There were very few touristy things I was interested in doing in L.A., mostly due to my disdain for any group of people larger than about 10 and the aforementioned desire to spend this vacation engaged in as little actual activity as possible. But there was one thing that I wanted to do. Just one thing. And that was to visit the spot on which it all began: Dash Calabasas, the first Dash store owned by the Sisters Kardashian.
And y'all? It was basically in a regular ass, dingy strip mall. You can't see it very well in this picture, but to the left there is a nail salon with a white sign that just says NAILS in red lettering. Not even "Tina's Nails" or "Fancy Nails" or "YO NAILS LOOK GOOD, GRL." Just, NAILS. Also, I'm pretty sure there was one of those stock image looking cartoony stick-on ladies in the window. You know the ones.
And you know what? It was strangely life affirming. Here's to you, Dash, and your funky carpet and your handmade sale signage. You are just like everybody else.
After we took a quick stroll around Dash and found that even the items on sale were way out of our price range (they wanted to sell me a Dash tee shirt for sixty em effing American dollars, I'll have you know) we drove around Calabasas for a little while, gawking at houses. Okay, and there was one other thing. We may have been on a quest for this -- the old town Calabasas sign that E! always shows in b-roll on Keeping Up With the Kardashians. We spent most (if not all) of that time driving around discussing various plot lines of various episodes of various Kardashian spin-off shows, and also wondering whether the Armenian restaurant they go to all the time is actually in Calabasas, and then subsequently deciding that, in fact, nothing is actually in Calabasas. Except the Kardashians. Possibly I should take this moment to reiterate my very strict policy on there being no such thing as a guilty pleasure. I listen to all kinds of smart music, and watch smart shows and read smart things. And sometimes my brain bleeds out to Khloe Kardashian trying to figure out whether that is poo or chocolate on her Egyptian cotton sheets. (It was chocolate.) Oh, and one last note on Calabasas: apparently some of the locals call it "CalaBLACKless." When I learned this, I wanted to come up with lots of reason to talk about Calabasas, so I would have lots of reasons to talk about its distinct lack of racial diversity.
That afternoon, we headed for Hollywood. I was on a quest for the tackiest souvenir I could possibly find (to be bestowed upon the Fair Haired Boy), and we'd wanted to cruise through the Hollywood Hills gawking at billion dollar houses, so we decided Hollywood Boulevard would be the perfect place to start.
We popped into a few tacky souvenir shops, wandered the Walk of Fame and hit the Kodak Theater to take in some views of the Hollywood sign. We tried to have a drink at the Roosevelt Hotel, but sadly we were a little too early and their bars weren't open yet. Haven't these people heard of day drinking?
As planned, we left tourist country and headed up through the Hollywood Hills. We took whichever turns felt right at the time and wound our way up and up and up and then -- happened upon this.
We'd driven our way up the mountain to a scenic overlook above the Hollywood Bowl. The views were incredible. 
On the way home, we spent as much time in Beverly Hills as I could talk Emily into: we drove through it. I was able to snap this picture of the police station as we passed by it, whilst having two very important thoughts: 1.) Even the police station in Beverly Hills is fancy pants, and 2.) Axel Foley?
cheers,
elizabeth
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