LA Vlog!!

Falling down at The Grove and coming home with Portia de Rossi's autograph!

First, contrary to popular belief, I did not fall on Portia de Rossi, knock her over and have Ellen DeGeneres's people beat me up. No matter how many times that has been suggested.

It happened like this. It was a sunny day, so Ella and I planned on hiking up to the Hollywood Sign. I was very excited until I found out that there was a HUGE fence around it. I had already seen it from Griffith Park, so we decided to go to the walk of the stars thing and then hit the Grove.

The Grove is a mall, but it's not really in a building. It's got a Farmer's market, stores, apartments and restaurants. It's this little area with roads and side walks (footpaths) and stuff, but no actual cars are allowed. It does have a tram (trolley) in there though. So while I was crossing the road, I tripped and flailed for about ten freaking seconds yelling "I'm falling, I'm falling" repeatedly till I fell and said, "Oh, I fell." Luckily, because I was flailing, I was also leaning forward and running (trying to gain balance), my fall was not from the epic five feet, ten inches it usually is, but a mere two feet high. So I ended up bruising my knee a bit and scraping my hand. But in case no one had noticed, a scraped hand hurts like hell!!!

So, to make me feel better, Ella and I decided to go shopping. We went to Barnes and Nobles where I really wanted to get Portia de Rossi's book "Unbearable Lightness". I went to the back to ask a store clerk where I could find a copy because the store there is three stories tall and I had never been there before and I had no intention of walking up and down trying to figure out how the store was structured. I was still in pain and by then, my knee was telling me that I had hurt it also (the scraped hand was burning, so I didn't really realise I had hit my knee).

The clerk told me that someone had just returned a copy and asked it I would be interested in it. I really didn't care as long as the all the pages were there and it wasn't in a bad condition. So he led me back to the sales desk and gave me the book. I opened it to check if everything was there and it was a freaking SIGNED copy!!!!! Some doofus called "Susie Lee" had returned a personalised signed copy!!!! Of course I took it! My name is not Susie Lee, but really, what are the chances that me, a girl from India, will go into Barnes and Nobles in LA and get a signed copy of Portia's book?



I went to get it billed and actually asked for a discount because it was a returned copy and they gave me one!!! So I basically got a discounted, autographed book! I think it balanced out the falling in the Grove, in front of a LOT of people thing.

That day was a very good day in my book. Now all I have to do is actually meet Portia and get it readdressed. Anyone know someone who knows someone who knows her? Or anyone know her?

The Hollywood life!

So, I am in LA. Reached here in one piece, even though my plane got struck by lightening while landing after a seventeen hour flight. No biggie. Whaaaa???? YES biggie!!!! It was insane! After seventeen hours of flying non stop, all we wanted to do was get that plane to land and feel the ground beneath us! I was concentrating on not having to use the barf bag because I was feeling pretty ill. Suddenly, there is a loud bang, the lights flicker, the plane shakes and you look outside the window to see sparks!!! You're like what the hell?? And then the air-hostess makes an announcement saying that we were hit by lightening but there was nothing to worry about. It happens apparently. Let me tell you, I freaking worried!!! It doesn't HAPPEN!


Anyway, I went out of the airport, bags in tow and was welcomed to LA with ice cold air, some rain and the biggest rainbow I had ever seen!!! It was MASSIVE! And so beautiful! I could only manage to take a really bad picture of it though. I pretty much passed out at Ella's place out of sheer exhaustion.

Thursday was nice. We explored Studio City, which is the next locality of where she lives and I ate Greek food for the first time. Then it got dark, cold and started raining, so we decided to come back and plan the rest of my stay here. We managed to get tickets to see Jimmy Kimmel Live with Cameron Diaz and Scott Foley as guests.Don't really care about Kimmel, but the guests are cool!!! Unfortunately Ellen is on hiatus and her show is full. Oh well. We also made chocolate covered gummi bears after Aaron Ginsburg tweeted that Steve Damstra made it. I suddenly wanted some too! The first attempt was a disaster, but the second attempt was very successful!



I hiked to the observatory at Griffith Park on Friday. It was an INSANE hike! I didn't expect it to be this bad and I'm not a real fan of walking uphill. The view was gorgeous though. We could see the Hollywood Sign and the city. The city view was foggy. There were a lot of dogs being walked there which was awesome. It did kind of make me miss Gypsy a lot though, but there is no way in hell either she or I would be hiking up there on a regular basis. Another cool part about Griffith is that it's not a manicured park. It's pretty much wild vegetation with a winding, uphill pathway. There are also mountain lions living in that area, but they come out at night when there are no people. It is fun to say I walked where mountain lions walked though :D



Christmas was awesome. We spent the day at home, with a Christmas lunch and then headed out to eat in the evening. We ate at a restaurant in Studio City. We were supposed to go to Hollywood but it looked like it was going to POUR, so we stayed near by. After dinner, we went out of the restaurant to find a dog that had run away from his owner. We kind of held on to him till his panicked owner came running to find him.

I actually teared up a little when I saw dog and owner reunite, because there have been times when Gyp has gotten away from me and I've literally had a heart attack! The dog is a Rottweiler mix called Riley and he is so sweet. The owner, Jasmin, asked us to come down the road, a few buildings away to a new club called P71. Apparently her boyfriend owned it, and I really wanted to experience LA night life so Ella and I went. It was SO much fun, and we stayed there for a couple of hours. It was loungy, with a nice dancing area. The DJ who was spinning that night actually spins for the Roosevelt, so that was pretty cool!

