IT'S A WRAP

Los Angeles, CA
(April 7, 2012)

We woke up relatively early on our first official day in Los Angeles, partly because we were still on New York time so our brains believed it was three hours later, and partly because we scheduled brunch plans with a friend of ours.

We got ourselves ready, waved goodbye to Sal as he headed off to work at Soul Cycle, a popular New York-based spinning studio, and headed out to Hollywood to meet our friend Lori.

Lori was originally a friend of Miriam’s sister, Beth, but because of our mutual interest in show business, we three had become close, so it was a no-brainer to meet up with her during our stay in LA.

We agreed to meet at The Hudson, a bar/eatery in Hollywood and, conveniently, walking distance from Lori’s apartment. Well, walking distance for a girl like Lori who used to live in Boston and walked everywhere-- a proper LA person would NEVER walk anywhere, or so she told us. Side note: We also, amusingly, discovered how unwilling people are to travel from neighborhood to neighborhood, especially our NYC friends who should have been used to a lot of travel time getting from place to place, but, no, having to travel over 20 minutes somewhere was a bit out of everyone’s comfort zone. That amused us.

Anyway, we, luckily, found street parking right outside the restaurant, went inside, and found Lori waiting for us at a table. Everything on the menu looked delicious, but we were so busy catching up that it took us a while to place our order. Near the end of the meal, Lori pointed out that the restaurant was actually built up around a couple of 50-foot -plus trees, meaning that, literally, there were trees growing in the restaurant. How in the world did we miss that?? Especially the giant tree. Across. From. Our. Table. Doh!

Lori, Miriam, me, and the tree

Our meal came to an end but we weren’t ready to say goodbye to Lori just yet, so we kidnapped her. Obviously. Actually, it was pretty easy to convince her to come with us. All we had to do was tell her we were on our way to a shop in Burbank called It’s a Wrap, a consignment shop used by the movie/television studios. Everything in the shop was purchased for and/or used in television shows and films, and each item has a tag with a code telling for which studio or, more specifically, which show it was purchased. Once the studios no longer need the costume item, they sell it to It's a Wrap on consignment, and people like us can purchase them for cheap and then have the honor of saying, "These pants were used in [insert movie title here]."

We were having a field day perusing the merchandise and figuring out the various codes. I ended up finding a steal of a deal! A Zara trench coat used in “General Hospital”, originally retailing for $200, was on “winter” clearance (because in LA, a spring trench coat is considered a winter coat...*ahem*) for $30! A ridiculous steal! I was super excited because I had been looking for a cute spring trench coat, and this one practically fell in my lap!
We finally exhausted ourselves and made our purchases. I ended up scoring not only the trench coat but also a scarf for my mom from the short-lived television show “Detroit 1-8-7” and a beautiful tie for my brother from the reincarnated television show “Melrose Place”. Miriam walked away with a cute summer dress from the Warner Bros. Studio, stellar earrings used in The Green Hornet, and amazing, sparkling black heels from 21 Jump Street. I can’t remember at all what Lori ended up getting, but we were all really happy with our purchases.

Bob Odenkirk

After dropping Lori off at her apartment, we headed down to Sunset Boulevard to hit up my favorite—and the world’s largest—independent music shop in the world, Amoeba Music. We originally discovered Amoeba Music when visiting San Francisco in 2006, and when we drove down to LA later that same trip, we made sure to visit their Hollywood store. It’s a huge warehouse-sized store with new and used CDs, DVDs, LPs, and memorabilia. On my last visit I found a very hard to find import title by one of my favorite artists, Keri Noble, for über cheap (plus a ton of other music that filled up a good portion of my carry-on luggage…). This time around we searched for all our favorite artists, couldn’t find anything we didn’t already have, and headed to the classical and musicals sections instead. Jackpot! We loaded up on a bunch of used operas and musicals, and I even found the recording for Cirque du Soleil’s Wintuk—which is only available through Cirque—for one-third the price. Woo hoo!
At this point a charity auction started up at the store’s main podium, led by comedian/actor Bob Odenkirk, so we amused ourselves for a while listening to him auction off crazy and stupid things. It was fun. Then it was time to check out, and the cashier loaded us up with free bumper stickers, magnets, and hipster pins. We were golden!

The mural outside the building.

Going to In-n-Out Burger is required when visiting LA…or so we like to believe. Our appetites being ravenous, we decided to get the required visit out of the way and searched for any In-n-Out Burgers in the area. Our search pulled up a plethora of In-n-Outs to choose from—you could practically throw a rock and hit three at once. So we picked the easiest one to get to and had one heck of a time trying to park in their ridiculously built parking lot (you would think a city filled with drivers would have better parking lots...you would be wrong). The place was crazy crowded, but we managed to snag a table and enjoyed our quick bite to eat.

                

Inside Aroma

Having nothing else planned that afternoon, we decided to hit up the other It’s a Wrap store, located in West Hollywood. It was farther than we anticipated, so we only had 15 minutes to look around before they closed, but I was able to find a brand-spanking-new Drew Brees Saints jersey for Miriam for only $9 from the Warner Bros. Studio—it still had the tags on it! Then we hit up a nearby Target to get a few things we needed for our stay and headed back to Sal’s apartment in the not-so-bad rush hour traffic.

Back at Sal’s apartment we freshened up and prepared to meet up with my little cousin, Autumn, who moved out to LA right after she graduated from high school a few years ago. We rarely get to see each other anymore—it’s rare that we’re all at home in WI at the same time—so it was a nice treat to be able to see her on our trip.
We met at one of her favorite hang-outs in Burbank called Aroma Coffee & Tea Company, a cute little café offering a wide variety of teas and coffees, as well as amazing looking desserts and a fabulous array of savory dishes. Miriam and I settled on a fresh hummus platter and a beautiful salad, and the three of us grabbed a table in Aroma’s ultra-cute backyard, where we chatted about life and waxed philosophical before we all started getting tired.
After saying our goodbyes, we headed back to Sal’s, camped out in his living room chatting, and then hit the hay. We had a big day on the morrow-- a TMZ tour awaited us!

Me with my cousin Autumn

My favorite table at Aroma