Highlghts of the North Hollywood/San Diego Trip

Great trip to southern California last week to see the kids.
Step one - have knee surgery and get this handy-dandy cooler with a rubber hose attached to your ice pack that wraps around the knee. Then, when you go on the trip and have to take it along, you fill up the cooler thingy with frozen homegrown loganberries and raspberries to take to your children, packed in the checked baggage.

We stayed with Kris for a few days first, seeing some of the city during the days while he was at work. These included the Getty Center Museum, the LA County Museum of Art, a walking tour of downtown, and a drive to the coast and through one of the canyons with a visit to see Traci. One of the days, Grady made a pie for Kris and his roommate with the loganberries and the pie plate we bought for him. I cooked dinner (halibut with pineapple sambal and an Asian pear slaw). On the downtown trip, we took the subway into the city and took Kris out to lunch, visiting him at his office afterwards. He introduced us to just about everyone who works at JETRO except for his boss who was the only one tied up in a meeting while we were there. Either they are all really polite or they think quite well of him.

On Saturday morning, we drove to Aileen's house in San Diego. She made pancakes for us with blueberries and added our homegrown raspberries that Grady had brought. We enjoyed seeing her photos from the most recent work in Antarctica (lots of dirty penguin chicks this time around) and her hiking trip to Patagonia. Had a delicious Thai dinner out one evening. Otherwise, we spent some time providing ground transportation - to grocery stores (stocking up since she had just returned a few days earlier) and to the nursery to stock up on supplies to get her garden started. Sunday afternoon, we all had lunch with Lisa, Phillippe, Emerson and Claire in Carlsbad. I hadn't seen my cousin in several years so it gave us a nice chance to catch up. Later in the evening, after Aileen made dinner for us, we headed back to LA with Kris. And more ground transportation - grocery store and Costco. Good thing we rented a hybrid for us visit to our carless kids.

So, I'm not too good with taking pictures along the way - not thinking ahead to wanting to have them to illustrate the blog post. But, here are a random few of the ones I took while we were down south:

Kris in his cube at JETRO. Yes, I do have a more serious picture of him there, but who needs that?
Every trip we take has to include some architectural sights. This is Grady checking out a sculpture at the Frank Gehry-designed Walt Disney Concert Hall in L.A.
Lunch with the Peluso family in Carlsbad.
The requisite family photo after the lunch - getting Philippe to take the picture for us.


This one has nothing to do with our trip to California - it's just a bonus. A shot of Granddad and Liam at Easter dinner in our dining room.