More Palm Springs

Is my head in it today? I think so. I have grand intentions of doing a bunch of stuff today so let's see how long that lasts. I'm completely out of creamer and sugar so the coffee will last me exactly this cup, no danger of getting amped on caffeine and then needing to take a nap at 12n. Like yesterday. But I digress.

Seriously I'm not going day by day on this thing. I'm already starting to forget stuff.

So Sunday we moved to a different pool because the Santa Monica girls just wanted to challenge Cece politically and apparently stupid people irritate her. I can dig it. We started the morning tradition of getting up at 6 and getting coffee at the Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf downtown. Since it was a chilly 86 degrees most mornings, this was a pleasant way to spend the morning, chatting with locals and cooing over the gay men's dogs. There isn't a lot of tourist activity in August, being as how it's in the 100s by noon, so we had a lot of opportunity to drill the locals about the whats and whys of Palm Springs.

We talked about doing the tram at some point, and since we are both afraid of heights we decided Sunday was the day to do it. Our condo was conveniently located across the 111 from the tram entrance (who knew from the signage that it was 4 miles up from the 111? And who knew that in extreme heat there would be highway signs advising you to turn off the air conditioner? Thank God it was a rental car, because I never would have punished my own car the same way I did going up that dang hill). After getting some supplies (fruit, soda, water, styrofoam coolers) at the Stater Bros and the Dollar store, we finally headed out to the (other) pool. HOT. We pretty much had the pool to ourselves the whole time, except in the early afternoon when that VERY good looking, tan, built, Boston-accented guy came out to swim. We never did catch his name but he was fun. And not hard on the eyes. At all.

Our agenda pretty much entailed "try to get to the pool by like 8:30 or so, lay out til around 2:30 or 3, and then do something". For the most part we did that. Sunday was tram day, and we had found out earlier that if you take it after 3pm you save like $3. Perfect. Cece had purchased a book about the tram and was busy throwing out fast facts to pretty much anyone at the pool (meaning me and the Boston guy). That whole tram thing is pretty spectacular, just so you know, and is worth the trip. Down.

The trip up sucked (for me). The operator was good but holy mother of Christ I don't like heights and there was just no where to look that didn't scare the crap out of me. It's like a 10 minute trip and sometimes it's bumpy and it's really really high and it seemed that any time I opened my eyes we were flying straight into the sheer rock wall of Mt. San Jacinto. Neat! By the time we got to the top I was a wreck. Thank God everywhere in Palm Springs (including there) serves Stella Artois on tap.

It's pretty high up there.
It was roughly 30 degrees cooler up there too, which was nice. We took some photos and then hung out for a bit having beer and chatting (again) with some broad and her nephew and friend who gave us some good dinner ideas. The trip DOWN, after a little over an hour, was much easier. In the same way that I prefer landing to taking off in an airplane, going down the tram was awesome.

We had some dinner at a great Italian place I can't remember the name of (Calura? I don't know), and were in for the night.

That's the theme, I guess. Pool til 3ish, shower, go do something. Monday we were joined by Boston Guy and another fellow, not sure if he was Cheech or Chong (I'm going with Chong), who was full of deep insight and existential points of interest (no, up til now, never thought about the earth's core..), and a working knowledge of where Elvis's Palm Springs estate was. Cece's sort of a pop culture junkie so after cleaning up, we headed up another hill in search of the King. Thank God for the iPhones (kinda) because Boston Guy and Chong's directions were a little bit off. After some driving around and u-turns (I'm not the best driver), we made it.

I know he's dead but apparently he lives on in the form of chimney art.
From there we found Liberace's house and then drove down to the Ingleside Inn for a cocktail at Melvyn's (a must-do per Chong and Boston Guy).

So glad we did that! Not only did I sit in the very bar stool that Tony Curtis sat in not 2 weeks ago, we were charmed by the very eccentric and polished Maitre d'Hotel Sir Michael Campbell, who does not, in fact, go on cruises, but rather, travels by ocean liner, and Scotty the gay bartender who had spent one year in the Pacific NW and ran screaming back to the desert. How can you blame him? This flipping place was the shit. Seriously. It was oozing old Hollywood. We had a blast and three martinis each there, and finally went back to the condo feeling like stars.

Okay. It looks like this is going to be a three-parter. I might be back later today because vacation is over and I won't want to write about it past today, I'm sure. And it's just not fair to any of you to leave you hanging.. I know it was a long one today but hey, I threw some pictures in so that had to be worth it, right?

Okay. On to my productive Sunday.