Feliz Navidad Whatever

 Feliz Whatever.
It is now late afternoon on Christmas Day. I must say that it is a rather unusual time to blog & perhaps indicates that I have nothing better to do.
 But nothing, My Dear Reader, could be further from the truth.
 I am sitting in Marge's front parlour in front of her magnificent artificial fire with v. real-looking flames listening to a Joan Baez LP Record on a record player that Maeflower & me bought for her as a Xmas gift.
All around me are the remains of a two-hour marathon of gift-giving that we performed earlier in the day.
Kenneth, Marge's beloved husband has put a v. large turkey in the oven & we are waiting breathlessly for it.
The picture above of Maeflower visiting the famous Becker House on Sycamore in the Simi Valley is meant to put you in a festive mood just in case you weren't in it. Perhaps you are All Festived Out?
I sincerely hope not.

Now let me take you on a Little Odyssey.

It looks like Marge & I are marvelling at Giant Spaghetti. But we're not.
Sadly, it's just plastic but it's fantastic.
We stumbled across it at LACMA - Los Angeles County Museum. I personally could have spent many happy hours playing amongst it. But we had to move on.

 Like to Late Picasso.

And then to the v. confronting Robert Mapplethorpe whose small black & white photographs of Unmentionable Acts worthy of a mention in The Guinness Book of Records juxtaposed with delicate flower portraits were featured in a v.v. darkly lit side gallery that came with a warning- MAY not be suitable for all audiences.
I'll say. But maybe I over-reacted because of the Jet Lag.
 

 I did react quite emotionally to the many US flags that were at Half Mast in remembrance of the recent Sandy Hook massacre. Here's one on Wilshire Bvd.

 Meanwhile, back at Boring Barney's (OMG, I feel almost blasphemouse saying that), Maeflower & Naetitia are trying on Outer Garments in Shades of Brown.
Sadly, no purchases were made.

Oh, as were driving out of the Barney's Carpark, we had a kind of Celebrity Sighting. If you look closely or perhaps squint, you can barely make out a slightly blurred figure in Shades of Grey.
That was Jennifer Garner who is walking out the back door & into what looked like an Armoured SUV. She isn't carrying any purchases because Minions who didn't feature in the photo are doing it for her.
Note Marge's Matching Cuffs which I bought for her as a Birthday Gift some months back.

Next stop was The Huntington Library in Pasadena. What a joint.
Here I am trying to look kind of coy amongst the Statues on the Huntington Estate. Note one half of my new favourite Golden cuff freshly bought from Forever 21.

Maeflower & Me at Huntington. She's wearing my Chanel silver chain belt & I'm wearing a v.v. old Chanel bag that my friend AJ said looked 'on its last legs' when I bought it at my favourite thrift shop for ten bucks some months back.

How wrong she was.

More Huntington. I always love that everywhere I go in Southern California, there's always mountains in the distance. And Palm Trees close by. And generally blue skies. And Starbucks.

What can I tell you about Huntington?
Not much which is a shame particularly as I visited his house. You can see Maeflower in his sumptuous personal library in his house which is separate to the actual H. Library itself.
I think Huntington had something to do with Railroads.
Anyway, he made a ton of money which he mainly spent on collecting art & books. He was lucky enough to buy the Gainsborough painting 'Blue Boy' for $700,000 from the Duke of Westminster which was the highest price paid for a painting at the time, 1922.
Apparently, the Brits were really cranky about Blue Boy being shipped off to America. Noel Coward wrote a song about it.

Here's a little man photographing Blue Boy.
 He apologised to me about blocking my view.
 I was v. gracious about it.

Here's Blue Boy's shoes.
And below is Maeflower at a pre-Xmas celebration. I do love her black hair band.

Finally finally, I'm cavalierly holding a real not Toy Coach bag that Marge found at the Salvation Army Depot in Thousand Oaks for $25.
Even though you can't tell from the photo, I was thrilled.
What a Christmas.
Hope yours was as good.

Accept the Good If You Can Possibly Bear It

You'll be glad to know that I actually got on & off the plane & arrived in Los Angeles with no loss of luggage although in spite of frantic efforts to rehydrate mid-flight, I'm sure I lost a ton of moisture along the way.
A wonderful thing was that my daughter Maeflower was already there.
Here she is with our great friend Netitia, a genuine Los Angelino about to enter the La Brea Tar Pits Museum. We were all gagging to see the skeletal remains of poor creatures who were trapped in the tar pits along the side of Wilshire Boulvard millions of years ago, although it wasn't called that back then.
I was v. distressed to see concrete sculptures in the Actual Pits of a little Elephanta Family where the Mum was trapped in the Tar whilst the Dad & Baby were helplessly looking on on safe ground. It was heartbreaking, but not heartbreaking enough  to stop us blithely skipping into the Museum Gift Shoppe & browsing their collection of authentic Dire Wolf Souvenir Skulls & Bison Tusks.

