Friday, July 22, 2011.
This Three Meals A Day Business Has Got To Stop.
For the first time on our well-fed California vacation, I ate a traditional American breakfast of an omelette with tomatoes and cheese, hash browns (no grits at this hotel, either), toast (no biscuits--what do you think this is, Dogpatch?), juice and coffee. As if to balance that off, Mary Ann got the fruit plate. She is now officially in an orgy of self-recrimination for eating too much on this trip. She will be home for two weeks before she can bear to get on the scales. (She would find that she actually lost weight.)
The morning went towards my final one-the-road newsletter. I had a hard time finding a good place to write at the Langham Hotel. I walked through all the public spaces, and the only ones with seats and tables at the right level for extended typing are in a sterile, windowless business center. If I'm going to work in this resort property, at least I want a good view of the grounds. Which really are beautiful.
The Marys were ready for lunch in the late afternoon. We took the meal on the Terrace, the all-day restaurant of the hotel. I was still full from breakfast, so I had their tomato bisque. This was excellent, with a bit of cream, quite a bit of hot red pepper, and a loud, day-glo orange color.
I followed that with a Los Angeles specialty: Cobb salad. Bob Cobb, the owner of the extinct Brown Derby, created that back in the 1930s. Its distinction was that the ingredients were layered in a glass bowl, then tossed at the table. They sort of did the former in the Terrace, but not the latter. So the chicken chunks were here, the blue cheese there, the avocado there, the bacon in front, and several cores of romaine in the middle. It was too big, and would have been better tossed.
The Marys each had their own salads. What can a deluxe hotel do with a wedge salad to make it special? See photo. ML said it wasn't as good as the Acme's is at one-third the price. MA had a weird Caesar variation, but she liked the semi-dried tomatoes.
We returned to the courtyard for yet another meal in the late afternoon. Mary Ann was turned on by the barbecue the hotel set up every day, and wanted to try it. That's three meals in one day for her. I couldn't do it. No great loss, MA said. I just sat there with a cocktail made with blackberries and joked around while the whole four of us (Jude had shown up, too) watched the sun go down.
While there, an idea hit me for a television show. Mary Ann thought it was brilliant, and ordered me not to talk or write about it. My participation will be completely off camera, which makes it viable. Jude and his production unit would be involved, but he seemed less enthusiastic about it than we are.
Jude had passes for a screening at the Paramount studios of Captain America. I'd like to see that. When I was a kid, Cap was one of my favorite comic book characters. During the barbecue, I began spilling out all the geek details about him--how he was created in the 1940s by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby, that his real name was Steve Rogers, and that his shield was made of adamantium (or was it vibranium?).
We drove to the Paramount lot, where Jude said he'd meet us. But he reported back that he only had four passes, and already had six of his people with him. This would have created an outrage if the movie were anything the Marys wanted to see. But MA doesn't like 3-D movies, and ML didn't care one way or another.
If I'd known we'd have a free night, I would have followed through on an invitation to have dinner at the Magic Castle. This is a private club for magicians, who are among the few people other than waiters who wear tuxedos often. The Magic Castle's dress code requires formal wear, and we didn't pack any. My connection is a member of the club who has been a subscriber to the New Orleans Menu since its earliest days, in the late 1970s. She still is. Next time.
Back at the hotel, Mary Ann seemed to think that I had not had enough fun today, and offered to join me down in the lounge. We passed it on the way to our room and heard a live band, with a woman singing my kind of music. We grabbed a spot, but it wasn't working. I had a headache, and the band was playing much too loud. As they all do. I begged off and we went upstairs to watch Conan O'Brien. He's been funny every night. It's a good thing I stay in hotels once in awhile, or I'd never see any television at all.
