now!

Boy Wonder discovered me and started to panic.  He ran to a man at the door and says, “Please help me, my mother…”  I leapt up like I wasn’t suffocating and dying and said “I’m fine!” only the words wheezed out of me like a concertina organ let loose in the dining hall of a retirement village.  I could see the whites of my son’s eyes and he looked like he was about to lose his shit so I hugged him fiercely and forced myself to calm down; reassuring the poor kid.  We went inside and I found a place to calmly sit and finally, some air got in and I started to breathe again.  My fucking asthma ruined the experience for me.  Boy Wonder and I made a pact to not tell them until we got back down to ground level because we actually give a shit.

On the way back to the apartment, as exhausted as we all were this night, me with a throbbing headache because of the asthma incident, we took the wrong fucking train line and ended up about 10 blocks away from our brownstone.  We had a choice of catching a train back to 42nd street and starting again on the correct line, or catching a bus to 142nd street.  Our collective groans sounded like a herd of cattle stranded in the middle of Harlem so The Captain hailed a cab before we stabbed him to death in the hood!

We dined on a big arsed pizza from a Pizza shop across the road from the apartment.  The take away box was massive and had the Captain laughing, like it was all a joke.  Each slice of pizza took up most of the dinner plate.  I found my asthma pump on the floor beside the bed where my bag had been that morning.  From this point forward, I checked my bag compulsively for my asthma pump before we left the apartment because I can’t have a repeat of that kind of stupid behaviour!

28^th December 2016 – Day 6  in New York City

We took the subway to Museum of American history.  As we approached, we saw a queue winding around block and considering we were up and raring to go early, we all groaned in anticipation of the hours of waiting ahead of us.  The Captain stalked up to one of the security guys and boldly asked, “Do we have to join this ridiculous queue?”  Surprisingly, The guard advised that there was a revolving door around the corner that we shouldn’t have to queue for very long at, so we made our way over there hurriedly; walking briskly like we were all in need of a quick shit because we didn’t want to alert the queued people of our sneaky queue jump.  Security was swift for once; the security guard barely checked my bag before we got in.  We were sceptical that there was no giant queue in here but this back entry actually worked for us.

There were four floors here.  We took our time wandering from floor to floor, taking in the native animals, marine life, the history of the native people and the evolution of man, the dinosaurs and lastly outer space and the planetarium.  We had spent four hours in there and the boys cracked the shits because they’d seen enough and couldn’t understand why we annoying women insisted on reading the boring plaques and checking everything out.  For fuck’s sake, we were at an interesting museum, we wanted to check that shit out.  We ended up throwing up our hands in anger and saying “fiiiiiiiinne!” like it actually was fine, but it really wasn’t.  We wanted to go into the planetarium and see the amazing stellar display but the groan from the boys was loud and unyielding.  Poor Miss Marvellous missed out on her most coveted thing there and we did have a little bit of a row with them outside of the Museum and the boys were treated with disdain for a few hours, to show how miffed we really were…and also so we didn’t hit them both over the head with something very hard.

On the way back to Harlem, I lost a lamb skin glove at the Subway entrance on 49th street but I wasn’t allowed to run back up and retrieve it because our train was arriving at the platform and everyone was feeling a bit tetchy.  It’s not like another train wouldn’t come past in a few minutes but I was loathe to miss the train and try to catch another on my own (because I’m a wuss and scared of being lost in New York on my lonesome…especially after the wrong train line incident the night before).

That night, after we all calmed the fuck down and stopped wanting to throttle each other, we went on the Harlem neighbourhood tour on foot and look at all of the different landmarks surrounding us, including parks, the Harlem River, Yankee Stadium, churches, the City College and Hamilton Grange, the home of one of the founding fathers of New York, Alexander Hamilton, a historical figure who lived locally.  We ate dinner at The Grange again but this experience proved to be a shitty-food one that left our palates wanting and Miss Marvellous’ meal wiped from the bill due to the lack of pork and huge content of pig belly fat in her dish.  

Shit Happens in USA…New York Part 3 will continue our New York experience as soon as I've written it.

Shit Happens in USA…New York Part 1

22^nd December 2016, arriving in New York

The taxi ride from the JFK airport to Harlem was a fucking nightmare.  We played Tetris with the cases until we could make them all fit, then wedged ourselves in amongst our carryon, neck pillows and handbags…jammed together like sardines.  But not Captain Fantastic, he rode gunshot with his new trilby hat perched on his head like an advertisement to all of New York of his coolness.  It was late and we just wanted to get to the apartment so we were mostly silent. 

The cab driver kept accelerating and braking constantly, drifting between lanes and we were all jerking about in the car, looking for all intents and purposes like we were on a theme park ride.  I was in the middle so I couldn’t even hold onto the Jesus bar but I had my hands on the roof holding me steady because I was sure death was imminent.  He took the Van Wyck expressway.  A Seinfeld episode springs to mind with George yelling at Kramer “not the Van Wyck, it’s a suicide mission!” 

After ten minutes of this shit, we started glaring at the knob driving the vehicle with an intensity that should have made his head throb; should have at least made the fucker aware of his nightmare driving.  The Captain, sitting in the front seat, glared at the guy like he was a Martian and said rather loudly, “...are you on the drink, mate?”  The cab driver, who was as Asian as fuck, shook his head and mumbled something incoherent to us but The Captain informed me later he’d said he was tired and had done back-to-back shifts.  Are you fucking kidding me?  We really could have died at the hands of this tool.

He continued to drive like an incompetent idiot, with all of us jerking about in the cabin and the people unfortunate enough to share the road with us beeping their horns and throwing up their hands in frustration.  I wanted to wind down a window and scream at them “I know, he’s fucking crazy!” but instead, I just slunk down in my seat and prayed for swift and safe passage to the apartment.  Then, he turned to The Captain and asked “do you know how to get there?”  The Captain started laughing his you’re a fucking idiot laugh, loudly, and said, “We’re from Australia, mate.”  His mirth made me nervous because Captain Fantastic doesn’t suffer fools.  I didn’t know what is going to come out of his mouth because anything can happen when he laughs like that but mercifully, he went silent, chuckling to himself like he was suddenly deranged.

