90012, Little Tokyo

Wish tree in Little Tokyo

Dear ——–,

I’ve barely been out of the house since our daughter was born, but Bryan and I decided that we should try hiring a babysitter for the first time and go out for dinner for our 5th anniversary. We started at the Spice Table, a restaurant with southeast Asian specialties and an owner that used to work at Mozza. I had to try the Hainanese chicken and laksa because I wondered what the gourmet version of these humble comfort foods would be like. They were pretty tasty — less greasy, more focused, with sharper flavors. They also soared with the wine flight that our waiter recommended. After dinner, we took a walk around Little Tokyo, stopping to listen to an outdoor karaoke session (?!). After gawking at some mochi in the Mikawaya, I decided to pick up some imagawayaki, biscuit-sized pancakes filled with sweet red bean paste, for dessert. We stopped to admire a tree frilled with wishes on slips of paper. There was only a subtle breeze, but I was hoping one of the slips of paper would blow off, on its way to being fulfilled.

90027, Los Feliz

Dover sole at Puran's

 

Dear ——–,

Bryan and I were on the fence about going out to dinner last night. On the one hand, I’d had my first real, painful contractions yesterday morning, waking me out of sleep at 4:20 a.m. But they’d turned mostly mild by midday and we thought this might be a last opportunity to have a quiet night out together with no babysitter. We headed out to Puran’s on Hillhurst. There was unlikely to be a wait and it was close enough that we could make it home in less than 20 minutes. I also love their herb-grilled Dover sole — I’m picky about fish even though I know I should eat more of it! As we settled into our seats at dusk, I noticed for the first time that you could see Griffith Observatory from our table. I wondered why I’d never noticed it before, but was glad I still had time to savor stillness and quiet. We headed home last night a little giddy in anticipation, knowing that it would probably only be a matter of hours before we would head to the hospital.

90027, Hollywood

Two kinds of pizza at Mother Dough

Dear ——–,

We came to Hollywood tonight to join Erika and crew at the Moth, but bailed when we found out it was so full it was standing-room-only. (The guy at the door said that if we wanted a seat, we should get there next time at 6 p.m. for the 7:30 p.m. start time.) There was no way I could stand for more than 15 minutes, so we decided to use our trip to Hollywood to go to Mother Dough. So what if we’d been here exactly a week before for the first time? Their blistered, neapolitan-style pizzas had left us drooling for more. (The chocolate mousse and poached pear desserts were also heavenly.) This time we tried to arugula-prosciutto and margherita pizzas. I could do with a little more San Marzano tomato sauce and a few more slices of buffalo mozzarella slices, but the crust had a perfect toothiness. (The name comes from the old world practice of using a little bit of yesterday’s dough  — the mother dough — to help get the leavening process started on the next batch.) I was also impressed by the Bundaberg ginger beer, which might challenge Thomas Kemper’s ginger ale as my favorite ginger carbonated beverage.

90291, Venice Beach

Walking along Venice Beach

Dear ——–,

It was boiling in Eagle Rock so Bryan, I and apparently the rest of Los Angeles headed to the beach today to celebrate Independence Day. It was a good 15 degrees cooler in Venice, with a deliciously cool breeze, so we took a long walk up to Santa Monica and back. Some people were decked out in red, white and blue sequins, while others thought that the most American thing they could do was walk around with their chests bared. I guess the best thing about this country is that life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness can mean so many things — family reunions, serious barbecue spreads with food-service-grade Saran wrap and women in aprons wielding tongs, rollerblading in bikinis, biking in hijabs, drinking beer with your toes in the sand. With all the chaos in other parts of the world, it made me thankful that we are bringing our daughter into the world here. Los Angeles can be nutty and a little sloppy, but people aren’t afraid of those things.

90028, Hollywood

Trading CDs for cash at Amoeba Records

Dear ——–,

What we learned the past two weekends: used CD shops are interested in Swervedriver, “experimental noise” albums and the indiest of indie rock. They’re not interested in mandopop, French hip-hop or Ani Defranco. Bryan and I have been trying to clear out our basement, starting with our CD collection. We’ve basically gone digital, so there’s no reason for us to keep artifacts lying around. We started last weekend with Permanent Records, which just opened in Eagle Rock. They paid us $200 for about 100 CDs. I spent a dusty Saturday trying to match empty cases with their discs and came up with about 400 to take to Amoeba Records in Hollywood this past Sunday. We sold them about 200 CDs for $140 cash. (We declined the $180 in store credit.) Not a bad haul for stuff that’s just gathering dust in our closets, but I wish they had taken more. We still have about 200 discs we don’t know what to do with. (Why didn’t anyone want the Weezer blue album? Isn’t that a classic?) Is it time for a garage sale?

