| THIS IS A READ-ONLY ARCHIVE FROM THE SORABJI.COM MESSAGE BOARDS (1995-2016). |
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What are the major cities with big airports in Montana? What about the neighboring states? I'm trying to plan my October trip, and I need to know where to fly into. Here's what I would like to do, if it helps. I want to fly into MT on Sat, Oct. 4, drive around (where is a matter of debate), and end up in Las Vegas on Friday, Oct. 10. That last destination and date are definite -- everything else is up for discussion. I could also fly into WY or ID, I guess. BTW, I know it's a big area I'm trying to cover in 6 days. Hehe, this weekend, a family acquaintance from Italy is staying with me, and she just sent me an email saying she wants to see LA, Chicago, NY, Texas, and DC while she's here. For 10 days. I think she expects to be able to drive to LA from DC in a few hours or something. Europeans, huh. |
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One-way ticket to Missoula from BWI ($446/person), one-way from Las Vegas to BWI ($244), and renting a car from Missoula to drop off in Las Vegas( $669). $2049 total, $1025 each, not counting gas/food/lodging. Compare that to one round-trip ticket from BWI to Vegas ($241) and renting a car in Vegas to return in Vegas ($174). $662 total, $331 each. But it's over 1000 miles from Las Vegas to Glacier National Park. We'd have to drive there and back in 6 days. It could be done, but would it be any fun? Ay, dios mio. What to do... |
. It's pretty common for us Western Montanans to drive to Spokane to catch a cheap flight. That's around 200 Miles. |
i think you'd have much more fun driving over to LA and then up the Hwy 1 to Santa Barbara or San Luis Obispo or Big Sur or Monterey or Santa Cruz or San Francisco or Jenner or Arcata. Depending on how much driving versus looking around you wanted to do. |
I've already done the Las Vegas - San Francisco via Hwy 1 trip....I want to go somewhere new and somewhere I think I may want to live. Oregon and Washington are attractive and I may change plans to go there instead, but Glacier National Park...in October....the thought makes my heart sing, baby. |
miles after miles of ass. and not in a good way. |
Do you get nostalgic for certain journeys? When I was little, every other summer or so, my mother, brother, and I would drive from Las Vegas to Salt Lake City and back to visit my family up there. The route from Las Vegas that dips slightly into Arizona before continuing north into Utah has a special place in my heart, even though in all actuality it's probably butt-ugly scenically and mind-numbing to anyone else. The strangest thing happened last summer, when my mom and I drove south from SLC to Cedar City, halfway to Las Vegas. One thing I remember very clearly from those childhood trips to SLC are the purple mountains and huge grazing fields of prairie grass on either side of the highway. But last summer, I didn't see such a landscape, even though I'm certain we were on the same road. A few summers earlier, I had made the trip from Las Vegas north to Cedar City, and I didn't see the purple mountains then, either. So where are the purple mountains?? I know I wasn't hallucinating all those different times, and I can't think of anywhere else I could have driven where I would have seen such a sight. |
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Sweet, finally a sorabjite comes to see TBone and I. |
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NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO RESIST! |
I just want to see Agatha's goods. |
If my damned brother got off his ass and at least told me what he does and doesn't want to do, I could make a decision. |
jesusmontechristo! |
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(she grins) |
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my wife, in the past, has been a proving ground for girls trying out the gay side. it got old & shallow really fast. |
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no. |
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i've seen agatha's goods. hubba hubba! |
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i'm thinking we should have a sorabji women's gathering. and i *promise* not to molest any of you. ha! i crack myself up! |
Alternately, Las Vegas, October 11. Be there! |
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ooooh! October 11th is my birthday! vegas it is! (i'm not kidding) |
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The thing is, though....will Agatha be able to make it? Agatha, you have to be there. Kazoo, will you be on fall break at that time? |
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I still need to work out my work-load/budget/sem-schedule...but I will keep it in mind. I just added Las Vegas to my airfare list. |
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damn you people! making me consider these things! |
