My trip... the second day!

There are very few rules when you visit Standing Room Only headquarters so you feel pretty free to be yourself.
Rule #1: Make yourself at home. If you want something, go get it.
(I love this rule because it is so like the way things are at my house)
Rule #2: Don’t gripe about stuff or you will get someone rolling their eyes at you.
Rule #3: Know that Polly is the queen. Act accordingly.
Rule #4: You can wake up early, but don’t wake anyone else up till 9 a.m. (which is 11 a.m. my time!)

So Monday night we finally got to sleep at midnight, which happened to be 2 my time, so I figured I would be able to sleep pretty late the next day. Wrong!!! I woke up at 6 California time and was wide awake. I laid in the bed for what seemed like forever and finally decided to get up, trying very hard to be as quiet as possible. As I worked my way off of the air mattress, I knocked over a few things… sending books flying every which way, and in the process, breaking a beautiful (and very expensive looking) dish. OH crap.
Now I had flooded the bathroom AND broken something in the apartment and my visit hadn’t really started yet. Ugh.

And to top it off, in breaking the dish, I woke Hugh up! I broke rule #4!
It didn’t take long though, for him to go back to sleep and for Polly to come over and hang out with me, making me feel a lot better.
Later that morning, we got ourselves up and around and ready to go to breakfast.

The Breakfast place is conveniently just around the corner from where Hugh lives and is a nice, short walk full of awesome people and things to see. First, we walked past a nursery with the coolest plants I have ever seen. People come and go across the street just to visit the nursery, from what I could tell. Then, there is the newsstand where Hugh gets his paper to do the crosswords. The man and woman there are just darling and they love Hugh and Polly. They give Polly treats and tease Hugh lovingly. They are great. I loved them instantly!

I have to admit that I was a little nervous about the breakfast place. I mean, it IS famous! It IS the hang out of David Spade, but most importantly, it is the place where some of Hugh’s friends are. So I wanted to make a good impression.
Polly led us to our table and sat down in the booth, as if she was ready to order her meal.
The waitress there was lovely. She knew exactly what Hugh wanted and brought it out as soon as she saw him come in.
Polly got a bowl of water and she and I shared a delicious breakfast.
I secretly wished I had a breakfast place down the street from my house too.

OH, and then there was the dog park in the afternoon.
We drove up rolling hills on one of the most beautiful drives I have ever been on.
We sang Leela James songs and danced as we drove, with the windows down and the breeze running through our hair. Well, my hair, at least. Hee hee.

The Dog Park is a huge place, surrounded by a fence with a separate place for little dogs to hang out. There are benches and trees and lots and lots of dogs running around. The people I was hoping to see weren’t there, and we were forced to make small talk with random strangers. Poor poor us.
Finally, the puppies came in the gate and they all ran to Hugh like a kid running to their favorite parent at the end of the day. They love Hugh and they all fight to sit on his lap. He called them over and I was impressed with how well he could remember their names and distinguish one from the other. Pearl, the diva of the group, hopped on Hugh’s lap and growled at him for what seemed like forever. I knew when she hopped on my lap, I would be in trouble, but she didn’t growl at me at all. I guess a diva knows another diva.
Polly sat in the sun and enjoyed her friends from afar…too cool join in the running and playing, but not soo cool to totally keep her distance. It was cute really, the queen and diva, even at the dog park.

The evening was filled with Italian Food and singing and dancing and crazy talks.
We talked and talked and talked and joked and laughed and laughed and laughed.

We called BT and he wondered what kind of trouble we were getting into.
And then, there were the talks in the dark. I love love those talks in the dark, when the world is still and the city begins to sleep.

My trip... the first day!

