DRAG QUEEN BINGO

Los Angeles, CA

(April 11-12, 2012)

We had one last full day in LA and decided to relax a bit. We had no real plans until that evening, other than brunch plans with our friend Kate, so we decided to make it an off-the-cuff kind of day.

Unexpected rain aided us in having a leisurely morning (I mean, who wants to rush anywhere when it’s a rainy day, right?) before we headed over to Sweet Butter for brunch in North Hollywood. Our friend Kate is another LA transplant from NYC. She made quite a name for herself in the cabaret/piano bar/musical theater scene (we met her years ago when she was host of a late-night, musical theater open-mic night at one of the West Village’s piano bars) and decided it was time to try her hand out in LA. 

Miriam and Kate outside of Sweet Butter

We had a great morning catching up and remarking how nice it was to see the rain (Kate said she misses the rain now that she rarely sees it out in desert country). After brunch, which was quite yummy, I might add, we made our way to Kate’s apartment, where Sal met up with us, and we hung out for a while in her fabulous apartment with her ultra-cute dog, Oscar. It was nice to take some time to just sit back and relax while on vacation. I rarely allow myself to do that—it’s always go-go-go with me so that I can see as much as possible.

After leaving Kate’s, we left our car parked by her apartment and let Sal chauffeur us around. Miriam mentioned she was interested in doing some shopping, specifically for some new shoes, since we had a ton of weddings to attend in the summer months, so Sal took us to Westfield Century City Mall. I remarked that they never had fun heels for feet as large as mine (think canoe paddles), which turned into a challenge for Sal and Miriam, who both started pulling huge, ridiculous, drag-queen-like shoes off the sales racks. I was refusing to try them on so Sal said I had to try them on if he did (turns out we wear the same size), and he proceeded to give us a fashion show in the heels, complete with rolled up pants—the better to see how fabulous his legs looked. A deal was a deal, so I did try them on, but Sal’s legs looked much better than mine…

After our unsuccessful—yet amusing—shopping excursion (we even saw Trouty Mouth, aka Chord Overstreet, from “Glee” doing a little shopping), Sal took us over to Silver Lake, a neighborhood with a hipster vibe that reminded us very much of NYC’s own Williamsburg. We stopped at a coffee shop for a little coffee and pastry and relaxed at one of their outdoor tables. We wandered around the neighborhood for a little bit, but the shops were a bit out of our price range so we hopped back in the car. We decided to stop at a really good hole-in-the-wall taco joint in North Hollywood called Henry’s Tacos for a quick bite. I was still kind of full from brunch and didn’t want to completely ruin my appetite for the dinner we were going to in a few hours, so I only had one little taco, but it was quite tasty. Sal had always wanted to try this place, and all three of us gave it two thumbs up.

Sal had to get ready for work, so we picked our car up at Kate’s and drove back to his apartment. After freshening up, we headed to Hamburger Mary’s in West Hollywood for their Wednesday night Drag Queen Bingo, the event I had been looking forward to for five days.

We got there early in order to get a seat, having not made a reservation ahead of time, and settled into a table in the back of the restaurant, waiting for our friend Marques to get there. That evening, bingo was a charity event for a local school, so the prizes were pretty tame, like gift certificates to restaurants and spas. Our friends have gone before and won lots of lewd and crude prizes (which are always humorous to win, even if they won’t be used). Miriam and I made our donation and got our bingo cards and bingo markers and waited for the show to begin. Marques showed up right as it was about to start, so we ordered our dinner and uncapped our markers.

I must say, there’s something about drag queens that livens up any event. They’re so full of spitfire and ready with snappy insults that it always makes for an amusing evening. And this evening proved to be no different. Our drag queen host had a male co-host, and they kept things quite entertaining with their witty banter. 

Along with our bingo cards we were given an information sheet of the various bingo games we could play, most with obscene names like Pole Dance (fill the “N” column) or Rim Job (fill in all the spaces around the free space), and all the “call-backs” we had to be ready to yell (i.e. “Not after but...” B4 or “Not malignant but...” B9. Clever).

Every winner had to go up to the front and show the hosts their winning cards. They then had to take a victory lap around the restaurant so that those of us who didn’t win could crumple up our losing cards and throw them at them. There were also plenty of people not paying attention to the game we were supposed to be playing and would think they had bingo, would run up to the front, and would then get made fun of by the hosts. It was entertaining. And, lesson learned: when the drag queen is talking, shut up and listen. The three of us got so close to winning on numerous occasions, but, alas, it was not meant to be. Regardless, we had an incredibly fun evening.

