The Miata, almost exactly where I left it at the end of the homeless tour.
On the way over the hill to collect the Miata, John pointed to a place we had eaten at some unknown time ago. “Nobody seems to be able to keep that place open,” he lamented. We discussed why that might be, my theory being that although it is on a busy highway, it’s not near anything. When you’re on you way to somewhere, you don’t want to stop half-way, no matter how picturesque the destination. The place needs to be a destination in its own right to succeed here.
We discussed various gravity-enabled entertainment options – I started with a water slide but then figured that would be difficult in the current water-aware political environment. John suggested other lubricants for the slide (glycerine and KY). We went through some other ideas to make the place successful. When I suggested a bar with an attached hotel that forces patrons to spend the night if they drink too much (at an exorbitant rate), John wondered out loud just why it was we weren’t rich yet.
Looks nice out there, but I’m inside.
After one minor navigational snafette (In czech, snafuček) and a bit of an electrical infusion the Miata was purring like a 500-lb kitten, the top was down, and I was ready to drive. The first stop was supposed to be the DMV, but I wanted to run the alternator a little more before shutting things down. I’ll take care of that driver’s license thing later. I drove back south, up the winding road that connects San Jose with Santa Cruz, enjoying the light traffic, revving things a little higher than necessary to turn the alternator a bit faster. At the top I figured there must be enough electricity in the battery for one start, so I pulled out at the restaurant that always fails for a little lunch.
This is a nice place. I am indoors, with a good view of the patio where I would like to be on such a beautiful day, and the wooded hillsides beyond. There are no tables out there, however. Service is friendly and efficient without being oppressive. I am taking advantage of that peculiar North American tradition of free refills on ice tea, and the caffeine is starting to hit my system. My chicken sandwich was tasty. Soon, though, it will be time to go out and see if the car starts. It’s going to be very inconvenient if it doesn’t.
You mention “that peculiar North American tradition of free refills on ice tea.” There are parts of North America where that tradition doesn’t apply — such as New York City. I once ran up a tab of $16 or so when I kept ordering refills on a warm spring day.
Gahh! NYC sucks.
Occassionally, when I log in and see one comment in a new entry, it is Jer adding a follow up. When I saw there was one comment, I said, “Ah, jer is going to tell us if the car started or not.” BUt it is CA (not that it isn’t nice to hear from her), …so did the car start.
This entry is a tough one – on the one hand, I want to see the get poor quick category get more entries, so I think it shoulda been filed there; but on the other hand, I understand the need to keep the “bars visited” ticker going.
The car not starting probably would have warranted another episode, but in fact the little beast fired up just fine. Much more driving ensued, generally with some pretense of a goal, but without ever achieving anything.
I did not increment the bar count for Deer Creek despite the name, because I didn’t use it as a bar. It’s a tough distinction, but especially in the Czech Republic where every business serves beer — including the phone repair place where I got my phone unbuggered — so the criterion is whether I use the place as a bar. Sandwich and ice tea does not constitute bar usage.
I try to present specific ideas in detail in the Get-Poor-Quick section, but this could easily have gone there. No matter how you look at it, opening a bar where almost every patron must drive several miles home over a winding, heavily-trafficed highway does seem like a way to lose your shirt, no matter how you slice it. The reason I filed this one under Bars of the World is because it is the first in the subcategory “Mini Road Trip”.
I enjoyed the writeup on the Deer Creek Rest. Its indeed an out of the place location to have that operation. Perhaps the owner being of foreign extraction was duped into buying it..It happens. Whats unusual here is its also the location for some shots used in a UFO hoax. The Drone case , and perps Chad, one of 5, took some nice photos behind the restaurant.
Fortunately a viewer saw the photo location and immediately recognized it as los gatos and not Lake Tahoe. All the perps worked their magic along that stretch of the santa Cruz hwy and hwy 17,where the Restaurant is located.
Back to the Rest owner, FF, is creative as last year he cosponsored an acting theatre group to do performances there while people ate. The view is nice. The food has received mixed reviews.
He also has a website for catering, so the man appears to be trying.
I mentioned the ufo part as I know you are a sci fi writer, and probably ran across the story script at issaccaret.fortunecity.com
anyway enough rambling,
keep up the good and witty writing
Manny
could you please delete your comments about deer creek bar and grill
thank you
No.
[edit] There I was all happy with my reply when I realized the above comment is by a spambot. I sure can be pithy when arguing with machines.
But this is a fine, top-of-the-comments opportunity to mention that the place is once again under new ownership, this time as the Summit Roadhouse. They’re halfway there — they’re serving alcohol, now they just need hotel rooms for the drinkers not ready to navigate highway 17. They allegedly have live music too… Jer, we should meet there, corner the owners, and propose Polkacide as the house band and the glycerin slide as, well, the glycerin slide.