Still in Los Angeles.......

This will be a quick post, as I know I'm behind, but have just arrived in Las Vegas, so I'm keen to get out there and see what is going on. 

Following on from my last post, our third day in LA started with brunch at the 101 Coffee Shop in Hollywood. I had read about their "No Huevos Rancheros", a vegan brunch dish consisting of scrambled tofu, soy chorizo, corn, black beans, avocado, peppers and tortillas. We also indulged in some onion rings, which were tasty, but it was a little hard to stomach the amount of oil involved. What did I expect from onion rings though?!

While it is good that there is a vegan option at a diner like this (which is open until 3 am), but my suggestion would be that the soyrizo in the NHR be served in circular type slices rather than being ground up (if that is possible). It seemed to blend too much into the black beans, and indeed, I had trouble even finding it to start with. 

Then it was time to hit the main Hollywood sights. In T's view, this meant Amoeba Music. We spent about 2 hours there, and found albums/EPs that have long been out of print or just impossible to find anywhere else. Here is a list of what we found (and purchased): 

I'm Gonna Stop Killing - Carla Bozulich

Dear Companion - Meg Baird

Asa Breed - Matthew Dear

Tiny Mirrors - Sandro Perri

The Verve EP (now out of print for about 10 years - I had coveted a friend's copy since about 1998)

Yes, I'm a Witch - Yoko Ono

The Seldom Seen Kid - Elbow

Lie in Light - Cloudland Canyon

6 Peace EP - Schneider TM (Finally after years of searching it appeared in front of me for $5.99)

Life on a String - Laurie Anderson

Andre Sider Af Sonic Youth - Sonic Youth, Mats Gustafsson & Merzbow

Circular Sounds - Kelley Stoltz

Sandro Perri Plays Polmo Popo

Young Team - Mogwai (Deluxe Version)

From a Basement on the Hill - Elliott Smith

After dragging ourselves out of there with our stash (ok, it was mainly me dragging T out of there), T showed me a metro station on Hollywood Boulevard that he had seen many years ago: the walls are lined with thousands of old film reels. We trawled over stars on the sidewalk on our way to the theatres -  namely the Kodak and Grauman's Chinese. I don't mean to sound jaded, but the Kodak seemed to be part of a big shopping mall and quite far removed from the glitz of the Academy Awards. There was however a nice view of the Hollywood Sign, with the obligatory swarms of people crowding the viewing platform.

Grauman's Chinese Theatre required a little more time to explore, with all the hand and foot prints etched in concrete out the front. Some highlights for me included John Woo, the cast of Star Wars, Doris Day and Jack Nicholson. T tried to fill Jack's shoes, and I tried to get my hands into Doris' tiny prints. 

It was then time for some true celeb hunting, or should I say celeb house hunting - for us this meant the houses of David Lynch and Trent Reznor. Some internet research had turned up the addresses, as well as some locations for Mulholland Drive and Lost Highway, so with our trusty travel companion TomTom, we headed for the Hollywood Hills. We located David's house, which is well known to be the Beverly Johnson house. The two houses next door are also owned by David, the last one being Fred and Renee's house in Lost Highway ie the creepiest house I have ever seen committed to film. It was eerie standing outside as it was so quiet. Someone then appeared out of the middle house, talking loudly on a phone and asking "What is his schedule like for tomorrow?" David's schedule perhaps? 

We then located the octagonal body double house and the corral from Mulholland Drive. It was getting quite dark by this stage, and the corral was lit by a single lightbulb as in the film. Creepareno. 

T had managed to find out about a vegan japanese restaurant called Shojin in the downtown area, so we made a beeline there to shake off our creeped out-ness. We ordered the Crispy Tempeh Salad, Seitan Katsu Curry and Seitan & Broccoli. The salad was amazing - crispy barbecued tempeh and a gorgeous miso dressing over the salad leaves. The curry and seitan/broccoli combo weren't really to my taste, but T hoovered them up. The service here was wonderful, and our waiter Ken and I exchanged some shaky (on my part) pleasantries in Japanese before we headed off. 

More on our last day in LA tomorrow.......