We decided to skip the later session of bingo, said goodbye to Marques, and made our way over to The Abbey, a famous gay bar in West Hollywood, that on Wednesday nights turns into Girl Bar. Earlier in the day, our friend Kate mentioned she would be there that evening and told us we should join her. Parking was proving to be difficult, but we hadn’t heard from Kate confirming that she was actually there, so we refused to pay for valet parking. We drove around for a little while and eventually found a parking spot around the corner and down the block from The Abbey-- a parking spot most LA residents would probably refuse because of the “long” walk, but we’re New Yorkers-- all we ever do is walk!

It was still relatively early in the evening-- a little after 9pm-- so getting in was easy, and the place was far from crowded. It looked really cool inside, with big, working fireplaces blazing and an outside garden area. The music was a little loud, especially since no one was on the dance floor, but we found a seat and waited to hear from Kate. Not long after we got a text saying she wasn’t going to make it. Although the place looked cool, it wasn’t really our cup of tea if we weren’t going to have company, so we decided to call it a night and head back to North Hollywood.

The next morning it was time to start packing up. Our flight was leaving in the early afternoon, but before we headed to the airport we wanted to spend a little more quality time with our host-with-the-most, Sal. Brunch was a definite theme this vacation, so we couldn’t pass up the opportunity to have one last brunch, this time at Bea Bea’s Cafe in Burbank. It was nothing to behold inside, but the food was delicious! Sal and I both got all things pumpkin-- pumpkin waffles and pumpkin pancakes with a pumpkin cream cheese marmalade. If something has pumpkin in it, I’m going to try it, so this was a lovely meal in my eyes.

After brunch we ran to a nearby grocery store so I could pick up a birthday card for my brother, and then we stopped by the post office so I could put my brother’s birthday gift (some fun finds from It’s a Wrap) in the mail. I can honestly say his was the only birthday present that arrived on time this year, all thanks to me being on vacation. Thanks, LA!

With nothing else to do and Sal having to go to work, we packed up the car, said goodbye to Sal, and made our way to LAX. We waved goodbye to our little rental car and checked in for our flight.

We were ready to eat by the time we got on our Virgin America flight, so we ordered food to eat almost right after take-off, using the handy-dandy order screen at our seats. And then we waited. And waited. And waited. After almost an hour we finally stopped a flight attendant and asked where our food was, and she explained it would be delivered after they served everyone beverages. I was already starting to gnaw on my knuckles from hunger... My question is, why offer something and say they’ll bring it right to you, if you then have to wait until they feel like bringing it? Ugh. Whatever. (Editor’s note: if you ever fly Virgin and want to order food or drink, do so after the beverage cart has gone by and it WILL come to you quickly. Miriam ordered a diet soda later in the flight and it was out in less than five minutes.) 

The flight itself was uneventful, thankfully. We landed at Newark really late and then waited forever for the shuttle bus to take us back to the city. Why not a cab? Because it would cost us a ton of money to go from New Jersey to Brooklyn-- about the cost of a one-way flight, actually. So we waited. Finally our bus appeared. We then grabbed our train home, walked into the apartment, gave the kitties a welcome home squeeze and collapsed into bed.

All in all, it was an incredibly fruitful trip. Many thanks to all the wonderful friends we were able to see: Sal, Lori, Autumn, Rightor, Isabella, Ryan, James, Kate, and Marques. Y’all made it an extra special trip.

‘Til we meet again, LA. ‘Til we meet again.

HIKING TO HOLLYWOOD

Los Angeles, CA

(April 10, 2012)

 Day four in LA and we woke up ready to conquer a mountain! Well, hike a hill, really.

Sal told us it was possible to hike up pretty close to the legendary Hollywood sign, so we did a little research and set off early in the morning in order to beat the heat and the crowds.

(If you are looking for directions to the Hollywood sign, scroll down to the bottom of this blog post.)

The Hollywood sign is located by Griffith Park and can be reached by taking Beachwood Drive to the Hollyridge Trail. Basically, find Beachwood Drive and keep driving all the way to the top. The beginning of the Hollyridge Trail is right by Sunset Ranch, so we parked right outside the entrance to the ranch.

