Happy 35th Birthday Wade! I will share the story about this later in the blog.
We left Charlotte early Thursday morning to get out here. We got up around 4:45 and left the house about 5 til 6:00 which was perfect. Wade swung me through the drive thru at the Lizzard’s Thicket that opened the day before across the street from our sub-division to get me some yummy cheese grits. I told him I had to get my daily corn intake. He said 'corn?!?!' in the way only he can. The flight from Charlotte to Dallas was uneventful, but the flight from Dallas to Los Angeles had some of those ‘character building’ moments in it I introduced in the previous entry. Our flight to Dallas was early, but the gate was not open, making us late for our very quick 50 minute layover. We hustled off of the plane (which we were sitting about on the last row on), got on the train, got OFF the train at the wrong spot and then RAN close to a half a mile down the concourse to our plane – not easy to do carrying all of our luggage for the week. We got to the gate just in time! There was one person behind us who was boarding. She came off of the same Charlotte flight as us.
We got settled in our seats after we got someones luggage out of our seat that belongd to some random man and after we had to stow our luggage somewhere in a land far far away from our seats. We did our cool down and stretches from our recent jog in our seats – just kidding. It was kind of hot, because they had the air turned off (maybe because we just ran ½ a mile). It may have had something to do with the fact that the right engine was not working (we overheard a stewardess communicating this to the captain over the phone – why the captain would not know this, I am not really sure, but clearly, he didn’t). the smell of jet fuel was over whelming in the plane. It was awful. I was not having very happy thoughts at that moment. We sat for about 30 minutes, then go back to the gate to get the engine fixed, sat for about 45 minutes – manually started the engine – pull back out. Sat for about 45 minutes, captain announces another issue so pull back to gate – sat for about 20 minutes – captain says we can get off the plane if we want to – sit for 5 minutes – captain says ‘we have done a poor job keeping up with who has gotten off the plane, so we don’t know who is currently on the plane, so we are going to have to ask everyone to de-board (mind you at this time we should have been getting close to our decent to LA if we had left on time. So needless to say we decided it was best to go ahead and get another flight with a competent pilot on a working airplane (after Wade hit his head on the TV’s on the way off of the plane), so we did – and we finally got to LA!
Stuck in Dallas, ready to GO!
We were so excited to finally get here. We took a shuttle to the enterprise rental car location which was a great experience. We got a standard sized car for really cheap thanks to Wade’s thrifty eye. They allowed for us to choose which mid-sized car we wanted (they didn’t seem to want to give us the upgrade to the convertible for free - darn!). They said, you can have this two door grand prix (ehh no), this Saturn (ummm nope) or this Nissan cube (ding, ding, ding ding!!!). I said, we’ll take it! Wade looked at me like I had 14 heads. He later said ‘you have me driving this baby poop green shoe looking thing with wheels’. Yup honey – sure did! Why not get the car closer to the size of an SUV, with fantastic gas milage, tons of interior room, tons of window space to look out for the same price as a grand prix? Yes – it is a super ugly car – but we were in LA! We would be driving down the street and I could not figure out why people were starring at us, then I remembered ‘ah yes, we are in a baby poop green roller skate car.’ Fun times! 10 gallon tank – 30 mpg!
The baby poop green Nissan Cube - so funny!
We arrived a the bed and breakfast we were staying in, The Inn at Playa Del Rey, to find out they upgraded our room to a marina view room with a fireplace for free! They said they like to do that to be nice and see people’s reaction. Our room was beautiful and the bed was so comfortable. We could see the Hollywood Hills sign from our bed! How cool is that! The inn is located on the south side of Santa Monica. The fireplace was gas with a switch, which we took advantage of. The view was beautiful. We arrived in enough time to enjoy the wine and cheese they offer in the afternoons. They had some sort of warm broccoli cheese garlic dip and crackers which was very yummy. http://www.innatplayadelrey.com/
Our fantastic Inn
The view from the room
One side of the room
Homemade cookies and a sweet note awaited us on our first night
The sign and me
Friday we got up bright and early to for Wade to enjoy part of my birthday present to him – tickets to the championship tour of Dodger Stadium. He was one happy young man Friday morning.
I think this should be a part of the Dodgers marketing materials
Wade waited 35 long years to take this picture
Hanging out in the Dodgers dugout
The tour guide said this should be our Christmas card picture and we can photoshop the doggies into it.
They hand paint the logo on the field. It was a very interesting process to watch
After the tour we went to eat at the Original Pantry Café which has been open since 1924, and never closed. It is open 24 hours a day. They do not even have locks on the door like they do at waffle house. They bring our homemade coleslaw and bread to every table. The power did go out while we were eating there, but the staff did not miss a beat with their gas stoves. They kept on truckin' like nothing was wrong.
