There’s this saying. Life moves pretty fast. If you don’t stop and look around, you might miss it. I need a serious brake adjustment on my life. The past month has been GO! GO! GO! And while I try to take moments to stop and enjoy the present moment, I’ve only succeeded in slowing down momentarily before cutting back to my break-neck speed. This weekend was no exception.
Early Saturday morning I climbed aboard a plane bound for Los Angeles and so began the shortest trip I’ve ever been on. I have never been to LA so I was really looking forward to checking it out and seeing friends, both blog and college, who I hadn’t seen in a while (and in one case, had never met!). But the real reason I was out in LA was for Nintendo! They are launching their Wii U and I was given the awesome opportunity to fly out to LA to try it out at one of their parties. I stayed at the Standard Hollywood, a hotel I will be design-geeking out about over on The Wanderscapes, which was AMAZING. I definitely let out a squee and hopped up and down a bit when I walked into my very own hotel room with a gorgeous view over LA. I realized that I had never stayed at a really nice hotel by myself before and had to remind myself that I could walk around naked in the room and no one would see.
I met up with Nico and Angela for a sushi lunch before the Nintendo WiiU event. My one requirement of this trip was to eat fresh raw fish. Colorado does mountains really well and while their seafood isn’t bad, it will always pale in comparison to the coasts. Sadly I couldn’t sit and chat as long as I would have liked over lunch but it was great to see them, even if rather briefly.
Obviously Nintendo’s Wii U event was so fun. I’m definitely not the biggest video game fan but their new console is pretty cool. I even played Just Dance 4 which was a lot of fun–mainly because someone else is controlling your dance moves. I’m a horrible dancer (as anyone who witnessed my round can attest to) so being in control of ridiculous dance moves for other people to do sounds right up my alley. I watched a lot of the games and the new Wii Fit U looked really cool and there was one other game where as a team you had to find another person in this maze that I wish I had played but it was still fun to watch. I got to play a little bit of Mario on the XL 3DS and like usual, died within five seconds, repeatedly.
But wait! The best part of Wii U? Getting to meet Katelin FINALLY after five years of reading each others’ blogs! Also meeting Michelle, Janet and Rachelle, whom I hung out with continuously throughout the night and at the after party at Pink Taco. Afterwards there was talk of drinks with Nico and other blog friends but to be honest, I was completely worn out from the day of travel and being social so I opted to hang out in my awesome hotel room and read 11/22/63 by Stephen King. It was pretty perfect, actually.
Sunday was my day to really sight see. I immediately got coffee and went to Trader Joe’s, which you all know is something that I miss dearly. I know we’re getting one next year BUT WILL IT HURRY UP ALREADY? I only got some chocolate covered peanut butter pretzels because they didn’t have the coffee I wanted, but those are ridiculously awesome so either way, I won.
I had never been to LA and luckily, my friend Alex from Michigan State, a fellow ginger as well, lives with her fiance in LA so I was able to play tourist with them for the day. We started at the Hollywood Farmer’s Market where I got a wonderful sample platter of this AMAZING vegan food from Surprisingly Vegan who had a stand there. OMG GUYS. The vegan Mac and Cheese? BEST THING I’VE EVER EATEN THAT WASN’T ACTUAL CHEESE. As Alex said, amazeballs.
We also went to a large flea market that I know for a fact Liz and I could spend days rummaging through. All the stuff was awesome and I wish I lived closer so I could get some of the furniture I saw for not bad prices. We then went for food at Cafe Gratitude. One thing to note about all these adventures was that it was super hot over the weekend and hi, this girl doesn’t do humidity. I was a dripping gross mess.
So clearly, when Jason Bateman walked into Cafe Gratitude, I wasn’t about to impress him with my soppy grossness. BUT YAY! Celebrity sighting! And a pretty cool one at that! Cafe Gratitude was so cute though and the food was awesome. I made the BIGGEST mess of myself but it was so worth it. After lunch they dropped me back off at the hotel where I hung out reading my book (which I cannot put down–it is so good!) until Nico arrived and we went for dinner at this place called Stout. I had a ginormous burger with brie and fig jam and caramelized onions to completely counter all the vegan food I had eaten. It’s all about a balanced diet, I say.
And then the weekend was over. I was back at the airport waiting for my plane to Denver in what seemed like the blink of the eye. Luckily this time, I held onto my Kindle.
*Disclaimer: I am a Brand Ambassador for Nintendo, who hosted the WiiU event and all opinions and recaps are my own. Nintendo oh-so-awesomely flew me out and put me up at the Standard Hotel Hollywood and for that I am so thankful!
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