Hell-ay, Baby!

I began writing this during the midst of my very first spring break trip.Well, the first one I want to count, anyway.

There was that one dreadful trip to Florida when I was a college freshman and my three girlfriends and I managed to find the only city in the entire state that was almost completely devoid of college-aged kids. Out of sheer necessity, we hooked up with a group of boys from some vague midwestern state that also made this unfortunate choice of destinations. The boy that singled me out for wooing had not quite finished evolving, so I ended up taking one for the team and entertaining him so that they could flirt with their Plan B love interests. (I'm nothing if not a humanitarian.)

I never took a spring break trip again after that. Until now.

Last year, when we were still in the I-can't-believe-we're-paying-this-much-for-kindergarten-but-it's-awesome-because-there-are-no-in-service-days-or-lengthy-spring-breaks mode, we did not have to worry about this. But now, we get a forced week off right before Easter and since we had to take the time off work anyway, we figured we'd just book a trip somewhere.

We're cute.

Apparently, the entire universe has spring break at exactly the same time, so flights cost $47 million, resorts have no availability, and even some of the more exotic destinations we researched were completely sold out. It looked at though we were going to have to stay home, and as lovely as a "staycation" sounds (Ed. "staycation" does not sound at all lovely) I knew it would inevitably mean taking care of home projects and errands. While that is a slice of heaven for my husband, I have let him know several times that if (God forbid) anything ever happens to him, I am immediately moving into a studio apartment because that is all I'm capable of managing. And only then if I can e-mail the landlord instead of speaking to him or her directly.

So when one of my friends mentioned finding cheap fares on Virgin America - we booked ourselves some flights to LA. Both my husband and I have fond memories of young, crazy days in LA. Nights spent on Sunset Boulevard and at the Forty Deuce, rubbing elbows with movie stars (while serving them cocktails, but whatever) and getting disgusted eye rolls from hotel management in trendy West Hollywood hotels. We figured that age 7 was the perfect time to initiate our daughter.

For the first half of our trip, we stayed at the Standard Hotel on the Sunset Strip in West Hollywood, and not just because Leonardo DiCaprio is an investor. The hotel is very well located and very hip -- especially for people as cool as us who rent very subtle cars for their vacations:

Bitchin' Camaro. With a booster seat.

We did eight million things while staying in West Hollywood -- La Brea Tar Pits and Page Museum, Griffith Observatory and hike, walk of fame, meth, Grauman's Chinese Theatre, The Grove and the Fairfax Farmer's Market. And saw some of the more famous landmarks as well:

And just because we're now older and have a child does not mean we missed out on the celebrity hobnobbing:

"Muse" may be too strong a word, but I do have Louis CK's ear.

For the second part of our trip, we headed south to Huntington Beach where GET THIS - our child OPTED OUT of a day at Disneyland to stay at the hotel pool and play with her new friend. Which would have been awesome if he was not a 53-year-old drifter.

We biked, played on the beach, visited with our beautiful friend, Lisa, who we met while working the Vanity Fair party all those years ago

Canetto, Lisa, Jeff Cockey and Me. Circa 2003?

and revised our retirement strategy to include winning the lottery and buying a house on the Strand in Manhattan Beach.

Can it still be considered a successful spring break when you have no regrets?
Brutalism