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July 19, 2007
L.A. Story
(With a happy nod to Steve Martin's genius movie of the same name)
Work has brought me to Los Angeles for the past two days, which was much less in-n'-out than Oklahoma City (e.g., I was on the ground for more than 24 hours), but still didn't provide the kind of free time I need to see the sights, kick back, and enjoy a little vacation.
Plus, it's not like I'm ready to just run around like a frat boy at Daytona Beach: customer visits can be exhausting, mentally and physically, and by the end of a good half-day or day-long session, I've generally got a hard drive full of notes and a head full of cotton. Back to the hotel, sleep, repeat as necessary.
And yet, it was still a lot of fun. To wit:
- Our hotel was The Standard in downtown Los Angeles. It's a total hipster joint, all sly/snarky wall coverings, clean white formica, plastic chairs, huge televisions, fluffy pillows, Bang-and-Olufsen knock-off CD players, beds on the floor, that sort of thing. The hotel rooms themselves are One Big Room; the bathroom is one corner, and separated from everything else with floor-to-ceiling glass. This, coupled with the low bed, makes the room feel huge. It's Euro as hell, and I loved it.
The Standard is also home to a hip-and-happening open-air bar/lounge/dance club/swimming pool (no, really) on the roof of the building. It's something you have to see to believe; there's nothing quite like being 130 feet in the air, smack-dab in the center of tall, twinkling, glass-and-concrete buildings at 10 at night, surrounded by the Beautiful People, listening to techno, and holding a glass of wine in your hand. (Big, big thanks to my friend - and native Angeleno - Adrian for the hotel recommendation!) - The heat in Los Angeles makes me miss the endless gray of a Pacific Northwest February. I'm a mammal, not a reptile.
- I got to drop in and see Heidi for a while, who is doing fabulous, looking fabulous, and took me to a fabulous sushi place in Hollywood. Seeing good friends is just the thing a guy needs after getting off a plane a couple hours beforehand.
- LAX, the good: Los Angeles International unveiled fifty AC-power charging stations, salted around the airport in every terminal. This is, for obvious reasons, great news. Hopefully, someone at SeaTac will get a clue.
- LAX, the bad: the place still looks unbelievably run-down. And let's not even talk about the carpet or the baggage claim.
- Our appointment on Wednesday wrapped up earlier than expected, so the three of us found ourselves back downtown, blinking in the sunlight, and not too-terribly-shagged out. So we did what any three red-blooded American rejuveniles would do, and hit Disneyland.
- (Don't even try to look surprised.)
- We zoomed down I-5 to Anaheim (aside: I know it's passe to bitch about LA traffic, but, for the record, LA traffic really suuuuuuuuuuuuu-[breath goes here]-uuuuuuuuuuuucks), got parked at the garage, hooked up with Tony & Andrea, and proceeded to go on a full-on, full-throated, park-hoppin' rampage of the E-tickets: Soarin', Screamin', Tower of Terror, Space Mountain, Indy, and Buzz. It was a lot of walking, a lot of waiting, and a lot of fun. It was also phenomenally exhausting.
- In a strange quirk of the calendar, this Afternoon Of Disney Park Craziness took place two years and one day after Khan, Christine and I attended Disneyland's 50th anniversary.
- Obligatory iPhone reference: I sleep like the dead, but the iPhone's built-in alarm clock was loud enough to rouse my tired, dragging behind from an extremely comfortable bed and get rolling this morning. (And said alarm was considerably more reliable than the hotel wake-up service, which was 13 minutes late.)
- Starbucks' new breakfast sandwiches aren't rolled out broadly in Los Angeles yet. As one who's become addicted to them on busy mornings, I found that to be a real downer.
- My flight back to Seattle wasn't slated to fly until the evening, but I got to the airport soon enough that I hoped (prayed?) I might catch an earlier flight. No luck - United's Seattle-bound flights are booked solid, a function of overbooking and a cancellation somewhere else in the system. Thank God for widely-available AC Power (see above) and some T-mobile WiFi goodness.
- Rather than tell you about the actual flight home, I'll just ask: when did planes become airborne day-care centers? Inquiring minds want to know.
Damn, it's good to be home.
Posted by Gavin Shearer at July 19, 2007 11:33 PM. Posted to Disney | MSFT | Travel.
"...he can have the cheeken."
Posted by: Mr. Sharumpe at July 23, 2007 2:19 PM
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