you MUST be kidding me...

Oak Glen.

It's this place about an hour past riverside, it's one of those places where they have like, a bunch of dirt feilds everywhere and then some guy got this tight idea to put grass over one of the dirt fields, gifting the community with a soccer field/football field/place to walk your HORSE in small circles, which is no big deal cause in Oak Glen everyone who is anyone owns a horse...I mean really, there are a lot of horses over there..

Oak Glen has an apple orchard, its a little reserved plot of land where they do things like civil war reenactments and uh..apple growing...

Well around october [which i assume to be like, prime apple picking season or something] Oak Glen opens its orchards to the public, charging around 6 dollars a bag. In short you pay to go and pick your own produce.

Now what mostly perplexes me is, while it is cheaper to pick your own apples, why do it? I mean, the apples that you can actually reach are about half the size of my fist, keep in mind i have remarkably small hands, and the apples you can't reach, which are the only ones worth actually picking, are WAYYYY at the tiptop of the trees, and even if you can manage to get one down chances are a bird or worm, or both, have gotten to it long before you.

There is one trick to apple picking though. I don't know the exact name of it, but its a little basket-thing with claws at the top of it, this basket-thing is attatched to a long pole, and it makes the whole "go for the apples at the tiptop" thing alot eaiser..alot easier

Now just because you have this apple-picking tool, does not mean your actually going to benefit from it. Like i said, most apples at the top, while bigger and riper, have been attacked by said birds and worms and just arn't generally something you'd want to consume.

The highlight of my day at Oak Glen was as following...

[I had the pole-claw-apple picker-thing]

"Mom, i'm gonna go give this to someone since were leaving"

"noooo, go out into the middle of the field and drop it!"

this was a brilliant idea. People actually ran towards its, like, they flocked to it.

If it weren't for the cute little asian girl who got to it first, i'm pretty confident there would have been some bloodied lips and black eyes involved.

survival of the fittest..i think not

survival of the best equipped....maybe...but only if you're willing to look past the worms...

haunted california (part 2)

I know i've already talked about spooks, but california has many notorious haunted-hot spots and with a recent encounter of yet another spook i can't help but fill you in.

In the early 1900's Riverside California was home to thee California State Asylum for the Insane. Pretty intense. The Asylum existed for around 50 years, it was shut down in the mid 1950's and turned into what is now know as California Baptist University. 

When the Asylum was in use the staff would lock all windows and doors at night and leave the Asylum through underground catacombs, series of underground tunnels and passageways. It is rumored that when patients "misbehaved" they would be taken down into the catacombs and punished. The punishments given to the mentally insane in the 1900's are the equivalent of modern day torture, bad enough to send shivers down even Mr. McCains back.

Anyways.

The rare and few California Baptist University students who have risked suspension and explored the supposedly haunted catacombs beneath their campus have bone chilling stories to tell, and so of course I had to do a little exploring of my own. [how  John Cusack* of me...]

Adventure beings with a tour of CBU campus. My friend Daniel points out an eerie stairway leading down to an old wooden door on the side of one of the old asylum buildings.

"There's one of the entrances to the catacombs" he says

"oooohhh lets see if its unlock" I insist, well knowing that with a little research this would be my blog topic for the week

Hesitantly he agrees and in a train me, Daniel, Janelle and Devron take the narrow steps down to the ultra-spooky door. 

"Do you think it'll be unlocked?" I ask as we all stare at the door

Without a reply coming from any lips I decide to brave-heart it and turn the handle, I mean honestly, the worst that could happen is like, a huge rat being on the other side of the door...or like, a ghost...but we didn't really consider the latter.

"ohhh mannnn its totally unlocked, lets go in!" I have no idea where this bravery/complete disregard for common sense-is coming from, but its there none the less, and I convince the rest of my group to follow me into the PITCH BLACK FRIKKIN CATACOMB.

Once the door was shut, we became a pretty uniformed group, it's not my belief that fear brings out the organization in everyone.

Janelle has two cellphones stretched out infront of her, leading or train with the little light that they give off, Devron is holding tight on to Janelles shoulders, Daniel has one hand on cellphone and one hand pulling me through the narrow passageways. At the point of actual "Hey lets walk really far away from our only exist and explore this incredibly scary place" I lost all nerve. 

We walk through an honest to God MAZE of underground passageways light by not more then four cellphones and come to a door. At this point I notice Daniel being a little more on edge. 

JOAIW@%$#^FWIFBL

we heard a weird sound, that was the best impression of it I can give...

It sounded like a cross between a bump and scuffle and it scared me half out of my skin and we turned and ran.

Once were out of the death-trap-catacomb-of-doom Daniel proceeds to actually fill us in on the history behind the catacombs, which up to this point neither me nor Janelle knew of. He ends his tale with "and every time you reach that door you hear the knocking of the tortured" It sounds like a typical ghost story, but after just experiencing it, it's enough to scare your socks right off you...(haha...)

Okay so of course, being completely illogical teenagers seeking some entertainment and thrill in life, we decided that it'd be a brilliant idea to go back down and test the theory of the "knock of the tortured" because we had an argument in the group of wether it sounded like a knock or a rat or something else that goes bump in the night.

Organized in the same line up with start our walk back through the catacombs, what I now assumed to be like, my last few moments of life.