Meanwhile, I was trying to call ahead to Tracey, the poor girl waiting for us at the apartment who had been sitting there for hours awaiting our delayed flights and death defying taxi experience so she could show us around and explain shit to us and then go home and live her own life.  We finally pulled up outside a brownstone apartment and I was sure I had just been transported to a movie set – it was exactly how I imagine New York apartments to look.   The Captain exited the vehicle and grinned at us, “Welcome to the hood,” he said…we all groaned in unison.

            We found out that we had to lug those giant cases that weighed a bomb up numerous flights of stairs to the second floor.  Miss Marvellous was silently cursing her snow globe addiction because they made for heavy lifting.  We were eager to get inside and start chillaxing so we just got to it.  Inside the apartment was even better that we imagined…we had separate rooms and the kids had separate beds in their own room.  Everybody was doing their happy dance.  The temperature was comfortable and not an oven, and there was a laundry and a TV with cable and everything!   The people on the ground floor must have been sick of hearing the elephants on the second floor doing a jig…except the Captain, he’s too cool to dance, he told us to stop being weird.  Fun sucker!  Tracey explained the ins and outs of a duck's arse to us and we nodded mutely.  She was finally allowed to leave.

23^rd December 2016– Day 1 in New York City

We decided to walk the few paces outside of our apartment to the subway and catch a train to Central Park to explore the great city of New York.  We were standing on the train because all of the seats were taken.  Nobody spoke, we were all just silently standing and out of nowhere, something rolled across the floor and Miss Marvellous shot out a foot to halt its trajectory with her foot.  First day in New York and we encounter a crack pipe on the subway.  Excellent!

The overwhelming smell around Central Park is horse shit.  Horse drawn carriages were everywhere and the air was permeated with the scent of their arses!  A build-up of ice hugged the corners of the pathways and I was excited that we might actually get some snow while we were there.  It is here, for the first time ever, we see squirrels.  Miss Marvellous and I almost lost our minds.  They are so freakin’ cute I couldn’t stop squeaking and clutching my balled fists under my chin in an effort to control my excitement at their cuteness.  After five seconds of viewing this behaviour, the boys were bored and keen to move on but Miss Marvellous had her long-range lens out and was snapping photos of these charming creatures like they were modelling for Vogue!  Squirrels are tiny, adorable and twitchy and every animation ever created about them is delightfully accurate.  A woman standing beside me looked pointedly at me like I’d lost my mind (which I most certainly had) and said “you act like you’ve never seen a squirrel before.”  My eyes were crimped as I excitedly squeaked, “I haven’t, we’re from Australia!”  She was not impressed so we had to fuck off before we piss the locals off.  

As we were walking around, taking in the sites we saw ice skaters on the Donald Trump rink, we saw a frozen lake and discovered 5^th Avenue, 7^th Avenue and 8^th Avenue.  We walked past Trump Tower and The Rockefeller Centre and saw more ice skaters there.  We visited Times Square, which is busy, bright, lit up and teaming with tourists.  A long queue snaked around the square and we found out later they were for last minute tickets for live theatre shows. 

We wandered through The Public Library of New York and it was awesome.  The architecture and art that adorns the walls are breathtaking as is the magnificent ceiling in the Rose Reading room.  It felt odd to see people actually reading and studying in there but it is, of course, a working public library.  That night we dined at The Irish Pub and got charged a service fee to have someone walk our drinks over from the bar a few paces to our table.  No tip for you, fuckers!

24^th December 2016– Christmas Eve – Day 2 New York City.

We went shopping like bargain hungry tourists.  Miss Marvellous spent an eternity in Forever 21 and purchased a stupid number of jackets…like her wardrobe isn’t chock full and suffocating in her obsessions!  Every time we entered a department store (or any store), we had to remove layers.  Inside the shops the air was stuffy and warm, made so by heaters and sheer body mass of the tourists who slowly walked around in herds.  During one of the de-robing occasions, I lost my favourite winter hat and had to purchase a replacement from a street vendor that was itchy and scratchy and stood up on my head like a snowman’s erect dick.  Every time the kids walked past me from this point forward, they bopped the pompom on the top of my head and said “boop!”  Kids are annoying shits!  How long did they think that was going to last before I channelled my inner pterodactyl and screeched at them to stop already?

We went into Macey’s and I felt like baaing like a sheep as we got shuffled along by the crowds.  I was waiting for the sheep dogs to start bouncing on our heads.  I had removed my coat, hat and gloves and was still feeling hot enough to roast a fucking duck with my tits when I realised I was in the middle of a hot flush.  Jesus, fuck I was hot.  My face was clammy and my hair was stuck to my face like I’d just walked out of a sauna.  I stripped down to my singlet top and looked like a pack-horse carrying all of my bundled clothes around.  It took half an hour of walking around the streets of New York City in 2◦C for my core temperature to slowly drop enough for it to feel like my head wasn’t going to blow off my shoulders with steam.  The Captain curled his lip at me, Billy Idol style, and reported that I looked ridiculous.  In my ire at being ridiculed for my aging body’s response to menopause, I resorted to my teenage offspring’s vernacular and retorted, “your face is ridiculous!”  

