'The Big Picture'

Right, did you know that there is a 'Little Ethiopia' in LA??? Along with a 'Little Thailand' and a 'Little Armenia'! I stumbled across little Epthiopia when i went out for a drive on Wednesday afternoon/evening and i must have driven past about 15 Ethiopian restaurants......Yes, I said 'Ethiopian restaurants'?????!!.. Now that would surely be the place to go for a 'light' lunch wouldn't it! Someone get on the phone to Sir Bob and Bono!

Had a fairly quiet first night here cos i wanted to get up proper early today and go 'sightseeing'...to give you an idea of how much driving i've done today...i picked my car up (from the valet) at 9.40am and have only just got back to the hotel and it's now 18.30...! The first two hours were spent trying to find the closest possible view of the Hollywood sign.....me and sat nav have had a pretty bad falling out today, in fact, we are not talking....well she is cos she doesn't shut up but I'm refusing to answer her....i even switched her off halfway through the afternoon. I told her where i wanted to go and she took me the complete opposite direction......typical woman. It all started so well in San francisco.....we got on, it was almost harmonious but things have turned sour and i don't know why....... me and women eh?? She did accidently take me to Paramount Studios which I was quite pleased with although they wouldn't let me in without a pre-booking and they were all out today so i never got to go on the tour but i guess i can always come back one day..

So i managed (by myself) to find the point where you can get up close to the Hollywood sign and I took some pictures and even got someone to take pictures of me........in exchange for me doing the same.... (you end up doing these things when travelling alone)....so by the time i eventually left The Hills it was almost 1pm and I needed to get to the next place on my list. I turned up at Hollywood boulevard and parked up and i looked, again, like a proper tourist....one big camera, one small camera and a video camera and proceeded to film almost every star on the hollywood boulevard although i couldn't find Elvis' star for love nor money and was getting bored by now.... the walk of fame on Hollywood Boulevard goes on for a good mile and a half on both sides of the street so i wasn't gonna walk the whole thing! I did get up as far as the kodak Theatre where they hold the Oscars though and that is the lively part of hollywood Boulevard. There are some real weirdo's down that road as you'd expect... old hippies holding up banners about how Obama is in cahoots with the devil and how he is linked up with the banks and are planning to take over the world! i know this because i started chatting with one of the old hippies and asked him what he was banging on about......he was pretty convincing but i think deep down he just had the hump cos he has been left in the 60's.

I did manage to meet yet another 'new friend' on Hollywood Boulevard' opposite the Hard Rock cafe... 'The Big Picture' (as he calls himself....and i got him on video camera too) was giving away his album for a small donation...he described himself as part 'rap'/part rock n roll so I gave him four dollars for an album and then i stayed with him for ten minutes and tried to help him sell some more albums.... he ended up calling 'me' crazy??? We had a laugh and had pictures and filmed ourselves messing around on the boulevard.... he was a good bloke actually... told him i'm gonna play his CD en route to Vegas tomorrow. So i left HB and felt the need to stalk some celebrity houses so i out Pamela Anderson's address into my Sat Nav.....(I had to use the Sat Nav for this)... you may be wandering how i know Pammies address....well i asked google and it gave me  list of loads of celebrities addresses and it turns out most of ' em live on mulholland drive which is on the way out of LA.....

Stupid stupid idea! By the time i got to mulholland drive (which took an hour on the freeway) it was dark and not much to see anyway so i had a quick look at some huge houses and decided i should just get back to the hotel which took me another half hour!

Anyway, I've rambled on enough now and i'm gonna go out to Sunset Strip tonight for a couple of beers as there is nowhere in beverly hills to just have a beer (according to the hotel doorman, as it is all just restaurants in beverly hills)...

I'm meeting Ben at Vegas airport at 14.30ish tomorrow (around 22.30 UK time) and apparently its gonna take me about 4 hours to drive there from LA but with my new CD from 'The Big Picture' I'm sure it will fly by!