Still highlighting 2018.......

No doubt about it!  Seeing Thirty Seconds to Mars (JARED LETO) was extremely high on the awesome things we did as a family in 2018.  He is a God, no question about it.

Since we struck out looking for vegan, edible cookie dough in LA..........

I am so glad we found it here in Georgia.  Sweet Loren's is seriously delicious!!!  You can also cook this if you want but raw cookie dough is something to behold!!!!

TGIS.........

Fingers crossed this season will be great!

We will be flipping to this during commercials
hoping to catch a few of our favorites presenting
and winning.  

Eating in LA......

Much to my surprise, I did not find LA to be all that vegan/vegetarian-friendly.  It was actually disappointing.  I just had it in my mind that meat and dairy would be harder to come by than almond milk and tofu but now I know.  It could explain the $23 veggie burger though.  Still have trouble believing that. 

Luckily, we did find Stuff I Eat Vegan Restaurant and had dinner there before we went to see Imagine Dragons in concert at The Forum. 

The restaurant is super cute and very open.  Pink Himalayan salt, fruit-infused water, and picnic tables with benches to eat at.  The place was extremely clean too.  Good vibes all the way around.




The girls both ordered the organic soul food platter.  This was a massive amount of food including yams, vegan mac'n'cheese, BBQ tofu, kale greens, black-eyed peas, cornbread muffin, vegan potato salad, and coleslaw.

I ordered the Sumthin-Sumthin which included wild rice, seasoned tofu, black beans, corn, guacamole, carrots, un-tuna, and two corn tortillas.

The food is a little expensive but considering it is made to order, insanely large portions, vegan, and 95% organic it was a good investment.

If you are in that part of LA, I would definitely recommend having breakfast or dinner at Stuff I Eat.  Check out their website here.

One for the books........

Look how fabulous!!!

There are only a few things that C19 loves more than books and that is why when we were in LA, we decided to check out The Last Bookstore in downtown LA.

The bookstore boasts about being home to more new and used books and records in all of California.


The bookstore is in a century-old, multilevel, abandoned bank building and is a sprawling space with maze-like hallways that lead to hidden rooms, you can walk through book tunnels, and there is also a vault of horror.


Sounds delightful, the problem is the location.







This landmark bookstore is located on South Spring Street which is directly adjacent to the infamous Skid Row.


If you have not heard of or seen Skid Row, lucky you.  I will never forget what I saw there.  I am enclosing a few pics but be warned.


To call this area impoverished is a gross misrepresentation and understatement.


I really do not have words to describe what I saw myself.






We were driving block after block looking for a place to park but the sea of homeless people was so disturbing, we decided to leave.

The latest census from 2018 estimates there are 41,000+ people live on Skid Row.






Click here for a video (if you can actually watch it).






If you are still determined to check out The Last Bookstore, there are places to park if you don't mind throwing away $20 to park your car and walk past these destitute people with nothing.

We just could not do that plus there are gang-relating activities going on as well.  For a minute, I forgot I was in America.  I am not sure what I was thinking to be honest.


I forgot to mention that even though there are 41,000 homeless people and decaying buildings for blocks, there are also beautiful buildings with fancy Chandeliers and fancy people going in and out shopping and living their lives literally stepping right over homeless people to get their shopping done.  It is disgusting!

I can honestly say I have never seen anything quite like this before and hope I never see anything like this again. 


I am from Atlanta.  I am fully aware that we also have homeless people but this was on a different level, a different everything really.

We did, however, find another bookstore close to The Forum which was small and overcrowding with books, vinyls, vintage magazines, random art, and miscellaneous other collectibles.  C19 bought herself a book written in German from 1851 just because it was so unique and A Christmas Carol from 1901 which is fabulous.  It is called Angel City Books and Records. 

What to expect in LA when you rent a car while you are on vacation......

Expect to pay a LOT of money on parking anywhere and EVERYWHERE you go!  The beach, the mall, a restaurant, and even pay to park at Target.  Pay to park at Target?  I know!

Don't bother trying to be cute and park and get in and out quickly because we saw a few cars being towed away.  What a stink!

 Literally $2.00 for 15 minutes.

Good luck finding an available parking meter but if you do, these money-suckers are $2.00 for about an hour.

Who in the world would have thought that it would cost between $16 to $40 to take your kids to a beach?  Certainly not me!  Hey, LA, you can keep your murky brown-water beaches.

