Los Angeles

Last week we were in L.A. for the whole week. I was so excited to get into warm weather after being in Alaska. Nope. Pretty much rainy and in the 40's and 50's the whole week.

Regardless, it was a fun week. We stayed in downtown L.A. at the swanky Westin. My room was small, but it was really nice. They have the "Heavenly" beds and showers, and I had a fridge and a good view, so life was good. The only issue was that our theatre was in Beverly Hills, 10 miles away, and for the first time ever, we had no company bus, and no rental cars. 10 miles can mean 1 hour there. Get this- they actually gave us public transportation passes to take the public bus to work! Ha! After late buses, musicians and instruments waiting in the rain, and major frustration, they finally got us a company bus. It was not exactly fun.

Anyway, I was able to see a LOT of friends when I was out there, which is one of my favorite aspects of this job. My cousin Brian lives there (you might recognize him from a few Disney shows and network shows, and if you don't, I promise you will), my friend Stacie from tour last year was in the area with CATS, and my friends Doc and Amelia from tour now live in Vegas, so they drove in for a few nights. It was awesome to see all of them!


L.A. = expensive. Between Anchorage and L.A., I have hit my monthly budget in two weeks. That is not good.

Darrel and I took the subway to go to Universal Studios and Hollywood Boulevard one afternoon. We didn't actually go in to Universal, but we walked around their little town area and and had lunch. We of course had to see the Hollywood Walk of Fame and the Chinese Theatre. That whole area is totally what you would think it would be. Tourist hell. Cheesy people dressed up as Spider Man and Jack Sparrow charging a dollar to take a picture with them, people selling their ghetto hip hop CD's on the street for $2.00, people selling tours of the stars homes- the whole nine yards. But the Chinese Theatre is really cool. It was so fun to walk around and read the names of the people who have imprinted their hands and feet in the concrete, both old and new. I wouldn't make a trip out of it, but it filled up some time on an afternoon off!