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.