I LOVE L.A.

Grauman's Chinese Theater in Hollywood.

Spencer Tracys' star from the Walk of Fame. Had to get a shot of that since he is one of the people my Spencer is named after.

This is Evan posing with a Storm Trooper outside Grauman's. They pose for tips and the guy even had the gun for Evan to hold. Totally worth the 2 lousy bucks I gave him. (Yes, I am cheap. Get a real job, dude.)

Hard to see but this is Frank Sinatra's block at Grauman's. I put my hands in the handprints and felt ... okay, nothing. I wanted to say I had some electric psychic experience but oh well.

Evan in these next two, posing for Papa next to the handprints of 2 cowboys and the hoofprints of their horses -- Roy Rogers with Trigger and Gene Autry with Champion. We also saw Gabby Hayes' star on the Walk of Fame. Garrett knew who he was right away because they all just watched a cowboy movie with Papa. (I had no idea who he was.)


Here's Garrett with the prints of Darth Vader, C3PO and R2D2. We did this relatively early in the day but having been there at 2 AM, I prefer it at night. Much less crowded.

This is from the La Brea Tar Pits. I have always wanted to go there and it really was pretty cool. Definitely worth the time (and pretty inexpensive, too).


The Petersen Automotive Museum is just a few blocks away -- we walked down there and looked around, since my dad is such a car freak and the rest of us have caught the disease as well. It is really hard to get good pictures because the lighting is so wonky.

This is a car owned by some guys from my home state, North Dakota. They own a ton of car dealerships. This car was done by Chip Foose, a god of automotive design. It won the Ridler Award for the best custom car at Autorama, a huge annual car show. Rumor has it they have over 7 figures in this baby. Honestly, it shows. It is flawless. Spectacular. It's hard to tell but the main color is a beigey-taupe and the upper half of the car is a really subtle silvery sage green. Pinstripes in orange accent it, and it is amazing.


Last but certainly not least: The Getty. Wow. Again, spectacular. this facility cost a Billion dollars to construct and its most famous work, van Gogh's Irises, was bought from someone who paid over $50 million for it before selling it to the Getty, which has not disclosed the price it paid. The museum has such a huge endowment that it does not charge admission. For 7 bucks in parking fees we saw countless priceless works of art. Besides that, the entire facility is simply breathtaking. It meant so much to me to see this before we left California. And Irises is as marvelous in person as I imagined. I love van Gogh's work -- the emotion in it is palpable. The museum shop had a little van Gogh doll that had an ear attached by velcro. LOL I really wanted it for my scrap room. Maybe another day.



We saw all this in one day. Have I mentioned I LOVE L.A.? Totally.