Journal entry for November 27, 2001

Today's summary: L.A. trip, Day One. Flying out there.

Here's an overview map of all relevant locations in L.A.. Nick Sembiante is my cousin and he's living out there, too. Diana's house is where I stayed all week. The gallery is Rezon8 Studios.

I woke up at 4:00 am (OUCH) to get ready and get to my plane, which left BWI at 9am. I wasn't sure what the traffic would be like, much less airport security, so I erred very much on the side of caution.

As it happened things went pretty smoothly... getting out there, parking, checking in, security check, etc. My one almost-mistake could have been a rather bad one -- I had that dragonfly pin I made the other day in my purse, and that technically qualifies as a weapon, and security might take exception to my attempt to bring it onto the plane. Luckily at the last possible minute I suddenly realized I needed to put it into my checked luggage, NOT carryon, so I snatched my already-checked luggage back for a second and stuffed the pin in there.

The plane went from Baltimore to Phoenix, where I switched planes. I had a lot of trouble equalizing my ears this time for some reason, especially my left ear. On the way back I have to remember to bring gum and to toke up on decongestants.

Side note: I have always had trouble with that ear... ear infections as a kid, and that's the eardrum I ruptured when I went for my scuba diving certification. So much for being a marine biologist, eh? I should have got a generic zoology degree or entomology instead. Whatever.

Other than that, I always enjoy flying and I loved seeing the landscape below. St. Louis, and then later, Phoenix. I've never been so far west before and it just amazed me to see all these endless plains and hills with no grass. The outskirts of Phoenix felt especially alien to me -- mountains that look like huge piles of dirt and dust, in the middle of totally flat, grassless towns. Beautiful, but strange.

Anyway, I arrived in Burbank at around 2pm. Hello California! The terrain here is similar to Phoenix in a way, all flat with steep mountains jutting out of nowhere, but at least here there's some greenery on most surfaces. Mostly arid bushes on the mountains, and palm trees in the flat areas.

The weather was pretty much identical to the unseasonably warm weather at home. Low 60s and upper 50s during the day, and more chilly at night. Same all week, actually.

After grabbing my luggage, I picked up my rental car. Conveniently it's the same kind of car I have at home... and it has the added feature of a global positioning system (GPS) tied to a mapping program. So as a result, I can just type in an address or location, and it will automatically give me directions, update the map view as I travel, and so on. It speaks aloud so you can watch the road, and this calm female voice tells you things like, "Prepare to exit - on the left - in - one - point - five - miles." It even will automatically come up with a new route for me if I get lost or miss a turn. Really cool and really helpful... although, I must admit it has a tendency to get confused on a regular basis when I was on winding or hilly neighborhood streets. Even so, I can deal with that.

So, after learning how the GPS works and reviewing Diana's directions, I went to her house in Pasadena. She's letting me stay with her for free, which is great! I'm probably going to make her a dragonfly pin or take her with me to Six Flags at the end of the week, in return. She has this really cute and laid back dog named Beauregard ("Beau").

After introducing myself, dropping off some stuff, and helping Diana set up my bed, I took off and headed for Rezon8 Studios. I was hoping that the work I sent 3-day air (before Thanksgiving) would be there today... The first set was there already, but the second set wasn't, which worries me. It had better show up tomorrow or I'll have to hassle UPS. Of course, I forgot the tracking number...

I met Nanci at the gallery, the one who contacted me originally. She's very friendly and helpful, although of course she was very busy getting ready for everything. I also got a look at some of the other work in the gallery... all nature-themed, everybody's very talented. I feel honored to be in this show.

I offered to help Nanci out, but I was already dead on my feet tired. Because I woke up so early in the morning (4:00 am EST, that's 1:00 am California time), I crashed into bed immediately after going to get groceries. Ugh. I think I have given myself reverse jet lag...