90021, Downtown Los Angeles

Inside Church & State

Dear ——–,

Leah and Neal know their way around restaurants, so when they suggested Church and State, we happily said yes. The bistro was in the National Biscuit Company building — whose title finally explained to us how the cookie company Nabisco got its name — in a warehouse-to-loft part of downtown. It was pretty noisy so we had a little trouble hearing each other, but maybe that was intentional on the part of the restauranteurs. The better to get guests to lean into each other and feel “intimate.” The gem lettuce salad was boring, but the mac and cheese and salmon main course were fantastic. The salmon was wrapped in ramp — which Leah informed us is a wild leek that is rare because it can’t be cultivated. It was sitting in a basil veloute that made me want to tip the bowl and drink the stuff like soup. I restrained myself just to sopping it up with bread. Bryan and I considered for a moment ordering the a.o.c. butter from Normandy because it’s the first time we’d ever seen butter on the menu. But while it was the cheapest item ($3), special ordering butter just seemed so excessive.

90013, Downtown Los Angeles

Photos of NYC subway cars

Dear ——–,

I’m wondering why it took so long for an exhibit like Art in the Streets to happen. I guess the people who finance shows at marquee museums for a long time didn’t think of something done for free — and illegally — on walls and tunnels as art. It’s hard to collect. Maybe the tide started turning in the 1980s with Haring and Basquiat. The thing I love about street art is that it makes you laugh (though usually ironically); art has for so long been serious. Banksy, in particular, made some pretty pointed commentaries that were painfully funny — including a recreated frame of the Rodney King beating video with a colorful pinata instead of King. Neck Face‘s piece featured an alleyway full of trash and a fake homeless man. Erika pointed out that this was probably the first time MOCA had trash in the galleries. Some online forums have criticized the museum and the artists featured in it as sell-outs. But I’m guessing these artists are laughing all the way to the bank — they’re getting paid to thumb their nose at authority. The exhibit — definitely worth seeing — runs through Aug. 8.

90017, Downtown Los Angeles

About to bite into the "ruby canard"

Dear ——–,

What could be better for a snacky pregnant woman than a studio lot full of grilled cheese? Bryan and I went to the Grilled Cheese Invitational this afternoon. The Mendocino Farms pork belly cubano with Chinese hot mustard was my favorite of the day. We also polished off a Feast food truck grilled cheese with sweet chili paste and Thai basil; a Cynthia Washburn “ruby canard” sandwich with truffled chevre and duck; a Campanile cured meats and cherry peppers grilled cheese; and the Oaks Gourmet‘s Black Forest bacon and Cotswold cheese sandwich. There was buzz at the Daily Dish for the “Elvis:” chocolate marscarpone, brulee-ed bananas and bacon. But by the time we ordered, there was no bacon, so it was a let down. (I also felt bad for the guy who spent the entire afternoon with a hand torch treating the bananas.) The disappointment was quickly fixed by churro tots with whipped cream at the Border Grill truck.

P.S. The surprise of the day was the free sample Kruegermann pickle, which is the best pickle I’ve had out of a jar. When we asked the guy where we could buy them in L.A., he said, “Do you really love them?” Uh, yeah, I’m pregnant. We left with a free jar.

90010, Mid City

The beautiful art deco Wiltern Theater

Dear ——–,

When we heard that Pete Yorn was going to celebrate the 10th anniversary of releasing Musicforthemorningafter, we had to get tickets. It’s the album we put on to get us in a good mood every time we leave Mammoth to drive home to L.A. and one of the last albums that will ever be pried out of my cold, dead hands. So Bryan got seats in the balcony (because of my own “Strange Condition”) and we stayed out late on a school night this week. Pete told stories about how he wrote the songs, including how a song basically wrote itself from an electric guitar worthy of AC/DC that had a broken neck that was taped back together. The back of the guitar had “Nancy” scratched in the enamel, so he called the song “For Nancy.” Bryan knew the keyboard player, Joe, so we got stickers for the after party. There was a line and even Pete’s mom had to wait. Hollywood is a tough town if the star’s own mom can’t bypass the velvet rope!

91204, Glendale

The new car

Dear ——–,

We bought a new car on Saturday because Allstate decided to declare my poor workhorse Civic — bashed by a hit and run two weeks ago — a total loss. I didn’t exactly want to go through the hassle of buying a new car because I already have strollers, cribs and layettes to learn about. But it’s spring and we’re expecting a baby and maybe it’s a time for new beginnings. As we poked and prodded five cars on Saturday, I’d never been so interested in trunk space and rollover danger. We made our decision on mileage. (The latest Subaru Outback has better mileage than the older version … but they inflated the station wagon into an SUV. Why not just keep the car the same size and get even better gas mileage?) I teased Bryan about wanting dolphins and polar bears to nuzzle us, but our back-of-the-envelope economic calculations made sense. We’d make the extra cost of the car back in gas money in about four years, even with a conservative assumption that gas prices would stay the same! When we got home, spring fever seized me. I did some spring cleaning with the vacuum and planted a packet of poppy seeds. Can’t wait to see the blooms!

 

By the way, here’s a last picture of my sad, smashed-in old car.

Bye, old car!