LA Xtended

Sorry the last blog was rushed off, it was $5 an hour and we only had 5 dollars!

I am now sat in the comfort of San Diego Library where they provide free internet for an hour. this is great but it keeps crashing and i just lost a whole blog i typed! oh well!!

Anway, i think it is worth going back to Hollywood in this narrative. It was an interesting place and it was difficult to digest it all at the time. I'm still not quite sure what to make of it.

While we were there we were privy to a red carpet event (the ESPYs...some sporting awards show) in the Kodak theatre where they do the Oscars), right next to the Chinese theatre. It was interesting to see the whole operation take place. it was right outside our hotel window and we saw it from setting up the street, laying the red carpet and the guests arriving through to packing up the next day. it drew quite a crowd so we hung around for a bit. it really was A-list stuff. the first guest we saw walk the carpet was the one and only Mr. Belding! Wow....im still recovering...
also James Blunt appeared, haunted by 'you're beautiful' being played over the tannoy. i think i saw Andre Agassi too but it might have been a fat Mexican. that was too much excitement for us, so we went and had tea at Hooters.

now, guys, if you have never been to hooters, i recommend NOT going with your girlfriend/spouse. While it is a fine eating establishment in every way, it has rather....distracting staff. it is THE RULE that they must wear the shortest and tightest orange hot pants....its just the rule....there was nothing i could do about it how ever much i complained. so when we finally got a seat and were served a drink, hannah actually watched me put the drink to my mouth, tip it, and completely miss and fill my lap with icy water. probably the best thing for me considering where i was looking. i maintain i was watching a near-by plate of food that just happened to be by a waitress' bottom.

ok so i mentioned we saw pirates of the crabby bean (fat man's breast) but i didn't describe the theatre. the El Capitan is one of those relics from the 20s you just don't get in the UK. they had kitted it out in pirate fittings, with ship wrecks and all sorts of pirate related props everywhere. they even had pirate entertainers (and no, i didn't get told to get back to work....even though i would make an awesome pirate)

they put on this big show before the film started with light effects and stuff, but the second the film started, that was it...the audience we uncontainable. it was cringe worthy at first....every cheesy joke they were rolling around and every time jonny depp so much as looked like he was going to think about saying 'savvy' they all cheered like he was in the room. having said all that, it was a really good atmosphere and somehow i think it must have been better than the curzon....

our second day in hollywood already felt like we'd been there too long....it is really a day-stop town. the day before a guy on the street handed us some tickets to see a TV show being filmed....never heard of it but i thought it would be an interesting experience. they printed off a map on the back of the ticket which looked like a messy game of nought and crosses so it took us about an hour to find the place in the back street grid system studios of hollywood (we were half an hour late....surprise)

none of that mattered. as soon as we were seated in the air conditioned darkness it began. very odd. it was called 'the amazon fishbowl' with bill maher and the producer basically cam out at the start and told us if we didn't laugh at the jokes he would get fired. he was only half joking. we were informed it was a webcast, as well as a TV show...so try and watch it!

the show got underway and the first guest was Morgan spurlock. the show was only half an hour so the questions didnt get very interesting but it was entertaining. daniel powter performed and was actually really good. the jokes were all lame....but my....how Bush is hated in California. every joke at his expense. anyone would think they hadn't re-elected him!? Even Arnie was distancing himself from Bush in a local paper (granted....by cuddling up to the gay vote so to speak)

on leaving our hostel, someone had written 'hope lies in the proles'. someone else had crossed out proles and replaced it with 'chavs'. if this is the case there is no hope! i'm sure that's not quite what Orwell had in mind.


so that's about it for Hollywood....we got the bus out of there that evening....and it wasn't fast enough!