CALIFORNI (VA) CATION

My bad. I have been back from a two-week vacay in California for over a week now and have trouble getting acclimatized. It is glorious today but I returned to snow and slush and heavy clothing. To appropriate a Mamas and Papas lyric, “I’d be safe and warm if I were in L.A.”
  
My charming travelling companion was Wendy Zelsman, whom I have known for a gazillion years. Wendy is a former nurse and proprietor for 14 years of a charming and sprawling bed and breakfast in Lakefield, Ontario where she is doyenne. She stands out, because of her irrepressible personality and her fuchsia hair. In fact, on our trip, Wendy got raves for her hair daily. As did I for my Tom Ford glasses.

We started out in Los Angeles, where we squatted at the fabulous Westwood home of pal Alison Emilio Kleckner, her husband Jay and their teenaged son Daniel. We dog-sat their adorable pooch Taylor, who I persisted in calling Swifty. He didn’t seem to mind. He ignored me equally. 

Jay is a TV producer and Alison is director of Marketing & Strategic Partnerships. I have known her since she was svp of New Line Cinema in Toronto and we worked together during my previous incarnation as entertainment columnist. 

Then it was on to Santa Barbara where our long-suffering pals Tom and Victoria Ostwald put up with us for two weeks. Tom is a retired scientist who also directed university programs focused on schools and teachers and Victoria is a retired public/high-school orchestra teacher. They both hail from Berkeley and are total academics. For pleasure, they sight-read madrigals. Hell, I didn’t even know what a madrigal was. l had to look it up. “A madrigal is a secular vocal music composition, usually a partsong, of the Renaissance and early Baroque eras.” You are welcome. 

We met in the early '70s when we all resided in a dilapidated house on Spadina Road, managed into the ground by a deranged woman who wore her hair in twin ponytails secured by clothes pins. What could be do but bond in perpetuity? 

Wendy and I spent our last night in California in Los Angeles, which coincided with the Academy Awards, bunking in at the storied Hyland Gardens Hotel, around the corner from the Oscar ceremonies.
  
Hyland Gardens is the ground zero for Canadian actors and assorted musicians, mostly of the notorious variety like Jim Morrison. In fact, I was reading the Joan Didion bio The Last Love Song and was fascinated to learn that not only did Didion live down the street on Franklin Ave.,  but that Janis Joplin OD'd in room 109 (when the hotel was called the Landmark) and we were staying in room 108. Cue theme song from Twilight Zone. 

We spent almost the entire day at the Rose Bowl Flea Market in Pasadena, held the second Sunday of each month and featuring a mind-blowing 2,500 or so dealers. This is a rare Rudi Gernreich bathing suit priced at $600 at the Fabulous Mess kiosk. I passed. No one needs to see me in a knit bathing suit, especially costing a whopping $600.

No, it’s not the Marlboro Man. It is Chris West, who makes cool leather goods including the fabulous bag he is modelling. Some of them are re-purposed from belt buckles and horse reins. West grew up in the foothills of Ventura California, where he rides his horse Magnum in the Ojai Mountains. All I can say is “yippie kai yeah.”

A coat I am still obsessing about from Danski Blue, a kiosk at the Rose Bowl with a shop based in Ojai. I visited the shop at 321 E. Ojai Ave. and did some damage. It is worth the schlep.

A mural of Lucy and Ricky from the legendary series I Love Lucy in Culver City where some of the series was shot.

Wendy and my suitcases vomiting clothing at the foot of the winding staircase at the L.A. home of Jay and Alison. We couldn’t haul them up the stairs so we worked from the base camp.

Two groovy Goth girls at the train station in Los Angeles, en route to Santa Barbara.

A pornographically phallic cactus on California Street in Santa Barbara.

Beautiful Butterfly Beach in Santa Barbara, our favourite beach. We even spotted porpoises frolicking in the waves.

Wendy and I having smart martinis and yummy fungi pizza at the luxe Biltmore Hotel opposite Butterfly Beach. We were in our beach cover-ups and flip flops and no one relegated us to the cheap seats -- even after we’d checked our tacky plastic beach chairs at the valet, those same folks who habitually park Maseratis and Mercedes.

