Family Travels

12-hours in the air: LOST

Friday, June 2nd my mom, dad, brother and I went on our first trip together in, well, none of us could even remember how long. Destination: Ria's graduation from Med School, UC Irvine.

During the 2-hour flight delay, Brother and I became addicted to LOST. (I had downloaded the first two episodes onto my iPod to test out its video capacity the day before.) For the next four days 20-year old Brother asked me every hour to download subsequent episodes, though he could have done it himself. Some advice: watch LOST but do not watch the first two episodes just before a plane ride.

Saturday was Ria's graduation from Med School. Congrats, prima! The ceremony was hot as balls but otherwise nice (and short). The celebratory lunch was at a diner on the beach in Laguna, a cute town -- kind of the Hamptons meets Seville. Jet-lagged, dehydrated by the sun, and exhuasted from graduating/watching a graduation, we all hit the sack early.

Sunday we drove to and then all around L.A. The day was hazy so we couldn't see the mountains, but it was warm and it didn't rain. We had a great time walking around Sta Monica, L.A., and Venice Beach and driving through Hollywood, Beverly Hills, and other neighborhoods full of beautiful houses (where we each picked out our future homes). Venice Beach is awesome. It is full of street performers, artists showcasing their work, and T-shirt and souvenier shops. There were people spray-painting canvases, walls, shirts and hats. There were basketballers playing their game, rollerskaters dancing to music, and body-builders training at an outdoor gym. Oh the people watching to be done! Most of the time we spent hours crammed in the car; Kat, Brother and I grew delerious and laughed inanely. At night, we split from the grownups and got trashed at Ria's house. Kat danced a lot, I laughed a lot, but it was Brother who was in top form: he had trouble with volume control when commanding Ria's parakeet to "step up" onto his finger, then thought a piece of bird shit was a bug and squashed it with his thumb, and topped off the night by falling asleep on the toilet.

Monday we chilled. Brother, dad and I caught the red-eye back that night.

Good trip, guys.