hello faithful readers! i have a good friend, ali, here in la, who is also a fellow blogger. although she's not in the industry, she's a transplant from the midwest, too, and so she often writes about her experiences of living in la.

she's going out of town this coming weekend, and asked me to be a guest blogger on her blog, fun!! so...check out her site, and i think my post (which is pretty fun--it's about seeing celebs at church...) will be up this thursday!

her blog is: http://ali-in-la.blogspot.com/

enjoy!!

hey yeah, that's me! as of may 4th (i think?) i'll officially be a cover girl! my friend, beth, is an editor of a couple of magazines, one of which is working nurse (see http://www.workingnurse.com/). she got to set up a cover shoot for the may issue of the magazine, which is themed, "building a healthier america." and, she asked me to be the cover model!

so we had our photo shoot today, and i dont have any of the actual pictures yet, but i did have one from my iphone where you can see one of my lovely gigantic scrub outfits, and tool belt (per the issue's theme). who knows how it will turn out--hopefully cute! and, if i get anymore of the photos, i'll post them so you can see what all went on! but, it was fun, and i'm super excited to be able to say that i'm a cover girl--woo hoo!!

i know i constantly boast about how wonderful la is and how many free, fun things there are to do in this city, but i only do it because it's true! in keeping with the theme of 2009: best year ever (B.Y.E., for future reference), i took advantage of an afternoon excursion to the warner brothers lot in burbank. my friend, mj works for the ellen show there, and she recently told us that she could get us walk-on passes to the lot, and even take us on a free tour of the WB museum, which has an entire floor devoted to harry potter! now that was music to my ears (the harry potter theme song was actually stuck in my head all day)! so, holland, ali, and i met mj there this sunny thursday afternoon and our adventure began...





first off, i just love being on the lot; i feel so at home--like i just know i want to work there. secondly, we had some free time before going to the museum in which we sneaked around, peeking in and out of sound stages. we got a kick out of tour carts driving past us as their passengers whispered to each other and looked past our big sunglasses to see if we might be celebrities. :) here are some fun pics from around WB:



they were filming a new pilot for the on-screen adaptation of the book, "the witches of eastwick." if you're a gilmore girls watcher, this small town may look familiar because it's downtown of star's hollow, along with the following photo.





ali and me



hooray! we sought out the sound stage where they filmed friends! this is where i want to work someday :)



we even took a little detour to chicago during our afternoon out...ok, just the whole chicago portion of the lot, which was surprisingly realistic!




a street from the dog pee scene in bruce almighty



who said la doesn't have public transportation?!




only at a hollywood studio (well, burbank, really) could you find fake speed bumps painted on the roads...



the set of ER. apparently george clooney (and paul rudd!) was on the lot today, but we didn't catch a glimpse...curses!




when we finally made it to the museum, it was equally as fascinating! unfortunately, you couldn't take anything in with you, so there are no pictures. but, basically, they had props and costumes from a variety of WB films. i actually made a list of some of the exhibits so i could remember to tell you all...on the first floor we saw the following things (there's more but i just put some highlights):

-*dark knight--joker's suit and nurse costume, the bat costume, scary clown masks
-wardrobe selections from gossip girl, chuck, the departed, and supernatural
-sweeney todd--helena bonham carter and sasha baron cohen's costumes, meatpies
-matrix--about 10 creepy life-size dopplegangers of some character i don't know
-corpse bride--puppets and a miniature set used in the film
-*willy wonka (original 70s version)--costumes for charlie bucket (he was TINY!), willy wonka, veruca salt, an oompa loompa, boxes of chocolate bars, a golden ticket!, decorations from the candy room (i love this movie, so this was one of my favorite parts of the exhibit!)

then...we took a trip upstairs to "privet drive," where we saw the harry potter exhibit. is it sad that this may have been the most captivated i've ever felt at a museum? i think i read all the fine print on all the display cards! what we saw:

