Howl-O-Ween 2007

Doyle Park sponsored a dog costume party last night. Abby was dressed as a dingo. Her favorite dog was a Dachsund that was dressed like a dragon. When he ran his fake arms flopped and the fire-breathing teeth/mouth opened. It was hilarious.

E for All

This weekend we headed up to Los Angeles for the inaugural E for All video-game convention.

We pulled up to the convention center just as it was opening at 11:00 a.m. David and I quickly hopped out of the van and said our goodbyes to Sherry and Charlie, who were on their way to the Natural History Museum.

As soon as we walked into the convention, a huge Nintendo booth greeted us with over a dozen gaming stations featuring newly released and about-to-be released games. Almost half the stations were dedicated to demo versions of Super Mario Galaxy, and to our surprise, David and I were able to start playing almost immediately.

We were only alloted ten minutes to play (at which point the game automatically reset), but David made the most of it, getting farther through the galaxies than the Nintendo girls who had practiced for eight hours the previous day.

We grabbed a quick lunch (an overpriced pizza and some drinks), then spent the rest of our time playing Galaxy for ten minutes, walking around, playing Galaxy for another ten minutes, walking around, etc. In addition to Galaxy, we got to play Rayman Raving Rabbids 2. Our favorite mini-games were one where you had to put down your cell phone real fast when the lights went up in a movie theater, and one where you had to slap your kids in the back seat of your car to keep them quiet.

Mom and Charlie picked us up around 3:00, and they took us back to the Natural History Museum where they wanted us to check out the outdoor Spider Pavilion. It was basically a garden that you could walk through with dozens of the biggest, scariest spiders you've ever seen. There was nothing separating you from them and their webs, so you could get real close. None of them were dangerous, of course. (The dangerous ones, like the Brown Recluse and Black Widow were safely behind glass.)

After that, we headed to Highland Park for a visit to Galco's Soda Pop Stop, which features exotic and hard-to-find soda from all over. I bought a six-pack of Cheerwine (a cherry soda I first had when we visited the Meramec Caverns), Sherry and David bought a bunch of different kinds of root beer, and Charlie bought a GooGoo Cluster (a candy with marshmallow, chocolate, caramel and peanuts).

Next it was on to our hotel, the Fairmont Miramar in Santa Monica. We got settled in, then went to find a place to eat. We ended up at a restaurant called Yankee Doodles on the Third Street Promenade. We ate outside and were serenaded by a young street performer who couldn't have been much older than David. She was quite good, although for some reason about halfway through our meal, she kept singing Whitney Houston's "Greatest Love of All" over and over again.

The next morning we had a way-too-expensive breakfast at one of the hotel's restaurants, then the kids took a dip in the pool. After that, we took the kids to play at a nearby neighborhood park, then we headed to the Apple Pan for lunch. (Before we got there, we passed the Santa Monica Car Wash, so of course we stopped so Charlie to take a look.)

The Apple Pan was great as usual. We actually got a parking space in their lot behind the restaurant and didn't have to wait too long for seats.

Next it was off to Sprinkles, a high-end cupcake shop in Beverly Hills. We had to wait about twenty minutes in line to get into the tiny shop, but it was worth the wait. Sherry said she wouldn't have believed that a cupcake could be so unusual and delicious, but it was.

We drove back to the hotel, and Sherry and Charlie headed over to the Santa Monica Pier while David and I went back to the convention. We were able to play Galaxy a couple more times before half the convention center suddenly lost power! No big deal, though, because it was about time to head over to the Video Games Live concert at the new Nokia Theatre. We had a blast. A full orchestra played music from various video games accompanied by images on a giant TV screen.

And what evening in L.A. would be complete without another trip to the Apple Pan? David and I went back after the concert for more hamburger goodness. We got out of there right at midnight.

Charlie had so much fun at the Pier that the next day we all went back for a short visit. The kids and I went on the Sea Dragon and the West Coaster.

The drive home included a stop at the In 'n' Out in Laguna Niguel.