I Left My Shaving Cream in L.A. International Airport

Theresa and I decided to do something different this Valentines' Day, so we abandoned the tired old cliches such as heart-shaped boxes of candy and Hallmark cards in favor of a relaxing four-day weekend in San Francisco.

We arrived at Los Angeles International Airport a couple hours early, on the off chance that our flight was going to depart on time.  We got our boarding passes, and proceeded to the security checkpoint.  My carry-on was the lucky winner of a more thorough inspection because I was bringing along "Wheezer," my CPAP machine.  I have no problem with the extra scrutiny, because safety is the first priority and you never know when Al-Qaida will start disguising bombs as sleep-apnea treatments.  During the examination of my bag, the TSA officer also confiscated my shaving cream, which resembled a can of plastic explosive or something.

Here's the funny part.  I don't mean "ha-ha" funny, like Sarah Palin getting hit by a bus, this is more like "how the hell does this happen in post-9/11 America" funny.  Later on, when we got to our hotel, Theresa discovered that she'd left her three-inch locking blade knife in her purse rather than in the checked baggage.  That's right, folks, the knife made it through the security checkpoint undetected.  Apparently, TSA believes that a woman in possession of a knife poses less of a threat than a 6'3" guy wielding a can of Barbasol.  That, my friends, is profiling and I strenuously object.

No trip to the L.A. airport would be complete without a celebrity sighting.  At our gate, I saw an old lady that used to be in commercials.  You guessed it, it was the corpse of Margaret Hamilton!

Not really.  I still can't remember her name, or the commercials she starred in, but believe me when I tell you if you saw her, you'd immediately point and call out, "HEY!  IT'S THAT LADY FROM THAT COMMERCIAL!"  Actually, it's been driving me batty that I can't remember what she was in.  I've run every Google search I can think of, but it's no use.  It wasn't Josephine the Plumber, and it wasn't Mother Nature.  If you could help me out, I'd be eternally grateful or at least be able to sleep at night.

So anyway, our flight out of Los Angeles was, in theory, scheduled to leave at 3:55 but here's a big surprise -- we were delayed.  At about 3:00, the following announcement came over the loudspeaker:

"Flight 1582 to San Francisco is being delayed until 4:55.  However, do not leave the gate area, as the flight may actually depart prior to that time, or even at the originally scheduled departure time.  There is also the possibility that the flight will have to be delayed further."

Did you get that?  Either the flight was going to be on-time, delayed, or delayed even further.  Why not just make the announcement, "We are pretty sure that flight 1582 will be departing at some point in the future."

We left shortly after 5:00.

We arrived in San Francisco without incident, which is to say "late, tired, and hungry" and took a cab to the hotel.  We stayed at the Hyatt Fisherman's Wharf, which I highly recommend to any of you who may be traveling to the Bay Area.  Since we hadn't eaten, we decided to walk down to the wharf, where we had dinner at a very nice restaurant called Neptune's Palace.  I had the shrimp alfredo, which was delicious.  However, when I asked for a glass of water, the waitress informed me that they were having a problem with their plumbing so all the water was, and I quote, "yellow".  I told her to forget about the water, and I spent the rest of the meal trying not to think about where the carbonated water in my Diet Coke had come from.

We slept in on Saturday, and then took the cable car to Chinatown for lunch.  For those of you who have never been to San Francisco, I'd like to point out that the city's landscape resembles Magic Mountain's famous roller coaster "Colossus."  So we got off the cable car and walked down Clay Street, and by that I don't mean that we walked in a certain direction on Clay Street, I mean that we walked, literally, DOWN Clay Street at approximately a 70-degree angle.

We ate at a lovely place called The Oriental Pearl.  During our meal, we noticed two women at the table next to us enjoying an appetizer consisting of, as far as I could tell, eyeballs.  At another table, there was a family who really should've opted for a more suitable restaurant like, say, McDonald's.  The four-year old boy, who clearly did not possess an "inside voice," insisted on using his chopsticks as drum sticks and his chair as a jungle gym.  This continued until his father gave him his cell phone so Junior could talk to, I'm guessing, his grandmother.  Obviously, I couldn't hear Grandma's end of the conversation, but everything she said prompted Junior to reply, "I'M EATING CHICKEN!"

We finished our lunch, and I must tell you the food was outstanding, and walked UP Clay Street to catch another cable car.  We spent the rest of the afternoon shopping, sight-seeing, and relaxing back at the hotel.  That evening, we went to a comedy club called Punchline, and saw the hilarious Dana Gould.

Sunday morning, we had brunch with my brother Eric and his girlfriend, who live in the Haight-Ashbury area of San Francisco.  We ate at Crepes on Cole which, despite its "hole in the wall" atmosphere (or maybe because of it), turned out to be our most enjoyable dining experience of the weekend (no disrespect toward Neptune's Place or The Oriental Pearl intended).

The rest of our trip included a walk down Lombard Street (also known as "the world's crookedest street"), a bay cruise that took us around Alcatraz and under the Golden Gate Bridge, and a visit to the Aquarium of the Bay.

MOMENTARY DIGRESSION

I don't know who came up with the idea of serving clam chowder in a bowl made of sourdough bread, but he is a genius and should receive a Nobel Prize.

END OF MOMENTARY DIGRESSION.

On Monday we took a cab to the airport two hours early, in the foolishly-optimistic hope that our flight would leave on time.  It didn't, of course, so we sat around the airport reading and partaking of over-priced snack foods.

