And Now…The Rest of the Story

The week has snuck by, and I forgot to post the rest of our pictures from the trip. I’m discovering another useful thing about blogging is that it really serves as a great way to remember trips, even if it bores everyone else.

And now…the rest of the story (I just love Paul Harvey).

The most memorable part of the trip is that this was the first extended time away for me and Wade together post-child but without the child. Wade had to go to a conference in southern California, so I got to tag along with him. Tate was soaking up all of the attention and fun for one day at his friend Jackson’s house (thank you Laura!!!) and then for three days at Mimi & Grandpa’s house (thank you Mom & Dad!!!).

So I had always been curious about what life in the real OC and in The Hills was like. From what I saw, I think I like my little suburban life just fine. We had a great time, but everywhere we went there was a TON of traffic, everything was expensive, and everyone was just dressed way too cool for me. It wore me out.

But the highlights of the trip were:

• Driving through beautiful neighborhoods in the Hollywood Hills and scary, narrow, curvy streets to find just the right view of the famous sign.

• Bowing down to the Star of all Stars’ Hollywood Walk of Fame star. With all of her cheese and goofiness, I still love Celine!

• Wade realizing he and Humphrey Bogart had the exact same hand and shoe size. I always thought there was a little resemblance.

• Realizing that maybe our gas prices of $3.79/gallon aren’t that bad.
  

• Completing 2 seconds of my 15 minutes of fame with a very short appearance on The Tonight Show. Do you see us (hint…far left)? The show was pretty cool to go to, and Dwight Yoakam put on a surprisingly nifty little outdoor concert. But how does he breathe in those pants?
  
  

• Feeing no guilt at all as I had a hot dog and shared nachos AND Cracker Jacks with Wade at the Anaheim Angels vs. LA Dodgers baseball game on the 4th row. It was a great game, great seats, great weather, and a great stadium.
  
  

• And who can’t help but enjoy finishing out a quick, kid-free trip away with the one you love while watching a fireworks show choreographed to classic rock hits of the ‘60s? Just what I’ve always dreamed of.

Some highlights without pictures:

• We laugh about it now, but it was extremely tense and scary when we had a flat tire within 30 minutes of arriving in town right in the middle of an insanely busy highway that splits off two ways. Wade changed the tire really fast, and we got out of there really fast. SCA----RY!

• I spent way too much time researching all of the hot spot restaurants in West Hollywood. After realizing their version of trendy was way more than the latest cute dress from Ann Taylor Loft, I thought to myself, “Who am I kidding?” We then settled for a delicious meal at a nice, classic steakhouse on Santa Monica Blvd.

• We also learned quickly that our dinner reservations at 7:30 p.m. at a place on Sunset Blvd. were the equivalent of the older folks eating at Luby’s at 4:30 p.m. here. Seriously, there were two other people at the restaurant! The waitress said the dinner crowd starts at around 9:00 p.m. Woops!

• So our one and only late night out on the town was going to the Second City Training Center on Hollywood Blvd. We saw a couple of student one-man shows. They weren’t the best, but also weren’t the worst. Hopefully they’ll get famous one day, and we can say we saw them way back when.
  

It was a fun-filled four days away together, but by late that Saturday night, we were both ready to come get the Tater Tot and have our little family back together again.