Boy Wonder discovered the NBA store and went absolutely nuts buying shoes for a sport he loves but doesn’t play.  We all refrained from any line of questioning that would bring this to the fore and left him alone to spend his own money how he saw fit.  As we were making our way back towards the subway, the Captain spied a shoe store which was packed to the rafters due to a sale, and tried on some pretty funky shoes.  My eyebrows floated somewhere near my hairline but I kept my mouth firmly closed and my judgement to myself.  Whilst I was wandering around waiting for him to finally grow a set and choose a pair, I found a devine pair of ankle boots!  The first person to help me was an arrogant little upstart so I found another of the young guys and asked him for help.  He was adorable.  I made sure they got his name at the registers for my sale and not the little shit with an attitude bigger than his dick.  That night we dined on local cuisine at The Grange in Harlem…in the ‘hood’, as The Captain kept announcing, loudly enough for us to look around us to ensure we wouldn’t get knifed by a local for the Honky with a smart mouth.

25^th December 2016 – Christmas Day – Day 3 New York City

Christmas Day dawned bright and sunny and bloody chilly.  We had no gifts for kids as we’d already shared our gifts back home at the sneaky Christmas before we left on this holiday (which was the biggest present of all).  Part of the Christmas Day celebrations involved our first NBA Game (another of the Christmas gifts) which saw The New York Knicks vs The Boston Celtics at Madison Square Gardens.  This was a fabulous way to spend our Christmas Day.  We had never been to a basketball game at all let alone a major one and on Christmas Day, a most coveted game.  The atmosphere was thrilling.  They had the dancers (hot dancers according to The Captain who’s eyesight was suddenly 20/20) shooting t-shirts into the crown with giant pump guns but since we were up in the nosebleed area, only a fucking bazooka would have sent one our way, but it was exciting all the same.  A whole lot of excitement happened in the last quarter with the scores even with twelve seconds to go…only to have the Boston Celtics win by five points in the last few seconds of the game.  A very exciting couple of hours that inflated the boys up to total buoyancy and even got an ‘I loved it’ from the sport intolerant Miss Marvellous.

After the game, we made our way to Times Square in search of facilities.  My feet were protesting about being shoved in brand new shoes that hadn’t been worn in (yes, I know the rules but it was Christmas Day people!), all in the name of fashion.  The Captain told us to sit in Starbucks while he queued for tickets to a Broadway show.  We all gave him our recommendations but a couple of hours later he came back with some show called “not that Jewish” with Monica Piper.  Who the fuck is she?  Why would I want to go see this?  I’d never bloody heard of it or her but I shoved my disgruntled non-appreciation of his efforts deep down until I’d actually been to the show – reserving my judgement until then.  I thought Boy Wonder was going to absolutely hate the show and groan through the whole thing but what the hell do I know?  He thought it was great.  Who are you and what have you done with my son? 

The show was really funny.  It turns out Monica Piper was one of the writers on The Rugrats, Mad About You, The Wild Thornberrys, The Mr Men Show and Rosanne.  Okay, perhaps it was wise of me to stow my judgement.  That night we dined at a bar called Harlem Public.  Merry Christmas from New York, fuckers!

Shit Happens in USA - Los Angeles Part 2

The following morning, day two, we went down stairs in the lobby for a coffee and the kids ordered an iced coffee.  They expected a thick and luxurious iced coffee milk drink served with whipped cream & powdered chocolate…like you get in Australia.  They were served weak drip filter coffee with ice cubes floating in it. What the actual fuck?  We were all laughing so hard we were almost crying.  As expected, it was shit.  We went back to Killer Café (the 24 hour diner from our first night) and ordered breakfast.  Boy Wonder ordered the French toast, which was massive and the fat fluffy pancakes tasted like a vanilla dessert and he struggled to eat or even enjoy it (whaaaaat?  Go see a damn doctor about that shit, sunshine).  Miss Marvellous ordered an omelette with a hash brown on the side.   She was expecting a thin and crispy hash brown like the frozen kind we have in Australia; she was served something that was the size of half a loaf cake and although it was very tasty, it was  HUGE.  I ordered poached eggs and they threw some sausage, a bowl of fruit and an extra two slices of toast I didn’t want for good measure.  Bloody hell!  We were struggling to get used to the food in LA.

After breakfast, we headed off to Hollywood in an Uber.  All the way there, The Captain was pumping the driver for information.  How much does he makes on average?  How many hours does he work?  Is this his car?  Is this his only job? We had heard all of this before.  We got to Hollywood and walked up the strip, taking photos of the famous stars in the pavement on both sides of the road.  On the opposite side on the walk, there were street performers and a cluster of people taking photos of Ryan Reynolds’ star.  We later found out that he only got his star the day before we got there, so that was cool.  The kids and I started picking shit through the performers in costume.  We saw a fat spider man, a very paunch and balding Dead Pool and a Batman who looked to be erring on the wrong side of 70.  Retire your arse, Grandpa!  Boy Wonder whispered, “These guys need to lay off the burgers”, in my ear.  I had to stifle my guffaw.  A tall, lithe Dead Pool wandered past with very fine arse and impressed Miss Marvellous and me; elicited an eye roll from Boy Wonder. 

A tall street performer with gold teeth targeted Miss Marvellous and asked her if she wanted to hold his snake (no alarm necessary, a very large and very real snake was looped around his neck; a smaller one around his hand).  Miss Marvellous advised that she had no money (we had wandered away and she couldn’t hail us and had no money of her own with her).  She told him she was with her parents so she couldn’t pay him and he said, “That’s okay, more people might come over if they see you with a snake around you neck.”  I wonder if it was absolutely necessary to have his turgid trouser python pressed up against her as he transferred the snake and had Miss Marvellous blushing.  Nothing is free in LA. 

There was a large section of path with celebrity hand prints and famous names and quotes that I really wanted to see but it was barricaded and closed to the public because some rich arsehole leaking $100 bills out of his arse was holding a big function so we were not allowed to get close to take photos.  That pissed me off because I wanted to take pictures of that shit.  Michael Jackson’s hand print was in there.  Entitled arsehole!

