Sea of Heiuso

The whole weekend didn’t revolve around possible apparitions of long-dead prom queens in white hats, however. This below is entirely more representative of my time at home.

The Woman in White

I drove home last Saturday for a brief break from Santa Barbara life. In all, the weekend went well. On the drive up, however, I nearly veered off the road while gawking at an unexpected roadside attraction: a strange person, dressed all in white, with a white, wide-brimmed hat, bowing reverently to passing traffic. This occurred right on Highway 25 — a backwoods stretch also known as “Airline Highway” that I use to cut through King City and get to my house without having to pass through Salinas. She was standing right where the road forms a “T,” with the various legs of the letter running to Hollister, King City and Coalinga, respectively.

Yesterday morning, I traced the same route back home. When I got to the T once again, I saw the same white-clad person, only a few yards from where the first strange encounter happened. This time, the person was walking with her back to me, towards Coalinga. I was half-tempted to follow and ask what strange compulsion could possibly be causing this activity — at the height of the midday sun and on a shadeless road, no less. But then I started thinking about “Texas Chainsaw Massacre” and “The Hills Have Eyes” and the like and decided to press ahead to King City.

Right at where Highway 25 dumps off onto the 101, there’s a gas station that I always stop at. I arrive at this spot either one hour or three hours into the four-hour trip it takes to between Santa Barbara and Hollister, and regardless which way I’m headed it usually marks the time when I have to use the bathroom. So I asked the attendant — from whom I’ve been buying bottled water and assorted car trip food since I started college — if he had heard of anybody ever seeing this person. He had, in fact. He confirmed that the figure was a woman and that she had been dressing in white and walking the back roads for a while now.

I had never seen her before. Honestly, she creeps me out a bit. However, I’m curious to know if anybody who reads this blog had seen her or if they know why she is doing this. Is she keen on Jesus? A proponent of midday constitutionals? Proud of her white hat? Somehow, I feel the number of regular readers who would have reason to use this bypass would have diminished since we’ve mostly all graduated and moved away from Santa Barbara. I found nothing online about the Woman in White — not that I really expected to, seeing as how her ilk usually spread their gospel on poorly Xeroxed newsletters with lots of exclamation points and run-on sentences.

The combination of fearing for my life and not wanting to slow beneath sixty miles per hour didn’t allow me photograph the woman, but until I can this image will have to suffice.


Disregarding the nose, the menacing grin and the lit dynamite, it’s actually not a bad likeness.

Don't Drink the Cuckoo Punch

It's just not a good recipe. Click for a larger image with readable text.

Your House Is Ass

Before I forget, the Kane mansion wasn't the only notable building we saw on the drive down. Please also note this La Jolla residence. Visible from La Jolla Scenic North, its circular roofline gives the structure a striking resemblance to an anus.


You see it, right? A certain Flickr user provides us with a better angle. He seems to be missing the joke, however.

The Neptune Reality Tour

Seeing Jen and Shaun get married was more than enough motivation to see San Diego. Really — a Nexus wedding, sure to one day create little Nexus babies. Furthermore, it’s a union between two co-workers that I don’t hate and, more importantly, don’t hate together. But that’s a different entry.

This post concerns the trip to San Diego, but strictly from the viewpoint that this city serves as the setting for Neptune, the fictional hometown of one Veronica Mars. Since Spencer is a San Diego native, more or less, he came along for the ride and showed pointed out various points of interest — ostensibly those relating to himself, and not to the spunky teenaged detective. However, one leg of this journey took us through Rancho Santa Fe, his old neighborhood, and directly by a yellow cardboard sign that read “V. Mars.” Now, this being election time, it’s not uncommon to see various strangers’ names on signs posted along the roadside. We noted the “V. Mars” and continued up El Montevideo — the road’s official name, sans “Rd.” or “Dr.” or anything, like all the byways in the area — and came to another “V. Mars.” sign, this time directing related crew to park in a dirt lot.

Spencer explained that the area was in very close proximity to the house that serves as the Kane mansion, inside which much of the show’s first season drama unfolded. (Spencer also points out that Casa de Kane is a “mere chip shot away” from his family’s former digs in Rancho Santa Fe. El Montevideo runs so close to the house, in fact, that you can recognize it on this Google Maps close-up.


I darkened the unimportant areas on the map. The bright line crossing over the image’s bottom left-hand corner is El Montevideo. The dirt lot where the "Veronica Mars" crew was parking is just south of here. The house in the top right corner with is the Kane House, better known as 6658 El Montevideo. See that light circle with the diagonal rectangle in the middle? That’s the Kane family pool — or the place where sweet little Lily Kane got her head bashed in.

Perhaps the most interesting part of this cyber-real estate-voyeurism is that the house is currently for sale — for the very affordable price of $7.6 million. So if you want to film your “Veronica Mars” fan scripts, you’d better be prepared to cough up the money. This Del Mar real estate website features some better photos of the Kane mansion.

Here, again, is the death pool.


And here is a photo of what I’m guessing is one of the complex’s kitchens. If you look in back, you can note the door has those strange translucent horizontal panels that appeared in many of the shots inside the home.


And here’s another shot of the home, from a better angle than the one Google Maps provides.


The upside of all this — other than the fact that I was potentially within earshot of my favorite TV show as it was being filmed — is that the crew’s presence means the old, upper-crust Neptune crowd may soon be making a re-appearance on the show. My guess is that Duncan Kane — now excised from the show’s opening credits — could show up again, though Spencer tells me that the house used as the Goodman home is also in the area. That’s fine. I’d rather see Gia again anyway.

More goodies: Wayfaring.com keeps track of these kinds of things. They give you a street number for a lot of "Veronica Mars" shooting locations, as well as for other shows.

[ link: be a snoop ]

Fun Teenager Ketchup Party

Stole it from Meg H., who stole it from Bri. It really did sound like fun:

Rules:

1. You guys tell me what kind of music you want.

2. In a few days, I'll post one mp3 for each of you.

You can't request music by band name or genre. You have to describe, in terms of color, mood, texture, taste, or any other creative way you can think of, what you're looking for in a song, and I'll do the best I can with what I have. Yes, that means that I may end up posting a song that you wouldn't normally listen to. That's part of the fun.

I can't use more than one song by any given band. The point of this meme is to give you a taste of new stuff, not to pirate whole CDs. If you like what you hear, you'll still need to buy it yourself. If two of you come up with identical descriptions, I have to find two bands that both fit, or use one song for both of you.

I can't make the song permanently available. Unless the song in question is already available on the band's website (in which case, I'll provide a link to their site instead of posting an mp3), I'll be taking the songs down in a few days, or posting them on a temporary host so that they'll expire after a few days.

And be forewarned: I tend to have fairly odd taste in music. Make of that what you will.

Antonio Carlos Showbeam

Still too busy for words. In the meantime, play with this neat little reflected bird. He's fun, I swear.