We woke up in our clean-smelling hotel room in a safe and secure neighborhood quite early. Early for us, anyway, and started our touristy day right after our free extensive continental breakfast. Or, a bucket of bagels and some coffee, same thing. We high-tailed out of there ASAP when a whole family came into the small room and started coughing all over the food, and then the littlest kid sneezed and a thick column of snot went all over his hands and plate. It's hard being hungry in those kinda situations.
We first drove to Hollywood, and one of its most famous attractions, Grauman's Chinese Theater. It's instantly recognizable. It's also the location of the Walk of Fame.
Saw some famous people's footprints, like here, Dean Martin.
Twins.
Pam's hands are as big as Jimmy Stewart's. You know what they say about people with big hands. (They tend to stretch out their winter gloves.)
Some guy named Frank Sinatra.
Some chick named Julie Andrews. Unlike the caption of the Frank Sinatra footprints, I'm serious here. I don't know who Julie Andrews is. (I had to pretend a lot in Hollywood, because I know nothing about movies.)
Will Smith, star of the best movie ever... Wild Wild West.
We decided to take an actual tour of the Chinese Theater. There was some neat Chinese thingamabobs in there, like this Chinese lamp thing.
The theater had a lot of history in it, a point the tour guide stressed again and again. It had prestige. Famous people were here. It had collections of props and costumes from famous movies. Even the bathroom lounge was where all the stars hung out. The main point being that Grauman's Chinese Theater was an important piece of cinematic history.
This history, in my opinion, was cheapened by the movies that were being featured this month at the theater (an actual movie theater, ya know): Tyler Perry's Madea, Step Up 4, Katy Perry, etc. A far cry from Citizen Kane.
You may recognize the sign in the background.
Get that ugly mug out of the way, we want to see the Hollywood sign again.
This was the view from the Chinese Theater area, by the way. You could get tours that would take you closer, but they were costly, and they also included stop like "Mel Gibson's house," and "the hotel where Hugh Grant got busted with a prostitute." No joke. We passed.
There was some jabroni from Glee, apparently, on the floor below us getting slobbered on by a bunch of paparazzi. Pam was holding the camera at this point, I hope it goes without saying.
We seriously have two pictures of this?
Get that ugly Hollywood sign out of the way, we want to see the Pam again.
No celebrity-filled town would be complete without this kind of place.
There was a ton of stars on the ground for blocks and blocks. Here's Walt Disney's. I was hoping Stone Cold Steve Austin had one, but I couldn't find one.
It was still pretty early, so we took the highway to the fairway to the parkway or whatever and ended up at Old Pasadena, a cool little town with lots of nooks and crannies and a bar with a backyard where you could sit and enjoy a bitter IPA.
Then we took the highway back to the expressway next to the freeway or whatever and ended up at the fancy part of town. I forget what it's called. Wait, let me wake up Pam and ask her. Yup, okay. It's called Rodeo Drive. Apparently it was in Pretty Woman. I've never seen that movie. I've never seen a lot of movies; I told you, I had to fake it a lot in Hollywood.
Anyway, Rodeo Drive. It had a lot of really high-end stores, most of which I have never heard of, some of which I could not pronounce, and absolutely none of which I've ever bought anything from. But it was nice mixing in with the patricians and the noblemen. Kind of.
Maybe Pam can edit this later and come up with captions for these pictures. I got nothing.
Alright! So we had tickets to see the Phillies vs. Dodgers game that night! That's a plan that's more my speed. Getting to Dodgers Stadium was easy - our hotel was about a block away. We just had to walk up a big hill is all. Strangely, there were different entrances for you depending on what level you were sitting in. We had nosebleeds, so we had to go up two big sets of steps to even gain entrance to the park. And there was only elevators connecting the different levels of the stadium, no stairs or escalators on the inside.
The park itself looked real nice. It cavernous, with lots of seats, and LOTS of empty seats. I enjoyed looking out to right field and fondly remembering Matt Stairs's moon shot into the night.
The fans, true to their reputation, sucked. They showed up in the 2nd, they left in the 8th. They were leaving in droves, despite the fact that it was only a one-run game and the Dodgers are in the middle of a pennant race.
They cared little about the game. Oh sure, they cheered loudly for Matt Kemp when he came up to bat, but they cheered louder for a freaking beach ball that was being tossed around from section to section. That would NEVER happen at a Phillies game (in fact, Franzke and Anderson made fun of them in tonight's broadcast for those freaking beach balls). And they cheered the loudest for one of those mid-inning things on the scoreboard where you pick what song should be played after the game. They cheered three times as loud for "Living on a Prayer" than they did when the Dodgers tried to rally in the sixth. Pathetic.
The stadium was okay. Citizen's Bank Park, I think, has spoiled us. Dodgers Stadium was old and cramped. The concessions were all the same. Each one was just called "Dodger Dogs" and sold, um, Dodger Dogs, along with the obligatory peanuts and crackerjack. Ho hum.
Note how I'm staying off the railing on the steps. Remember the snot family from the free continental breakfast? Yup, they were there, running their snotty hands up and down the railing right next to us. Germ-free, yo.
We weren't the only Phillies fans there. Now, there wasn't as many as, say, the games we attended in Pittsburgh or Washington D.C. But there was a decent amount, including a big group two sections over from Temple University. They were quite drunk and started many a "Let's Go Phillies" chant, which we appreciated.
This is the beautiful view from outside the stadium. It was a great game. Joe Blanton threw a great 8 innings of two-run ball, which is spectacular for Joe Blanton (first time he didn't give up a home run in a game since May 8th, no kidding). Howard hit his first dinger of the season. The Phillies, though playoffs are quite close to impossible at this point, are putting together a nice winning streak. Glad we got to see a good game, in any case.
And now I know all you folks reading this, a group that includes both our sets of parents, were worried about leaving the game to head home, and our safety on the journey. Let me assure you that: 1) No one started trouble with us, not once; 2) Like I said, we were really close to the stadium, like a block; 3) We coincidentally walked back to our hotel with a big group from the game that was also staying at the hotel. They were all Dodgers fans, and of course the literally snotty family were among our numbers, but we were safe. All is well!
Today was not as exciting a day, admittedly. It was mostly driving through the dessert, and then crashing at the hotel in Phoenix. Here's the dessert we drove through.
Here's a ton of wind-energy things that we saw. Seriously, there were hundreds.
More mountains. Yea!
Tomorrow we are driving to Las Cruces, NM, where we are going to camp at a pretty nice campsite. So, no update tomorrow. But I'll be sure to post something by the time we roll in Houston, Texas Thursday night. By that time, we'll only be in time zone behind! Goodnight, ya'll.
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