Those.Prickly.Hills.

My LA trip is fast becoming a distant memory, a place I pop to in my mind when I need a relaxed sunny memory - I'm sure I don't have to spell it out to any London readers..we are not exactly experiencing the HEIGHT of summer right now. Rain, drizzle, cold.

So let me write my last LA post and indulge myself in the memories of slapping on 50+ suncream to gaze at the Hollywood sign from a hill covered in cacti & lizards soaking up the rays.

ENTER AT YOUR PERIL ('peril' aka sun envy)

Seeing the Hollywood sign whilst staying in Hollywood seemed pretty imperative to Kimberley & my LA adventure, so we took our little automobile to the nearest possible point which happened to be a Wild West style ranch. We said hello to the horses, considered letting them ride us through the hills before deciding on braving the rattle snake infested wilderness alone - two blondes in incredibly inappropriate attire..what could possibly go wrong?

If something had in fact gone wrong I'm sure it would make a funny story in retrospect, however I'm glad to say that we returned from the hills unscathed and drove back to the heart of Hollywood to reminisce about all the rich and famous on Hollywood Boulevard.

The Muppets were by far my most exciting find. 

 

This nutella crumble was also a pretty ideal find. If it's not rich and famous yet, it certainly should be.

 So that leads me on to the food in Cali. One often hears of the obesity epidemic in America (which advertising certainly isn't helping with - see photo below) & so true to form, we had our fair share of munching on Ihop pancakes & Fatburger burgers which was pretty dreamy, although a week of it was about all my sensitive tummy could handle. On the opposite end of the spectrum, we ate lots of poolside sushi, drunk fresh juices and felt very healthy indeed.

 TV night in with sushi, juice, avocado, strawberries & choc chip cookies. Yum.

 Apart from our one TV night dinner after a long roadtrip back from Palm Springs - we hit the town. One particularly fun night was at a very swanky Italian joint called RivaBella..good name right?

The meal was delicious & made us feel like we were quite frankly in the land of Michaelangelo. We drank Bella Bellini cocktails & finshed off with what could be seen as the ultimate pudding..or just plain weird..

NITROGEN ICE-CREAM.

 The ice-cream was so exciting we even made up a dance in its' honour. It is called the 'nitrogen ice-cream' dance, because despite being a group of 2 actors, a swimwear designer and an artist..our ability to creativity name a smoking ice-cream failed us on this occasion.

 And this my friends, is a CRO-NUT. 

We named it Mr. Cronut.

Full of food, fun & freaky dance moves, we continued the night at Soho House - there were slightly less palm trees than the Soho House pop-up Kim & I went to in Coachella, but the Photo Boudoir certainly made up for that...

 So I guess this happened....                    ....Interesting.

 

Ok ok I know what you're saying - in the name of a mustached stop sign - STOP dreaming of fun in LA & get back to your desk in rainy, drizzly London.

Crazy.Surreal.LA.

Continuing on my current theme of 'goodness me, I had a pretty crazy-surreal experience in LA' - let me say that I found the walking (or not walking, in this case) habits of LA dwellers to be especially crazy-surreal. Driving around the streets in our automobile it was an extremely rare occurrence to see a single human being walking along, except in a mad dash to get into their car - as if the open air would cause immediate spontaneous combustion. I really am one for the outdoors & love walking here & there, so I really think I would struggle living in such a place (however much 'crazy-surreal' is usually my vibe). I have lived in the same area of London all my life & am good chums with lots of the neighbouring families. We bump into each other walking down the street, taking the dogs to the park, in the vegetable (chocolate) isle in tescos..I don't know how I would survive without these friendship afirming chance encounters, because nothing says 'life-long friends' like '"can you help me reach the kitkat chunky's?" right?

And the moral of the story is: How do the LA crowd get their chocolate??

As well as not seeing two-legged creatures roaming the streets, I also didn't see their four-legged friends wandering either, however I was very glad to find a massive shop dedicated to catering to the every desire of our fluffy counterparts.

Lamb, potato & peas - gluten-free dog food? I should think so.

I have a very jolly little dog called Daisy (in fact when I say she's 'very jolly' she's not THAT jolly in her old age..) who has always been at the receiving end of my fun in playing 'dress-up'. I started to enjoy this activity with barbies, then teddies, then my brother at one point & then of course myself at another, preparing Daisy as the perfect candidate. Jumpers, tshirts, raincoats, glasses, hats & the like..I was unbelievably excited to find DOG SOCKS in the LA pet shop! Winnie the pooh themed, no less. They were the perfect compliment to the pink bobble hat & 'One Hot Mess' tshirt I also paid good dollar for.

 Another crazy-surreal LA discovery was this CUPCAKE ATM machine. Quite like taking out money, you 'take-out' a cupcake. Love it.

In a final blog pop back to Palm Springs, I've got to show you some snaps from our last party - Soho House pop-up in an incredible private house in the desert..
Filled with the who's who of the festival-chic world, amazing food, flowing drinks, oh and a lake with a swan boat floating around.
Everyone has a swan boat in their back garden, right?

On a final note about the movment habits of the LA crowd, I am going to take them back out of the doghouse and tell you that they do ROLLER BLADE which give it 100 brownie points from me!

Kimberley & I cruised down to Santa Monica beach to rent skates and have a jolly jaunt up & down the sea front...in tiny little shorts (as this Daily Mail article pointed out...!!!)

Having a bit too much fun..

So Forest Gump right now...run Forest RUN! 

OR AT LEAST WALK.