I'm leaving for Chicago tomorrow morning and I'll be back on Tuesday, but I'm going to try to squeeze in a recap here so I don't get extremely behind.

After waging war and doing bloody battle with my father, Kathleen and I boarded the bus to Union Station from Pomona. We spent the ride as the only two people on the entire vessel speaking, and speaking very loudly, I'm sure. Everyone was staring at us. What else are you supposed to do to entertain yourself??? I'm sure that's what Sarah and I will be like (but even louder, since it's Sarah in place of Kathleen) tomorrow on the plane. Andy was there to pick us up, and about 30 seconds after we got into the car, I knew it couldn't go well. We pulled up to pay for parking, and Andy was about 8 feet away from the booth, and the guy was like, "So far away???" And as we pulled away, Andy, apparently, did not know that there was as CURB, and we went all the way up the curb and then a huge drop. This, I'm afraid to say, was only the beginning of our driving woe. We went in circles through Chinatown, up hills populated by Asians, amongst many other random places in our search for 10 WEST!!!!! Every time we saw a sign for the 10, we started SCREAMING collectively, and by the time we actually found it, we were HYSTERICAL. As Andy would put it, curse one-way streets and no U-turn laws!
We eventually made our way to Santa Monica Pier and Third Street Promenade. We ate at the Crepe Cafe, where we had... guess... CREPES!! THEY WERE AMAZING!! NUTELLA!!!! HEAVENLY!!! I had panini for the first time, as well. The one thing we did on this trip was eat. Really. All the money we spent was on food and transporation.

The beach is really beautiful and tranquil at night, and it was hauntingly beautiful to stare into the depths of the black water with nothing but the moon and the lights from the pier reflected in it. We tried to take jumping pictures, and I failed every single time, even "mooning" a child while I was at it.. However, Andy and I, who were both wearing shoes as opposed to flip-flops, realized, as we left the beach for the pier, that our feet were completely covered in sand and would thus be unfit to be covered by footwear again. We found a foot-washing faucet nearby, but after washing our feet, we had no towel to dry them, and there was still a long distance before the sand faded away. Andy hobbled over as he could, but me? How did I get to the pavement? KATHLEEN CARRIED ME.



Whee that's what best friends are for. :)
On Third Street, there were lots of street acts, and Kathleen was utterly mesmerized by the breakdancers and we stood there gaping at them for a really long time. Oh! I almost forgot. There was this South Asian man on the pier doing juggling and balancing tricks and he REFUSED to do his grand finale act without collecting a dollar for each person standing there. Seriously. It's not going to work. Just do it first so we think you actually deserve it. Stop being so Asian!! Though I do feel sorry for all those street performers, especially the little kids.

Of course, no day is complete without Starbucks, and we ducked into that coffee haven with our energy sapped. However, the highlight of this part of the excursion had to be Kathleen's little nom de plume. She likes to have "Starbucks names," such as "Hoshi" and "Sheniqua," just to make life difficult for the barista. This time, her "name" of choice was... CHAGUSTO. WHO WOULD NAME THEIR CHILD CHAGUSTO?!?! This was only exacerbated by the fact that, after laughing for five minutes about it, I realized that it could be a part of, "Mucho gusto!" as "MUCHO CHAGUSTO!!" or even "MU-CHAGUSTO!" :D :D :D

We eventually found our way back to Andy's place (after much traffic that Andy was kind enough to liken to constipation). Andy's room is GIGANTIC for a college room!!! Well, he is in a frat house, but still!!! HUGE! Kathleen was so mad.. She complained, "Mine is a third this size and there's three people instead of one!" We stole a mattress from the empty, neighbouring room, and sat down to watch "Little Miss Sunshine," which is adorable, by the way! Then, Kathleen collapsed on the mattress on the floor, Andy on his bed, and me on the airbed on the other side of the room, breaking the promise to my dad that we would sleep in a separate room. SHH!!

After enduring Andy's bipolar shower (SCALDING HOT and then LUKEWARM), we set off for the day's adventures, which began with the most-dreaded (on Kathleen's part) tour of USC. I personally really liked the library's architecture, but Kathleen spent the entire time comparing it to UCLA and protesting all the red and gold things around. Even the parking signs were in red and gold... It was rather ridiculous, as was the USC wear part of the student store.

With that done, we hopped on a bus and made for Rodeo Drive. By the way, NEVER take public transportation with me. I will fall on you. At one point, I had my head on Andy's shoulder, and Andy got up without me realizing it, and I fell over right when the bus lurched, and I ended up on the floor on Andy's foot, with the entire bus staring at me. It was lovely. Since Andy has been working with IHOP and thus staring at pictures of their scrumptious promotional pancakes, we just HAD to eat brunch at IHOP. That was probably the most food I've had in a long, long time...
At Rodeo Drive, we marveled at all the expensive things we can't afford, and gaped unbelievingly at the DJ in the Guess store. They actually had a DJ for their store! How ridiculous is that!! Radio just not good enough for them, eh?
Andy then introduced us to Sprinkles' cupcakes, which are REALLY GOOD, but ridiculously overpriced and probably not worth it. However, the three of readily devoured a red velvet cupcake, despite having eaten our weight in pancakes and chicken at IHOP only an hour previously.

We headed over to Hollywood and Highland on the Metro. I did not even know LA had one... but it's actually pretty good. Kathleen was all excited because it reminded her of France. Seriously, the only thing she remembers about/loved about France was the Metro.. she gets so excited about it.. We engaged in a little pole dancing while on the Metro (ANDY), and then stepped off the train to be greeted by huge crowds swarming around the footprints of famous people and others dressed up as famous characters. We wandered through the footprints and then the mall (where I saw Saumil), and I got my picture with the blow-up WALL-E, even though Kathleen didn't know that was what I wanted. THey had a sign for "WALL-E" and then above it, a HUGE inflatable WALL-E. I freaked out and made Kathleen take a picture of me with it.
Twenty minutes later, she asked me, "Okay. Of all the WALL-E signs out there, why did you have to take a picture with it now?"
"UMM. HELLO. LOOK AT THE HUGE INFLATABLE THING."
"OHHHHHHHHHHHHH!! Is THAT what you wanted a picture of???"
Sigh. Good thing Andy was there to take the picture instead.

By this time, we were exhausted, even after Starbucks and water, and after wandering through Forever 21 where Andy found the cutest vest, we went back to USC and collapsed for about an hour before heading to Little Tokyo. We had sushi and tempura ice cream (which is a fascinating phenomenon) and looked through all the extremely Asian gadgets before settling down in chairs to just talk. We played the, "Who would you marry, shag, and kill" game where someone lists three people and you have to choose. It was difficult. And painful. OH. And we had to tell Kathleen about EIGHT TIMES who Patrick Dempsey was. Every time we mentioned him, which was quite frequent for some reason, Kathleen would be like, "OH! Oh wait... who is Patrick Dempsey again???" Sigh...

Andy drove us back to Union Station, where we boarded the bus, seated next to the world's most talkative old man and across from two rather good-looking skater guys. However, after a brief conversation with them, we decided that they were too uneducated to be spoken to, given the elitists we are, and we spent the rest of the time listening to and fawning over Gregory Lemarchal, whose name Kathleen butchered as "LAY-MARK-CALL." Alright. No, I have not taken French, but even I know that it's not supposed to be pronounced like that!!!!

All in all, it was an EXQUISITE trip. :)