More Los Angeles

Another great day in LA. We spent most of it driving around, and came across lots of great stuff like: 

• Experiencing the best vegan chicken burger and vegan cheesecake in the entire universe at Native Foods in Westwood
• Driving around Beverly Hills looking all at the amazing houses
• Watching the sun set over LA from a lookout on Mulholland Drive

• A return dinner at Real Food Daily in Santa Monica

Tomorrow is Hollywood day, as well as David Lynch film location spotting day. 

Hello Los Angeles

After a long sleepless flight (I just couldn't!) we arrived yesterday in Los Angeles. By way of a brief summary, so far we have: 

• Ate soylati in Santa Monica    
• Driven to Malibu and through lots of canyons
• Taken a spooky drive (and got lost) on Mulholland Drive - no success in finding David Lynch's house (yet!)
• Driven around Hollywood and West Hollywood (a return trip is on the cards) 
• Eaten peanut butter filled oreos (wow!!)
• Had a long fantastic sleep at our hotel
• Taken a huge walk around Venice Beach

• Eaten great vegan mexican food and drank pomegranate daquiris and strawberry coladas in Santa Monica
• Eaten fantastic organic vegan food and drank vegan beer in Santa Monica

Tomorrow we are going to try and get to San Diego and check out the home turf of the Black Heart Procession. And go to Santa Monica Pier. 

Getting Ready

Only a week to go before we head off! I am very excited about going on a daytrip tomorrow to Daylesford, with Tim, Kristy, Toby and Dan. I haven't been there before, and there are plans afoot to visit The Chocolate Mill (hello vegan chocolates!) I love daytrips with these guys - the last one was tobogganing at Lake Mountain. 

Snacking & Reading

I resumed work today. It was extremely uncomfortable for the morning, but got a tiny bit easier in the afternoon. One glimmer of hope is that I'm allowed to work from home for a couple of days a week until we go on our big trip, which I think will make the 14 remaining working days more bearable. 

I did wish today that I was able to spend my afternoon eating strawberries, reading Fruit of the Lemon by Andrea Levy, and doing some research on Cuba. I miss the days of last week.

Now that I've finished Fruit of the Lemon, I'm going to start reading this. Also in the queue are this and this. 

Insomnia

It is now almost 1 am, and I should be fast asleep in preparation for my first day back at work tomorrow after almost three weeks off. Can I sleep though? No way Jose. 

Having suffered from sporadic bouts of the no-sleep disease over the years (even outside of my flirtation with gothiness in my teens), I thought by now I would have a surefire method of getting past it. I've tried focussing on positive things, focussing on nothing at all, reading. Nothing seems to work. 

Still, I have been productive. I have booked the first hotel of our big trip. It felt so good to actually book it and know that we are definitely going. I have to say the clincher with this particular hotel were the rather dignified looking dog chaps on the doona covers.......I'm sure I will sleep like a baby with them watching over me. 

You can take a virtual tour of the hotel here.

A little break.......

I can't believe it has been over a month since I last posted.......just goes to show how fast time can go when you are having a bad time. I've been having a terrible time at work which has been completely and utterly all-consuming (in a dark, evil and terrible way). Things are back on track now though after having almost 3 weeks away from the joint. I'm nervous about going back tomorrow, although Kristy has suggested that I reward myself with something at the end of the day. Sound advice. 

The Melbourne International Film Festival has also been on over the last few weeks. I managed to get to a few, and my favourites were: 

Johnny Mad Dog (France, shot in Liberia) 

Paper Cannot Wrap Up Embers (Cambodia) 

Gardens of the Night (USA)

Alone in Four Walls (Russia) 

The Debt (Israel) 

Jar City (Iceland) 

Cargo 200 (Russia)

I saw Cargo 200 yesterday afternoon. The absolute horror of the story, particularly given that it was based on true events, has made it very difficult to stop thinking about. I would definitely recommend it, even though I found it pretty traumatic. Here is a clip.

Prior to the film however, I did attend the Great Vegan Bake-Off & Launch of Vegan Indulgence . I entered Jaffa Cream Cheese Muffins. There were close to 40 entries, and everyone ate themselves into a sugar-induced stupor. Easy to do when you have vegan baked goods like this in front of you!