Saturday, 23rd March 2.00am GMT
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Friday, 22nd March - Hotel Move
Today was the big move to the Beverly Plaza hotel in West Hollywood. Most of the morning was spent faffing around with the Radisson's awful Internet connectivity, but just before midday, I set off for West Hollywood. The drive proved much easier than that to Universal City, mainly because traffic was slow with plenty of lights and turnings that enabled me to check the map.
After a minor drama that took half an hour to sort out ("We have no booking for Smith") I was told that check-in could not be performed until 3pm, which gave me the chance to explore the area a bit. Despite looking from the map as if it's in a heavily populated area, the wide avenues and greenery make one think one is actually outside the main area. About 15 minutes walk away is an area called "Farmer's Market", a delightful warren of little eating places, fruit and vegetable stalls, newsagents and specialist stalls.
Just beyond here is a more modern shopping mall area, with picturesque fountains, trees and footbridges in a secluded area where the only access is on foot or by tram. There seems to be an over-abundance of "beauty " shops and indeed walking down West 3rd Street to get to Farmer's Market is seems like every third shop is a hairdressers. Oh well, I guess this is Beverly Hills after all. There are an incredible number of police and security guards around this main area, all wearing what looks to these British eyes as a sort of black version of a Canadian Mountie's outfit. Even though it's Friday afternoon, and presumably a work day, the place is really buzzing - the numerous restaurants are all close to full, with a mainly young, smartly-dressed crowd, all of whom seem to spend at least half their time talking into cell phones.
There is just time, returning to the hotel, to admire the clear blue skies and bathe in the rays. The hotel has a small swimming pool (which can be viewed directly from my room's balcony) but alas, the swimming trunks did not get packed this trip because last week it had been "cool" and "rainy" here.
I was just thinking of grabbing a nap when the hotel phone rang. It was Robyn (ValkyrieCrush) who popped down to introduce herself and arrange a meal out in the hotel restaurant. A few minutes later Bri (AngryPixie) also calls and the result is that an hour later, Amy (Primula), Ward (Primula's brother), Pixie, ValkyrieCrush and myself are meeting down in the lobby. Photo's and censorious comments can be found here!
Tomorrow is probably the second most important day aside from "The One Party" itself since it involves close to 50 fan club members touring two exhibitions (one for costumes used in the motion picture, another showing actor Viggo Mortenson's art and photo's) and a "pub moot" - all the way to Los Angeles for a pub meeting with fish and chips seems rather surreal at this point!