We were warned there was limited parking, so we made sure to get there early in the morning. We had a prime parking spot right by the start of the trail. Woohoo!

The trouble with the trail being right by a ranch that offers tours by horseback is that we shared part of the trail with the horses. And that meant one thing: poop. We learned very quickly to avoid it...there was a little bit to avoid.

We walked for a little ways and then there was a drastic split in the road. A U-turn option, if you will. A road met up with ours, looking as though it headed back in the direction we had come but going up the hill instead of down. One would think we should just continue going straight, but one would be wrong. If we were to continue straight, we would be following the horse trail around the hill and not at all where we would want to end up. If we took the trail that headed up the hill going in the direction we had just come, we would get to the Hollywood sign. It had a big ole Labyrinth feel to it—“Which way do you want to go? Up or down?” Rule of thumb: If faced with taking a road covered in horse poop or a road devoid of horse poop, take the road devoid of horse poop.

So we took the sharp U-turn and headed up the hill. It was nice being able to look around without worrying about stepping in manure. The road continued for quite a while, following the natural curve of the hill and providing us with views of LA and glimpses of the Hollywood sign growing ever closer. We were tempted by an incredibly steep shortcut that traveled almost straight up the hill, but we weren’t sure exactly where it would lead us, and we were nervous about how steep it was. We decided to stick to the safe and easy path.

Admiring the plant life 

People carved their names into the cacti along the way

Eventually we came to another fork in the road. Here’s where we had options. Option 1: Go to the left and get up relatively close to the front of the Hollywood sign. You can’t get too close, since it’s private property and you can get arrested for trespassing, but you can get pretty darn close. Option 2: Go to the right and get right up behind the Hollywood sign. You can get a whole lot closer to it from this angle, but then you can’t get pictures in front of it.

We wanted our pictures to have the front view of the Hollywood sign, so we took Option 1 and followed the road to the left. The trail got a little steeper, but the views were pretty cool. We had been walking for a while when we came across another shortcut, this one not as steep. I looked up ahead and saw that our walk would take us to where the road curved and went uphill. The shortcut looked like it would cut out all that extra walking, so I chanced it and scurried up the hill. Once I got to the top, I saw that it landed us at our end destination: the Hollywood sign! Yay! So I gestured for Miriam to come on up.
There are big fences and a really steep hill that keep you from getting close to the Hollywood sign, so we stayed where we were and had fun taking lots of pictures.

Once finished with our goofy photo shoots, we headed back down the hill (the easy way, not the shortcut way) and came across a big, metal gate across the road with giant signs on it. We were coming at it from behind, but I had a feeling I knew what the signs said and started laughing.

Sure enough, the signs all said No Trespassing. Whoops. We took the shortcut and bypassed all this signage. We were trespassers. How were we to know?!

After having a good chuckle, we started heading back down the trail. Miriam had been on the lookout for snakes falling from trees ever since seeing the warning sign that snakes were in the area at the beginning of the trail, but I told her we would definitely know if snakes were around (how? I don’t know—I was trying to calm her down!). At one point I said that snakes won’t be falling out of trees on us…and then a snake fell out of a tree. Not on us, but right next to us. And Miriam bolted like a scared horse and almost jumped off the cliff. Not even kidding. I’ve never seen her move so fast!

From that point forward she refused to go by any trees and stuck to the edge of the hill, just in case something came slithering out of the holes in the rock we were walking next to. It was pretty funny stuff.

We were out hiking for about an hour and a half and were good a sweaty by the end, so we headed back to Sal’s to freshen up and then we were out the door again, this time in search of Little Tokyo.

Years ago, Miriam worked at Tokyo Disney Sea in Japan, and while there she fell in love with a cookie by the Bourbon company called Alfort. It’s a shortbread-type cookie with a layer of delicious milk chocolate on top. There are plenty of cookies like that out there in the world, but to Miriam, nothing compares to the Bourbon Alfort cookie. And wouldn’t you know, it’s impossible to find in the States. We have scoured the country, visiting all sorts of Japanese grocery stores and websites, and have come up with nothing. Well, not nothing—I did manage to find it through a website here in the States, but their shipping costs were three times the cost of the cookies—not gonna happen. So, we were determined to search through Little Tokyo in LA to see if we could possibly find these dang things. 

