Well my first full day in LA happened! It was a big one. The flight landed just before 7:00am. I had managed to get some sleep on the plane so my challenge to myself was to stay awake all day.
Once I dropped my bags off to the hotel and freshened up my first task was to set myself up with an US SIM card. Danny from AT & T sorted me out and before I knew it I was on my way to... somewhere. Now I just had to figure out what I wanted to do next.
A quick phone call to Olive and June the nail salon featured in my Wallpaper* guide and my appointment was made. Based on my wonderful experience I have decided that I will always get a pedicure after a long haul flight. It felt so good (P.S. don't mind my bunion)!
With a whole afternoon to myself and no plans I decided to wander around Beverly Hills. I quickly realised that I was not dressed quite as well as I would like to be but I just let it go and enjoyed myself. It was lovely to just have the afternoon to explore and I ended up at the Beverly Hills Art Show. I restrained myself but I did see some beautiful ceramics that I was very tempted to bring home.
I was so pleased to be able to get into my room, have a shower and feel like I was set up. Staying only two nights at a time at any of my booked accomodation it was going to be a struggle to create a sense of home that us introverts crave. I’m staying at The Grafton Hotel. It's a great little hotel with a pool, a really great sized room (at least mine is) and friendly staff. I was keen to get in the pool but since I've been struggling with eczema on my face for a little while now I didn't feel comfortable exposing my skin to chlorine before the filming. I was nervous enough!
I figured it was surely time for dinner. When I sat down at Pono (I had this great warm salad with a home made quinoa salad) I realised that it was only 5:30pm. While I wasn't too tired yet I really wasn't sure what to do with my time in such a sprawling city. I had walked around the city enough to know that I wasn't going to be able to potter from one small store to another for a few hours- everything was so spread out. Oh dear.
This was going to be tough... what was I going to do to stay awake until my childhood bed time of 8:30pm? After chatting to some friendly retail staff I decided to make my way to Melrose and discovered the Hollywood Improv Comedy Club. Success! A 7:00pm show! I decided that alcohol probably wasn't the best idea for a jet lagged body so perched up on a bar stool, I ordered myself a house baked choc chip cookie (which was huge and there were two!) and enjoyed the comedians up on stage switch it up between squirming and smashing it up on stage.
This place was great and I only started to doze off on my bar stool during the last 10 minutes- lucky those things are sturdy. Thank goodness for Uber to get me home.
Getting home was such a relief and I slept like a log... 