Before the door thats allegedly haunted, theres a turn. You don't see the door untill you turn the corner, and at this point, I don't want to see the door. Daniel is litterly dragging me down the hallways, and at this last turn I put my foot down and refuse to turn the corner. 

Unfortunately, Daniel's bigger then me and so it pretty much came down to "see the door" or "have my arm ripped out of it's socket" 

As a turn the corner were all completely silent. Hands are grabbing who ever they an reach, and were just about ready to move closer to the door.

knock knock.

O MY GOD. I've never ran so fast in heels in my ENTIRE LIFE.

I don't know if I believe in ghosts but I believe in that knock.

*1408 reference...its a stephen king novel...and movie!

p.s. This is the first blog to actually meet the 800 word request.

yay.

Let us grow old.

Coffee shops. It matters where your drinking, and what your drinking. California subculture is brutal. With starbucks on every corner, and hundreds of independently owned coffee shops you have to know what you want in life. This may sound slightly ridiculous but coffee/tea drinkers are not to be taken lightly. 

I myself REQUIRE coffee every day, or i cease to function. As of lately i've also joined with up on the tea band wagon, consuming over 70 ounces of iced tea a day, preferably Jasmine Dragon Pheonix Pearl. Yeah. It's not a joke.

Starbucks, corporate.

Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf, less corporate, still a chain. (best tea by far)

It's a Grind, long beach based coffee shop, frequented by mid 30's to upper 40's

Portfolio, ultra-hip points for ever cup of black coffee you drink here

Hot Java, one step below the ultra-hip scene of Portfolio, best mochas around.

Where you drink, says alot about a person.

I spent a year as a barista at a local based chain coffee shop, what a person drink says a lot about them. By the end of my time working as a barista i was able to guess a persons drink before they ordered. Effective 85% of the time.

Black Coffee, addicted to either coffee, or wanting to be cool (you can tell by wether or not their nose scrunches up when they take a sip)

Coffee w/ tons of sugar and cream, either addicted to sugar and added fats or just can't handle it black, usually a more honest coffee drinker.

Tea, laid back and cheap

cappuccino, the elitist-snob of all coffee drinkers, make sure to make it dry if they ask for dry, and wet if they ask for wet, because they WILL know. They always know.

blended mocha, baby steps. The gate-way drink. you know...

I mean, i could analyze every drink on the menu, but like, i wont. Cause that would just get tedious. But honestly, what you drink says alot about you, how much your willing to pay, how much you want, how strong or weak, flavored or black, all speaks to character. Most the time at least.

(sorry this is so short, i don't know what else there is to say about coffee, leave a comment and ill make it longer or something...)

Haunted California

For those visiting the west cost, especially southern California area there are always those, must see spots, attracting tourists and locals alike. For me, one of those places has always been the Queen Mary. 

I have early memories touring the Queen Mary as a girl scout, and i have older memories climbing flights of stairs in heels looking for the part of the ship i was supposed to be experience winter formal at. 

I've spent time stalking the ship with friends in a last ditch effort to find a bathroom, and I've even spent a night watching scary movies in the back of my toyota tacoma in the Queen Marys parking lot.

The Queen Mary has over 60 years under her belt, most of which she spent sailing cross the Atlantic Ocean as a passenger ship. But it wasn't always that the Queen Mary sailed freely, for the entirety of World War II the Queen Mary was used as a floating hospital and supply ship, over that course of time the Queen Mary became the death site of nearly 50 people.

After her retirement of 1967, the Queen Mary was moved to Long Beach, CA, and turned into a hotel and museum, many tours are offered but the the most popular is based around the myths and facts that lead to the popular opinion of the Queen Mary being Haunted.

 The following is a very true story:

Me, and a few friends were frantically searching the hallways of the Queen Mary for  a bathroom. It was really close, like, me, along with two other girls almost like, pissed out pants. 

Well, we walk down a longggggg hall, and end up in a room resembling a chamber of doom. In the center of the room there is a huge staircase, going up forever and ever, and going down even further. The walls are all different doors, one of which being a bathroom. Hurray.

Okay so, this brings us to, the "the Queen Mary is totally haunted" part of the story.

While Girl A and Girl B are still in the bathroom, i exit and start talking to Boy A. Boy A and i decided to kinda explore the really weird room were in.

Well we begin reading door plaques and we come across the creepiest name a door could ever have. "The Immortal Chaplains Ward" well were just like, dang, the Queen Mary is hanuted, and were like, staring the office door of like, the head ghost or something. Well it goes like this,

"Open it, come on, i dare you!"

"No way, touch it, i double dog dare you!"

"Noooo way, you touch it"

well, we get closer and closer to the door, weary of our lives being at stake, and as we nearrrrr the door, adrenalin rushing, THE DOOR HANDEL  SHAKES!

we ran.

Anyways, i'm not the only one who believes the Queen M. is haunted. 

Charlyn Keating Chisholm, a women who studies the paranormal, has written many articles and done loads of research proving her theories of ghost encounters that have taken place on the ship.

Is the Queen Mary hantued? If you plan on trying to figure it out i suggest you avoid the tour, which costs around 30$ and is full of gaudy effects, and go straight for you own adventure, just pretend your staying at the hotel and if it all comes down to it, say you got lost looking for the bathroom. And then run.