I asked my handy little Siri where we could find Japanese grocery stores, and she was able to pull up a few options, so off we went. Our first stop was the Marukai Super Market. The place was huge compared to other Japanese grocery stores we’d been in, so we had our fingers crossed. We looked everywhere. We checked every aisle and spent extra time down the cookie aisle in the hopes of finding what we were looking for. Alas, we could not find them, so Miriam approached an employee and pulled up a picture of the cookie on her phone. The employee brought her over to the cookie aisle and said they didn’t have the exact cookie she was looking for, but they had something close—Bourbon Alfort chocolate cookies with white chocolate, as well as Alfort chocolate cookies with dark chocolate. Close enough! We bought one container of each just so we could try them, left the store, opened them up on the street to try them, and promptly went back in to buy every package they had. So good!

Little Tokyo

We then wandered around Little Tokyo some more, venturing into other stores along the way in the hopes of finding the exact cookies we were seeking, but we struck out. At least we had the chocolate cookies, though! Miriam was very excited.

Then we were off to Santa Monica. We couldn’t travel all the way to the Pacific Coast and not put our toes in the ocean! We parked near the 3^rd Street Promenade shopping area and sauntered through the open-air plaza for a while before making our way to the beach.

Miriam next to her favorite flower, Birds of Paradise, by the 3rd Street Promenade

A fun dinosaur fountain on the promenade

Let me tell you, the beginning of the beach to the actual water is a bazillion miles away. It was crazy! I can only imagine how much those beaches fill up in the summer. Nevertheless, we kicked off our shoes and trudged through the sand down to the water, taking a lot of fun photos along the way. Once at the water we started walking towards the Santa Monica pier, which was way off in the distance. We had no intention of visiting the pier and its amusement park, since we’ve seen it before, but we did want pictures of it in the distance.

See? A bazillion miles away!

We made it fairly close before we decided it was time to head back. We had to beat the rush hour traffic since we had a show to go to later that night. So we left the beach and hiked back to the 3^rd Street Promenade, stopping for an ice-cold coffee drink, then jumped in the car and made it back to Sal’s.

We managed to get back to his place really quickly, so we took our time getting gussied up for our show, and then we were out the door and headed back to Hollywood. We went to pick up our friend James at his office—it’s where all the magic happens and Jerseylicious is turned into an actual show. We got to hang around in the lobby for a little bit while he finished up work, and he was surprised we didn’t see any celebrities hanging around while we were out there. Apparently, they hang around all the time. Oh well!

This sums up our dinner with James

Miriam and I had tickets to see Cirque du Soleil’s show, Iris, at the Kodak Theater on Hollywood Boulevard, so we wanted to grab dinner relatively close to the theater. We settled on Mel’s Drive-In, a 1950’s themed diner, which was conveniently right around the corner from the Kodak Theater. All three of us ordered burgers sans the bun—we were in LA, after all (gotta watch our figures)— and had a lot of laughs over dinner. There are always a lot of laughs when James is involved. But soon enough it was time to say goodbye. James started his walk home (he lived nearby) and we made our way to the Kodak. 

I’m a huge fan of Cirque duSoleil and try to see every show that comes to NYC. A part of Iris was featured at the 2012 Oscars, also located at the Kodak Theater, and the moment I saw it I knew I had to go to the show. Miriam, on the other hand, isn’t crazy about Cirque. Many say that once you’ve seen one Cirque show, you’ve seen them all, which is partly true. A lot of them have the same sorts of acts—it is a circus of incredible feats, after all—so there are bound to be clowns, contortionists, some high-flying aerial tricks, a balancing act, and trampolines of some sort. The difference is the story they tell with the costumes, the music, and the way the acts all come together. My love for Cirque blossomed at my very first Cirque show, Varekai. I spent the whole evening in awe of the beauty and had to scrape my jaw off the floor at the end of the night. But, I digress…

When I go to a Cirque show, I usually pay to sit as close as possible, since it gets me fully immersed in the show (it’s one of the few treats I allow myself), but knowing Miriam wouldn’t want to pay that kind of ticket price, I settled for the next section back in the orchestra. And I had a coupon. Awesome.

First of all, it was amazing just to be in the Kodak Theater. My thoughts: I see this theater on TV every awards season, and now I’m sitting in one of the seats. It was pretty exciting. 