I wonder how many famous people have eaten here
Kind of like Waffle House
The checkout area. They only take cash - no checks or cards
Jewelry district and Chinatown/Little Mexico/Little Italy was next on the list. We got me a cheap dodger blue shirt from one of the vendors for $5. We then took some time to drive up to Griffith Park and hike a little up Mount Hollywood. We checked out the observatory while we were up there.
A building located right outside of the jewlery district. We saw lots of jewel traders moving about.
This is the largest park in all of the US. It is larger than Yellow Stone. It was given to the city by a wealthy land owner. 4,200 acres of land (and lots of dirt, I tell you what!!) Griffith Park is where a lot of movies are filmed. It is where the original Batman bat cave is.
This is the observatory. It is free and open to the public every day but Monday's. It is beautiful on the inside with Italian inspired painted walls, ceilings and decor.
This is a pendulum given to the United States by Frenchman Jean Foucault. He was proving that the earth tilts on its axis about every 10 minutes. We watched it happen! The big ball swings back and forth. It is anchored to the ceiling by a magnet so it cannot move. Towards the bottom of the photo you can see a line of black things lined up. This bar too is bolted down. The ball will swing back and forth and every 10 minutes or so it will knock down on of the black things with this pointy tip at the bottom of the ball. It takes approximately 42 hours for a complete axis tilt to occur. You learn something new every day!
You can see the Hollywood sign behind us
This is actually an old real estate sign. It originally stated Hollywood Land, but the "Land" fell down. They The Hollywood piece was begining to fall down in the 40's, so they reacreated it with strong Australian materials, and here she stands today!
Me and my good buddy Jimmy Dean. A rebel without a cause....
We just thought this was funny. This HUGE tripod for this tiny camera.
By this time, we had to head back through the crazy LA traffic to get back to the first dodgers game. They were playing the Colorado Rockies (who we just saw play in Denver last week) for the Western division championship. The game was a nail biter, that the Dodgers ended up losing, but of course, not before some more character building moments!
I was DETERMINED, I mean d-e-t-e-r-m-i-n-e-d to get Wade a ball while we were there. For those of you who know me really well, you know what that means! For batting practice they open up center field and put up PVC piped fences with the plastic netting like you see at a concert or parade or something. It is a major free for all mosh pit type thing with all of these grown men throwing themselves around to try and get a ball…
Some of the people in the Mosh pit
I managed to elbow my way up to the front so I could stand right up against the fence. Ball after ball after ball kept going to other people. Wade almost got one, but it popped out of his hand as he was getting pushed around. I had my hands clasped with anticipation of a ball getting in my hands. Wade jokes that you could see the whites of my knuckles. I heard the crack of the bat, looked up and saw a ball coming in my direction. I thought this is it!!! I am going to get a ball!!! Well 10 other grown men around me had the same thought because they all started pushing, which threw me off balance – which threw me into the fence, knocking it, myself and 10 other people to the ground with the fence onto the warning track as my sunglasses flew to the field. We all got up and by this time I was REALLY frustrated and had some tears forming in my eyes, because I wanted that ball so bad, batting practice was ending, and now I had knocked a fence over and scrapped up my forearm and knee. I am not sure Wade quite knew what to do with me at that moment. A couple of balls were hit not to us, and I knew our fate was not to get a ball…. UNTIL - - - Rogers, #48 for the Rockies held his hand out to me like ‘hold on a second’. A couple of balls came his way that he was holding on to. He walked over and looked at me with a tossing motion. I mouthed “I CAN’T CATCH IT!” so he looked at Wade and tossed it to him, and so we finally got our coveted ball.
A little dirt never hurt anyone :)
That night at the ball game they honored Tommy LaSorda for 60 years with the Dodgers. That is pretty amazing. We all got small replicas of his hall of fame plaque. At the end of the game they opened up center field to all of the fans to come down and watch a great fireworks show that was set to different California themed songs.
Opening up center field for the fireworks show
We got home late that night after a great first day in Cali. Day two started off with another delicious breakfast from the Inn. We packed up our day pack and our little cube car :) to go on this great LA in a day tour put together by the Inn. The first stop was Vinice Beach. Wade made some sufer dude mad when he whipped the baby poop green cube into a parking spot that this guy really wanted. We began our walk down Vinice beach and made a few stops along the way....
Vinice Beach Walkway
Wade at Muscle Beach
Doing some excercises at Muscle Beach
On the beach. If you look behind us you can see the mountains.
It was a beautiful day in Sunny California!