We walked past a Hooters bar and all joked that we would go inside later for a drink.  Boy Wonder got excited at the prospect.  After that, we went our separate ways for a spell because we wanted to look at different things, deciding to meet an hour later.  Miss Marvellous and I did some shopping.  We spied a Saphora makeup store and made my niece very happy by purchasing makeup pallets she asked us to buy for her as they’re not available in Australia.  Miss Marvellous was like a kid in a candy store while I was incredulous at the astounding price of make up. Miss Marvellous advised that I have no idea about makeup, a statement that was correct, so I fucked off and killed time texting my niece.  Outside of the makeup utopia, I stumbled upon a shoe store and bought some boots that had me skipping for the rest of the afternoon. Boy Wonder scored some jeans at American Eagle that cost an arm and a leg but looked great on him.  He wore these jeans through most of the trip so it was definitely money well spent. 

Miss Marvellous added to her snow globe collection because she had developed an obsession.  We walked past the Hooters again and Boy Wonder asked The Captain if we could go in.  I was dreading this because I do not need to see my 15 year old son ogling topless waitresses, possibly with a menu covering his crotch, sharing titty scores with his father.  This kind of male bonding does not need to occur with mother in the room.  The Captain stated that he had already been inside and they all had tiny tits so he walked back out.  Boy Wonder nodded at his father and said ‘fair enough’ and the topic was dropped.  I was suddenly grateful for small breasted women but horrified at The Captain's judgement.  We started looking for an Uber to take us back to the hotel.   All through the trip, The Captain was asking the same questions of the driver and I couldn’t stop my eye roll.

When we finally got back, we dumped our purchases, opened the sliding door to cool down the hot box, and walked across the road to a group of shops where we dined at a Thai restaurant.  This is one of the best meals I ate in the US, although the rest of the team thought it was just okay.  I think it might have been poor choices on their part and not the quality of the food but I didn’t say anything because my stomach was not protesting and I was almost purring like a sated cat.  We paid the bill and gave them a nice tip before we realised that they had forgotten to charge us for our drinks (two beers, a glass of wine and a couple of soft drinks each for the kids) so we high tailed it across the road to our hotel and snickered that we’re rebels because we did a runner on the drinks bill.  Woot, woot, a win for us!  Someone’s arse was going to get nailed to a wall over the road.

We went to the Killer Café again, ignoring Boy Wonder’s protests.  The kids had a milkshake that restored my son’s faith in the café and The Captain and I had a nice coffee to set us up for the day.  As we headed off to Universal Studios in an Uber. The Captain was pumping the Uber driver for information again, the same questions.  This was starting to get annoying.  When we finally arrived at Universal Studios, I leaned in to Boy Wonder and joked that Dad keeps repeating the same boring conversation every time we take an Uber ride.  Boy Wonder glared at me and said “really?” I shrugged my shoulders.  What? He said, in a really bad imitation of a female voice, “we leave for Honolulu at 7.30 at night and arrive at 8.30am on the same day…like we got into a DeLorean and went back to the future.”  I vaguely remember repeating that a few times but I didn’t think he had picked up on it.  Then Miss Marvellous joins in, “…and we leave to go home on the 7^th of January and arrive home on the 9^th.  We don’t even get to see the 8^th…the 8^th doesn’t exist for us.”  The two traitorous bastards then high fived each other, like they’ve got me all figured out.  Fuck off, I’m not predictable!

So we made our way through Universal Studios and after going through airport security, and almost getting my arsehole probed because I forgot to take my fucking bangles off, we headed for Harry Potter World.  We were all beside ourselves with excitement for Harry Potter World except The Captain.  The Captain is not a Harry Potter fan. He hasn’t read the books and he hasn’t watched the movies so a look of dread passed over his face.  Stiff shit mate, three against one, we’ll meet you back here later, we three were mad for it.  Miss Marvellous went nuts buying books and stitch on patches and was disappointed that there were no snow globes.  Both kids tried Butter beer at Hogsmead and loved it, but I wasn’t a fan (it tasted like fizzy butterscotch but had a bitter saccharine aftertaste).  We looked in Zonko’s and the kids queued up for a roller coaster ride that cost them forty minutes of queuing time for a 2 minute ride that they reported was not worth the wait whilst The Captain and I sat bored out of our brains on a park bench checking Facebook, awaiting their return.  I was hoping this shit ride was not a precursor for all rides here because next we queued for an hour for ‘The Ride.” 

The Captain was not impressed by this wait, he doesn’t do queues and long waits well, but he was the epitome of patience and even agreed that it was really well done because as we turned each bend as the queue snaked around twists and turns, shuffling along at the pace of a sloth, there was something amazing around every corner.  J.K. Rawlings actually worked with the design team to ensure that all of the details, like the talking portraits, the car hanging out of the Whomping Willow tree and layout of the rooms were true to the books.  We were amazed and this was not a painful hour of queuing.  After we made it inside the mountain, we stowed our shit in lockers because we were advised that the ride was jerky (shit, really?...better not be a fucking rollercoaster) and I started to worry about the ride itself.  I’m not a fan of rides.  I was a fan in my youth but I’m over that shit now and I’m not an admirer of putting myself though heart-attack inducing terror for a thrill.  I’m too old for that crap.  Within minutes (well, a few of them) of getting back in to the queue, we were at the front of the line and our 4 seat carriage arrived.  We were strapped in and then I started to seriously shit myself.  I clung to the bar with a death grip as we zoomed along.  We were surrounded by screens that simulated the ride.  Flying over bridges and through a Quiddich match, every time we climbed or dipped, my body reacted like I was actually flying; my heart pounding in panic as my guts dropped and my bum nipped but I couldn’t wipe the grin from my face.  Holy crap, it was amazing!  It was the single most amazing ride I have ever been on.  Needless to say, when we finally disembarked, I was a little shaky and felt fatigued down my left side because I’d clung to the bar like death was a real possibility, and I had a tension headache building.