Iris is all about the history of cinema, as seen through the eyes of two people: a young man in search of love and a young woman with dreams of being a star. The young man falls for the woman and follows her through the ages of cinema. I LOVED it. I’ve seen around 10 Cirque shows, and this ranks up there as one of my favorites—second only to Varekai. The music was amazing (composed by famous film composer, Danny Elfman), the set was stunning, and the talent was out of this world.

A practically empty Mann's Chinese Theater courtyard.

After the show, we wandered around a nearly deserted Hollywood Boulevard, watched as a crew started blockading the boulevard and setting up for the red carpet movie premiere of The Avengers happening the following day, and then took our tuckered-out butts back to North Hollywood. It had been a fun and crazy day, and we were exhausted! 

An almost empty Walk of Fame, with the barricades for
The Avengers stacked in a truck on the street.

Directions to the Hollywood sign:

Miriam is taking the U-turn up the hill.
Down below was where we just came from.

• Get on N Beachwood Drive and take it all the way to the top of the hill. If you are coming from the Hollywood/Santa Monica area, it may be easiest to get on N Beachwood from Franklin Street—Beachwood is not a straight-through street until after Franklin.
• There will be plenty of signs saying that you can’t get to the Hollywood sign and Beachwood gets all curvy and makes you think you aren’t heading in the right direction, but trust me, stay on Beachwood and take it all the way to Sunset Ranch and the start of Hollyridge Trail.
• There’s limited parking, so I suggest going in the morning. I’ve found that a lot of tourists go about their days leisurely and so the trails and the parking weren’t crowded in the morning. I’m all about getting up and out early so I can miss the crowds. And going in the morning means you’ll beat the heat, as well. Nothing wrong with that!
• Watch for the U-turn split in the road not too far into your hike. Make sure to take the road that goes to the left, up the hill. The path that continues straight on ahead is what the horses take on their tour—it doesn’t lead to the sign. Remember my rule of thumb from earlier: If faced with taking a road covered in horse poop or a road devoid of horse poop, take the road devoid of horse poop. 
• After a while you will come to a split in the road. Here’s where you decide what you want to see of the Hollywood sign: the front or the back.
• To the Left: The trail will lead you to the front of the Hollywood sign. You can’t get too close, but you can get some really fun pictures.
• To the Right: The trail will lead you to the back of the Hollywood sign. You can get a lot closer and get cool views of LA, but you won’t get the front of the sign in your pictures.

The left leads to the front of the sign, the right to the back of the sign.

• If you take the trail to the left as we did, you will follow the road for a while and then come upon a little shortcut up a small, yet slightly steep hill. If you’re brave, give it a try. We did. Otherwise, follow the road around the curve where the gate will block the way with its No Trespassing signs. I like to believe the gate and signs were meant for cars only and that hikers could go up beyond the sign. There was plenty of evidence around that told us we were not the only ones who had visited that spot!

Shortcut!

• I believe it took us about 30-45 minutes to hike up to the sign, so give yourself at least an hour to an hour and a half to go roundtrip.

Have fun taking your pictures with the iconic sign!

THE THIRTY MILE ZONE

Los Angeles, CA

(April 8, 2012)

We woke up on day two in Los Angeles to discover that the Easter Bunny had paid us a visit! Yay! Well, in truth, Miriam, the ever-prepared wonder, thought ahead and brought delicious chocolates from our favorite chocolatier in NYC, Jacques Torres, with a couple of traditional Hershey’s and Dove chocolate bunnies thrown in. The little sneak got up in the middle of the night to hide chocolate Easter eggs all over Sal’s apartment, and Sal and I, still dressed in our PJs, had fun finding them all on Easter morning. 

This day was going to be loads of fun, starting off with brunch with Sal and one of Miriam’s oldest friends, Rightor. Miriam and I, having watched a lot of TMZ, a paparazzi/entertainment based news program, wanted to hit up a brunch place often featured on the program called Toast, located in Hollywood. Apparently, it’s frequented a lot by celebrities. I wanted to go there, not for the possible celebrity sightings, but because I had seen it so often on TMZ that I had to check it out. 

