Whirlwind Tour, part II
Jul. 13th, 2003 08:56 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
madbakerThis marketing trip was basically a last-minute affair... among other mild annoyances, it fell during some scheduled vacation time. Dawn and I had planned to drive down to LA to see the illuminated manuscript exhibit at the Getty. So I had the company buy my return ticket to LAX, where Dawn would drive down to meet me. As last-minute compromises go, this wasn’t bad. I took Southwest - it’s been a while since I took that particular cattle car flight. They had overbooked and were looking for passengers willing to bump; as they got more desperate, the incentives got better. I was tempted by the last one they announced (they’d reimburse the cost of the original ticket, plus $200 in Southwest tickets good for one year, plus something like $200 in cash) but I didn’t act quickly enough and someone else took it.
So I flew into the LAX zoo and took a taxi through LA gridlock. Our hotel wasn’t that far from the airport, but far enough that there aren’t any shuttles running, alas. Dawn made it in about two hours later. She would have gotten there earlier, but rush hour traffic meant it took her an hour to creep five miles. Yet another reason I’m glad I live in Northern CA. Oh, that rush hour traffic was at 3 PM.
We showed up at the Getty half an hour before they opened and made a beeline for the exhibit. If you like 15th century Flemish illuminated manuscripts (and after all, who doesn’t?) this has a serious wow factor. We spent several hours oohing and getting watched by nervous security guards. (Come on guys, that’s why these things are in cases – so we get nose prints on the glass and not on the books!) I wonder what some people thought when we crouched down and turned our heads upside down to look at the underside of the open books. Dawn may talk to some metalworkers about reproducing some of the clasps for her own bookbinding use.
After some hours of this, my brain was full. We wandered around the gardens, went into a couple other special exhibits, and then took a garden tour. The volunteer docent leading the tour blahed on interestingly about all sorts of random tidbits. If you’re making a trip to the Getty, I’d definitely recommend the garden tours. Last time we went there (for our honeymoon in 2000) it was our first trip so we didn’t spend too much time outside the exhibits.
For dinner, we drove through surprise! more gridlock traffic to a Mexican restaurant called El Cholo. It’s been there since 1923 and is an institution. I tried one of their specialties, green corn tamales – excellent.
Saturday morning we drove back. Since we were in no hurry and had taken the Mustang, we took Highway 1 back the whole way – from Santa Monica to San Francisco. It was kind of neat. It would have been better if the weather had cooperated; it was foggy until San Luis Obispo. Was SoCal being cranky or just trying to get rid of us? Oh well; at least the drive through Big Sur and Santa Cruz was gorgeous. The passenger would look at the ocean, rocks, and sun with a dazed, slack-jawed expression of awe; the driver would sneak looks in between hairpin turns. Then we’d change over and repeat. We got home around 9:30 and crashed. First time back in my own bed since Tuesday night, yay!
Books: what with all the airplane travel I got through some of my reading backlog. Among others, I re-read Harry Turtledove’s Ruled Britannica. The basis is that the Spanish Armada won, and 1598 England is under their control. I think it’s his best in quite some time. Also, my copy of Chiquart’s On Cookery arrived! Woohoo! This is a faboo book, but it’s out of print. I managed to find a copy originally from a Virginia college library, sold by a Scottish bookseller.
I love the internet. 8)
So I flew into the LAX zoo and took a taxi through LA gridlock. Our hotel wasn’t that far from the airport, but far enough that there aren’t any shuttles running, alas. Dawn made it in about two hours later. She would have gotten there earlier, but rush hour traffic meant it took her an hour to creep five miles. Yet another reason I’m glad I live in Northern CA. Oh, that rush hour traffic was at 3 PM.
We showed up at the Getty half an hour before they opened and made a beeline for the exhibit. If you like 15th century Flemish illuminated manuscripts (and after all, who doesn’t?) this has a serious wow factor. We spent several hours oohing and getting watched by nervous security guards. (Come on guys, that’s why these things are in cases – so we get nose prints on the glass and not on the books!) I wonder what some people thought when we crouched down and turned our heads upside down to look at the underside of the open books. Dawn may talk to some metalworkers about reproducing some of the clasps for her own bookbinding use.
After some hours of this, my brain was full. We wandered around the gardens, went into a couple other special exhibits, and then took a garden tour. The volunteer docent leading the tour blahed on interestingly about all sorts of random tidbits. If you’re making a trip to the Getty, I’d definitely recommend the garden tours. Last time we went there (for our honeymoon in 2000) it was our first trip so we didn’t spend too much time outside the exhibits.
For dinner, we drove through surprise! more gridlock traffic to a Mexican restaurant called El Cholo. It’s been there since 1923 and is an institution. I tried one of their specialties, green corn tamales – excellent.
Saturday morning we drove back. Since we were in no hurry and had taken the Mustang, we took Highway 1 back the whole way – from Santa Monica to San Francisco. It was kind of neat. It would have been better if the weather had cooperated; it was foggy until San Luis Obispo. Was SoCal being cranky or just trying to get rid of us? Oh well; at least the drive through Big Sur and Santa Cruz was gorgeous. The passenger would look at the ocean, rocks, and sun with a dazed, slack-jawed expression of awe; the driver would sneak looks in between hairpin turns. Then we’d change over and repeat. We got home around 9:30 and crashed. First time back in my own bed since Tuesday night, yay!
Books: what with all the airplane travel I got through some of my reading backlog. Among others, I re-read Harry Turtledove’s Ruled Britannica. The basis is that the Spanish Armada won, and 1598 England is under their control. I think it’s his best in quite some time. Also, my copy of Chiquart’s On Cookery arrived! Woohoo! This is a faboo book, but it’s out of print. I managed to find a copy originally from a Virginia college library, sold by a Scottish bookseller.
I love the internet. 8)
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I'd pass on the Midwest...
Date: 2003-07-14 12:28 pm (UTC)As for El Cholo -- isn't that a racial epithet? I almost wonder if it falls under the same area as going to Sambos for good ol' down South cooking. And yes, I have eaten at the latter.
Big Sur is indeed gorgeous. Hitting it around sunset is especially remarkable.
Re: I'd pass on the Midwest...
Date: 2003-07-14 06:41 pm (UTC)And yes, I remember eating at Sambo's too. Tiger pancakes with tiger butter and your choice of tiger syrup...
restaurant name
Date: 2003-07-15 07:35 pm (UTC)