After that, we queued for an hour for The Captain’s most coveted thing to do at Universal Studios; a bus tour through the sets.  They showed us how they make floods and lightening occur on movie sets, we went into a simulated ride with Jurassic Park and King Kong and that was absolutely amazing (it was 4D so we got sprayed with water and jerked about too).  The second simulated ride was a Fast and Furious one and although it was great, it didn’t feel as real as the first one.  We saw the sets from Desperate Housewives, and many series that we had grown used to on our TV sets.    Of course Jaws was one of the attractions on this bus ride and the mechanical beast burst from the water for a thrill that didn’t quite translate because it was as predictable as fuck.  The Captain advised that it hadn’t changed since he was last on this tour in 1988.

Then I got roped into going on the Jurassic Park ride and of course it was a fucking rollercoaster and I nearly shit myself.  I yowled and scrunched my eyes shut because I can’t do this shit anymore.  Boy Wonder was apologising profusely beside me because he knows how I feel about rollercoaster rides and it was he who convinced me to go on it.  At least I didn’t scream “Mummy!” in terror this time.  Unfortunately, it was after 4.30pm and the sun had set and it was starting to get cold. The Captain got absolutely drenched all down one side of him when we came down the last part of the ride through water.  I disembarked on shaky legs and vowed that the Jurassic Ride was the last one for me.  The kids then went on  the Transformers ride, which Boy Wonder reported was really shit and not worth and the long wait in the queue.  He crapped himself on The Mummy Rollercoaster ride whilst The Captain and I sipped hot chocolates and waited in comfort.  We bought the kids a hot chocolate when they disembarked to warm them up then ordered our Uber and returned to the hotel.  That night we went across the road from The Terrace shit-pit to a small restaurant which offered pizza on pita bread.  This was crispy and flavoursome and finally we all enjoyed a nice meal in LA, although The Captain was a little disappointed in his as it lacked ‘flavour’ (he has a very fussy palate…he needs to stop expecting the world on a plate in a place where they deep fry mars bars).  The kids reminded him of the place across the road that served shit on toast and called it pizza, so he refrained from further grumbling.

The next day we wandered around Marina del Rey and Venice Beach then we made another trip to Santa Monica, this one in the evening so Miss Marvellous could get her SLR out and photograph the Santa Monica Pier all lit up at night.  She produced some gorgeous photography.    Walking back to the hotel was a bitch because there were no fucking toilets and every restaurant had a sign stating that the restrooms were for patrons only.  Fuck...my eyeballs were swimming because I was so full of pee and I was really getting stressed that I would not make it back without embarrassing myself in front of my family and the community at large. Miss Marvellous could not take my moaning a moment longer, so she marched into a restaurant, fluttered her eyelashes at a waiter and asked where the restroom were located.  The waiter was indeed distracted by those eyelashes and concentrating on her pretty face and forgot the rules, pointing behind himself to the facilities.  She cheerily replied “Great!  My mother and I really need to go.”  Embarrassingly, she grabbed my hand and dragged me past him as he started looking around guiltily, his face morphing into acknowledging panic that he’d just broken the rules.  I was so grateful to her I could have cried, but I feared my tears would smell like urea, so full of piss was I, so instead I followed meekly behind her like I was a little soft in the head.  You’d think that after holding it all in for that length of time, it would burst forth and sound like a racehorse.  Instead, my muscles would not relax so it trickled out of me for an eternity like it really did have to make its way down from my eye sockets.    That was the longest time with a full bladder I had ever endured.  That was soon going to be trumped daily.

The next day Captain Fantastic thought it would be a grand idea to catch the bus to UCLA and then walk to Beverley Hills.  I looked at the sky and suggested it might rain, but The Captain confidently informed me “it never rains in California.”  Well, he knows fuck all because it started to rain on us within minutes of this false statement.  We walked for a stupid amount of time and we were getting tired and grumpy…and by we I mean me, so the drizzle didn't add joy to the mix.  We stopped at Starbucks for a restorative coffee and a pee (because toilets are as rare as fucking hens teeth and you pop into any one you come across and squeeze out every little drop you can) and I saw in the mirror above the hand basin that the drizzle had made my hair, which was in a tight ponytail, frizz like an agitated orang-utan.  I looked ridiculous.  I hoped we wouldn’t see someone really famous because I don’t want to be remembered for all of the wrong reasons.

After we finally made it to Beverley Hills, the rain had eased somewhat and we looked through the shops that only the mega rich can afford, all wet and unkempt as we were.  Our appearance screamed “tourist” like a neon sign flashed above us.  Some stores had mega rich children’s clothes for sale in them too…like junior requires a three piece suite from Petit Bateau!  Please! We took photos because we’re poor arsed bogans and imagined a life where extravagant clothing was an everyday thing. 

We spied a Bugatti Veyron, a rare site in any city, and took photos of the exceptional gem parked in the street.  Then we walked the streets where the rich and famous live before finally catching a bus back to the hotel.  The bus driver gave us a free ride (probably because we looked bedraggled and exhausted and my hair was a frizzy halo surrounding my pinched face - desperation speaks to people).  He gave both of the kids a Mexican sweet which was possibly the shitiest tasting thing they have ever put in their mouths.  Miss Marvellous’ candy tasted normal at first but it’s centre was volcanic chilli heat which made her sweat a little before she spat the offending piece of crap out.  Boy Wonder’s was soft and after a nibble, his horrified face said it all.  I took the sweet from him and popped it in my mouth, because I’m stupid, and then promptly spat it back out.  I read the wrapper, it was pureed fig.  What fucking kid would find that shit yummy?  It tasted like how I imagine re-hydrated dog shit would taste.  Thanks for the free ride, generous bus driver dude, but put your candy in a bazooka and fire it at the moon.  The taste lingered in my mouth for a very long time, making my face a mask of disgust that I could not hide.  Botox required!