Sal & the tea bag selections

Rightor & his coffee

Sal dropped us off and went to park the car, and we started catching up with Rightor while our table was prepared. Miriam and Rightor grew up together in New Orleans, and for a while we all lived in New York, but very recently, a television series he’s been writing garnered the interest of a major producer in LA, so he has “temporarily” relocated to LA to write more episodes in the hopes that a studio will pick it up. We’ll see how temporary that move is…
The brunch menu at Toast looked AMAZING! We all had a difficult time deciding what to get. Miriam and I settled on something sweet (pancakes and French toast covered and stuffed with all sorts of goodness), Rightor on something savory, and Sal, the skinny snot, couldn't decide, so he ate two meals to get a sweet AND savory fix!

My chai came with cookies!

We had a blast over brunch, chatting as though it hadn’t been a millennium since we’d last seen each other. We had a lot of laughs and a lot of fun, and I think we highly amused our waitress.

Once brunch was over, we said goodbye to Rightor, and Sal dropped us off on Hollywood Boulevard by the Grauman’s Chinese Theater (also know as Mann’s Chinese Theater). Miriam and I were going on the TMZ Hollywood tour, and we couldn’t have been more excited about it!

We got there a bit early for our tour, so we checked in at the tour booth and then played around with all the famous hand and foot prints that are pressed into the cement outside the Chinese Theater. As a tourist, you can’t have a real Hollywood visit without testing your hand and foot size against those of some of the most famous music and screen legends. At the same time, I can’t even imagine what has been in those handprints we were all so willingly touching…if you’re squeamish, bring some hand sanitizer.

Miriam matching up with Cher

Finally, someone with bigger hands than me! (Arnold Schwarzenegger)

AKA, my mom's side of the family

We also took some pictures of the Hollywood Walk of Fame, the many blocks of stars gracing the sidewalks around Hollywood Boulevard that idolize celebrities from musicians to television personalities, all the while trying to avoid the costumed characters wanting to take pictures with you for money. No, thanks.

Finally, it was time to join our tour!

Here’s a little back-story: TMZ is an entertainment news source, using both a website and a television show to promote the news of the entertainment world. Their television show takes place at their morning pitch meetings, where the TMZ employees pitch their stories to Harvey Levin, the creator of TMZ, in the hopes of getting the stories posted on the website. I absolutely LOVE watching these morning pitch meetings. They are ridiculous and hilarious. Personally, I could care less about the videos and pictures they get of the various celebrities-- I’m more interested in watching the camaraderie of the employees. I find it so entertaining that I actually DVR it so I can make sure to watch it every day.

Anyways, TMZ stands for “Thirty Mile Zone,” a term from the 1960’s, which meant that any film shooting outside this zone was considered a location shoot-- location shoots require per diems and paid travel and living expenses, so to film within this thirty mile zone was cost effective and ideal for producers. The Thirty Mile Zone basically sits on top of the center of Hollywood. Harvey Levin thought it would be a fun throwback to name his entertainment news website after the Thirty Mile Zone, since a lot of their news comes from, but it’s not limited to, Hollywood.

So, Miriam and I were super pumped to be going on the relatively new TMZ Hollywood tour (it was less than a year old when we went). It’s different from your typical sight-seeing tours because the tour guides are TMZ employees and could even be one of the people you see on the television show, and rather than point out the expected LA sights, they point out where celebrity happenings have occurred (i.e. the corner where Hugh Grant picked up the prostitute or the Laugh Factory where Michael “Kramer” Richards had his racial rant), all while scoping for celebrities. 

Van!

We were really hoping our tour guide would be Van, the young black guy from Louisiana often featured on the show. We were so hoping it would be him that we decked ourselves out in New Orleans and Saints t-shirts. And wouldn’t you know, our tour guide was Van! 

We let him know right away that we were going to be a fun pair, but it looked like the rest of the people on the bus were going to be quiet and unresponsive. I decided right then and there to make up for that. I was joking with him and trying to give clever answers to his questions and even tried to get the other people on the bus involved. They were boring. But at least I was entertaining myself and Van. Miriam just shook her head and laughed at me.

The tour is in a big, open-air van. Well, bigger than a van but smaller than a full-sized bus. It has a roof but no windows, just giant open spaces that we could hang out of if we felt adventurous—ah, the glories of living in a desert without the real worry of rain. We could see everything around us without the hindrance of windows but still kind of be out of the sun. That was sweet.

