The California trip blog continues...
Part One: The Hotel
Dave and I decided that we needed to stay somewhere fun and swanky since we were only going to be in California for a few days. The W was booked so we opted for The Standard, a West Hollywood boutique hotel full of hipsters.
So I've never, ever been at a place where I've used valet services--it just seems too lazy and weird to me--but we had to use it at the hotel to park. The only reason I bring this up is because we rented a Chevy Cobalt and it was totally and utterly out of place from the other guests' lux sedans, but I suppose we all kind of felt that way the entire time we were at the hotel anyway. The hotel is, as you can probably tell from the pictures, a bit self-conscious of how cool it is/wants to be. I have nothing wrong with this, and in fact, it's probably what attracted me to it. So when we checked in, we immediately noticed the Cactus lounge was full of the beautiful and the well-dressed. A bit intimidating, actually. So we checked into our room, took turns sitting in the silver bean bag chair, and played with the thermostat which only read: blow "hard" on one side, and blow "harder" on the other (heh).
So then it was off to the pool. This was the closest thing I've ever been to being on another planet--uncomfortable on the one hand, fascinating on the other. Again, I wish I would have taken pictures: this was a land of the very privileged 20 somethings. It was kind of like going to a really horrible cliquey high school dance if your high school was filled with the cast of The Hills. Instead of bolting, we sat down and had $12 cocktails. After taking everything in for a while, the landscape seemed to come into better view. While at first glance everyone was amazing looking, there were just as many ordinary people there too. Of course, as I told Dan, for all anyone knew, we could have been the sons of billionaires who burned money to sleep at night, so no one was really looking at us knowing we were Nebraskans utterly out of our element. The experience, to me, was like being inside a Brett Easton Ellis novel--a mini Less Than Zero all there to mull over. In fact, I think having read so much Ellis made me appreciate the scene at hand even more. The over-sexed tan hotties in the pool with their $50 pitchers endlessly smoking could have come right out of the novel. I know my coping mechanism is supposing that everyone was coked up and had totally unhappy, empty lives,but it's just as likely that they have everything they want and are well adjusted wonderful people.
On our last day at the hotel, I decided that another trip to the pool was in order. Since it was Sunday morning, there were only a few people around, mostly maids in pink uniforms vacuuming the blue astroturf back and forth. A couple sat across from me on the other side of the pool. They were mid-20s and pretty in a "we-have-money" kind of way. The woman pulled out a script from her large Louis Vuitton tote and began to study it, mimosas were ordered, sun tan lotion applied, and then he read Wired, frequently breaking off to read passages of the article to her. Above them, patio doors opened, the hotel guests were waking, smoking, getting ready for another day in LA. Then, more mimosas. What a life.
The last picture below, by the way, is when we arrived back at the hotel around midnight. The glass box behind the front desk was occupied with a girl who apparently just sat there looking at the Internet. I think she must sleep there, too. I told you it was too hip. So, in the spirit of the hotel, I have a picture of me trying to be too hip in the hotel.
Part 2: Holyfuckingshit, it's radonkulous
Thanks to one of Dan's colleagues at his conference, we had a new term to throw around during our trip: radonkulous. It's like ridiculous, but on a much grander scale. There were many things we saw in California that fit this definition to a T, especially the film festival we happened to find as we drove by the Silent Movie Theatre. They host a Saturday night filmfestival called Holyfuckingshit that features--exactly--the kind of B-VHS movies we enjoy on weekends. The night we were there, they screened The Story of Ricki-Oh. The link will show you some highlights. It was a great group of fun people, and the movie along with the previews, including Night of the Lepus and Bugs, were really funny.
A few other radonkulous items to report:
Driving into the Hollywood and Vine area, we spotted Marilyn Monroe walking her dog. There was something so, well, pedestrian about seeing her on the sidewalk, as if there was nothing out of the ordinary in seeing a long-dead celebrity walking her dog. So truly wonderful.
The walls were great, full of Hollywood icons, inlcuding
LA was fun, radonkulously fun.
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