The California Trip

It was nice but not quite as nice as I had hoped (boo hoo!) The main thing was that the weather in Palm Springs was unseasonably cool (it was actually warmer in Buffalo!) and as soon as we arrived I came down with a bad cold (which was probably just a massive allergy attack but I was running a fever in addition to sneezing / coughing my head off.)

On the other hand...

In Los Angeles for the first time ever I had a chance to do some driving around, just for fun. I spent just one night with Naoyuki (at the Hilton Universal City) but even so managed to drive Sunset Boulevard from Hollywood all the way out to the Pacific Coast Highway, then back to West Hollywood to catch a bite to eat at the Beverly Center. The next morning while Naoyuki was finishing up at his conference I drove up Mulholland Drive and down Laurel Canyon before catching up with him at the convention center. Afterwards we went to Little Tokyo for sushi and a visit to a couple of different Japanese bakeries.

In Palm Springs we visited the Moorten cactus garden, had dinner at Copley's, made a return visit to Joshua Tree National Monument, and did a day trip down to Julian, an old goldrush town up in the mountains between Palm Springs and San Diego. Plus a trip to Cabazon, a couple of other nice restaurants (Edgardo's Cafe Veracruz) and a fair amount of time in the hot tub. Pleasant enough but not spectacularly so (as has been the case previously!) Maybe next time.