All in all, Theresa and I had a fantastic weekend, and we'll definitely be returning to the City by the Bay in the near future.  And next time, I'll remember not to pack my suspicious can of shaving cream in my carry-on bag.

Just 'Chute Me

I'm not a particularly adventurous person.  My idea of "roughing it" is staying at a hotel where the room service menu doesn't include shrimp cocktail.  Vacations are for relaxing, not for pitching a tent and hanging bags of food in trees so the bears don't eat your Mallomars.

Not everyone shares my cautious attitude, however, so travel agents have discovered another great way to separate vacationers from their money -- provide them with unique and challenging ways to kill themselves.  Rock-climbing, skydiving, and ceremonial fart-lighting while chugging Budweiser from a beer bong (yes, Alabama has a Department of Tourism too) all attract and gloriously cripple thousands of tourists every year.  For thirty bucks, you can even buy a framed action shot to share with loved ones as they stand around your hospital bed.  But, like I said, such treacherous pastimes aren't for me.

Except once.

I was on a Mexican cruise, and the ship docked for the day in the beautiful resort/dump of Puerto Vallarta.  I spent the morning taking the official city tour, which consisted of a high-speed foray in a beat-up '72 Volkswagen Beetle driven by Paco the Tour Guide.  Paco quickly pointed out the carnicerias, which is Spanish for "store that sells fly-infested pig heads."  We saw many of Puerto Vallarta's other lovely attractions too.  I'd be happy to tell you about them, except I was too busy vomiting out the rear window to notice what they were.

The tour ended (perhaps by accident, but let's give Paco the benefit of the doubt) when the VW's right front tire blew out shortly after we'd run over a flock of wayward chickens.  I headed back to the dock with three hours left to kill, and since the ship's casino was closed while in port, I tried to find something "touristy" to do.  I bought a couple packs of Chiclets from the kids on the beach, and that's when I noticed a cardboard sign propped up against a sleeping "extra" from The Three Amigos.  The sign read "Parasailing: $20".

Parasailing is really quite simple.  A crew from the Mexican Navy straps you into a parachute, which is tethered to a speed boat.  The boat heads out to sea, and as it picks up speed, you run along the beach and gently rise into the air.  The captain pilots the boat in a large circle while you enjoy the breath-taking view from an altitude of about three miles.  After a while, the boat comes back to shore, and you return safely to the beach, your life forever changed.

I can give that a go, I thought.  Before fully committing, I decided to assess the risk by watching a few other tourists take their turns.  I popped open a Corona and took a seat at a nearby picnic table.  Over the next forty-five minutes or so, I saw a little kid, an old lady, and a morbidly obese gentleman in an unfortunate shirt and Bermuda shorts have the time of their lives.

If they could do it, I reasoned, so could I.

So I handed my twenty bucks to a guy named Jorge.  His two partners got in the boat as Jorge helped me strap on the parachute.  Jorge then gave the captain the high sign, and we were off.

According to The Official Mexican Parasailing Captain's Training Manual, the take-off procedure requires the boat to stay parallel to the shoreline to provide a sufficient "runway".  Once the parasailer is airborne, the captain then -- and only then -- heads out to sea.  That's how it's supposed to work, and that's exactly how it DID work with every single person I watched go up.

That's not, however, how it worked this time.

As the boat accelerated, I trotted along the beach, waiting to be lifted into the air.

And waiting.

And waiting.

I ran faster and faster trying to keep up with the speedboat, which was now approaching the speed of sound.  Before long I lost the race and gravity took over. I plunged face first into the sand and got dragged about fifty feet.  Fortunately, I came to a quick stop.  Unfortunately, it was because I slammed sideways into a pile of large boulders.  Jorge was yelling at the top of his lungs, "PARE EL BARCO!  PARE EL BARCO!" (in English: "Get your asses back here, this stupid gringo is about to die!").

The captain turned the boat around and returned to shore.  I picked myself up off the ground and assessed the damage.  Banged up hip.  Scraped up knees.  Bump on my forehead.  "Uh, I think I'd like my money back, Jorge.  I'm done."

"Sorry, amigo, no refunds."  At least, that's what I think he said.  It was hard to hear him clearly with my ears full of sand.

Since I didn't want to resort to fisticuffs over a matter of twenty dollars, I decided to give it one more shot.  We secured the parachute, backed up to the original starting point, and tried it again.  This time, the parachute filled with air and off I went, into the wild blue yonder.

It was not comfortable.  I wasn't simply hanging from the harness, I was also "sitting" on a rope "seat" that was digging and chafing its way into the "back of my thighs".  After about fifteen seconds, I was ready for the whole debacle to be over with.

They kept me up there for a good ten minutes, which seemed much longer and resulted in the rope "seat" finding its way into my butt crack.  Given my lack of confidence in Jorge's parachute maintenance skills, I was reluctant to shift around to try and remove the rope from my keester for fear of unhooking myself and plummeting to an embarrassing and watery death.  So I dealt with it.

Eventually, we headed back towards the beach, and I landed without further incident.  Jorge helped me out of the chute, shook my hand and said, "Amigo, chu want to go 'gain?  Only ten dollar dees tine."

"Hell no," I said, as politely as you can say "Hell, no", and I walked back toward the street to get something to drink.  I bought a Corona, and when I turned around I saw Paco's VW, complete with a repaired tire.  I said hello but I don't think he recognized me, which is understandable given my facial lacerations and swelling.

"Welcome to Puerta Vallarta, senor," he said.  "You want a tour of the city?"

h