Giant LA Post

So I failed to microblog my LA trip through twitter, so I guess I should do a REAL blog post about it. You will notice how much food I devoured over these 8 days. My stomach will be full for days (but probably not, I like food too much ;p) I also failed to take many photos myself sooo this post will have other people's pictures :p pretend they are from my trip.

Day 1: Thursday the 11th
Got to the airport around 4 in the morning since my mom had an earlier flight than me. Found out my plane was going to be practically completely occupied by the Star Steppers, my high school's drill team. Arrived in LAX with a terribly full bladder. Had an awful time while the airplane drove along LAX's vast amounts of tarmac for like half an hour before getting to our gate.
Ross gave me some floooowers at baggage claim :). We then went on a walking quest for some crepe place that we just could not find. So we got some food at a place called Manny's. I got a hamburger but what I was REALLY excited about was the Horchata, which I'd never really tried before but it is soo delicious :Q. mmmm.

Next we just went back to nap. I was pretty beat from only having an hour nap before going to the airport at 4 in the morning. Then we took a trip to Hollywood and Highland. There were all these women dressed as Flo from Progressive for some event. There were so many the people who hired them must have run out of brown haired blue eyed white girls because there were black Flos and asian Flos too. We saw one of Ross's friends from his internship who is now interning with Jimmy Kimmel. After wandering around to some of the shops we went back to get dinner. We got a nice Italian dinner with Mark at a place called Spumoni's. It was especially awesome because they gave a complimentary tiramisu for dessert :)
THEN we went to the Upright Citizen's Brigade Theatre (first of 3 times) to see Chelsea Peretti's instructions on How to Live.
The best part of her intro was when she showed picture after picture of dogs eating ice cream. Here, let me help you pretend you were there:



Awesome! Now it's practically like you saw the performance too! Except without out the jokes and the other pictures and the other parts of the show.
Then there were guests. Guests like 2 LA comics for a panel of ass eating, another comic who pretended to be a gangsta, and then the dude from I Love You Beth Cooper and the new girl on SNL.
Then we were going to help Ross's friend shoot a part of a film buut we found out the place was like an hour away so that plan fell through.

Day 2: Friday the 12th
Ross had to work for a few hours in the afternoon so I wanted to go down to Union Station on the Metro to get a week pass for all the buses and subways and jazz. BUT La's Metro is fucking retarded. Turns out if you want a week pass, you have to ask for it a week before you want it to be valid. This is told no where on the website and is also an awful business plan. So we were at Union Station and couldn't do what we went there to do so I wanted to see what was around the station. And Ross wanted to find somewhere to eat lunch. We found this awesome little open air Mexican market.

That picture is actually from the market we were at, though I didn't see and dancers. There were musicians though which was annoying because if they played near you, even uninvited, they expected tips. We got some delicious authentic tacos and taquitos and HORCHATA! mm and headed back to Universal City.
After Ross got back from work we began watching Dumb & Dumber with Mark.

I hadn't ever watched it before because I was afraid it would be like Dumb & Dumberer which I saw in middle school and thought it was completely stupid and not funny. Buuut Dumb & Dumber surprised me, I thought it was really good.
In the middle of the movie we had to go catch our reservation at the happy hour at a fancy Japanese BBQ place down the street. It was the beginning of a festival of some sort so we got way cheap Filet Mignon and $5 sake. If you didn't know, at these types of places there's a grill in the middle of the table and they bring your meat out raw.
Since it was happy hour a bunch of other food and alcohol was way cheaper than usual. At first I was disappointed at the $15 minimum, but it was definitely worth it and at the end we got 2 s'mores dishes on the house!
We then went home to watch the rest of the movie. They put on Mr. Show after that but I fell sleep.

Day 3: Saturday the 13th
Woke up and got breakfast from a place called Crave. Ross got a giant breakfast burrito and I got eggs, hashbrowns, and pancakes.
We then went to check out the snazzy shopping center The Grove.


