Meeting LA - 2/11/2011

Tricia and I got up early and then sat in the living room booking our flights to Madison (so I can get my braces taken care of) and Africa (Tricia’s going to a wedding). We also planned the next leg of our itinerary to the Grand Canyon, San Antonio, and Austin, and tried to line up Couch Surfers in those cities. Afterwards, I decided to walk into town and see if I could find anything interesting. I ended up in a Pollo Loco (I know it’s fast food - but I’d never been there before). I tried a spicy avocado fish taco and a couple churros (impulse buy). They also had a salsa bar which was kind of fun. The food wasn’t half bad either.

Afterwards, I found Holly Ave, where Jed and his family lives. I tried to walk down it back to the house, but got stopped twice - first by an elementary school and then by the water tower. I ended up taking a very circuitous route back to the house, but I have a better understanding of El Segundo now and am decent at navigating within a mile of Jed’s house. :)

Grilled Cheese Truck - Day 9 pics

Wee Man

Jed wanted to take us to the famous Grilled Cheese truck for lunch, and had promised Damian he could go too, so we went and picked him up early from school. The truck was parked in a shipping company’s parking lot, and the line stretched through the parking lot. A lady trying to keep everyone in order said it was the shortest the line had been all day. We figured it would be about an hour wait for our grilled cheese. Just as we arrived, a bunch of Monster monster trucks showed up. Monster is an energy drink, and they thought a line of people who’d been standing in the hot LA sun for an hour would be a good group to give free energy drinks to. We got giant cans of the caffeine-spiked soda, which was red, but tasted pretty good. They took our pictures smiling with the drinks and we took theirs too. Apparently I got a picture of the famous “JackAss” midget (the tv show on MTV). So, it turns out we did get to meet a celebrity in LA.

While we were waiting in line, I tried to distract Damian (who was a little hyper from the Monster) by asking him what math he was doing in school. He’s in the first grade, and is doing addition but hasn’t started subtraction yet. So I taught him division. I said, “If you have 5 apples, and 5 people, how many does each person get?” He paused a beat, and then said “One!!” Okay, if you have 8 apples and 4 people, how many does each get? Again, after just a second or two, he said “Two!!” The kid’s a child prodigy.

Brie grilled cheese

After our hour in line we did get to try the famous grilled cheese. I had brie with apples, caramelized onions, walnuts, and fig paste on potato bread. Tricia tried the macaroni and cheese with pulled pork on Italian bread. They were both excellent. :)

Two headed turtle

Pot and Botox

Jed took us over to Venice Beach next, which felt like we were entering a time warp. First we passed a small group of boys who reminded me of the kids from Grease - turned up collars, slicked back hair, cigarettes behind their ears. What is that, the 50’s? Then there was the Freak Show, with two headed snakes, turtles, and chickens, the rubber girl, and the sword eater. When were freak shows popular? The 60’s? They had build a skate park there for skateboarders, which was very 80’s. Then there was the boardwalk itself, which seemed like a throwback to the 90’s to me. Several times people passed us pumping music out through little speakers, and once a guy even passed us with a boom box on his shoulder. And then there were the pot stores, which I guess is very “today”. There were about 10 shops rented out to people who could not only sell you pot, but also write you the prescription right then and there. They had people outside the stores trying to lure people in. (“Elbow hurting you? No problem!!”) It was a blast. Before we left the boardwalk we also tried on pair after pair of sunglasses and finally settled on a couple of very cute new shades.

For dinner, Jed made us wonderful artichokes and Moroccan chicken and spinach pastries. They were wonderful. Tricia and Damian had never had artichokes before, and were a little apprehensive about the green vegetables, but both declared them delicious!! Jed had boiled the artichokes in lemon juice and garlic and added a garlic mayonnaise and lemon dipping sauce. It had been a long time since I’d had them, and I was really craving them. Afterwards, Damian and I played Plants vs. Zombies on the PlayStation. Plants always beat zombies.