According to box-office estimates from Box Office Mojo, Pixar's "Cars" movie was No. 1 for the second consecutive weekend, with total estimated grosses of $31.2 million.

It beat out stiff competition from "Nacho Libre" ($27.5 million) and "Fast and Furious 3" ($24 million).

"Cars" also has soared past the $100 million mark in total grosses and is near $120 million already. And it hasn't even opened wide in many foreign markets. 

"Cars" seems to have strong legs. During Monday-through-Thursday, which is a slow part of the week, it was averaging a robust $5 million to $6 million a day. Upcoming Pixar reported earlier that "Cars'" weekday averages were more than double Pixar's previous film, "The Incredibles."

So it seems that dire predictions about "Cars" being a flop were premature, to say the least. 

Nita and John Berryhill of Globe, Ariz., are now the new owners of the Motel Safari on Route 66 in Tucumcari, N.M., reports the Quay County Sun.

At Motel Safari, “We’re going to try and keep all the old 50s and 60s flavor and all the furniture,” said Nita, pointing to a decorative room divider and chair from the era.

Nita said she will be commuting for several months to oversee renovations. Her husband, a shop foreman and master mechanic at an automotive shop, will work in Globe until the hotel is ready for the couple to live, she said. 

Nita also is well-experienced in the motel business.

“I grew up in a motel,” she said. “I was raised by my grandparents and they had a motel.

In fact, she continued to operate the El Ray Motel on Arizona Highway 60 East after her grandparents died in 1995. She sold the motel a year ago. But not long after, she discovered she wanted to get back in the hospitality business.

…

“I looked at the business in the town and the fact that the big hotels were here meant that there was business. So in that sense, I thought it was favorable,” Nita Berryhill said.

“I don’t see them as competition because the people who stay in those hotels are not here to see Route 66. They’re really not competition. People traveling along Route 66 want to to stay in the small family-owned motels,” she said.

Here's a vintage postcard of the Safari, complete with its camel-rider sign. Here's a more-recent photo.

There is an O'Neill's Pub being built on Central Avenue, aka Route 66, in Albuquerque. Ordinarily, this wouldn't be humongous news, as the Duke City's main drag is regularly a hustle and bustle of business activity.

But Chantal Foster of the Duke City Fix blog says it's a lot more significant than that. I'll let her explain:

I was never a cult-like groupie of the old O'Neill's, but I'm a big fan of urban pioneers and that's exactly what Rob O'Neill has become. He'd probably think it's hokey that I'm calling him a pioneer, but his decision to move out of Nob Hill, east to a more transitional 'hood is significant. I'd even wager to say it's a pivotal moment in the resurgence of East Central Ave.

Don't get me wrong, it's still rather run-down and racy in that part of town across from the derelict De Anza Motor Lodge, but something's afoot. Not only did Rob O'Neill intentionally move to what some cynics (you know who you are) call the ghetto, but he also did something more symbolic.

The new O'Neill's faces the street.

Facing Central Avenue in this part of town is no small gesture.

Some of the most successful restaurants and bars east of Nob Hill have intentionally turned their backs on old Route 66. Think of places like Orchid Thai and Martini Grille, both of which have oriented their entrances to the parking lot behind the building. The only thing visible from Route 66 are boarded-up windows.

Not for long.

I'm betting that the risk will turn into a big fat "I told you so" for pioneers like O'Neill. And shuttering a business to our city's main street will eventually seem as strange in Albuquerque as Kentucky bluegrass does today.