Pictures

Pictures

Home Sweet Home

We have arrived safely back in Ann Arbor. We got back in town around 2:30 Tuesday afternoon. In the next few days we will have some final posts and update all the pics.

Vegas and iPhones

We are about to leave Vegas, heading for the Hoover Dam. Most people drop lots of money and leave Vegas with nothing but an empty wallet. We dropped lots of money, but we are leaving with new iPhones!

Short Travel day

We made the short drive down to San Diego yesterday, but not before stopping at the first Denny's. This stop at Denny's is sort of like an homage many years in the making. Back in high school Gordon and I decided that Denny's is quite possibly the best restaurant ever and we need to go on a regular basis, and the Denny's club began. It started with just Gordon and I enjoying romantic meals at 6 AM junior year before going to AP chem. The group grew quickly with other AP chem classmates at first and then just other friends. At it's peak we had 30 people coming to Denny's before 6 AM on a Thursday mornings. This lasted our last two years of high school and even carried on for a bit with some of the younger members.

We arrived in SD around 2ish and went directly to the beach. Spent the afternoon lounging on the beach and I finally began reading possibly the funniest book ever, I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell by Tucker Max. Around 5 Bryan and I decided to leave the beach and grab a beer while waiting for his cousin to get off work. We meet up with his cousin, who luckily had a parking spot in his apartment building for us, around 6. His friends were having a little BBQ so we went over there for the night. SD seems pretty cool so far. On a side note new iPhone comes in less than two days, which we will be in line for in Vegas!

"Experience makes a difference"

Our day in LA was absolutely fabulous! It started with a little hiccup when Amy decided to get her key stuck in the door. Luckly, her father was able to save the day. He came home and within minutes the door opened as he was wielding a knife. Amy asked how he did it and he response was simply "experience makes a difference." It was very Mr. Miyagi-like. We then began our trek to Roscoe's Chicken n' Waffles. This is possibly the best meal I have ever had. It surpassed any expectation I had, and I had high expectations. Following Roscoe's we made a pit stop at BevMo bought a 6 pack and scurried to Manhattan beach, which oddly enough is only minutes away from the hotel I stayed at last time MMB was at the Rose Bowl. The beach was great, a nice relaxing few hours just laying in the sun sipping some delicious apricot brew. We had dinner plans with a bunch of Amy's friends and needed to fill some time, so she took us to UCLA campus, which was a very nice campus. It reminded both Bryan and me the Florida State campus. Our dinner plans were for this authentic Asian dumpling house so Bryan and I thought what better way to get ready for that than Sake Bombs. We used the hatch of Amy's car as a bar once we got to the restaurant parking lot while we were waiting for Amy's friends. We had to wait a bit to get seated due to the size of our group, but it was well worth the wait. Luckly Amy's friends knew what was going on and had ordered while we were waiting to be seated. As soon as we sat down food started coming and it seemed to never stop. Everything was so delicious! Bryan and I agreed that this was probably the single best day of eating we had ever had! Dinner was great and we had a chance to meet a bunch of Amy's friends who were all really nice as well. It was nice being part of a large group of essentially strangers and feeling so welcome. After Bryan and I raved about how great the day was going, Amy started to get really stressed about finding a great bar to finish such an amazing day. She picked a winner. We ended up at Big Foot Lounge in LA, karaoke included. It was 80s night, which we didn't know prior to entering and at least 80% of the people were dressed up and all of the song choices were very appropriate. The place was lot of fun, had great decor, bar tenders were all friendly even though they were very busy and the karaoke was great! I did sing a little diddy, which we have already posted the link to the Youtube video. LA ended up being pretty much the exact opposite of what we thought it was going to be. It was a very rejuvenating experience. Thanks for the great time in LA Amy! Pictures will go up later, internet in not agreeing with my computer right now.

God Bless the USA!

Kyle loves America

Check out the Youtube video with Kyle singing God Bless the USA at the Bigfoot Lounge in Los Angeles

So Cal

We are in LA now. We meet up with Amy at Huntington Beach and had dinner with her and a bunch of her friends down there. It's about 40 miles to her house in LA. We dropped our stuff off and went to grab a drink in Old Town Pasadena. She read about this little place, Baldwin's Pub, which sounded great, and in fact it was. It was a pretty small place inside, but had a fairly large patio. Since you cannot smoke indoors in the state of Cali the patio was pretty busy and also very smokey. We choose to go inside to avoid the smoke and it was also just a touch chilly. They had a great selection of beers and a nice bartender, who asked about our Michigan clothes, as most people do. We were well received by the crowd, including the OSU alum, I think he may have been to old to know where he was or what his name was. The tap setup was very ad-hock as they were just crammed in wherever there was a little extra space. The price was reasonable, about $5 a pint for some damn good beers. We all agreed that this place is sort of comparable to Ashley's in Ann Arbor, but better. Baldwin's pretty much saved the day today. We had a not so great drive down to LA and a hard time finding the right beach, but as usual things turned out pretty nicely for the boys from Michigan. We also decided that we are going to Roscoe's Chicken and Waffles for breakfast tomorrow, should be sweet!