Palm Springs Weekend

Palm Springs, where white people go to die.















Seriously, have you ever been to Palm Springs? It's got to be one of the most bizarre places on earth. It's full of death-defying Caucasian retirees in pastel-coloured lightweight cotton casuals.

Creepy.

I'll admit we were staying in the heart of country-club-ville but you get the impression that there is literally nothing but gated communities, sprinklers and golf carts. Where are all the normal people who service this lifestyle? Where are the children, the cleaners, the huddled masses?

My sense of the surreal was not helped by the fact that the house we stayed in had piped music playing in every room all the time. Frank Sinatra and the like. For the first few hours as that first margarita sank in it was all rather retro and hip. Then it started to get annoying, and I could only find seven of the no doubt eight radio controls (literally mounted next to the light switch in every room).

Bing Crosby continued to serenade me.

But I could lie in bed and look out at the snow covered mountains, see the grapefruit and lemon trees outside my bedroom window and watch my gently sleeping child.

While LK golfed.















(I think this photo is upside down but I can't be arsed to fix it.)

It sounds fun, but I was literally terrified of falling asleep in case Anna woke and somehow found her way unsupervised to the pool, with which she was obsessed.

My weekend went like this:

"Can we go swimming?"
"No, sorry love it's too cold"
"Why?"
"Because it's not a heated pool"
"Why?"
"Because it's usually too hot here to have to heat it"
"Why?"
"Because this is the desert?"
"Why"
"------"
"Can we go swimming"
"No Mummy has to get drunk now"
"Why"
"Because I said so"
"Why"
"Because this is the desert"
"Can we put our swimsuits on and, and, and, go in the swimming pool" - nice change of tack there with the addition of 'can we put our swimsuits on' - but no dear, it's still a no.
"Why"
"-----"

- Pause of maybe 3 nanoseconds -

"Can we go swimming in the, swimming pool"

Poor thing. Fortunately there was a bathtub the size of a small Santa Barbara apartment. Where we swam.

A lot.



















Apart from the terror of toddler-drowning and 10am cocktails we had a lovely time. We were there to see the Pacific Coast Open (more on that later), the late-night golf cart rides through the sprinklers on the 9th, 10th & 11th holes were just gravy.

The truly terrifying thing about Palm Springs is that's where LK sees us in 40 years time. Him golfing every day and me no doubt on my 4th Bloody Mary by 10am, bracing myself for another browse through the Coldwater Creek catalog.

Yikes.