That evening, we dined at an alternative restaurant that was just fucking weird.  The Captain’s meal was the best, but it came with a giant section of bleached white bone on the side and he had to dig out the bone marrow and spread it on the slow cooked beef cheek (this alone made my stomach roil, I don’t eat marrow, it’s up there with offal, goat testicles, snail arseholes and tiger penis…shudder).  The actual beef cheek was very tasty but I’m not interested in the bone guts.  Miss Marvellous ordered tasty lamb dumplings but it was swimming in what tasted like a horse piss & goat sweat reduction – gross.  I ordered pumpkin ravioli but I think his rolling pin must have been broken because it was dense and chewy and way too thick…and orange AF!  It warranted a vote of mediocrity from me.  Boy Wonder went the safe option; he ordered spaghetti and meatballs.  That waiter queried, as he took his order “you do know there is no pasta in this dish.”  What?...but it’s spaghetti and meatballs.  He advised that it was vegetables and meatballs so we were imagining veggies that had been spiral cut to look like pasta and we all got a little excited about the prospect of some vegetables in the land of deep fried shit-on-a-plate.  What a load of crap, the tasty meatballs turned up on a pile of mashed celeriac.  Why?  If you want to be creative, give it another name like meatballs on mound of mashed shite.  Stop being artsy and hipster and just serve real food, please.  I was not impressed by this fuckwittery!

The next day we returned to LAX airport at the ungodly hour of 5:30am.  This was the first flight we were on that differed from the Captain.  The Captain’s flight was departing at 7:30am, ours at 8:00am.  We were half dead because it was just too frigging early to be out and about.  The Captain paid the Uber driver and I waited for him to give us our passports.  I had to ask for them because he must have still been asleep inside his head.  His face completely drained of colour; a look of pure horror crossed his face.  “Shit, I’ve left the passports and the money in the hotel safe.”  Holy fuck, you did what now?  How did you manage that, Einstein?  He left $7,000 in cash and all of our passports there.  My face was now a twin to his mask of horror as I realised the extent of the fuck-up.  I refrained from reprimanding him because he was hating on himself already for being a dolt.  This was very uncharacteristic of Captain Fantastic.  He bolted out the door to catch the driver before he departed.  He stated that he had left the passports in the hotel safe and before any of us could say anything, Boy Wonder said “I’ll go” and dived in the cab with the driver.  The Captain and I were doing guppy things with our mouths as the Uber departed with our son inside.  Seconds later, I realised what the fuck had just happened.  My 15 year old son had climbed into a car with a driver and disappeared into the darkness.  We didn’t know the driver, we didn’t know anything about him.  Fuck!  I started panic thinking stupid shit like if he sees our boy with all the money he might just knock him on the head and throw him in a river.  I’ve seen too many episodes of Criminal Minds.  All sorts of scenarios started popping into my head and I thought I was going to have a stroke.  I was seriously shitting myself when The Captain announced, “I gotta go or I’ll miss my flight, here’s a hundred for the driver, let me know how he goes” and he was gone.  Aaarrrggghhhh!  My face was the horror emoji again and I immediately started texting my son demands “text me the driver’s name and ID number please and whatever you do, don’t mention the money… just the passports.”  He responded with a “yep” and then the info I had asked for.  I was trying to calm the fuck down but was not succeeding.  The Captain was bombarding me with texts asking if I’d heard from Boy Wonder.  I got a text from my boy, “waiting for security to take me to the room.”  Oh Jesus, it dawned on me that he had no fucking ID on him…this was one giant cluster fuck!  I calmed myself with the knowledge that he had made it there okay.  I felt the need to assume he was slightly touched in the head and sent him a text, “Mate, put the cash where the driver can’t see it, like down your pants or something, and grab the passports.”  He didn’t give me shit for this; he knew I was freaking out. 

Moments later, I received a text.  “Items acquired, on my way back.”  Miss Marvellous laughed at the Secret Squirrel shit her brother was texting me and I think I saw something akin to pride in her expression.  The Captain suddenly appeared beside me “I can’t go without my passport.”  I thought to myself, ‘this just keeps getting better and better’. I watched the Uber pull up with my son in it and The Captain ran outside pay the guy.   I hugged my boy with a spine cracking death grip that made him squeak; I had tears of relief filling my eyes.  He looked pretty chuffed with himself for saving the day.  His father patted his back, extracted his passport and ran back up the stairs to catch his flight. 

The terror of the incident had woken me and I just want to get on the flight and get the hell out of LA!  We made our way with our luggage to the Qantas terminal, only to be advised we had a 4 hour delay ahead of us.  Say what now fuck face?  He was apologetic and gave us each a $20 voucher to go get something to eat.  We had a cooked breakfast which consisted of deep fried everything on a sweet bun, but I ate it anyway before taking an acid prevention pill and I texted The Captain the bad news.   

On the flight, we asked the steward if Miss Marvellous could have an alcoholic drink because she’s Australian and 18 and allowed to drink at home.  I was expecting to be told no because we were in American airspace.  The steward was affronted by my suggestion that this might be the case, “Of course you can, this is an Australian airline, let me get you some wine right away, sweetie.”   That made for a relaxing trip for us.  The flight was packed with Australians, all travelling to New York and we wondered who the fucker was that had our flight so delayed that it screwed up this leg of our trip.  When we finally arrived at JFK airport, The Captain had been waiting there for 6 hours for us with nowhere to go because there IS nowhere he could go with his luggage in tow.  We still couldn’t talk to him because we were waiting for our luggage.

We were busting to go to the loo again but could not leave the baggage areas as we would not be allowed back in (what a stupid rule – they should hand out adult diapers on the flight so people can still function after they land).  Miss Marvellous had a pained expression the entire wait for the bags, wishing, I suspect, she had some of those diapers.  It took an eon for our bags to arrive.  We finally got out of there to find a highly tolerant Captain waiting for us.  We hailed a cab to take us to Harlem…that in itself was a scary introduction to New York.

