Too much fun

   

     I can't believe it's been a week and a half since I've blogged anything. I was so good at the beginning of the year doing it every day, then every other, but there's just been way to much activities/festivities and fun going on. Last weekend was my husband's birthday weekend. We made it  a weekend because instead of going away we decided to do a staycation here in LA filled with fun stuff that we never do - namely, venture east of the 405. Friday evening I wanted us to go to The Museum of Death in Hollywood, but the logistics of traffic means that we have to put that off for another time. It sounds really cool though, so when we finally get there I'll be sure to report back. We opted to chill at home for a few hours and take naps instead. What we did do was go The Prince for dinner. It's one of those LA institutions set in a historic building, this one in Koreantown. It's also the setting for the bar scenes in New Girl, which we're big fans of , so I thought he'd get a kick out of it. The food was amazing - I had some vegetable dumplings. We've been really getting into Korean food lately. I don't eat meat, but they're known for their fried chicken. The hubs had some kind of chicken dish and loved it. The have a private room for parties and lots of banquets. It's a fun place for a group of friends and a great place to take out-of-towners.

     

This much fun should be illegal

     Saturday was his actual birthday do we wanted to do some grown-up things. Our son went to a sleepover and off we went. We finally made a trip to Greystone Mansion which is an historic site in Beverly Hills. They have tours of the interiors but unfortunately they're only on the first Saturday of the month. We did walk around the grounds which were lovely and had an impressive view of the city. The site is used extensively for weddings and other events as well as filming. I really wanted us to go to the Chado Tea Room after this, but the Hollywood location was in the Hollywood and Vine complex and I could see it would be a nightmare getting in and out of there, so we stopped in a little place along Melrose instead. The Chado is something I first saw on Groupon and it looked like a fun activity. Besides afternoon tea, they have a tea tasting and a store. There are several locations around LA. Since my son really loves tea we might do this with him another time. 

     For dinner, we went to another LA institution, Lucques. I've been hearing about this place forever and have seen Suzanne Goin all over the chef shows. I would describe it as Rustic Continental cuisine. We started with salads of burrata and root vegetables. Hubs had a beef dish which he claimed was devine. I had the ricotta gnocchi, which were these pillows of perfection on top of sunchoke purée, pea shoots, chanterelles, pecorino and pistachios. Wow. I'm obsessed with her now and want to get her cookbooks. Beyond the flavors it was the textures which were really memorable and unique. The dining room itself is pretty small, though there is a patio area. There's a small bar and a cozy fireplace as you walk it. It's incredibly romantic and the service was great.

     

     In the theme of the weekend, I planned a lot, but we ended up doing about half. After dinner, we realized that we had 4 hours to kill before the late-night event, so we decided to once a gain go home and take naps, but not before grabbing some tres leche cake at Whole Foods to sing happy birthday with. Then we were off to North Hollywood to Zombie Zoe's Underground Theatre. I was trying to find something really unusual and there's a lot out there, including roller derby and burlesque and Mexican wrestling, but none of those we going on that night. After searching around I came to this theatre doing some weird stuff, so we went to see an 11pm show called The Nightmares Trio. I've seen (and done) quite a bit of experimental theatre, but never anything quite like this. This production had 3 very compelling performers and a musician. It was dark and sexy and touched on a little bit of everything and somehow tied it all together. You should see it, and if you like it, like we did, you'll be back. Outside the theatre I saw a friend from college that I hadn't seen for years. He was a long time fan and was getting set to mount a show there himself, so we got to meet Zombie Joe. We talked about the writing process for these shows and some of the other things they do there. They've been in the space for more than 20 years, and though it was a struggle getting attention up in the valley for a long time, they've lately gotten a lot of critical love from the LA Times which has been great for them. 

     Sunday we had to take our son downtown for rehearsal, so we took that opportunity to visit another LA landmark, Grand Central Market. This was kind of like the Original Farmer's Market by the Grove, but much more crowded, bustling, ethnic and downtown. After walking the whole place, we settled on Berlin Currywurst as they had a tofu option for me. You can specify the level of heat, the way it's served and the toppings. It was pretty good, but I have to say not nearly as good as Wurstkuche. The sausage was small and the bread was overpowering, but the flavor was pretty good. We ordered the fries which were amazing. 

     After this we stopped in to The Last Bookstore. This is an old bank building which has been converted to a retail and art space. Downstairs is the bookstore which carries both new and a curated selection of used books, CDs, DVDs and vinyl. Upstairs has the rest of the books in a warren-like maze of rooms, art gallery spaces and Gather, downtown's only yarn store. 

     I finally got to go inside as every other time I've been down here it was closed. It's a very tiny space with a small selection of yarn, some of which is from indie dyers. I had planned for us to go on a walking tour of downtown with Free LA Tour, but the skies looked threatening and my hubs, being a good dad, sacrificed his jacket to the kid. Once again we opted to go home and take naps, which was a good thing because it then proceeded to rain like hellfire. The plan was to go back later and pick up our son, then head to the San Gabriel Valley for dim sum. It was still pretty crappy out so we punted on the road trip, took him home and got noodle bowls from Whole Foods. And that was the weekend! Planned lots of stuff, did half of it, took naps. It was pretty adventurous for us considering the stuff we usually do in LA (mostly within a mile of our house).

     Last time I mentioned a rather aggressive yoga class I took at Yogaglo. Well, I ended up straining my lumbar spine so bad that I could barely move for days. 11 days later I'm still having a hard time bending down even to put on clothes. Now, this could be owing to a lot of factors - lack of conditioning, my own lumbar history, age, but I've been practicing for 21 years and I've never experienced anything like this. I'm very good at making adjustments for my body, especially when it comes to forward bends. The problem is that I really believe these kind of asana should be proceeded my 45 minutes to an hour of vinyasa and standing poses. In contrast, this was only an hour long Level 2 class and had almost no warm up. I feel a little arrogant questioning the wisdom of this teacher, but this was my honest experience. The take home lesson? I really understand the value of all that hard work you have to do in order to safely do advanced asana. I'm not always a fan of it, but it's for your own protection, among other things.

 

 

     Besides being a gimp this week, this was the week of rehearsals and performances for my son with the LA Opera Off Grand, which was at the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels downtown. He's playing violin in the Production of Noah's Flood. This was a great opportunity for young musicians and community members to work with world class artists including conductor James Conlon. This series has been going on for 9 years and this was the first time I'd heard of it. I can't say it's all that fun getting form the Westside to downtown during rush hour, even on the weekends, but it was only a few times and I think it was worth it. Hopefully I can convince him to do it again next year.

     The other fun thing we did as a family was get new iPhones, which were a long time coming as ours were barely functional. We also finally dumped AT&T for T-Mobile. Had to buy the phones at full price but don't have to worry about a contract. So far we are loving the iPhone 6, though migrating was a little confusing. Some of my photos seem to be lost in the mix but are floating around here and there. I have a pretty Spigen case and got a white phone for a change. I also opted for the shatter-proof case recommended by the clerk, as apparently these phones are super fragile. Best of all, no overages with T-Mobile, which were what made us leave AT&T. 

     I'm one my way with the second Aegean Sea mitt. Once I get this very long post up, I can maybe make some progress on it.