Being in LA is just a little bit different from the places we’ve been for the past three weeks—we actually interacted with people.

We stayed with Greg and Natalie, who have a extremely cute sixteen month-old named Katie and a very excited dog, Max. They are like a real adult family, with a house with a two car garage and a yard. It was a very relaxed weekend—dinners, walks in the park, watching TV on a couch (yes!).

On Sunday, we went over to Jude and Christy’s place. They have a seven week old boy named Nathan, who apparently believes that sleep is overrated.

From there, we went over to Karl’s for a barbecue. Most of the crew from college was there—Brett, Roy, Johnny, Jude, Karl, Fred, Greg, Simone, and others who I am probably forgetting.

Given the concentration of college friends, the inevitable drinking games were played. First, I was able to get in a couple of games of beer bowling in. My skills had atrophied a bit, but thankfully Brett and I were able to beat two girls (one who’d never played before). Unfortunately we couldn’t cover the point spread. On game two, we played a couple of professionals (Johnny and Simone) and my lack of practice was exposed. We lost by two pins.

We then moved on game two—Flip Cup. It is a very simple game, but a good one. It doesn’t have the subtlety and nuance of the vastly superior beer bowling, but it is good for large groups. Of course we did boys versus girls. We were handicapped by an extra person, so lost the men lost two out of three. I blame Karl.

On Monday, we checked out a Mission. The name escapes me at the moment, but it was a pretty cool little find. Natalie worked there a few years ago so we got our private tour guide.