A Lovely Mini-Holiday

I started today with a home visit from my massueuse, who gave me almost an hour-and-a-half of glorious attention. Then, after showering off the massage cream, I went with Lee and our boys to a fancy English tea at a new teashop in Woodland Hills. We had tea, sandwiches, crepes, scones and outrageously sinful desserts on fine Staffordshire china and enjoyed ourselves thoroughly. We waddled back to the car and went on to the Getty Museum where we arrived in time to join a docent-led viewing of Manet's "Bar at the Folies Bergere" on loan from the Courtauld Institute in London. From there, it was only a step to the nineteenth century European drawings exhibit. I gained a new appreciation of Seurat from his black-and-white drawings, but I still prefer Ingres. We also saw the Weston photography galleries before we wandered out into the gardens that are one of the particular delights of the Getty in Westwood.

Glen had been considering joining a sketching group but decided he'd rather have supper. Since the rest of us hadn't been too sure about hanging around another three hours even if there was still plenty to see (though we've seen most of it before), we didn't argue. I suggested that we go south to Santa Monica for supper rather than homeward, since the traffic on the northbound freeway was rush-hour heavy, and I wasn't too keen on driving that way. Besides, there's an Irish pub we like on Wilshire Boulevard. In spite of its being NOISY (I'd forgotten today's Friday), the pub was great, and the Irish stew was as good as ever.

In all, it was an excellent vacation for a one-day outing.