Sunny SOCAL

Steve and mom picked me up from my house at 4:30am. Ouch. We headed straight for the airport for our 6am flight. Checked our bags, went through security, hung out for a while and then got on the plane. 45 minutes later we're on the ground in Chicago. Grabbed a coffee and some Mickey D's for breakfast, hung out, took a little nap, and finally got on the plane heading for San Diego. Fairly long flight. Read, listened to the iPod, looked out the window. Saw New Mexico. Pretty cool.

We landed in San Diego around 10:30am - still had the whold day ahead of us! We walked down to grab out luggage and who should walk up right behind us?? That's right, Katie. The one who's supposed to have to work all day. Nice surprise. We picked up our rental (upgraded thanks to Katie and her "gifts") and headed straight for the San Diego Zoo! Three adult women at the zoo. Fun. It was HUGE and there was tons to see, but my favorites had to be the polar bears, giraffes, elephants, and pandas. Got some great photos. Spent the rest of the day there, then left and headed to La Jolla to see the ocean and the seals. Gorgeous. Saw crabs and sea anemonies and pelicans, and all sorts of other stuff in the tide pools - incredible. After that we drove back up to Katie's place and crashed hard.

Thursday morning we woke up early to head to L.A. for a taping of the Price Is Right. Lots of traffic. Hours of traffic. Got there and waited. For hours. We were on standby, but did eventaully make it in to the show. What an eye-opening experience. The studio is TINY. It looks nothing like what you see on TV. Everything is so small and cheap looking. It all looked homemade. Bob Barker was incredibly nice and friendly - talked to the audience between every take and took questions. Katie got us blacklisted from being on the show - completely not her fault. She works for Apple. They give away Apple products. Bummer. Oh well, it was still a lot of fun to see and experience the whole thing. For example, we met some really interesting people while we waited in line for HOURS. Two nice people - AnnMarie and Jordan, from Canada - and The Cat Lady. She came to a taping of the Price Is Right with a cat on her shoulder. Seriously. A live cat. On her shoulder. With a little rope leash. While talking with this woman she explained that she bakes, and she pulled a football-shaped fruitcake out of her bag of stuff. That pretty much says it all. Anyway, she was semi-quietly removed from the "audience" just before we were allowed into the building for taping. By the way, a girl across the aisle from us won TWO cars. One by "mistake" - watch the show on December 15 to see what I mean.

After taping we walked around The Grove - a mall where I can't afford to buy...well, anything, and the farmer's market. Very cool. Then we decided to take the PCH (Pacific Coast Highway) from L.A. back to Katie's place in Laguna Niguel. FOUR HOURS later we got out of the car. Bad idea. Motorcycle accident, about 42 wrong turns, closed ramps, pennisulas, and more u-turns than I could count...made for a very long day. Total of at least 6 hours in the car, between the two trips. Yowza. Sharon and Steve, some of Katie's best new friends here in CA, came over so we could meet them. Hung out for a while and laughed a lot. Nice people! :) Thanks again for the ice cream and brownies, guys! After that, we hit the hot tub for a while - nothing better than cool air and a hot tub. Perfection.

Friday morning we slept in a little bit and then met Steve in Dana Point to go sailing on Steve's boat - on the ocean!! Way cool! It was absolutely gorgeous - warm, breezy but calm, and sunny. Perfection. Saw a couple of pirate ships and a sea lion up close and personal. WOW. After that outing we went for some incredible Mexican food and then drove up the PCH to Huntington Beach to meet my Great Aunt Eileen and the CA family for dinner. Got to hang out with Aunt Eileen, Paulette, Fred, Wendy, Mark, and Brandon for the evening. Good times. They are hilarious people - could have talked for hours. Wait, that's right...we did. Loads of fun. A quick stop at Ikea and Nordstrom Rack, then back to Kate's and the hot tub.

Saturday morning we got up and ready, then headed to a nearby nail salon for manicures and pedicures. Ahhh, that's good stuff. I could get used to that! Then we drove up the PCH again and walked the shops in Laguna Beach, stopping for lunch at BJ's - with a view of the ocean. Not too bad. After a little shopping (but not buying - did I mention it was Laguna Beach?) we headed back South, stopping at a few stores along the way. Then we hit Walmart for some cleaning supplies and rented a Rug Doctor, preparing to give Katie's place a good sanitizing. (Mom was having some issues with the place - it was never thoroughly cleaned after the last tenant, who was a smoker the owner of a black dog. Oh, and he was a gay porn star.) So, I went from a manicure and pedicure in the morning, to painting, carpet cleaning and scrubbing in the evening. Such is my life. Back to normal. After a couple of hours of that, we opened a bottle of wine and then hit the hot tub. Nice finish to the day.

Today is Sunday (did you roll your clocks back??) and I haven't yet gotten out of bed. We've got a trip to San Diego, and possibly Mexico, ahead of us today before our flight leaves at 10:50pm. That's right - an all-nighter. Gotta love a red-eye. Not to mention a 3-hour layover at O'Hare at 4am... should be an interesting day. Oh, and we get to go from 80's and sun, to 50's (if we're lucky) and permacloud. But at least I'll get to see Adam and the kids...about 24 hours from now. :)