Popping My LA Cherry

When BIL and I first arrived in California, I was so tired/buzzed/out of it, I barely remember the airport. I do recall, however, getting off the plane in the land of hard bodies...and high tailing it directly to the nearest airport McDonald's. Classic. I was hoping to see some celebrities at LAX, but no such luck. I always see at least a few pictures in my FagMags (tm) of celebs at LAX each week, but no such luck that day. BIL and I had to wait a while for our hotel shuttle, but once we found it, it took us literally 45 seconds to get to our hotel.

We ended up spending the next two day holed up in our room. The only times we left were to smoke or travel down to the gift shop to get a sandwich. We started to get a bit concerned about how we were going to get to our apartment appointments on Monday. Thankfully, our mom came through and got us a great deal on a rental car. We picked it up on Sunday afternoon - an adorable little Suzuki. I fell in love.

Since the rental agreement was in my name, my mother requested that I be the only one to drive it. That was fine by me - I wanted to experience some of the crazy LA traffic I had heard so much about. Honestly? It wasn't that bad. The regular roads were completely fine - I had no assholes refusing to let me switch lanes or people cutting me off. The 405, which is the major expressway in the area, was crazy, but nothing I couldn't handle. The whole trip, we only got caught in slow traffic once, and that was supposedly during rush hour. It wasn't bad at all, and really quelled my fears about getting around LA. Everything is 30 minutes or less away - the airport, downtown Hollywood, North Hollywood, Santa Monica Pier...

On Sunday night, we decided to check out the nightlife. We had a bit of trouble finding a place for my brother (BRO) to go, as he's only 19. Finally, we decided on a gay bar in West Hollywood - the one good thing about gay bars (besides their generous shots and fabulous music) is that they appreciate young gay boys and usually let them in. Without wrist bands, of course.

So we found this bar called Rage and decided to try it out. It was about a 25 minute drive from our hotel, in a really cute area near Wilshire Blvd (Reg. Bev. Wil.) and Rodeo Drive (baby). There was a whole row of cute gay bars along the street and the patios were great for people watching. Upon entering Rage, I could immediately see we would have fun. There were mostly naked boys dancing on the bars, and the Russian Hercules behind the bar knew how to work the girl customers so well, he had me questioning his sexuality by the time I ordered my first drink. BRO and BIL danced the night away, while I stood quietly in the shadows, getting danced on by small, drugged up, shirtless gay boys. The music was loud, the drinks were strong, and everyone was so friendly. It was the most fun I've ever had at a gay bar.

On Monday, we went to see apartments. I already spoke about that in the last blog, so I won't rehash the details again. At this point, we're still leaning towards the first building - we just can't decide what we want to sacrifice - living space or (some) privacy. We did have some AWESOME authentic Mexican at a place called Los Burritos. And the cute ladies that worked there were so nice - they even let us smoke illegaly on their patio. Twice.

BRO fell asleep early that night, so BIL and I decided to venture down to the hotel bar to have a few bevs. We met some nice people from London who were stuck there due to the freak volcanic ash cloud hovering over their area. But they were having a great time - they told us how they had rented a car and driven to Vegas the previous night, and when they ordered their drinks, they used free coupons. I wouldn't mind that situation at all.

Tuesday was supposed to be "let's make no plans and just explore LA" day, but of course it was overcast and rainy. I really wanted to see the Santa Monica Pier, and BRO and BIL were good sports and said we could go despite the weather conditions. When we arrived, it was still raining pretty hard. We took a few wet pictures, then wandered into a restaurant on the pier called Rusty's. We figured we'd wait out the rain for a bit, eat some lunch, and try again. Well, the food was DIS-gusting (for example, I ordered a side of mac and cheese...and it was Easy Mac. Honest to God, microwaveable Easy Mac. And they charged me $6.95 for it. And don't even get me started on the Cooter Soup.), but our plan worked. By the time we finished gagging our way through the meal, the rain had let up and the sun was peeking through. We went out and walked around a bit. We found a playground, and decided we wanted to swing. Of course, as soon as we got some height, it started raining again. We tried to be strong for a few minutes, but we were quickly beginning to look like drowned rats. So we gave up and went back to the hotel to relax for a bit before dinner.

After searching and making a few phone calls, we realized that a straight bar wasn't in the cards for BRO with his age. We decided to head back to the area Rage was in and grab some dinner, then go back to Rage if nowhere else would let BRO in. We found a really nice restaurant called Eleven down the street from Rage. (Rage should seriously pay me for all these free plugs.) The food was great and the atmosphere was really fun...the only thing is, we got our first taste of LA waiter/actors. They SUCK as waiters. I can only hope their acting skills are better, or it won't be long before Chet/Ashton/Tod/Grayson are on their way back to being John/Bill/Gary/Fred.

After dinner, we could tell that Eleven was turning into a club - they brought out the velvet ropes and the music turned from quiet background noise to ear splitting techno. Always a sure sign. We decided to check out what else was in the area, and ended up at Mickey's (another gay bar) a few doors down. It was really nice, with a huge wrap around bar inside, smaller bar outside, dance floor, faux fireplaces...and the obligatory shirtless bartenders and mostly naked dancer boys. We had a lot of fun at Mickey's, too, but unfortunately, the amount of food I had consumed at dinner sort of ruined the night for me. BRO and BIL were sweet about it, but I could tell they wanted to stay out when I decided I needed to go to bed a short time after arriving. For our last night, it was kind of a bust. But at least we tried a few different places. (Although I now have no sense of the heterosexual nightlife in LA...)

Wednesday morning, we got up early, took the rental car back, and boarded the plane for home. I missed LA almost immediately and truly cannot wait to get back there. Nothing against Buffalo, and of course I'll really miss my friends and family - I just can't wait for this new chapter in my life. I'm totally in love with LA. Now I just have to lose 20 pounds to feel comfortable...

xoxo