Wooden traveler mugs at the fabulous Fig home accessories shop in Ojai, California, an amazing shopping destination. I lusted after one but they were priced at a hefty $100. I would only leave it on the subway.

The amazing silk art deco robe I succumbed to at Soul Tonic (I have totally embraced my aged hippie vibe) boutique in Ojai owned by an unapologetically flower-childlike woman named Shael who included a peacock feather in my shopping bag. It felt like an acid flashback.

What says California more than the obligatory photo of a majestic painted redwood?

The historic Arlington Theatre in Santa Barbara, a classic example of Mission-revival architecture that still screens first run films. We saw The Revenant in Santa Barbara but at another theatre. After the horrifically violent first 10 minutes which included the infamous bear mauling, I turned to Wendy (who was watching the film through clenched hands) and said, “Give Leo the fucking Oscar already.”

A display in the fabulouso Renaissance high-end designer consignment boutique on State Street in Santa Barbara where I scored a Moschino jacket for $40. Santa Barbara has excellent high-end and low-great thrifting including Unity Thrift Shoppe where both Wendy and I did major damage at cheap cheap prices. Thrifty even stocks plus sizing.

Inside the Tiendaho boutique on State Street, which is very “Come with me to the Casbah” and looks like it was staged by a film set decorator. Tiendaho specializes in generous sizing and a lavish colour palate so on trend with the Boho blitz in fashion.

A chair at Tiendaho that could easily have come from a Moroccan souk.

A Californian blonde sporting the ubiquitous “hun” hairstyle I saw everywhere on everyone young and blonde and Californian. This woman happens to be a ringer for The Big Bang Theory’s Kaley Cuoco, whose hair is currently too short for it.

Flamingos at the Santa Barbara Zoo just because I love flamingos.

A pair of knock-out vintage jackets in the “Stars, Snapshots & Chanel” exhibit at the Santa Barbara Historical Museum which chronicled the city’s social scene in the ‘70s and ‘80s as documented by society columnist Beverley Jackson and featured everyone from Sean Connery to Truman Capote.

With Alison, Jay and Taylor the wonder dog sunning at Butterfly Beach.

A bottle of Zin-Phomaniac wine which turned out to be Zinfully wonderful. California wines range from four-buck Chuck at Trader Joe’s (which has an incredible selection of wines including Francis Ford Coppola’s yummy Director’s Cut cabernet sauvignon) to unaffordables. We took a lot of cabs – from Layer Cake Primitivo at Cost Plus to awesome vineyards including Andrew Murray and Stolpman in Los Olivos and J. Lohr in Paso Robles.

When you mosey on up to the bar at the Parkfield Café at the V6 Ranch in Parkfield, California you get to sit on actual saddles for bar stools. Giddy up cowboy.

Me doing a selfie with the cigar store Native American on the café’s deck.

Inside the mission at San Miguel, California there is an altar dedicated to Our Lady of Guadalupe. We have a beaded curtain in our kitchen with the same icon. Amen.

Tons of elephant seals sunbathing on a beach outside of Santa Barbara. There were even new moms nursing their young. Awwwwwwwwwww. These creatures are almost primordial.

Inexplicably, this statue of Lenin with a bird on head resides on La Brea Avenue in Los Angeles.

A Chanel backpack in terrycloth at What Goes Around Comes Around high-end vintage shop at 159 South La Brea Avenue. Who knew Chanel made bags out of terrycloth? Just the thing in the event you accidentally drop your bag in the tub.

All the cool kids in L.A. wear camo with buffalo plaid, sweetie darlings.

The 40-minute line-up was worth it. This is my hot dog from the legendary Pink’s “A Hollywood legend since 1939” at 709 North La Brea Avenue. It is the 9 inch “stretch” Emeril Legasse Bam Dog: mustard, onions, cheese, jalapenos, bacon and coleslaw and beyond yummy. To hell with the carbs and fat. Pink’s used to sell the coolest T-shirts featuring a Vargas girl straddling a giant wiener with the inscription “big wienies are best.”

I finally made it to The Way We Wore vintage boutique at 334 South LaBrea Ave. featured in the series L.A. Frock Stars, my guilty pleasure.  Wendy and I shopped at the original store in San Francisco way back in the ‘80s and we both bought black cocktail dresses from the ‘20s.