Posts Tagged ‘scenic’

Living it up in LA

laelene Posted in general blog,Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
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It’s been a busy two days for my relatives! They spent their first full day in LA out at Universal Studios, with a brief stop in the Hollywood area first, and a visit to Griffith Observatory afterwards. They took pictures of the Hollywood sign, walked around Hollywood & Highland, checked out the Chinese theater, looked at the star walk, and even stopped for some photos with some street walkers dressed as pirates from Pirates of the Caribbean. Then it was off to nearly 8 hours doing every possible thing at Universal Studios! The shows, the rides, the sights… and some of them they even got around to twice. Pretty impressive.

sunset over hollywood hills with hollywood sign on right sideI picked them up at 6:30 yesterday after that full day of adventure and we wrapped up the night by swinging by Griffith Observatory to check out the view of LA and look at all the exhibits inside. They peered into a telescope looking at a giant telescope atop Mount Wilson, learned about tidal waves and seasons and moon phases, played with the giant periodic table, figured out the way the pendulum worked, and tested out their weights on various planets. Oh, and they took a ton of pictures along the way! The sun was setting as we arrived at the observatory, so they went crazy getting some great shots of the natural scenery. We didn’t get home until 9:30 and then it was time to eat up for dinner!

Today it was another full day, first going to the Getty, where we explored nearly all the exhibits (it was actually my first time entering anything other than the West building). Then of course we had to wander around the garden area, where there were a ton of great pictures to be taken and flowers to be admired. Three hours later, we were able to wrap up and get to Santa Monica, where we wandered around Santa Monica Place, Third Street Promenade, Santa Monica beach, and the Pier. There was a stop for lunch so we’d have the strength to continue going and we saw everything ranging from the shopping strip to the ocean and even paused to check out a trapeze lesson on the pier!

panoramic shot of getty garden area view

Before we knew it, it was late afternoon and we rushed off to the Getty Villa since you could park there for free if you go on the same day as visiting the Getty. They close at 5 though, so time was limited. Traffic on the PCH was awful and it took a good 45 minutes to get from Santa Monica to the Getty Villa! Insane. We made it just 10 minutes before closing and they almost didn’t let the car through, but I sweet talked them. 🙂 Once again it was a great time for lovely pictures, with some exploring of the grounds before they started to chase us out for the day. On the ride home, we made a pit stop to get some ingredients for dinner and then another to get the wine that they forgot the first time around. We were going to make our way to some outlets too, but they decided that they can figure that out when they’re in Vegas or on another leg of the trip.

They sure did check out a lot in these two days, and got a pretty good feel of things from the coast all the way inland. There’s of course plenty they missed out on, but I think they covered quite a bit of ground in just two days.

On My Mind, episode 2

laelene Posted in on my mind,Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
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(In case On My Mind is not self-explanatory enough and you want to learn more, check out my post explaining what inspired it.)

screenshot of giveaway tools final result: mary q. won 3-month conscious box subscription from just another new blog~I won!!! I’ve been trying to win a bunch of things, but in particular is a 3-month subscription to Conscious Box, which tons of bloggers have been giving away. AND I ACTUALLY WON! I was just going through checking up on the giveaways that had expired to see if they announced winners and what did I find? My name! That is probably the most exciting thing in the world.

~Last week I went to the DMV because I wanted to renew my license and update the photo. Why can’t I just send in a picture like I can with a passport? I’m assuming it has to do with that special shade of blue they use for the background, which then begs the question… why that color??

~I tried to book an online appointment for the DMV but the earliest appointment was two weeks away! If I didn’t need to drive in the mean, I totally would have gone that route to save the time at the DMV. Unfortunately I didn’t have that luxury this time, so I was stuck standing in line. It took nearly 3 hours (and there were only like 15-20 people in line in front of me!). Luckily, I was smart and got a book to read before going. I was the only one.

~My mom and I went to Best Buy because she had some reward money she had to spend – all told, we spent $0.30 on a bunch of random pens for her and a cool whiteboard/blackboard for me! We didn’t know what else to buy with her $20 credit. And it took us over an hour to figure it out, lol. Granted, much of that hour was spent waiting for an associate to help me locate the board at another store. The one they had was missing the crayon box and what’s a board if you can’t write on it?

5 sets of pens from best buy

Ignore the cat paw. 😉

crayola dry erase board dual-sided black and white with set of dry erase crayons and wiping cloth

Comes with dry erase crayons!

~I’ve been reading a bunch of books like Buyology & The Zappos Experience – great source of learning and very useful lessons for my future business attempts. I’m trying to apply everything I learned to the Kickstarter I’m developing. I sure hope it’s successful!

~So when I went to get some of those books I’ve been reading, I discovered the cool new library self-checkout! My fancy little library has this system where you put the stack of books (up to like 7 or 8 at a time) on the counter and it can check them all out for you. No more scanning one by one! Nifty. I should also note they have a conveyor belt thing behind the wall when you return a book, complete with video so you can watch your book get dropped off into some bin at the end.

~Remember that Influenster campaign I mentioned last time? Well, yay I got in! Turns out it’s for an Aveeno product, which they’ll be sending to me shortly. 🙂

~This week I got to hang out at the Hotel Maya in Long Beach. It’s right on the water and I really enjoyed working in the cabanas and other similar areas. It’s great to have a fabulous view, a slight breeze, the warmth of the sun, and the option of shade all at once. If it weren’t for my reflective laptop screen, it’d be perfect for working all day.

outdoor couches at hotel maya in long beach

I spent most of the days here.

view of waterfront from hotel maya in long beach

~Since I was at the waterfront, I spent a lot of time (sea) bird watching. Totally fun! There are the ones that bob around on the water and dive down for fish, disappearing for minutes at times. Then there are the fliers that dive down to the water from high above, making a nice splash. There are the little ones that flit about quickly and the larger ones that almost seem like they’re gliding in the air. In the morning, they were most active and by noon, many of them had settled in for a nap. By the afternoon, they started waking up again and as the sun set, I lost track of them.

~I also caught a glimpse of a seal! Actually, I think a pair of them. So cool!!! Next time I need to find a beach that they hang out at. I’d love to seal watch.

(Here you can hear how excited I am to see them, even though I didn’t get to see much.)

seals at Long Beach from Mary Qin on Vimeo.
 

 

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