How about taking an Uber or a Lyft?  That sounds like a good idea but for as many things as we did, it would have been too much trouble to arrange transportation for everything we did.  Plus it is expensive.  It cost almost $3.00 just to book a driver, both Uber and Lyft charge about $1.10 each and every mile, and there is a minimum of fee of about $6.00.  Try not to cancel because they will charge you $5.00 automatically.  Just one example, we went to The Forum twice.  It was approximately 21+ miles from our hotel.  That is $23.10 one way, oh, and don't forget that $3.00 fee which makes the trip there about 26.10 so there and back is a grand total of $52.20.  It would save you the ridiculous $25.00 plus tax to park at The Forum but we prefer to drive and just eat the gas and parking fees.

And one last thing, the price of gas while we were in LA was between $4.29 and $4.99 a GALLON!  One freaking gallon of gas.................So glad we had a fuel-efficient car while we were there.  I do not know how people live in LA.  More to come!

Planning a trip to LA? You might want to rethink that (coming soon)......

This happened but everyone kept putting their damn feet on the star when we were trying to get a pic..............

LAX: Home of the $23 veggie burger...........

Concerts in Cali......

We have been to so many concerts I have lost track and while we were in California, we added two more concerts to the list.  We were able to see Thirty Seconds to Mars and then Imagine Dragons at The Forum. I know! Both of these concerts were insanely fun!

Jared Leto has my vote for best live vocals ever, I am talking EVER! And
like I said, I have seen a lot of concerts.  He is mesmerizing, beautiful,
Godlike, and all-encompassing.  Sigh......

Dan Reynolds has my vote for most sprightly, bouncy, ass-kicking,
unstoppable powerhouse!  I thought I was high-octane.  This
guy is literally a ball of energy in constant motion.  He came to win!  

We had so much fun on the whole trip but we really love going to concerts.  Next up is the return of Twenty One Pilots.  We have seen them before but cannot hardly wait for this come back.  The opening show is in Tennessee and is going to be AmaZinG!

Los Angeles: City of Angeles in my opinion.......

has been grossly misnamed. 

I only saw one angel in five days and that was Jared Leto.

Just a few more days..........

Gothic mansion, zombie attacks, and tight red pants........

Must mean I am adding the Thriller house to the ever-expanding list of things to do.

At 1345 Carroll Ave in historical Angelino Heights, you will find the house where Michael Jackson's Thriller was filmed.

Side note, the Library of Congress recognizes Thriller to be the most famous music video of all times.

The house was built in 1887 by Michael Sanders, a warehouse operator.  This 4 bedroom, 4 bathroom house is not currently for sale but is estimated to be worth $1,600,000.  That is serious bank!

This is also the neighborhood to go trick-or-treating in as reportedly crowds of up to 30 people at a time can be standing on porches knocking on doors in search of candy.  One year 2000+ costume clad, candy-seekers visited this Thrilling neighborhood before the night was over.  They must have magical candy.

Officially added to the list.  Wish us luck!

Check out the video here.

“No mere mortal can resist the evil of the thriller.”

Record high temps of 111 degrees in California today. I hope it cools down before we get there....

Highest temp since 1939 with was 109.

Cannot wait until we head out to The City of Angels.....

 or as it was formerly known as El Pueblo de Nuestra Senora Reina de los Angeles sobre el Rio Porciuncula (the Town of Our Lady the Queen of the Angels).

Counting down the days to see this guy in concert.......

Edible raw cookie dough made without eggs.........

Nasty

Yes, Please!  We are in!

I honestly have no clue how any person in their right mind would eat anything with raw eggs in it whether it be cookie dough, cake batter, or whatever, it is DISGUSTING!





We will definitely be checking out California Cookie Dough
while we are in Cali.

A few more things I hope we will have time to do in Cali..........

Moonlight movies on the beach.

Juice Bar.

Bridge to nowhere.

Hollywood farmer's market.

And, of course, the Hollywood sign.

We must do this without a doubt........

We are insane over The American Horror Story and
cannot wait until season 8 comes out so I figure it
would only make sense to visit The Murder House from season 1, Right?

Our California to do list is getting bigger every day.........

A movie in a cemetery.  What?  Check out the link here 

to find out more about this haunt-filled movie screening. 

This is right up our alley.  Cemeteries-Love

Movies-Love!