Day 6: Hey Chimpy, no more mini golf

  Lake George, New York
Friday, June 18, 2004

We got up Friday and thought, what do we do today? There were a few mini golf courses that hadn't been open when we'd gone by earlier in the week. So we decided to play some mini golf, try to find me some new sneakers at one of the outlet stores, and check to see what time the Polynesian dancers were appearing at the Tiki Lounge. But first, we needed a good breakfast.

There was a place called the Mount Prospect Diner, which looked promising. It was housed in one of those old silver diner cars and attached to a big building where I guess they served the dinner crowd. Inside we grabbed the only free booth and our waitress arrived shortly. She was old and surly. I wondered why waitresses in this area were so rude, but Michelle defended the woman arguing that she was dense and walking in a fog. Not sure how much of a defense that was, but Michelle was cutting her a lot of slack. The waitress seemed nice enough to the regular customers, but was brusque with us.

I ordered my standard breakfast of eggs and home fries. But they were more expensive than the places we'd eaten, and I only ordered one egg due to its cost. When eating at a diner, I expect food to be good and inexpensive. This place seemed expensive for a diner. The food was pretty good, but not any better than the other places where I'd had more food for less money.

The one really cool thing, beside it being a diner car with a counter, was that there were jukeboxes at every table. Even the counter had jukeboxes every couple of seats. There were lots of song choices, which Tristan and I flipped through as Michelle took photos of the ladies bathroom. Yes folks, always bring your camera with you when you eat as you can capture photos of the food (my strategy) or the bathroom décor (Michelle's strategy).

We went from the diner to Pirates Cove mini golf course in a neighboring town. There were two eighteen hole courses. We decided to do all thirty-six holes. When the day started, it was overcast and seemed like rain. But as we walked onto the green at Pirates Cove, it was hot. Tristan and I were wearing long pants, which was a really bad idea, especially since there was no shade on the greens and the temperature kept getting hotter. We were semi-miserable by the end of our golfing and I wondered how hot we had to be to get diagnosed with heat stroke.

The other Pirates Cove was in Lake George. There were only 18 holes at this one, but there were a lot more pirate displays. There were mannequins of pirates doing everything imaginable, well almost everything. This course had some shade, which made the slight breeze feel really nice.

We were mini golf fiends today. As if the 54 holes we'd already played weren't enough, we went to Goony Golf to enjoy the colorful plaster characters. This is one fun mini golf course, and we wished there were one in our area. We would be there every week.

After our mini golfing extravaganza, we stopped at the Tiki Lounge to see what time the Polynesian dancers were going on. They also have an Elvis show but only in July and August. The Tiki Lounge was the big event we had saved for the end of the week. We were horrified to find out that the Polynesian dancers also perform only in July and August. Noooooooo!!! They had comedians during June, but that is no replacement for Polynesian dancing.

We left with our heads hanging, wondering what to do to fill our night. What could ever replace the Tiki Lounge Polynesian dancer show? Michelle suggested more mini golf at which point Tristan and I realized we could not endure even one more hole of mini golfed out. No more, please!!

We headed back to the cabin, since it was still hot out. As we sat in the cabin, we realized that the town had started to get a lot busier, and so had the hotel. At the beginning of the week, the hotel was nearly empty but now it seemed to be filling up. We'd noticed more people in town and more traffic every day.

We started watching people walking or driving by our cabin. A van full of 30 year old frat guys pulled up outside. Uh oh, not what you want to see next door to you. Luckily the cabin had a bit of space between it and any other buildings. But the frat boys walked around, were loud, and of course were drinking beer. Oddly enough, they ended up being fairly quiet. Perhaps they all passed out before they could shout, "woooooo."

There was also a kind of creepy guy wandering around the parking lot. He wore a lime green button up shirt, had a red cravat (!?!), glasses, and a dry look pompadour. He looked quite a bit like the cartoon Fred from Scooby Doo. Or probably more accurately, he looked like a cross between Fred and Velma. Was he going for that look? Did he know he looked strange? Did he look hip in his native environment? What the hell?

When it was cooler, we went to Capri Pizzeria. While they made our pizza, we went in the arcade next door. Tristan and Michelle shot targets in an old west saloon type scene. Then Michelle tried the Adams Family Electric Shock Game. The point of the game is to electrocute yourself. I'm serious. You grab two metal posts and as the voltage increases, you try to hold on, maintaining the electrical connection. There are lights that go up the machine to the bulb in Uncle Fester's mouth. Hold on long enough, and all the bulbs light up. Yes, you are paying to be electrified! I can't believe anyone was allowed to produce that game. I can't believe Michelle played it.

Michelle grabbed the posts and Tristan hit the high power level so she'd get maximum voltage. As the bulbs lit up, she looked fairly calm. I asked if it hurt, and she replied yes, as if I was an idiot. As the voltage increased, she started making faces. I was impressed that she was still hanging on and started to think she'd beat the machine. Suddenly she yelped and jumped backwards, breaking the connection. Oh the fun we have with electricity.

We got our pizza and took it back to the cabin. It was just as tasty as the one we'd had earlier in the week. Oh Capri Pizzeria, we love you! Later on, we went back to A&W to get some more soft serve. We don't have an A&W in our town, plus we were impressed with the 60 flavors of soft serve.

At night we relaxed in the cabin, although at one point someone tried to get into our cabin. We had the door open, letting the cool air in through the screen door. A guy from another room tried to walk in, and then realized he was at the wrong door. What the hell? Now the thing that's really odd is that he had a room, not in a singularly-contained, on-it's-own, not-attached-to-any-other-part-of-the-hotel cabin like we did. How could he not realize that he was at a cabin door, not a hotel room? Either he was nuts, really drunk, or really, really stupid. I wondered if idiot boy would be back and slept the sleep of fear that night.