Tour guide in a city I only moderately know

My first visitors from Ohio - Sarah, Kate and Kyle H.

Let's be honest. I've only been here two months. So when I'm expected to play tour guide in a city I am only moderately familiar with, I feel a little intimidated. I want to show my friends an out-of-this-world time in sunny southern California.

As a good Los Angeles tour guide, of course you have to take first-time visitors to see Hollywood. To be completely fair, I think it is one of the weakest, despite being the most-recognizable, LA tourist attraction. Aside from some stars and handprints on a sidewalk and a smoggy picture of a distant sign that reads, "Hollywood," there isn't really anything there.

You think Hollywood is glamorous, but it is actually rather dirty and not really kept up. Right in front of Grauman's Chinese Theater, of course, everything looks great. As you go a block either way though, the sidewalk is chipped, stars are damaged, and it is a little sketch. Half of one star was even missing. Can you imagine the fans and family of that celeb coming to take a picture and discovering half the star gone?

My favorite part of that tourist trap is the fountain in the middle of the mall there. I don't know why. Maybe it is the elephants on the pillars in the square. Maybe it is because I'm always tempted to run through it. Maybe I just really like fountains.

Of course, Kate, Sarah, Kyle H. and I took pics with the stars hand and foot prints. The better pictures, however, I think took place at the Hollywood sign viewpoint. If you take a photo with just your camera, it is going to be really far away (no matter how many megapixels your camera sports or how far your zoom is). So we decided to pay the quarter for the telescopic viewer to get a better look. Well one quarter eventually turned into a couple quarters.

And it only took two - sometimes three - sets of hands to get a pic. Not a bad shot though:

We complemented our trip to Hollywood with a visit to the Santa Monica Pier and of course, an O-H-I-O shot!

I've never seen the TV show, The O.C., but Sarah's a fan, so I took the group to Newport Beach.

I think she may have been a little disappointed that no one told us, Welcome to the O.C., bitch.

After lunch at the restaurant at the end of the Newport Beach pier, we headed down to the beach. Kate taught us how to frolic in the sand, and then we decided to dip our toes in the Pacific. I think Sarah's expression below can best demonstrate how cold the ocean on the West Coast is.

We meandered over to Little Corona Del Mar. Tucked behind a mostly residential area, it is definitely one of the most scenic beaches I've seen out here with the waves crashing into the rocks. Read about it on yelp and would highly recommend.

There are so many sights to see around LA. Nevertheless, I love taking visitors to my backyard - the Hermosa Beach pier. Just a short walk up the strand - or a short frolic down the beach, whatever mood strikes you.

At the foot of the pier is Hennessey's. Admittedly my new favorite watering hole and restaurant for their Cajun chicken, famous homemade lemonade, and their outdoor, upstairs deck that overlooks the ocean.

I'm always open to more visitors, so if you want to see me (or Cali, but let's be honest, I'm the real attraction here), hit me up!

Classic LA weekend: went to an invite-only Hollywood club and met a celebrity

It felt like a real LA weekend.

Saturday, I went to an invite-only Hollywood club. It is called Magic Castle - dubbed as the "home of the academy of magical arts." Could this be a real-life Hogwarts? I didn't see Harry Potter, but I did see a lot of magic and some really great magicians.

Angie and I went with two of her friends from college. Started the night out at a Japanese noodle place called Asahi Ramen that was actually quite delicious. I'm pretty sure it is real Japanese, not American-Japanese. When I asked for a fork, they looked at me as if I was crazy. I had no idea what to order, so I ended up picking something that looked good in the pictures on the menu - it was called Yakisoba. When it was served to me I realized I actually have had it before - and I love it - I just didn't know its name. I ordered it all the time at the dining hall in Ohio State's RPAC (Recreational & Physical Activity Center)... but under the name "Asian chicken noodle bowl." Yes. I'm serious. We're apparently pretty white.


Magic castle was awesome. You drive up to beautiful lighted fountains as the valet takes your car. Once inside, you say "open sesame" to a wall which "magically" parts to let you in to the 1908 Victorian mansion.


No photos allowed, so I didn't take my camera. I'll rip some pics off of Google images though so you can get a good feel. Here's the outside from about.com and the inside - one of the magic stages - from JoeMTurner.com (some magician's website). Some of the shows we watched were in rooms like that, other times we just sat down at a card table with a magician who would wow you with cards or mind-reading.

I loved Irma though. I'm a sucker for piano bars, and while this doesn't exactly classify as one, they did have a piano - played by a "ghost, Irma" - who played everything from Beethoven to Lady Gaga. It was such an interesting mix of a crowd, especially evident in Irma's room. There was our group in our low-to-mid-20s, a group of exceptionally drunk 40 or 50-somethings, and a group of ancient men who were probably part of the original 150 charter members when the home was transitioned into a night-club in 1963. I couldn't tell if they were offended or amused when the plastered middle-agers requested Sir Mix-a-Lot's Baby Got Back and sang every word to the 6 minutes of Queen's Bohemian Rhapsody.


Sunday, Allison and I went to Fiesta Hermosa, Hermosa Beach's arts festival held every Memorial and Labor Day weekend. More festival than art, but there were several exhibits of impressive and beautiful photography and paintings. Again, I didn't take my camera, so an overhead shot from the Fiesta Hermosa website will have to suffice:

When I really needed to have my camera ready was when I went to the Hermosa Beach Comedy and Magic Club that night. I was picking up tickets to see Jay Leno perform, when suddenly, he pulls up in his Camaro and is walking in, saying hello and shaking hands with everyone as he walks in to the club. I can't believe I saw my first celebrity on the street. (I'm not going to lie, I get pretty star struck). We had dinner in the lounge next door and got priority (front-row) seating as a result. And wow, was he hilarious. Definitely one of the coolest things I've done and one of the best weekends I've had in LA.

Do you get rolled over by a Mars rover at your job?

Do you get rolled over by a Mars rover at your job? Because I do, and let's be honest - that's awesome. We worked an educational exhibit for elementary, middle and high school students at the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) Space 2010 Conference, and after all of the kids left on the last day, the adults got to play. The Texas Learning and Computation Center brought the Mars rover, which felt like a giant spider massaging your back. Hard to decide if that felt good or creepy.

Spent a lot of time on the road that week driving to Anaheim. I'm getting used to always assuming there will be traffic in LA - at all times of all days, except Friday mornings. I don't think anyone works on Fridays here. It typically takes me about 20 minutes to get to work. The other morning I made it in 11, and trust me, I was following all speed limits and traffic signals.

What I can't get used to is driving near the airport. The runway runs over the road (not literally, you drive through a tunnel beneath it), so planes fly (and drive) right over you all the time. It shocks me every time one takes off over me.

Another thing I can't get used to - not being in Columbus for the football games. I thought it would just feel like an away game. It doesn't. Not when you see the Shoe, the fans, the band. I really the phrase the ESPN announcer used the other day: "Welcome to the Horse Shoe: a place not known for luck, but dominance." I miss it and can't wait to go back for the Purdue and Michigan game this year (since my sister is being exceptionally nice and letting me use her tickets).

For the opening game against Marshall, I went to one of the many local "Ohio State" bars - On the Rocks in Redondo Beach. It felt good to walk in and see a familiar sea of red jerseys and hear Carmen Ohio. And I can't complain, watching the game as the sun sets over the ocean and sail boats sail by. Not a bad setting. O-H!