California!

The past 3 days were probably the most packed couple of days I have had in a long time. It all started a couple of weeks ago, after my friend Erin went to the Ellen Degeneres Show in Burbank, CA. I decided to check online for tickets... A few hours later, the show called and asked how many I wanted! So... this past Monday morning, Nicole, Kristin and I woke up bright and early to head to the airport to catch our flight to L.A.!

None of us had flown in nearly a year, so we didn't know about all the new rules (no liquids on the plane...). This was a sad sad thing, because we had to go back and put everything in our check-on luggage. Each of us has a pretty intense chapstick addiction. By the time we were about an hour into our 2nd flight, our lips were hurting pretty badly for our chapstick. We tried water at first, but it just didn't last. It got so bad that we asked our flight attendant if she had any lotion or anything wet we could put on our lips (there was still several hours left on our flight. So, she brought us a cup with some lotion in it. The thing is, at first it worked (kind of), but pretty soon after, it burned. The lotion was called Lemon and Wasabi or something.

When we finally got there, we got our chapstick out, and headed to the rental car place. The SUV's were the same price as an economy car, which is crazy, but true! We drove a Toyota Highlander around while we were there (sunroof and all) and had a blast! The drivers are crazy there, but God answered our prayers and kept us all safe and sane.

The first night, we met my friend Erin and went to the Farmer's Market to eat lunch, and then we went to Hollywood later that night. We saw Jimmy Kimmel outside of his studio, interviewing people or something, and then we just walked around and looked at the "stars." You can't really tell, but I am sitting by William Shatner's star. For those of you who know me well, you'll remember when I thought William Shatner died. For about 3 months, I believed this to be true, until I saw him in a Priceline commercial, and I thought that was really tacky for them to use his commercial after he died. Of course, I Googled it and realized he was very much still alive.

We also went to Grauman's Chinese Theater to look at all the hand prints of the famous people. The cool part about going to Hollywood, was not only the excitement of seeing someone currently famous, but to be able to see where all the old classy actors and actresses had once been, and where their careers were born. It was all so neat.

The next day (Tuesday), we woke up really early so I could get in line for the Ellen Show. We thought only one person was supposed to wait in line, but we found out later (too late) that it doesn't matter if your friends wait with you. Kristin and Nicole dropped me off around 4:30 (which thankfully only felt like 7:30 because of the time difference). Out of 250 seats, we were numbers 8, 9, and 10! It was definitely worth it. Here's a picture of us on the show after Ellen said something funny.



I have to put in a shout out to CK West Coast 2005... I ate at In-N-Out Burger!! I called several of you (Sims, Emily, Miley) and thought of our team. I ate a double cheeseburger with fries and a coke. There's not too much to choose from, if you remember, but what they have sure is good!




This was our last day, sadly, so after the show taping we went out to Santa Monica Pier, where we saw a movie being filmed. It will have Paris Hilton in it, who I am not a fan of, but I have to say it was still pretty cool to see part of it being made. Paris had already left for the night, but we took some pictures of the guy who's in it. It's called "The Hottie and the Nottie" and it's supposed to come out next year sometime. Apparently it's about a girl and her fiance and how she won't marry him until he finds someone to date her ugly friend. A Paris Hilton film is not something I would normally want to see, but I think I'll see it, just since we saw part of it being filmed.

After that, we were so tired, we went right back to the hotel and went to sleep. The 7am flight back was uneventful, (with a beautiful sunrise from the plane) and we are so thankful to have had this experience! It was such a whirlwind, but we had a blast. I totally recommend going to see the Ellen show, if you're ever in the area. And to you, if you stuck through with this blog to the end, thanks so much for caring! :-)


My disclaimer: Not all of these pictures are mine! We combined our photos after we got back, and several of these are Nicole's and Kristin's. Casey's been teaching us so much! :-)