Winter break in LA.

I got home from LA last night.

It's weird to think that I was standing on a beach in a short sleeved cardigan exactly twelve hours ago; now I am huddled in bed under my blanket dreading my walk to school in the rain. The good news is, however, that my Monday classes don't start until 1:30 PM.

We only had Internet for my stay in LA for the first three days before it got shut off for one reason or another, so I had a very Internet-free week. Which was actuality kind of nice, nevermind the massive amount of emails I now have in my inbox waiting to be replied to.

I got to Long Beach on the 26th, Luke picked me up, we ate some food and went back to his place. We got to hang with Alex for a few hours before we took him to the airport. Our trips only overlapped for those few hours, which was incredibly bogus, but at least I got to see him at all.

The next day was my birthday, and I don't know what it is about the number 22, but it feels incredibly weird. I had fun reading facebook and twitter messages all day, but for the most part it was a pretty low-key birthday. We checked out HD cameras at Best Buy (because I am thinking about getting one) and worked on a song and later we got some pizza. Not quite the Las Vegas trips I had for my birthday the last two years, but it was nice to be with Luke. I guess I'm like an adult now and stuff anyway. No more party hats.

The next day Sarah Snitch came over with the most epic birthday cake ever (she'd covered it in a million different types of candy and the inside was dyed different colors) and that saved my birthday for me. It was incredibly sweet of her. :)

I'm losing track of what we did each day now, but I'm pretty sure the next day was also the day we saw Avatar at the Arclight with Michael Aranda and his friends. Not only is the Arclight an amazing theatre, but Luke, Jason and I were completely blown away by Avatar. It was so much better than I was expecting. I mean, I didn't even really know what it was about going in, but we all walked out in complete awe.

The next day these two girls (Anna and Krystal) arrived that Jason had invited. They were really nice and fun and we spent pretty much the rest of the week hanging out with them. We played a lot of Rock Band (I can play drums on hard now!) so that was fun (and they played a lot of Mario Kart Wii, much to my chagrin) and I cant even remember now what we did on Wednesday. Oh, we saw Sherlock Holmes. I fell asleep in the theatre. Oops. xD

Thursday was New Year's Eve, and also the day I woke up feeling really sick. I was so disappointed, because we'd kind of saved the really fun stuff for the end of the week, and now that we were about to DO that fun stuff, I had gotten some sort of stomach virus. :( We tried to go to Disneyland for New Year's but the park was sold out, so we walked around Downtown Disney and I got increasingly worse-feeling. We made it back home in time for midnight, and I rung in the new year wrapped in a blanket after throwing up. Fun stuff.

The next day we went to Disneyland for real, getting there at about 10:30 in the morning to make sure we got in, in case it sold out again. It was Luke and Anna's first time at Disneyland so it was fun to show them our favorite rides and I liked being able to share Disney fun facts with people that I had learned in my Disney class last quarter.

I had a fun day, but my stomach ache relapsed about halfway through the day, and the Disney fried food and rides were not really helping. I'm impressed with myself; I made it about 12-13 hours before I literally just couldn't take it anymore. We stayed at the park for 14-15 hours, which is a pretty long day for anyone, even if you're not sick. But I would say the accomplishments of the day included playing Buzz Lightyear's Astro Blasters FIVE times, and getting a high score of 246,000. We wont talk about Jason getting somewhere in the 900,000's on one turn. xD

We also rode Space Mountain twice, and I hate to admit this, but I think the one in Disneyland Paris is actually better. The Haunted Mansion was all Nightmare Before Christmas themed which was fun, and we made sure to hit all the important rides as well as getting our faces put on the bodies of Star Wars characters (but then not buying them because they're overpriced, haha).

We saw the fireworks which is always fun and eventually started making our way home around midnight.

The next day we hung out on the Santa Monica Pier and randomly ran into Sarah down there, and I thought that was one of the most fun things we did. We walked all the way down to the end of the Pier and stared off into the ocean, feeling the breeze and seeing the twinkling lights from the beach miles and miles down the coast. It was nice. I love the ocean.

That night we watched Cube (a pretty cool low budget suspense movie from Canada) and the Italian Job (which I didn't think I was going to like and then ended up loving). Then I spent my last night in LA.

The last day Luke and I did a hilarious and slightly awkward photo shoot for our next album cover. We tried using a self-timer right away but finally we just got Jason to come out and take pictures for us, and that's when the shoot got really fun. I would say of the probably 100 pictures we took, maybe 15 are usable. xD

We worked on music a little bit, we went out to eat, and then they took me to the airport. As usual, I was a sap and had a very teary goodbye, went inside, and found out my flight was delayed by three hours. I frantically called them back, feeling a little bit terrible for making them turn around, but we ended up having a really nice time on the beach in the dark filming some parts for an Oceanic 6 music video. Even though getting home was a mess and I wasn't in my own bed until 2:30 AM on a school night, I'm glad my flight got delayed. Those last few hours on the beach were among my favorite parts of the trip.


I'm home now. School starts. I work this weekend. It's a weird adjustment to make so quickly. Especially when I know everyone else is still in LA, probably playing Mario Kart Wii in peace now since they don't have me there to roll my eyes at them. Haha. I just can't find a game where I spend most of my time falling off the edge very much fun. I gave it an honest effort, I really did.

I'm seeing Luke again in a month. It feels far away from here.

But the good news is, this morning I found my $40 clicker for class that I thought I was going to have to replace. So yay school. Or something.
Actually, I'm pretty excited for class today, now that I am home and actually thinking about it. I only have one class on MWF and it's Human Sexuality (T and Thu are a bit more intense). I'm sure I am going to learn all sorts of interesting things this quarter, if my childbirth and Disney classes were anything to go by. :)

So here's to another quarter, here's to 2010, here's to having boyfriends who live far away. Here's to the Disney annual pass I may or may not have purchased.