Long overdue – Last Weekend in Review
Long overdue – Weekend in Review
I have been sitting on this blog for the last 5 days choosing instead to type about other things weighing me down, but have decided to finally post this as there is no excuse for delaying the review on a rather fantastic weekend:
Friday Night: I saw Blue October in Concert. They had a special exhibition concert at the Avalon Theater and played to a sold out crowd. I was only about 6 rows back from the stage and stood transfixed as the greatest concert of my life played out. The best part of the concert had to be that they sounded even better live then they do on their perfect album. Please note I am passionate about music and for me to use the term “perfect” is huge. If you have not yet listened to Blue October, get the led out and buy Foiled (their newest album.) but also note they have other albums before that are just as fantastic!
So back to the replay…after the concert we went to a nice little Jazz bar called “Daddy’s” and enjoyed a round (water for me) but something a little heavier for the others with me. We hung out in this uber atmospheric bar that just screamed “I am an uber atmospheric hip place in Hollywood” It was pretty cool. Afterwards we went on a mission to see the Hollywood sign, as we drove up and down streets trying to get a glimpse for over an hour, we came to the rather anti-climatic discovery that the sign was turned off for the night because of the fog…. Le sigh…so we returned to the hotel and we all bid each other goodnight.
Saturday: Was up bright and early and began by hanging out at the hotel, lounging around watching bad cartoons on T.V., we than decided to go downstairs on a quest for food prior to heading to Manhattan Beach to enjoy some fun in the sun. We got to the beach and the sun in the sky was perfect, the water temperature was perfect and the waves were perfect. I swam out far (but at the same time protected by Mike who kept me from going under on some of those stronger currents.) I also got to see my first sand crabs ever and those kinda creeped me out. I mean they move really fast and bite, not my kind of thing at all and funny enough while a consummate world traveler and having done all kinds of SCUBA diving and snorkeling I have never really swam in ocean like this. It was truly amazing. After a long afternoon playing in the waves, we all headed back to the hotel to shower and get ready for the evening festivities.
That night we went to a place called Medieval Times which for those not in the know is a real live jousting show with dinner. Quite an experience and was just a complete blast. We had my niece (who is 4 and a bit horse crazy) with us and I don’t think I have ever seen anyone enjoy something so thoroughly. It was an absolute joy and made the trip extremely memorable.
So we returned back to the hotel tired but satisfied as our knight happened to win the princess and the competition. Our hands full of cheesy souvenirs and images of horses in battle drifting through our heads.
Sunday: It was time to come home and since it is only a 5 ½ drive we decided to get on the road around 1:30pm after an extremely long lunch at Denny’s. Our simple drive home turned into an endurance test as the Grapevine was closed for many hours due to major fires. It took us almost 4 hours to go 8 miles and when we finally got out of the worst discovered the restaurants and gas stations for the most part had been evacuated for the fire so we had to keep driving homeward bound with no real rejuvenating available to us. At this point in the story I have to give major props to my Niece as she survived 9 ½ hours in the car in 90 degree weather without us being able to turn on the air conditioning the whole time we were stopped on the grapevine. She didn’t complain once and lasted the whole trip better than I did. The most harrowing part of the drive home was Sarah driving 90 miles down I-5 with her phone in one hand and negotiating the traffic with the other hand and with limited attention… I send a special thank you out to David for making that moment possible ;-)… TeeHee (I swear I am just giving you a hard time.)
So thus concludes my weekend wrap-up, I intend to be slightly less adventurous this weekend as the biggest plans I have is to spend lots of concentrated time studying the back of eyelids….
I have been sitting on this blog for the last 5 days choosing instead to type about other things weighing me down, but have decided to finally post this as there is no excuse for delaying the review on a rather fantastic weekend:
Friday Night: I saw Blue October in Concert. They had a special exhibition concert at the Avalon Theater and played to a sold out crowd. I was only about 6 rows back from the stage and stood transfixed as the greatest concert of my life played out. The best part of the concert had to be that they sounded even better live then they do on their perfect album. Please note I am passionate about music and for me to use the term “perfect” is huge. If you have not yet listened to Blue October, get the led out and buy Foiled (their newest album.) but also note they have other albums before that are just as fantastic!
So back to the replay…after the concert we went to a nice little Jazz bar called “Daddy’s” and enjoyed a round (water for me) but something a little heavier for the others with me. We hung out in this uber atmospheric bar that just screamed “I am an uber atmospheric hip place in Hollywood” It was pretty cool. Afterwards we went on a mission to see the Hollywood sign, as we drove up and down streets trying to get a glimpse for over an hour, we came to the rather anti-climatic discovery that the sign was turned off for the night because of the fog…. Le sigh…so we returned to the hotel and we all bid each other goodnight.
Saturday: Was up bright and early and began by hanging out at the hotel, lounging around watching bad cartoons on T.V., we than decided to go downstairs on a quest for food prior to heading to Manhattan Beach to enjoy some fun in the sun. We got to the beach and the sun in the sky was perfect, the water temperature was perfect and the waves were perfect. I swam out far (but at the same time protected by Mike who kept me from going under on some of those stronger currents.) I also got to see my first sand crabs ever and those kinda creeped me out. I mean they move really fast and bite, not my kind of thing at all and funny enough while a consummate world traveler and having done all kinds of SCUBA diving and snorkeling I have never really swam in ocean like this. It was truly amazing. After a long afternoon playing in the waves, we all headed back to the hotel to shower and get ready for the evening festivities.
That night we went to a place called Medieval Times which for those not in the know is a real live jousting show with dinner. Quite an experience and was just a complete blast. We had my niece (who is 4 and a bit horse crazy) with us and I don’t think I have ever seen anyone enjoy something so thoroughly. It was an absolute joy and made the trip extremely memorable.
So we returned back to the hotel tired but satisfied as our knight happened to win the princess and the competition. Our hands full of cheesy souvenirs and images of horses in battle drifting through our heads.
Sunday: It was time to come home and since it is only a 5 ½ drive we decided to get on the road around 1:30pm after an extremely long lunch at Denny’s. Our simple drive home turned into an endurance test as the Grapevine was closed for many hours due to major fires. It took us almost 4 hours to go 8 miles and when we finally got out of the worst discovered the restaurants and gas stations for the most part had been evacuated for the fire so we had to keep driving homeward bound with no real rejuvenating available to us. At this point in the story I have to give major props to my Niece as she survived 9 ½ hours in the car in 90 degree weather without us being able to turn on the air conditioning the whole time we were stopped on the grapevine. She didn’t complain once and lasted the whole trip better than I did. The most harrowing part of the drive home was Sarah driving 90 miles down I-5 with her phone in one hand and negotiating the traffic with the other hand and with limited attention… I send a special thank you out to David for making that moment possible ;-)… TeeHee (I swear I am just giving you a hard time.)
So thus concludes my weekend wrap-up, I intend to be slightly less adventurous this weekend as the biggest plans I have is to spend lots of concentrated time studying the back of eyelids….
posted by Jennifer at 6:41 PM
1 Comments:
OK - so i'm behind in reading your blog and I bow to your tribute of my most excellant driving skills :D
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