my heart is damaged (damaged)

So...this is gonna be mostly words about our mini vacay, because I'm really bad at taking pictures while I'm visiting places. Nate and I were actually discussing this, and we decided the road trip ruined us because every place we go now feels like home. When you live in your car, the idea of home focuses way more on people than anything else. Home was where we were. Therefore, we weren't tourists...so why should we take pictures?

(This is my story and I'm sticking to it. Nate is better about taking pictures than I am, but shy around new people and doesn't want to be the weird one taking a bunch of photos. It's a hard life, y'all.)

In any case, we got up at the buttcrack of dawn -- 4:25AM -- on Friday the 9th and dragged our happy selves to the airport. It was relatively painless, and the flight down was very easy. I decided not to go back to sleep and instead, watched reruns of America's Next Top Model because VirginAmerica is kind of the best plane company ever and I wish they flew everywhere FOR REAL. But that's enough of that.

We landed in LA around 10AM, grabbed our rental car and headed out. We ate breakfast at a random diner and then wandered around Westwood (which is basically UCLA campus) for a while until Chris, the dude we were visiting, could come home from the studio/hotel (he is working on NBC's The Sing-Off right now -- kinda REALLY FREAKIN' COOL) to meet us back at his apartment.

Bob Hope Chapel @ LA Nat'l Cemetary

Not Hollywood -- outside an old-school diner in Westwood!

Random diner between LAX and Westwood.

Mormons in Westwood -- so pretty!

Random dice art.

We were all slightly exhausted, since he hadn't slept much the night before either, so we chatted for a bit before he had to go back to the studio. Nate and I wandered out to get food and wound up at Enzo's, which had been billed as the best pizza Chris's friend, Chris (this definitely cause confusion while playing Uno later in the weekend,) had ever had.

It was pretty good. They also had fried ravioli. Uhm...yes.

It's also funny how things work out, because our Seattle friend Meghan said we HAD to go to Diddy Riese -- which wound up being two blocks from Chris' apartment. So we went there, also.

Fresh-made cookie ice cream sandwiches with your choice of cookie and ice cream for $1.50? Sounds like a plan.

Seriously, if you are in LA, go here. It's SO GOOD. p.s. - they only take cash, so bring cash. 

Once Chris got back from rehearsing with the groups, we stayed up much too late for people working on little to no sleep. We also had to make a slight detour back to the hotel to borrow some blankets and towels because Chris didn't have any and CVS apparently doesn't actually sell home goods, unlike they advertise.

Next day we woke up leisurely, around noon, got breakfast/lunch at Headlines, where they had giant tobasco.

That's a regular-sized coffee mug next to it. 

Afterwards we went to see Contagion, which was horrible, then went back to the house for a quick-change before heading with Chris to the hotel to meet some of the groups and see the behind the scene action. Turns out there wasn't much rehearsing going on, but we did get invited to go eat dinner with the remaining groups, which was super awesome. We ate at C&O Cucina's and at one point they passed out lyrics to That's Amore and turned the music up real loud. Great fun with a bunch of singers...who have been drinking. ;) 

Afterwards we went to Target to buy board games, but board games are expensive, so we bought cards and Uno instead, and headed back to the apartment to hang with Chris and Chris (the two mentioned above) and Chris (that we were staying with) and my friend, Jenny, from FSU and a cappella, who moved to Hollywood recently! It was great, awesome fun. The card games kind of dissolved into watching Miranda Sings videos on YouTube and running to get pizza at 2:50AM before the place closed at 3AM. We're cool kids, yo.

Sunday morning, Nate and I got up and grabbed coffee and breakfast at WaffleChix in Westwood. I HIGHLY recommend this place -- they had sweet tea (real sweet tea. I MISS SWEET TEA, WAAAAAH.) and chicken and waffles (hence the name.) We got the Red Velvet Cocoa waffle with Mascarpone Whipped Cream and it was heavenly. Afterwards we packed up and met Chris at the hotel to hang out a bit more before heading to the airport. 

We got a little lost on the way back to the rental car place and had to drive in several circles, but we finally made it, grabbed some Burger King for dinner, hopped on the plane and flew back. We got home around 10PM and promptly crashed. 

And then got up and went to work on Monday.

FUN TIMES!

I love traveling. Have you gone on any mini vacations or staycations recently?