 I'm standing in front of an Poor Ancient Bison who had become stuck in the tar.
Poor Thing.
Luckily, I left a small Capsule Wardrobe behind from my last visit so I was able to wear this Gap Jacket purchased for ten bucks in January from the Jewish Women's League Thrift Shoppe in Santa Monica.
Sadly, I had packed my backs rather recklessly with a whole slew of slightly grubby black clothes left over from My Winter, so the jacket was a bit of a Lifesaver & certainly cheered me up as I made my way through the Anamatronic Death Scenes on show in the main hall of the Museum.

Here is Maeflower & Netitia talking rather earnestly to a Volunteer Docent who informed us that every time a new carpark is being excavated in the Hancock Park area of Los Angeles, new Prehistoric Carcases are found & dug out & then quickly put in large boxes for later perusal so as not to disturb the smooth passage of Carpark Construction.

Maeflower is standing in front of a whole mess of Dire Wolf Heads.
What a Name. Dire Wolf. I wonder why?
She's wearing a little wool scarf that I bought in Rajasthan in 1987 in a desperate bid to avoid the freezing cold. Who knew that India could be cold?

I was surprised at how jaunty some of these skeletons looked considering that they were stuck in  tar so long ago. This Highly Polished one looks like it's just about to go for a brisk walk.

At the end of our Museum Stop my BFF Marge arrived just in the nick of time to carry us off to the next part of the day. She too is looking v. jaunty in a v. interesting mix of colours - a bright pink jacket with a thinly striped top in shades of Light Orange.
It looks fab.

It's a shame that you can't see those Upsetting Concrete Sculptures of the Elephanta Family in the picture above. They are right behind us.  I'm pulling a face but Marge is keeping to her usual High Standards that she learned long ago at the June Dally-Watkins School of Modelling & Deportment.

Later, we ended up back at Joanne's, the Craft Store in Thousand Oaks  where we purchased a range of Xmas Ornaments that were up to 70% off. We didn't pay more than $3 for anything including these adorable crocodiles & flamingos.  Earlier, we had stopped off at Barneys in Beverly Hills where almost the exact same ornaments were selling for $62.
Oooo, I must have a brief rant about Barneys. I was almost quivering with excitement as we drove into it's beautifully lit carpark which made me feel like I was arriving at the Oscars. But once we got inside it was a different story. As soon as the lift doors opened,  a whole slew of over-eager Sales Clerks (to use an American expression) immediately pounced on Marge & me & began telling us what was wrong with our skin. We refrained from informing  them that what was actually wrong with our skin was that we were sixty. Marge let them pat her skin which apparently is the only way to touch your face.
 It seems that all these years of wiping & tugging have reeked senseless havoc.
Who knew?

So what I need to do is what the sign above that I spied for eighteen bucks at the Los Angeles County Museum Gift Shoppe  is telling me to do.
It's quite hard especially if you were brought up by a Relentlessly Complaining Mother.

Marge & Me love Matching Cuffs. 
Here's some pink sparkly ones that we spied at Forever 21 in the Thousand Oaks Mall.
The clothes are dismal but the Jewels are Wonderful.

I'm trying on black diamante bangles that I ultimately decided not to buy.
Pourquoi, you may ask?
I thought perhaps that were a little showy.
Even though I'm kind of a devotee of Joan Rivers, I don't really want to look like her.
Who would?

After filling up on F21's Fab Jewels, I scampered across to Charming Charlie which had to be the largest shoppe I had ever seen of Costume Jewelry. I left empty handed after five minutes.

We were stunned by the oversized Xmas Baubles on a tree in Macys.

Lastly, do look at the way Maeflower & Netitia Xmased-Up Marge's house while we were at The Mall.
A large plaster statue of an alluring Forties Siren whose known as Holly looks amazing in a Santa Hat & Xmas Lights. Or do we call them Holiday Lights, I wonder?
Actually, Holly reminds me of my Least Favourite Holiday Song that has been blearing from every shop & Mall since I arrived.
Santa Baby. You know the one. Breathless Horny Female Sings  massive come onto Santa.
Ewwww.

Off

Here I am at the gate at Sydney Airport en route to Los Angeles.
You can see the security man behind me which adds a certain charming authenticity to this v.v. brief  blog entry.
The challenge is, can I get through this in approximately ten minutes which is the estimated time until boarding?
I am struggling with concentration because of the incessant announcements urgently pleading Rogue Passengers to board their Air China flight which is waiting for them. What the hell are these people doing? Spraying themselves with Chanel in the Duty Free which is just what I've done, only I've sprayed myself silly with Dior Diorrescence. Chanel smells like Cat's Wee to my v. thin nose.
I'm wearing a Toy Chanel scarf with a Mela Purdie little black dress which is more like a Top, footless tights & loafeers with a gold chain across the top. Pearl earrings.
Discreet. Confident. At Ease.
What a joke.
At least I've got an aisle seat. It's fourteen hours. I wonder if James Bond's Skyfall will be showing on my little individual screen. I've already seen it & its about twenty minutes too long. I thought that the villain would never die. But I didlike the look of Daniel Craig except when he removed some nasty shrapnel from one of his pecs.
Just heard one of the Virgina Australia staff saying that it's a full flight.
Time to Board.