Hollywood, California

Our first stop was LA, Hollywood to be precise.  Completely by accident we ended up staying opposite the Guitar Centre, which was cool.  I narrowly managed to not buy a new bass, finally convincing myself that carrying it around for 6 months might be annoying...

We discovered quite quickly that America is like Australia, except for a couple of important differences.  Firstly, the food portions are bigger.  Secondly, the cars are bigger.  Thirdly, there are a lot more crazy people walking the streets (yes, I know it was Hollywood, but this seems to be an ongoing pattern...).  I learned to be careful about which version of English I use - amazing how hard to understand some people have found our accent, although I've discovered that saying "crikey" a lot generally sorts it out.    For me, the trick seems to be  to talk like a TV character.  Like, totally...

Anyway, we've been good tourists, going to all the Hollywood attractions, Universal Studios, Venice Beach , Warners etc.   We discovered that downtown LA is not a good place to hang out, and that the smog is exactly as bad as everyone says it is.

The best bit though was the second night, seeing Ben Folds and John Mayer at the Hollywood Bowl.  We were really there for Ben, and were very surprised to find that no one knows him here...  Also surprised to find that we'd seen John Mayer at the guitar shop and not recognised him.  Guess I should read more gossip magazines...  We should have been here the next couple of weeks - I could have seen Marcus Miller and Les Claypool as well.  Never mind!

Next stop, San Francisco...