4th of July Weekend in LA

I'm back y'all! 4th of July weekend in LA was fun. The preparation for the trip was not. Talk about running around like a chicken with it's head cut off! Man, I was all over the place on Thursday and Friday.
Felicia picked me up from the airport Friday evening and we quickly made a Bee line for the nearest mall. I picked up a cute little white jacket and pair of black skinny jeans to wear in case we headed out to the club that evening. Got to Felicia's place and finally met her fiance, Derek. I had heard so much about Derek over the years that it seemed funny that I was meeting him for the first time. I wonder if he'd thought the same thing? Anyway, Derek was very nice and all that I thought he'd be.
After stopping by the house for a change of clothes, Felicia and I headed out for some dinner at Roscoe's Chicken and Waffles and maybe a drink or two at Rock Bottom. Now for those that don't know, Roscoe's Chicken and Waffles is a California Legend. Since it was my first time at Roscoe's Chicken and Waffles I ordered, what else, chicken and waffles. I didn't want to say that I'd been to Roscoe's and not had the chicken and waffles! How would that sound? Crazy, I know. By the time we finished eating at Roscoe's we were too stuffed and too sleepy to try to go anywhere else! So we headed home. The 'itis got us and y'all know me, can't feed me without me getting sleepy!

Saturday morning rolled around and Felicia and I were trying to find a nail shop open so that she could get her eyebrows waxed. Our search was in vain. No nail shop in the immediate area was open on the 4th. We went back to the house to start getting ready for the bbq. The bbq was held at Derek's cousin's house and most of Derek's family was there. The food was good, especially the banana pudding, but one thing brought down the whole evening there. Derek's cousin trying to mack to me! Lord, I knew I shouldn't have worn that black maxi dress.
This man, who shall remain nameless (and faceless), was doting on me like I was the only chick there! At first I took it as being friendly and hospitable, but it wasn't until he asked for a picture together that it sunk in. Then, to add insult to injury, his sister comes over and basically busts him out saying that her brother wanted my number and yadda, yadda, yadda. I quickly scrambled together a story about California's economy being horrible and that I had no intentions of staying much longer, which is true. For the most part, anyway. I spent the next hour and a half avoiding eye contact and him in general. When Felicia finally suggest we get ready to leave I was ecstatic. I wanted to get the hell out of dodge before O'boy got the courage to ask for my number! We said our "good-byes" and "nice-meeting-yous" and left. I was glad to be rid of the doting older man! Seriously, he was probably old enough to be my dad.

On Sunday Felicia and I had tickets to see Crowns, a musical about the African-American tradition of wearing hats to church. It was the last show of the LA premiere at the Ebony Repertory Theatre and that seemed to have brought out a few stars. While standing in line for our e-tickets, Felicia sees Jackee Harry (227, Sister, Sister) and Marla Gibbs (who Felicia called Florence, I guess from some stint she did on Martin.) Felicia goes on over and asks Jackee and Marla for a picture and they happily obliged. A little while later Felicia glances over and sees Allen Payne (House of Payne, Jason's Lyric, New Jack City) and was like "Jasmine, isn't that the guy from Jason's Lyric?" When I confimed that it was him she told me to go over and ask for a picture. I told her I wasn't going over there! I couldn't even remember the man's name and neither could she! So I whip out the trusty Blackberry and googled Jason's Lyric and found that his name was Allen Payne. By the time we'd worked up the courage he was heading into the theatre. We get the tickets and start making our way into the theatre when we see Allen towards the end of the hallway looking like he was waiting for someone. I casually say "excuse me, are you Allen Payne?" when he said yes I said "Oh, okay, I just wanted to be sure" and we strolled on over to our seats, which happened to be not five feet away from where he was still standing. Felicia tries her best to get me to go ask for a picture. Shoot, I was nervous and a little star-struck! So she finally got up and asked him for a picture and I just piggy-backed on her request. The play was excellent, by the way.

After the play we had an early dinner at The Grand Luxe Cafe at the Beverly Center. I heeded Felicia's warning about the pasta and followed her lead and got a burger. We got dessert to go and called it a day.

It was an eventful trip to say the least, but it was also nice to just hang out with Felicia. Since we don't live nearby, I don't get to see Felicia and hang out as often as I'd like to.