{"id":14874,"date":"2017-05-10T20:24:55","date_gmt":"2017-05-11T01:24:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/graceuncensored.com\/WordPress\/?p=14874"},"modified":"2017-05-10T20:24:55","modified_gmt":"2017-05-11T01:24:55","slug":"the-king","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/graceuncensored.com\/WordPress\/travel\/the-king\/","title":{"rendered":"the king"},"content":{"rendered":"

We left new orleans on wendesday, march 15th. \u00a0the bathroom at the b&b in NoLa had many cool things on the wall, and this was my favorite because it included the isle of wight, where we’ve been. \u00a0plus i’d love to travel along the whole southern coast of england.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

we headed for memphis and graceland, another place \u00a0kevin wanted to visit when he was a starving college student, and he and his roommate brian sat on the curb across the street and ate peanut butter sandwichs, not able to afford the cost of admission.<\/p>\n

i had been to graceland quite a while ago, and i didn’t remember the neighborhood around it being so seedy, but it sure was now. \u00a0we stayed at a somewhat shady hotel that nonetheless had some good oatmeal for breakfast. \u00a0the breakfast room was full of\u00a0international travelers, and i just want somebody to explain to me why elvis continues to be such a world-wide attraction.<\/p>\n

in order to get the cheapest tickets, which weren’t cheap at all, we had to buy them online beforehand. \u00a0they were $38.75 apiece, and only included the house and the grounds. \u00a0all the other ticket combinations were at least twice as much, and the most expensive ones were $159.0<\/p>\n

i mean, come on here.<\/p>\n

on the morning of the 16th we headed down the block and across the street to the mansion, and were quickly stopped by a guard at the gatehouse. \u00a0we walked back across the street to the sprawling new elvis complex in order to go into to the house.<\/p>\n

There were so many buildings – shops and a museum or two, and c’mon here. We finally found an entrance, claimed our tix and watched a short video about elvis. \u00a0then we piled into a van that drove us back across the street.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

finally at the front door! \u00a0but we had to wait a few minutes to enter because there was another group in front of us who had just gone in. \u00a0this didn’t bode well to me, crowd-wise.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

oh dear. i was right about the crowding – this give you an idea of the mob scene inside. \u00a0instead of a tour guide, we were all given i-pads which had a pre-recorded by john stamos guide to everything.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

i looked over at kevin, who didn’t have his headphones on. \u00a0i felt bad because he hates crowds so much and this was such a crowded crowd.<\/p>\n

i took a bunch of photos but i know there must already be tons of photos of the place out there, so here are just a few.<\/p>\n

the ugly 70’s kitchen – note the big microwave there slightly to the right of center. \u00a0elvis was fascinated with getting the newest marvels that came out, and the microwave was one of them.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

here’s the receipt – in 1975, the microwave was $628! \u00a0crazy.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

i also thought it funny that all this stuff was encased in plastic. \u00a0as if the red wall phones were deeply important and valuable.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

the jungle room, with a waterfall on one wall.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

i know that many people have many TVs, but i was also amused that he had three of them all lined up.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

i took a picture of my ipad which listed\u00a0elvis’s favorite movies.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

ditto his TV shows. \u00a0i liked many of those same shows. \u00a0i feel that maybe elvis watched more TV than i do. can you think of any other person whose house you could tour and get this much information? \u00a0super important info like what he watches on tv.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

this was my favorite room, the pool room. \u00a0that’s pleated fabric covering the walls and the ceiling and i was mesmerized by it. \u00a0i want to get pleated fabric for our pool room! \u00a0maybe that’ll be a winter project.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

naturally, the couch matches the walls and ceiling.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

and this is the ugliest room on the tour – it’s his manager’s office, maybe? \u00a0headquarters. \u00a0this was a building off of the main house.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

funny. \u00a0i’d like to know how much that battery-powered tv cost back then.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

even though i was there about 25 years ago, i’m pretty sure that some of his outfits were on display then. \u00a0they’re not now; instead, they’re housed in one of the elvis museums. \u00a0there were all kinds of photos and letters hanging on the walls down a long corridor, most of them not so interesting.<\/p>\n

but i thought this was funny – it’s written by hedda hopper, who was a hollywood gossip columnist. \u00a0there’s lots of crazily interesting info about her on wikipedia; this letter was penned by hopper just five years before she died, at the age of 80.<\/p>\n

in case you can’t read it, the last paragraph says “you will be amazed t know that i am now doing the Twist – not as well as you do, but i am doing it. \u00a0it is the best exercise I’ve found. \u00a0I have taken one inch off my waist and two off my fanny. \u00a0now i know how you keep so thin.”<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

at the end of the tour was elvis’s grave, along with his mother and father’s, and grandmother’s.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

we walked to the driveway where we were to get on a bus back to the ticket booth, because we couldn’t just walk down the driveway and out to our car at the hotel, which we could see from where we stood. \u00a0but there was no bus anywhere, so we waited for about a half hour on this very chilly march day.<\/p>\n

and that’s rather anticlimactic ending to our trip.<\/p>\n

it was very good to get home. \u00a0chester was so happy to see us that he actually slept right next to me for a while.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

ok then,<\/p>\n

mrs. g.h.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We left new orleans on wendesday, march 15th. \u00a0the bathroom at the b&b in NoLa had many cool things on the wall, and this was my favorite because it included the isle of wight, where we’ve been. \u00a0plus i’d love to travel along the whole southern coast of england. we headed for memphis and graceland, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[295],"tags":[406,407,408],"class_list":["post-14874","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-travel","tag-elvis-presley","tag-graceland","tag-hedda-hopper"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6JLYy-3RU","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/graceuncensored.com\/WordPress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14874","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/graceuncensored.com\/WordPress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/graceuncensored.com\/WordPress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/graceuncensored.com\/WordPress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/graceuncensored.com\/WordPress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14874"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/graceuncensored.com\/WordPress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14874\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14896,"href":"https:\/\/graceuncensored.com\/WordPress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14874\/revisions\/14896"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/graceuncensored.com\/WordPress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14874"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/graceuncensored.com\/WordPress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14874"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/graceuncensored.com\/WordPress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14874"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}