Hm. A little over a month away. (You must prepare for the art show!) Oh, that begins on the 30th, not the 14th or something. (You haven't even started!) I might be driving again by then. (Everything's a mess and you're a flake!) Dammit. |
Yellowstone is partially in Wyoming, partially in Montana. |
so, not gonna happen, agatha. unless you plan some fucked up bus thing. |
Add away, Kazoo. I kind of forgot about the friendster thing about ten minutes after I created a profile, but maybe I'll check it if I know I have more than one friend on there. |
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i have this image of you in like a late 70s toyota wagon of some sort, perhaps yellow or doodoo brown, rusting in some spots, sputtering along the highway, cursing & bumbling at traffic while trying to crank out some mudhoney or something heavy like that through the only crappy speaker that still works. |
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It's a Chevy Loooooomina. |
me and cleo were performing in a band that was half white stripes, half trachtenburg family slideshow players. i was playing raunchy, garage-y guitar and singing while cleo played drums. she was up front on the riser and i hung back in the relative shadows. we'd played for what seemed hours and every time we finished a song, i'd start with the, "thank you, goodnight!" but cleo would cut me off by beginning the intro to another song which sent the crowd into another wave of clapping and cheering. so we'd launch into another song. over and over. and over and over. i had to wake up to end the show. |
if I log on here again in the next 10 days, I will continue to talk about wedding shit that no one gives a hot pickle about because I feel it's not only my right but my duty as a bride to bore the fuck out of everyone about my stupid wedding, which, by the way, is going to suck. for instance. the weather. ok, I want you to guess the date of my outdoor wedding based on the silly 15-day forecast. 8/29 Sunshine and warm 8/30 Mostly sunny and pleasant 8/31 Partly sunny and comfortable 9/1 Mostly sunny and warm 9/2 Sunny and warm 9/3 A good deal of sunshine 9/4 Mostly sunny 9/5 Brilliant sunshine and warm 9/6 Partly sunny and warm 9/7 Cloudy with a chance of rain 9/8 Mostly cloudy and warm 9/9 Partly sunny and warm 9/10 Partly sunny 9/11 Partly sunny like fucking hell. |
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we've been living together for two years. we decided to get married, then we decided to get married soon, because within days it became clear that everyone was going to harass us daily about plans, and we thought better to waste one summer planning a wedding instead of an entire year. I had wanted to get married on a certain primate-encrusted rock in the mediterranean, but my family's sob stories about that got increasingly shrill, and one day I came to the realization that we couldn't just do what we wanted, not without constantly being reminded, "you know your brother is going to have to drop out of school in order to attend." so now it's a backyard wedding, though this particular backyard is on the puget sound surrounded by tall pines with bald eagles flying overhead and all those niceties. it probably would have been good if the weather could have held up for just one more day, after what must be a record-breaking string of sunny days. I feel like it's been months since it rained. oh, well. the yard, which slopes down to the water, might be too steep for a tent, but maybe we can figure out what sort of canopy we can put up and all that shit. it was going to be small and simple, but then it turned out that certain people had to be invited. a lot of them. my only concern about that was how we were going to fit them all in the house if it ended up raining; come to think of it, we never really did figure one that out. flowers: dahlias. cake: coconut, banana, chocolate kahlua. processional: ravel. recessional: satie. red wool carpets and cotton blankets on the lawn. oh, my god, I can't believe how boring this is, even to me. hey, can anyone tell me what a day of rain would do to copper? |
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What do you think about flying into Seattle, driving across to Montana, down through Yellowstone, down to SLC, and down to Las Vegas, and then flying home from Vegas? Is that, like, way too much driving to do in a week? This is bumming me out. I think I want to do too much. |
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. But we didn't sleep. Add sleeping and Yellowstone, and it'll get kinda tight. . I dunno... 6 days... It's a lot of driving, but I bet you could swing it. |
Nope, I don't think I can take two weeks off. What if I focus on the Seattle - Portland - Salem corridor, and then drive to Las Vegas, leaving Montana for when I (please God) live in the Seattle - Portland - Salem area? Maybe I shouldn't have told my bosses I wanted to quit. Shit, now I'm scared and depressed. |