Hugh and I had joked that we hadn’t actually MET. I mean, we talked every day via email and on the phone every once in a while, but we hadn’t actually officially MET. So my plan was, when I saw him at the airport, I would extend my hand and introduce myself. That was my plan anyway… and then I hopped in the jeep… There was Polly looking at me like “uh, who are you and why are you in my space?” (She is, after all, a big diva) We wrestled with my super heavy suitcase and then Hugh leaned over and gave me a big hug and it was over. Introducing myself was out.
Oh well.
All at once, it hit me like a big old slap in the face. THIS is what I have been waiting for for six solid months. This was what I had looked forward to! THIS was what I had imagined in my head over and over again. It was finally a reality. I was somehow sad. Not that it was happening, not that I was there, but that there was no more anticipation. Do you know what I mean? It is hard to explain. I had to say to myself several times, “hey, you are here!!!”
I think Hugh took this as me freaking out, cause he was very quiet, very slow to make any sort of conversation at first. He pointed out usual Hollywood sights and it slowly became a reality in my head. Slowly I began to realize, “WOW! I am HERE!!! How amazing is this???”
We laughed and we joked and we talked about all of the crazy places I saw and we rolled down the road towards Hugh’s place.

He parks in a parking garage, one with a cool garage door opener for the gate. That was really fun. And he has his own parking space… totally reserved for him.
We didn’t lock the car doors, which I found odd, but whatever.
He lives on the third floor of this cool building with little balconies all peeking out into the street. It is in a fabulous part of town, and surrounded by tall buildings. Totally not what I am used to in texas!
As we walked in, I noticed how freakin’ tall Hugh was! I am short, but he is really really tall. It was cute, really, and I am sure we looked like the total opposite couple, walking into the building together.

For some reason, as soon as we walked in, Polly ran down the hall to the elevator. You know how dogs do when they are running on slick floors? They sort of can’t get their footing for a second and slide instead of run? That is exactly what Polly did. It was cute, since those aren’t really diva like actions.

Hugh’s apartment was not really anything like I expected it to look, but so Hugh at the same time. For some reason, I had created a floor plan of his apartment in my head and it SO didn’t match what was reality. That is ok.
The first thing I saw was a giant picture of a man’s butt… I know, it is art but still… ☺
He loves art, natch and he loves books. He loves hand blown glass vases and jars. Everything in his apartment has a special meaning, a place in his heart. Everything has sentimental value, from the beautiful photographs of his mom and grandmother, to his newly acquired print of a truck. It all has a story for Hugh.
I loved hearing the stories. I soaked up his stories and stared at the pictures and the books and the things in the apartment. So these are important things to Hugh… these are important to my friend. I needed to make them important to me.

I gave him some Texas playing cards (since he only has naked lady playing cards) and we vowed to play some Texas Hold’em as he put them in the “card drawer” in a little table between two wickery chairs.

That evening, Hugh and I talked, we got comfortable, we played, we danced, we ordered dinner, and Hugh talked to BT and got advice for how to deal with me for the rest of my time there. We watched TV and talked and talked and ate Chinese food and Polly just watched me and tried to figure out who this strange person was in her space.

That night, before bed, I decided to shower. I proceeded to flood the entire bathroom! I guess the shower head didn’t like it when I moved it down. It started spraying water out the side…something I didn’t notice till I was almost done with my shower.
Yikes.
Here I was in a strange place, and I had totally flooded the bathroom on my first night there! The roll of toilet paper...drenched! My pajamas were soaked! My clothes that I had just taken off were soaked! Yikes!
I am normally not the most graceful kid there is, but jeeze… the first night! What was to become of me by Thursday???
After drying off, hanging up my wet clothes, and putting on clean dry pajamas, it was time for bed.

Hugh had borrowed an air mattress from a friend of his and had set it up in the living room for me to sleep. It was great!
So as Hugh laid in his bed with Polly, I laid in my bed on the floor, we talked in the dark like a bunch of kids at a slumber party, who’s parents had made them turn the lights out, but who weren’t really willing to quite go to sleep yet.
These (come to find out) were some of my favorite times…when we would lay in the dark and talk.
Somehow it is safer to say the harder/scarier things in the dark...