Doona

Shit Happens in USA - Los Angeles Part 1

We finally exited LAX airport at around 1:00am on 17th December.  We were so tired and hungry we’d gone past frustrated anger and we just looked defeated as we shuffled outside of the airport with our cases to wait for a taxi large enough to take us and all of our luggage.  We were silent on the cab drive to the hotel and even the Captain looked completely stuffed.  He pepped up as we drove into the Marina del Rey area, where our hotel was located, and started talking animatedly about how much he loves the area and how it hasn’t changed since he was last here in 1988.  How the hell he could tell this from the pitch blackness of night outside of the taxi is beyond me, but he was suddenly excited.  He turned to us in the back seat and said, “We’ll just dump our cases, then find a diner and get a meal.”  Up we all popped like a row of jack-in-the-boxes along the back seat at the mere mention of food.  Suddenly we were awake and ready go.

We wandered into the deserted hotel lobby at 1.30am and checked in.  We made it to our room and as soon as we opened the door, we were immediately hit by a wall of hot air.  It was like a balmy afternoon in Darwin in there.  I felt like I was going to melt into a puddle on the carpeted floor.  We dumped our cases and resisted the temptation to strip to our underwear to cope with the sudden heat.  We asked the concierge how to turn the heat down and he straight away turned it to Celsius for us.  Well, good on you mate, but turn the fucking thing down before we all sauté in our own gut fat!  I stood at the thermostat trying to make the fucker go down to arctic blast with the kids looking over my shoulder for support, but the lowest temperature we could get the unit down to was 24◦C; very fucking balmy! It was so hot in the room that we were almost fainting so we opened the sliding door to the small balcony and decided to leave it open while we went out to eat in the hope that the room would be habitable when we returned.

We passed a 24 hour diner on the way to the hotel so the Captain pointed us in that direction.  It was called ‘Killer Café’ and I was hoping it had nothing to do with the food. Turns out Marina Del Rey were into death threats because not only did we find a Killer Café, we found Killer Hairstyles and Killer Shrimp too.  Considering California’s serial killer list, this was an accurate threat. The first thing we saw when we opened the door and wandered in at 2:00am was a giant black man standing in the middle of the diner wearing a floor length fur coat on.  What the fuck?  Captain Fantastic turned to me and grinned, “Check that out,” gesturing at the anomaly in the animal pelt.  I nodded mutely because I was so hungry I was starting to feel queasy!

Perusing the menu and almost salivating all over it because we were deliriously hungry, we finally settled on burgers and sandwiches.  When the meals arrived, it was comical...they were huge.  The Captain ordered a meatloaf burger but he received a meatball burger, which was a little disappointing for him.  I had ordered a sandwich and it arrived on a platter, not a plate.  The sandwich was served on bread that had been cut down the length of the bread loaf so it was double size.  It took up about a third of the giant platter like plate and the rest of the plate was piled high with fries like a heart attack begging for a way in.  Of course I could only consume half of the giant sandwich and a few of the fries because I’m a normal person and not from the land of giants where this meal should have been served.  As wasteful as the excess was, I was still scarred by the acid incident so I refused to shove any more of this deep fried crap into my body than I could manage.  Boy wonder devoured his entire burger and most of the fries as did The Captain because the boys had large appetites and could actually reside in the land of the giants.  Miss Marvellous only ate half a sandwich too; she’s normal just like me.

We made it back to the hotel room and collapsed into a fitful sleep made all the more uncomfortable by the heat in the room.  We discovered that if we left the sliding door open, we could actually get enough cool air in there to make sleep possible…if you only draped a sheet over one third of your left leg and hung slightly off the side of the bed to catch a little of the breeze.  

The acid incident came back to haunt me because with the late arrival into LA and the sprint to the café for sustenance, I’d forgotten to take an antacid pill so I endured another night of heartburn that felt like molten lava had been set loose in my oesophagus.  I managed to get through the night without vomiting so that was a bonus but I was more wary than ever.  

Every day we would leave the room with the door wide open to reduce the chance of actually baking in there and when we returned, after the room had been serviced, we’d find the sliding door closed and the room an inhabitable hotbox again.  There was no fridge in the room so we left our wine and beer outside on the balcony in the cool air to refrigerate it for us.

Our first day of sightseeing in Los Angeles was led by Captain Fantastic as he retraced the steps he’d taken in 1988 (Jesus, we’re old).  We walked towards Venice Beach and after admiring surfers tackling nondescript waves from the pier, we made our way up the Venice Beach boardwalk that eventually ended in Santa Monica.  I wished The Captain a Happy Anniversary...21 years.  With the screw-ups and time differences, the date had completely slipped his mind.  As we headed towards the boardwalk, we passed paddle tennis courts featuring a pretentious bunch of knobs playing like there was a trophy involved.  Knobs were a real feature on this boardwalk and it made for an interesting walk.  Within seconds of passing knob central, we were set upon by a very tall and imposing black man selling his CD.  He asked where we were from and The Captain told him Australia.  Big dude grinned and said “Hey, Guy Sebastian”, like he’s the only thing Australia has every produced of any worth.  Captain Fantastic was not expecting this dude so he actually purchased the CDs to make him go away.  He is not easily bamboozled like this so I was very surprised that he bought it.  He only made that mistake once.  We’ve never listened to whatever is on the CD, it was the equivalent of throwing a few bucks at him to be granted passage to continue on the boardwalk.  The interesting observations started.

The smell of marijuana hung heavy in the air and no fucks were given by those openly smoking rolled joints on the path.  Every second store front had a marijuana leaf on a sign stating “medicinal marijuana available here’ with staff dressed in green medical uniforms sporting the dope leaf like an emblem of health.  On the right of us as we headed towards Santa Monica, dotted amongst the dope dealers, were stores selling tees with hilarious words printed on them, underwear with rude and funny declarations about the body parts contained within, smoke stores selling God knows what and the odd diner or food vendor.  On the left, beach side, were market-esque stalls selling drawings, paintings and homemade jewellery and it felt very much like wandering through a small market with regular stalls.  The artistic talent was astounding and then, every now and then, a stall trying to sell ‘art’ that looked like something your kid brings home from Kindergarten that you’re supposed to admire but is a mess of screaming colour all bleeding together and you think it is actually a piece of shit.