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. I'm so glad I managed to spend some time in Glacier before the fires started and they closed so much of it down. I found some wild raspberries and ate as many as I could... I'm probably lucky a bear didn't kick my ass for eating his berries. Saw some major sights. . Glacier's still pretty smoky right now, I hear. A friend spent the weekend in Yellowstone, though. He says it wasn't smoky at all down there. . Hopefully I'll still live 'round here when folks decide to come visit. |
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you could get a small credit card to front you the money. debt is a bitch, but debt in the 500-1000 range is totally doable with your income. |
I do get sick pay, but I need to use it for the operation on my hand and related dr's visits. Anyway, I've asked for six days off (week of Oct 6-10, plus the following Monday). The plan is to focus on Washington and Oregon and then drive to Vegas. I think this will be cool. We can go to Crater Lake and the Cascades and other nice, pretty areas of interest out there, and save Montana for later on. |
Crater Lake is really nice and you'll want to see at least part of the gorge. It's beautiful. |
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How long do you plan to be in town? A couple hours? A day? Let me know so I can plan to not be working. |
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I've got Saturday off completely and Sunday evening free (though there is zoobombing). |
Agatha, lady, you bet yer sweet ass I'll come see you. I'll just have to figure out when I'll be in the area (probably Oct. 5). I'm irritated at my brother this morning because he was supposed to call me last night and tell me which flights he'd like to take. If I buy tickets without consulting him, he'll be pissed and may bail on the whole trip. I'm trying to tread delicately right now. I hope we travel well together. I like to plan things ahead of time and he's more of a "whatever happens, happens" kind of person, and it's easy for us to drive each other crazy. |
I think I'll be around that weekend. I have some goofy site council retreat to go to for Cleo's school somewhere around that time, but that's only for half a day. |
'he's more of a "whatever happens, happens" kind of person' |
Anyway, I spoke to him and bought the tickets. Now to rent the car. Is there a difference in gas usage between a mid-sized and a standard sized sedan? |
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Compact = Ford Focus or similar Economy = Hyundai Accent or similar Mid-size = Oldsmobile Alero or similar Standard = Dodge Stratus or similar Full Size = Ford Taurus or similar I'm assuming that the smaller cars will have better gas mileage...is this reasonable? Would a full-sized Toyota do better than a standard Ford? I'm pretty retarded when it comes to cars. I've driven Toyotas (a Corolla and a Camry) and a Honda Accord -- do you know what sizes those are? The Accord was pretty roomy...maybe that was a standard? The Corolla is smaller than a Camry...maybe those are economy and standard? I should know more about this stuff. |
in terms of consumption, in my experience, there is little difference in the mpg of say....the Dodge Neon i was supposed to get on my recent trip and the PT Cruiser that I ended up getting. Corolla is Toyota's economy car, as is Ford's Escort and Dodge's Neon. Honda's Civic, Mazda's Protege. Camry, Accord are usually 4 door and a slight upgrade (i.e. power windows, locks, cdplayer, and V-6). If you're going to be doing a bit of driving, especially in the west, id get something a step up from say a corolla or ford escort or dodge neon, but that can be a $12-15 dollar per day difference. I really really really liked the PT Cruiser we had on this recent trip. Unlike the low end economy cars it had cruise control. Considering I was dodging South Carolinian Highway Patrol for most of the trip, it helped me to keep my speed down and consistant. |
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i got fucked on my expedia.com reservation because i reserved an economy dodge neon. they said it was a four door. come to find out, neon's can be 2 or 4, its the economy car, so the door count wasn't guaranteed, so i was fucked. i had to upgrade to a dodge stratus. fine. it was going to cost me about $10 more dollars a day. whatever,. just give it to me. dodge stratus is the equivolent of a honda accord. fine. nice. v-6, cruise control, LETS GO. but then i get to the lot, go to the car, supposedly the keys are in the ignition. they arent. there are no more dodge stratus models in the lot. "want a PT Cruiser?" at this point, Id take the Clampet family pickemup truck. But In the end i was quite pleased with the fuck up. |
Agatha: I think I've got my next weeks schedule at work, just not here. I'll have to take a look. If you ever want to ride a bike while you're here, I have an extra. My cruiser's fixed! |