la la land

although i grew up fancying myself as a world traveler, the truth was there was an impressionable decade (ages 10-20) when family travel consisted of sissy and me in the back of our pickup truck playing legos on our way to idaho. although my previous job had me on a plane sometimes weekly, they were always domestic short hauls. it wasnt until recently that ive made my way to asia and latin america and finally kicked the '2 wks so now its time to go home' sentiment.

sure, this 2-wk puddle jumpin tour before settling down in chitown is all domestic, but i feel a transition from tourist to traveler taking place. when i flew into los angeles yesterday, i wasnt sure where i would be spending the night or what id be doing over the next 2 days. i had hoped i might spend some q.t. with my girl cindy, but in her typical sabotage style she had booked a vegas trip early tomorrow am. as a consolation prize, we headed to west hollywood and danced to nelly furtados lame promiscuous song with the lala homos. at 3 am i wanted to just sleep in her rental car but she made me check into a hotel (it had wifi). buzzed upon checkin, it wasnt until checking out this morning that i realized that i had stayed in this very same radisson some 3 years prior for an amea board retreat. weird.

this morning i was a model of saving money (and wasting time?) by using cheap forms of public transit. i checked my bags with the concierge and did a lil walkabout in oh so un-walking-friendly culver city. call it hormones, but i felt strangely euphoric. i came back and took the free hotel shuttle to lax, where i hopped onto another bus to la's metro system (no one i talked to in la had rode it before). i took it into pico and walked around a couple of hours, took the train back to the airport and was picked up by my friend nancy. we had a nice dinner in venice and walked the beach. (see fotos here)

the point is that im really begining to love the spontaneity of traveling. it feels like its impossible to waste ones time when youre creating your itinerary on the fly- its fun to put your trust in instincts and good luck. ive been planning some more ambitious travel this fall and im excited for it. i think that im in the right mindset to really take advantage of all that travel has to offer.