The Granddaddy of them All!

We went to LA and the Rose Bowl and we had a fabulous time! Of course it would have been better if we had won the game but hey...

We drove up this curvy, basically 1.5 lane road up to the Hollywood sign and the houses hanging off the side of the cliff were pretty cool. I don't know how they live up there- parking for parties would be impossible, driving that road at night would be scary and the mudslides? Can't imagine! My high school friend, Emily Bergl, gave me the directions. Emily plays Beth right now on Desperate Housewives.

This picture is one of my favorites! We rarely get pictures together but there was a woman from Tennessee with her 2 daughters up there who was happy to oblige and took many pictures for us.

The view to smog city.

We were hiking down this road to go behind the Hollywood sign but I think we went down the wrong road. Oh well. We had plenty of other things that we wanted to do on Friday anyway!

Santa Monica Pier. There was lots of red there. But Santa Monica Pier is lame. Had it been warmer and the beach piled with people, maybe not as lame. I wanted to see 'da pretty muscle boys lifting da bikini clad girls' (spoken like Hans and Franz...) at Muscle Beach but no such luck. Bummer. (Body building to the extreme gives me the willies!)

I have to get rid of that stupid balloon string!

New Year's Eve dinner at Ago in West Hollywood. We met up with 2 other couples there. This place I have to complain about. Now my 3 readers won't go there. Robert DeNiro co-owns this place, it's supposed to be trendy, a celebrity magnet and the regular menu looked pretty good. The NYE menu? LAME! I didn't expect to see any celebs (although our friends saw Sheryl Crow at Bubba Gump's the night before on Santa Monica Pier). They are known for their peach martinis. They were really good. They use fresh peaches and I could have put back a few of those easily. Not at the price they were though. I don't know how much they were because someone bought it for me. We get the menu and it is limited like most places do but the prices are also jacked up $6-13 more. I had heard that the Caprese salad here was awesome and it was. But regular menu- $14, NYE menu- $20. All the salads were at least $16. I ordered a pasta with artichokes that was basically noodles, artichokes and a little garlic and olive oil. Pretty boring. $25 though. I could have made that at home but it would have been better. Everyone had dessert and we had 2 bottles of wine. I have definitely had better meals in Wausau which is not known for its haute cuisine. The thing that absolutely drove me crazy about this place was the smarmy waiter that added on our tip to our bill. Jerk added 33.3%!!! I would have said something but I tend to be a little (ok, a lot) bitchy and irrational about things like that so I let it slide until another day when we could call them. But it still bugs me! One of the guys in our group tried emailing them the Monday after we got home and I don't know if he got a response.

Go Bucky!

Keith, Chris and Steve are pumped for the game!

Karen, Keith, Chris, Kristi, me and Steve before the game.


Jumpy, Jumpy!Bucky is pointing at ME at the Alumni Pregame Tailgate Party!

The game. Full of RED!

Steve still has a smile during 5th quarter after the Badgers lost. It was a good game. We were exhausted! I gotta hand it to the TCU Horned Frogs- they played well and hard. It was kinda nice to 'know' someone on the other side as well, my blog sista, Ryan from AmericanBridget Jones! I know she was excited!

On Sunday (after a good night's rest!!), we went to The Getty Museum of Art which was super cool. Wish it would have been warmer so we could have seen the gardens in bloom. We ate at the best little Italian place- Bravo Cucina in Santa Monica (3rd Street Promenade) for lunch. I could not get enough of the pomodoro sauce! The food at this place was WAY better than Ago!!I would recommend this place to anyone. Kinda a hole in the wall but sometimes those are the best places! We stayed in Burbank at Hotel Amarano which was nice because it was in a residential neighborhood and very nice. The staff was very friendly and helpful. LA is really spread out and you have to drive everywhere which I am not a fan of. I like to be able to take a cab or subway while in the city. Overall, it was a great trip to LA but I don't know when (or if) I will go back!