Living In Los Angeles: August 2018

August is typically the hottest month of the year in Los Angeles but this year August felt hotter than the previous years.  We spent most of our August days in our pool and some weekends at the beach.

Overall, August was a bittersweet month for us.  During the heat wave our AC system died and to make matter worse no AC technicians were readily available to fix it.  A week after suffering in the heat, we had to replace our 25 yr old AC system.  While enjoying the cool air from the new AC system for the first few days our water heater stopped working.   Yes, owning a home is a money pit no matter how you look at it.  There is always something to fix!

On a lighter note, we had family members from Canada and Sicily visiting us.

Here’s how we survived August in strides!

BEACH

My sister-in-law and her kids visited us for a week and we took them to the Santa Monica Pier the day after their arrival.  Needless to say, we were not able to stay as long as we would like.  To make a long story short, the keys to our cars and home were lost at the beach so we shortened the trip and headed home 30 minutes later.  Luckily, some great samaritan found our keys at the beach and returned it to the lifeguard.  We were able to pick up our keys at the pier the next day.  Otherwise, it would have cost us at least a couple hundred dollars to replace each car key.  A few days later we all drove to Vegas to enjoy the weekend.  Overall, we enjoyed having them and our kids had a great time with their cousins.

DOMENICO’S ITALIAN RESTAURANT

I always see the best in people that I meet, the food I eat, and the places that I travel to.  Last weekend we went to Belmont Shore in Long Beach, a Southern California seaside community 40+ miles from our home.  It took us 3 hours RT to get there and back because of traffic (yes, it was a Saturday and there was traffic – welcome to LA!).  The hubs never been to Long Beach and since we wanted to check out the real estate in the area for our retirement we didn’t mind the drive.

We walked around the area and decided to eat at Domenico’s after reading their reviews on Yelp, Google, etc..  But after checking out the surrounding area and their home prices Pasadena is still our top choice. The Pasadena real estate is a lot more affordable than anything in LA and it is smack in the middle of Los Angeles that is 20 minutes away from everything.

The restaurant was not what we had expected.  Please keep in mind that we are food snobs and with hubby being Italian, well forget about it!  The food was the worst Italian food we’ve ever had.  I don’t know what we missed from their famous in-house garlic dipping sauce/salad dressing but it was full of cream, fat, and grease.  The salad was so bad that I had to send it back, which I hardly do when dining at restaurants.  How can you go wrong with a salad?!  The pizza was awful, and the spaghetti and meatball dish was mediocre.  The only saving grace about this restaurant was the service.  Our server was exceptionally good and attentive.

Needless to say, we are not going back to this restaurant ever again.

THE MEG

The MEG is an action movie about a giant prehistoric shark and the team of heroes trying to stop it from destroying mankind.  We were a bit hesitant about watching this movie with our 7 yr old twins because it was PG 13.  So violence is definitely the biggest issue here because there are many characters die with blood everywhere in the water (you get the gist of shark attacks).  Luckily, our kids didn’t have any nightmare after watching the movie.

LOCAL FARMERS MARKET

We need to do this more often.  We have farmers market held every weekend in our neighborhood.  It is so important to support local farmers if you value fresh food and their livelihood.  I love knowing that the money I spend in my community stays in my community not to mention that locally grown food always tastes and looks better.

Until then, our next adventures await!