I spent one of my days in Los Angeles exploring Hollywood. Initially, I found a McDonald’s in which I could use the restroom that had an interesting locking mechanism on the door which alerted me that I needed to go to one of the cashiers to gain access to the restroom. It was supposed to be for my safety. I then parked my car a few blocks from Hollywood Boulevard and proceeded to ride around Hollywood on my bike and take some pictures. I photographed the Capitol Records building, Madame Toussaud’s advertisement, and New York cop Olivia Benson (Mariska Hargitay) getting a star on Hollywood Boulevard. Olivia drew a crowd. Hollywood was… weird. Lots of strange local people and lots of tourists. Lots of people in costumes who I assumed would allow you to take your picture with them for money. After that I went to Los Angeles’ premier urban park, Griffith Park, to take in the views and the observatory. It was hazy. But, I could still see downtown and the ocean. I also drove around to get a good shot of the Hollywood sign. Why is Hollywood so significant to me? It’s because I’ve learned that most foreign people’s perceptions of the culture of United States are all too often formed from the media experiences we export, i.e., movies and television. That’s very interesting when you think about it.

The La BBrea Tar Pits are located in Hancock Park in a section of LA where a massive amount of the remains of prehistoric animals have been found. It seems that the animals wandered into some the sticky goo of the area, which is essentially tar which has boon seeping up from the ground in this area for many millennia, and never got out. The first picture is a depiction of a mother mastodon getting caught in the tar. The second picture is the museum where active work to recover more bones is still ongoing. Admission is $9 for seniors. Also in the park is the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, or LACMA, as it’s often called. Admission is $10 for seniors to view the art.

In-N-Out Burgers is a California chain restaurant. If you go to California and you’re not a vegetarian, you have to go eat an In-N-Out burger just to say you’ve had one. I had the double-double, pictured here. You can also see the very limited menu, but I’ve been told that you can order more than is on the base menu above the registers. I saw some pretty good looking chili-cheese fries and they weren’t on the menu. The food is fast-food-down-home-American-greasy. If you get the double-double, an order of fries and and a shake, you’re looking at consuming about 1,500 truly wonderfully tasty calories. That should make your cardiologist cringe and cause you to loose a little sleep at night.

The Getty Center is the premier art gallery in Los Angeles. Actually, it’s one of the nicest galleries I’ve ever seen. Since I’ve visited the major galleries in London, Paris, Amsterdam, Madrid, Rome, and Florence I’d say that’s a big complement. But the greatness of the Getty Center doesn’t lie so much in the status of the artifacts. It lies in the presentation. The Getty Center itself is it’s major piece. Sitting high on a hilltop in Los Angeles, the views of the city are superlative. You can see downtown LA from one patio and then move to another patio and see the Pacific Ocean. The buildings themselves are works of art. Modern art. The Getty Center is more of a campus than a museum and the setting on the top of a hill makes it one of the unique galleries of the world. The presentation of the artifacts is also impressive. While it’s not a large museum, it’s not a small one either. Plus, it’s free to enter. You only pay $15 to park your car, meaning, if you have five people, the net cost is $3 per person. If you like, or even consider, going to art museums, I’d rank the Getty as a “must see” in LA.

Actually, this gallery is composed of 3 pics from San Diego and 3 from LA. The first pic is of a section of Ocean Beach, which is supposed to be an Old Hippie hangout. I didn’t see too many old hippies anywhere I went there. The second pic is of a bicycle parked in front of the Ocean Beach Public Library. The owner may be homeless, but they have a lot of possessions. The third pic is of a statue I saw when I went to check out Imperial Beach. I just liked it. The 1st pic on the second row is a statue of Ronald Reagan that is in front of the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, CA. I went there because I like Presidential Libraries. This one even has the actual Air Force 1 that Reagan used in the building. That was interesting. The last picture is the location where I wound up when I told my GPS that I wanted to go to Getty Center, the premier art gallery in LA. Apparently, my GPS wanted to show me who was boss. By the time I actually got to the Getty Center after my GPS messed me around, I decided it was better if I waited to go the the gallery until the next day. Thank LA traffic for that decision.

In 1968 I was dumb enough to let a friend talk me into going to California with him. What wound up happening was that I missed my Senior year of high school. After living in Venice Beach, Haight-Ashbury, and places in between for a few months, I returned to Oklahoma to recuperate and get on with my life. But I never forgot those times. Continue reading →

See the little car? Isn’t it cute. Why am I showing you a picture of a car? Because there are just too many people with cars in Southern California. It’s crowded. Really crowded. I’m from the Big Country. We have a lot of space. We don’t have major traffic problems. We can find a place to park our cars. Continue reading →

These are more pictures of my time in San Diego. The first picture is of Del Taco is which is a new-to-me fast food joint. They had burritos for 50 cents and tacos for 59 cents. Very cheap. Not for gourmands. Next is Petco Park which is where the San Diego Padres play. It’s a very nice park with a great family park setting within the ballpark in the area past the outfield. It’s very cool. Lastly I’d like to say that there are some really nice high rise apartments in downtown San Diego. Lots of them. I’ll bet some of the views are spectacular.

Some pictures of some of the sights I’m seeing in San Diego. Comments below.

The first picture is of a sign I saw in a McDonald’s that gave everyone a twenty minute limit on being in the building. The point here is to keep the homeless moving. Pic 2 is of a couple of homeless guys sleeping on the corner of Front and Broadway – the center of downtown San Diego. I watched two cops walk right past them and didn’t even look. I’m thinking about going homeless in San Diego. I’m thinking it could be an interesting social experiment. Picture 3 is of Fort Rosecrans National Cemetery. It sits on a hill overlooking the Pacific Ocean. The 4th picture is of the sign at the Gaslamp Quarter. It’s a great place to get food and drink. The 5th picture is of the cross at the top of Mount Soledad in the La Jolla district. This hill has some of the best views of San Diego that I saw.The last picture is of the entrance to the Park at the Park, which is a park at Petco Park, the home of the San Diego Padres.

Balboa Park is a 1,200-acre urban park. It was originally created for the 1915–16 Panama–California Exposition. San Diego Zoo, San Diego Air & Space Museum, San Diego Museum of Art, San Diego Automotive Museum, Museum of the Living Artist, San Diego Museum of Man, San Diego Natural History Museum, Museum of Photographic Arts, Reuben H. Fleet Science Center, and other museums, gardens, and attractions. I can attest that it is an excellent place to ride a bicycle.