-(well, first we got sorted--boo, i was in hufflepuff!)
-the actual cupboard under the stairs set piece with props inside--ali and i kept remarking at how amazing all the details are that go into making a film. there were cobwebs, an old vacuum, action figures, wrapping paper, and even old dress patterns in there...it was incredible
-the dursley's fireplace, complete with letters spewing out
-costumes galore--robes, quidditch uniforms, yule ball gowns, hagrid's cloak, voldemort's cloak, umbridge's haughty pink dress suit, ron's R sweater
-wands
-mini dragon figurines from the triwizard tournament
-pages from the program of the quidditch world cup
-the egg
-the triwizard cup, itself!
-the goblet of fire (which, ironically is made of wood--intricately carved)
-the boot portkey
-weasley's skiving snackboxes
-the time turner
-life-sized petrified hermionie
-aragog
-the monster book of monsters
-the actual marauder's map!!

ok, i was elated!! it was seriously so cool. apologies to any muggles (non-harry potter folk) out there, for i'm sure the above appeared as nonsense... :) i encourage you all to read it, of course! highest recommendations!


after a long and hot afternoon's walk, we headed over to jamba juice--a california staple that i'd surprisingly never had. i ordered up a "strawberry wild" with extra 22 vitamin boost, and it was as delish as i expected. the perfect end to our exciting day! thanks again to our delightful tour guide, mj! (and, if anyone ever comes to visit and wants to go on this little tour, oh, we'll make it happen!) :)

this weekend i experienced a big first, and oh, what a fun one it was! i got to go on a snowboarding trip up to mammoth with a bunch of friends. now, i'd been skiing twice before, but never boarded, and so i was very nervous, considering i didn't have much experience on the slopes at all, much less riding a board. little did i know that i'd love riding waaay more than skiing! it was super athletic and strenuous, but it was so much fun, and i feel like (even though i fell a TON, and am bruised and sore as crap!) i did pretty well for it having been my first time!

we have several friends that board, and so i was definitely intimidated. i was the only rookie out of about 10 of us that went. parker, who is a talented boarder (he's so good, seriously! and so cute out there!) could have gone down double blacks all weekend, but was so sweet and spent a lot of time riding green and blue runs with me. he was an exceptional teacher--so patient and gracious! i couldn't have had a better first boarding experience. i seriously would like to get my own gear and try to improve, going at least once or twice a season. it's so cool that here i am sitting amongst the palm trees, by the beach, and yet the snow was only about 5 hours away...ah, life!

anyway...we stayed at a really cute condo, had an amazing time hanging out with our friends (old and new), eating at yummy restaurants, and bundling up on the mountains (both june mountain and mammoth). and, i'm honestly just pleased that i'm back happy and in one piece (albeit a still very stiff piece..)

below are a bunch of the fun pics from the weekend!! have fun perusing :)

the ski bums at convict lake: brent, me, nate, parker, yuko, matt, graeme, and jer (thanks jer for this shot and the first one above, as well)



parks and me the first day at june



i'm a burnt little ski bunny!



everyone predicted this is how parker would feel after a day of teaching me how to board:



and, lastly, a new friend, tracey, and me taking a break on a run:

last saturday, a bunch of my friends and i went to the getty museum. i appreciate it almost more for the grounds and it's architecture than any of it's art exhibits (although they did have a couple neat ones this time, including an old exhibit of california photography and some impressionists--which i love). but it was such a glorious day outside, that i have to post some pictures from the excursion! we went with charlie, parker, and jon, the book club girls and our regular guys, and a few other friends thrown in the mix...

(most of these shots were taken by parker, so credit to him)










(i took this one of our friend, jer, and i was proud of it so i'm including it!)



here are two of the impressionist paintings i like, a cezanne and van gogh.



a year and a half later, i still say how much i love this city and all the unique (and free--hooray getty!) things it has to offer!

go out and have a great thursday, people!