Wade's new BFF. This guy was not so happy I took this picture. He wanted some money for it. Yikes. We knew at that point it was time to leave and to head to our next stop on the LA for a day tour.
Another picture of muscle beach. This is on the new Travelers insurance commercial.
We were the totally paparatzi in our baby poop green cube. We saw all these people with cameras surrounding this restaurant and Wade said "I wonder who that is" and whipped into a parking spot. Do you know who this is??
Yup, Jon Gosslin. I managed to elbow my way up to the front of the crowd to get a good gander. He was eating across the street from the famous cedar sinai hospital. I had a great idea that Wade cold 'just break my arm real quick' so we could go into the hospital and see if we could see any famous people. Luckily, even though it was a stupid idea, Wader knew I was kidding. See below for picture of "Wader"
Cedar Sinai
A trip would not be complete with a trip to Pinkberry. They eat pinkberry on one of the guilty pleasure shows I watch, The Hills. The below picture is a shout out to all my Hills loving girlfriends, especially Rachel, Tinsley and Elizabeth....
Pinkberry with oreos and strawberries. If you are ever in LA, you must have some of this. Best ice cream ever!
Sunset Blvd was next on the tour. We saw the Kodak Theater, Grauman's Chinese Theater, lots of ..... interesting people and of course the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
This picture is kind of like Where's Waldo? But more like Where's Freddie Krueger
Elmo was not very nice. As we were taking this picture he told me good luck to being married to Wade because he looked like a handful. It was actually quite creepy. Reminded me Miranda in the Sandwich episode of SATC.
Grauman's
Got to hold hands with Clint Eastwood ;)
Wade hanging with Snoop double g
Morgan Freeman's star
Wade with the LA Dodgers Star. I think I sar tears in his eyes when he saw this star... such a happy little man.
We met a local guy who was on the phone talking wth his roommate about the UGA score. We were shocked, so we started to talk to him about SEC football. He said, everyone loves SEC football and on any given Fall Saturday, you can find fans for whatever team you cheer for. He said there are sports bars all up and down Sunset Blvd specific to each SEC team. So there is a specific sports bar where all the Auburn fans go every Saturday to watch the game. We thought that was pretty cool.
By this time, we needed to pack up and head back to Dodger Stadium. It was Star Wars night. I thought this little guy was so cute and I wanted to take my picture with him. I thought it was a robot, so I walked right up to the face part and looked real hard on the inside and didn't say a word. It was actually a 3 year old kid who didn't like me being in his face too much and was trying to take this picture as little man was walking away -hence the weird pose.
The trip for Wade would not have been complete with out having a Dodger Dog! (Personally - I just stuck with the nachos :)
This was the night that the Dodgers CLINCHED the West. Wade could not believe he was there to see it happen. Below is the universal symbol for 'clinching' something. You guys know me and my signs and make up symbols for random life events!
Wade also could not believe that he was there to see Kathy Ireland throw the first pitch
The next day was our last day in Los Angeles. It was also Wade's birthday. We spent the day doing lots of fun things like riding horses up the side of Mount Hollywood
We then had lunch at the Universal Studio City. We ate at Wolfgang Pucks restaurant.
Then we drove up the famous Drive per a great suggestion from my Dad. I am sure we saw som famous people's houses, but we just didn't know it. It was a beautiful drive that I highly recommend.
We then took a beautiful drive up and down the Pacific Coast Highway through Santa Monica and Malibu. We saw a Gamecock tire cover. Earlier in the day we saw a lady with a Gamecock visor on. Wade really liked seeing that!
It was so WINDY!!!
Nets set up for beach volleyball
Malibu sign. Bad picture, I know.
I just love this picture
It was time for dinner at this point, so we ate at this great place the B&B recommended called Cantalini's
We had some really great food, and this great little three man Italian band was playing. We talked with the server and I happened to mention that it was Wade's birthday. Before we knew it, up behind Wade come a man playing a guitar, a man playing a smaller guitar and a man playing a huge string bass, following our server come towards Wade with a piece of triamisu with a candle in it. They sang, and the band played happy birthday. It truly took Wade by surprise. He could not thank me enough for what he called 'the perfect birthday'. Of course that made me happy to see him that happy.
Looks like our beagle Tanner got lost and decided to open his own coffee shop!
We topped the night/trip off with a night time stroll down the Santa Monica Pier. A perfect ending to a perfect trip.
And this is a picture of the famous ferris wheel - shout out to my Hills girls - where Speidi got engaged!
Wade and I had a wonderful time being together and celebrating such a wonderful day for Wade and celebrating our life together while thanking God for the many blessings he has given to us. We have a lot to be thankful for. We can't wait to one day return to LA.
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