It is definitely what the Domain is trying to be. It was really busy though and there was some event going on in the center.


This dude was doin' some arts. We got free monster and izzi juice. There was also a really cute farmer's market there.
Next on the agenda was a fantastic trip to the gigantic museum The Getty.
The place is HUGE we were there for a long time and probably saw less than a fourth of the stuff there.We saw a cool exhibition on 12th-16thish illustrated books that ranged in subjects from arithmetic to astrology to psychology to secrets of rulers to magic to decorated horse bridles. I especially liked the books of secrets and the illustrations of the horse bridles were fantastic.
After being very cultured and looking at masterpieces of art and artifacts of culture, we decided to do a 180 and eat dinner at In 'n' Out since I'd never had before and it's got quite the hype around it.

That's an actual photo from our trip.

Day 4: Sunday the 14th
Today I insisted on going to the Museum of Contemporary Art. They didn't have any specific exhibitions going on, instead they were having a showcase of their first 30 years. It was pretty damn sweet. The exhibition was split into to 2 buildings and it was pretty much a recap of my art history class last semester. We saaaw

Pollock!

Rauschenburg!

Stella!

Flavin!

Basquait!

Koons!

Contemporary Artists!

This creepy Christmas installation!
And many more!
After that Ross got some coffee at Starbucks and I got some yummy froyo from Yogurtland in the Little Tokyo district.

That's what I look like when I eat Yogurt.

Cherry Blossoms in Little Tokyo! :p
Next we had to get going to a Curb Your Enthusiasm panel as a part of Paleyfest. Ross had been trying to get rid of the tickets so we could help Pierre Bernard with a video shoot, but it didn't happen so we went to the panel.

It was fun and I'm glad we went even though I don't really watch the show since I don't get HBO.



Day 5: Monday the 15th
Beach Day!
We went to Santa Monica Beach! It was very relaxing to sit in the sand and read and nap. We didn't swim because it was a bit cold, but we walked around on the beach and the pier. I bought some postcards and we headed back on the REALLY long bus ride. And we got Subway between transferring buses. We were so tired when we got back we crashed at like 10pm and slept through till the morning.









Day 6: Tuesday the 16th
Ross started his fulltime job Tuesday so I was on my own till 5. I had wanted to explore the city on my own and take some photos. I paid for the bus fare to the metro station and a day pass for the metro. But on my first train ride some super creepy old man (like really old man) was like, asking me if he could follow me to wherever I was going and take me to a movie before I left LA *puke*.
I was so uncomfortable I hopped off the train at the next stop, MacArthur Park and Westlake. This area was heavily Hispanic. There was a nice little park with a fountain.

After walking around the park and being kinda bored I walked around the streets there. The streets were lined with little shops selling all sorts of bags and stuff, it reminded me of the Vietnamese market in Prague.

That's from google streetview to give an idea. I didn't feel like I should take pictures, and I didn't want to test it for fear of conflict. I was getting cat called and shit and it was really uncomfortable. It really fucking sucks when someone(a female in most cases) can't even feel safe walking in public because of idiot cat callers. I decided to just go back to the apartment. On the way back some nice man gave up his seat to me (and also gave up his seat every time another woman got on the train). Next to the seat some guy started talking to me, not very annoying or creepy but just asking me about school and shit and he was my age so it wasn't creepy like the old dude. But the guy who gave up his seat to me called the kid out, asking him why he was so inquisitive. I think that really embarrassed him.
I got back and started making a hoooome cooked meal.
Theeeen Comedy Death Ray!

I was muy muy bueno. The Special guest was Russell Brand. (Ross thought it might be Conan but nooope)

Day 7: Wednesday the 17th
Shopping. Fancy Dinner! An Education, Spuds and Gilligan

Day 8: Thursday the 18th
Last Day :( Hollywood and Highland. Hot Dogs. Jimmy's Show. In n Out again.

Day 8.5: Flight home on Friday