Sunday, the day after the partying, was like a day after partying. I woke up at 8am, went back to sleep at 11, woke up at 2pm, ate a little, hung around, then went back to sleep at 8pm, now waking up at 2am on Monday, blogging! HA!

Today, we plan on hiking to the Hollywood Sign, because it's warm and clear (warm for LA - 20C!). I'm a little scared for NYE, cause the temperature is supposed to drop to a lovely 4C!!!! I have never been in temperatures that cold. The club where we're going should be heated though, otherwise I'll be celebrating Halloween late, by going as an Eskimo!

Will blog more as I explore LA! And if I meet the fancy celebs!!!

PS: I am now not apprehensive about cats! Thank you Bandit Louise!

Unemployed, Maths and LA!

Ok people, it's been a while since I blogged, probably because I vlogged my last day at work and send off and then nothing of much interest is happening. I am now unemployed. I don't really miss waking up in the morning and rushing and dealing with the hours of traffic. I do miss getting out of the house though.

I am currently studying for my Masters. My exam is in December, so I have to learn general knowledge, maths, data interpretation (percentages and ratios) and brush up on my analytical abilities. Here's the fun part, I don't particularly excel in any of these fields, which is why I now spend my days doing maths, reading random facts and doing about a dozen IQ tests. Do you know with practice, you can increase your "IQ" on these tests? HA! I was a 145, now I'm a 156!! Soon, I'll be a freaking genius! Jeez. The stuff you get online! I truly do love the Internet.

While I study, learn my times tables and increase my "IQ", there are two things that are happening in my life. The most exciting thing is a trip I'm planning. A trip to LA!!! I'm going there for Christmas and New Year! I'm so excited about this! I'm going to be meeting Ella and Michaela there and the three of us are going to be up to no good! I'll eat fries and apple pie for breakfast at a diner in the mornings and maybe nap in the afternoon and go for a comedy show at the Laugh Factory in the evening! I dunno, these are the pretty castles I'm building in the air. I'm not so sure that diners serve fries at 8am. If they do, I will eat them for breakfast. It's something I've not done, but have wanted to do for a while now.

I'm also going to the Thrilling Adventure Hour in Jan, and I hope to catch Paget there. It would be lovely to see her again, since Ella, Michaela and I are friends because of her. That's how we all met!

If any of you reading this in LA and have suggestions of things for me to do or see, let me know! I'm up for anything that doesn't involve heights or roller coasters!

The next thing that is of importance in my life deserves a whole blog post of it's own. It just does. I'll write it soon. Just after I hit the publish button below this post!

When it all becomes too serious

Sometimes, you look back at your life and want to kick yourself for either making those colossally bad decisions or for not seeing stuff coming. You look at yourself in the mirror and ask if you are really that naive or if you're stupid (Then you take the IQ test and get an IQ of 141 which reassures you. A little.).

Today I'm in a stage where being in a said relationship matters, knowing what you're doing in life matters, knowing who you are matters. To me, only the third thing really matters. I don't know who I really am, I change, grow and things that were of earth shaking importance yesterday, is worth nothing today. I think I'm in a position to say that I'm okay with the kind of person I am, the values I have and the life changing decisions I've made so far seem to be ones I can live with, even if some may be mistakes.

A while back, I had my first real crush. Up till now, I've never really wanted to hang out with a boy or been comfortable around one. I've grown up in an all female household, full of very strong female presences, have had various female role models and went to a girls' school and college. Is it any wonder that I'm not particularly comfortable with the male gender? I didn't know what to talk about, what was considered cool and definitely didn't / don't know the art of flirting (At the age of 23, yes.)

It was weird when I became one of the girls I laughed at, waiting for a call or a text, wanting to meet and hang out or something and then analysing everything he ever said or did. Luckily I'm not a patient person, so this lasted all of 2 months. I am done and now all I can think about is that poor boy was subjected to many a discussion with my friends. Some of whom hadn't even met him!! HA!

I've sworn never to do this because I was moody and miserable and definitely not good company. I'm usually fun and have a wide range of interests, but all I ended up talking about was this boy! Like get over it already!

In other news, I'm spending quality time with Gyp cause I won't see her for a whole month soon. I think I'm gonna miss her above all else. If you don't get my relationship with my dog, then all I'm gonna say is that I feel bad for you because you've clearly never been the recipient of unconditional love. So yeah. I'm gonna miss her the most!

This trip is going to be different because I'm only at my aunt's place for 10 days and for the rest of the month I'm on my own! YIKES! I've never holidayed on my own, but I'm looking forward to this trip. It's going to test my independent nature (I've proved that I can't live with another person and I'm okay living alone) and I'd be lying if I said I wasn't a little scared. Mostly about how I'm going to lug my beeeeg suitcase around the various airports and between various hostels and houses! I remember the last time I travelled to the States, I had 2 suitcases of 23 kilos each (50lbs) and I had to use everything I had to get it of that baggage runway thingy. NIGHTMARE! And then, when I had to run to the other side to get my other bag, some doofus tried stealing my trolley! I think I'm just gonna be glad that it's only one piece of luggage right?

In other news, I haven't fallen off anything, hit anything or be hit by anything. An achievement, considering that it's been two whole days since I last blogged :P Anyway, my next post will probably be me squealing just before I leave for the airport.

I'm sooooooo looking forward to meeting my family, Kate Walsh and hopefully Paget Brewster! This time next week, I'll be racing through Heathrow Airport to make my connecting flight! WIN!

Oh, oh, my recommendation for this post is a blog I recently discovered. It's a fun read. It's called "I wont make you eggs in the morning" and I had a fun two hours reading it all. Check it out!