Hollywood, for all it's worth...

Yesterday's California sky was blue and filled with a combination of fluffy white clouds, and a few dark ones here and there. Chris and I got up and started on the packing for our trip pretty early. Around 10am I texted my friend and neighbor Mike and asked him was his day's itinerary was. On it? The Farmer's Market.....Yeah!

Quickly Chris and I got showered and dressed and walked the few blocks down the hill to the Sunday Farmer's Market on Hollywood and Ivar to meet up with Mike. We finally found him, and wandered through the crowd, looking at the flowers, berries and vegetables. I selected a huge bunch of Birds of Paradise, a carton of strawberries, fresh squeezed pomegranate orange juice, some mustard greens and two of the best flans I've ever tasted:
http://www.flan-king.com/

We gathered with a crowd, our arms full, to watch an old fashioned polka band playing, tuba, accordion and all.

On the way out, we picked up some fresh kettle corn and some fresh rain fell on our heads. It was awesome.

After just five minutes of drizzling, the warm sun came bursting out, and we zig zagged our way back home, stopping at our favorite local coffee shop on the way: http://www.sdchollywood.com/

Armed with a nice hot Vanilla soy latte, we walked up Ivar hill, back into the Hollywood Dell. We admired the vegetable gardens of the Vedanta society and took a walk on their grounds.

We got back to our apartment, unloaded, went to visit my dear friend and neighbor Tony, and then made our plans for outing number two of the day.

I've recently been ordering sushi from a place I've never been to, but their take out Menu advertised $1.95 sake and $2.95 sushi. Kazoku: http://www.kazokusushi.com/
The place had a "Cheers" meets sushi bar kind of feel to it. Soon we were laughing with the sushi chef, other customers, while the amazingly pleasant waitress brought us plate after plate of delicious fish. They were showing the Oscars on the large flat screen HDTV behind the sushi bar, it is after all Hollywood, and we had fun commenting on the red carpet show. HDTV is unforgiving.

We made our way back home, where I fulfilled my creative surge by dressing Mike's mannequin, Veronica, in a new flashy outfit, accessories, head piece and all.

Chris and I shared one of the flan, watched the rest of the Oscar's with Tony, watched South Park episodes, then hung out talking and laughing until it was time to go to bed.

Days like yesterday gave me a sense of home in Hollywood. Usually I feel out of sorts, out of place. Maybe it was the weather, maybe it was a conscious choice...but yesterday we had fun in Hollywood. Us. The non-bar hoppers, the non-clubbers, the non-douchbaggery participants.
Go Hollywood! There's a reason I love you, deep down.