Day One: Los Angeles
I felt hungover and wretched all day yesterday, and by the time that Jeff took me to the airport at 2:45pm, I still wasn't feeling much better. Much more apparent as well, yesterday, was the fact that what appears to be my tailbone is in increased agony with each passing day. After another day, I can safely say this is true.
Anyway, the plane we were to take from KC to LA was twenty five minutes late in taking off, because of a rain delay coming in from Indianapolis. All things considered, it went well, as it arrived at the gate at LAX only and twenty minutes late. It could have been much worse. I've had it much worse. The really bad part of the trip was some of the stuff that couldn't be helped.
The torturously uncomfortable seats played hell on my aching tailbone. Just sitting still was painful. It wouldn't have been quite so bad, however, if I didn't have to keep getting up. The woman sitting next to me must have suffered not only from an acute fear of flying, made apparent by her audible humming of Mary Had A Little Lamb during takeoff, ascent, descent, and landing, but also incontinence. In the three hour flight, she got up to pee(forcing me to get up too) no fewer than four times. Each time I rose from my seat, no matter how gingerly, a surge of pain would wrack the kickable part of my buttocks, and a similar one would afflict me when I sat back down.
We arrived at LAX and I only had to wait about fifteen minutes while Erp and Ashley worked their way through traffic to get to the terminal. We hopped onto Lincoln Boulevard and headed north toward Santa Monica, where we had planned on getting some dinner and some drinks. As we crossed Pico, Ashley asked me what kind of food I wanted. She asked me a question, so I gave her the answer that was on my mind. "If I'm in LA, I feel like I need to have some In-N-Out." I was expecting both of them to shrug it off, and possibly even agree to accomodate me, but to my delight, they both jumped on the idea.
Twenty minutes later, I had an animal-style double-double dripping into my plastic tray, and a carton of the best fries available in the fast food world. Recently-turned vegetarian Erp tried to feign disgust, ut it was a poor betrayal of his feelings. He wanted some of that tasty tasty Southern California burger.
After that, we made a beeline for Main Street in Santa Monica, and went first to the Library, a fantastic bar that specializes in draught beer of the regional variety. I had a Bear Republic Racer 5 IPA, a Mad River Extra Pale Ale, and a sublime pint of a Jamaican Red, the name of whose brewer eludes me at the moment. This of course being LA, the bar's televisions were tuned to the Emmys, and most of the patrons were paying rapt attention.
We then went to what Erp referred to as a "dive bar," called Rick's, which I found to be anything but. It was definitely accessible, but there was nothing unsavory about it. On the contrary, it was lined wall-to-wall with twentysomethings that were uncharacteristically abundant for a Sunday night. From there, Erp, Ashley, Ashley's neighbor Mimi and I came back to Ashley's place and played some battle-of-the-sexes Jeopardy on Ashley's amazingly still-functional 8-bit Nintendo.
Naturally, the boys won, and we called it a night at about 2am. I spent a night listening to Erp snore like a lion, and never really getting tired enough to sleep through it. In the four hours I lay there, I slept for perhaps one, until 6am, when I had had enough, and just decided to get up. Ashley had set the alarm for 7am, but I couldn't toss and turn for that long. It's 7am now, after I've written all this, my bag is packed, I've taken a soap-light shower, and dressed in my wrinkled packed clothes.
Bring on the train!
I felt hungover and wretched all day yesterday, and by the time that Jeff took me to the airport at 2:45pm, I still wasn't feeling much better. Much more apparent as well, yesterday, was the fact that what appears to be my tailbone is in increased agony with each passing day. After another day, I can safely say this is true.
Anyway, the plane we were to take from KC to LA was twenty five minutes late in taking off, because of a rain delay coming in from Indianapolis. All things considered, it went well, as it arrived at the gate at LAX only and twenty minutes late. It could have been much worse. I've had it much worse. The really bad part of the trip was some of the stuff that couldn't be helped.
The torturously uncomfortable seats played hell on my aching tailbone. Just sitting still was painful. It wouldn't have been quite so bad, however, if I didn't have to keep getting up. The woman sitting next to me must have suffered not only from an acute fear of flying, made apparent by her audible humming of Mary Had A Little Lamb during takeoff, ascent, descent, and landing, but also incontinence. In the three hour flight, she got up to pee(forcing me to get up too) no fewer than four times. Each time I rose from my seat, no matter how gingerly, a surge of pain would wrack the kickable part of my buttocks, and a similar one would afflict me when I sat back down.
We arrived at LAX and I only had to wait about fifteen minutes while Erp and Ashley worked their way through traffic to get to the terminal. We hopped onto Lincoln Boulevard and headed north toward Santa Monica, where we had planned on getting some dinner and some drinks. As we crossed Pico, Ashley asked me what kind of food I wanted. She asked me a question, so I gave her the answer that was on my mind. "If I'm in LA, I feel like I need to have some In-N-Out." I was expecting both of them to shrug it off, and possibly even agree to accomodate me, but to my delight, they both jumped on the idea.
Twenty minutes later, I had an animal-style double-double dripping into my plastic tray, and a carton of the best fries available in the fast food world. Recently-turned vegetarian Erp tried to feign disgust, ut it was a poor betrayal of his feelings. He wanted some of that tasty tasty Southern California burger.
After that, we made a beeline for Main Street in Santa Monica, and went first to the Library, a fantastic bar that specializes in draught beer of the regional variety. I had a Bear Republic Racer 5 IPA, a Mad River Extra Pale Ale, and a sublime pint of a Jamaican Red, the name of whose brewer eludes me at the moment. This of course being LA, the bar's televisions were tuned to the Emmys, and most of the patrons were paying rapt attention.
We then went to what Erp referred to as a "dive bar," called Rick's, which I found to be anything but. It was definitely accessible, but there was nothing unsavory about it. On the contrary, it was lined wall-to-wall with twentysomethings that were uncharacteristically abundant for a Sunday night. From there, Erp, Ashley, Ashley's neighbor Mimi and I came back to Ashley's place and played some battle-of-the-sexes Jeopardy on Ashley's amazingly still-functional 8-bit Nintendo.
Naturally, the boys won, and we called it a night at about 2am. I spent a night listening to Erp snore like a lion, and never really getting tired enough to sleep through it. In the four hours I lay there, I slept for perhaps one, until 6am, when I had had enough, and just decided to get up. Ashley had set the alarm for 7am, but I couldn't toss and turn for that long. It's 7am now, after I've written all this, my bag is packed, I've taken a soap-light shower, and dressed in my wrinkled packed clothes.
Bring on the train!
1 comment
ck took the time to say:
have fun on the left coast.
have fun on the left coast.
9:02 AM, Aug 28, 2006
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