Yesterday I called a friend of mine hoping he could help me bottle some beer that we brewed back in January. He said he was headed to the First Annual L.A. Street Food Fest downtown for some food and beer. One of the fun things about L.A. is the food trucks, ranging from roach coaches to gourmet fusion taco trucks. So someone had the bright idea to round up those trucks, have them prepare sample sized food, and sell it at a festival. I thought it over, and due to my goal of getting out and enjoying L.A. (and also for the sake of not being lame and staying in my house all day) I decided to go down and join them. I drove over, found my way to the general vicinity of the event, and fought my way through the insanity of cars and people. I parked my car and walked for a few blocks - and then I glimpsed the line, which wrapped around a couple of blocks. I had been thinking I would be a good person and stand at the end of the line, even though my friends were somewhere further up, but when I saw the line I changed my mind. It worked out because a couple of minutes before I showed up, two people from our group gave up and left anyway. In the end it didn't matter, because after waiting an hour and a half, we were turned away because the event was filled beyond capacity. All the vendors were running low on supplies, and lines to buy food were reaching ninety minutes long. They had planned for 3,000 people, and 10,000 showed up. Whoa.

Instead of letting this turn of events spoil our day, we just decided to come up with a new plan, still involving food and beer. We walked over to Figueroa/Flower area, where there a bunch of good places I went to during my summer of working at the firm. Unfortunately, none of them are open on the weekends. So, we decided to walk back to the car and take off in the direction of my neighborhood (we were growing hungrier by the minute). We ate at Tender Greens, went to Father's Office for beers, then headed to Sweet Lady Jane's (where i had never been) for dessert (it was to die for).

So, moral of the story - even if L.A. events can be rough due to the hoards of people who will invariably show up, there are still delicious things to be had.

Farmer's Market

One of my favorite things about L.A. is the abundance of farmer's markets. Any day of the week you can go just a little way and run into one. When I first moved here, I was excited to be only two miles from the oldest market in L.A. - the one at Third and Fairfax, which is open every day of the week. I went once, and it was fun, but I was disappointed in the fresh produce that was available. Only two booths were selling vegetables, some people were selling fish, meat, cheese and baked goods, but the focus seemed to be on the tourism aspect. A lot of booths were devoted to arts, crafts, and touristy L.A. things and also to prepared food you could grab for lunch. Don't get me wrong - the produce I bought was about the same price as what you would find at the grocery store but much, much better. I would definitely drop by to pick up a few things instead of stopping at the grocery store. But! When I moved here I did NOT expect to find the little market that happens every Thursday evening at La Cienega and 18th, which is about half a mile from my house. They have a good variety of everything I could want - produce as well as a guy selling fresh cheeses and... a local coffee roaster! He wakes up at 3:00 a.m. to roast beans to bring to the market, and if you can't make it to the market, he does deliveries on Saturdays. So early this evening I walked through my neighborhood to buy some coffee and anything else that caught my fancy. I ended up with half a pound of Sumatra and half a pound of Bolivian coffee, which came out delicious in my french press. I also got a basket of strawberries and a bunch of asparagus.

I do have one observation about the market - though Rob and I are pretty much the only white people in the neighborhood, and I saw our usual Indian, Hispanic and African American neighbors while walking to the market, the market itself was full of white people. I wondered what is it about farmer's markets that makes them continue to be a white yuppie thing to do? Surely it isn't that my neighbors don't like delicious, fresh, cheap things. I decided to consult Stuff White People Like and found this entry. Not terribly illuminating but, as always, true and funny.

Convenient Travels

One of the things that makes living in any given place unique are the other places you can reach from it. For example, when I lived in Ann Arbor I went to Traverse City a couple of times - once just to hang out, once for a snowshoe race. Rob and I decided that we would take advantage of out location and our time off to drink all the beer we could handle in Northern California and Oregon. We took a cheap commuter flight to Oakland, rented a car, and took off. We hit tons of breweries including: Russian River, Third Street Aleworks, Lagunitas, Mendocino, Bear Republic, Anderson Valley, Mt. Shasta Brewing, Sierra Nevada, Deschutes, Bend Brewing, Full Sail, Lucky Lab, Roots, Pelican Brewing, Rogue, and North Coast (over the course of seven days - don't worry). We took several tours and learned a lot about brewing. At the end of the trip, we took the Coast Starlight train back down the coast to L.A. The train was an entertaining way to travel - we had lunch in the dining car, played cards in the observation car, went to a wine tasting in the fancy schmancy parlor car. All in all, it was a relaxing day.


The day after we returned from our trip, I flew to St. Louis to judge a debate tournament at my alma mater. A lot of people who were on the team with me were there, and it was amazing to see them and catch up. Last night I returned to L.A. - via Orange County. That's right. My old debate coach, when filling out the form to request that the university make my travel arrangements didn't notice that the box that says "include surrounding airports" was checked. So, I ended up flying into Orange County at 10:00 at night. I was pretty bummed, since traveling between John Wayne Airport and Los Angeles at that time of night ranges from impossible to really expensive, but it worked out all right. A friend who was supposed to pick me up asked his girlfriend to do it instead - and she works in Orange County and lives in L.A. My observations on the John Wayne Airport: rich folk in Orange County clearly got tired of dealing with LAX and decided to build a fancy airport to welcome them home to their Escalades and McMansions. The people watching while I waited for my ride was fantastic. The people on the Real Housewives of Orange County are not making that stuff up.

Today I am recovering - tomorrow I will go running. When I get a little more endurance, I am hoping to plan a run from Santa Monica to Venice and back on the trail by the beach. That sounds like the exact kind of thing I should take advantage of and enjoy here in L.A.