The market stalls gave way to a cluster of youth playing basketball on concrete courts with the beach as the backdrop.  The men were of mixed race and college age; it was interesting to watch.  Boy Wonder and I stopped to watch the skills of the youth.  As he was watching he said, “black people are so much better at sport than white people; it’s in their genes.”   Going by the skills displayed on the courts before us, I was inclined to agree. We continued walking and every few meters, someone tried to impress upon us, our need to purchase their CD.  The Captain has been burned once and did not even enter into conversation with the pushy black men.

The market stalls continued until they ended suddenly at an enormous sea of homeless people.  All clustered together, some of them sleeping, surrounded by everything they own, was an eye opener to the homeless situation.  There were toilets at regular intervals along the beach so we were lulled into a false sense of security about restrooms, which would become a problem for us in the coming days and weeks.  We wandered past muscle beach and it was empty.  I tried to imagine the kind of tossers who would like to work out there.

We made it to Santa Monica and The Captain stated often how he would like to retire here.  He is obviously planning on a future without me because I don’t share his desire to live here.  It is noisy and full of people thrusting shit in my face like I’m on a beach in Thailand.  We got our first taste of street performers in Santa Monica and we were impressed.  The Santa Monica pier is fabulous and is the end of Route 66 so we took a gazillion photos here and marvelled at it; Boy Wonder’s fascination of Route 66 started with the movie Cars in his childhood.  Miss Marvellous bought a snow globe because she has issues.

We ate a sandwich in a café with bread that was so thick that each slice was the thickness of four toast cut slices.  It was too much and as usual, it was quantity of quality.  Boy Wonder chose a drink which stated on the can would perk him up and immediately started feeling ill because of it (it’s a great imagination he has…I suspect the placebo affect had taken place).  He didn’t like this café and I think it was because the bread was so thick and dry that he has to gulp the drink down to make the dry shit slide down his throat and that was more than likely why he was feeling ill.  Either way, he blacklisted the café. I ordered a smoked salmon and cream cheese bagel which only cost about US$3 so we were pleasantly surprised until it turned up as just a bagel with cream cheese, much to our dismay.  The Captain queried this and was told that the stupid bitch who took the order didn’t hear smoke salmon (obviously a deaf stupid bitch) and advised that the smoke salmon bagel costs US$12 each.  Holy fuck.  Did they catch it and smoke it themselves?  Next I’ll have to sell a kidney for a glass of orange juice.

We walked back to the hotel the way we came and the kids discovered a candy store called It’sugar, which really gave me the shits because of the dual use of the ‘s’ but I had to get over that because my offspring were intolerant of my grammar Nazi bullshit.  Miss Marvellous discovered a row of shelves at the back of the store holding 'candy dick rings’ , 'giant cock pops’ and ‘dick lips’ sugar sweets; pointing and giggling at the sex shaped lollies because she is 18 and still a child in the mind.  Boy Wonder had discovered Duff Beer and we saw boxes of ‘Skittles’ by the kilo!  I suddenly wanted to get the hell out because my brain was screaming “Diabetic Coma!” at me at a thousand decibels.  On the way out of the store I spied a box of cereal called “colon blow”.  Curious, I took a closer look at the box and saw that it touted the cereal is incredibly high in fibre…all-righty then!  Walking past Muscle Beach at the end of the boardwalk showed us a group of wankers who like to flex their muscles whilst a crowd gathers to watch them work out.  I was not impressed by these tossers; they just confirmed their toss bag status to me.  They should rename this section of beach ‘wanker beach’ so passers by get a real understanding of what happens there.  Twats!

It got dark at around 4.30pm, which was something we needed to adjust to having come from an Australian summer where the sun sets at 8:30pm.  The sunsets at Venice Beach were astoundingly beautiful.  Miss Marvellous was clicking away like the tourist she was, which resulted in some gorgeous photos of pink skies and palm trees.  The first dinner out (if you don’t count the 3:00am diner meal) was at a place called The Terrace.  We ordered the pizza because we thought it would be a safe bet but we were so horrified by the disgusting flaccid shit-storm that we were served that we decided we should not tip these fuckers.  They obviously know their food is shit because they have cheekily already worked the tip into the bill and it was about 18%, which is what you should pay for great service and great food, not the limp flavourless mediocrity served in this shit hole.  This place was black-banned and was given the award of “Worst pizza EVER!” by our posse.

The Captain and I decided to walk to the supermarket so we could get stuff for breakfast or brunch because we don’t actually want to have three sit down meals a day.  He told the kids we would be back in 40 minutes but he had no fucking idea because it was a forty minute walk one way.  It was late and I was over it but we bought some wine so I thought I might be happy when we returned.  I tried not to think about serial killers while we walked back in the dark. The Captain’s beer purchase was amazing; a 6 pack of Leffe for US$9.95.  What the fuck?  In Australia they cost around $6 per stubby.  How wonderfully weird.  There was a definite spring in The Captain’s step on the walk back home.  The wine is okay but was a little on the sweet side…beggars can’t be choosers so I downed that shit anyway.

The shitty pizza gave me indigestion again and despite the preventive pill, the flaccid shit-storm churned in my stomach for hours and had me vomiting acid again in the middle of the night.  My resentment of ‘The Terrace’ grew to the point where my mind referred to it as ‘The Terrorist’ because it blew up my guts.  “Fuck my life” I thought miserably as I hugged the toilet bowl in the hotel bathroom while the rest of the family slept like the dead in the sweltering room beyond.

Doona