Our friend Lori had gone on the TMZ tour the month prior so she let us know that they’d ask for volunteers for games along the way, with the potential to win a free t-shirt. Well, I wanted that t-shirt. The minute Van started saying the word “volun-” my hand shot up in the air. The game I played was whether or not the celebrity in the video would wave at the camera or give the finger. The whole bus thought my celebrity would give the finger, but I said he would wave. And guess who was right? That’s right, baby. I’m the proud owner of a TMZ Hollywood tour t-shirt. Boo-yah. I won’t tell you who my celebrity was in case you, reader, end up on this tour and happen to get the same celebrity video. No cheating!

We ended up playing the game twice more and both contestants got it wrong, so in an effort to give away his last t-shirt, Van asked everyone where he was originally from. I was the first to answer, but since I already had a t-shirt I couldn’t win again.

The tour cracked Miriam and I up. We stopped by all sorts of crazy places, including the hospital where celebrities are born, go crazy, and die, the Hollywood precinct, which has a special rule in place where they won’t release mug shots (celebrities, if they are going to be arrested, hope to be in the Hollywood precinct at the time of their arrest…), various restaurants celebrities frequent when they want to be seen (like Boa), and an apartment building with some very famous inhabitants (like Elton John, for instance, who has a separate apartment for his baby…because the baby can take care of itself, right?).

Surprise carrot cake!

Van, who was mic’ed the whole time, would start up conversations with people on the street or in the cars next to us when we were stuck in traffic. At one point he started up a conversation with the couple in the car next to us, asking what they were doing for their Easter Sunday, at which point the lady lifted an unexpected carrot cake from her lap! WTF?! Where did that come from?? We had fun with that one. 

We only had one brief celebrity sighting—Wayne Brady—as he waited to be seated at a brunch place Van was pointing out to us. Van then told us how he has some bad blood for Wayne Brady after Wayne’s production company optioned his screenplay about Hurricane Katrina and then never did anything with it. It’s what brought Van to LA in the first place. He may be slightly bitter about it, but he’s now a celebrity in his own right. Shoot, the guy was invited into the back of Cee-Lo’s limo when they both showed up at the same fast food joint. Cee-Lo recognized him from TMZ and asked him to join him in his car! He said it was wild eating his value combo in Cee-Lo Green’s limo. Pretty funny stuff.

One of my favorite moments was when we passed by the Chinese Theater (remember the costumed characters I mentioned earlier?). On the count of three he had us all say hi to Spongebob, who happily turned toward our bus and waved. Then Van had us watch a video where that very Spongebob got beat up by two women who thought he said something disparaging about one of their mothers. It was the perfect set up. We were so happy and then completely mortified. It was hilarious! Trust me, it was hilarious.

Then, sadly, the tour came to an end. We, happily, gave Van a nice tip (always tip your tour guides!) for the very entertaining tour we took and asked him to take a picture with us outside the tour bus. My reaction to the picture (“Sweet, wounded...That’s beautiful.”) sent him into hysterics, at which point he hugged us both and told us he loved us. Aw.

After the tour, we ventured into various shops along Hollywood Boulevard until Sal could come pick us up, then we all went to the West Hollywood It’s a Wrap (yes, again) since Miriam and I only had 15 minutes there the day before. Sal had never been and really wanted to check it out.

I totally scored at this It’s a Wrap, finding two perfectly fitting pairs of dress pants from the television show “Brothers and Sisters” and the Adam Sandler movie Jack and Jill. I also found a really nice dress shirt for my brother (it was his birthday in a week, after all), and a pair of stainless steel hoop earrings from the Selena Gomez television show “Wizards of Waverly Place” that only cost 90 cents. 90 cents! Total steal.

My fried burrito

The fun cactus chandelier

After we drained It’s a Wrap dry, we headed back to Sal’s apartment to freshen up, randomly running into a friend of his driving by and convincing her to chat for a second in a convenient parking lot-- LA really is a small town sometimes! Then we met up with Sal’s friend, Isabella, for dinner at the Mexican restaurant Don Cuco, where I got an amazing fried burrito. Dinner was a blast and Isabella was so much fun.

By the end of the evening we were so tuckered out by our long and eventful day that we couldn’t wait to pass out...but not before having some Easter Bunny chocolate...

Sal, Isabella, and Miriam outside Don Cuco's